The Death of Vanessa

The spiral staircase leading to the Mythical Archives was not merely long; it was alive.

As the group descended the winding steps that seemed to continue into oblivion, the air grew heavy, the taste of ancient dust coating the tips of their tongues. The walls, carved from shimmering, splendiferous apatite, seemed to breathe, the bioluminescent veins pulsing in time with their footsteps, marching downwards into the belly of the Academy.

Arachna walked in front of the group, her posture rigid. Behind her, Aureli and Silver walked closely, a wall of tense silence erected between them. Ezekiel followed closely, his mind still with Noah, while Vanessa trailed behind the rest, her heart hammering against her ribs as they continued the descent.

She felt a strange sensation at the base of her skull, like a humming, a vibration of sorts. It was the same feeling she had felt on the day she met Silver, that of time stretching thin, causing a well of unease to rumble to life within.

Click.

It wasn't a sound from any of their boots, erupting from inside the walls.

"Stop!" Silver barked, but it was too late. The stairs beneath the group dissolved into liquid shadow instantaneously as gravity twisted sideways and the walls groaned, shifting like the tumblers of a massive lock, separating the group in a chaotic slide of stone and darkness.

They fell through wormholes of darkness, appearing in locations within a maze of trials, enchanted to snuff out the weak from the worthy. To separate the threat from the welcome. The archives wouldn't allow entry so easily.

The First Timeline

Vanessa hit the cold floor hard, the wind knocking out of her. She sat there , struggling to catch her breath as a voice appeared above her "My lady!"

A hand grabbed her arm, pulling her up. It was Ezekiel. His grey eyes were wide, a tinge of concern in them as he scanned the darkness.

"Stay close to me, we do not know what to expect." he ordered, his voice sharper than a butcher's knife, laced with panic. "Do not leave my radius, this is the archive's magic at work. We should’ve expected this but no one has been down here in so long, I’m sure the others forgot as well! Those nitwits, but I am no lesser. I should’ve been more alert!"

The duo found themselves in a narrow corridor of black stone, all alone. The others were gone.

Elsewhere in the maze, Silver and Aureli landed in a circular arena.

"Wonderful," Aureli dusted off his knees, looking around at the encroaching shadows. "Trapped in a box with a brute. Just my luck."

"Shut up and draw your weapon," Silver growled.

From the walls, constructs of shadow peeled away. One by one, faceless warriors wielding jagged blades emerged in various shapes and sizes, raring to go and hungry for a fight.

Silver didn't hesitate. He launched himself forward, a blur of lethal efficiency, fighting the army like a storm, brutal and direct, without pause, ripping away the ranks like a tornado in a field of delicate flowers. Aureli, in contrast, moved like water. He didn't block attacks, neither did he lunge forward. He waited to be charged, flowing around the attacks, using his magic to trip and redirect the shadows, forcing them into Silver’s path to be decimated.

"You're sloppy on your left side!" Aureli called out, ducking a shadow-blade.

"And you talk too much!" Silver retorted, decapitating the shadow.

Despite their bickering, they moved in perfect sync. The murderer and the noble, forming an unlikely duo. One was the hammer, the other the scalpel.

"You hate me," Aureli noted, using the brute force of his magic, blasting a shadow back. "But you fight well with me."

"I fight well with anyone who doesn't die," Silver grunted, focused solely on the task at hand; brutalising the enemy.

Elsewhere, Arachna landed gracefully on her feet, barely making a sound. She stood alone in a cavernous hall, surrounded by silence. Her eyes were closed, listening intently for any movement when suddenly, the darkness shifted, causing her to slowly open them, directing her gaze towards the other end of the hall.

Materialising from the gloom, a dozen shadow-beasts approached, shaped like massive wolves, snarling with jaws that dripped void.

Arachna didn't flinch, observing them with incredible stillness. She didn't even draw her sword immediately, waiting for the charge. She simply adjusted her gloves, looking at the beasts with a bored, clinical detachment.

"How tedious," she murmured to herself as the first wolf lunged. 

She sidestepped the attack with effortless grace, like a ballerina skating on ice, her hand blurring to her back, swiftly.

Click.

A flash of steel illuminated the dark as Arachna’s magic sliced through the wolf which disintegrated before it even touched the ground.

