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Aisling was suffocating. In that state of near-constant asphyxiation, understanding where she was and what was unfolding around her demanded a superhuman effort. The rare moments of lucidity seemed instantly swallowed by pain. Her only advantage lay in the pride of the Prince of Hell, terribly arrogant for having cornered the Horsemen. At least the young human knew she was no longer alone.
Her plan had proved to be one of patience and perseverance. Never let it show that she resisted. Let them believe she was lost. Once again, Lucifer’s pride had been her salvation. With exhausting effort, in what now served as her prison, a stripped-down cell, almost empty, pierced by a single window that looked out over the chained humans far below, she had begun to carve patiently at a fragment of rock. Her hands, tense and wounded, never released her improvised tool for a single instant. More than once, she had drifted into the labyrinths of her tormented mind. But she had endured.
When Lucifer had summoned her, she had slipped the improvised blade into her mouth, focusing on not swallowing it. When her eyes had fallen on her friends, chained, wounded, or bewitched by the foul enchantments of that place, anguish had overwhelmed her. Yet she had shown nothing, scanning the surrounding darkness, desperately trying to catch sight of Dust in the shifting shadows. She had kept convincing herself that the bird would not have abandoned its master, but she had no certainty. She had done what she could, launching herself into a silent act of faith. She had nearly lost herself again in her own mind at the decisive moment, but Fenja had anchored her there with the memory of Nimue.
She knew she had managed to pass the tool to Death, but she had no idea whether her action had proved effective. The hours had stretched on, perhaps even the days, within her freezing cell. No one had come to see her, or at least, her clouded memory retained nothing. She had felt neither hunger nor thirst: the thing Lucifer had forced her to ingest had been enough to keep her body alive. But never had she felt so utterly drained.
Only the thought of her friends kept her clinging to life. More than once she believed she was about to fade away, to sink into a sleep from which she would never return.
Then, a sound rising from the base of the fortress pulled her out of her stupor. It was not the familiar noises of the Rephaim or the Anakim, nor the screams and pleas of the chained humans. No: a murmur that grew into a rumble, a revolt gaining strength.
With a superhuman effort, she crawled to the window of her cell, her body groaning, and hauled herself up to the ledge. A monstrous chaos reigned in the frozen fortress. The very walls seemed to tremble under poorly controlled spells, throwing the nearby demons into total panic. And in the midst of that turmoil, the humans were escaping, running, screaming.
A neigh split the air, and Aisling nearly burst into tears of joy. She recognized at once the mounts of Death, Strife, and War, leaping into the heart of the chaos. Her plan had worked. But her joy was fleeting. The door of her cell exploded into fragments, and demons rushed inside:
“The Bearer of the Seed must be moved! Quickly!”
Everything blurred around her. The first demon who tried to approach collapsed suddenly, an arrow buried in his throat. Other silhouettes surged into the cell. Fear and adrenaline struck her all at once, but a burning certainty coursed through her: her plan was working. It had to.
Hands suddenly seized her. Aisling had no time to discern whether they belonged to allies or enemies. Someone tried to pull her upright, then, seeing she could not stand, two figures flanked her, half-lifting her to drag her out of the cell. Her feet barely scraped the frozen floor while, all around, the uproar swelled. The clash of weapons filled her ears: the metallic crash of blades, the howls of agony, the inhuman roars. The air thickened with a bitter, unbearable stench, hot iron, torn flesh, and ashes mingled together.
Everything blurred again. Time dislocated, swallowed by her own exhaustion. At last, her bearers laid her down against a wall. The icy touch of the stone bit into her back. A hand, trembling yet gentle, brushed her forehead, wiping away something, burning sweat or blood, she could not tell.
“Aisling, wake up! Please!”
Fenja? Yes, it was her, right in front of her, eyes wide with panic. Aisling tried to answer, but no sound passed her lips. The foreign mass lodged in her throat was choking her. Desperate, she tried to raise a trembling hand to her neck to point at it, but every attempt to speak tightened the invisible noose strangling her.
“Fury! She’s choking!”
A growl of rage answered the call, followed by the crash of a weapon.
“Raaah! Take care of them!”
Aisling’s eyes rolled back, her consciousness plunging into a black abyss before Fury’s silhouette even entered her field of vision. But she heard her coming, a torrent of furious curses. Then, without warning, something forced its way brutally into her mouth, shoving downward with relentless violence.
“Sorry, Aisling… this is going to hurt.”
