The Citadel of Eternal Light and my Palace of Moonlight were directly across from each other. As a child, I used to flit between
them in the blink of an eye.
Now, I crawled from dawn until dusk and still had not reached home.
The journey was so long, so agonizing, it brought back a millennium of torment.
At the end of the first century, Aurelius had sent a phantom projection of himself to me.
He had asked, his voice cold and remote, “Rhea, have you learned your lesson?”
At the time, I was fighting for my life every day, battling various demons to protect my virtue, my body covered in wounds. Outrage
and grief churned within me.
“I did nothing wrong!” I had shouted. And it was true. I had never intended to harm Lyra. It was all a charade she had orchestrated.
Aurelius had sneered. “It seems your life is still too comfortable.”
“I suppose you are of phoenix blood. Even with your powers stripped by the Spire, you still have your phoenix bones to protect you. You must be living as you please among the mortals, knowing nothing of hardship.”
He had pointed a finger, and a bolt of lightning shattered my phoenix bones. I screamed in agony as the last of my defenses crumb-
led.
After his projection vanished, the demons lurking in the shadows emerged. They took advantage of my grievous injuries, my utter
helplessness, and defiled me.
They laughed, their voices grating. “A Celestial, as expected. The taste is truly… exquisite.”
“A delicacy delivered by the Crown Prince himself. How could we not partake?”
I cried until I had no tears left, but I was powerless to stop them.
At the end of the third century, Aurelius’s phantom appeared again. He saw me adorned in fine silks and jeweled hairpins and was
incandescent with rage.
“I sentenced you to self–reflection, and instead you’ve made a fine life for yourself!”
He didn’t know that I had been captured by the brothel matron, dressed in finery, and forced to entertain clients every day.
bolt of lightning struck With
tiel tail feathers
the
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core of my being–shattered. I was the last Rainbow Phoenix in existence. With each lost feather, I moved closer to oblivion. When
all seven were gone, I would simply cease to be.
At the end of the fifth century, the moment Aurelius appeared, I fell to my knees and confessed. I lied, admitting to everything,
begging him to stop punishing me, to let me return.
But he only laughed coldly. “A little late for regrets, isn’t it? It is Lyra’s misfortune to have a sister like you.”
He shattered another of my feathers, for my “own good.”
My heart died then. The light in my eyes went out.
After that, I learned. When his phantom appeared again, I pretended not to see him. Aurelius, thinking something was amiss, never
came back.
And so he never knew. I had not been living out ten mortal lifetimes. I had spent a thousand years in the Abyss of Lost Souls.
3
The Palace of Moonlight had been empty for a millennium, draped in dust and decay. But still, a flicker of excitement rose in me. A
thousand years,
and I was finally home.
But just as I reached the threshold, the world went black, and I passed out.
