Cold Thunder: Termina Temple epilogue

Termina Temple — A passage after oblivion

Brentan expected oblivion after the shot, yet he can still ask whether this is what having a soul obliterated feels like. An unseen voice complains that there are no trees or berries and that walking will not change the scenery. It belongs to Tanaris. Brentan has reached the Plane of Energy.

Tanaris explains that the destroyed newborn Avatar crumbled into Skye, returning everything stolen from the land and more. Brentan and the souls Iona trapped were caught in that flow. Tanaris believes that they now have a new Avatar of Energy: Tanaris themself. Sorting through Haeos’s memories leaves the new god unsure whether this means becoming Haeos or a fusion of the two. Explaining it to the Firmament may be difficult, if the other Avatars listen at all.

Brentan realizes he damaged Sparagmos more effectively than he knew. He asks whether the souls must remain in the Plane of Energy forever. Tanaris would welcome company, especially because Eire is absent, but refuses to keep them from their final destination for the sake of that loneliness. Light gathers around Brentan as the farewell begins. Tanaris thanks him for saving Skye and wishes him safe travels. His earlier fear that the souls would never reach another life has not become their certain fate.

Termina Temple — The debt returned

Victoria once believed the Avatars invincible. Kieran now calls them monsters that anyone could shoot out of the sky, but she refuses the glory of a solitary god-slayer. The arrow drew on Skye’s original gods. It would have taken more than her vision if Tara’s arrival had not given her strength to hold on. She is an ordinary person, and ordinary people must protect one another.

Lieber betrayed both Skye and Greenguard, Victoria says, but his accusation about the stolen gold was right. King Duncan took it during his invasion. Wrongs against his family do not excuse what happened to Skye’s innocents. She will return what belongs to them. A ruler protects the weak and trapped; a crown is not required to do that work.

Speaking for Skye’s Fianna Council, Kieran entrusts Bananach, their treasured Guardian, to Victoria. Cold Thunder’s destruction has renewed the land: nature flourishes, magic runs through the rivers, and the people have been healed. Illaria has been saved too. Kieran understands his daughter’s decision to leave and asks that she be cared for, hoping she and her brother will return home one day.

Termina Temple — A home and an awkward revelation

At Termina Temple, Tara is glad to have the Hero and Victoria back. Even Volgritian has a place there, although he no longer has wings. She hopes there will be time for Brentan’s funeral. Tell-Tale Heart asks the Hero to check on Felix and Illaria before recounting Skye’s story: both newcomers have much to endure. Its two conversations lead to a renewed promise to keep them safe, protect what lies beneath the Temple from the Lightguard, and ask Warlic whether he needs help strengthening the barrier.

The Hero tells Felix about Termina Temple and suggests that he remain with Illaria until she has recovered enough to travel. Felix gets no further than the revelation that his benefactor is the Eternal Dragon of Time. The Hero tries to reassure him that they will not suddenly become a lizard, but the mention of his dracophobia arrives too late. Indradeep supports him as he slumps. Tara reminds the others that their meeting is due now.

Termina Temple — The court and its allies

Lord Granville objects to returning Skye’s gold and helping its Elven kin. He had expected an empire, not what he calls blind charity. Durance answers with a whispered warning about his next swim, and Richard asks whether Granville blinked when Victoria slew an Avatar. The Queen rejects ruling by threats even as she refuses to tolerate Evil in her court. Victory will not mean adopting Iona’s example.

Ai No Miko offers the Yokai Isles’ support; Zhoom pledges the Sandsea against real tyranny. Skye and its Fianna Council have joined the alliance. Victoria calls freeing Skye and saving Lore a victory whose sacrifices she will remember. Galanoth agrees, Artix promises to stand between her and anyone looking for a fight, and Rhubarb pledges that his ships will leave the alliance unplundered. Everyone else, he adds, remains fair game. The Hero warns the nobles that favors and refusals will be remembered.

Victoria addresses the spies she knows are listening. They are to take her words to the Mouthpiece: Arbiter Justiniani, leader of the Jus Divinum. Greenguard rejects his trickery and false justice. She intends to find the organization’s network and hold it to account for the Ashray Elves’ deaths and its part in instigating the war with Skye. The alliance she accepts does not include the partnership Lieber tried to preserve.

Termina Temple — The warning in the letter

Tara finds the resemblance between Justiniani’s name and Jus Divinum suspiciously convenient. Is it false, or a joke at their expense? The Hero thinks the latter would suit Lieber. Brentan’s letter gives a more immediate warning: the organization is in Termina Temple, and the Mouthpiece speaks for a Mask. The Hero thinks Brentan may have omitted specifics to protect them if the letter fell into the wrong hands.

