From the back of his fire dracken, Anduis looked out across the sea of Grongarg to the distant island where his master, Okael had fought his mistress, Sarthea. The latter had slain the former, but in his death throes, Okael had burned a great wound into the arbor that even now spewed fire into the sky. It needed to be sealed, or the damage to this branch would be immeasurable.

If it were possible for Anduis to do this himself, he would—even at the cost of his own life. For what was one life compared to those of all the creatures, big and small, who dwelt here on Grongarg?

Numbers never lied. This was what Sarthea had failed to grasp when she cast him into the between. The lives of her night maidens were precious, yes, but were they more precious than the thousands he might save with the knowledge he gleaned from their sacrifice? It wasn’t up to Anduis—or Sarthea, or anyone else—to judge the worth of a single life. All that mattered was achieving the greatest gain at the lowest cost.

After Okael had freed him from his imprisonment in the between, Anduis had longed for nothing more than to continue his research. His new master would have happily allowed him to subject the skarakh of Thrikaxis to his dream manipulations. But Sarthea had cut off his magic, denying him his dreams. Anduis was, for all intents and purposes, completely powerless. Because of his condition, he lacked even the physical robustness of the average drengar.

So today he could do no more than watch as a calamity was unleashed upon the arbor, and Sarthea and Dougan struggled to undo the damage they’d caused. He watched as the storm dracken, Iscaragraithe, plunged into the boiling sea. He watched as Dougan faltered, and Sarthea left him at the base of the island. He watched as Sathea made her way up the mountainside, step by agonising step, and stood before the fire until her suit of lightforged argnum burnt away. He watched as she did…something to the molten arlium, making it solidify into a structure that very much resembled a crystal flower. He watched as the charred husk of his mistress fell to the ground, and lay still.

But she wasn’t dead.

Anduis knew this, because he felt no stirring of awakened magic. He was still bound to her. And as long as that were so, he would never dream again.

What was one life, compared to all those he might save…?

Anduis urged his dracken to land atop the newly-formed mountain, where it stood, mouth agape, awaiting his order to bathe his mistress in drackenfire. Almost, he gave the order. But something stayed his hand. A sudden realisation, like cold water across his face.

He may be bound to Sarthea, but she was also bound to him. She was a dreamer, as he was. And that made her especially susceptible to certain techniques he’d developed over the years. He’d used those techniques on her before, with some success. That, he suspected, was the true reason she’d been so quick to banish him. Without his magic, he couldn’t access those techniques, but severely weakened as she was…

Anduis lifted the charred husk, and bore her away.

It took many years of conditioning; remolding his own mind, and that of the vast creature that lurked beneath the surface of Sarthea’s dormant form. Her body slowly healed of its own accord, but with a combination of alchemy, runebinding and his own returning magic, Anduis was able to keep her mind from surfacing.

Now she lay cocooned in a shell of runeworked arlium, utterly at his mercy.

He had been right to keep her alive. By combining her ability to make vassals with his own dream manipulations, he’d been able to create the perfect tools to perform the great works he envisaged for this world. His Chosen were everything a vassal could be, and more. With their help, Anduis would become more powerful than Sarthea had ever been. His reach would extend across all the branches of Arbor Mundi, and he would bring about a new age of order and prosperity. The follies of the past would be forgotten, and everyone would celebrate his name.

A gentle chiming at the door pulled him from his reverie. It was Ragnold, delivering his evening meal. These days, Anduis often forgot to eat, but his old friend would never let him starve.

Anduis took the proffered tray. “Thank you, Ragnold.”

The words were unnecessary. Truth be told, there was little of Ragnold left in the pale, bald dwarrow who stood before him. A curious side-effect of his lingering presence in the minds of his Chosen was that their bodies began to exhibit some of his own physical characteristics. Over time, their minds became one with his as well. Now, he could feel Ragnold’s presence the same way he could feel his own hand. It was at once comforting and disconcerting. He missed his old friend. He missed the jokes, the laughter, the camaraderie—though he had done little to show his appreciation at the time.

But nothing could be gained without sacrifice. Anduis had sacrificed everything he had—everything he was—for this world. And now that he had the world within his grasp, he would let no-one take it from him.

