Celeste Windwhisper's Arc

Chapter 3 of 14

Celeste landed beside the boy on the glowing altar. Its carved surface pulsed warm under her feet. He knelt and pressed his small hand to the stone. "It can fix your colors," he said. "But only once. The altar gives itself up." Celeste's throat tightened. Seven years of thin, dying pigment. One stone that could end it. She looked at the boy's bright wings, then at the glowing carvings. "Do it," she whispered. The boy smiled and pushed harder. Light poured up through the cracks. The altar shuddered. Stone split. Gold dust rose in a slow spiral and wrapped around Celeste's brush. Her pigments drank it in. They thickened. They burned bright as a vine-draped tower lit from within. The altar cracked apart beneath them. Pieces tumbled into the clouds. Where it had stood, only rubble remained, pale and broken and quiet. Celeste lifted into the air and swept her brush. A leaf bloomed across the sky, vivid and strong, its colors holding firm against the wind. It did not crack. It did not fade. It drifted downward, whole. Below, in the place where the altar fell, a great oak rose from the rubble, its branches catching the colored leaf as it landed. Celeste stared down, shaking. The colors had survived. But the altar was gone forever, and she would never be able to fix another mistake.