She felt her fingers break the surface and kicked herself upward, desperate for air. She emerged, sucking in air and spitting out river water. Her feet stung through her shoes with the impact, and she could sense a bruise starting to form on her legs as she kicked. Vast walls of stone and gold had burst through the earth on either side of the water, and the risen city of Orazca towered high overhead.
Suddenly, a searing stabbing slicing pain through her temples—she cried out—and an image appeared in her mind with a flash.
Panic flooded her veins once more and she desperately kicked toward shore, craning her neck to get her bearings as she swam. Vraska was still in Ixalan, but the image in her mind was of Ravnica.
What was that?!
She was alarmed and confused, desperately paddling her way to where the brand-new river met the newly exposed stone of the city.
Vraska spotted Jace. He was clinging to a rock near the riverbank, blood gushing from a wound in his head and his eyes alight with magic. His face was flush with confusion and pain, a faraway look in his eyes.
Did he see it too—?!
"Jace!" she howled, swimming closer, pulling herself and her heavy soggy clothes through the murky water, paddling to stay out of the swift current brought by the waterfall. "Jace, your head—AHH!"
She wore a blue cloak and hood, and lay on the central dais of the Forum of Azor. Niv-Mizzet, the parun of the Izzet, was looking down at her, and she could make out the faces of the maze-runners from every guild of Ravnica. This is a memory, Vraska realized. The memory was colored with meaning, belonging, responsibility. It was the day Jace became the Living Guildpact.
Suddenly, the image dissipated, vanished, and Vraska was swimming in the river once again.
He is remembering everything, Vraska realized with dread.
Jace's memory was returning all at once, returning as a flood and spilling over the sides, and he would soon remember everything about what Vraska was. He would soon remember their grudge, remember her guild, remember his job, and then none of what had happened over the last few months would matter. He would remember he was the Guildpact and she was an assassin and their friendship would certainly dissolve.
Vraska choked on river water as she frantically swam toward Jace on the shore. He was bleeding, broken, eyes alight and lost in the agony of remembering.
It's over, Vraska lamented with a heavy heart as she waded through the shallows toward the mind mage. A pang of headache warned her another memory was about to flood her perception, and she shut her eyes tight to brace herself as Jace's past slipped through his control and rammed into her mind.