 

Rising from her dream, Saskia took a moment to process what she’d just experienced. She’d long suspected that Anduis was Abellion, and this all but confirmed it. What she hadn’t understood—although maybe she should have—was how he’d become so powerful.

Well now she had her answer. Anduis had never stopped being Sarthea’s vassal. Sarthea was alive, and his power came from her. This was huge. If Saskia could find a way to wake Sarthea from her induced slumber, Abellion’s reign would be over. Sarthea would banish him to the between, or straight-up kill him. And all of his Chosen would become ordinary vassals.

The time for dallying about on these lower branches was over. It was time to get their butts to the Crown of the World and deal with Abellion once and for all.

There were only two people who might have other ideas. Sure enough, they didn’t hesitate to voice their thoughts.

“We must go to the Hall of Eternity immediately,” said Garrain.

Some of her frostling vassals had tracked Xonroth to his old lair. He hadn’t even made an effort to conceal himself, so she suspected he wanted her to follow him there.

“I agree we should go there—after we’ve taken care of Abellion in the Crown of the World. If Xonroth is in the Hall of Eternity, that means he’s not guarding Abellion. This may be our only chance. Once we neutralise the Arbordeus, the Primordial will no longer be Chosen. He’ll be much easier to deal with.”

“He’ll kill our nestling, Saskia,” said Nuille.

“He won’t,” said Saskia. “I know you must be beside yourselves with worry, but try to think about it rationally for a moment. If he wanted her dead, he could have destroyed the egg. He didn’t. He took it.”

She didn’t elaborate, but she had other reasons for believing Xonroth would spare the egg. The other Chosen she’d encountered had retained some of their goals and preference from their time as independent beings. Thiachrin had always been a loose cannon who couldn’t be trusted to make a cup of coffee without killing someone. Freygi had enjoyed killing elves before and after her assimilation. Xonroth, as far as she could tell, had wanted the baby eternal to be born and raised in the Hall of Eternity. There was no reason to suppose that goal would have changed so soon after he became Chosen, unless it directly conflicted with Abellion’s goals.

“Perhaps,” said Garrain. “But you don’t know that. And if he doesn’t kill her, he may do something worse. What if he made a Chosen out of her?”

“I…don’t think that’s possible,” said Saskia. “At this point, she’s too young to have a mind to corrupt. Anyhow, let’s hear what everyone else has to say. Whatever we decide, we will get your child back, don’t worry.” Or die trying, she added silently.

“I’m with Sashki,” said Ruhildi. “’Twould be foolish of us to go where the enemy wants us to go. The Primordial took the egg because he wants us to follow him to his lair. Where he is strongest.”

“Aye,” said Baldreg. “Why is this even a question? The tyrant on the amber throne has made a dire mistake in not keeping the Primordial close. We must seize the opportunity and make him pay for it.”

“I do wonder…” said Kveld.

They all turned to him.

Kveld coughed awkwardly. “I mean, why would Abellion do this? It makes no…”

Saskia frowned. That was a good question. Why would Abellion allow his Chosen and the dragons to hang around at the Hall of Eternity, when they could be guarding him? Unless…

“Do you think he’s laid another trap for us at the Crown of the World?” she said. “What if he wants us to make the obvious choice, and come straight to him? Or what if he’s not even there? He could be hiding among the Chosen in the Hall of Eternity.”

“Or,” said Garrain, “the Primordial, Xonroth, could be Abellion.”

Saskia shook her head vehemently. “No. Abellion is Sarthea’s old vassal, Anduis. I’m certain of it.”

She gave them a quick rundown on what she’d experienced in her latest dream.

Rover Dog nodded. “That explains much. And if Sarthea lives…”

“We might be able to wake her up,” said Saskia.

“If Xonroth has the magic of every worldseed, he would have the magic of dreams as well,” said Garrain. “Anything Anduis could do, he could do too. And more.”

“That may be true,” she said. “But then why would I have just dreamed of Anduis? Seems far more likely that it was Anduis who became Abellion, not Xonroth. Abellion assimilated the Primordial, just as he did to all the other Chosen. Don’t you agree?”

