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[Rough Draft] Chapter 30: A Descendant of Isbrand
“Give back—Viktor’s heart?” Carina echoed numbly as the dark-winged god loomed towards them. She pressed a hand to her chest as if that could suppress the feeling of Kirsi scratching to get out. “And how exactly—do I do that—without dying?”
“The transition requires your willing sacrifice,” the god Veles replied without a glimmer of remorse. “You have already been granted countless lives, Kirsi, far more than any mortal should dare to experience. If you maintain this foolish, selfish hold on Viktor’s last chance—you will both be reduced to nothing.”
‘What?’
“I have only lived one other life—a life where my heart was cut from my chest—” Carina snapped back, anger and tears burning against the back of her throat as she met Veles’s morbid red eyes. “And you want me to—just—” Her breath caught as her fingers dug into the fabric of her dress above the cold, numb, yet beating heart that kept her alive in this world. “Die—just like that?”
“You are mortal. Death is inevitable.”
“Haa—” Carina stumbled back and found Beaumont’s solid armor behind her. His arm wrapped across Carina, and the warmth it gave eased the panic swelling up in her chest.
“It has to be her choice, Veles. So back off,” Beaumont said, with far too much confidence and authority.
“I cannot reverse time if you die in this life, Kirsi,” Veles continued, his narrowed eyes still locked onto Carina. “I cannot stop the inevitable any longer. I have saved you countless times. Arachne has brought you back every time I failed, but the Isbrand line has run dry. Even this half-blood was barely enough to contain you. Viktor granted you that heart to save your life—the least you could do is return it to him now to save his. Or must both of you perish to fulfill your grudge against the gods?”
Carina felt as if she were drowning beneath the god’s words. Knowledge, Kirsi’s knowledge burned through with sharp clarity as the infant screaming in her ears dulled to a faint distant wail.
***
A child of perhaps ten years with dark raven hair and a crown of frost stood defiantly before a vision of fire, destruction, and immortality. Kirsi did not waver as she gathered Viktor’s power in the form of a glowing cold spear that she quickly hurled towards Kritanta’s chest. Waves of raging fire crashed against the small ice witch, but the spear flew true, finding its mark in Kritanta’s armor as the Goddess of fire staggered back a step.
The desert around them was a sea of witches battling in a torrent of snow, ice, fire, and brimstone. Kritanta’s army had her ferocity and seemingly unlimited power, but Kirsi led the last of her mother’s coven, the legendary Isbrand Immortals. Descendants of the First Isbrand Queen, a pure-blood line of ancient magic that quickly turned the tide against the fire witches’ countless numbers.
Another spear appeared in Kirsi’s hands even as she slid beneath the whip-like torrent of Kritanta’s dark flames. She kicked her foot against a chunk of molten sand, launching herself into the air as she brought the spear down through another whirlwind of fire, past Kritanta’s raised arms, into the Goddess’s cracked chest armor.
“No!” Kritanta screamed as she tried to rip the spear free. Ice magic fused the weapon to her body as Kirsi locked the Goddess’s arms to the earth with shackles of ice. Hellish flames raged over the trapped immortal’s body. The chains and spear that bound Kritanta quivered beneath her furry.
“Minerva!” Kirsi begged as the first chain snapped free.
The earth quivered. Then dark green roots rose and fastened about Kritanta’s burning form. They burned, withered, and died, but still, the earth continued to attack, pull, and restrain the Goddess’s desperate struggles until Kirtanta lay entombed in a mound of molten sand that bound her limbs and sealed away her magic.
“It’s over, Kritanta!” Kirsi shouted as she stood trembling above the Goddess’s trapped body. “Give me back Viktor’s heart!”
“You despicable—mortal piece of shit!” Kritanta snarled. “If I have Viktor’s heart—if I had the heart of two gods—then how is it possible that I would lose to an insignificant spark like you?”
“Spare me your words of deception!” Kirsi snarled back, her young face twisted with rage. “If you won’t give it to me—then I’ll rip it from your chest myself!”
