Page 158 of The Legacy of Ophelia
Gatrielle said, “I don’t know much about seraphs given that you’re the first we ever knew existed. But I think most new discoveries begin like this. With an innovative idea and someone insisting it’s worth a try.”
“We’re worth a fucking try,” I said, and Tolek brushed a hand down my wing in encouragement, making me shiver. I shot him a scolding glare over my shoulder, but he only smiled with mock apology, knowing exactly how to work me up with these damn things.
“What weapon are we using?” I asked, turning back to the table. Malakai and Cypherion stood on either side now. “I still haven’t replaced mine…”
My voice trailed off at the memories of Starfire and Angelborn being melted down.
“We thought of that,” Tolek said, and he pulled his family blade from his hip, extending it toward me.
I whirled, blinking up at him. “That’s the Vincienzo dagger.”
“It is,” he said. “And I can’t think of a single greater honor for it.”
“Tolek, no?—”
But Tol stepped forward. My wings rose behind me, giving us a semblance of privacy. The heated look in his eyes told me whatever he said next was meant for my ears only.
“Ophelia Alabath,” he whispered, and the way he said my name had my throat drying out and my heart running rampant.He cupped my face, thumb brushing my cheekbone. “This weapon has been in my family line for generations. It’s been passed from parent to child, has seen countless battles, and has innumerable stories etched in it. But from the moment I stole it from my father’s armory when I was sixteen, I knew I wanted to give it to someone else. That I wanted to domorewith it. To let it mean something beyond Vincienzo.”
Because Tolek had already loved me so fiercely at such a young age. He may not have dared to dream I would be the one he gave the dagger to when he stole it, but he knew how powerful those feelings were—how strong they could be for someone—and he knew he’d want to show his love this way. To rewrite a history of how his father had treated him and carve out his own path with this very blade.
By handing over his legacy when it mattered most in order to build a new one together. A greater story that could outshine the gods.
Spirits, ifmylegacy was nothing more than being loved by him, I’d be the luckiest warrior to ever grace Ambrisk.
“This dagger is meant for the family,” Tolek reminded me. “You have always been my family. And I’ve known for a while now that I wanted it to be yours until the day we have a child to pass it down to.”
My heart squeezed so tightly at the thought of that future with him. If someone dug through my spirit at that very moment, they’d find Tolek Vincienzo’s signature all over it. He was mine, and I was his, and this blade being handed to me with promises of legacies rewritten only carved him even deeper into my fate.
Taking the dagger from him, I pushed onto my toes and kissed him. My hand holding the weapon laid flat against his chest, both of our hearts pounding against it. “I love you, Vincienzo. And I know this is so much more than a blade you’reoffering me now. I know it is every bit of your present and future. And I don’t care if we don’t have a tattoo promising it, I gladly claim you.”
“Infinitely,” he swore. Then, his eyes turned hungry. “Now let’s make them scorch.”
As I spun back around, reinvigorated, the others’ conversations broke off. I placed the dagger on the table and stepped back until my wings brushed Tolek’s chest.
“How do I do this?” I asked Cyren, the Starsearcher General having been in charge of the project to imbue weapons with precious resins and oils with the goal of making their readings more powerful on a battlefield.
“We’ve been imbuing ours in the forging, so I would imagine the heat of your Angellight would need to weaken the metal. Make it more malleable so it can truly absorb the properties of the magic.” They steepled their fingers on the table, resting their chin atop them and waited with an eager look in their eye.
Let’s make them scorch.
I took a deep breath, thinking of every warrior who gave their life for this cause. Thinking of Lyria, who had supplied the offhand idea of forging weapons with the power of the seeing chambers and of Damien who may have guided us here.
On the exhale, I poured seraph power forward. A storm of gold light crashed through the room, flickering with the signatures of every Angel. Fiery reds and tempests of blue waves, stormy skies and glittering lilac constellations. The amethyst of encroaching death, the inky black of the dark pools, and the vibrant effervescence of Mystique magic. But shrouding it all, containing it, was the pure, white gold shimmer that tugged at the deepest parts of me. Thatwasme. My own personal brand of power.
Thewhooshof light flooded the room, drowning out the theories of my friends and their shocked gasps at the sheerintensity of the heat. I poured and poured that magic forth, willing it to sink into the steel?—
No.
To bend the steel to its will as I would the might of the Angels and gods who stood against us.
I found the individual raw magic of every one of those Prime Warriors—the power only I had ever wielded all at once—and I forged the Vincienzo blade into something new and more deadly with it.
I gave until the strings stretched to their very fibers, and then, I dug deeper still, imbuing and bending and wielding. Until I was panting and collapsed forward, sweaty hands catching me against the table as my ears rang.
Tolek came up behind me, wrapping an arm around my waist. “Anything?” he asked Gatrielle and Cyren.
They assessed it, the Angelblessed Bodymelder tilting the blade toward the light. “It’s heavy, like it absorbed the power, but there are no physical signs.”
