One Eye For The Future

The sensation of the Stone beneath Nino’s hand disappeared before he had time to pull his fingers away.

The chamber was still there, but the cold of the walls, the weight of the air, and even the presence of the people behind him had vanished. All that remained was darkness, absolute and silent, similar to what he had found within the memories that did not belong to him. Nino tried to move his hand, but even touching his own body was impossible. Even so, he could feel the Primordial Stone before him, as though its presence occupied the entire space around him.

A voice emerged from the void.

State your desire.

Nino remained silent for a few moments. He had thought about that question ever since learning of the Stones, though he had never imagined he would actually stand before one. Now he knew what the King had obtained from the first, and he had just discovered that a second wish had been made. Four Colossi were marching toward Lumeris. Leo was among the soldiers accompanying them. If the power to dominate everything was truly what the King had wished for, the coming war would be unlike anything Nino had ever faced.

“I want to undo his wish.”

The emptiness around him seemed to deepen.

A granted wish cannot be undone by another wish.

Nino frowned.

“Then give me the power to nullify it.”

All power has a price.

“What price?”

One equivalent to what you wish to receive.

The answer reminded Nino of the conversation in Veyra. The stories about the Primordial Stones always ended the same way: a wish, followed by a loss. Even so, something did not add up.

“Does the sacrifice have to be something I love?”

The sacrifice must possess value to the one who offers it.

Nino thought for a few seconds.

“Isn’t that the same thing?”

Love takes many forms.

The darkness around him seemed to move, though there was nothing within it to see.

There are those who love people. There are those who love wealth, power, dominion, a kingdom. Even the world itself. There are those who love only their own lives. The value of an offering belongs to the one who gives it.

Nino remembered the King sitting before him in Solvar, speaking about his own family, about the kingdom, and about everything he had done to reach that point. He also remembered the power that now drove four Colossi toward Lumeris. If the price increased with the magnitude of the wish, something as great as that must have demanded an equally great offering.

“What did he sacrifice?”

It is not my place to reveal the price paid to another Stone.

Nino had expected that answer.

“But he paid. And how can I sacrifice another life? Then why didn’t he simply decide to sacrifice me?”

Every wish is an exchange. A life can only be offered when the one making the wish possesses greater power than what is being exchanged.

“You mean the King was only able to exchange other lives because he had a more powerful Pulse than those he sacrificed? What exactly are the rules?”

Pulse. Mana. Current. Many names have been given to the Energy of Life. The rule is simple: the exchange must be equivalent, and only one wish may be made to each Stone. If you make a wish upon every Stone scattered throughout the world, then you may choose between the gift of immortality or the restoration of everything you have sacrificed.

Those words remained with him. The King had not received his power simply by finding a Stone. To offer other lives in exchange, his own Pulse had to surpass the value of what he gave. Nino still did not know who had been sacrificed, or how many lives had been required, but now he understood part of the price behind that power. And there was something even more disturbing: if the King found every Stone scattered throughout the world, he could recover everything he had sacrificed — or attain immortality. The choice he would make was obvious.

And now Nino stood before the same choice.

“I have two more questions. How did the Stones come into existence? And if I can’t erase his wish, how much would it cost to give me enough power to defeat him?”

The answer came without hesitation. Repeated.

The price would be equivalent to the power you seek. And knowledge of the Origin is granted only to the one who receives the gift of immortality.

“To hell with all this talk about immortality and origins.”

Silence.

Nino waited.

The question returned to his own mind with a clarity that unsettled him.

What do I need to sacrifice to gain enough power?

For a few moments, it made perfect sense. The King possessed four Colossi marching under his command. An army was approaching. If Nino could obtain something greater, he could defeat him. Perhaps he could end everything before Lumeris became another Elora, before more people were placed under that man’s control.

All he had to do was discover the price. Then he realized what he was doing.

The King had found the Stones and asked what he needed to give in order to obtain what he wanted. Faced with the same power, it had taken Nino only a few moments to formulate exactly the same question.

The silence that followed felt heavier.

“No. Forget what I asked.”

Your wish has not yet been made.

Nino closed his eyes, though in that place it made no difference to the darkness.

If he could ask for anything, perhaps the question should not be how much power he could extract from that Stone. Perhaps it should be what he could do with it.

And a face he knew only through his own hands appeared in his thoughts: Alicia.

She had crossed mountains clinging to his back, trusting the steps of someone who, when he first met her, had not even considered his own life important. She had walked through cities she knew only by their sounds, slept beneath skies she had never seen, and reached Lumeris guided by voices, hands, and the Pulse she perceived in a way no one understood.

That very day, she had found her mother.

Nino still remembered Alicia’s fingers tracing Raysa’s face, recognizing through touch what her eyes had never been able to show her. She had gotten Tenshi back. She had gotten her mother back. Before her stood the family she had crossed half the world searching for, and she still had to ask others what their faces looked like. And she had a dream she had once shared with him.

Throughout that entire journey, Alicia had never complained about her condition.

Nino opened his eyes to the darkness.

“I know what I want.”

It was as though the presence of the Stone drew closer.

What is your wish?

Nino told it.

The cold air of the chamber returned all at once.

Nino pulled his hand away from the Primordial Stone and took a deep breath. The violet flowing across the rock’s irregular surface faded, and the pale filaments within it slowly dimmed until they returned to their almost imperceptible movement.

Behind him, no one spoke.

Nino blinked.

He turned and found the Queen, the Prince, the guards, Raysa, Tenshi, Three, and Alicia. All of them were facing him.