Victoria will have her Knights move what is hidden beneath Balemorale to Termina Temple. Greenguard needs her, and nobles like Granville will make governing difficult; she leaves the problem of Chaos to the Hero. For the Hero, the Voice in the Sea and Cold Thunder form a pattern of Avatars and strange eyes. The Flame of the Beyond remains. They need to contact Fiamme, the most obvious potential target.

Termina Temple — A day for the sisters

Celestia insists that the companions first have tea with her and Volgritian. Rest matters, and chances to enjoy it are growing rare. Victoria can stay only a day, but she and Tara will make the most of it. Tara wants to hear about Skye and Brentan; Victoria wants to hear about her sister’s time on the throne. Tara says Warlic helped her, though they slept perhaps three hours a night.

Tara explains the threatened siege that Henry reported. The Lightguard Paladins argued with her and began waving their axes, so she secretly called Gravelyn. Astero would send help to Victoria only if Termina Temple were returned to the Lightguard. Tara refused: they could afford to build another temple. Warlic and Song had gone back ahead of the party. Then Victoria stops the conversation. In the forest outside Termina Temple, she notices a silence the others have not: no birds, no breeze, nothing.

Termina Temple — The sound below

Inside the Temple, Hans points toward the growing sound. Jadzia says it began about a week ago and has made reading intolerable. Rand hears a pattern, almost a drumbeat, rather than mumbling. He and Shakaz will investigate first. Hans wants to join, but Jadzia refuses to risk the Temple’s one good cook. Song goes with the explorers and tells Warlic to close the hole if he hears screaming.

Below, the sound continues through darkness that even Rand and Shakaz cannot penetrate with their night vision. Song lights a torch. Its light reveals an immense red face threaded with veins and strange eyes. The repeated voice has no named speaker. Song gives a quieter instruction than a battle cry: back away, slowly.

Termina Temple — The people given shelter

Felix and the others are settling into the home the Hero and Victoria offered them. Dr. Rivale has cared for the newcomers, and Illaria’s health improves daily. The materials from Balemorale have arrived safely. Felix cautions that forbidden magic—or, more precisely, Chaos—is predictable only because of Drakath. His gratitude does not make the Temple’s contents harmless.

Felix remembers the other exiles: Adreanna Noelle and Mitford survived, but necromancy makes him unwilling to rule out the others. Fitzroy, Bligh and Ryder were fanatically devoted to their King; he hopes never to encounter them again, while preparing for the possibility. Victoria’s amnesty also extends to Iona’s surviving children. Some grieve the only mother they knew; others understand Iseul’s sacrifice and call Victoria their savior. Their freedom does not give them all the same response to their past.

Indradeep offers his own sword in the Temple’s defense. Hans has taught him the patrol schedule, and he has noticed Lightguard scouts drawing closer to the gates. While the Hero seeks Fiamme, an attack remains possible. He feels the strength returned to Skye, knows Illaria has been healed, and refuses to leave Felix or his family again. Time, together, may help the siblings stop calling Iona their mother.

Termina Temple — The innocent vessel and the broken god

Felix warns against lingering near the purple pillar. It is Ophelia, the innocent vessel possessed by a fragment of the Queen of Monsters in the events that enabled Drakath’s creation. The Temple also holds Bill’s bones, the remains of someone close to Drakath. Felix asks the Hero to remember the woman who suffered beneath the monstrous power rather than use that history to cause more suffering.

Illaria calls the basement behemoth the Colossus, a Doom Spirit. Warlic believes it dormant and very weak, but she warns against underestimating it. Bananach belongs to the same kind of being, though their actions could hardly be more different. The Colossus terrorized Lore near the end of the Planar Conflict before being torn in two. One half lay under the sea; how the Lightguard obtained the other remains an unanswered question.

Muusa has given Illaria a journal found in the Temple, written by her friend and mentor, the real Caoimhe. The Paladins fed Caoimhe to a creation resembling Sparagmos. Illaria fears there is no soul left for her to contact. Greenguard’s suffering at the hands of necromancy cannot excuse what the Paladins did. Her account leaves another victim behind the Lightguard’s demand for their Temple.

Termina Temple — Toward the Flame

Illaria helps Tara relieve Warlic’s watch over the behemoth, whispering because she fears it may be listening. She wants to repay the people who gave her a new life. Darkness still terrifies her, but she asks to face that fear without being stopped. Skye’s recovery healed her body; it did not settle her guilt or make it easy to face her father. She hopes to return one day better than she was before.

Indradeep wonders why Haeos’s loss did not break the heavens. Perhaps the Avatars are less essential than he believed; perhaps Haeos has already been replaced. His uncertainty contrasts with Tanaris’s account in the Plane of Energy. Tara, meanwhile, prepares to travel with Warlic toward the Flame of the Beyond, which may be in the Yew Mountain Chain. The Hero should speak to Indradeep before setting out for Thelima City. Cold Thunder has been silenced, but the eyes, the hidden agents and the Order’s silence still stand between them and the truth.