She sheathed the blade in the same poetic motion. "The Archives have grown rusty. These tests are beneath me.”

Meanwhile, Vanessa and Ezekiel were running for their lives. The corridor was shrinking, the walls closing in, bristling with spikes.

"Dead end!" Vanessa cried, pointing ahead.

Ezekiel spun around. "Get behind me, I’ll protect you!"

He shoved her against the back wall, placing his body between her and the corridor.

He raised his hands and began to chant, a barrier of grey magic shimmering into existence before him. But the Archive's defense was ancient, older than his magic. It had recognised Vanessa as the main threat, shadows bubbling on the floor beneath their feet.

"Ezekiel, look out!"

Hundreds of needle-thin spikes erupted from the floor, walls, and ceiling simultaneously, aiming directly for the "intruder" the Archives deemed unworthy.

Vanessa.

"NO!" Ezekiel screamed.

He threw himself over her, trying to shield her with his own body in a display that caused Vanessa to be struck with awe. He was intending to sacrifice himself for her. But the needles were made of shadow, phasing right through him, solidifying only when they reached her flesh.

Thwack! Thwack! Thwack! Thwack! Thwack!

The sound was sickening. Like meat being tenderized.

Vanessa gasped, her eyes growing wide with intense pain and horror. She looked down at the dozen or so black needles protruding from her chest, her stomach, her throat, her mouth. She was a mess of blood and agony

Ezekiel froze, hovering over her. He had failed again.

"Vanessa..." he choked out as Blood filled her mouth and she slumped over, hanging in place from the needles that had penetrated her. The world turned grey as her ability activated and time began to rewind, the last memory from this timeline that of Ezekiel’s hollow eyes filled with tears.

I died... she thought as the hum returned and the flow of the river reversed.

The Second Timeline

Click.

Vanessa gasped, stumbling as the walls pulsed, looking around wildly to find herself back on the stairs with the others. Ezekiel was walking in front of her, alive and well, whereas Silver and Aureli were behind her, eyeing each other down.

It happened.. she realized, her hands shaking. I died.

"My lady?" Ezekiel paused, looking back at her with concern. "You look pale."

"The floor!" Vanessa shouted. "Don't step on…"

Too late.

The floor dissolved yet again, gravity twisting and pulling the group apart like before.

"No, this can’t be happening!!" Vanessa screamed as she fell into the dark, landing on the cold floor of the corridor again just as in the previous timeline. Ezekiel was with her once more, the same protective aura emerging from within.

"Stay close to me," he ordered, similar to the previous timeline.

"Ezekiel, listen to me!" Vanessa grabbed his shirt frantically, pulling herself up towards him. "The shadows! They come from the floor, the walls, the ceiling, everywhere! We won't survive, we can't stay here!!"

Ezekiel looked at her, confused by her hysteria. "My lady, calm down. I will protect…"

"You can't!" she sobbed. "The needles, they phase right through you!"

"What are you…" before he could finish his sentence, the shadows bubbled again, unforgiving.

The poor elf tried to move, to push Ezekiel away, to run into a safety net, wherever she could survive. But the speed of the trap was absolute and merciless.

She squeezed her eyes shut, curling into a ball.

  "I'm sorry."

In the next moment, pain exploded in her chest as a thick black needle pierced her heart. The force of the thrust physically displaced her, pinning her to the stone wall.

Not again

Vanessa thought

I have to be faster.

"VANESSA!" Ezekiel ran to her side, his hands hovering over the wound, hesitant to touch the spike in fear of worsening her injury, his composure shattering completely.

"Not you too..." he wailed, the sound ripping from his throat. He grabbed her shoulders, pulling her limp body into his chest, rocking back and forth. "Stay with me! Please! I can't fail again! Not so soon! Open your eyes my lady!"

Vanessa looked up at him through fading vision. She saw the raw, unfiltered devastation in his face, the sheer panic and horror in his eyes. He wasn't just an instructor losing a student, but rather a broken man watching his last hope die.

"Ezekiel..." she whispered, blood bubbling on her lips, coughing it out onto the collar of his white shirt.

"I'm here," he sobbed, his tears falling onto her cheeks, warm and filled with pain. "I've got you. I won't let go."

He really cares, she thought as her heart slowed to a stop. He really tries.

The Final Timeline: Escape

Click.

