40. the undoing

Rivian

October 24th

A few days have gone by and the kingdom sat in the throes of the eerily calm and quiet void, almost waiting for something to happen. Travois still sits in his prison hold while someone, anyone, proves his innocence. It won’t be long before they accept him as the suspect and convict him of treason and murder.

I know that in no time, the ground we walk on will divide in disaster, leaving the remnants of a broken kingdom to fend for themselves, less a king and queen, and I will have no qualms with watching the monsters within burn with their unnamed sins.

But I have to give my brother and sister a fighting chance and I can’t do that without setting Travois free first.

I explained the detailed updates in regard to Travois and the claims Valor Cove has made. She wasn’t happy to learn that all of this had been happening while she suffered through her bloodlust. But we’ve spent the last few days working on her management and now we’re taking it day by day.

I have to admit though, I am a wrecked man. After finding my wife in utter ruin, evidence of her shadows coming to light, I knew there would be no going back. I know the denial I fight to refuse every day has surfaced and I'd forever be a prisoner to that feeling if I didn't just accept it. But I don't see the ending that I am able to have both light and dark because my darkness will swallow her whole.

I mistook her dim light for one of burnout, desperate to ignite in the form of wanting to exact payback. She just merely needed to be seen for her true worth and despite my best efforts to rid her of the trivial idea that she needed love, she still yearned for the most basic emotion any human can ask for.

I denied myself of that same feeling for so long because I've seen what rejection can do to a person, where it can lead them. The villain never gets the girl because evil and good are two contradicting roles in Society that will clash in a war of unrequited love.

When I turned, the emotion I felt greatest of all was my need for love, just like Lucynda. But I had to rewire my brain to turn that feeling off, to minimize the need to carry such hope for something so damning. Because I knew that it of all things would be my undoing, so I inculcated the idea of revenge deep within my soul to prevent an idealistic poison from ruining my life. It was easy to do so as my father nearly stripped me of all of my blood the day after I turned—needing to ensure my strength—so I focused on my one dominant emotion of hating the person who took my ability to feel love away. The person who enabled a man to be so cruel and did nothing to rectify the situation.

The former queen.

Yet, here I am knowing that in all of my efforts, I have led myself to my ultimate demise by letting the venom of that decrepit four-letter word sink its claws into me. And now, I am simply on the verge of resemblance to the dilapidated castle that will hold evidence to the downfall of our kingdom simply because love was the undoing of us all.

The events of my life have done nothing but tear me down, leaving me with nothing but the abused idealistic view of what life means to the standard soul but I am not a standard soul. I have been hollowed from the inside out, forced to believe that the nature of Nocturnes is capable of nothing but evil. And while I reveled in the nefarious acts of accepting my true self, I knew it was all in due time that I'd get my day in hell, but I'd take down the whole fucking kingdom with me.

And now, I know hell won't be so lonely.

I haven't told her or anyone else of the discovery I made about Cyn when she was bathed in the blood of her first victim. But one day she'll learn how to thrive as a lavendulan messorem Nocturne , but for now it's best that this remains a secret to me because the truth is, they are known to be an unfavorable kind of evil that will likely break control at one point and have the power to obliterate an entire kingdom in little to no time at all.

I also haven't admitted my change of mind in regard to the most desirable need my queen craves. I know that when I do confess my love for her, it will be as we both fall into the darkness letting death take our souls. It's the only way.

I stare out my bedroom window as night falls against the horizon. My wife is asleep on our bed, her naked body on full display for only me. It seems peaceful in this castle; the sky crawls with looming clouds, trees whistling up against the cusp of Halloween night—just a few short days away.

I hated to admit it—my pride always got in the way—but it's obvious that I too am just as broken as my muse, and I am drowning in a sea of emotions that I want to feel yet hate the idea of having the burden of all at the same time.

It's how it feels to be in love. Carved in madness and caged by pain.

A light knock raps against the door of my bedroom, pulling me from my thoughts and rearing my head to make sure my wife doesn't wake.

I walk quietly to the door to see my Factotum waiting on the other side.

"She's here." Zharus confirms what I'd been waiting for all day, indicating that my visitor has arrived.

"Have her ready in the dungeon for me. I don't care how you get her there, but she needs to be chained." I know Zharus will get the job done, I have no doubts in his ability to satisfy my requests. As he leaves, I head to the bed where my wife rests her tired eyes and I silently vow to her that all of this won't be in vain.

I kiss her scarred cheek and head for the door, knowing the next time she sees me, I'll be the villain once more.

