Fungal Halo

She crossed the room leaving a smudge across my vision that no amount of blinking would clear. Her fingertips bled black ink into the air around them. I should have been afraid, but I was transfixed, couldn't let her leave my sight. I ditched my friends and followed her outside.

My prayers do not reach the goddess. Of course not. Whose prayers ever do? None of the priestesses here at her temple really matter to her as anything more than pretty dolls on display, performing our devotion during her centuries of absent neglect.

You never questioned why your exploration of this hidden temple's ruins went so smoothly and easily, did you? How you seemed to instinctually notice the hidden passages and trap triggers? You and your fellows rode a wave of excitement all the way to the most hidden chamber here.

When I was at my lowest, that's when she came for me. I had nothing and no one to care for me. I was delirious and dying, and when I was gone, no one would mark my passing. Maybe that's how she found me, even. Suffering like mine was a beacon to a certain kind of creature.

In the first hours of the morning, the mind is still soft and pliable. A clever touch, careful pressing, and you can nudge yourself in a new direction. Daily reshaping, and perhaps eventually you can make of yourself something greater.

The more she kisses me, the more I get lost in her kisses, unable to think or notice anything else. I cry in pain when her clawed fingers pierce my flesh, but even then it only inspires me to kiss back with greater fervor.

Drink from the pool in the deep woods. Find your vision blurring, brightening, twisting and colorful. Your steps grow unsteady as you quest for a warm spot in the sun in which to lie.

Do not wake. Put roots down. Stretch your limbs and bloom into a beautiful home for fairies.

Over the ages they tell my story in hushed whispers decorated with breathless warnings like lovely jewels. They say I am evil. They say I am deadly. They say that to look into my eyes is to be lost. They say I steal fair maidens and teach them sin. They say such sweet things.

The Dark Lady of Nightmares glided silently through the night's cool air, her body magically transformed into her giant bat form perfectly suited for stealth. As she approached the City of Light, she swept her eyes over it, scanning for the tower where the princess slept.

People still speak fondly of the pantheon that was.

It's not yet been so long that it has passed out of memory, though each year more children are born without the warm assistance of Oriah and raised without the guiding light of Ralles.

To them the stories are just stories.

Something has changed in this temple, and I am afraid.

My sister-priestesses, even some who have proven themselves devout and fastidious caretakers, have been noticeably neglecting their duties.

And the mold creeping in seems to return as quickly as we clean it off.

Once upon a time, there was a group of stalwart, incorruptible heroes who ventured forth on a quest to save a kingdom from ruin. Monsters had overrun the land, and these were capable warriors with the power to dispatch them.

But they needed someone who could keep them alive.

A powerful angel. A beacon of light. He whose blade shatters the night. Hero of a myriad battles. The most loyal of all His soldiers.

So many things they called me. Even after my defeat, for some reason, they believed in me.

The Hero bursts through a wall, mere masonry no match for his might. Civilians inside scream briefly, but when he shouts "The eyes of justice gaze upon you!" they recognize their savior.

So does the Villainess terrorizing them.

"You!" she yells in disbelief.

"Yes! Me!"

The power of the fairies' blessing touched the body of her lover and they stirred to life once more.

Weeping, she held them in her arms again, glad she never lost hope.

She ignored her friends shouting their warning. Her lover's eyes, now open, were dark, empty pools.

What a lovely afternoon to relax with an old friend and reminisce over tea.

We laugh over stories of our adventures together, and for a moment, it's like we were never apart.

She reaches across the table and takes my hand, and I smile like I haven't in years.

The knight drags her sword behind her as she ascends the stairway up to the throne room.

Her muscles ache with the exhaustion of a long journey that now comes mercifully to its end.

Dangling at her chest is the Amulet with the power to seal the Demon Queen away forever.

It was all over. The forces of light victorious. The Dark One banished to wait for another turning of the cycle to clash with another destined Hero generations from now.

Still the Priestess grieved her love, the Hero who gave her life to win this victory.

I'll kiss you and you'll fall because there is no other way for this script to go.

The ripples I make as I move in this world touched you from afar, and I see painted in your wide eyes in this first meeting that you were already addicted to me before the moment we first met.

Your angel is so sweet, so pliant, with her collar around her neck. Such a wonderfully docile creature since you learned how to leash her more firmly than even her halo.

The defiant warrior swinging her flaming sword is long, long gone now.

The first time you summon a demon, you're so nervous that your shaky hands nearly drop the ritual dagger.

You have to make it work, though. This world was never made for you, and so you need to carve a place for yourself in it one way or another.

In the dream, the Queen of Spiders sneaks up from behind you and sinks her fangs into your neck.

Your Gem is missing. Your power does not answer your call. But the venom in her bite fills you with indescribable heat and desire, and you don't care.

Oh, dear pet, there is no need to flinch from me in fear. You surrendered your will to me, remember? You serve me now, utterly and irrevocably, and I have no need to make you suffer any longer.

I am not one to damage what is mine; I take care of my possessions.

The goddess watches while her chosen hero arrives at the culmination of his journey. He's so close now. All he needs to do is raise the amulet and speak the invocation, and the goddess's great enemy will at last be vanquished.

And yet, he collapses instead. He fails.

I accidentally summoned the ghost of a dead empress who lives in my head and makes me dress slutty, and I think I like it?!

You were told the cult would help you "open your third eye" and "reveal the ultimate truth of the universe" to you, but—you poor dear—that's not at all what they did to you, whatever visions you now find yourself burdened with.

Pray to the stars, for they are eternal.

Pray for your soul, that the stars may keep it safe when you pass on from this life.

Pray to them in life, if you value the sanctity of your selfhood, that the stars may swiftly find your pure spirit in death.

There is always a Dark Monarch. There is always a Princess in Gold. There is always a Hero and always a conflict between light and shadow.

In defeat, in victory, in death—whatever the outcome—the cycle begins again with the coming of a new age.

But this cycle is different.

That the planet was haunted would never deter the executives running the galaxy's biggest mining corporation, of course. They weren't the ones who'd have to go near it.

No, they just send their most disposable employees there. Us.

"We all miss Reisa," my friend told me. "And we all want to see that bastard pay, believe me, but this is too much."

The knight was a hero once. The princess called her that, at least, before sending her on this quest.

A bolt of light streaks through the air, faster than the human eye can track, aimed unerringly for my servant's heart. A blur of motion intercepts it, and with a sharp crack of sound, the magically charged arrow is deflected to the side.

Good puppet. Well done.

I remember Emilia. I could have loved her, but in the end her heart was set on another.

I gave her everything—all my hate and all my power—and we would have had the world if she hadn't thrown it all away for that foul priestess of hers.

They say there are powers—unfathomable and unnamed—buried deep within the earth. Boons and banes and spirits and seductions call to the ambitious, but I've never known of someone actually finding one until now.

What does one say to a dark sorceress on the cusp of her victory?