The afterlife is a wide field of flowers resting within a circle of snow-capped mountains. There is no sun, only an evening sky of glittering stars. At the center of the field, there is a single tree near a pond of shimmering clear water. Beneath the branches, resting in pink petals and black feathers, sits a winged and horned man with long black hair. He faces me, revealing sad eyes of glittering violet. His wings drag behind him when he walks. The ends of his robe rustle around his bare feet and slip over his nimble fingers tipped with black talons.

“Hello, Aster,” he says with a smile.

“Stop right there!” I shout, holding out my hands, but my mana—it’s gone. What once rushed through my veins as natural as my blood has been stripped away, leaving a hollow sensation. “How do you know my name?” I hiss, keeping my hands raised, ready for a fight even without my mana.

“You shared it with me,” he claims.

“When?”

“Only moments ago.”

Moments ago…

“Are you Death?” I ask.

“No, although I have led many to their deaths,” he replies, halting a few steps away from me. Now I have a better look at his slim face, pale as fresh snow, without a single blemish. Strands of sleek black hair frame his sharp cheekbones and rest along wide shoulders, dropping to his mid-back.

“Who the hell are you? And where am I?” I ask, inspecting our surroundings more thoroughly now that I’ve got a sneaking suspicion that this is not the afterlife. But there doesn’t appear to be anything or anyone other than us. There is no break in the mountains, as if we’re an island in the sky.

“You are within the Glimmer,” he answers, smirking at the shock written on my face. “A place that does and does not exist.”

“Typical fairy, always answering with a riddle.”

“If you would like to think of it as a riddle, then you may.” 

He shrugs.

“Ok, one question sort of answered. Are you going to answer the other, or will that be a riddle too? Because I’m warning you, I’m in no mood for games. I will pluck out all of your feathers one by one.”

His eyes brighten, blinking confusion before his shoulders shake with a chortle. He rests a hand gracefully over his mouth to muffle the sound. “My name is Maven Athik,” he claims. “But you may know me better by another title, the Demon King.”

What?

I give the Demon King, or rather, Maven, another swift look over. Even with the horns, wings, and talons, he’s nothing like what I expected, what the stories made him out to be. Soldiers that patrolled the border between our human kingdom of Halshamane and the fairy’s land of Fateir often spoke of the Demon King. They spewed stories of a winged beast made of shadows, who spoke in harsh roars and held death in his clawed hands. From those tales, I imagined a monster of nightmares with twisted limbs and eyes of bloody red, who crept through the night and slept in skeleton crypts. The man before me is not that monster, but appearances can be deceiving, especially with fairies.

“What kind of trick are you playing?” I ask, puzzled by this whole situation.

“This is no trick.”

“But the Demon King is dead.”

“Yes, I am.”

“So I am dead too?”

“No.”

“Then how am I seeing you?” I counter. “Why are you here? Why am I here?”

“Now those are excellent questions,” he states. After a surge of wind, Maven looms over me. In his ominous shadow, his eyes shine brighter than the stars overhead. “There isn’t much time. Listen closely and listen well, I can only explain once. My body and magic are long gone, but my soul has been, and always will be, tied to the Glimmer.”

“Why?”

He doesn’t answer, continuing to explain, “I’ve felt the magic of the world drain away, and I’ve seen what it has become through your eyes. You and your friends came here to strengthen the Glimmer, but it cannot be revived.”

His words are heavy, even when I hadn’t been sure the Glimmer could be revived. How many have I lost over the years? How many have I buried, thinking of tomorrow to get through today? Only to learn that, no matter what I did or how long we survived, the end could never be averted.

But then he takes my hands that warm with familiar mana when he declares, “But the Glimmer can be saved.”

“My mana,” I whisper, observing as it forms around our hands, but not from me. From him. And within it there’s something different, something grander, something old and powerful. The wind around us kicks up, a swirling vortex of energy.

“What do you mean by saved but not revived?” I inquire, almost fearful, almost hopeful of the answer.

“You offered all that you have, and I’ve accepted. The future can be rewritten by changing the past, but you must be up for the task.”

“Change the past, what… that’s not possible.”

His expression says otherwise, eyes stern and determined. The wind is howling now, roaring in my ears. The mana between us shines brilliant purple until all is saturated with the color. Beneath our feet a glyph forms, engulfing the land in strange, interlocked spheres and scattered runes.

“This is all that you have given me, and this is all that I can give in return. When you wake, do what you must. Do what you can. Prevent the end,” he says.

“Wait, why me? I’m not a soldier. I’m barely even a mage,” I bellow, thinking of the girl who spent most of her life on a farm, who only learned magic through stolen texts and desperation for survival. “Where would I even begin? What am I meant to do? There has to be a better choice! What… what if I fail?”

Maven rests his forehead against mine. Warmth trickles through me, a sense of calm I haven’t felt since the farm, since the world was at peace.

“Save them, Aster Valmar,” he whispers. “Save me.”

Then he lets go. I plunge into darkness, watching his sad smile disappear above.