Queen of Shadows, Queen of Dreams

When Meagan came to, she was lying at the shallows of a lake. The water was a greyish-blue that reminded her of fish-scales, but there were no fish swimming in it. The sand was the same color, so that she almost lost track of what was water and what was dry land. Bleak mist covered everything, as did a bone-chilling cold under a twilight sky. Meagan stood and shivered, damp. She looked down at herself, and noticed her hands were pale and translucent, even glowing a bit. Her palms had no lines, like Ebbony's.
“Your body is still forming. This is a temporary one the Gate is giving you until it's ready,” Jemma said behind her.
“Oh.” She wasn't sure what else to say. Just “oh.”
“We're in the Gate,” Jemma informed. “This is it for us.”
“For us?”
“It's different for each person. I knew someone who had it as a black void, and another who had it as a glowing, suspended nihilism of golden light. But for us, it is a lake.”
“Wait- I can see,” Meagan realized. She wondered why she wasn't thinking as fast here. “How?”
“Well, how should I know?” Jemma asked, exasperated. “Goodness, I don't know everything about it. Just bits and pieces from Risus.” She shivered. “I think we've been here before.”
“When?”
“Maybe as babies. Maybe in a dream.” Jemma sighed. “Crap. How are we supposed to get out of here?”
“We could walk,” Meagan suggested. “It might clear our heads. Besides, if we go in a straight line, we'd reach the end eventually, right?”
“This place is infinite. The only thing we'd do is march ourselves to exhaustion until we feel like dying. Nothing dies here. It exists between worlds, so nothing can.”
Meagan frowned. “Does the landscape change? Could it be something other than a lake farther on?”
“Maybe. I don't know.” Jemma cursed under her breath.
Meagan glanced at her reflection in the clear water. Her eyes were violet, like Jemma's, and she seemed taller. She gave a little gasp as she saw the magnificent, translucent feathered wings on her back, with long, elongated white feathers tinged with gold and indigo hues at the edges. They were spectacular, making her previous white ones look like drabby, filthy pigeon-wings. She beat them experimentally and found, to her delight, that both worked. She almost cried in glee as she rose into the air.
“Hey!” Jemma snapped. “Quit playing around.”
Meagan drifted back down to the ground. “Sorry.”
“Sorry my foot.”
“What was that, earlier, with our voices?” Meagan asked.
“Your desperate thoughts and longing woke me,” Jemma replied. “You were stupid to shove us in here.”
“You could've stopped me.”
“I could've,” Jemma acknowledged. Meagan, even with her sight back, could sense Jemma could've; despite how little Meagan had seen of her in action, she had more than an inkling of her capabilities. Jemma certainly could have- but she wouldn't and didn't. Even if she didn't admit it, Jemma also carried deep worry and anxiety about Jenni, and would've done the same thing a thousand times over, just as Meagan would have. They were, after all, the same person.
Meagan sat on the sand and swept her hand across it, feeling the grains. “Now what? Mariale was stuck here for five hundred years. Who knows how long it'll be before it opens enough for us to get out?”
Jemma crouched next to her. “I guess we wait.”
“We wait?”
“What, do you have a better plan?”
Silence fell between them, broken only by the lapping of the water on the sand. It was a rhythmic motion, and everything seemed to be in beat- even the thumps of Meagan's heart. In, out. Ba-dump. Ba-dump. Jemma scratched words in the sand, erasing them as soon as they were etched out. Meagan twiddled her thumbs, and sighed.
A scream full of rage, pain, and bloodlust shattered the twilit quiet.
Meagan jumped to her feet, unsheathing her sword. “What was that?”
Jemma drew a dagger from the sheath at her waist. “I don't know.”
“I thought there was just us in the Gate.”
“Me too, but whatever it was, it sounded pretty mad.”
“Let's not wait for it to find us.”
“Good idea.” Jemma pointed to the water. “It sounded like it came from there, so we should head the opposite direction. Maybe there's something beyond all this sand.”
