ADIRA’S LAST GAMBIT
ADIRA’S LAST GAMBIT
POV: Adira
The Moon Temple is gone, but I still see it when I close my eyes.
White columns, silver flame, hymns that promised crowns if I bent low enough. All ash now. Ash and her.
Araya.
She stole everything. The wolves’ loyalty. The prophecy. Even the gods look at her fire like it’s scripture. And me? I’m left with nothing but Erik’s whisper in my blood and the child inside me my last coin, my last crown.
I press a hand to the swell. You were supposed to be mine. The roots stir beneath my feet, answering his promise. Not alone. Not yet.
Then the fire flares on the ridge.
She’s here.
Araya.
\---
POV: Araya
She looks thinner than before, but her eyes are blades. Adira stands in the ruined courtyard, belly rounded, hands trembling as if she’s holding the world wrong.
“Araya,” she spits. “You ruined everything.”
Nyxara prowls in my skull, unimpressed. She ruined nothing. She revealed rot. Burn her roots, not her ribs.
“Go home, Adira,” I say, though we both know there’s no home left. “The fight isn’t with you.”
“It is always with me!” Her voice breaks. “You stole my pack, my prophecy, my goddess. You think the child is yours too? He is mine!”
The ground answers before I can. Roots writhe up her ankles and wrists, coiling like jewellery eager to bite. Erik’s shadow rises in them, his voice silk over thorns:
“Claim her, Adira. Claim what she stole. The child will be my vessel. Your blood will make him law.”
Her eyes shine, desperate. “Yes. Yes, I’ll”-
\---
POV: Adira
The roots tighten, hot with Erik’s power. Strength floods me, filling the hollowness I’ve carried since the Temple burned. I feel tall again, vast, a priestess.
“I’ll bind her,” I promise. “I’ll cut her from the world like a tumour.”
The unborn shifts inside me, restless. My hands press down, trying to soothe, but the child writhes as if the roots are poison.
“No,” I hiss. “You’re mine. You’ll be his. You’ll make us holy again.”
The courtyard shakes. Roots spread, choking stone.
Araya lifts her blade, Hollowflame burning bright but I see her hesitate. She looks at my belly.
“Coward,” I laugh, half sobbing. “You won’t risk the child. That’s why I win.”
\---
POV: Araya
Her smile is cracked glass. Roots flare green, reaching for me, Erik thickening the air.
“You won’t touch him,” she hisses.
“No,” I agree. “But I’ll touch you.”
Hollowflame erupts—thin, precise threads. I slice the roots reaching for me, cauterising each with ruthless care. Erik snarls in the hiss of sap.
Adira screams, lashing out. Roots spear for my chest. I burn them midair, ash falling like snow.
“Stop fighting me!” she shrieks. “We could have ruled together!”
Nyxara laughs darkly. She never wanted to share. Burn the lie.
Then the seam shivers. The pulse booms. The air chills.
Something else arrives.
\---
POV: Erik
He rises half-formed through Adira roots cracking stone, eyes glimmering with green fire. His voice is a storm under her skin.
“Burn her, my vessel. Burn her in my name.”
The child kicks hard. A ripple of Hollowflame, not hers, not mine, spills from Adira’s belly. The roots recoil, smoking.
Erik snarls, shocked. “What ”
And then the void hand appears.
\---
POV: Nytheria
She manifests only in part: a hand blacker than shadow, woven with threads of night, stretching down through the seam. Behind it, a face flickers half-formed, galaxies turning where hair should be.
Her whisper rattles teeth:
“Children of chains, you play at crowns. Not yet.”
The void hand brushes Adira’s cheek. She freezes, wide-eyed.
“Mine,” Erik growls, trying to coil tighter.
“Not yours,” Nytheria answers, soft as knives.
The unborn wails a cry that pierces the battlefield though no lungs should yet be strong enough.
\---
POV: Araya
The sound stops me cold.
The child lives. He resists. He burns.
Adira’s eyes widen as roots recoil from her belly, hissing into ash. Hollowflame flares there pure, untainted. Cleansing.
“No!” she shrieks, clawing at her skin. “He’s mine! He’s mine!”
The void hand closes on her shoulder. Her body stiffens, convulses.
Nyxara’s voice is low, merciless. Incinerate her. Leave the child. Do it now.
I raise my blade.
Adira’s scream twists into a hymn gone wrong. Erik howls through her throat. Roots lash wild, striking wolves, tearing stone. The void face leans closer, unfinished, unreadable.
I breathe once. Then I burn her.
\---
POV: Adira
Fire eats me alive. Not just flesh memory, prayer, or vow. Hollowflame unthreads me, peeling back all the careful lies I wrapped around my bones.
Roots scream as they blacken. Erik’s voice cuts out.
My last sight is the child, wreathed in silver flame, untouched.
Mine, I try to whisper. The word never leaves.
Ash scatters.
\---
POV: Araya
She is gone.
Only ash drifted where Adira stood, her scream echoing in stone. The roots shrivel to dust. Erik’s presence fades with them, furious, thwarted.
And the child, small and fragile, wails from the centre of Hollowflame. Not burned. Cleansed.
I kneel, trembling, and lift him from the fire. His skin glows faintly, silver and gold. His cry rattles the ridge like prophecy no one wanted but everyone needed.
The void hand hovers a moment longer, brushing the air above his brow. A half-face flickers: Nytheria, not whole, not kind, but watching.
“Not yet,” she whispers.
Then she withdraws. The seam narrows to a thread.
The courtyard falls silent.
The wolves kneel not to me, not to flame, not to gods. To the wailing child who has survived.
And I hold him, ash streaking my arms, heart hammering, knowing everything has changed again.