The Burning Light with Shadows (A SOTAM Fan Fiction)

Déjà Vu (Tam's PoV)

I was nearly at Biana's room with Marella before I felt a hand on my shoulder. Marella and I looked back to see Sophie, red faced and panicking. "Th- there's a bottle on the shore of the lake. It has a note from our ally," she panted. "Or at least, who I think is our ally."

"Uh... shouldn't we go get the others before we go get it?" Marella asked, twirling a braid. Sophie looked down at her boots. "I don't know... I think we should get it right now. It's just a gut feeling." I nodded. "If that's what you think, let's do it."

She practically dragged us out the front door to an orange-tinted bottle in the sand. I hadn't realized that it was already nighttime. "Wait, this is where we saw the shadow," I said. Sophie nodded. She picked up the bottle and uncapped it, sliding a scroll onto her hand. Then she unfurled the message. Marella and I looked over her shoulders to read it.

Oblivimyre. Now.

Everblaze.

"Everblaze?" Sophie whispered. "Oblivimyre..." Marella muttered. "That's where you did the healing on Fintan, right? Where Kenric..." she didn't finish. "We need to teleport there now," Sophie declared, starting to run to the gate.

"What if it's a trap?" I asked, catching up to her. She paused for a second, stopping midstep. "We'll teleport nearby," she concluded. We met her at the cliff, and she dragged us off into the void.

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We landed on a grassy patch of land to find out we were surrounded by councilors, emissaries, alchemists, including Elwin and Dex's dad. Then we noticed a large, burning yellow flame heading toward Eternalia.

"Sophie!" Councilor Oralie ran toward them. "I was just about to hail you. We need you to get 24 bottles of quintessence." Sophie muttered something under her breath. Oralie handed her a leaping crystal, a stellarscope, and a bag of bottles. "I'll go with you," I volunteered. Marella shuffled her feet nervously. "I'll stay here. See what I can do..." I mentally facepalmed, forgetting that she was a pyrokinetic. Not that she could do much without being exposed to the Council.

"Hurry," Oralie urged us. Sophie held the leaping crystal, and we both stepped into the beam of light.

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The moment we got there, Sophie yelled out, "Why is this happening, again!?" She shook her head. "It's happening in exactly the same events. The everblaze is in the exact same location, and I'm in the exact same location... but with you instead of Fitz," she noted.

Sophie shook her head again. "That doesn't matter. We need to hurry," she concluded. I watched her set up the stellarscope. When she finished, she sighed. "I didn't bring my cape. We need to rip up something to protect our hands. When quintessence is bottled, the stellarscope becomes white-hot."

Luckily, I had brought my cape. And boy was I glad I did. I ripped it off and started tearing it into shreds. In a few seconds, it was just a messy pile of fabric strands. Sophie ran over and started wrapping her hands in the fabric. "Can you hold the stellarscope while I find the star?" she asked. I nodded, starting to place the fabric on my hands too.

When we finally finished, Sophie held up the stellarscope. I came up behind her using one of my arms to level the scope. Then I placed my other arm around her, placing my hand on hers. "Uh... is this okay?" I asked awkwardly when she flinched.I felt her nod.

Sophie looked through the lens and began turning the knobs. Then she flipped the lever and I felt heat emit from the stellarscope, and a bright flash appeared inside the bottle. The glass made a tiny clink sound as it bottled up the quintessence.

"One down, twenty-three left to go," she said softly. The next five bottles felt like an eternity, and then the next ten felt like a few minutes when she started to get a hang of it.

"8 more," she said softly. She shook her head. "I'm just getting a bit dizzy from staring through the lens." She was able to do two more bottles before almost collapsing on me.

"Sorry," she said, struggling to stay standing. "How did you do it last time?" I asked. She thought for a moment. "I... I transmitted the location of Elementine to Fitz. But last time I did, I accidentally gave him all my memories of the stars."

"Then transmit it to me," I suggested. "I'll finish up the last 6 bottles." Her eyes seemed somewhat unfocused, but I suddenly saw an image of a star. I repeated the image in my mind a couple times before holding up the stellarscope and locating the star through the lens.

It had been quite a while since I had last bottled up light from a star, but somehow, I still remembered how to do it. I turned the knobs to isolate the star, and flicked the lever. The bottle lit up and clinked.

"Nice job," Sophie said, smiling uneasily. "I'm getting a serious case of Déjà vu," she mumbled. I quickly bottled the last five bottles and packed them up in the bag. "We need to be careful with this," she warned. "Otherwise... ka-boom..." I started placing them a tiny bit slower once she had said that.

We leaped back to Eternalia to see the deadly flames nearly at the city. I gave the bag to Councilor Oralie, who quickly handed it to another alchemist. "Thank you," she said fragilely, and her eyes welled up with tears.

Sophie looked just as close to crying. "This is where Kenric... where Kenric died." I wrapped her in a tight hug. She surprisingly didn't flinch this time. I think we stayed like that for a while, because a while later, someone came and joined the hug. I saw braided blond hair and said, "Marella?"

"Yeah," she responded. We all released from the hug. "I didn't know you were a touchy-feely person," I teased. She glared at me "I'm not really. But this is a touchy-feely situation. Especially over the death of a Councilor..."

Surprisingly, Sophie had fallen asleep crying. "Did you do anything to slow the everblaze?" I whispered to Marella. She shook her head. "I tried to do it subtly, but I couldn't really do anything." She shivered. "I didn't like the feeling of it."

I nodded. "Yeah, understandable." I looked back down at Sophie laying in the soft grass. "Let's bring her back to Everglen. If they need us, they'll hail us."

Luckily, Sophie had a leaping crystal to Everglen that Fitz had given to her. I picked her up bridal style and Marella held the crystal up to the light. The moment we stepped inside Everglen, everyone swarmed us, asking what had happened and why Sophie was asleep. Marella waved them away, starting to answer their questions. I ran into Sophie's room and placed her on her bed.

"See you later, Sophie," I said softly. I could have sworn I saw her smile.

A/N You may be wondering why the elves are at Everglen, and why they haven't gone to Foxfire. Well, after the Neverseen infiltrated Foxfire and attacked Sophie and Tam, they put Foxfire on hiatus for a while. Foxfire will open in about a week or two. And the elves are at Everglen firstly for their safety, and second because Biana wanted a sleepover. Next chapter is Plans Pt. 2.