I let the amber caress of candled lighting warm against my skin as I walk through the cemented hallways to get to the dungeon room.

"Let me go!" I hear her shouts for release echo against the emptiness surrounding, followed by the rattling of chains.

I round the corner to see my visitor. Ameliana. The ex-queen and my dear old step-mother.

"Rivian," she smirks in a cynical manner as she sees me enter, settling down her attempts to break the chains.

I wave my guards to their exit, leaving just the two of us.

"I heard you've been wanting to see me," she spits as she squirms in her chair.

The chains holding her down from every angle—two from the ceiling locked over her wrists and two from the ground, cuffing her at the ankles—makes sure she experiences the fear of being trapped here forever.

"I’ve always wondered when you'd come searching for me. And using my daughter to lure me out? I must say, I'm rather impressed. But the question is why?" Her demeanor can't be bothered, something I know she passed off to her daughter.

Stubbornness runs in the family.

"You will not speak of her." I let my vexation fall over me prematurely knowing that she is getting the exact response she wanted out of me. "You have no right to bring up the daughter you abandoned."

"Well, I can tell you won't be any fun." Her sarcasm only pisses me off further but despite her tough exterior, I recognize it as fraud. I can tell she is worried about her presence here, regretting ever having come.

"Do tell, what held you to the confines of Valor Cove, Ameliana? Why not brave face when Renard died? Or sooner for that matter?" I pace the ground in front of her.

Shadows dance across the gray rock walls, flashing in little ambient specks as the candlelight sways in the small breeze that bounces around the room.

I remember just how cold it got down here, especially in the winters. I'd come out with blue toes and frozen lips. And I wasn't even granted a warm bath. But Natasha tried. I just hated seeing her get hurt for offering her well-being to try and save me.

"You didn't answer my question," Ameliana responds, clearly not wanting to entertain my interrogation.

"No need to be so puerile." I quip, hating how she thinks she's going to get out of this without an explanation or otherwise . . . alive.

Finally, she yanks again on the chains, coming up short with the strength required to pull them free from her limbs. I smile, knowing she must hate being trapped but she will know my pain. My fortress is impenetrable. She’s stuck until I saw otherwise.

"I had my reasons." Her answer is a cop out of sorts, she thinks she's going to give me the bare minimum but I will force every last poor excuse out of her if it's the last thing I do.

I continue pacing back and forth, making her sweat while she processes what I could possibly want with her. I know she can't be so oblivious to the pain I endured. To the series of events she unraveled upon her arrival.

“Let me go, Rivian. We can talk about this.”

I scoff.

"Did you know that when you accepted my father’s offer of marriage, you forced my mother to be thrown out on the streets with no recollection of who I am to her?" I feel my veins burn with irritation. How can someone be so cruel, ignorant to the trauma left in her wake.

"You know more than anyone that I had no choice in the matter, Rivian."

I don’t give her the satisfaction of a response. I savor the feeling that overcomes me as she struggles against the holds keeping her in place.

"So that's what this is? You're mad at me because your mom didn't get to see you grow up into this hateful man?" Her words shouldn’t hurt. I have put up with so much that I have become numb to it all, but speaking ill of an innocent woman strikes hatred in me, especially if that woman is my mother.

"My mother actually loved that horrid man, you resented him. Yet how is it fair that you were the one who got to stay?" The words falling from my lips, more so for me as I recount just one of the reasons why I am plagued with this need to make Ameliana pay.

"It's not my fault your father chose me over Valaria, Rivian. You said it yourself; the man was horrible." She tries to place guilt onto someone who already lost his life to the karma that he deserved. But it’s not enough.

"Do you hear yourself? It is exactly your fault."

"You're being childish."

I grab the nearest Tiki torch, blow out the flame, break the stick in half, then fiercely toss the piece of wood straight into Ameliana's chest from ten feet back, all within a split second, purposefully missing her heart. I don't want to kill her just yet. I only want to hurt her a little first. Make her suffer just as I did.

She groans as the splintered stick penetrates her skin, the chains rattle as she bends over in agony.

"You know the very chains that capture your wrists were the same that held me down while my father whipped me. And the same chair you are confined to is the same chair I sat in while I was starved for days.” I lean down to match her level, still a few feet back, as she groans for me to get the stick out of her chest.

I was told I needed to be man enough if I was ever going to take place as king one day. Because half-bloods are weak and he believed I was never going to be good enough. He was more worried about the disgrace of his name than the well-being of his own flesh and blood.

