The Umbral Messiah Pt. 16

"Indeed," Charlotte said. Then she laughed. "Of course, if they see me..."

Her black hand gestured along her body. While she was clad in her finest silk dress, tailored for her new form, it did nothing to hide her ebony black skin, her pale white hair, her multiple eyes, her multiple arms.

Tanner grinned at her. "I kinda like it," she said, playfully.

"You've proved that often enough," Charlotte crooned back. Her lower hand reached down, where no one else could see, and caressed the bulge in Tanner's leggings. The lady now known as the Rebis Knight of Shandil laughed and blushed and squirmed, looking aside.

The two of them started off the wall after surveying the work some more. They came to where more peaceful, more hopeful construction was underway. Men and women of every race were at work rebuilding homes, or sifting through the loot of the Undead Army. That was a harder task than it seemed, as much of the magical items and resources that the Undead Army had left behind was booby trapped or cursed. And so, chests that had been scried out as being too dangerous to move, let alone open, had been left where they lay when the army itself had...dissolved. Charlotte smiled wanly, remembering the stories she had heard when she had emerged from the Chanti ruins.

The 'whole army' had simply laid down and died. Their souls drawn upwards, to the new realm of the Dead, what some wags were calling 'heaven', but most had decided to simply term the Aether. Some days, when the moon was bright and the clouds were clear in the sky, you could see the spirits up there, twinkling as new lights in the sky, drifting between earth and the stars. In great, ribinous masses, they formed gold and blue and orange delights that reminded Charlotte of tales of the Northern Lights. Well, now, the Southlands had their very own lights - and those lights would shine evermore.

Charlotte sighed, quietly.

"What's wrong?" Tanner asked.

"I know...I shouldn't still be so sorrowful. She died to save Ranna...and, heavens know, we'd have all tied many times over if it hadn't been for that succubus," Charlotte said, shaking her head. "But I miss Sari."

Tanner slid her arm around her lover's shoulder.

They had been visited by Ranna during the last month. The demon kingdom - called by everyone Hell, despite the fact that every demon claimed it was quite nice - had been firmly established with 'only a minor bashing of a few heads' according to Ranna. Am Shegar ruled down there, having firmly broken the Wheel that he had been trapped within. There were rumors that some of the mountain-locked Free Cities had already dug deeply enough to make contact with the demons. What would be born of the strange fruit that mortal cities and demon kingdoms making contact? Charlotte could not say. She wasn't sure if it excited her or terrified her.

Tanner's voice was soft. "We will remember her."

The two of them came to the very thing.

In the center of the most burnt out part of town, where work was being thrown into crafting a place that everyone in Shandil could enjoy - a community center. Sari had pushed for it...and as she was the daughter of Lord Menelag and the woman who had, according to everyone who had witnessed it, destroyed an entire undead army through a single magical spell (and Charlotte had tied of explaining the significantly more complex real story by now), she had gotten what she had wished. Greenery was being planted and new places for the greenery was being carved out. A fountain was being constructed, pipes already being laid by the best and most experienced engineers in Shandil.

And there, in the heart of the garden, was a plinth. Standing on it was the crude likeness of a human woman, with a tail and horns, a sword at her hip, and a staff in her hand. The stonemason who was carving it was working off descriptions, but as Charlotte had used her illusion magics to summon a perfect image of Sari from her mind, she knew that the statue would look just like her. She and Tanner looked at the statue, and Charlotte sighed, sadly.

"I worry once it's done, this statue will just make me want to avoid this park," she said, softly.

"Oh, it won't," Tanner said, quietly. "You'll come here to read and to give lectures to other apprentices." She flashed a grin. "And maybe to indulge yourself with your overworked wife."

Charlotte giggled.

As if on cue, several children, spotted Charlotte, started to run forward. They clamored, excitedly. "Tell us a story, tell us a story!"

There were many orphans in Shandil these days. Charlotte had set aside a not inconsiderable portion of the city's gold to give these orphans a shot at a better life, and more than a few families had stepped forward to take many in. But despite that, they still had need of a motherly figure - and Charlotte had taken to reading to them when the days were bright and shining, as they seemed to be quite often as the year ground forward through its cycles. Charlotte laughed as the children bounced around her.

