105. THE SWITCH

Kihrin’s story

Inside the Stone of Shackles

The instant of Vol Karoth’s death

I felt a cold, fierce pressure when Urthaenriel pierced my heart.

The world turned indigo blue.

The Stone of Shackles ripped my souls free from their usual housing, granting me a new, temporary residence while the old one finished dying. It wasn’t a pleasurable sensation. All around me were strange angles of light and dark, looming shapes that I felt certain were both my old body and that of my unwilling killer. The dark line of Urthaenriel sang a discordant melody near me. Tendrils of cobalt energy arced through the space, wrapping around me as they pulled me forward from one dark container to the other. A blue tendril had wrapped around Urthaenriel as well, and I watched as the sword shivered and then jerked, once. A small ball of light from that direction flew at me.

Urthaenriel stopped singing.1

All was silence except for the slowing of a double tap of percussion: my heart, beating its last.

It would start up again in eight seconds.

My brother traveled in the opposite direction, wrapped in the same blue chains. We drew closer, much the same except for one major difference. He was struggling; I was not.

[What have you done?] he screamed at me without sound.

[You did this to yourself,] I told him. [All of this has happened by your design.]

His face contorted. [Arrogant, egotistical maniac! You’re no better than me!]

I didn’t reply. Some projections simply weren’t worth commenting on.

We orbited each other half a turn before the tide began to recede, withdrawing us both to new sides. He to his new body and I to mine. The sound of a second heartbeat began to grow louder: my brother’s body.

Normally … normally, the Stone of Shackles would force the souls of the murderer (in this case, Relos Var) to enter a corpse. But the Stone of Shackles wasn’t Grimward. The murderer’s souls weren’t bound, so those souls (having little choice in the matter) then passed on to the Afterlife. Not this time, though. I didn’t think the transfer was taking eight seconds, even if it felt like eternity plus a day. Relos Var would enter my body (S’arric’s body, Vol Karoth’s body), and then that body would self-resurrect, as I had so many times in the Korthaen Blight. Except this time Relos Var would find himself in a body he didn’t understand and didn’t know how to control.

Unless we timed this perfectly, what followed would be a very large explosion.

[I want to understand,] I said, arm outstretched toward him. [Why? Why do all of this?]

[You’ll never know. You always thought it was about you. You were unimportant. You were nothing more than the needle and thread I was using to darn a ripped seam. And now you’ve ruined it. You’ve killed everyone!]

A thin, bitter stream of laughter welled up in me, too tired to break free into something more genuine. Veils, I was so tired. This didn’t feel like victory.

[Ruined it? Vol Karoth is going into the Nythrawl Wound. Just exactly as you had planned. You wanted to save the world, brother. I’m letting you.]

Eight seconds. Probably half that. That was how long Doc and Janel would have to make sure he was on the other side of the Nythrawl Wound before he revived again. Before he woke, lost control, and exploded.

My velocity increased. Time began to speed up once more. Revas’s healthy, whole heart beat faster in my ears.

[Goodbye, brother,] I said. If souls were capable of crying, I would have wept.

[Go to hell,] he replied.

Those were the last words Relos Var ever spoke—at least, in this universe.