Chapter 22: The Gift Buried in Ashes
The wound was gone.
Selene hadn't moved in minutes. Her breath was shallow, her pulse louder in her ears than the silence that surrounded them.
She had died with Aria once.
Held her—bleeding, broken, surrounded by fire and the howls of the dead—when Aria gave everything for them. For her. For all of them.
And now, she was watching her glow with a power that didn't exist in the first, bitter timeline.
Not healing.
Not golden light.
Not hope.
"…Why now?" Selene breathed.
Aria looked at her, flushed with confusion, her voice small. "I don't know. I just… I saw you hurt. And I couldn't—my chest—my hands just…"
"I would've died without you," Selene whispered. "Twice."
Aria's lips trembled. "You've said that before."
Selene didn't respond.
Because she couldn't tell her.
Not yet.
That she had already died.
That the world had already ended—once.
And that this version was different.
⸻
Far away, something stirred.
Not in the world.
Beyond it.
In a place where time refused to pass.
Where flowers never withered.
Where a woman cloaked in rose-gold stood among petals that never fell.
The Goddess of Love.
She had watched Aria burn in sacrifice. And for that one act of complete, ruinous devotion—not for strength, not for potential, but for love—she had offered a single chance:
Return.
Rebirth.
But not for free.
For Aria alone.
Only Aria.
And none would remember.
None, except Selene.
⸻
Back in the room, Aria sat still.
"Do you think I'm… different?" she whispered.
Selene watched her for a long, unreadable moment. "Yes," she said softly. "But not in the way you think."
Aria tilted her head.
"You were always meant to break the world, Aria. But only to make it bloom again."
⸻
Emotionally, the gift was more than power.
It was forgiveness. A second chance.
A path not carved by death.
Practically—it was evolution.
Aria wouldn't gain all her abilities at once. She wasn't born into her gifts like the others.
She would earn them. Through love. Through loss. Through survival.
The space inside her—the pocket dimension, her hidden sanctuary—was only the beginning.
Now, healing.
And soon, the storm.
The frost.
The flame.
All of it.
But for now, Selene watched the girl who would one day be a goddess herself—
—and said nothing.
Because to tell her everything now would be too cruel.