“I just don’t know,” admitted Garrain. “We can’t be certain of anything.”

“So we do the best with what we think we know,” she said. “This may be a trap, or there may be some other angle we haven’t thought of. In fact, it almost certainly is a trap of some sort. But even if it is, I don’t see how it would be to our advantage to go straight to the Hall of Eternity without at least investigating the Crown of the World first.”

This was met with a chorus of agreement—from everyone except the two parents-to-be.

Nuille let out a disgusted growl and stormed off. Shooting Saskia an apologetic look, Garrain hurried after her. Saskia didn’t eavesdrop on their conversation, but she could hear the sound of raised voices halfway across the camp.

When they finally returned, Garrain announced, “I don’t like this at all, and neither does she. But we will accept your decision if you promise to help us rescue our nestling as soon as we deal with Abellion.”

“Of course,” she said. If we survive.

 

Ages came and went. Empires rose and fell. His body slowly withered, while he dreamt of distant places and meandering lives.

In the early ages, he reshaped the world with a deft hand. His own people, the drengari, he moulded into a new species, who came to be known as the alvari. In time, they splintered into distinct subspecies, scattered across several branches. Slowly, his interest in them waned, and he began to take a less active hand in the affairs of his followers.

Most of the lives he observed were of little interest. Kings and bandits, farmers and thieves, warriors and slaves; they were all the same to him. Their lives would not disturb the balance he had so carefully cultivated. Anduis the dreamer had once been like them: inconsequential. He was Anduis no longer. He was Abellion the Arbordeus, the one true god of Arbor Mundi.

But there were some individuals to whom he paid extra attention. One of these was an upstart dwarrow named Calburn the Archurgist. Calburn was becoming a problem. He possessed knowledge and abilities Abellion had never beheld before. And because of his actions, the alvari of Ciendil had been subjugated, and the Ulugmiri Empire had risen to heights never before achieved. Their ships sailed the skies between branches. Their armies drove into lands that were not theirs to take.

And all the while, Arbor Mundi screamed in protest.

Abellion still occasionally felt the distant pains of his own decrepit body, but the pain of the world tree was a gnawing agony in comparison. The blood of Ulugmir was fuelling the fires of expansion, and the branch was freezing over as its air seeped into the void.

The dwarrows alone couldn’t account for such a rapid decline. Something else was draining Ulugmir dry. Something or someone.

When Abellion finally caught a glimpse of what Calburn was doing, he could scarcely believe what his dreams were showing him. Deep beneath the surface of Ulugmir, Calburn was drawing the branch’s life blood into himself. Volumes beyond comprehension—oceans of precious life-giving arlium—were flowing into him.

This proved beyond a shadow of a doubt his growing suspicion: Calburn was of the same ilk as the so-called old gods, Sarthea and Okael and Murgle. All of them had caused their share of strife. But none had been as destructive as this dwarrow demon.

Calburn had to die. There was no other way.

But Abellion was too late. Too slow to rally his armies. By the time they arrived on Ulugmir, the air was barely breathable, the seas had frozen over, and all that stood before them were a few desperate dwarrows and a legion of walking corpses.

While Abellion’s followers laid siege to the city of Pentus, the demon vanished into the depths of Ulugmir, and drained the last of its Inner Hollows. Abellion’s people suffocated alongside the dwarrows they fought.

It was small consolation that Calburn didn’t live to celebrate his victory. Returning to the surface, he succumbed to his own folly at last.

Perhaps that had been the demon’s intent all along: to drain the branch dry, before leaving to plunder another world. In so doing, he’d doomed an entire branch of the world tree; an act so heinous it defied comprehension.

Abellion couldn’t allow this to happen ever again. Though he was well aware that not all dwarrows had followed Calburn the Arborcaede—and most of those who had were already dead—an example had to be made of them. All traces of the Ulugmiri Empire would be expunged from this world. Their language, their culture—and most importantly, their technology—would become taboo.

And should another demon emerge on this world, he would meet a swift and brutal end.