The healer had never believed she still possessed the strength to scream, yet a guttural cry tore free of her throat. The pain was unimaginable, atrocious, the sensation of her entrails being ripped out through her gullet. She truly thought she would die that way, smothered by the horror of that extraction, as fevered visions of torn organs flickered through her delirious mind.
Then, suddenly, the pressure gave way. Air forced its way back into her burning lungs. Aisling gasped violently, her jaws aching from having been pried beyond endurance. Yet already, the opaque haze that had bound her for days was dissipating, allowing a feverish clarity to pierce through.
When she reopened her eyes, Fury was crouched before her, holding in her gauntlet three shapeless, glowing masses that still throbbed. Beneath the heat of her armor, they began to melt, oozing and disintegrating, until only three glistening seeds remained, black as ash. With a growl of disgust, Fury hurled them to the ground and crushed them beneath her heel.
“What is it with demons and their obsession with shoving things down people’s throats?!” cried Idris, whom Aisling finally glimpsed in the distance, his sword casting aside a demon with a sharp backhand blow.
“Pomegranate seeds…” Fury spat with icy contempt, before sliding a solid arm beneath Aisling’s shoulder to haul her upright. “Can you walk?” she asked, her gaze hard, yet blazing with worry.
“I… I think so,” rasped the healer, her voice hoarse and broken. Her thoughts were clearing. At last, she was finding herself again.
“I’ll help her,” Fenja intervened, rushing to her side to support her and take some of her weight.
“Quickly, we must reach the others!” Fury growled as she straightened, already carving a path ahead. Her whip cracked through the air, urging them forward.
“Thank you for coming back for me…” Aisling groaned, her voice fractured, her breath still painful. She squeezed Fenja’s hand, her eyes brimming with desperate gratitude.
“Thank you for holding on. We’ll get you out of here…” the huntress replied, her firm tone contrasting with the fear shining in her gaze.
“The humans…” Aisling’s sudden clarity surged. “Lucifer and Lilith have imprisoned them, we must—”
“The others are handling it,” Fenja cut her short, refusing to let her relapse.
They plunged into a maze of dark corridors, each turn bringing a fresh wave of demons and monsters. The clash of blades, the guttural screams, and the stench of blood formed an infernal symphony. Yet their small group pushed forward, carried by urgency and rage. Finally, they burst into the vast main hall, now drowned in absolute chaos.
There, not far from them, Strife had become a living storm. Armed with artifacts of dubious origin,scavenged from who knew where, he hurled them at random, each exploding or unleashing uncontrollable energies into the howling mass of demons, Anakim, and Rephaim.
“Oooh, what’s this one do? Ouch, that must sting!… Oh, this one looks expensive! Can I keep it? No? Fine… eat this!”
“Strife!” Fury roared.
The Horseman instantly turned his head toward them, adopting a mock-serious expression.
“Sorry, folks. When duty calls, you answer… Send the cleaning bill to the Council!”
With a sharp whistle, he summoned his mount, which burst forth in a gust of dark flame. Vaulting into the saddle, he cut through the horde in a murderous gallop toward their group.
“Where are War and Death?” Fury demanded without delay.
“War’s gathered the humans into shelter. He’s holding them off until we regroup. As for Death… well, he found himself some new friends!”
Indeed, Death stood atop a mountain of still-smoldering corpses, a spectral figure in the midst of the carnage. What froze the healer’s blood was watching those bodies rise again under his command, transformed into ghastly puppets. His necromancy animated them, driving them with relentless precision to slaughter the remaining demons, his eyes glowing with an icy steel light.
“We need to move fast before Lucifer and Lilith get involved…” Fury growled. “Did you find what you came for?”
“Oh, I did!” he replied, spinning a small silver sphere in his palm, pulsing with an inner glow. “I knew they’d have a beacon like this!”
“Then let’s go!”
Together they surged forward, forcing a path through the demonic tide. Fenja never strayed from Aisling’s side, swearing no creature would touch her. The group’s progress was slow, and just as they seemed about to be overrun, the ground quaked with a new detonation.
War erupted into view, clad in his monstrous form, incandescent limbs annihilating a battalion of foes with a single swipe. Then, as though nothing had happened, he shifted back into his human guise.
“We leave. Now.” War’s rough voice rolled like contained thunder.
He strode forward without hesitation, lifting Aisling and setting her against his massive gauntlet, holding her steady with one arm while reclaiming his still-bloody sword with the other. His gaze hardened as he gestured to a corner of the hall where a trembling mass of survivors huddled.
“The humans need familiar faces.”
