Day 48:

The last time she had stood before Bahamut—how many years ago? Four? Five?—the Ring of the Lucii had years more power amassed and she could see each blow before it fell. Today, she had only that ancestral power—not yet replete—and Cor's combat training to aid her. But Ardyn stood beside her, just as he had before.

"Are you ready, little Dreamer?" He rose up alongside her, crimson glaives turning a slow circle around him, and held out his hand to her.

She took it. "Today we end this."

One way or another. For the last time. Today she wouldn't wake up if something went wrong. Today she couldn't weave in and out of the flow of time as if she had never really belonged to any moment. Today she had something to lose.

Bahamut drew his sword once more, taking hold of the blade that hung in the air before him and lowering his draconic mask over his colorless face. He stood, sword low, daring them to make the first strike. Yet Reina hesitated. How could she know where to strike, where to stand and where not to stand, if she had no notion of what he would do? The last time she had faced true battle with the Messengers outside Cartanica, she had stumbled and failed. If she could have Dreamed, perhaps she could have defeated them. But she never could Dream while she was awake.

Without that, she couldn't stand on her own. She couldn't fight Bahamut and win; not without the others at her side.

Ardyn dragged her closer until their spectral arsenals became one: a double circle of violet and crimson surrounding both of them. He looked down at her, grasping her jaw and turning her face up toward him.

"Face your prey, little Dreamer. And tear his throat out." Ardyn stooped and his lips met hers. She kissed him back, all thoughts but the instant driven from her mind. "For everything he has done to you. For everything he would have done to you. Cut him down so he never stands again."

Just like Drautos. She had faced him—she could have killed him on her own—though those days were little more than a blur in her memory. She still had that strength. She still had power, if not her Dreams.

And Bahamut was no god.

She rose up, splitting from Ardyn and settling at eye level with Bahamut. She took hold of her Armiger—not with her hands, but with her mind—and she thrust them forward with every ounce of strength she could muster. They struck, each and every one, clashing with his armor and throwing sparks. He lifted his blade and brought it down in one clean motion, responding to her strike with one of his own.

He wasn't as slow as she remembered him being.

She shifted aside and he missed her so narrowly that she felt the rush of wind as his blade passed by. She couldn't worry about that now. She would just have to move faster. She gathered up the Armiger again, and again she struck while Bahamut pulled his sword from the ground.

Ardyn's crimson blades danced with hers. Both sets of Armiger seemed to do less damage than she recalled from her Dream. They slid off his armor, finding cracks less often than not. But of course. All those years in darkness Ardyn had spent biding his time and nurturing his own power in preparation of Noctis' return. At this time neither of them had been as powerful. Bahamut wasn't faster or stronger, but they were both slower and weaker.

Still they turned circles around him, weaving in and out of his strikes. With no Dreams to guide her, Reina fell into studying the motion of the Draconian's body. Everyone has a tell. Stare at them long enough and you'll see where they'll hit without seeing the future. Cor had taught her that. It left less time for searching for Bahamut's weaknesses—the joints and cracks in his armor—but she couldn't afford not to spare the time. Perhaps he wasn't a god, but he had been worshipped as one for a reason. And he commanded the other Astrals for a reason.

They made little headway, even with both sets of Armiger burning bright and painting lines of light in the growing dark.

Reina reached for her elemancy. He had taken away her fire, but she had two left to rely on. She gathered up an armful of lightning and thrust it out at him. The blast forced him back a step as purple lightning leapt across his armor and found all the gaps Reina didn't have time to look for. A thin line of smoke rose from his chest where she had struck him.

If the power of the Calums in this age was insufficient to destroy him, perhaps the power of his fellow Astrals could be turned against him instead. She dodged around his blade, trying to focus more lightning, but he forced her to dodge again. Then again. His flurry of blows forced her back, diving and rising through the air to escape his blade as he advanced. Ardyn took the opportunity to strike from behind. His Armiger must have struck true; Bahamut spun and swung for him, instead. That was all the time she needed. She reached for Ramuh's lightning and…

Found nothing where it should have been.

A great empty void that had held power moments before. She scrambled through her links of power, looking for the cut ends. Could Ramuh himself have rescinded his gift? Had Bahamut cut her from the Astrals as he had cut her from her family?