 

Saskia blinked away the cobwebs of sleep, feeling more ambivalent than ever. If that memory she’d just experienced had been anything close to real, then her dad had a lot to answer for. Had she been alive back then, she’d have been on Team Abellion.

Didn’t mean she was going to give the Arbordeus a free pass now, of course. Abellion had tried to kill her and assimilate her and her friends. He’d done little to prevent the apocalypse on Ciendil, and he’d just ravaged Grongarg and Lumium. But at least now she knew why he’d had it in for her.

The flight to the Crown of the World would take at least a couple of days, even with Zarie and the frostling tempests giving it everything they had. The storm dragons and their riders would take even longer.

Time enough to obsess over her ever-growing list of doubts and worries. Was she leading her friends to their deaths? Could she even last the journey herself? This body was on its last legs. She could feel the sickness slowly creeping into her. Every day or two she had another seizure. Her only consolation was that there had been no more major blackouts since the one that had cost her a month of memories. Their best guess was that it had been a temporary thing—a side effect of taking Rover Dog as a vassal, combined with her illness and the stress brought on by recent events. But what if they were wrong? What if she faced off against Abellion, only to forget why she was there? What if she forgot her friends?

That thought terrified her more than just about anything else. When her time on this world was over, all she’d have of it were Ruhildi and her memories. They were more precious to her than any power or abilities she might carry into her future incarnations. To lose those memories was…unacceptable.

“Everything will be alright, Sashki,” said Ruhildi, sitting beside her in Iscaragraithe’s cabin. “You won’t forget. And if you do, I’ll be there to remind you.”

“What if I forget you’re my friend?” said Saskia, feeling close to tears.

“Then I’ll befriend you again, you big blockhead of a trow.”

Saskia sniffed. “You know, I probably won’t be a trow next time. Or big. I could be something tiny. A hobbit—I mean halfling. Or a goblin—gebling. Or an anthropomorphic squirrel. Wouldn’t that be funny.”

“Whatever form you take, it matters not to me. You’ll always be a huge blockhead in my eyes.”

 

The river of time flowed ever onward. Though his link to Sarthea afforded him an unnaturally long life, and the dreaming extended it yet further, Abellion was not immortal. The dull, yet ceaseless pains of his shrivelled body were a constant reminder that his time would soon come.

Yet he couldn’t let go. Not yet. Who would tend this world after he was gone? Without him, there would be only chaos. He could trust no-one else to do what had to be done; to make the sacrifices that had to be made for the good of all.

It was almost a relief when the Arborcaede’s heir emerged on Ciendil, corrupting the seed of knowledge, and sewing madness among the oracles. Here was something that could distract him from his growing despair. A problem that seemed solvable. All he had to do was kill her; send her back to the between, where she could no longer corrupt the people of this world, as had her predecessor.

Yet killing this demon, Saskia, proved more difficult than he’d anticipated. She acquired powerful allies, resisted his dreaming, and slew his Chosen.

As his failures mounted, and her power grew, he came to a strange realisation. He was enjoying himself. Enjoying the contest. He didn’t want it to end. There was more of Okael in him than he’d realised. For a time, he toyed with the idea of making a Chosen out of the demon. It might be possible, though it would not be easy.

That plan was a colossal failure as well, resulting in the death of one of his most powerful assassin, Freygi, and the defection of the newest member of the communion, Baldreg. It was the first time a Chosen had been stolen from him rather than simply killed, and it sent a shiver of fear into his spirit. He’d thought such a thing impossible. But Baldreg’s ascension had been less than complete, and he had rejected Abellion so vehemently that the bond had been broken.

Saskia and her allies were coming for him. Trying to assimilate her had been folly. She had to die.

Luring her into a trap, his dragons decimated her fleet, yet still she managed to evade him. So Abellion turned to the one thing that had proven to destroy her kind: the substance that had become known as Okael’s Bane. His oracles had learned of this poison many spans after Okael’s demise. They’d traced it back to a forgotten wing of Sarthea’s palace. There it had sat for greatspans, unused.