“Why don't we fly?” Meagan suggested. “It'd be faster.
“Someone itching to get airborne?” Jemma cracked a smile. “Go for it.” They unfurled their wings and with a mighty leap, took to the sky. Meagan beat her wings to the rhythm of the lake, and she saw Jemma do the same. In, out. Ba-dump. Ba-dump. Up, down.
There were no clouds, only more gatherings of mist, which pulsed and convulsed eerily. It was colder higher up too. Another roar rocked the distance, then another. Jemma paled. It was closer. Much closer.
“It moves quickly,” Meagan noted.
“At least it can't kill us,” Jemma said in an attempt to lessen the fear and tension they both felt. “Nothing dies in the Gate.”
“That doesn't mean it won't give us enough to pain for us to wish it could,” Meagan pointed out.
“Shut up.”
The roars continued incessantly as they flew, getting ever closer as they went farther and farther away from the water's edge. The sand spread for what seemed like miles, its color changing from the blue-grey of fish to a mix of scarlet and maroon that looked akin to blood. Meagan blanched, and even the mist turned into the sanguine hue. Looking ahead, Meagan saw another lake, its waters turbulent and spewing foam.
“Do you hear that?” Jemma asked as they hovered over the red water. She cupped her ear.
“I don't hear anything.”
“Exactly. It stopped. Whatever was making that noise stopped.”
Meagan breathed a sigh of relief, and Jemma sheathed her dagger. “I don't want to go back,” Meagan said.
“No duh.” Jemma frowned, and pointed to the water two or three feet below them. “It's bubbling.”
Meagan stared. “Does that mean there's something be-”
A great eruption of spray hit them in the face, throwing them into the water. Meagan coughed once she resurfaced, and beside her, Jemma spluttered. The water tasted foul and metallic, and it seemed to be much heavier than water in real life- if this strange substance even was water.
A bellow sounded in front of them. Meagan looked up. A red serpent, eyes black pits and teeth jagged spikes of yellow stained scarlet, curled over them, giant in comparison to their small forms. Meagan was instantly rendered mute.
Jemma screamed, and that act gave Meagan her voice back. She followed suit. They turned and frantically started swimming, but the serpent shrieked and whipped its tail forward, smacking them in the chest. Winded and breathing heavily, Meagan felt it coil around them and lift them into the air, until they were level with the serpent's fathomless gaze.
“It was behind us,” Meagan whispered. “How did it...?” She glanced at Jemma, whose breaths were shallow and slow. “Are you okay?”
“It hurts... to breathe,” she whispered. “Give it... time. Gate... heals.”
The serpent opened its huge maw and roared again, its hot, fetid breath striking the girls. Meagan wrinkled her nose at the stench. “Beloth,” it rasped. “Shingar beloth.”
What?
Something went 'click' in Meagan's mind, and she understood. “Maggots,” it had said. “Filthy maggots.” It continued, “Why do you desecrate my grounds?” The voice coming from the serpent was unmistakably female, and sounded rather ticked off. It gave a sense of familiarity, but not the happy kind that nostalgia gave one. It was the kind that made one feel sick to the stomach. “I am the Queen of Dreams. This is my kingdom. Why are you here?”
Meagan said, “We'd like to leave.”
The serpent laughed. “You are mine, Meagan- both parts of you. Now you are in my land, where I have the power.”
“Please let us go,” she pleaded.
“I need subjects. You shall be that subject. It is a pity the other one got away.”
Does she mean Mariale? “Please, Your Majesty. Our sister needs us.”
At the word 'sister,' a pained look came upon the serpent, and once Meagan finished her sentence, the tail snapped back, dropping them into the water below. Meagan hit the water and searched for Jemma, worried she'd be too pained to swim, but her fears were relieved once she saw Jemma treading water a few yards away. Then she looked back to the serpent.