But no. Where she looked she found not even cut lines. She found nothing at all, as if it had never been there in the first place.

Ramuh was dead.

The first thing she felt was terror. She had no fire. She had no lightning. The Ring's magic was insufficient and her Armiger was a weapon without a sight. She couldn't possibly defeat him with what remained to her. Not even with Ardyn at her side. As the Caelums grew weaker, so too did he. They couldn't do this on their own. Not today. But if not today then all life on Eos ended as soon as they failed.

The next thing she felt was a rising elation. Ramuh was dead. Father had won. Even if she couldn't feel him or Cor or Iris through their bonds any longer, she knew they were alive. Alive and triumphant.

After a brief but furious search as she hung motionless in the air, she found that Leviathan, too, had been cut free from Eos. Ravus, Father, Cor, Iris—all sound and successful. Even Luna, though Reina had expected no relief from knowing she lived still.

Bahamut rounded on her, taking advantage of her distraction to bring his blade across. She shifted her weight back—too slow by a fraction of a second. The very tip of Bahamut's sword cut across her chest, deep enough to send pain shooting through her and blood blossoming across her top, but not enough to cripple her. Pain. Pain was nothing. After what she had lived through, he expected her to shy from a flesh wound? She had already died before. And she had suffered so much pain in the years before that she had been desperate to stop breathing.

:Thou art outmatched, Daemon Queen.:

"So we are." Reina laid her hands on her chest and called on the strength of her ancestors to knit flesh and quell pain.

:Thou cannot win.:

They had rather established that already. One thing remained constant from her Dreams: Bahamut responded only to that which made sense to him. And very little made sense to him.

"We don't need to win," she said. "We just need to hold you back until the others arrive."

:Thou wouldst endanger thy family? Thou wouldst invite them into conflict and risk their lives?:

"I will invite them to conflict, when I stand in the middle of it."

:If thou bringest them here, thou givest them unto me. And thou givest them unto death.:

"You can't play on those fears anymore. I know what you're doing—what you have been doing since the minute I woke—and I know you're wrong. My family—my friends—have stood and survived against the ending of the world more times than I can count. They can do the same one more time."

:Thy surety does thee no credit.:

"On the contrary, Draconian. I live still not because I was strong enough, but because they stood beside me, in spite of my wishes. You might have succeeded in killing me before—as you might have succeeded in killing me today—if not for them. I couldn't stop them from following me if I wanted to. Not least of all because you've severed my bonds to them. They will come. And they will stand with us. You may withstand the strength of two Caelums. But you will not withstand that of four Caelums and all those who have flocked to them."

:Then thou wouldst weaken thyself. Thou cannot protect thy kin and thyself.:

"I don't need to. They don't weaken me. We are stronger together and we always have been. I can see now that every person who sought to weaken me, also sought to pull me away from my friends." Her eyes flicked toward Ardyn, who was watching the exchange with interest.

He shrugged elaborately. "Can you really blame me, little Dreamer?"

"No. But you did do it."

"Of course. You're dangerous all on your own. You might have been deadly if I left you to them."

:Thy kin shalt never reach this place. They will be torn down by mine.:

Another bond inside her snapped, then dissolved. Titan was dead.

Reina smiled. Not a pleasant smile, but the sort that preceded suffering and death. "You have no kin left."

Save Shiva, who had abandoned him.

:Then they shalt be torn apart by the protections laid on this place.:

Reina glanced up and out. No trees grew on Angelgard to gauge distant wind with, but she heard no howling among the stone fingers. Not even a whisper.

"I don't think they will. The winds came from Ramuh, didn't they? And Ramuh doesn't exist anymore," she said.

He all but confirmed her surmise when he responded with the swing of his sword. She laughed, leaping backward and somersaulting in midair. When the tides turned against him, he resorted to destruction. Yet every time he did, it backfired against him. This time would be the last. All they needed to do was bide their time and prevent him from doing what he intended.

Fear drove the Draconian into a frenzy. His sword struck the stone of the arena, the fingers of earth that reached up toward the sky, breaking rock and crumbling the island around him. If they had fought anywhere else he would have trampled all still living on the ground. But Angelgard was barren. Lifeless. All he trampled were the rusted swords of generations long forgotten. Generations who still revered him as a god.