I'm sure if my father was allowed to let Travois take reign, he would have but the law states that the first-born male must rule. Apparently, I wasn't strong enough because my mother never got the chance to perform the sanguis religo after marriage. To this day, I’ll never know why but it left me labeled as a flawed half-blood, claiming my blood was defective because of it.

I walk up to the chair, seeing her flinch just a little at my arrival and I reach down so that my chilling whisper can be heard rattling her bones. "Then there was you." I grab the stick and drive it in further, hearing the splices of her organs twisting against the jagged edges as blood starts seeping from her chest. "Forcing me to live through the ridicule of a weak man because you were so special that you took the only comfort I knew away from me. It was torture being chained up the way you so gracefully demonstrate now."

"You're deranged." Ameliana spits at my feet, her body still bent over the makeshift dagger that's buried in the middle of her chest.

"What an observation. Care to make another one?" I glide the stake a little closer to her left, entering her heart and letting the threat of fire engulf her, worry strains on her face.

"Fuck you. I have nothing to do with this little tiff you claim I have caused. Your dad followed the lore. Just like you apparently did."

She’s not wrong. But it doesn’t make it right. I can’t imagine a scenario that she might make up where her actions were justified.

She allowed it to go on.

She left her kids behind in the wake of a monster.

She didn’t do anything to stop his cruelness.

She got to parade around with respect and the promise of love while my mother faded into the distance as a forgotten memory.

"How about the time I got whipped across the chest for simply smiling the way my mother did. Because he told me that you hated that I resembled her. She made you jealous, so he tried to make me look less like her by searing cigarettes into my skin or marking me with his belt." The memories I've worked hard to never forget in regard to the very things that made me surface in my head.

"I didn’t mean it like that,” she tries to defend herself. But her admission to it, nonetheless, is harrowing.

One time, it was eight days. Eight days of me fighting for air, because my mouth was so dry that it felt like it was closing up on me. I couldn't talk for a month after that.

I give the stake one last good push, driving it almost entirely into her body with the heel of my boot.

She groans against the intrusion. "I am exactly who my father wanted me to be. Who you allowed me to be. Carved from the trauma I was forced to endure; forged by acts of evil and blinded by ideas of false love. I will fucking take from you what you took from me!"

"There was-" She gasps for air, suffering from the same thing I had to go through. "Nothing I could do."

I decide to rip the stake from her chest and watch as blood drips delicately from her open wound. I know it'll heal over soon, but her torture is not even close to the end.

I wave the bloodied stick around in delirium, relishing in this moment. She straightens herself up as she looks me directly in my eyes. I hate that she shares the same eyes as her daughter. It's daunting.

"You think I wanted this life? You're wrong. I didn't have a choice when I was ripped from the night. When I was basically told that I had to marry a vampire, have his kids and become a queen. I didn't understand, but I didn't have a choice." She yanks one her hands to try to make herself more comfortable, the chain rattling against its restraint.

"I want to see my daughter!" She shouts, yanking the chains again, and again, and again.

"I wondered when you’d ask." Proof that my initial plan was always going to work, luring her out with something I knew she couldn't resist.

"I hate what I did to her. To them . You don't think I've suffered through my decisions? I hate what I've become, which is why I tried to undo it."

"You didn't seem too remorseful moments ago. And undoing something doesn’t mean replacing it with something else. You did marry again, didn’t you?" I refuse to let her gaslight me into thinking she yearned to rid of the monster she turned into. Her claims of hating her vampirism are worthless to me when she opted to stay the very thing she said to have feared.

She could have stripped all of her blood and gone back to human form, decaying to her proper age and maybe I would have granted her freedom from my promise to end her.

"I am filled with regret every day." I hear her voice crack, emerging sadness from her tone as her body visibly deflates. "I married again for safety, for love. I fell in love with Dominek and I wasn’t going to earn the respect of Hollows Tracee after what I’d done. When Renard died, I felt like it was too late. I hate that I didn't get to see them grow up. I had to leave the twins behind because I was scared. I hate that I had to choose between my happiness without them or a miserable life with them. But I had to leave. I needed to be free. I knew my kids would be safe. I knew I'd get a chance to see them again."

"Yet you never came to see them again. And your daughter was far from safe, Ameliana. Are you that delusional?" I allow the fury I feel for the innocent soul who was just as destroyed by her decision as I was to rage freely in my voice; passion for the pain that no one should have to endure . . . feeling like someone doesn't want you enough to just walk away. "Do you even know what's going on between our societies? Do you know where Travois is?" Her lack of awareness dumbfounds me.