It was gone. In its stead stood Ebbony, gazing at her hands, stained a violent red at the fingertips. “...a sister...” she whispered. “My brother...” She gave a choked cry. “My hands... is this her blood? I didn't kill her! I didn't kill them!” The water level dropped so that when standing, it only reached to Meagan's ankles. Ebbony turned to her, crying. “It wasn't my fault! I didn't kill her! I didn't kill them!” She grabbed Meagan by the shoulders, her now-indigo eyes wild and weeping. “You have to understand. It wasn't my fault! I was only eight, and... I didn't kill them!” She gave another cry, then fell silent.
“Who?” Jemma asked. “Who died?”
“Ariana. My whole people. I didn't mean to. It was five hundred years ago. It was a complete acci-”
“But Ariana's alive!” Meagan exclaimed.
“No, she isn't. She may be, but half of her is dead. I killed her dreams, and without them, is she truly alive? I killed her, just as I killed Cattallus. Just like how I killed the entire Victuran race.” Ebbony looked into their eyes. “Meagan, you must forgive me. I killed your race. No wonder Mariale fears me. I’m a monster.”
“You killed valkyries?”
“No, fool. I see your mother never told you.” Ebbony sighed. “You aren't really a valkyrie. You're a Victura. A Victura who unconsciously hid behind a false valkyrie essence, even hiding your eyes. When I took your essence, I took the fake one. I revealed who you really are.”
She dropped to one knee. “Meagan, scion of the Star, how could I not have realized? Ascella's daughter, seventh in line to the heir of Aeternam, I beg your mercy! Do with me as you will, you have every right to exact revenge on me right now, but I beseech you to have mercy.”
“Wait, what?” Meagan stared at her, dumbfounded. “Seventh in line? Scion? Mercy?”
“Take it!” Ebbony begged. “This Gate was given to me, and I eagerly accepted, but I was a child. How could I have understood what a curse I had agreed to bear? I don't want it anymore. Take it, Meagan! You of all people I trust the most to take this burden from me. Please.”
“But-” This was so unlike Ebbony that Meagan was unsure of how to respond. “Aren't you its ruler?”
Ebbony deflated. “I am. I'm stuck with it. Curses to those people who did this to me. Then, Meagan, be my regent. Take care of it for me, and I will remain its queen only in name. Be my winged commander.”
“Do it,” Jemma urged. “With this thing's power behind you, defeating Linius would be a cinch.”
“Are you sure you're okay with it?” Meagan asked Jemma. “I kind of stuck you in here without your permission.”
“We're the same person,” Jemma replied. “Do. It.”
Meagan turned to Ebbony. “I'll do it.”
“If I ever want this back, you'd have to give it to me.”
“I don't need it forever anyway.”
“Then you'd have to follow my orders.”
“If I don't like them, I won't follow them.” Meagan extended her hand, and Ebbony shook it.
“Spunk! I like it,” Ebbonly laughed, seemingly restored to her former self. “Draw your sword, Meagan Sanguis Lapis, and Jemma Lapis Caelum. I have named you such, as no one else is here to give you your Victuran elements. That's right- Blood-Stone and Sky-Stone, draw your swords as one and open the Gate!”
Meagan nodded. “Ready, Jemma?”
“Ready.”
Their minds linked, and Meagan felt dream-self and true-self act united as a whole, how she was certain it was meant to be. With a cry devoid of savagery, a cry of pure will and determination, Meagan and Jemma, movements perfectly synchronized, rent the air in two, tearing through the Gate as Ebbony lent her aide. For the first time since its forming, the Gate opened from the inside, and a Victura walked out, head held high, knowing that she now held power over its queen. As they traversed the limbo between their worlds and the Gate, Jemma fading to the place where dreams go when one is awake, the Queen of Dreams forewarned, “Meagan Blood-Stone, beware the Queen of Shadows.”

Oooh!!! I knew she was a Victura! Well, I can't refer to her as "The little Valkyrie" anymore. But still, she's back from the dream world to crush Linus's. His dream of world domination that is.

A user of this : Meagan's half, so everyone still calls her "Little Valkyrie." Other *spoiler* Valkyries call her 'half-kin' and 'Little Valkyrie' as well.

You saw it coming, you say? 

Linius wants a bit more than world domination...