Reina and Ardyn spun around him, weaving up and down, left and right, and turning circles in opposite directions. They had little time for much, save avoiding his blade, with how consistently he moved. But when he swung for Ardyn, Reina struck behind him and when he turned toward her, Ardyn took advantage. They made little headway in all that time.

But they didn't need to. A Magitek engine appeared in the sky. Somehow, she didn't think the imperials had come to exact revenge while she battled the Draconian. The hatch opened. Bahamut turned as people dropped out in twos and threes.

First was Father with Clarus, then Cid and Weskham—the last time she had seen him had been in a Dream. He had shaken his head, disappointed, and turned away. All that was erased now. Cor and Iris dropped next. Cor gave her a nod, Iris a salute. They circled around Bahamut toward her, giving the Draconian a wide berth.

Noctis and Ignis—who had on his face that focused determination he wore when he forced himself to put everything else aside—came next.

"Doing alright, Rei?" Noctis called.

She nodded, throat tight. When this was done—when they were both alive and safe with Bahamut nothing but a memory on Eos—then she could hug him. Right now they both had more important things to worry about.

Ignis glanced to Noct, who flapped a hand at him. The result was Ignis running ahead to join Cor and Iris.

Gladio and Prompto landed behind Noct. Lunafreya and Ravus brought up the rear.

"Nice of you to finally turn up," Ardyn said as Cor and the others joined them.

"Couldn't let you have all the fun," said Iris.

Ignis straightened his glasses. "Quite." He caught Reina's hand and squeezed her fingers briefly before letting go.

"Enough talk," Cor said. "We came to kill this thing."

She had expected to feel fear. Her family and friends stood beside her, facing a threat she never would have wished on any of them. A threat she had always wanted to protect them from. To spare them from.

Instead she felt a welling of gratitude that made her vision blur. Noctis and Father, together with her, formed the center of the chain mesh all linked together with their respective retinues, each of which had bonds—familial or otherwise—among the others. Alone, she was just one link. Bahamut could break her with one solid blow. Together they were stronger.

She could think of no way she would rather face the peril of a second death.

:Numbers will not avail thee. Thou standest against fate: a tide that cannot be resisted.:

Fate. That was what he had always put this down to, wasn't it? It was Father's fate to die in defense of his children, Ardyn's fate to become the Starscourge rather than the king, Ignis' fate to buy the strength to protect Noct with his eyesight, Noctis' fate to sacrifice himself on the throne.

Reina's fate to be the spare. The last, half-forgotten Caelum, tacked onto plans as an afterthought when fate had given the Astrals two children instead of one.

And none of those things had come to pass.

"Your future is a false prophecy you wove to manipulate our family into doing what you wanted," Reina said. "But no longer. Let Father live to see his children and his children's children grow. Let Noctis sit on the throne, not to die but to rule—his reign prosperous in spite of no blood sacrifice being made. Let Ardyn stand beside us—not forgotten, not daemonized, not despised—but embraced as a friend and a brother." And so much more.

Behind Bahamut's feet, light flashed as Father and Noctis called on the power of their ancestors and summoned their own Armiger, standing blue in stark contrast to Reina's violet and Ardyn's crimson. Beside them, Clarus, Weskham, Cid, Prompto, and Gladio all drew their weapons with the same burst of blue light. In a blink, Gentiana, not previously anywhere at all, stood beside Luna. Lunafreya summoned her trident. Ravus drew his sword. And a cold wind blew snowflakes from the clouds overhead.

:And yet, thou wilt forever be forgotten. Thou art an unmemorable face in the shadow of thy brother.:

"Perhaps I will be." She lifted herself up. Beside her, Ardyn did the same, and Father and Noctis mirrored them. "By those who matter not at all. But to my friends and family I will be the only thing I ever wanted to be. A sister and a daughter. A friend. A lover." She lifted her hands, taking hold of ten strands of magic, ten spectral Glaives. "And the silent protector of all I hold dear."

