Tavis stood on the summit of Othea Tor, watching a veil of flaxen sunlight cascade down the Endless Ice Sea’s looming face. As the sun behind him rose higher, the curtain fell faster, until it was descending so swiftly that when the sallow light finally reached bottom, it splashed out onto the bleak snows and spread across the entire empty plain in the span of a single expectant breath. Othea’s shadow did not fall over the rift so much as appear along its length all at once, and suddenly the high scout found himself staring into the purple bowels of a deep, gloomy abyss. He could hardly comprehend what had happened. There had been no earthquake, no plume of billowing darkness, nor even a thunderous rumble to proclaim the opening of the fissure. The vale had simply appeared, as though it had been there all along and required only the goddess’s umbral touch to reveal itself.
The abyss was shaped exactly like Othea’s shadow: a long, narrow triangle that stretched from the base of the tor to the foot of the Endless Ice Sea. Its walls were as sheer and black as slate, descending more than a hundred feet before they vanished into the swarthy murk that filled the bottom of the chasm. In the center of this gloom hung the silhouette of a palace roof, supported by nothing that Tavis could see except viscous shadow. The structure appeared to be a harmonious balance of three symmetrical wings arranged around a central cupola, but it was impossible to tell more. The rest of the building remained a dusky, half-sensed enigma, as nebulous and obscure as the vale itself.
Tavis turned away from the palace and started down the back of the rugged tor, occasionally stumbling over a crag as he struggled with the length of his new stride. That morning, he had awakened refreshed and famished and not quite the size of a hill giant, as he had discovered when he reached for his rucksack with a hand as large as a buckler. Only after devouring all of his food, and much of Galgadayle’s as well, had he paused to inspect his new body. He had found legs as thick as spruce trunks and arms as big as putlogs, and a chest so large a cooper could have bent cask hoops across it. Though the scout stood a full head taller than any firbolg he had ever seen, Galgadayle had not been particularly surprised. The ability to change sizes was primarily a matter of spirit, the seer had explained, and anyone who intended to battle a titan certainly had an ample supply of that.
At the bottom of the tor, Tavis found the verbeeg warriors lingering a safe distance away, their hungry eyes fixed, as always, on Sky Cleaver’s obsidian head. After witnessing Orisino’s fate, they had grown temporarily more cautious. Their attitude would change the instant they had a chance to steal the weapon, of course, but their current wariness had allowed the One Wielder a few hours of rest. He now felt stronger and more clearheaded than he had since Wynn Castle.
Tavis stepped over to Basil and Galgadayle, who were huddled together at the center of the tor. Over their shoulders, he could see a labyrinthine diagram of glowing green strokes that the runecaster had traced on the mountainside. The scout had seen enough runes to realize this was not one. Rather, the lines seemed to be a chart of the mount’s fracture zones and stress points. He waited in silence while his friends discussed internal forces and cleavage planes, then Basil selected another runebrush from his cloak and traced a single red line down the spine of the mount.
When he finished, the runecaster stepped back and gestured at the red line. “That’s where you should strike, Tavis,” he said. “Did the rift open? I didn’t hear anything.”
“It opened, but not like we expected,” Tavis answered. “When Othea’s shadow fell over it, the vale just appeared.”
“Appeared?” Galgadayle echoed.
Tavis nodded. “Like the shadow is the Twilight Vale.”
“Oh, dear!” gasped Basil. “We can’t destroy Othea Tor without destroying her shadow!”
“And destroying her shadow would close the vale?” surmised Galgadayle.
Basil shook his head. “Worse. If Othea’s shadow is the vale, then, by definition, eliminating the shadow wouldn’t close the valley-it would eliminate it.”
“And what happens to those inside?” Tavis asked.
The runecaster set his ice-crusted jaw in determination. “I don’t know, but we’ve already lost Avner,” he said. “I won’t take chances with Brianna.”
“Even if you’re right, destroying the shadow shouldn’t hurt her, or the child,” Galgadayle said. “It would be like opening the drapes in dark room. The sun will illuminate what’s inside.”
