Reincarnated As An Archmage’s Daughter

The portal spat Hania out into chaos.

She tumbled through the air, before crashing onto a cold stone. Her hands… no, not hands. She stared down at herself and saw nothing. She was translucent, flickering at the edges like a candle flame caught in a storm.

She looked up.

The imperial palace courtyard had become a messy war zone. The elegant marble colonnades were shattered. The manicured hedges were frozen solid, their leaves crystallized into jagged black ice. A massive amber-gold dome of solar fire, Leonarth's isolation barrier, flickered overhead, barely holding against the pressure of the mana storm raging within.

And at the center of it all was her father.

Dravin hovered several feet above the ground, suspended in a vortex of his own unstable magic. His silver hair whipped around his face like a blizzard. His crimson eyes were rolled back, only the whites visible. His body convulsed violently, the same seizure she had witnessed in the memory of his childhood, but magnified a thousandfold. Arcs of black lightning erupted from his chest, his hands, his temples, cracking the stone beneath him and sending shockwaves that rattled the barrier dome.

"Dad!" Hania screamed, throwing herself toward him.

She passed right through his body. Her soul-form couldn't touch him. Couldn't do anything.

No, no, no—

"Dravin, you stubborn bastard, fight it!" Leonarth's voice roared across the courtyard. He was braced against the ground, both hands extended, pouring every ounce of his fire mana into the isolation barrier. Sweat streamed down his face. His coat was in tatters. His arms trembled with the effort of containing an Archmage's collapse. "I did not spend two centuries keeping you alive just to watch you detonate in this backyard! Sylvara made me swear! Do you hear me?! Your sister made me swear!"

Dravin didn't respond. The black lightning intensified. The barrier cracked.

From the shadows of the shattered colonnade, a figure watched. He was tall, pale, and dressed in a torn velvet coat. His dark hair was streaked with the faded remnants of mahogany dye.

This is ridiculous, Valthazar thought, leaning against a broken pillar. Absolutely ridiculous. I was supposed to be enjoying soup and charming Empresses. Instead, I'm watching an Archmage have a magical seizure while a fire Duke screams about promises he made to a dead woman.

He examined his nails. They were chipped. This environment had ruined his manicure.

The small menace is going to be devastated if he dies. Weeping. Possibly for years. She'll expect me to comfort her. I don't do comfort. Comfort is entirely outside my skillset.

He sighed, pushing himself off the pillar.

Fine. If only to avoid the emotional labor.

He stepped into the light.

Leonarth sensed him immediately. The Duke's head snapped toward the shadows. Even with his mana stretched to its limit maintaining the barrier, his combat instincts were still sharp. "Who's there? Show yourself!"

Val stepped forward, his hands raised in a gesture of theatrical surrender. "Calm yourself, Duke Emberlyn. I'm not here to fight. I'm here because your Archmage's daughter is currently unconscious, and if he dies, she'll be absolutely unbearable about it. I'm protecting my own peace and quiet. Nothing more."

Leonarth stared at him. The vampire's posture was relaxed. His red eyes, fixed on Dravin's convulsing form, held something that looked almost like... concern? No. Not concerned. Investment. Like a collector watching a valuable piece of art teeter on the edge of a shelf.

"You're the vampire," Leonarth said slowly. "The one who kidnapped Hania. The one Dravin fought over the Southern Sea."

"Kidnapped is a strong word. I prefer 'facilitated an unscheduled excursion.' And yes, we fought. It was very dramatic. He froze the concept of darkness. Very impressive and annoying." Val waved a hand. "But that's between me and him. Right now, the question is whether you want my help keeping that barrier intact, or whether you'd rather do it alone while I stand here and offer unhelpful commentary. I'm happy to do either. The commentary would be excellent."

Leonarth's eyes narrowed. "Why?" Leonarth demanded. "Why would you help him? You barely know him. You tried to kill him days ago."

"I tried to fight him. There's a difference. Fighting is recreational. Killing is so final." Val examined his chipped nails again. "And as I said, this isn't about him. It's about the small menace. She's bound to me by a blood-thread. An accident involving a summoning circle and a fish tail. Very complicated. The point is, if he dies, she'll cry. If she cries, I'll have to deal with it. I don't do tears. I do wine and architecture criticism and the occasional bit of seduction. Tears are entirely outside my wheelhouse."

"Fine," Leonarth said through gritted teeth. "Help me hold the barrier. But I'll deal with you later."

"Naturally." Val stepped forward, rolling up his tattered sleeves. "I look forward to it. Your great-grandson mentioned something about gargoyles. We have a great deal to discuss."

"What?"

"Later. As you said."

Val raised his hands. Shadows poured from his fingertips. It flowed through the cracks in Leonarth's amber barrier like ink through water, reinforcing the dome with layers of compressed night.

Leonarth felt the shift immediately. The pressure on his mana eased. The barrier stabilized. The vampire's magic was incredibly strong.

"You've done this before," Leonarth said.

"I've contained worse things than an Archmage's temper tantrum. There was a plague in Luxemenia, the Howling Death, they called it. Turned people's mana against them. I held a quarantine dome over the royal palace for six weeks. By myself. While writing poetry." Val's red eyes flickered with something that might have been memory. Might have been regret. "This is nothing. Stop talking and focus."

They worked in silence after that.

★★★

Hania watched them from her soul-form, invisible and helpless.

Val came. And Leonarth… he doesn't even know Val, but he trusted him enough to work together. Because they both care about Dad. In their own weird, dysfunctional ways.