And she unleashed them. Though Bahamut's sword came up, cutting through half of her Armiger, her blades were not the only ones he had to contend with. Ardyn's Armiger struck where hers otherwise would have. Father and Noctis attacked from behind. And with a shout of pure rage, which laid bare the dark beast that hid behind the Draconian's noble exterior, Bahamut brought down his sword.

Cor, Iris, and Ignis were on the ground where it had landed. And each one of them was a skilled combatant, unlikely to fall prey to such a clear threat. Even if one of them faltered, the others would stand strong in place.

She didn't look down. She drew the Armiger back around for another volley. When Bahamut's sword came around she dodged, all but colliding with Ardyn, who caught her around the waist and spun in mid-air.

"Ah, the final conflict. I knew there was a reason I had stuck around for so long." Ardyn turned her as Bahamut's blade came down, then lined them up again so both sets of Armiger flew true.

"Only one reason?"

He flashed her a smile—a look she might once have called unsettling. "You know I can't lie to you, little Dreamer."

And they were apart again, split when Bahamut's sword came down between them. She dove. She lunged. She circled in an unending barrage of spectral blades.

"I can't believe you were going to do this without us," Noctis called when she passed him in the air. "This is way more fun than King's Knight."

Bahamut's blade narrowly missed giving him a haircut. He shot her a sheepish look. "I take it back."

Reina circled closer, searching for weak points to exploit while Bahamut swung for the others and stomped booted feet in futile circles. Father had the same idea, it seemed. Or else he had followed her with a fatherly scolding on his tongue.

"Come to tell me off for getting too close, Father?" She ducked under Bahamut's elbow and kept tight on his torso.

"On the contrary, my dear. The closest to danger, the furthest from harm. Is that not so?" He granted her a smile before running up Bahamut's armored back and finding the gap beneath his helmet to send his Armiger. Though he had only six glaives to Reina's ten, it seemed to her he used his twice as well.

Bahamut turned his head. Father leapt from his shoulder and dropped closer to Reina.

"But you must not forget he has threats still to bare," he said. "You know how to end an Astral's existence permanently?"

She had done so before. Though at the time suffering, rather than survival, had been her goal.

"Yes, Father."

Bahamut side-stepped and swung his sword at the pair of them. She dropped down while her father rose up; it was Reina that Bahamut pursued, turning one swing into several and forcing her to perform an unending evasive maneuver.

:Enough. I grow tired of thy foolsome meddling. Let justice rain down and light pour across the land in a cleansing flood.:

He crouched and leapt into the air, launching himself so high overhead that he became little more than a black silhouette against the clouds, only an inch tall. Bladed wings sprouted from his back. He couldn't call his cleansing light in a moment's notice, but if they needed to take to the skies to prevent him from weaving his magic, they would.

But first came his rain of justice. A hail of blades.

"Down!" Father shouted.

Reina was dropping to the ground before she even registered his warning. She threw both hands in the air, calling on the aid of The Just and projecting a barrier overhead. But hers was not the only shield that protected Angelgard. The violet of her magic blended with the crimson of Ardyn's as he cast a flawless Wall alongside her. Both of them overlaid with a barrier from Father and one from Noctis. Noctis, who had always struggled with the more intricate magic of shields and elemancy.

Four Lucian shields cast a glow on Angelgard and those below. And four Lucian shields took four hundred blades as they rained down unending. One alone would have been destroyed. Even two and perhaps even three. But between the four of them, one could gather strength and repair cracks while another took the brunt of the onslaught. And when it grew too much for them to bear it passed to the next Caelum, and the next. They passed the burden of protection from one to another and back around, and the light of barriers waxed and waned over all.

The Draconian's rain of justice ran dry. When he found them still whole and uncut on the ground below him, he gave another bellow of rage—one that must have been audible across Eos for all that it shook the world.

"Do not let him focus his attention!" Father dropped his shield and summoned his Armiger back. "If he is left unhindered, all will be lost."

"We'll bring him down." Reina leapt into the air after Bahamut, calling her Armiger and taking the wings it gave her. "Ardyn—"

"I thought you would never ask, little Dreamer."

Up they rose, higher in the air until the distant shape of Bahamut began to resolve into a distinct figure. Far below, the others had been reduced to mere toys standing on Angelgard. Waiting.

