Dragon Aster Trilogy

BOOK THREE



Where the Caelestis falls,

Fate shatters,

Darkness escapes,

And two worlds shall be merged,

By one light.

—Texts of Tenu



1: CASTLES



Loki sat on the wall of his constructed castle, pretending to look oblivious to the ones who were following him. He had made the long and hard flight from the Suzerain Continent to the Torian, as the lethal Aur storms still raged over the Eternal Waters. They had to be outflown before morning, or so he thought. Now that Loki was an Awl there were advantages. The lightning from the colliding bolts of estus and aeri energies had caught him several times, but didn’t burn him to a crisp.

He didn’t know what the plumas wanted as their behavior was unusual in the least. When one of the Regals stepped out of its hiding place in the bushes and eyed him with its green eyes, it didn’t appear to have any kind of an explanation. None of the winged cats outside of his castle gave any clue to what they were thinking, or what their intents were. Loki took its presence as some kind of warning, as he could only guess that the pluma were here because of something to do with the gunfire that echoed from Toria.

Even from here, the colorful lights of aeri-infused mists that surrounded the majestic white castle was spectacular. The waterfalls rose at the sides of Toria as the aeri from the Soph Aur constantly propelled them upwards into a mist of rainbows. His kind had died taking Toria from the chimera three hundred years ago, and it was too difficult to accept that the chimera would take it back today. That this very day might be the end of the dragon kind.

The Falls had used their chance to strike his home while the High Guard were on the Suzerain Continent. With only a few Novaists left because of the collapse of the Fay Wall, the dragons wouldn’t stand much of a chance against the Tech the Falls brought with them. Cannons and gunfire could pierce dragon scales and dragoons were trained to use swords, polearms, bows and axes. When he remembered Hain fighting off the griffins and their Tech on the Suzerain Continent, hope seemed lost. They had listened to the false High Priestess and followed her advice of staying away from Tech in every way possible. In doing so, they were still in the dark ages, while their enemies used their advanced and powerful weapons against them.

Loki looked back at the Regal that still watched him from the ground. He wondered if it would try and stop him if he flew to Toria. He might be able to help as the Awl he was now. Daath was to blame for the collapse of the Fay Wall and not the plumas, but his heart still held nothing but hate for the winged cats. His mother and baby sister had died that day, and whether the plumas were poisoned by the Aeger or trying to help them by stopping Daath, nothing could change that fact. With his older brother dead as well, he had no family who he cared about left. The only one left that he gave a damn about was Sybl.

The Regal stepped back and fanned its colorful wings out around its back like a peacock. Then its feathers all changed to one color; blue.

“You want to help? What can a handful of Regals do against the army of the Falls?” Loki asked. Perhaps that answer had a certain color too.

“There are more than a mere handful who wish to help you,” a voice said from inside. Master Gei’s white-furred head appeared from the room that separated from the rest of Loki’s makeshift stone castle.

“Master Gei—how? What are you doing here?”

The Iynx jumped up to where the dragon sat on the wall and looked at the Regal below with his equivalent cat-likeness. The Regal immediately lay down as if bowing to a god. “I only wished to say goodbye before I left for Earth.”

“I didn’t know I was that significant to you…” Loki said, unsure of what to make of the Iynx. The Regals he could likely handle, but the mysterious, ageless fallen Sentry was well above his current skill level.

“Those who have felt the cold knife of separation by sacrifice are often drawn to the warmth of each other. You are far from alone. That and the Rift that will take me where I need to go is on this side of the world. This war must be stopped on both sides if we are to succeed.”

“You mean the broken one at the former town of Berion?” Loki asked.

“A broken Gate is a broken Gate. The Rifts are still open,” Gei explained. “It also looks like you can use some help with Toria.” He looked at the Regal that was now sitting down, twitching its tail patiently.

Loki also looked at the Regal. “We’ve killed so many of them, and now they want to help us? The irony of it all. If Simera was here he’d kill me for so much as thinking something so absurd.”

“Your kind killed many of them to appease the wrath of a single Sentry. But she is a Sentry who is now very much imprisoned for her crimes and will remain as such as long as her soul burns with hate.”

“Alexia…” Loki said as his memories drifted into the past. He still couldn’t believe that she had been such a dangerous threat all this time, hidden in Cirrus for that matter.

“Indeed. Now every living creature has the power to change the course of Fate. Aragmoth is dying, and you must secure the Soph Aur and give the Caelestis more time to stop the collapse of our world.”

Sybl, Loki thought to himself. He remembered how he wanted to protect her and give her a real castle and home. She was the only mirror he ever had that could truly see him, even before he had become an Awl. Now she was the only one who could save them all. “So you won’t be coming with me?”

“I have a war to prevent on the other side of this world as I have said. But I have called in the last of my favors on Aster to aid you with your cause.”

Loki looked towards the Casus Beli Canyon. The buzzing emanating from it grew louder and louder, until it took shape to what looked like a flock of birds, condensed together tightly enough to pass as brown smoke.

The Regals that had been following Loki gave a lions-roar. It reached the canyon and sent the swarm of thousands of plumas flying straight towards Toria.

The hope in Loki brightened a bit, but it was still dimmed by disbelief.

“You must stop daydreaming, Loki. Your mother’s and sister’s soul are within Aragmoth now. If he ceases to exist, then many will cease to exist with him. Many souls will be lost.”

Loki looked back to where Gei had been, but the white cat had vanished. He spread his light green wings and leapt into the air as the swarm of plumas led the charge towards Toria.