"Troy told me. And I don't know anything about what goes on outside of my compound’s walls."

"You have to know something. You have been in their shadows for years and you're going to tell me that your king isn’t planning to retaliate? Your own son is being unjustly framed, coerced into guilt, for your husband’s. Does none of that affect you?"

“Dominek? Dominek is not dead. What are you talking about?”

“Do not toy with me. I will take your life right here.” I press the stake against her carotid artery. She flinches at the manic threat that my tone carries.

"Rivian, I regret leaving the twins behind, I really do, but I didn't want this life. I left the first time because I was scared. If I could have taken them, I would have. But I didn’t have the means to take care of them. Then he ripped me from the life I tried to make up for and forced me into this marriage again. I left the second time because he enacted punishment on me for escaping the first time. That, and I fell in love."

"Dom,” I say under my breath as I stand back up and take a few steps back.

“Dominek is not dead, Rivian. I don’t know who told you that but it’s a lie. And soon, he’ll come looking for me.” I infiltrate her mind to see that she is not lying.

But then why did Viktrum announce his death? How does theFactionnot know that he’s alive?

“If he didn't give me the out I needed to escape Renard, I would have stayed but I don't know if I would have survived.”

My rage makes her jump as I close in on her face, taking up space and reveling in the way fear suffocates her. The way I suffocate her.

I wrap my hand around her neck, causing the chair to fall out from under her as I force her up against the wall behind her. The chains pull tight from their cemented rigs, and she winces at the pain.

"I- I-" she sputters as air escapes her. I watch her struggle for far longer than I intend before I let go of my hold on her neck and watch as she falls to the floor. The chains above rattle as they pull tightly and the chains below clash with her.

I step away, trying to decide exactly how I want to enact this new plan of mine. Previously, I knew just how I was going to make her suffer. Death would be too easy. I planned to lock her in a coffin, toss her into the waters of Cliff Island and let her drown over and over again all while starvation plagued her. Dark. Cold. Hungry. And alone. Just like I was all that time. Just like her daughter was. Ameliana would know the same fate.

My demise would soon follow, draining myself of my Nocturne blood as I bleed out in the height of daylight. I'd burn and feel satisfaction replacing the general rebuke of villainous acts, the erasure of who I am and all that I've done would allow me peace and solitude.

But then there's my Cyn. The very girl I’ve denied love to, promising her a life of freedom and royalty only to use her for this exact moment. But I am gone for her; I can't risk losing her. She sees me for who I am when she looks into the darkest parts of my soul and she has never left my side.

And the rumor that Ameliana promises to be true. If what Ameliana is saying is of accuracy, then this all might be pointless. Regardless, my anger toward her was always driven by the fact that she could have done something to free me from my torment, but she only thought about herself.

This all can’t be for nothing.

"It's not fair for you to hold this big of a grudge against me." Ameliana's hoarse voice creaks in a harsh echo against the cold walls. "You had no idea what I was going through." She's trying to plead her case, but she has no ground to stand on because my word will never go unanswered.

"Tell that to the eight-year-old boy who cried himself to sleep every night, and no one came to check if he was okay. You have no idea what that did to me ."

"So what?" She sighs in defeat. "What is your endgame exactly?"

"I promised my mother I would avenge her."

"So, you're going to kill me?"

I rush to her feet, dropping to my haunches and plunging my hand into her heart for merely a second. "I plan to drain you of every last ounce of blood in your body until you shrivel up like a prune and then I'm going to enjoy watching all the ways I can make your human body suffer the most painstakingly slow death one can endure." I release the grip on her heart, her breath hitches in agony as she gasps for air.

"I know that's what you think is going to happen, Rivian,” she chokes out, “but surely you'll know that you won't get away with that."

I laugh at her attempt to make me feel guilty for the way I take pleasure in how I'll destroy her.

"You fail to recognize that I don't care what happens to me in the end. I never wanted any of this either."

This can’t be all for nothing, I tell myself again, starting to wonder if any of this is justifiable now. My revenge is the closest it’s ever been and here I stand, contemplating my reasons.

"Don't tell me you're going to kill yourself after you kill me? Now who's being immature?"

Ameliana switches her position as she scoots across the floor to back up into the wall, allowing her something to lean on. I don't have time to respond back or force her to stand in her pain when a small, familiar voice chimes in from behind me and all of my thoughts run haywire.

"You want to kill yourself?" My wife stands bewildered at the door of my dungeon.

Her icy hair cascades down over her shoulders as her beguiling eyes look beyond me at the person chained up and then back to me as concern swirls in them.

