Chapter 518 Hell & Its Monstrous King

Chapter 518 Hell & Its Monstrous King
(Apollo) 

Chains made not from any Hellish material he knew wound around her body like the roots of some monstrous tree, black links biting into bruised flesh at her wrists, her waist and across her throat before disappearing into the surrounding walls. Every slight movement she made caused the enchanted metal to tighten fractionally, forcing another involuntary tremor through her exhausted body. 
Apollo felt each one. His own wrists burned. His shoulders ached with the memory of being forced backwards. His ribs throbbed beneath invisible pressure. 
The last two days... The bloodletting. The madness he had felt within him. The pain that had refused to leave him. None of it had been the poison. It had been Adelaide. Every scream. Every injury. Every impossible wave of agony that had dragged him half-mad across the past two days had never belonged to his own body at all. She had been enduring it alone... while all he had done was survive the echo. 
"Adelaide..." The name escaped him before he realised he'd spoken. 
She didn't move. She couldn't. Her head remained bowed, dark hair falling forward to hide her face as another slow breath shuddered through her battered body. 
Apollo reached towards the projection without thinking. His bloodied hand met only empty air. 
"I'm here." His voice broke despite every effort to steady it. "I'm here, Little Flame." 
Behind the image of the cell, Arkael spoke again, his calm voice filling the silence between them. 
Apollo didn't hear a single word. There was no throne room anymore. No generals. No projection. No Arkael. There was only the woman he loved, standing alone beneath the mountain, and the unbearable certainty that he had not been there when she had needed him most. 
Her shoulders trembled. Whether she had heard him... Whether she believed he was truly there... Apollo couldn't tell. 
Slowly, painfully, her head began to lift. Every movement looked like it cost her. Dark hair clung to bloodied skin as exhausted amber eyes struggled into focus, blinking against the ancient projection until, at last... They found him. 
For one suspended heartbeat, everything else disappeared. 
The pain of the chains. The pressure of the mountain. Even the hopelessness that had hollowed her face over the past two days seemed to loosen its grip. She knew him. She had found him. 
Apollo reached towards her without thinking, his bloodied hand pressed against empty air where only ancient magic separated them. 
"Look at me." The words came rough, almost desperate. "Adelaide, I'm right here." 
The smallest smile touched her swollen lips. It was barely a smile at all. The expression was so small another creature might have missed it entirely, but Apollo knew it. He had watched that same hesitant smile appear the first time she had looked upon the Citadel from his balcony. The first time she had laughed at one of his terrible jokes. The first time she'd looked at him not as the Devil... but simply as Apollo. This smile was heartbreakingly fragile. The smile of someone who had forgotten what hope felt like until the moment it returned. 
Behind her, Arkael's calm voice continued as though discussing nothing more consequential than the weather. 
"The terms are simple. Surrender the Citadel. Swear fealty to the Emberborn Throne, and your people will live. Refuse..." 
Arkael's words melted beneath the thrumming in Apollo's ears. His entire world had narrowed to the woman standing before him. Another tremor passed through her body. She tried to straighten. Tried to stand taller for him. As though she refused to let him see her broken. 
Something inside Apollo shattered. 
"Release her." His voice echoed through both throne rooms. No one moved. No one breathed. 
Apollo took another step towards the projection, black fire beginning to coil around his feet. 
"I said..." The words emerged as a growl that seemed to shake the very foundations of the Citadel. 
"Release." 
The flames exploded. 
Deep red devilfire raced across the obsidian floor, climbing pillars and walls until the throne room was consumed by living darkness. Generals threw themselves backwards as cracks splintered through the stone beneath Apollo's feet, the ancient projection flickering violently beneath the sheer force of his magic. 
"HER!" The roar struck the projection like a physical blow. 
For the briefest instant, even Arkael fell silent. Then he sighed, a tired, almost regretful sound. 
"So stubborn." 
His eyes rested upon Adelaide rather than Apollo. 
"I had hoped to spare her this." 
One of the Nether chains around Adelaide's wrists tightened. She cried out. Apollo felt the enchanted metal bite into his own flesh as though it had wrapped around his own bones, the agony tearing a raw, inhuman sound from his throat. Another chain constricted around her waist. She folded forward, fighting for breath. Apollo dropped to one knee, one hand slamming against the shattered obsidian floor hard enough to drive fractures racing away beneath him in every direction. 
"No..." His voice was barely recognisable. Arkael watched him with quiet sorrow. 
The chains tightened once more. Adelaide screamed. The sound travelled through the projection. Through the bond. Through Apollo's soul. 
Her eyes found his one last time. She didn't cry. She didn't beg. She simply looked at him. 
The fear pouring through the bond wasn't fear of pain. He had been feeling that for two endless days already. This was different. It carried uncertainty. Desperation. A frantic need for him to understand something she had no words left to say. 
Then... She gave the smallest shake of her head and mouthed one word. 
Don't. 
Even now... Even while bruised and bloodied. Even chained beneath the mountain. She wasn't thinking about herself. She was terrified for him. 
He didn't know what she meant. Don't come find her. Don't surrender the throne. Don't blame yourself. He couldn't tell. And he would never know. 
The projection began to dissolve. 
"No!" 
He lunged forward. His hands closed around nothing. Light shattered 
The light did not vanish all at once. It fractured. Adelaide's face broke into a hundred glittering reflections before each one dissolved into nothing, until the place where she had stood became nothing more than Apollo's own bloodstained reflection staring back at him from the ancient crystal at the centre of the throne room. 
Silence. Absolute, terrible silence. 
Apollo remained where he had fallen, one bloodied hand still reaching towards the empty space where Adelaide had stood only moments before. 
Behind him, no one dared speak. No one dared move. Because every soul in the Citadel knew the same terrible truth... 
The Devil of Hell had finally run out of hope. 
And hope had been the only thing standing between Hell... and its monstrous king. 

To Be Continued