“So you admit yours isn’t?” Strife, panting but never silent, chuckled.
“Strife… not now,” Fury hissed as she pressed on. Idris and Fenja followed immediately, racing toward the humans to gather and guide them.
At that moment, a chilling shadow swept beside them. Death appeared, his silent steps cutting through the surrounding din.
“I am buying us time,” he said simply, his tone implacable.
Behind him, the corpses he had raised continued their work with obscene obedience, carving through demon flesh in a mechanical slaughter that delayed the inevitable tide.
This time without jest, Strife spun the small silver sphere in his hand before hurling it to the ground. The object shattered in a burst of sparks, and a bluish vortex tore open, writhing like a gaping wound in the air.
“Go! Everyone, through!”
The humans surged toward it in desperate panic, driven by pure survival.
But a roar split the chaos. From a balcony overlooking the hall, Lucifer and Lilith appeared. The Prince of Hell, drunk with rage, twisted almost convulsively, his body warping as his fury reshaped him into an ever more monstrous vision. His skin cracked like molten armor, his eyes blazed with pure hatred, and each pulse of his wrath made the fortress walls shudder.
No one waited to see what would come next. In one motion, the Horsemen and their allies hurled themselves into the rift, swallowed by the vortex, while Lucifer’s screams of vengeance echoed behind them.
.
Aisling struggled to piece together the thread of events. The final moments of their escape were nothing but indistinct chaos, a blur of sounds, blows, and cries swallowed by the echo of the Void. Before the portal had closed, Anakim and Rephaim had hurled themselves after them, forcing the Horsemen into a brutal fight among the suspended pathways of that unstable nothingness.
In a flash of light and flame, Uriel and her Hellguard had surged from an adjacent portal, Astaroth and his infernal legions beside them, and even human soldiers, led by Azrael himself. Together, they had repelled the onslaught of infernal creatures to grant the prisoners a path toward the Twilight Realm. Then, when the moment finally came to cross, the portal had carried them elsewhere.
Aisling blinked groggily, still numb, her head resting against War’s massive shoulder. Around her she glimpsed Idris and Fenja close by, Uriel and Astaroth standing in their radiant or burning auras, and above them loomed Azrael. The healer drew a painful breath, her lungs still raw, then caught Fenja’s hesitant voice, as though the huntress rubbed her eyes to be sure she wasn’t dreaming.
“Where are we?”
The healer could never have given an answer. It felt as if they floated in the sky, suspended in a space without anchor, wrapped in a sea of clouds. Then the cotton masses split apart, revealing a breathtaking sight.
Before their eyes stood a colossal island, floating in the void like a fragment of creation torn from the world. Its greenery blazed with unreal brilliance, translucent rivers wound through radiant meadows, and waterfalls burst from immaculate cliffs, their waters shimmering with supernatural purity. Between the hills spread white ruins, colonnades and broken arches glowing with forgotten memory. At the center, towering over all, rose a tree of impossible scale. Its trunk was so vast it seemed to bear the heavens, and its branches, cloaked in dazzling green foliage, disappeared into the light above.
Aisling’s mouth fell open, unable even to breathe for a moment.
“This is…” she whispered.
“This is impossible,” murmured Uriel, her face frozen in rare emotion. She lifted her gaze toward Azrael.
“This is Eden,” confirmed Death. But his voice, usually sharp as a blade, trembled with a contained unease.
War frowned and fixed his eyes on the Archangel.
“I thought after the last time, you swore to let Eden vanish, Guardian.”
Azrael himself looked disoriented.
“I did. And yet… it seems this place has chosen otherwise. For them.” His gaze turned toward Fenja and Idris, shining with unexpected respect.
“For us?” Fenja asked, unsettled.
“Eden should have returned to your race,” Astaroth breathed, shaken with awe.
“We… we are meant to go in?” The huntress barely tore her attention away from Aisling, still worried for her condition.
Azrael inclined his head.
“The Tree of Knowledge has chosen to grant you a vision.”
Idris’s brow furrowed, wary.
“Is it safe?”
“For you, yes.”
Fenja hesitated, her gaze shifting from Aisling to Idris, then finally nodded.
“If it can help us…”
War bent low and gently set Aisling on her feet, letting her go forward with them. But the healer froze at once, her body locked by a strange resolve.
“Aisling… come. Let’s go together,” urged Fenja.
Idris stepped closer, thinking she wavered only from weakness, ready to carry her. But Aisling shook her head and gave a faint smile.