Fuck . She wasn't supposed to see me like this, and I wasn't supposed to see her like this.

"Lucynda." I let my familiar tone ghost through the space between us. She reacts to the way I say her name as a tiny gasp leaves her puffy pink lips. Her freckles dance on her skin against the flickers of candlelight and the sound of her heart beating does nothing to quell the ache I feel for my wife.

"You are beautiful." The scratchy voice from behind me speaks up, her chains rattling as she bends to get a better look.

"Who is she?" Lucynda takes a step forward. Her white flowy gown dances in the small breeze as curiosity licks at her.

"This is Ameliana," I say as I turn to look at the poor excuse of a woman chained up near my feet.

"Ameliana. The twins' mom? But why?" I wonder if Lucynda will put it together. I wonder what her initial reaction will be when she figures it out.

"Wait." Cyn takes another gracious step forward, almost closing the space between her and I.

“I remember now where I’d heard that name from. The police officer told me about a girl who trespassed Hollows Trace years ago and was never seen again." That piece of information is of no use to anyone. That was simply the Outsiders believing they had a missing person when really, I know why Ameliana was trespassing and why she never returned.

I turn to my wife and force her attention onto me.

"Lucynda, you shouldn't be here right now." I try to tread gently, not quite sure how this could play out. But having her here is only clouding my thoughts; I can't seem to think about anything other than her when she is near. My heart craves hers desperately, but I need to figure this out.

"Why do you want to kill yourself?" She avoids my request, stubborn as she is, and removes her focus from Ameliana to look back at me.

The need to grab Lucynda and kiss her is unrelenting yet the urge to keep her as far away from this as possible is just as strong. I pull my hand up to hold her cheek in my palm. She closes her eyes as I caress her soft skin.

"Lucynda, I need you to leave. I need you to leave and not ask me about what is going on here until I have dealt with it first,” I whisper to her.

"Why, Rivian? Is this what you were trying to tell me the other night? I told you I'm all in. Whatever you need, I'm here for you."

"Your devotion means a lot to me, little one. But I need you to let this go for now."

"Wait a second." The resounding chime of metal on concrete steals my attention to the captive behind me, seeing Ameliana force herself to stand. "Does she have no idea what your ridiculous act of revenge is? Have you been keeping secrets from her this whole time?" Her outburst ignites anger in me, giving me remembrance as to why I'm here in the first place.

But it’s not lost on me that I feel less inclined to rush my plans for Ameliana, the look on Lucynda’s face helps get rid of the idea in the slightest. Only because when I look at her, I see good .

"Lucynda, you need to leave." The demand I give my wife is a little sterner as I let go of our embrace and turn to face my enemy.

"Are you serious?" Cyn grips my arms to make me face her, but I can't give in right now. "What the hell is going on?"

Ameliana recognizes my pause, allowing her to take a chance to speak up to plead for Lucynda's help.

"Cyn, he's going to kill me." She struggles against her restraints. "He thinks I'm the reason his mom was banished from the kingdom."

"Is this true?" My wife reaches out for me once more and I calm the moment her hand skates over my skin.

"You don't understand," I tell her, wondering if she feels shame or disgust by my need to act out this plan of mine.

She walks ahead to put a few steps between us, her back now to the former queen who is pathetically begging for freedom at this point.

"No. I think I do." Cyn reaches up on her toes to press a kiss against my jawline. Something feral ignites inside me as I watch the cynical look of sincerity in her belief of my dark truth wash over her.

"You wanted to bring Ameliana back to the castle after she fled, leaving you and the twins behind because she was too cowardly to face the fact that she was the reason your dad kicked your mother out on the street, only for her to take it for granted and leave everything behind."

My wife lowers her head before turning around to face the woman behind her.

"You want her to pay for the desolation she caused. Because your mother loved where this woman couldn’t. You want to avenge Troian and Travois for the trauma they had to endure growing up without a mother. And for ruining the spirit of a little boy who had no hope of knowing love because she stripped you from that chance." She speaks at Ameliana while still talking to me. Her words bleed with traces of cruel malevolence as she recites every single thing that drove me to this moment.

Word for word, she displays her truth in understanding just how small Ameliana has made me feel. How she nearly took everything from me.

I feel prideful to see my wife stand up for me like this. Not that I need it, but my little sin wants to prove to her king that her vows aren't for naught.

"Lucynda," Ameliana whispers her name in a silent plea of reconsideration, likely sensing that she's made up her mind.