“You foolish waste of a god’s excrement! When will you realize Viktor is just using you for his revenge!”
“Of course, I’m here for revenge,” Krisi snapped back, a dagger forming in her free hand. “I want you dead for all the Isbrand witches you’ve killed over the years to extend your own immortality!” She stabbed the frozen dagger into Kritanta’s chest and flinched as the Goddess of Fire laughed. The malicious mirth resounded across the battlefield of fire witches fleeing back through the desert.
“Open my chest and see for yourself,” Kritanta taunted. “See who is lying to you, Isbrand Queen.”
Kirsi blinked, then dug her dagger in further as she pried the hardened surface of Kritanta’s chest armor open and found only a single blazing, pulsating organ within.
“What—”
Black fire exploded out from Kritanta’s chest, ripping away the roots and ice shackles as it hurtled Kirsi through the air. The ice witch crashed and rolled through a bloody mess of crimson sand and fallen witches.
“Yes, I tried to steal Viktor’s heart. But, Minerva, Creatrix, stopped us,” Kritanta snarled as she straightened and rose to her feet. “So I settled for the heart of Viktor’s half-mortal daughter. Who would have thought her death would have driven him to madness. He sacrificed everything to try and bring her back. His magic, his precious immortal, Isbrand coven, even his own frozen heart.”
Thunder rumbled above the clouds as Kirsi rolled slowly to her feet to face the fiery Goddess.
“The balance between the gods was broken by Viktor’s selfish desire to bring back the only mortal he ever loved,” Kritanta snarled as she circled the ice witch. “Of course, Arachne took advantage of his obsession to twist you both to her will. Meanwhile, Veles and I are forced to walk a fine line between Arachne’s perversions, Minerva’s selflessness, and Ramiel’s wrath. But soon enough—Viktor will have no choice. He can either take back his heart—or watch you perish with him.”
Kirsi laughed. “You had me going there for a minute, I admit, but you contradict yourself, Kritanta. Ramiel does not involve himself in the affairs of mortals.”
“He does where you’re concerned, Kirsi,” Kritanta replied with a merciless grin. “After all, Ramiel can’t stand the sight of you. The product of a union between a mortal and immortal, possessing the heart of a god. How could he tolerate such an abomination?”
“Ramiel can kiss my half-immortal ass.”
Kritanta’s lips stretched over a fanged smile as thunder rumbled overhead. “You have another choice, Kirsi. You could take Viktor’s place, after all—you are the direct descendant of the Isbrand Witch—you’re practically Viktor’s heir.”
Kirsi scowled and quickly summoned another spear to her hand. “You delay me with these useless lies and temptations. I do not know where you hid Viktor’s heart—but I will find out after I’ve smothered yours into dust.”
“Bold words for a half-mortal,” Kritanta snarled.
“Don’t worry, I’ll be sure to send your half-mortal consorts into the underworld to keep you company,” Krisi added with a cold smile. The spear beneath her small fist flickered and flashed with power as the ice witch dance and hurtled towards the Fire Goddess, who was already backing away with a smile.
“Too late,” Kritanta taunted.
Kirsi frowned, then her vision went white as pain surged coursed through her body seconds before she was slammed into the sand. Electricity sparked and curled around her limp body. The ice spear in Kirsi’s hand cracked and dissolved into vapor. Magic burned down her spine and clawed beneath her skull to her brain, moments before Kirsi was flipped over to stare up into the angry, golden gaze of Ramiel.
“Are you not going to finish her, Sator?”
Ramiel’s gaze snapped towards Kritanta as he raised his fist. A beam of golden light crackled from his palm and hurtled the Goddess of Fire across the desert. The God of Lightning curled his lips in disgust as he refocused on Kirsi’s child form.
“My children have sinned, but I am not without mercy. You will return that heart to Viktor, Isbrand Witch. Or I will ensure that you regret every minute of your pathetic mortal existence.”
The spear of lightning that rippled in his hand reflected against Kirsi’s ice-blue eyes as she spat up blood and sneered back at the God of Gods. “Hypocrite,” she wheezed before Ramiel’s decimating retribution snuffed out her second life.
