The Price of Tomorrow
Chapter 1: Dreams of Flight
The moon hung like a broken silver coin in the night sky, its light filtering through the dense canopy of the Forest of White Dreams. Aria hadn't slept in three days. Dark circles rimmed her violet eyes as she pressed her back against a massive oak tree, listening for the sound of pursuit she knew would come. The Sins wouldn't let her go easily—especially not Ban and King, who had appointed themselves her unofficial guardians since the day they found her half-dead on the outskirts of Liones.
Another vision clawed at the edges of her consciousness, threatening to overwhelm her. Aria bit down hard on her lower lip, using the sharp pain to anchor herself to reality. She couldn't afford to lose herself to the future right now. Not when she was so close to escaping.
"Just a little further," she whispered to herself, pushing away from the tree. Her legs trembled with exhaustion, but she forced them to move. The visions had shown her this path countless times—the route that would lead her away from the Boar Hat, away from the family she'd grown to love, and most importantly, away from the darkness that followed her like a shadow.
The sound of wings beating against the night air made her freeze. King. Of course he would be the first to notice her absence. The Fairy King had an uncanny ability to sense when she was about to have one of her episodes, often appearing at her bedside moments before the visions struck.
Aria ducked under a low-hanging branch, her heart hammering against her ribs. The forest floor was treacherous in the dark, roots and stones threatening to trip her with every step. But she knew this path. She'd walked it a thousand times in her visions, seen every twist and turn, every potential fall.
"Aria!" King's voice carried through the trees, thick with worry. "Where are you?"
She pressed her hands over her ears, trying to block out his calls. If she heard the concern in his voice much longer, her resolve might crumble. Images flashed through her mind unbidden—King's face twisted in agony, Ban's body broken and bleeding, Meliodas...
No. This was exactly why she had to leave.
The visions were getting stronger, more frequent. Each night brought new horrors, possible futures where the Sins met violent ends trying to protect her. She'd seen them all die in a hundred different ways, all because they refused to abandon her when the demons came hunting for her gift.
A twig snapped behind her, and Aria spun around, her silver hair whipping across her face. There, between the trees, stood Ban, his red eyes gleaming in the darkness.
"Going somewhere, princess?" he drawled, but she could hear the tension beneath his casual tone.
Aria took a step backward. "Don't try to stop me, Ban. Please."
"Stop you?" He lifted an eyebrow, looking almost offended. "Now why would I want to stop my favorite little fortune teller from taking a midnight stroll? Though you might've picked better weather for it." He gestured to the storm clouds gathering overhead, threatening rain.
She knew what he was doing—trying to put her at ease, make her lower her guard. It was how Ban had always handled her panic attacks, using humor and nonchalance to pull her back from the edge. But not this time.
"I saw it again," she whispered, and watched his expression shift from forced casualness to sharp concern. "All of you, dead. Because of me. Because you wouldn't let me go when they came."
Ban took a step forward, and Aria matched it with another step back. "Those are just possibilities, kid. You know that better than anyone. The future isn't set in stone."
"This one is." Her voice cracked. "Every night for the past month, the same vision. Different details, different places, but always the same ending. You all die protecting me, and they take me anyway. I won't—I can't let that happen."
A large drop of rain splashed against her cheek, then another. The storm was beginning, just as she'd seen it would.
"Aria!" Elizabeth's voice joined the chorus now, somewhere to the east. Sweet, kind Elizabeth, who had held her through countless nightmares, who had never once complained when Aria's screams woke the entire tavern.
The rain began to fall in earnest, drumming against the leaves overhead. Ban hadn't moved, but his eyes never left her face. He was waiting for something, she realized. Waiting for—
The vision hit her like a physical blow, dropping her to her knees. Colors and sounds exploded behind her eyes, too fast, too bright. She saw Ban lunging forward to catch her, saw King bursting through the canopy above, saw Meliodas and Elizabeth arriving moments later. She saw herself being carried back to the Boar Hat, saw the demons arriving three days later, saw blood and fire and—
"No!" Aria forced her eyes open, fighting against the tide of images. Ban was halfway to her, arms outstretched to catch her falling form. But she had seen this moment too, knew exactly how many seconds she had before her body betrayed her to unconsciousness.