"Fine, fine," She said, walking with them to one of the finished benches. Workmen stepped past them, flashing a smile as they saw the children, and Charlotte used her magic to summon one of her books from her library, the spell causing the book to appear between her palms. She smiled as she looked down at the assorted fairy tales and legends that the children oh so loved to hear from. She did wonder at how violent and bloody most of them were...but, well, these children did live in the Shattered World. It was a violent and bloody place much of the time.

She opened her mouth to begin reading when one of the children exclaimed.

"Shooting star! Shooting star!" He pointed. Charlotte lifted her eyes.

"Why so it is," she said. "Odd to see one during the day."

The shooting star, in fact, was not dimming at the termination of its trailing arc. If anything, it was getting brighter. Tanner, who had been looking up with a smile, started to frown. "I'm not sure that's a shooting star," she said, quietly.

"Neither am-" Charlotte cut herself off as the shooting star grew more and more. It was screaming straight at them. She shouted to the children. "Get down! Down flat!" she said, lifting her hand up. A glowing field of energy snapped to life around her, a sanctuary from the rushing star, while workmen ran for cover with screams and yells. They all knew what to do when something hurtled down from the sky - taught by firm experience during the siege. The star grew brighter and larger and Charlotte swore it would land directly on top of her.

Instead, cruelty of cruelty, the star crashed directly into the statue to the fallen Sari. The marble, bought at such expense, exploded into a spray of fragments and chips and smoke. A single arm flew off to the right, while the marble sword corkscrewed through the air then shattered against the wall of a barely repaired building. Smoke bloomed outwards and the children cried out in fear and confused shock. Charlotte lowered her hand as the energy field she had created shimmered into nothingness once more.

She walked with Tanner to the crater, shaking her head as she did so.

"No, no, no, do you know how expensive that marble was?" She groaned.

"But, on the upside, you've always wanted to...to..." Tanner trailed off. Charlotte had been just thinking that: At least she'd get to examine what a meteorite, the arcanist term for a shooting star, actually was. No one had ever found one intact, as they were rare enough in the world. But then all thoughts vanished as the smoke fully cleared.

Laying in the crater, naked as the day she had been born...was Sari.

She groaned.

Sat up.

Stretched.

She blinked up at Charlotte and Tanner.

"Hey," she said, grinning as she stood.

"Sari!?" Tanner exclaimed, while Charlotte flung herself down the crater, then threw her arms around the other woman. She squeezed to tightly that Sari let out a wheeze of escaping air. Her arms flailed, and she laughed as Charlotte drew away, babbling.

"How the- why the- did you- what the-" she stammered.

"Whoa, whoa, slow down," Sari said, grinning. Her skin was human hued and her eyes were the same smoky color they had been when she had been showing her human self. She blushed and covered her breasts with one arm and her crotch with her hand. "I...was sleeping up there. Among the Dead." She nodded up to the heavens. "And I..." She paused. "I got bored."

The two other women blinked at her.

"You just decided to come back?" Charlotte stammered.

"Yeah," Sari said.

Charlotte started to pace back and forth. "We've seen a marked uptick in the number of shooting stars. Most have fallen into the wilderness. But it's possible, entirely possible, that those stars...what if they're all like you? What if?" She asked, excitement bubbling inside of her. "What if some people after they die can just choose to come back now? Out of boredom? Or a need to deal with unfinished business? What does that mean for the world? For...for inheritance, for kingship, for land ownership? For war?"

Sari blinked at her.

Then she grinned. "Can I get pants first?" she asked.

"Oh, definitely," Charlotte said, laughing. She called out. "Can someone get clothes for the Lady Sari?"

People hurried off to follow her orders, while Charlotte and Sari kissed. Sari moaned, gently, then pulled back. Her voice was amused.

"To answer all of those questions, Charlotte," she said, her voice amused. "That's...part of why I came back, I think." She licked her lips, slightly. "I built a whole new world with you. I kind of wanted to see it, a little." She smirked, slightly. "Now, if we ever meet the Corpse King down here - in some new body, like as not - we have to make sure we tease her for getting bored of her paradise so quickly."

A worker returned, carrying some crude workclothes. Sari began to tug them on, how little they fit her.

Charlotte helped her out. Tanner slid her arm around her back, laughing.

And the three stepped away from the smoldering crater. It would be filled in and the statue would be fixed - or not.

They walked together, to Lady Menelag's manor house. To celebrate the return of old friends. To celebrate the possibilities of a world remake.

To see what the next prophecy might be.

THE END