***
A field of snow and a ten-year-old Kirsi waited for Carian when she opened her eyes again. The young Scarlet Witch sat on a broken throne with the frost crown balanced on her open palm.
“So, you’ve come to the beginning,” Kirsi murmured as she dropped and spun the crown around her wrist. “I suppose it’s a good a place as any to start. This is where my hatred for the gods began after all.”
“Your—hatred?” Carina echoed as she gazed about the endless white landscape and felt a moment of déjà vu in her chest.
“Since birth, I was nothing but a tool for the gods,” Kirsi replied bitterly. “No matter which path I take, or which life I’m given, they always find me, manipulate me, offer me something to love or hope for and then shatter it before my eyes. Always, the same selfish request followed by the same bloody conclusion, death. I either die again to be reborn, or I give Viktor back his heart—and die for good.”
“And you choose to live—each time?”
“Well—” Kirsi offered her a weak smile, “—some lives were ended before I could make that choice, but my resolution has not wavered.” The raven-haired child raised her ice-blue eyes to Carina as ice witch’s expression hardened. “The gods do not care about us. The only time we even spark their interest is when we contain enough power to survive and thrive without them—,” her fingers tightened around the crown once more,”—and then they quickly stomp us back down into the dirt.”
Carina flinched as the crown shattered. The frail translucent shards sprinkling across the snow as Krisi flexed her hand and sighed.
“Every time I opened my eyes, I was on the run, from the gods or Ramiel’s Saints. It wasn’t until I faced the Second Saint that I realized that my memories and time itself were being manipulated. That overinflated pig always greeted me with the same sappy line.” Kirsi raised her fingers into the air and formed quotations, “The only good witch is a dead witch!” She lowered her hands with a sneer. “Prudish boring bastard. A true sadist, if you ask me. All those damn relics he invented to help control and subdue pure-bloods. It didn’t matter who they were, whether they were young, old, criminals, victims, or just innocent nobodies. He burned them all and called it Ramiel’s will. I’m pretty sure even Ramiel was grateful when I finally put that vulgarian back into the ground where he belonged. Only took me three bloody lives to do it.”
Carina stood wordlessly, perplexed by this vision—‘or was it a dream’—she now found herself trapped in.
“You’re unconscious, but you’ll wake up soon,” Kirsi muttered, apparently able to read Carina’s mind. “Not that I blame you. Ramiel definitely delivered the most painful death by far. Probably too much pain for someone who spent the last eight years not feeling so much as a papercut.”
“I see—” Carina turned and, finding a rock close by, moved over to sit on it. “You said you hate the gods—all of them?”
“Well, I suppose Minerva wasn’t so bad,” Krisi said reluctantly. “But then, she most the most nurturing of the lot—until she died.”
“So, gods can die?”
Kirsi huffed and shrugged. “I suppose they can. Seems like it’s only when they want too though.”
“And Viktor?”
“What about him?” Kirsi growled.
“Do you hate him too?”
The ten-year-old ice witch stared at Carina for a long hard moment before replying, “I feel nothing for him.”
Carina blinked and nodded slowly.
“No—to be perfectly frank,” Kirsi said, rising suddenly to her feet. “I wish Viktor would just die already.”
Carina’s eyes widened, but before she could question Kirsi’s words, the Isbrand witch continued.
“I can’t even begin to tap into the powers his heart gave me while his soul is still draining away at the core. With him gone, I’ll finally be strong enough to face any of them—all of them—and then I’ll finally have my revenge.”
“You want to—become a god!?”
Kirsi’s ice-blue eyes narrowed in on Carina as she walked steadily closer. “Well, I’ve come closer this time than I have before—Viktor’s on his last leg, and you’ve shown me where the remnants of his soul are hidden. But again—as we’ve discussed—it’s a bit tricky to kill a god.” The child’s ice-cold hands clasped Carina’s cheeks as Kirsi bent over until their eyes were level. “So be a good little soul shard and convince dear old Vik to let go and give us what we need.”