Three had lost every trace of the smile that usually appeared whenever she wanted to hide her concern. Her eyes were fixed on Nino’s face. Tenshi’s lips were parted, and Raysa raised a hand to her mouth. Even the Queen stood motionless.

“What?” Nino asked.

Three took a step toward him.

“Nino…”

He realized where she was looking.

His left eye no longer held the same color as his right. The iris had lost its former hue and was now clouded by a pale, hazy gray. There was no wound, no blood, no scar. Only an eye that had been able to see seconds ago and was now empty.

Nino raised a hand to his face. Nothing changed when he covered his right eye.

Darkness.

“Nino?” Alicia called.

Her voice made everyone turn.

The girl was still wearing her blindfold. She could not see the expressions around her, but the silence had been enough to tell her something was wrong.

“What happened?”

Nino slowly lowered his hand. Before he could answer, Alicia reached for her blindfold.

“There’s something…”

She stopped. The fabric had loosened. The blindfold slipped through the strands of her blond hair and fell at her feet.

Alicia kept her eyes closed for a moment, accustomed to protecting them even when light had never meant anything to her. Then she opened them.

One remained as it had always been.

The other reacted to the light. Alicia immediately squeezed the eyelid shut and brought a hand to her face.

“Ah!”

Raysa stepped forward.

“Alicia!”

“Wait.”

The girl kept her hand raised. She opened the eye again, slowly this time.

The light made her blink repeatedly. Meaningless shapes appeared before her, patches that gradually gained outlines as her eye tried to understand something it had never needed to understand before. She turned her head, startled by how many things existed all at once.

Then she stopped in front of Tenshi.

He was crying. Alicia went still.

“Tenshi?”

The boy let out a short laugh through his tears.

“Yeah.”

She approached as though she still needed his voice to confirm it. Her gaze traveled over his dark hair, his face, his shoulders, then returned to his blue-gray eyes. Alicia touched his cheek.

“So that’s what you look like.”

Tenshi tried to answer, but his voice failed him. Alicia smiled and, before he could say anything, turned toward another presence she knew even better.

Raysa was already crying. Alicia stared at her.

For a few seconds, she did nothing. Then she brought both hands to her mother’s face and repeated the same gesture as before, tracing with her fingers the features she already knew through touch. Her forehead, her eyebrows, her cheeks. When she found the small scar she had noticed before, she stopped.

This time, she could see it.

“Mom…”

Raysa held her daughter’s hands.

“I’m here.”

Alicia laughed as tears began to fall.

“You’re beautiful.”

Raysa pulled her into her arms, and Tenshi joined them. Alicia kept looking at them even during the embrace, blinking through her tears as though closing that single eye for more than a second might make her lose something.

Nino watched in silence.

Then Alicia raised her head.

She searched among the faces around her until she found Three. She stared at her for a few seconds and smiled, as though something about the woman’s appearance matched exactly what she had imagined.

Then she searched again. Until she found Nino. Her smile disappeared.

She slowly pulled away from her mother.

Nino remained still as Alicia walked toward him. For the first time since he had met her, she did not guide herself by the sound of his footsteps, the direction of his voice, or the sensation of his Pulse. She simply walked while looking directly at him.

Nino lowered himself in front of her. Alicia stopped before him.

Her single seeing eye traveled over his hair, his face, and the marks left by everything they had been through together. Finally, it found his eyes and remained there, staring at the difference between them.

Nino understood that she had noticed.

Alicia raised her hand and touched the left side of his face.

“Your eye…”

Nino held her hand.

“It’s all right.”

Alicia’s eyes filled again.

“Was it you?”

He did not answer. He did not need to.

Alicia looked at Nino’s clouded eye, then at everyone around them. Three turned her face away for a moment. Raysa pressed her lips together, trying to hold back her tears. Tenshi remained motionless beside his mother.

When Alicia looked at him again, tears were already streaming freely down her face.

“Why?”

Nino looked at her. At that single eye that could now see him.

The girl had recognized him as her Hero when he still believed himself to be nothing more than a weapon. She had trusted him before he himself understood why anyone should. And now, after crossing half the world beside him, she could finally see the face of the man whose name she herself had given him.

Nino smiled.

“Because you wanted to see the world.”

Alicia tried to say something, but could not. Then she threw herself into his arms.

Nino caught her and sat down on the floor with her in his arms. Alicia buried her face in his shoulder, crying, while he ran a hand through her hair.

“Thank you…” she managed to say.

Nino closed the eye that could still see.

“I’m glad you finally achieved your dream.”

Alicia tightened her arms around him. For a few seconds, no one in the chamber said anything.

The Queen was the one who finally broke the silence.

“When I allowed you to touch the Stone, I imagined you would ask for enough strength to destroy an army.”

Nino opened his eye.

The Queen watched them both.

“Perhaps enough power to face the King. Perhaps something that would give Lumeris a chance against what is coming for us.” Her gaze passed over Nino’s clouded eye before settling on Alicia. “You used something my family has protected for generations, something capable of altering the fate of nations… to give a child her sight.”

Nino continued holding Alicia.

“Yes.”

The Queen looked at the girl crying in his arms. Then a small, weary smile appeared on her face.

“Perhaps that was the most futile wish anyone has ever made with such power.”

Three raised an eyebrow. The Queen continued:

“And perhaps the most honorable.”

Her gaze then shifted beyond Nino.

The second Primordial Stone remained protected behind the other door, untouched for generations.

The smile disappeared.

“Even so, I will not allow you to touch the other one.”

Nino did not even have time to answer.

THUMP.

The ground shook throughout the entire kingdom.