The doors creak closed behind me with a high whine, and I just pull my tail out of the way in time before they shut. Heilin, standing at the edge of her study, flicks one ear at my presence, her voice booming through the small, subdued room: "Avery. So glad you could make it."

From old paintings, I can tell you that the room has been done over every time the Auspicia reascends the throne. While Heilin didn't care to refurbish the rest of the castle to commemorate her reign, as the others have done, she repainted her personal office in a soft yellow not unlike the lighter shades of her undercoat and did away with most of the furnishings. She keeps a selection of plants along one wall, and a cabinet full of mementos on the other, as well as several rows of candles on the tables that take up most of the interior space. There are two, simple ones made of modest wood, which open up a straight line for walking from the door to the colossal tinted windows on the other side.

Above the entryway is a detailed painting of Aislyn, her Grand Auspecia's first incarnation, with all six wings spread to their full extent. Heilin doesn't manifest her wings unless she's performing miracles or on formal occasions, but many of her predecessors were known to keep two active at all time and The Enlightened, the thirty-sixth incarnation, walked around with all six of her wings. I can only imagine that she would have been terrifying to confront, even more so than the stoic Heilin, and I give another thanks to Verhamera for putting me in service of Her Sixty-Second High Auspicia.

The murals and walls are tinted red this evening, a vibrant red known only to the shades of flowers and blood. The sun is falling behind Lira City in the distance, and it's clear that soon all the light will have dimmed to naught. Sirius, the smaller moon, is already high in the sky, and Procyon, his sister, will be up not long after.

Heilin turns from the sunset and manifests two wings, running them along empty bottles on either side of the room. Where her feathers touch them, light wells up, illuminating the room. The gold glow hardly masks the violent reds visible from out the window, but the scents of otherworlds and spices spilling from the bottles at least make the atmosphere cozy. Heilin's wings tuck against her side and fade from existence.

She looks at me with a grim sadness in her eyes. "Well, Avery, I'm afraid I have something to confide in you."

I nod. I've been treated to secrets before, to the point where a Defender once called me Heilin's pet, but it's still nothing less than the greatest of honors. "You can entrust anything in me, your Highness, anything at all." I dip my head.

She dips it back, and everything from my paws to the tips of my ears goes electric. "The Obsidian threat looms over us still, like a plague of locusts just days from the crop. The Veil I've put up with my magic grows more opaque by the day, one of the final stages before it will finally give way, and then they will come in unimaginable numbers to take this world for themselves. I have, in the past, estimated this final day of reckoning at decades, even centuries in the future, though many have guessed it might be sooner. Though the predictions of the prophets of the past have turned out to be wildly inaccurate, I'm afraid recent predictions hold more weight than I'd care for the public to know."

I hold my breath, recounting in my head a hundred tales of the Obsidians, the perverted and terrible kin of our gods, the shapeshifters who had for millennia made husks of planet after planet, hoping in vain for the day they'd conquer us, their original foe.

"We have only a year left." Heilin finishes.

Tar fills my stomach, my lungs, everything. In some ways, I had expected it, but to hear it for her mouth still carries enough weight to cripple me. I imagine skies of glossy invaders, of shadow descending upon the land I love, of the end, and my heart picks up to a furious rate.

"Most of our world knows it as a much larger number, though if worst comes to worst, I doubt the ruse will hold out. It'll be a few months at best before everything begins to collapse. We've long since had discussions with Athena and the Ceilvyran council about preparations, but it will have to be a massive undertaking." Heilin says, her shoulders square and gaze high as she paces the room. "This is a battle we've been preparing for for untold ages. To this day, the potential results are uncertain, but it is clear that we can not wait around for miracles. They are not coming. Rather, we will have to make our own."
"So we have a plan?" I ask.

"There are many younger and more ingenuitive than I already assembling, those ready to protect this world and what we stand for until its final breath. We have alliances stretching cosmos, mechanisms that have been in place for millennia, and it is likely fate is not yet done with us. The situation remains dire, but we have not yet given ourselves to the jaws of death."

So it is to be an ultimate battle, then. I nod again. "Do you plan to engage Nethera yourself?" The queen and central hivemind of the Obsidians is our largest threat if we plan on taking down the entire cluster.

"As a last resort, I may have to, but it would be messy. My chances of surviving would just about rival hers in any fair duel."

"You'd also have to let the protective barrier about this world down to encounter her in her lair, leaving millions of innocents across all three continents unguarded. It's risky, that's for certain... alternatively, we could send a task force over to the Obsidian's world once we've put the Veil down, but who could we trust to go?"

"At the moment, despite many potentials, I can't think of any one squadron of Defenders I'd deem ready. Still, it remains that a small, dedicated group might better be able to attack Nethera than I would, owing to their unpredictability and sheer grit. Gods are not made to kill gods. Heroes are." Heilin's gaze narrows. "Anyhow, she'll be expecting me."

"Hope you find your heroes." I say, letting out an uneasy, chirruping laugh.

"And I as well," Heilin replies. I can see her smile in the glass, and my heart seizes up with endless want. She continues, her eyes glancing over me, "They have a tendency of coming from strange places, don't they?"

"I suppose so." I tell her, restraining my enthusiasm.

"I did bring you here for a reason, Avery. You showed much promise, straight from the beginning..."

"I can't imagine her High Auspecia passing over a pup in the grass," I insist.

"In the midst of a thunderstorm? Never. It's an auspicious sign, nonetheless. We speak of the she same young Canira brash enough to speak strategy with me to my face, the one who stares me in the eyes without cowering. The very same who's read and memorized most of the books in the entire library, giving her the tools and knowledge I'd need of a potential strategist. You lack the experience, true, but you have that of all the past leaders lodged in that head of yours."

I nod several times, trying and failing to hide how eager I am to begin. "Anything you need from me. I'll up my studies, talk with the Defenders, begin getting a feel for their tactics..." Though no Defenders have a warm place in their heart for me, given my rank, I'm too dizzy with excitement to worry about them.

"I know you will. I'll have special permissions for entering the training quarters." She shakes her head, as if she herself can't believe the lot of this is happening. "We're so close." she sighs, the sunset bright in her eyes, and I can hear millennia of conflict in every glorious note of her voice.

"I know." I say, padding to her side. I want to take in all the light with her, to offer something, but instead I just bring myself almost close enough to touch and sit, watching the final rays of light dissipate over the horizon.

How beautifully we go out in our last seconds.