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I understood.

The eather, the essence, had come from the stars that had fallen eons ago.

I understood.

Because I saw the Primals rise and the Ancients fall as my heart took its second first beat. I saw them faded into places of peace and rest. I saw many go to ground, and I saw that some remained to ensure what I now knew had to be more important than anything else.

There must always be balance, that life must always continue on. That death must always come.

I understood.

As the eather flowed into my fingers and down my legs, I saw the horror of what would happen if the cycle of life was broken. I heard the screams of thousands, of millions if death was vanquished, and I knew.

I knew that the Ancients who’d returned to the ground must never, ever return to the surface.

Because they were no longer the beginning of everything, the great creators, the givers of life and the balance that kept the realms stable.

They were the end that would shake the realms, erupting the tallest mountains, spewing forth flames and clouds that would consume all in its path, turning day to night. They would boil the rivers and turn seas to deserts, laying utter waste to sprawling stone kingdoms and toppling those great steel cities in distant lands.

For if they rose, they did so as blood and bone, the ruin and the wrath of that once great beginning.

As the essence of the stars hummed from within me, I saw the end.

And I knew.

I knew I was not a part of the cycle of life.

I was the cycle.

The beginning.

Middle.

The last breath before the end.

Death’s steadfast companion.

I was Life.

Slowly, I became aware of a pressure in my head. It built and spread, clamping down on my lungs.

My heart seized and then sped up. A sudden burst of pain lanced my upper jaw. Teeth loosened. A metallic taste filled my mouth as a tremor started deep in the center of my chest, where the two embers flickered and pulsed, expanding with each fast-pounding beat of my heart. The embers grew, swelling inside me until the chasm that had been cracked open splintered.

Pure, unadulterated power poured out, spreading like roots in my veins. The essence filled my organs. Eather entrenched itself in my bones and bled into my tendons, flowing to my muscles. My body warmed.

Something tightened around me. Not something. Arms? Yes, arms. Someone was holding me in…in water. A lake.

“Sera?” came a ragged whisper. His whisper.

The Asher.

I knew that voice. I’d heard it in the darkness, hadn’t I?

The One who is Blessed.

The Guardian of Souls.

The Primal God of Common Men and Endings.