“Assuming they still have an independent existence, of course-but there’s only one way to be certain.” Basil pointed at the axe in Tavis’s hands. “Perhaps you’d better use Sky Cleaver.”
The One Wielder nodded. “I think I will.”
Tavis stooped down to gently push his companions aside, then raised Sky Cleaver over his head. The mighty hand axe was still too large for him to wield one-handed, but he was now large enough to swing it with both arms.
“That’s not what I meant!” Basil slipped between Tavis and the mount. “Cleave our quandary, not the tor!”
“Isn’t cleaving a prime power, whether it’s substance or circumstance?” Tavis asked.
Basil had explained that the axe possessed two kinds of magical power. The most potent was the ability to cleave anything, be it a material object like a mountain, or a circumstance like ignorance. The weapon’s lesser ability was the capacity to defend the wielder from most kinds of harm.
Unfortunately, Sky Cleaver’s magic carried a heavy price. After hearing the high scout describe Snad’s ancient and translucent body, Basil and Galgadayle had deduced that the weapon’s magic was too powerful for mortals. Cleaving burned away the bonds that connected the One Wielder to the physical world, until they finally grew too weak to bind his spirit to his bones. Defending was more insidious. The axe invoked this magic on its own, filling the bearer’s body with powerful energies that aged him far beyond his years. Accordingly, the three companions had decided Tavis would use the axe’s powers as little as possible, and even then only when the damage to the titan would balance the harm to the One Wielder.
After a thoughtful silence, Basil said, “Cleaving is a prime power, but it would be wise to use it now. If Brianna and Kaedlaw are eliminated with Othea’s shadow-”
“They won’t be.” Tavis motioned for the runecaster to step aside. “You said yourself they’d be all right if they still exist apart from Twilight.”
Basil refused to move. “I hesitate to bring this up, but I have made one or two mistakes in my life.”
“Not this time,” Tavis said. “If daylight didn’t destroy Lanaxis, then he exists apart from twilight. Why would Brianna and Kaedlaw be any different?”
“Besides, it’s safer to trust our own judgment than to rely on Sky Cleaver’s power,” Galgadayle pointed out. They had already discussed how fast the axe’s magic destroyed its wielders and decided they could not even guess. “For all we know, Tavis could turn as transparent as Snad when he cleaves the answer you want, and vanish entirely when he cleaves the mountain. Then where would Brianna be?”
Basil reluctantly nodded. “It would be better for her to disappear with Othea’s shadow.” He stepped away from the tor and flourished a hand at the red line he had traced down the spine. “Swing away, my friend.”
Tavis brought Sky Cleaver down, whispering, as Basil had taught him, the ancient word for cleave. A stinging fire erupted in the bones of his hands and rushed through his arms to spread into the rest of his body. The axe struck with a sharp crackle, slicing clear through the rock to the icy plain below. A loud, sonorous sigh rose from the other side of the mount, and a gust of wind went rustling across the plain toward the distant glacier. A crack appeared at the base of the tor, then ran up the spine to the summit.
Nothing else happened, save that Tavis stumbled away from the mount, his breath hissing through his clenched teeth. He pulled up his cloak sleeve. His skin was sparkling like a fresh powder snow and had turned as white and lustrous as polished silver, but it still seemed fairly opaque. From the looks of his flesh, he guessed that he would be able to use the cleaving power five or six more times before turning into a ghost. The high scout stepped forward, raising Sky Cleaver to strike again.
There was no need. The spine of the tor suddenly turned to talus and cascaded down toward Tavis. As the scout turned to flee, an eerie chill rose from Sky Cleaver’s heft and engulfed his body. A boulder came bouncing at his head, then inexplicably rose and sailed past without striking him. The rest of the landslide scattered around his flanks and arced over his head. Tavis looked at his arm again and found the flesh hanging more loosely than he remembered, and etched with lines that had not been there before.
A low, rumbling groan rose from deep within the tor. The two halves of the mount slumped away from each other, and the rockslide came to an abrupt halt as the boulders fell into the cleft instead of tumbling down the