"No, I get it. I really do. I too have been through that pain." Cyn pulls her arms behind her back and clasps her hands together as she paces rather leisurely in front of Ameliana, back and forth.

Ameliana looks between me and my wife, satisfaction playing on my lips.

"Every day I used to think to myself, ‘ God, I hate my mother for leaving me with the piece of shit man who abused me and broke me down. She left for a better life because I wasn't good enough.’ It really shaped me to be this girl who thought that love was a ghost of an idea. I was bullied by my step-siblings, ridiculed by the kids at school because I didn't equate to their entitled ideas of perfection. Beaten down by my father and hollowed by the lack of love."

Lucynda’s tone transitions from reminiscent of her trauma and how sadness grew in her wake to a girl who feels angry for the torture she had to go through.

"What have you done to her?" Ameliana rears her head to look over at me, anger and hate twisting into a messy expression on her sweaty face.

" Me ? I gave her the chance to build a life that would give her everything she is worthy of. I gave her power. A sense of hope. A family." Lucynda looks back over her shoulder and provides me with the softest of smiles before turning back around.

"All while stripping her of love," Ameliana says with a hint of sarcasm, yankingher chains again in hopes that one more pull might break her free. "You really believe that you are giving her a fruitful life, Rivian? She doesn't belong here. Can't you see what you're doing to her?"

Yes. I do see it. But I am the only one who has taken care of Lucynda the way that she needs, whether we end in blood the way we were born or not.

"What goes on between me and my wife is none of your business," I simply respond.

"Lucynda, he doesn't love you. You have to know that. He's making you believe that you are capable of being happy without love and you can't let him take advantage of you like that."

Something dark twists in my wife's head. I can tell she is fully allowing her loyalty for me to drive the way she addresses Ameliana as she steps forward threateningly and lowers her voice.

"I don't know who you think you're talking to. But I am the queen of this castle and you will not speak to me about my husband as if you know me or my wants. You are in my home and you have betrayed the king. Show me some respect when you talk to me." Rage burns within the walls as Lucynda takes advantage of the control she now has over everyone.

She's fucking sinful the way she handles her words, with virtue while instilling fear in our guest.

"Lucynda, please. You have to get out of here while you still-"

"SHUT UP!" Cyn forms a tight fist and punches Ameliana in the chest. Her fist penetrates skin and digs deep into her body, the squelching sounds of blood sound musical to my ears as Cyn opens her hand to grip around the plump organ that is Ameliana's heart.

The chains clatter against their hold on her limbs as she drops to her knees, feeling the violation of having her heart tempted in the shadows of death and in the hands of the monster she helped create.

"Lucynda," she gasps. Air evades her as Lucynda holds her heart hostage.

"Mom?" I turn to see Troian standing at the doors to the basement, the scent of blood and torture permeate the room.

"Troian." Ameliana's voice is dry and croaky as my wife keeps her grip in place.

"Lucynda, let her go!" Troy tries to run for her mom but I step in line and hold her back, stopping her from impeding on Cyn’s beautifully savage attempt to back her king.

Maybe this is how I ratify having both. Maybe letting Cyn do the honors of watching Ameliana burn is what needs to happen for me to live in honor of my revenge and in acceptance of my love for my wife.

"What the fuck, Rivian? Let me go!" Troian tries to fight against me, but I wrap my arms around her to capture her in place.

"I can't," I whisper against her ear.

"What the fuck do you mean? What is going on?"

Troy's mom struggles against the grip of Cyn's hand, clutching her pumping organ tightly. I can imagine the exact way it feels as contentment paints my little muse’s face, accepting the power one contains when you have someone in fear of their life all at your hands.

Cyn turns her head toward us, twisting her hand as she does which causes our guest to sputter blood from her chest and her mouth.

"Troy, this isn't meant to hurt you.” Lucynda’s words to my sister are of sincerity. The bond they’ve created over time likely drives her empathy. “But she was a horrible mother to you, can’t you agree?" Evil spews from Cyn’s tone as a disturbed look paints her expression.

Something doesn’t feel right.

"I don't know, I mean-" Troy is lost for words. I know this isn't what she wants. Despite my issues with her mom and the fact that her mother left her for no reason other than for selfish choices, I know Troy wants a relationship with her mother.

"Well, I do. Anyone who leaves their children for the likes of someone or something else is rotten, in my opinion." She digs her hand in deeper.

Ameliana cries out in pain as I watch her life slip from her eyes.