Finally, success, of a sort. As Sarthea had done to Okael, Abellion tricked Saskia into absorbing some of the deadly poison into her body. In so doing, she had doomed herself. Yet even now, his victory tasted like ashes. The revenant Saskia kept constantly at her side did something to slow the effects of the poison. It would still kill her, but perhaps not soon enough.

Abellion could send his dragons after her, but would they be enough? He was no longer certain. It seemed every time he escalated their conflict, she grew more powerful in kind. But there was one more thing that might end this war quickly and decisively.

The so-called seed of eternity had been the subject of many a tale throughout the ages. Most mortals considered it a myth—when they considered it at all. But Abellion knew better. His old companion, Dougan, looked barely older today than he had when they first met. What else could explain the trow’s agelessness? It was a pity Abellion had never been able to make a Chosen out of Dougan. He’d tried several times, but the ancient trow had always resisted his dreamings.

Now Abellion had learned where the eternals had been hiding all this time. Perhaps they too had the strength of will to resist him, but if he could assimilate just one of them…

 

Understanding one’s enemy was supposed to be a good thing, but these dreams sure didn’t make her feel good. She didn’t want to feel the combination of frustration and…excitement Abellion had felt whenever she’d foiled his plans. Why couldn’t he just remain an evil, unknowable overlord? She’d feel a lot better about killing him if he did.

Today they rose up into the mass of smaller branches that marked the outer reaches of the Crown of the World. Some of them bore fresh scars. Eyeing the gouges and scorch marks—and the bones of dragons, already half-overgrown with creeping vines—sent a pang of regret washing over her. This was where the trolls of her invasion fleet had made their last stand against the fire dragons.

She blinked away fresh tears. Dogramit, what was up with her today? She was a blubbery mess.

As they rose higher, and moved inward through the central cluster of Abellion’s realm, Saskia couldn’t shake the feeling that something important had changed since the last time they were here.

“The light of the barrier,” said Nuille, sitting opposite her. “It’s gone.”

“Yes!” said Saskia. “That’s what’s different now. I was driving myself crazy trying to figure it out.” On their first trip up here, the surrounding branches had been bathed in a warm amber-coloured glow, cast by the barrier—or something behind it. Whereas this time the only light in the area came from the sun.

“If the light has faded,” said Kveld, “do you think the barrier could be…?”

A short time later, they got their answer. Gone was the magic that had turned Nuille’s gaze away from the barrier, preventing her from seeing it. And of the barrier itself, there was no trace. Abellion’s sanctum, Apex, stood exposed for all to see: a wide, flat disc nestled among the branches, topped with white spires and green trees.

“What the…?” said Saskia. “Do you think this is a trap?”

“Aye,” said Ruhildi.

“Indubitably,” said Garrain.

“Good,” said Saskia. “Just making sure I’m not being paranoid.” The first time she’d sent her frostling spies up here, there had been no barrier. Abellion could easily raise the barrier behind them, sealing them in—and their allies out. Or—she shuddered at the thought—maybe he could raise the barrier when they were halfway across, slicing Iscaragraithe in half. “So…we’re going in anyway?”

“Aye,” said Ruhildi.

“Indubitably,” said Garrain.

Just to be safe, Saskia asked one of her newly re-vassalised frostlings to wait well beyond the barrier’s reach. He could let everyone know what happened if she became trapped in there, and her other communication channels were disrupted.

Forehead knotted in concentration, Zarie guided them across the threshold.

Still alive? Good.

As they flew closer to the spires of Apex, and still no barrier appeared behind them, and no dragons came out to meet them, Saskia let out a long breath of relief. Then she sucked in a breath again, remembering that this was exactly the moment in a movie or game when something awful would happen. So she sat there, refusing to let herself relax, and waiting for the inevitable gut punch.

Rover Dog began to knead her shoulders. She let out a chuckle. “Is it that obvious?”

“You are like coiled snake, princess. Be calm. What will happen will happen.”

“That’s what I’m afraid of.”

“Is it just me, or do those spires look a bit…singed?” said Velandir.

Saskia looked where he was pointing. The stones at the tops of the buildings were streaked with black, and looked to have melted and sagged, then re-solidified. It wasn’t just isolated to a few of them. All across the city were similar sights. No fire or smoke, but definite signs of recent damage.

