Orion let out a slow, shaky breath. Relief mingled with something heavier as he nodded.
"Yes... that feels much better. But I still feel like I've lost something... something important."
Kaelya smiled gently and pulled him into a warm embrace—like a mother comforting a wounded child.
"That's because you have, little king," she whispered.
"You've lost someone you loved. I only took away the guilt festering in your heart. The love... the sadness of losing it? That still remains. No magic, no power, no ritual can strip you of those feelings. Nor should they."
She pulled back, her fingers brushing against his cheek one last time before she stood.
"Come," she said, her voice softening with a somber weight. "Let's see what can be done for Frieda now."
---
They stepped out of the glowing waters and onto soft, living earth. A gentle path of luminous moss guided them toward a single flowering tree, its branches hung low with delicate blossoms that glowed faintly in the twilight.
At the tree's base, surrounded by beds of pale blue flowers, lay Frieda.
Her body was untouched by decay—frozen in time, preserved as if the world itself refused to let her go. She looked more like an artifact than a corpse. Peaceful. Beautiful. Too still.
Orion's steps faltered.
He turned his face away, overcome by the tidal wave of emotion crashing in his chest. His throat tightened, and grief twisted his breath into something jagged.
Kaelya walked forward without hesitation and knelt beside Frieda, lowering herself until her face was level with the still form.
"She is dead..." she murmured, gently placing her hand on Frieda's chest.
"But her soul has not yet departed. It lingers—tethered, faint, but still here."
With a motion that looked more like intuition than technique, Kaelya reached inward—not physically, but spiritually. Her hand hovered above Frieda's heart, fingers twitching in slow, deliberate patterns.
And then, she grasped something unseen—pulling it gently forward.
A faint shimmer appeared. A soft, flickering light—fragile, dim, like a candle struggling in a storm.
But Kaelya's face fell. Her lips thinned. Her breath caught.
"...It's too late," she whispered.
Orion's heart dropped like a stone in water.
"What do you mean?" he asked, panic rising fast. "You said her soul was still there!"
Kaelya looked at him with a sorrowful calm—the kind that comes only from centuries of watching grief repeat itself.
"The soul is present, yes. But its connection to the body has been severed. Too much time has passed. The thread that binds them is broken... and cannot be mended."
Orion staggered a step closer. "Then—what do we do? There must be a way!"
She closed her eyes, exhaling slowly.
"A new body would be needed to house the soul," she explained. "But no true body is born into this world without a soul of its own. I could craft an empty vessel... but it would not be considered a living body. It would be a shell. A carcass."
She stood, the light of the soul fading between her fingers like dew in sunlight.
"And the world rejects what is soulless."
"Then just use my body," Orion said suddenly, his voice cracking. "You can do that... right?"
The words came not from logic, but desperation. His heart spoke faster than thought.
Kaelya turned to face him fully, her expression unreadable.
"Yes," she said after a long pause. "I could."
She gently lifted Frieda's soul—now a faint, flickering light—and placed it inside a small lamp carved from the sacred wood of Arian's Womb. The bark shimmered with faint pulses, as if acknowledging the life it now cradled.
"But doing so would simply mean trading your life for hers."
Orion flinched.
"You can't share a body with her. The toll would be unbearable. You'd never walk again. Never speak freely. You'd be trapped—paralyzed, conscious, and fading. Slowly."
Orion lowered his gaze. His voice fell into a whisper, trembling.
"I don't care about my life..."
The weight of those words settled into the air like smoke.
Kaelya's eyes softened, but her voice remained firm.
"You might not care. But others do. There are people who need you, Orion—more than you realize."
She set the soul-lamp gently beside Frieda's still body, its light casting soft shadows against the petals around her.
"I won't allow it," she said, final and absolute.
"We'll prepare a proper funeral. A farewell worthy of her soul. And when the time comes... we'll return her to the leylines."
She turned and began walking back toward the lake, her footsteps slow, respectful.
But Orion didn't move.
He stood rooted—his mind spiraling, drowning.
I can't lose her again...
I saw hope, and now that too is being taken away...
Why, gods? Why show her to me only to rip her away again?
His legs moved before thought returned.
He stepped quietly toward Frieda.
His fingers trembled as he reached for the lamp.
Kaelya, already halfway back to the water, called over her shoulder, "Come on, Orion. I know it's hard, but don't just keep staring at he—"
She froze.
Her breath caught as her eyes landed on him—head tilted back, the lamp pressed to his lips.
"Orion—NO!"
But it was too late.
He drank.
The soul-light vanished into his throat like falling stars, and in the next heartbeat, Orion collapsed—limp, silent, crumpling to the earth like a marionette with its strings cut.
Kaelya sprinted to his side, her composure shattering.
"You idiot," she hissed, grabbing his shoulders and shaking him.
"I should've known—you're still the same immature, reckless brat!"
She cradled his face in her hands, fear pooling in her eyes as she searched for any flicker of response.
The soul-lamp lay empty beside them.
And Orion's body lay still.
There was no sky. No ground.
Only light and shadow, spinning together in an endless spiral of colorless hues.
Orion floated—no, drifted—through a space that didn't exist, yet pressed against him like memory. It was warm and cold, full and hollow. It tasted like old snow and forgotten lullabies.
Then, something stirred.
A ripple.
A heartbeat not his own.
From the empty distance, a figure began to form—faint at first, like a candle seen through fog. Slowly, it coalesced into the shape of a girl. Long hair fluttered around her like ink in water. Her eyes—half-closed—glowed softly, echoing with a light that didn't belong to this world anymore.
Frieda.
"...Orion?"
Her voice wasn't sound. It was recognition.
Orion reached out, floating toward her, arms trembling.
"You're... here," he breathed.
She touched his hand.
And that's when the world exploded—not with force, but with meaning.
---
The space around them shattered like fragile glass, revealing a deeper layer beneath—a realm made of starlight veins and glowing leyline threads, as if the universe had veins of its own.
From Frieda's chest emerged a glowing sigil—delicate, flower-shaped, its petals made of golden light and gentle sorrow. From Orion's chest rose another, jagged and turbulent, made of grief and fire.
The two symbols spun, slowly circling each other—cautious, uncertain. Light met shadow. Sorrow met regret.
And then...
They touched.
A burst of light engulfed them, and their forms dissolved—not violently, but intimately. Like paint mixing in water.
Orion's memories spilled forth: the laughter, the pain, the endless guilt of survival. Frieda's essence wrapped around his—soothing, forgiving, understanding.
They saw each other's entirety. Every fracture, every smile.
Frieda's soul tried to separate—tried to return to the light. But Orion's held fast, not through force, but through choice.
A new soul began to form.
Their silhouettes overlapped—one heart, two pulses.
Her warmth filled the gaps in his grief.
His strength shielded her fading light.
And slowly… slowly… a new sigil burned into existence.
It was neither his nor hers.
A lotus of fire and frost—alive, unstable, shared.
Kaelya gasped as Orion's body twitched—once, twice.
His eyes flew open.
For a moment, they glowed—one aqueous blue, one cool blue.
Then he collapsed again, unconscious, but alive.
Kaelya looked at him, hands trembling.
"...You fool," she whispered. "What are you now?"