"How does it feel to have your heart tampered with, huh?" The irony is not lost. She thinks she's doing this for me, in an act of requite justified by the fact that Ameliana's actions have caused damage, and she is angered by it more so because she knows how that feels having gone through it herself. So Cyn's emotions are charged with the memory of her own.

Little does she know…

"Rivian, please. You have to do something." Troian's tears accompany her plea for mercy on her mother. I want to protect my sister, I really do. But I have lived for years with the pain that was bestowed upon me. She has her mother. I don't. My mother will never remember who I am because I was a mere flicker of time wiped from her mind and shadowed by the ghost that is now me.

"Why are you doing this?" Ameliana uses every last ounce of breath she can muster to ask my wife for her reason.

"Because I love my husband. Because he sees me for who I really am." She squeezes the heart harder causing bursts of blood to squirt against her hand. "He is the reason why I am alive and why I am free. He saved me. And I want to save him." Her loyalty raptures me. Of all the things in life, this is all I wanted. Someone to fight for me regardless of reason or events of action. “Because no one deserves the burden of feeling like they can’t be loved because they aren’t good enough,” Lucynda directs her eyes over to my own and I recognize now what I’ve done.

The monster I’ve created.

Her words ring truth in the air for herself against her own mother and father, for me against Ameliana and my father, and for the twins against their mom.

But she’s also talking to me.

She feels as if I denied her because I didn’t think she was good enough.

"Please don't do this." Cyn looks over at Troy who has given up fighting against my hold but still begs for her mother’s release.

Something flashes in Cyn's eyes and I immediately recognize the look. Fear pummels through me as I realize that she is not herself.

"On second thought…" Lucynda releases Ameliana who drops to her knees and gags on her own blood as air finally blesses her lungs.

But with no time for me to react, Troian is ripped from my arms and held up against the wall by Lucynda who now has her fist plunged into her Troy’s chest, reenacting the same torture technique she just used on Ameliana.

"No!" Both Ameliana and I shout.

"Lucynda,you are crossing the line," I demand, but my wife turns to me with a threatening look that I know I won't be able to survive.

She is stronger than me. Only I know that. But I can't risk making the wrong move and upsetting her desire to avenge me.

The lump in my throat is thick with worry; I lured her here with the idea of revenge only for her to hold loyalty to my own and now, she's gone utterly mad.

"You know how to hurt people the most?" She digs deeper, making Troy squirm in agony, blood spurting from her chest as Cyn grips her heart. "Take something away from them. But Ameliana never really loved you, did she Troy? Because she left you. She took Rivian's mom away from him and then she left you and Travois. Maybe she needs something taken from her to make her open up her eyes to the pain she's caused." Her voice is sinister, infused with tones of delirium. That's when I see her eyes.

Lavender.

"Cyn, baby." I take a small step forward, hands up in surrender. "You don't want to do that."

She gives me a menacing glare, her smile never wavering from the one I’ve grown to love but her eyes hold evil as she threatens my sister’s heart.

Tears run down Troy’s face. Fear grips her in ways she never knew existed. I hate that I let this get so out of hand. My selfishness in revenge and love is what led us here. But this is what I wanted, right? Complete ruin.

Something grim shifts in the air as Lucynda takes one last look at me.

"Actually, I think I do." Her grin creeps devilishly along her face. I hate to admit that she looks fucking devastating against the evil that paints her. But she has my sister's heart in her hands and she does not deserve the wrath of my revenge. But it's too late. Lucynda's words fall wickedly from her lips. "After all, loss is a great motivator. Right, Husband?"

Troy's body falls lifeless as the sounds of tearing and blood-splatter echo in the room. The thud from her body makes my heart stop as my wife holds a beating heart in her hands.

Tendrils and arteries hang intertwined in her fingers as dark red liquid drips on her white, willowy dress.

"You shouldn't have done that, Lucy," Ameliana cries from her chains, gasping on the floor.

The sight is ungodly. How could I have let her go this far?

"On second thought I think-" The heart drops from Lucynda's hand, splattering more blood against the soft chiffon of her dress, realization dawning on her.

She turns slowly, almost just as sinister.

"What did you just call me?" Fear and grave sadness coat Lucynda’s expression, replacing the evil she so willingly succumbed to.

Sobs rack Ameliana. Known to Lucynda as Amy .

"I'm so fucking sorry," she cries. Amy pulls herself up off the floor and tries her best to regain composure, but the damage is done. "I should have never left you or your father. But I had no choice."

"No." Cyn shakes her head, evidence of my sister's blood paints her face in tiny splatters and covers her hands in the thick red liquid. "You're lying." Trepidation colors her face in hues of pale, almost like she's seen a ghost.