“’Tis not just you,” said Ruhildi.

“Maybe Abellion didn’t keep as tight a leash on his dragons as we thought,” said Saskia.

It was more than a little surprising that no-one had attacked them yet. Even if the dragons weren’t here right now, there should be some kind of a response from their foes on the ground and inside the ruined buildings. She could see them down there on her map. Far fewer than she expected, but the red and orange markers were present.

And that was when she spotted something on her map that made her jaw drop. A cluster of blue markers.

Allies.

What kinds of allies would they find all the way up here, in the heart of their enemy’s domain?

Sending her consciousness into the head of one of her unexpected allies, Saskia sucked in another breath. “How in the world…? Land there! Now!” She pointed.

Their allies had taken shelter in the shadow of one of the taller spires. Zarie brought Iscaragraithe in to land at the base of the building, whereupon Saskia and Rover Dog leapt out to greet…

“What took you so long?” growled an emaciated, blood-streaked Princess Aele. When last Saskia had seen the Goldclaw princess, a dragon had been breathing fire all over her. Or so she’d thought at the time. Now, deep inside Abellion’s sanctum, Aele stood with eighteen other trolls, surrounded by the bodies of fallen skarakh and elves. The trolls looked exhausted, and they carried injuries ranging from arrow wounds to missing limbs. But they were alive.

“We all thought you were dead!” said Saskia. “I’m so sorry. If I’d known… How did you survive? How did you get here?”

Aele didn’t answer immediately. Instead, she dove for Rover Dog, latching onto him like a lamprey. Minus the teeth. Well, there were a few teeth, but she didn’t take more than a little bite, which he endured with a bemused smile. “I am happy to see you too, princess,” he said.

Aele peered into his eyes. “You seem…different.”

“So do you,” he said.

Saskia tried to keep her eye-rolling to a minimum when some shameless heavy petting ensued. Princess Aele had clearly gone through hell. If this was what it took to make her feel better, then fine. But yeesh, she thought, get a room, you two.

Slowly, the story emerged as to how Aele’s group had survived, and ended up here, of all places. In short, she’d hijacked a dragon. She’d killed its riders, then the dragon itself. In its death-throes, the dragon had carried her far away from the battlefield. Some of the other trolls had similarly unlikely stories of survival. Some had simply hidden under the bodies of fallen friends or enemies until the battle was over. Far more of them had survived than Saskia would’ve believed possible. Afterward, they’d banded together again to try to endure the hostile environment they’d found themselves in.

Surviving up in the Crown of the World had not been easy. They’d kept well clear of Apex at first, but even so, it had been a constant struggle. The Crown of the World was home to predators that not even trolls could take down easily. Food was scarce and hard to reach. They’d had to evade frequent dragon patrols. Mercifully, those had ceased after a while. And then…

“A fistful of fivedays ago, the drackens came back,” said Aele. “A huge swarm of them—at least as big as the one we faced in the great battle—flying up toward Apex, this time. Soon after that, the barrier came down. Eventually, we decided that since we were going to die up here anyway, we might as well try to get at the tyrant himself. But when we got here, we found…” She glanced around at the rubble and half-melted buildings.

“You didn’t do all this?” asked Saskia.

“I wish I could say we did. Well, those, we killed.” Aele pointed at the bodies on the street. “And others on our way in. But the city had already fallen before we got here. Most of the survivors keep to themselves, so we leave them be. Except Abellion.” Aele let out a snarl. “When we find him, we will not leave him be.”

Saskia was beginning to wonder what they’d find when they entered Abellion’s throne room. Assuming he had a throne room. If he were still here, would he have let this happen? It seemed more likely that he was with Xonroth in the Hall of Eternity, and someone had staged a coup in his absence. But she didn’t voice her suspicion this time, because she needed to know, one way or the other.

“Then you’ll be happy to know that’s why we’re here,” said Saskia. “Join us and we’ll end this, once and for all. Although we should wait for the cavalry to arrive before we storm his castle. The rest of our people will be here soon. And we have dragons.”

“Let’s just go there now,” said Aele. “Each day we delay is another day the tyrant might make his escape, or reinforcements might come to his aid.”

