Chapter 86 Villain
"I needed you to hate me," he said, his voice dropping to a raw, jagged murmur. He reached out, his freezing fingers gently wrapping around my trembling shoulders. "I needed you to believe I was the enemy. If you knew the truth... if you knew what your voice was doing to me, I knew you would stop singing. And if you stopped singing, you would die."
"I am the weapon," I sobbed, the realization crushing the breath out of me. I looked at the black, pulsing veins crawling up his neck. "I am the one killing you. Not the Emperor. Not the navy. It's me."
"Nerissa, listen to me—"
"No!" I shoved my hands against his chest, careful to avoid the blackened epicenter over his heart. "Three hundred years, Klaus! You’ve been drowning for three centuries because of my bloodline! And you just stood there in the ballroom, letting me command Vespera, letting me shatter the glass in the Cathedral... you felt every single note tear through your flesh, and you said nothing!"
"What was I supposed to say?" he roared, the sudden burst of volume triggering another violent coughing fit.
He doubled over, turning his head away as a spatter of black fluid hit the stone floor. I reached for him instinctively, grabbing his arm to steady him. His muscles were tight with agony, his entire frame shuddering as he fought for air he didn't even need to breathe.
When the fit finally passed, he straightened up, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. He looked at me, the mask entirely gone. There was no Grand Admiral left in this room. There was only a man who had been tortured for centuries by the very thing he was currently holding in his arms.
"I was a soldier," Klaus said, his voice a broken, breathless rasp. "I was an arrogant, foolish commander who thought he could conquer the sea. Ligeia punished me. She chained me to the throne of coral and made me the keeper of your filth. For two hundred and ninety-nine years, I hated your kind. I hated the sound of the ocean. I wanted nothing more than to rip this heart out of my own chest and end the misery."
He lifted his hand, his thumb gently wiping a tear from my cheek. His touch was so careful, so devastatingly tender, it made my knees weak.
"And then I found you," he whispered.
I shook my head frantically, fresh tears spilling over his thumb. "Don't. Don't say that. You can't forgive this."
"I didn't find a monster," Klaus continued, his eyes tracing the lines of my face as if trying to memorize them. "I found a girl hiding in the anemones. I watched you grow. I listened to you sing when you thought the ocean was empty. Your voice... it was the first beautiful thing I had heard in centuries. It didn't feel like a punishment anymore. It felt like a privilege."
"Klaus, stop," I begged, my voice breaking into a ragged whine. I grabbed his wrists, trying to pull his hands away, but he held firm, framing my face in his palms.
"I won't stop," he said fiercely, leaning down until his forehead rested against mine. His breath smelled of stale blood and stagnant salt, but I didn't pull away. I closed my eyes, letting the tears fall freely between us.
"You think I let you sing out of duty?" he asked, his voice vibrating against my skin. "You think I stood in that Cathedral and absorbed the shockwave of your power because the Emperor ordered me to? I did it because your voice is the only light left in this cursed world."
"Look at your chest," I sobbed, keeping my eyes shut. I could feel the heat of the black veins radiating between us. "The chain is breaking. You said it yourself in the journal. You are out of time. If I use my voice again, it will stop your heart permanently."
"Then let it stop," he whispered.
My eyes flew open. I stared at him in sheer, unadulterated horror. "What?"
Klaus moved his hands from my face, grabbing my right hand. He flattened my palm and pressed it directly over the blackened, necrotic flesh of his chest.
"Look at me, Nerissa," he commanded softly.
I forced my eyes up to his. The sapphire in his gaze was fighting through the grey haze, burning with an intensity that terrified me.
"Every time you sing, I die a little more," he said, his voice dropping to a raw, ragged whisper that scraped against the silence of the room. "And I would die a thousand times to keep you singing."
The words shattered whatever fragile restraint I had left.
A guttural, agonizing cry tore itself from my lips. I threw my arms around his neck, burying my face in the curve of his shoulder. I clung to him, my fingers digging desperately into the hard muscle of his back, sobbing so violently my entire body shook.
He wrapped his arms around my waist, pulling me tight against his chest. He buried his face in my dark hair, holding me as if I were the only solid thing left in the universe. I could feel the black fluid leaking from his chest, staining the front of my charcoal silk dress, but I didn't care. I held him tighter, wishing I could physically pull the poison out of him and take it into myself.
I was the villain. My bloodline was the disease, and he was the cure that we had tortured into submission.
"I'm sorry," I wept into his shoulder, the words muffled by his skin. "I'm so sorry. I didn't know. I swear I didn't know."
"Hush, little fish," he murmured, his hand stroking the back of my head. "It isn't your fault. You are just a victim of the same war."
"I won't do it again," I swore, pulling back just enough to look at his face. My vision was completely obscured by tears, my throat raw and aching. "I will never sing again. I will never hum. I won't speak a single word if it means putting another drop of that poison into you."
Klaus shook his head, a look of profound panic crossing his features. "No. Nerissa, no. If you stop using the Voice, the Blight will consume you. You will turn into a feral. You will lose your mind."
"I don't care," I stated, the vow cementing itself in my mind with absolute, unshakable certainty. I stepped back, letting my hands fall from his neck.
I looked at the black veins pulsing on his chest. I looked at the dark stains on the floor.
"My voice is a weapon," I said, my tone flattening out, devoid of any resonance. I stripped the magic from my vocal cords entirely, leaving only the dry, human sound of a girl making a promise. "And I refuse to point it at you ever again."
"Nerissa," Klaus warned, stepping toward me, his hand reaching out.
I backed away, moving toward the heavy iron door.
"I am done," I whispered.