“No… you two go. I’ll wait here.” Her hoarse voice carried unexpected firmness.
The silence lingered a second before Idris clasped Fenja’s hand gently. Together they stepped into Eden, disappearing from sight. The rest of the group stood still, watching as though they could not trust their own eyes.
That was when Aisling noticed a detail: Death had turned his face away, his stone features fixed on the opposite horizon. His three brothers joined him, rigid. Even Uriel seemed to know what lay hidden there, her silence heavy. Limping slightly, Aisling moved in their direction. Astaroth offered his arm to guide her.
Below opened an immense valley, like a gaping scar. The earth lay black, cracked, covered with ancient ashes that the wind sometimes lifted into funereal swirls. Here and there, grotesque mounds jutted from the ground: shattered bones, rusted fragments of armor, weapons twisted by centuries of abandonment. The whole place breathed the memory of a slaughter so ancient it seemed almost unreal, yet the pain endured, inscribed in every stone, in every grain of dust.
Aisling needed no explanation. She knew. Here the Nephilim had fallen, their blood saturating the soil until it poisoned the land, condemning the valley to be nothing but an open grave. Her eyes lingered on the battlefield until at last she glanced at the Horsemen, but their faces were closed.
Astaroth’s hand pressed gently on her arm, urging her to turn away. Better to leave the Horsemen to their silence. Uriel and Azrael followed gravely, honoring the weight of that place. Night began to fall, draping the floating islands in an even more solemn veil.
Guided by Astaroth, Aisling left the battlefield’s view. They descended slightly until they reached a natural hollow in the rock: a small cavern hidden behind a curtain of moss and vines. Nearby, a thin trickle of water sprang from the stone to form a clear basin.
“Come, let’s get you cleaned up,” Uriel’s voice softened, though her eyes betrayed a deep worry.
The angel took over from Astaroth, slipping a firm yet cautious arm around Aisling’s shoulders to support her. She led her to the basin, her gestures imbued with rare gentleness. She helped the healer undress and immerse herself in the cool water.
“Will they be all right?” the young human asked, her voice raw and broken.
Uriel knelt at the basin’s edge, brushing a damp hand across her cheek.
“Don’t worry about them. The Horsemen are strong… they’ve survived worse. The real question is you. How are you holding on? No one passes through that circle of Hell unscarred.”
The young woman lowered her eyes, water streaming down her face.
“I’m… just tired.”
A terrible understatement. Though she had regained her mind, the seed lodged within her drained nearly all her vital energy. The pact with Lucifer had exacted its price… and had stolen much of her time.
Uriel poured water gently over her head, seeking to wash her pale brow and hair plastered with sweat. Aisling closed her eyes and tried to surrender to the sensation, but no rest came. This exhaustion would not vanish with sleep.
“Why didn’t you want to go with your friends?”
“I… I don’t feel like going. I don’t think it’s my place.”
While Uriel watched over her, Astaroth prepared a small fire nearby. Once Aisling emerged from the water, the angel settled her close to the flames. Yet she still felt cold.
When the Horsemen finally rejoined them, the atmosphere grew heavier still, their faces shut and dark. Uriel, seated near Aisling, cast a worried glance toward War.
“She’s freezing…” she whispered.
The colossus grunted but stepped forward at once. He sat heavily beside her, and his mere presence radiated a reassuring warmth. Exhausted, Aisling leaned against him. No one spoke. They remained there, gathered around the faintly crackling fire, each trapped in their own thoughts.
“You should sleep, little one.” Death’s grave, veiled voice rose from the far side of the flames. His pale eyes glowed through the shadows, fixed on Aisling.
“I… I can’t sleep,” she murmured, shaking her head slightly.
Death did not argue. He rose slowly, imposing, his steps heavy yet uncannily quiet. Reaching her, he crouched and placed a cold hand above her eyes.
“You will.”
She barely had time to frown, to try to protest, before her eyelids closed on their own. She collapsed into a heavy, dreamless sleep.
When she finally opened her eyes again, the night had consumed the sky. The fire had dwindled to a few glowing embers that pulsed faintly. She lifted her head and found Azrael standing motionless, statue-like.
“Do you feel better?”
Aisling nodded vaguely, still numb, then slowly pushed herself upright. Her curious gaze wandered around the camp.
“Your friends are still in the garden,” Azrael continued. “They are safe there. Astaroth watches from afar.”