In rising so high to escape their attacks, Bahamut made his fatal mistake. He had left the sacred place, warded against the darkness of the Starscourge. And though little lived so high up, the scourge was everywhere. And it went where Ardyn did.

Bahamut hung in the air, sword held point down with both hands folded on top as if he was praying over it.

"Now we end this, Draconian!" Reina shouted.

He neither moved nor spoke. She could feel the stirring of his magic and the swell of a light so bright it would burn away even the smallest life forms on Eos. But beside her grew a darkness black enough to swallow it up.

Ardyn circled around behind her, hands on her shoulders as his Armiger merged with hers.

"Now, little Dreamer," he murmured in her ear.

Their magic twisted up together: the blue of Caelum, the red of Starscourge, and the violet in the center where they met. Ardyn's face turned black with it. Reina let go of the scourge that sat dormant in her own core, letting it uncoil and overwhelm until she could feel black tears, cold and thick, on her cheeks. The darkness swelled around them, leaping, twisting, straining. And they overflowed.

The corruption surged through them and into Bahamut. In her Dream, he had screamed when they cut out his eyes and smothered him with darkness. Today he was silent. His focus was drawn inward entirely. If given too much more time…

She fed the Starscourge with more. More of herself. More of her magic. More of every bit of power and energy she could find. And when she reached for it, she found more than she had ever thought to have—not hers, but that of her family and friends. It was not only accessible to her, it was proffered. A nigh-limitless well of strength, fed by everyone she held dear and everyone they held dear. She took hold of it and channeled it into the scourge—into Bahamut—until every one of them was feeding the darkness that crept from his toes to his face and seeped into his nose and mouth, choking him, suffocating him, distracting from what he meant to do.

The Draconian fell.

No longer an armored deity held aloft by bladed wings, he was reduced to a corrupted, blinded shell, which trapped all else inside. The black thing spun as it picked up speed, hurtling toward the ground.

"One more flight…" Ardyn whispered.

He took her hand and together they dove, shooting after Bahamut with the cold wind whipping around them, roaring in their ears. Below, the others scattered, clearing out the space directly beneath Bahamut and taking one final stand, weapons raised, Armiger primed, to cut down the life that would have done the same to them.

The Draconian smashed into the ground, cracking stone and sending them stumbling, but those waiting below did not falter. Father's Armiger flew true, striking out at the crumbled mass of corruption and blades. Noct's joined him. Gunshots echoed. Knives flew. A blizzard blew in cold and sharp. And Reina and Ardyn dove, blades first, into the center of destruction.

As four sets of Armiger cut through Bahamut's broken body, he screamed—a choking, gurgling scream as the Starscourge poured down his throat and into his lungs, drowning him while they sliced him open.

Reina touched down on the earth. She reached out to guide the Starscourge deeper and found Ardyn doing much the same. They urged it on. It spread and grew and ate through Bahamut's core, turning white lines black and chewing through the bonds that held him to Eos, to the crystal, to the Caelums.

And several things happened all at once: what remained of Bahamut crumbled and melted into a pool of black ichor, the black clouds broke and a trickling of watery sunlight—orange with dusk—came through, and the Ring of the Lucii shattered: with the tinkling sound of broken glass and a burst of glittering magic, a hundred Lucian souls were set free. All save the second, whom she had cut out of the ring and cursed to an endless purgatory, a lifeless death, and a deathless life.

And the first, who stood before her, still anchored by the Starscourge. But that was all that held him on Eos. His soul, cut free, drifted longingly toward the Beyond, while he turned blackened eyes toward her. And he smiled, the sharp white of his teeth a stark contrast to the black of his lips.

"Oh, lit-tle Drea-mer…" He strung out his moniker for her, sing-song, as he turned her chin up toward him. And he laughed a laugh that echoed across Angelgard and beyond.

"We won," she whispered, staring past him toward the sky. It had seemed so impossible for so long. Even since she had woken it was little more than a distant dream. The only solution that had ever been possible was her death.

But none of that had ever happened.

"The princess has cut all but the last Astral tie." Somehow Gentiana's level voice was more unsettling than the twisted smile on Ardyn's face.