She turned back to her father. The black lightning was intensifying again. The barrier was holding, but Dravin's body was failing. She could see it.

I can't do anything. I crossed dimensions to reach him, and I can't do anything.

The world stopped. Literally.

The black lightning froze mid-arc. Leonarth's flames became statues of amber glass. Val's shadow threads hung motionless in the air like frozen spider silk. The dust particles suspended in the shattered courtyard gleamed like tiny stars.

Hania could still move. She turned, her soul-form flickering, and saw her.

The black-haired woman stepped through the frozen chaos. Her robes trailed behind her, untouched by the debris. Her face was still obscured.

She walked past Leonarth without glancing at him. Past Val without acknowledgment. Past the frozen lightning and the suspended flames and the motionless dust.

She stopped in front of Dravin.

He was frozen too, caught mid-convulsion. The black lightning had stopped an inch from his skin, held in place by the temporal freeze.

The woman reached up and touched his face.

"You've been fighting this for hundreds of years," she said quietly. "You were never supposed to carry it alone."

She pressed her palm against his chest, directly over his heart. The same gesture Hania had seen in the memory of his childhood. The same position. The same pressure.

"Ignis Sanguinis," she murmured. Fire of the Blood.

A pulse of crimson light erupted from her palm, sinking into Dravin's chest. His body jerked once, twice—still frozen in time, but responding to her touch.

"Vinculum Animae." Bond of the Soul.

Another pulse. The black lightning began to recede, pulling back toward Dravin's body like water draining into a sink.

"Obsigno Tenebris." I seal the Darkness.

The crescent moon mark on his forehead flared.

The woman was infusing something into him.

"Claudere." Close.

Her fingers pressed deeper into his chest.

"Tenere." Hold.

The black lightning was almost gone now, retreating into Dravin's skin like shadows fleeing a sunrise.

"Servare." Protect.

The final pulse was blinding. A shockwave of silver-white light erupted from Dravin's chest, washing over the frozen courtyard, passing through Hania's soul-form like warm water. She felt it in her chest.

The pressure that had been suffocating Hania since the imperial garden began to ease. Slowly.

The woman lowered her hand. Dravin hung motionless in the air, but his face had changed. The agony was gone. The tension had drained from his shoulders.

The woman turned.

And for the first time, Hania saw her face. Her features were fine-boned and pale, framed by that glossy black hair. Her expression was unreadable, a mask of calm composure that revealed nothing. Her eyes were purple.

The exact same shade as Hania's. The exact same shape. The exact same depth. The exact same light.

Two pairs of purple eyes locked across the frozen courtyard.

Hania opened her mouth to speak, but no sound came out. Her soul-form was flickering faster now, growing more transparent by the second. The thread connecting her to the garden, to her body, to the waking world, was pulling her back.

No. No, I need more time. I need to ask her—I need to know—. Wait. Can she see me?

The woman's expression didn't change. But something flickered in those purple eyes. Something that might have been recognition. Might have been regret. Might have been love, buried so deep it had become indistinguishable from grief.

Then she turned away.

She walked through Hania and stepped into a swirling portal that opened before her. The rift swallowed her whole.

The temporal freeze shattered.

Sound and motion crashed back into the world all at once. The black lightning dissipated. Leonarth's barrier flared and then stabilized. Val's shadow threads snapped back into his hands. Dravin dropped from the air, caught in Leonarth's arms before he could hit the ground.

"Dravin!" Leonarth shouted, his voice raw. "Dravin! Can you hear me?!"

Dravin's eyes opened.

"Hmm," he said.

"You are an absolutely impossible man."

"The corruption," Val said, stepping closer. "It's receding. I can smell it. The dark mana is pulling back. Who did this?” Val looked around but saw nobody. “Whoever it was, it's working. The seal is stabilizing." He paused. "Also, you're welcome. I expect gratitude. In the form of wine. The good vintage, not the swill you serve at state dinners."

Leonarth stared at him. "I still don't know who you are."

"Valthazar the Eternal. Blood-Drinker of the Crimson Moon. Scourge of the Southern Night. Midnight Architect of Luxemenia. The small menace calls me Fluffy. I hate it." He examined his nails. "We'll meet again soon, Duke Emberlyn. Your great-grandson and I have a standing appointment to discuss gargoyles."

"Gargoyles?"

"As I said. Later." Val turned toward the shadows, his form already beginning to disappear into mist. "Take care of the Archmage. If he dies, I'll have to deal with a weeping little monster, and I refuse. I absolutely refuse."

He vanished into the darkness.

Leonarth stared at the spot where he had been. "I have so many questions."

"Later," Dravin said, his voice hoarse. "Where is Hania?"

"She's—" Leonarth stopped. "She was supposed to be with Lusha. Lusha put her to sleep to keep her safe. She should be at the secondary estate by now."

"No." Dravin pushed himself upright, his arms trembling with the effort. "She was here. I felt her. Her mana signature… She was in the garden. She saw—" He stopped. His eyes widened. “Her soul… her soul is not in her body."

"What do you mean her soul is not in her body?!"

"Somewhere between the garden and—" He pressed his hand to his chest, where the woman had touched him. "And her. Hania followed her into the portal."

★★★

The world was fading around Hania. The courtyard, her father, Leonarth, Val—all of it disappearing into silver mist. She was being pulled back, dragged through the void toward a body that was lying unconscious.

But the last thing she saw before the darkness took her was the afterimage of purple eyes.

My mother.

She saved him.

She is still alive.

End of Volume 1