I run through the forest. The heavy rain hits me, it runs down my face, it darkens my hair, it's cold against my skin but I don't stop running. He can't kill it, if he kills it I lose being able to be an angel, I'll lose a part of myself. But he had once again been consumed by the darkness inside him. That made me lose an even bigger piece of myself.
This was how it was always going to be. He couldn't fight it forever. We were cursed, ill-fated, there would never be a happy ending for us in this lifetime. We would always end in tragedy.
I'm cold, I'm wet, strands of my wet hair stick to my face and the lightning provides me with enough light to follow the path. I reach the cave. I run down the stone steps, I'm surprised I don't fall. The lightning flashes into the cave as I reach the bottom. And I see him.
He stands over her body. The body lays against the grey ground. He holds a knife over her, the look in his eyes is not the Adonis I loved, but rather a different version that loving would result in my death. I shout as he raises the blade, "No!"
He pierces it through her heart with so much force I think it gets stuck in the stone below. Her skin turns white, I shout as I feel her appearance leaving me. I clutch at my skin, at my hair, as I feel it leave me. My white eyes return, my pale skin, my black hair. I was forced to look like the monster I was cursed to be for loving the man in front of me who would always betray me.
Slowly, he moves his empty eyes up from the body to me. All the angels were dead now. Hell would be released onto Earth, all the demons who survived my plans would come for me. I knew that.
"You were supposed to fight it," angry tears fill my eyes. "You were supposed to fight it for me, you owed me that. But you will always get consumed by darkness. We can never be happy together."
I cry while I say the words that shatter my heart. But they do not upset him. His face has no emotion on it. He pulls the blade out of the dead angel's chest, her blood drips from the tip of the blade.
I could never have happiness with the man I love. My father made sure of that.
"Was it worth it, Valeria?" he questions. Lightning fills the cave once again. "Did you become the God that you wanted?"
He steps over her body and I take a step back. He continues, "You're a fake God. Not a real one."
"We can't be together," I whisper to myself as my soul breaks. I truly realize it at this moment. "We can never be together, Adonis."
The words don't upset him. His face and eyes were empty, there was no love for me that remained.
"No," he agrees. "We can't."
He raises his sword and I quickly turn and run out of the cave. I ran back into the cold rain caused by him, I did not wear an angel's skin any longer, I could not fly, all I had were my fatigued legs as I ran from my once husband.
I nearly slip as I run, I have to blink a lot to get the rain out of my eyes, or maybe they are tears. This was all for nothing, I had done this all for nothing, the girl in the cave was right, there would never be a happy ending for us, we could never be together in this life.
As I run, I look over my shoulder. In the dark sky, I see his black wings above the trees, hunting me as if I were his prey.
I never should've fallen in love with him again. I should've stuck to the plan. I trip on a tree branch, I look behind me as I try and get up quickly, but it is too late. He stood in front of me, holding the blade, my back pressed against the tree with nowhere to go as I could not get up.
Raindrops fall from his face. A memory flashed in my head of when I experienced rain for the first time. With him, I felt it for the first time with him. While we could not touch, we danced in it, as he told me how much he loved me.
Now we were in the rain as he held the sword of the King. He takes a step toward me. I know I can't run.
"I will take your soul, Valeria," he says darkly. "Whether you surrender it or not."
I swallow. Thunder shakes the ground. He takes yet another step toward me, he now towered over me.
"It was always yours," I whisper.
He kneels down at the same time as the lightning, he holds the blade in his hand as he puts it against the skin that covers my heart. I clench my teeth as he applies a little bit of pressure, it draws blood.
"I loved you, Adonis," I say over the pain as he pushes the blade a bit further.
I look into his eyes. He looks into mine. But then, the pressure stops, and the look on his face changes. He whispers, "Valeria?"
He looks confused, he looks down at what he's doing like he doesn't understand how he got there. I whisper back, my eyes widening slightly, "Adonis?"
Pain flashes on his face as he drops the blade beside me and clutches at his abdomen. My eyebrows lower, but as the wind blows his shirt, I'm able to see something. I push the fabric out of the way and see some sort of infection on his skin. I ask him, "Adonis, what the hell is that?"
"I had Selena do it to me," he confesses. "An infection that would slowly kill me. In case something like this happened. I'm a threat to you, Valeria, they are taking over again. I am going to kill you if you do not kill me right now."
"Kill you?" I repeat. I couldn't.
He shouts and clenches his teeth as he fights the dark parts that want to take over.
"Valeria, you need to kill me now," he orders. "If you don't, you will die."
I couldn't. I couldn't kill him. There had to be another way, there had to be something else-
My thoughts end when his face snaps back to an empty expression with eyes that want to kill me. And he doesn't hesitate to try. His hand reaches for my heart, but the second his hand makes contact with my skin, the blade I grabbed gets stabbed through his heart.
A demon's scream. You never get used to it. It's not the rain that causes the goosebumps on my skin, it's his scream that echoes in the forest. My ears ring and my vision sways as I watch him fall back. As I watch him die. As I kill him.
I didn't want to do this. I didn't want it to be this way. All I wanted was to be able to love him. All I wanted was a life with him. But we could never have it.
I push myself up as I cry. I look at his body. At how handsome he looked, even now. I don't know why I do it. But I pick a flower that grew at the base of the tree and put it into his hand.
I force myself to look away. I cry while I run to the cave. My chest hurts. The storm slowly ends as he died, by the time I reached the cave the rain was no more.
I rush down the steps and only stop once I reach the floor. I stand there for a moment trying to relax, trying to stop my tears.
"It's done," I say into the darkness. "Adonis is dead."
She doesn't respond right away. I wipe my wet cheeks.
"But why are you crying, Luella?" she asks me. "This is what you've been working for."
"I know - I just thought this time was different," I say as I sniffle.
"But you do not have a soul to love him with. Remember?" she says.
I nod. I say quietly, "You're right."
"But you did it. I'm so proud of you," she says. "Look in the mirror."
My eyebrows lower. But I do. I turn and look in the mirror.
My eyes widen. I can't believe it. I touch my skin, my hair, as if this were a hallucination and doing that would end it. But it wasn't a hallucination. I was back. My dark brown hair was back. My green eyes were back. I was back to myself.
"It appears Adonis has killed all the other demons," she says. "Good job, Luella."
I smile as I look at my reflection. I see my smile.
But my smile drops as I think about something. I look into the darkness.
"Wait, you told me that anybody who says my name would die and so would I," I say. "Yet you say my name."
The cave falls silent as I wait for her response.
"Oh," is all she says.
I stand there, I wait for an explanation, as there must be one.
"Well, Luella, maybe that's because I am you," she says.
My eyebrows lower. But I watch her step out of the darkness. I watch myself step out of the darkness. I didn't understand. It didn't make any sense.
"You're me?" I whisper.
"The darkest parts of you," she says. "And now, with the angels and demons dead, I'm finally able to do what is necessary."
"What are you-" my question gets cut off by her touching my arm. As she does, I feel her enter me, I feel her become me. I no longer see her in front of me. She was now inside me.
She was me, and I was her.
Word Count: 1688