The healer gave a silent nod. Her eyes drifted then toward the basin, where two silhouettes emerged in the gloom. War and Uriel sat side by side. The angel had folded her wings around them and seemed to have dozed against the Horseman’s massive shoulder. War had rested his brow against the crown of her head, eyes closed. A peace they had perhaps never known. Aisling could not help but smile softly.
Death sat alone, gazing down toward the remains of the charnel field. The healer noticed he absently rubbed the strange scar across his chest. A little further on, Fury and Strife, kneeling, were shaping the earth with unusual focus. Intrigued, Aisling rose despite the biting chill still clinging to her skin. Her legs trembled, but she needed to walk, to shake off the icy torpor.
As she drew nearer, she discovered they were tending a small patch of soil where luminous blue flowers, gathered nearby, had been planted. The fragile glow of the petals stood in stark contrast to the valley’s darkness.
“You’re digging too deep, Fury,” Strife remarked, his tone surprisingly calm. “At this rate, the flowers will be buried before they ever breathe.”
Aisling knelt beside them, a tender smile touching her lips.
“What are you doing?”
Fury paused, her clenched jaw easing only slightly. She lowered her eyes to the plants, then after a silence, answered:
“It will take time… but the battlefield no longer burns.” Her gaze slid toward the valley below, over the scorched expanse, the ashes, the remains of the Nephilim. “In a few centuries, perhaps… these flowers will cover them.”
Aisling gazed at the glowing blossoms. She understood. Even Death had once spoken of lilies blooming along the Styx. Life always found a way. The healer inhaled deeply, placing her hands upon the damp earth.
“Not like that… watch.” She showed them how to set the roots properly, how to cover them with just enough soil, neither too heavy nor too loose. When the last flowers had been planted, Strife pushed himself upright, bracing on his knees, then set his hands on his hips.
“Well… guess we’ll have to come back in a few centuries… that is, if we don’t die first.”
His tone tried to stay light, but Aisling caught the melancholy he could not mask. Fury turned her eyes away, as though the thought left a bitter taste. The idea of never seeing the flowers bloom weighed heavier than they would admit.
Aisling remained kneeling, eyes closed, her palms pressed into the soil. Slowly, she drew a breath, seeking to reconnect with her “green hand”. The seed burned in her chest, draining almost all her life, yet she managed to gather a fragment of power and channel it into her fingertips. A soft light pulsed between her palms, then spread into the ground like an invisible wave.
“Aisling…” Fury breathed.
When the healer opened her eyes again, wonder slipped past her lips. Before her, amid ash and bone, the earth began to tremble. Translucent buds broke the surface, timid at first, then bolder. Within moments, a carpet of blue luminescent flowers unfolded, spreading beyond the small circle they had planted.
The wave of living light advanced slowly, blanketing the valley, winding down to the charnel field below. The radiant blossoms unfurled like fallen stars upon the earth, a terrestrial constellation, peaceful and achingly beautiful. Where death had ruled, life reclaimed its place.
The unreal glow drew War and Death’s attention. Strife and Fury turned back toward Aisling.
“No use protesting,” the healer murmured as she staggered upright. She let herself sink beside Death, resting her hands on trembling knees. “I couldn’t undo it, even if I wanted to.”
A heavy silence fell. None of them found words, perhaps too shocked, or simply incapable of naming what they felt. Then, one by one, they came to sit beside her, their eyes fixed on the field of flowers transforming the valley below.
Long minutes passed, marked only by the wind stirring the glowing corollas. At last, Strife let out a loud sigh.
“I suppose that’s the end of another chapter for the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse…”
Aisling turned her head toward him, a questioning light in her eyes.
“Why still use that title? It’s a slave’s name, forced on you by the Council. It doesn’t fit anymore… not really.”
Fury’s brow furrowed slightly, her gaze thoughtful.
“We never really had the chance to find another…” she admitted.
“And it’s gotta sound good,” Strife added. “A name that strikes. Something grand… but with a hint of fear. No, not a hint, downright terrifying. A name that makes you shiver just to hear it…”
“Darksiders.”
“What?”
“Darksiders,” Aisling repeated with quiet certainty. “It sounds truer. More like… what you really are.”
Silence greeted her proposal. Strife slowly raised his hands as if sketching the letters in the air.
“Darksiders… Yeah. That hits.”
Fury exhaled through her nose, a trace of a smile softening her usual sternness.
“Darksiders, then.”
Their eyes turned toward War and Death. War nodded gravely. Death remained motionless, his gaze fixed on Aisling, strangely softened. She met his eyes, and despite her fatigue, a smile slipped free.
Darksiders.
Yes. It sounded right. And that was enough.