Sentinel

Epilogue - Bring it on

Dedicated to Curader, because screw you I told you I'd finish it. 

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Epilogue - Bring it on

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Skye emerged blinking into the fading sunlight over the Wasteland.

The Citadel loomed behind her, its shadow half-cast over her figure, but she wasn’t afraid of it or the coming night for the first time since she’d become a Sentinel.

She opened her palm in front of her, wanting to see the emerald light to coat her fingers and flicker around her skin. When it didn’t come, she tried again with the same result.

Kiarae approached behind her, laying a gentle hand on her shoulder. “Though Radiance may have destroyed that which bound nature, the deity is still in a spelled hibernation.”

“Nothing like this has happened before, has it?” asked Skye, closing her fingers into a fist. “How would you know?”

“Such things were often theorized. There is evidence of deities that no longer exist, ether that cannot be restricted to the five elements and other anomalies.”

“So how do we wake it?”

Kiarae slipped her hand over Taldorei’s Light, curving her hand around a small stone.

“The Opal, Skye. When I add my own element to it, it will become what Kumos and Anton wanted it to be -- a direct link to the Nether Realm. We can, and will use it with five keystones to open a portal to the Nether and revive the deity, and we must be swift about it. This realm will not survive long without nature influencing the cycle.”

Kiarae replaced the Opal in her staff, its presence only noticeable to Skye because she’d seen where her teacher had put it.

I can already feel it, Skye thought, staring at her hand. Nature is dying, and its last remnants are within that stone.

Movement caught her attention, and she glanced up to see Tayne’s hand waving at her, beckoning her over. Skye moved towards him, Kiarae’s soft steps following behind her.

“Wrain’s stretcher is going to need another boost before we start moving. It’s fading faster than it was before,” said Tayne.

“I can walk. I’ll be fine,” growled Wrain. “I don’t need you to coddle me, I’ve been healed.”

Tayne started to reply but was cut off by Kiarae. She knelt down beside Wrain and poked him in the chest. “You are most certainly not fine, Silverborn. You will remain as I tell you to until I inform you that you no longer have to. Am I understood?” Though her words were stern, there was something tender about them that tilted Skye’s head.

As Wrain compiled a list of arguments as to why he was fine and Kiarae rebutted them all, Tayne pulled Skye to the side.

“Are you okay?” he asked. “I know we all just kind of assumed it, but no one actually asked you if you were. Is the deity...pushing you as the nature one was?”

Skye shook her head. “It’s not a deity, but no. Radiance... isn’t like the nature deity.”

“Is that a good thing?” asked Tayne.

She considered it a moment. “I’m not sure yet.”

Tayne tilted his head, looking at her. Under the fading light of sunset, she caught a glimpse of something on his forehead.

Skye reached up, brushing the unexpected mark with her thumb. Tayne seemed startled by the sudden contact, but he didn’t resist, merely raised an eyebrow as she stroked it.