So This Is Ever After

Chapter 1 CHAPTER 1
I'd been envisioning what it would be like to behead the Vile One since the old wizard had shown up at my door the day after I turned seventeen and told me my destiny-that I would be the person who ended the dark shadow of evil that ruled our realm. Well, okay, not that specific second because who believes a drunken stranger with a crooked hat carrying around a humming staff? No one. That's who. At least, you shouldn't. That's unsafe.

Let me amend. I'd been envisioning this moment since after we'd had tea and he'd explained a few things and told me about the prophecy. Though it didn't feel real, as in very likely, and downright probable, until I pulled a magical sword from a bog and a beam of light shot down from the sky, anointing me with supernatural purpose.

After that, I kept a vision in my head about what would happen when I separated the Vile One's head from his shoulders in the final climactic battle. The cut would be clean. There would be artistic arterial spray, and the disembodied head would roll down the steps of the raised dais and come to rest at the feet of my best friend. Everyone would cheer, and I'd finally be the hero I was prophesied to become. I'd feel different. Righteous. Awesome. Accomplished. Finally grown-up.

Unfortunately, as things seem to have gone since the start of this whole journey, that did not happen. Not even a little bit.

Fueled by adrenaline and vigor, I swung my blade for the death blow, expecting to cleanly remove the Vile One's head. Instead, the blunted edge buried halfway through his neck and jarred to a stop on his spinal column. Huh. Who knew that prophesied weapons didn't come ready-to-use? Apparently, magic swords that spring from bogs don't rise pre-sharpened.

Stunned at this unexpected turn of events, I froze long enough to draw attention from the party of questors supporting me.

"Arek!" Sionna yelled from somewhere in the chaos. "Finish him off!"

I wrenched the blade from the Vile One's throat, did my level best to ignore the astonished look on his face, the open mouth, the wide eyes, the gush of blood running down the front of his black robes, and struck again. And again. I hacked at the twitching body, which had fallen backward and slumped on the front of the throne, propped up like a grotesque doll, until I was certain he was dead, and no amount of magic could bring him back.

Finally, the neck gave way and the head plopped onto the ground, splattering like an overripe pumpkin. Dead eyes peered up at me from sunken hollows, and thin lips pulled over yellowed teeth in a parody of a scream. A picture that would surely fuel my nightmares for at least the next few months, potentially the rest of my life.

I had also imagined lifting the Vile One's head by his hair and holding it up as a kind of trophy as all the dark magic he'd used to usurp the throne and control the realm would recede like a fierce tide, sucking itself from the world in a flash of light as the populace cheered. Except, the Vile One was bald, and there was no way I was picking the head up by anything else, because ugh.

Also, nothing happened. No flash of light. No magical reversal. No swell of victorious music. No fanfare. Nothing.

Huh.

Disappointingly, I didn't feel different at all, other than sticky. And weary down to my bones, and nauseated. There were no cheers from onlookers, though the sound of vomiting was clear over my right shoulder.

I dabbed my blood-drenched face with the hem of my tunic, but only succeeded in smearing the crimson more thoroughly. My chest heaved. My arms ached. I turned, swaying on the steps, and surveyed the chaos of the room behind me. The fighting had ceased. My friends were all upright, scattered around like thrown dice, but alive. Followers of the Vile One, distinguishable by their black robes and neck tattoos, were either dead, fleeing, or kneeling in defeat.

I leaned heavily on the sword-barely resisting the urge to sag right there onto the stone steps, next to the jerking corpse, and take a nap. Instead, I stumbled down to the main floor.

"You okay?" Matt asked. He had soot stains on his sleeves, tears in his clothes, and a cut above his eye that leaked sluggishly. His brown hair was matted to his head with sweat. He smelled like ozone and magic. He held his staff in his hand, the bright blue jewel at the tip glowing like a star, but as we stood together in the aftermath, his power faded.

A late addition to the vision of victory I kept in my head included sweep...