"Stop!" Vanessa screamed in anguish.

She didn't wait for Ezekiel. She didn't wait for the floor to dissolve. She threw her arms out, grabbing Silver’s coat and Aureli’s sleeve, yanking them both back, as much as her frail body allowed, halting them to a pause.

"DO NOT TAKE ANOTHER STEP!"

The group froze as the echo of her agonizing scream bounced off the apatite walls.

Silver looked at her perplexed. "Vanessa? What is it? You sound like you’ve…" he paused mid sentence, realising the truth. “It happened again didn’t it? How many times is it now?”

Vanessa heard the question but couldn’t respond as she was hyperventilating. She could still feel the phantom pain of the needles in her throat, from her arms, in her heart, from her eyes, emerging from her ears, erupting all over her body. She pointed a quivering finger at the step directly in front of Ezekiel and uttered the only word that came to her trembling lips.

"Trap," she gasped, her voice ragged.

"The floor dissolves when you step there.. Shadow needles. Hundreds of them. From every direction. And then.." she stopped herself from continuing, the trauma from the incidents still fresh in her mind.

Ezekiel looked at the step and then back at the elf, seeing the sheer terror in her eyes, the look of someone who had seen death.

"Are you certain?" Arachna asked.

"Yes," Vanessa choked out. "Please. Trust me."

Arachna stepped forward and drew her sword, lightly tapping the stone step.

Hiss.

A black rune flared to life surprising the group except for Silver. Having the knowledge of Vanessa's ability, he knew exactly what had transpired.

"A Ward of Severance," Arachna noted. "It eliminates the weakest link or the main threat, depending on the situation."

She looked at Vanessa. "You have a sharp instincts, Ms. Vanessa. That rune was invisible to the naked eye."

Arachna knelt, placing her hand on the rune and muttered an incantation in a language that sounded like cracking bone. The rune flared once, then shattered into harmless sparks.

"The path is clear," Arachna announced, sheathing her sword.

The group exhaled, the tension breaking.

"Well done, Vanessa," Silver said, placing a steadying hand on her shoulder. He looked at her with a newfound respect, secretly hoping the ordeal wasn't too traumatising.

Aureli chuckled, though it sounded forced. "Shadow needles? Sounds unpleasant. I prefer my skin un-perforated, thank you very much."

Vanessa leaned against the wall, her knees weak.

"My lady?"

Ezekiel was there, standing close by and shielding her as his grey eyes searched hers, filled with the same concern she had seen as she died.

"You are shaking," Ezekiel whispered. "You look as though... as though you lived it."

Vanessa looked up at him. In this timeline, he hadn't screamed her name. He hadn't tried to save her. He hadn't screamed her name. He didn't know that she had died in his arms, twice.

But she knew.

She remembered the warmth of his tears on her face. She remembered the way he had thrown his body over hers. The way he had looked at her with absolute devastation.

"I'm fine," Vanessa lied, moving closer to him, her voice soft like she was murmuring a secret. "Just... scared."

"You are safe now," Ezekiel said, his voice gentle, speaking in the same tone as when she had died. "I will not let anything harm you."

Vanessa nodded, a lump in her throat. She stayed by his side, finding a profound safety in his shadow, one that hadn’t been there before.

As the group began to move again, staying close together, Vanessa didn't notice the pair of eyes burning into her back.

It was Arachna, trailing behind everyone. 

She wasn't looking at the path. She was looking at Vanessa, her gaze burning with chaos.

Arachna knew magic. She knew the flow of mana better than she knew her own heartbeat. And she had felt it, the way the mana in the air had stuttered just before Vanessa screamed. It had folded back on itself, like a ripple in a pond flowing backward.

Chronos Magic, a forbidden art. A heresy. 

Arachna thought, her eyes narrowing into cold slits.

She knew the trap was there because she had already died to it, and it seems Silver knows of this.

Arachna’s clenched her fist, her sapphire eyes darkening, shifting into that eerie 'Blue Moon' intensity as a slow, predatory smile touched her lips, unseen by the others.

So, the little mouse can rewind the clock, Arachna mused, filing the information away. 

How useful... and how dangerous.

"Let's move," Arachna commanded, weaving her way through the group towards the front, her voice void of emotion, masking the thrill of the hunt. 

"The Archives await."