Chapter 16 DEATH.
Venessa’s POV
The room went cold.
It was the kind of cold that bit into your bones and doesn't let go.
The First King didn't look like a monster. He looked like Dante.
He had the same face, the same tall body, and the same sharp jaw. But his eyes were empty pits of black.
He walked past me like I wasn't even there and stopped in front of my mother.
"My Queen," he said. His voice sounded… dead "I have waited a long time for you to wake up."
My mother smiled. It was a sick, happy look and reached out to touch his face. "I am here, my King. I brought you the Lock. And I brought you the Key."
She looked proud. She wanted him to praise her.
I looked at Dante. He was still standing there helplessly.
The black vines were pulsing on his skin, but his eyes were blue again. He was fighting.
"Dante," I whispered.
"Venessa, run," he rasped. Blood leaked from the corner of his mouth. "Get out of here."
"She can't run," my mother laughed as she pointed at my hands. "The ritual has already started. The Key is turning."
I looked down and screamed.
My skin wasn't skin anymore. From my fingertips to my elbows, I looked like a ghost that I could see the stone floor through my own arms.
I was fading away.
The First King turned to look at me for the first time since he walked into this room.
"To save the King, the Key must break," he said. He spoke as if I were a toy, not a person. "One of you has to stay in the dark. If Dante lives, you fade into nothing. If you live, he rots in this room forever."
"No," Dante roared and tried to move, his muscles bulging. "Take me! Let her go!"
"It's not about what you want," my mother spat. She picked up the black glass dagger. "The magic needs a sacrifice and North needs a King. And a King needs his vessel."
She looked at the First King with love.
She didn't care that her own daughter was disappearing. She only cared about her power.
I felt my legs start to go numb. The moonlight was moving up my neck and I was losing my weight.
I was becoming air—nonexistent.
"Dante," I sobbed.
I tried to reach for him, but my hand passed right through the black vines.
Dante looked at me.
The anger in his eyes died, replaced by something so soft it broke my heart.
He looked at me the way he did on the night of the red room. Like I was his entire world.
"I’m sorry, Venessa," he whispered.
"Dante, what are you doing?"
"I told you once," he took a breath "that I would burn the world to keep you safe. I meant it."
Dante didn't try to reach me again. Instead, he used the shadows.
He didn't aim it at the First King. He aimed it at himself.
The silver light from my wrist shot toward him, connecting us one last time. He used that energy to pull the black glass dagger right out of my mother’s hand.
The knife flew through the air. Dante caught the hilt.
"Dante, stop!" I screamed.
"If the Lock is broken, the Key stays," Dante said. He looked at the First King with a bloody grin.
"You want a vessel? Go find a new one."
He didn't hesitate. He drove the black glass blade deep into his own chest.
"NO!" My mother shrieked.
A wave of white light hit me, slamming me back against the wall.
The black vines snapped and the First King let out a howl of pain as his body began to turn into smoke.
Without a vessel, he couldn't stay in our world.
My mother fell to the floor, her power gone. She looked old and so empty but she wasn’t my concern right now.
I scrambled across the floor toward where Dante was.
My skin was solid again. The moonlight was gone. I was normal.
I was alive.But Dante was falling.
I caught him before he hit the ground. He was so heavy, but his skin was turning cold.
"Dante! Dante, look at me!" I pulled his head into my lap and pressed my hands against the wound in his chest. "I’ve got you. I’m here."
His eyes opened slowly.
The blue was fading. Hid eyes looked like a light that was about to go out.
"You're... back," he whispered and reached up, his fingers trembling as he touched my cheek. "You're real."
"I'm real because of you! Why did you do that?" I was sobbing so hard I could barely see him. "You stupid, arrogant man! You were supposed to stay with me!"
Dante tried to smile, but blood spilled over his lips. "I am... with you. Always…."
His hand dropped just as his chest stopped moving.
The sound of his heart beating—the steady thud that made me feel safe was gone.
"Dante?" I shook him. "Dante, wake up! This isn't funny!"
He didn't move. His body was limp in my arms.
The man who ruled the North, the man who called me his mate, was gone.
I held him tight, burying my face in his neck.
I waited for him to growl. I waited for him to tell me to stop crying.
Nothing. Only silence.
I looked up at the dark ceiling of the room.
My grief was so big it felt like it was going to swallow my damn sanity.
The doors to the chamber slammed shut, locking me in with my broken mother.
A new voice whispered in the dark.
"The price has been paid," the voice announced not caring that my mate was dead.
I looked at Dante's pale face. I wasn't the girl he married anymore.
I was now a widow. I was now a wolf without a mate.
My husband was dead. And I was going to make sure the world burned for it.