“I’m with her,” said Baldreg, who had come out to hear her story, along with everyone else. “The Chosen aren’t here to defend him—for now. If we wait, that may change. We are strong. We have everything we need to gut the bastard. So let’s just get it done.”

“No,” said Saskia. “This could still be a trap. We shouldn’t just rush on in like headless chickens. It won’t take long for the rest of our people to get here, don’t worry.”

Sure enough, the sky was soon filled with storm dragons, sending the survivors across the city scurrying for cover.

Upon landing, Vask greeted Aele just as enthusiastically as had Rover Dog. They didn’t linger for long on the ground, though. The Arbordeus wouldn’t slay himself.

Abellion, as it turned out, did not live in a castle. Nor even a tower. His innermost stronghold was a white dome atop a tall tree. The leaves of the tree had once been red, but now most of them were black and withered. A wide ramp wound its way around the tree, culminating in a platform that led to the dome’s single entrance.

Its door had been blown apart.

The dragons encircled the tree, ready to snatch up any slippery gods who tried to escape. Saskia insisted on being with the first group to enter the dome. She wasn’t about to miss the final confrontation.

Inside, they found piles of ash, and sooty, suspiciously humanoid silhouettes against cracked and crumbling walls.

“This place is a tomb,” muttered Velandir.

Saskia had to agree. There wasn’t the slightest sign of life in here. She’d almost have felt better if they’d had Chosen coming at them from all sides with swords and magic. That was what was supposed to happen, right? This was supposed to be the final level of the game. The final boss. But someone else, it seemed, had gotten here first. And with a sickening lurch, she realised who that someone was.

Oh yeah, she thought. There it is. The gut punch.

A surreal feeling settled over her as she stepped into the throne room, with its blue glowing walls, and the black obelisk at its centre. This was a control chamber.

The throne was at the far end of the room. It wasn’t amber, as she’d expected. Nor was it blue. It was carved from white wood, elegant in its simplicity. On the throne sat a pale figure, shrouded in a wispy white robe. The dry, wrinkled skin of his face and hands sagged from brittle bones. Abellion’s head was tilted back; mouth open; eyes sunken in their sockets, seeing nothing.

The air was heavy with the stench of death.

 

Something was very wrong. At first, this eternal, Xonroth, had been so pliant. He’d seemed almost eager to become Chosen. But now that he’d joined the communion, Xonroth was not responding to Abellion’s suggestions as had the others. For the first time, Abellion felt his own self being subsumed by another’s.

Impossible! It was Abellion who controlled the communion, not his Chosen! No matter their power in the waking world, Abellion was the master of dreams. This was indisputable fact.

Yet Xonroth was disputing it. And as Abellion felt his resolve falter, and his thoughts spiral toward the void, he couldn’t escape the feeling that the eternal was…bigger in here than he was.

Not just an eternal. The realisation felt like a cold needle in his spine. Xonroth was a dreamer! Inconceivable though it seemed, this creature commanded the power of two worldseeds.

No, not just two. Shock turned to disbelief as Abellion looked deeper into the newly ascended Chosen, and beheld the ocean of power roiling within him.

The Primordial. That was what they called him. And for good reason. This being was as old as the world itself. Abellion was but a child compared to him. Less than a child.

An insect.

“Now you begin to feel the gravity of your mistake,” said the Primordial. “You have served your purpose. And now you must make way for your new Arbordeus.”

His drackens took wing not under his command, but by the will of another. They were coming for him, and there was nothing he could do but rail ineffectually against his approaching doom.

The drackens laid waste to his city and his people. Entering Abellion’s sanctum alone, the Primordial systematically wiped out all of his most powerful guards. Only then did he enter the throne room, and face the shrivelled form sitting silently on the throne.

A quiver ran through Abellion’s body. His body, ignored for so long. He could no longer ignore it now. The pain. The pain! All the weight of his years piling into his head, pulling him apart.

As his mind began to splinter, and his body drew its final breath, he reached for the vast being that slumbered beneath the surface of the world.

“Sarthea, I’m so sorry. I never should have—”