Ashiyn crossed his arms. He considered it. Having a healing ghost following them might be useful. “Did you find anything out while we were gone?”
“There is only one way to defeat Sihtaar, my lord,” Sia said, his voice low as he beckoned Ashiyn away from Soryn.
Ashiyn followed the ghost across the library with a frown. He had to dodge stacks of books that the ghost just hovered right through. “Well, defeat is the wrong word. Sihtaar can only be contained. Soryn must make a portal to the world in between and the two of you must battle him there.” Sia said as he summoned a book to the air in front of them and flipped pages to show Ashiyn depictions of a great battle with the god-dragon. “When he is weakened, you must retreat and trap him there.”
“There is something you are not telling me.” Ashiyn grabbed the book and flipped the pages. The drawings depicted a celestial locked in battle forever with Sihtaar. “Soryn has to stay there and fight him forever?” Ashiyn slammed the book shut and threw it at the ghost. “No!”
Sia scowled as the book went through his ghostly form, then shook a finger at Ashiyn. “It is the only way.”
“It is the only way they tried that worked. That doesn’t mean they tried everything.” Ashiyn glanced back at Soryn sleeping on the desk. “I won’t sacrifice him. That was the point of this entire apocalypse. I caused it to save his life.”
Sia floated in silence with a thoughtful look on his face. It took him a few moments to respond. “You love him. Finally, you understand the pain you have caused so many others. You will have to sacrifice the only thing that is important to you to save the world.”
“I will not. I’m not an unselfish hero. The world can burn as far as I care. They deserve to die. All of them,” Ashiyn snarled.
“So, what will you do then? You will go hide in your castle with Soryn until the god-dragon devours the entire world and comes for you? Then what? Sihtaar won’t spare you, even if you feed him every other soul here. You might be eternal, but I promise you our world is not immortal. It can be damaged, and it can die,” Sia scolded, his ethereal arms crossed. “It will be very awkward for you to try to survive in a dragon’s belly on a dead world, and Soryn does not have the form of immortality that would allow him to join you there.”
“Then the world had better hope that you find a different way before Sihtaar devours everything,” Ashiyn spat. He turned and stalked over to pick Soryn up, then without another word to Sia, he used his magic to teleport them back to the castle. The effort cost him, and he instantly felt exhausted from overusing so much magic in such a short time.
Ashiyn carried Soryn into his bed chambers and laid Soryn on the bed. He ordered the Nthir to fix a meal, they weren’t quite as good at it as Soryn was, but they’d make something. Then he sat down on the bed next to Soryn and waited for his friend to wake up.
CHAPTER FIFTY
Ashiyn paced the room. Soryn still slept on the bed nearby. Three days had passed, and Soryn had not regained consciousness. After the first day, Ashiyn had retreated to his library and scoured it for some solution to the god-dragon’s destruction that did not involve trapping his only friend for eternity in an exhaustive, dangerous battle. No solutions presented themselves in his research. The silence from Sia meant the ghost had not found anything either.
It took Ashiyn a while to realize he was being watched. He turned to the bed to find Soryn’s dark gaze locked on him. Soryn lay there on the bed still in tattered clothing that revealed his thin frame. His majestic wings had faded from sight leaving Soryn looking more like a battered mortal. “There is food. You should eat. It has been three days,” Ashiyn said, as he gestured to the tray next to the bed.
Soryn glanced disinterestedly at the food. Then he sat up. The movement was slow and clearly painful, but he managed to sit on the edge of the bed. “You shouldn’t concern yourself so much. I have the magic of the celestials. I draw sustenance from the universe itself. I won’t die from starvation. Besides your Nthir are terrible cooks.”
Ashiyn stopped his pacing to watch Soryn. He did not care for the emotions trying to rage through him. Fear, panic, despair. These were not things he allowed himself to feel. His lips curled into a scowl as he fought them off. He should not care so much about Soryn either. “You have been through much because you are at my side. Perhaps we should part ways.”
First shock crossed Soryn’s face, then devastation. “You are going to send me away? That is your attempt to protect me? There is nowhere I would rather be than at your side.”
Ashiyn turned away and stormed to the window. He crossed his arms and stared out at the dark sky as clouds crossed the moon and blocked its light. “They tortured you to hurt me, Soryn. It is too dangerous to be my friend. You need to go and hide until I find a way to destroy Sihtaar.”
Soryn rose from the bed, though he wobbled a bit, clearly still weak from his ordeal. He gripped the nearest post on the bed to hold himself up as he narrowed his eyes. “I will not run and hide like a coward and leave you to this fate alone.”
Ashiyn turned to face him. “If you do not, there is no chance I will not spend eternity alone, Soryn. You