She points a bloody finger in her direction. "You're not…"

I take a step forward, careful to be undetected. If I can just get to her, we’ll figure this out.

Confusion floods my wife's face as she looks into Ameliana's eyes now, the resemblance is uncanny. Ameliana has black hair just like Trav, Troy, and like her . The color of their eyes, however, is the dead giveaway.

While the twins share eyes of the color blue, Lucynda’s and Amy’s are gray.

"Mom?" Pain coats her husky tone. Her hands begin to shake as perception plagues her, seeing the truth behind it all.

"And you fucking knew?" She turns to me without another second, realizing that I have betrayed her.

The tendrils of smoke swirl against the lavender hues in her eyes, cracking against the black clouds like ice. "That's why you brought me here? The whole tether shit was a lie, wasn't it? You knew my mom was still alive and you knew that bringing me here would bring her out of hiding, so you can exact your stupid revenge. You knew?" The hatred in her voice breaks me, I never wanted to make her feel like this. Especially after accepting my true feelings for her.

But I let my personal vendetta get in the way. I let my monsters become hers.

I have betrayed her. I knew it would come to this. But I can’t stand the way she questions my loyalty to her otherwise.

"I beseech you to calm yourself, Lucynda.” Fury burns in her eyes as I try to remedy this situation. “The tether was true. All of it. I didn’t want for it to come to this.”

"The night you killed my dad. You knew who I was then?"

The tables have turned. I feel lost in my strength knowing I am guilty in creating this monster. She isn’t going to let me explain myself, something I’m not sure I deserve.

I nod my head in admittance, knowing that she feels the penetration of betrayal rip through her like a tornado.

She lunges for me in a flash, we stumble against each other but ultimately, she locks me up against the wall, a stake threatening to rip into my chest.

"You don't understand." I say, not showing effect to the position she has me in. I was going to die anyway, I already am dead. So why fear the very thing that made me who I am today?

"No, I understand." She digs the tip of the splintered wood into my skin, it breaks the fabric of my shirt and presses into my flesh. "Your thirst for revenge was stronger than your desire to accept me . Which is ironic considering that was how you used to lure me into this life, isn't it Rivian?" She presses herself closer to me, causing the stake to break skin just the same.

"You thought I'd want to enact revenge on everyone who fucked me over more than I'd be willing to crave love. But really, that's what your excuse was all along and you used me because it was easy to take advantage of the lovesick, beaten down, little girl." Her tone is laced with so much pain, evil, and betrayal. I can feel the resentment that manifests and permeates from her broken soul, the very thing I craved from the beginning.

"I didn't think I'd-" I try to explain to her that things have changed. We can fix this. But it’s far too late for that. I molded my wife to be a fiend for vengeance the moment I betrayed her with my intrusion of her privacy. The day I met her. The day I made her believe she was not worthy of my love.

Little by little I created the very darkness I obsessed over, only to have the tables turn on me.

"What you failed to see is that my heart is bigger than you gave me credit for, Dark King ." The wood sinks deeper into my chest, inches away from piercing my heart and tempting to desiccate me.

I could fight her off, but I don't want to risk her humanity being completely shattered and having to deal with the tantrum that comes with it.

"You used me. Just like the rest of them," her spit of hatred toward me doesn't faze me much, because I’ve been prepared for the betrayal of love my whole life. But I am at fault for this. I have to take the punishment she feels I deserve, if only to save her from herself.

She brings her mouth close, pressing her lips softly to mine and I crave to lean into it, but the blood of my sister is splattered on her skin, and I crawl with fury at her attempt to tempt me.

She kisses me gently before lowering her voice to an eerily devious whisper.

"I think you might have forgotten, little one . Queen takes the King every time ."

Lucynda pushes the tattered stake into my chest all the way, ripping through my heart. I grab for the hilt, gasping as the wood terrorizes my beating organ.

I look over as my sister bleeds out and her mom is exhausted from the pain, twisted against her chains trying to break free to run to her Troy.

I try to pull the stake from my chest to yank it free, but I'm stuck in shameful admiration as I watch my wife walk through the chaos of her demise, grabbing a candlestick off one of the fixtures in the wall and turning to me one last time before reaching the door.

She looks at the mess she’s made, then settles her hauntingly alluring eyes on mine, demanding to be seen and heard.

"You once said you would burn the world for me, but now you get to watch as I burn the world down for you, my king."

She drops the candlestick, and lights the castle on fire.

TO BE CONTINUED…