"But I did not do it alone." Reina tore her eyes from him and looked toward Gentiana, who stood with Lunafreya not but a few feet away.

"No one ever does," Luna said.

No. They didn't, did they? And no matter what Reina said, she would never have wanted to.

"Though the Oracle's plan did not proceed as intended, there remains only one Astral to convince." Gentiana turned toward Luna.

"I know," Luna murmured. "But I hate to ask you to leave."

The reality of what they discussed sank slowly into Reina's muddled head.

"No," she said sharply. "You can't."

"Your Highness, we can destroy the Starscourge," Luna said.

"And so can I," Reina said. Later.

"Little Dreamer." Ardyn squeezed her shoulder. She looked back to find the darkness fading from his features, coiled up and hidden away once more. "Let me go."

She shook her head, disbelieving. They had decided. They had agreed. She would take him with her when she was ready to leave. She could free him, but they could both wait one more lifetime.

"I'm not ready," she said.

"Maybe you aren't," he said. "But you'll do it, won't you? What am I to you, save a reminder of a bad dream that never happened?"

"You're the only bright thing that came out of a dark dream. You're a friend I never knew I needed, who showed me what the world was and helped me to turn it around. You're me."

He smiled. "And it's time, don't you think, to let that part go?"

She shook her head. A tear fell hot and heavy down her cheek and he wiped it away.

"It never happened, little Dreamer," he said.

"But you remember. You're the only one who remembers like I do."

"And that is precisely why you should want me gone," he said. "When it's real to someone else, it's so much easier to convince yourself it should be real to you, isn't it? Wouldn't everything be so much better if you knew—if you understood—it isn't real and it never has been?"

No more losing herself in memories that had never happened. No more wondering what year it was. No more waking up in a cold sweat with tears on her cheeks. It could all just become a bad dream.

"Let me go, Little Dreamer," he said. "I'm so tired."

Tired. She remembered that. A soul-deep exhaustion that nothing could reach. Noctis had begged her to stay because he wasn't ready to live without her, but she couldn't live that way. She couldn't live for him.

Reina nodded once, not trusting her voice. Ardyn glanced over her head toward Gentiana and some unspoken words passed between them.

"Don't mourn me, little Dreamer." He took her face in his hands. "No more than you wanted Noctis to mourn for you. I'm going where I've always wanted to go and you have given me the justice I never thought I'd have. When you remember your dear Ardyn, remember why you are not me… and never want to be."

Inside her, a string snapped and dissolved. His lips brushed hers, warm at first, then light like a touch of wind.

"Goodbye, little Dreamer," whispered the wind. "Dream sweet Dreams."

She saw but a hint of him in the air when she opened her eyes before he faded altogether. But what she saw was not Ardyn as he had been, standing on Angelgard that day. He was Ardyn as he once was—the healer beneath the killer.

She stared at the parting clouds, seeing his face where it wasn't, while the world blurred beyond recognition. She rubbed her cheeks and found dried blood on her hands. Her blood. But the cut across her chest was gone without even a hint that Bahamut had ever touched her.

A hand squeezed her shoulder and she looked up into her father's face. He smiled, warm and sympathetic, and passed her a clean handkerchief. He had killed three Astrals, flown halfway across Lucis twice, and waded through at least one torrential storm, but he still had a clean handkerchief. She smiled at that. She dried her cheeks and the white cloth came away streaked red and black.

"Shall we go home?" Father asked.

Home. A concept she had once forgotten entirely. What was home when all she loved was gone?

Everyone else stood behind him, looking at her. Waiting. Noctis, grown so much older in just a few short weeks. Ignis, whom she had once thought of as only her brother's retainer, had shown her that he loved her as much as he loved Noctis. Cor, loyal to a fault until the very end, who followed her not because she was her father's daughter, but because she was Reina. Iris, the sister she had never had—or once had and been given a second chance with—would grow into that fierce warrior without ever seeing that darkness. Ravus, her old friend who knew what it felt like to taste the dark and look for something more.

And Father. Alive. Healthy for the first time she could remember. And that look on his face.

He always had loved her as much as Noctis, hadn't he?

"I already am," she said.