With the last of her strength, Aria reached for the magic she'd been holding in reserve. The spell was crude—she was no mage, despite Merlin's attempts to train her—but it would serve its purpose. Light exploded outward from her body in a blinding flash, forcing Ban to shield his eyes.
When the light faded, Aria was gone.
Ban cursed, blinking spots from his vision. "King!" he shouted upward. "Did you see which way she went?"
The Fairy King descended through the trees, Chastiefol shifting nervously between forms at his back. "Lost her trail in that flash. But she couldn't have gone far, not in her condition."
"She's getting better at timing those visions," Ban muttered, scanning the surrounding forest. The rain was coming down hard now, washing away any scent trail he might have followed. "Using them to plan her escape."
"She's been planning this for weeks," came Meliodas's voice as the Captain emerged from the trees, Elizabeth close behind him. The Dragon Sin's usually cheerful face was uncharacteristically serious. "Hawk noticed supplies going missing from the storage room. Small amounts, nothing obvious."
Elizabeth stepped forward, her silver hair plastered to her face by the rain. "We have to find her. She's exhausted, and when the visions come like this..." She didn't need to finish the thought. They'd all seen what happened when Aria pushed herself too far, when the visions overwhelmed her completely.
"Split up," Meliodas ordered, falling naturally into his role as captain. "Ban, take the north path toward the river. King, get above the canopy and look for any signs of magic use. Elizabeth and I will—"
A scream split the night, high and terrified and horrifyingly familiar. All four of them moved at once, racing toward the sound. Ban shot ahead, his supernatural speed carrying him faster than the others could follow.
He found her in a small clearing, curled into a ball on the ground. Her eyes were wide open but unseeing, glowing with an inner light that cast strange shadows across her face. Her lips moved rapidly, spilling broken fragments of prophecy into the rain.
"Blood... so much blood... the sword falls... darkness rises... can't let them... have to run... have to..."
Ban dropped to his knees beside her, gathering her rigid form into his arms. She was burning up, her skin hot enough to steam in the cool rain. "Easy, princess," he murmured, brushing wet hair from her face. "I've got you."
The others arrived moments later, Elizabeth immediately kneeling to place her hands on Aria's temples. Healing light pulsed from her fingers, trying to ease the strain of the visions.
"We need to get her back to the tavern," King said, hovering anxiously nearby. "She's been fighting sleep for days. Her mind can't take much more of this."
Meliodas stood slightly apart, his expression thoughtful as he watched Elizabeth work. "She really believes it, doesn't she? That we're all going to die protecting her."
"Captain..." King began, but Meliodas held up a hand.
"We're not giving up on her," he said firmly. "But we need to understand what she's seeing. These visions are different from her usual ones. More consistent. More detailed."
Ban lifted Aria carefully, feeling how light she'd become in recent weeks. When had she stopped eating properly? How had they missed the signs that she was planning this? "Whatever's coming," he said, "we'll face it together. Whether she likes it or not."
As if in response to his words, Aria stirred slightly in his arms. Her eyes, still glowing with prophetic fire, fixed on something none of them could see. When she spoke, her voice was different—deeper, resonating with power that made the air itself vibrate.
"The seven sins gather, the princess falls, the seal breaks beneath the weight of sacrifice. What was bound will be unbound. What was hidden will be found. The seer's blood is the key, and death follows in her wake."
Then her eyes rolled back, and she went limp in Ban's arms.
The four Sins stood in silence as the rain poured down around them, each contemplating the weight of those words. Finally, Meliodas spoke, his voice hard with determination.
"Let's get her home. And then we figure out what the hell is really going on."
As they made their way back through the forest, Ban looked down at the unconscious girl in his arms. She looked younger in sleep, more vulnerable. The dark circles under her eyes stood out starkly against her pale skin, evidence of her desperate attempt to outrun whatever future she'd seen.
"Sorry, princess," he murmured, too quietly for the others to hear. "But you're stuck with us. Better get used to it."
Above them, thunder rolled across the sky, and somewhere in the distance, something ancient stirred in its slumber, sensing the presence of the one who could see its awakening.
The prophecy had begun.