After her experience in New York, Emma wasn’t surprised that Vampires were real. It still irked her to see the ruler of vampires named Dracula. Perhaps the books and movies had been about him all along.

“How can I help Count Dracula?”

“To see that ethereal face animated by joy rather than misery,” Dracula said in a dramatic voice. “It pains me to observe a woman of your caliber reduced to... this.”

Emma felt her brow twitch. She might’ve been dealing with feelings, but it was her personal business. “You know, I might’ve blushed if you weren’t already halfway inside a coffin, Count.”

Dracula passed a hand over his face, and where his fingers touched, the wrinkles melted away like mist. When he lowered his hand, the face beneath was that of a man in his late twenties. Pale, aristocratic, and handsome. The white hair remained, but it looked like a crown rather than the mark of age.

“Am I qualified to compliment you now, Lady Frost?”

“Very much so.” Emma rose from the bed and smoothed her dress. “Count, am I to understand that I am one of your... targets? A convenient source of blood for the vampire lord?”

“I have more convenient targets to feed upon.” Dracula shook his head, smiling. “I sensed a mutant of significant power entering my territory, and I wished to see who had arrived. What a pleasant surprise to discover that it was the White Queen herself. I am quite disappointed that you think I would approach you with such crude intentions.”

“You are a vampire, Count. Forgive me if I assume the worst.”

He spread his hands slightly, a gesture of concession. “Which brings me to the purpose of my visit. I humbly invite you to join me at my castle. The hospitality of my house is at your disposal, and I would very much enjoy the opportunity to converse with a dazzling lady over a glass of wine.”

Emma knew the invitation wasn’t for any good reason, and the subtext was clear enough to read without telepathy. “May we discuss it here, Count? I must leave for New York in a matter of hours.”

Dracula’s eyes suddenly glowed a deep, hypnotic red. Emma felt a powerful suggestion trying to slip into her mind, but she pushed it back effortlessly. The Vampire Lord seemingly had the ability to hypnotize minds. Alas, Emma’s mind was too strong to be affected by Dracula.

Dracula smiled in delight. “Magnificent. Your mind is as strong as you are beautiful.”

“I’m a low-level telepath, Count. Nothing worth mentioning.”

“And humble as well,” Dracula whispered, his smile growing wider, almost creepy in a way. “I find myself... looking forward to observing how much your influence might grow over the course of centuries.”

She didn’t know how to respond to that. Her mutant powers weren’t geared to extend her life. She would live as long as a normal human unless she took another favor from Dante to extend her lifespan.

Dracula took a step closer, reaching out to touch her face. She did her diamond transformation, which left the Vampire Lord visibly sour. Rather than feeling her warm, smooth skin, he was forced to touch the cold, hard diamond.

His sourness vanished a moment later, replaced by a fierce desire on his face. “Join my family, Lady Frost. Become my bride. I will offer you eternal life, eternal youth, and a position at my side that no mortal man could ever provide.”

She didn’t know whether to laugh or curse him. The proposal was delivered with the same aristocratic polish as the invitation to dinner, but beneath it lay a primitive desire she had seen many times before. He wanted to possess her. Not as a partner, but as an acquisition. A night of conquest to satisfy his ego, then fangs to her neck, followed by the slow erosion of her will until she was simply another beautiful thing in his collection.

“Oh, Count,” she said with a sweet, regretful smile. “I’m touched that you would consider me worthy of being your bride. But I’m afraid to tell you my heart and everything of mine already belongs to another.”

Dracula’s sharp eyebrows rose. “Then forget about it.”

Emma was surprised again. She had expected more resistance since Dracula didn’t strike her as the type to accept “no” gracefully. She had braced herself for the possibility that she would spend the next ten minutes as a living diamond statue, untouchable and unarousable, waiting for him to lose interest.

But he simply accepted the rejection. This was possibly a trap to give her false sense of security.

He tilted his head. “I have another proposition for you. I will meet you in New York in a few days. This is a business deal you won’t regret accepting.”

His form became blurry before he turned into swirling black mist and disappeared.

Emma collapsed backward onto the bed, her arms spreading wide across the covers. Her heart hammered loudly against her ribs. Only after Count Dracula left did her composure begin to show cracks. Vampires were an unknown territory for her. She had no clue about their methods or how powerful they could be.

“I survived…”

“What are you afraid of?” asked a soft, familiar voice as Death appeared by the bedside, carrying the faint scent of lilies. “Companion only needs one hand to annihilate that bat.”

Emma closed her eyes for a moment, then opened them again. “I know, but I don’t want to owe him more than I already do. It’s not… nice to rely on a man for everything.”

Death snickered softly. “Dread it. Run from it. Destiny still arrives. You can’t escape my companion’s grasp.”

She found herself feeling delighted for a moment, then a cold dread whisked it away. Was it pride? The fear of becoming dependent on another? The terror of discovering that she could desire a man more than everything else? She couldn’t quite explain the tangle of emotions inside her chest that made her both reach for Dante and pull away.

She sat up and stared at the smirking goth woman. “You’re awfully jolly today. Did he fuck you good last night or what?”

“He did,” she admitted without shame. “But that is not the main reason I am happy.”

“Well, what’s the good news?”

Death sat down beside Emma on the bed. This was the closest they ever had been for a conversation. Usually, Death would appear for a moment, convey some information, and vanish. Today, she seemed to want to stay and talk properly. Even Death needed someone to listen to sometimes.

“Felicia will allow me to adopt her first child. I shall be a mother.”

Emma was stunned speechless for a long moment. “Seriously?”

“Mhmm.” Death nodded, a soft, almost shy smile touching her lips. “It will keep me occupied until he finds a way to impregnate me.”

Emma fell silent, staring at the floor. On one hand, she was genuinely happy for Death, who had been nothing but supportive toward all of them. Death was also her fellow adoptive mother for Sharon.

On the other hand… The child would be Dante’s. Felicia’s first child, yes, but also Dante’s biological child, conceived in the warmth of their relationship. The man she felt so intensely drawn toward, the only man she truly trusted with her life and heart, would be fathering a child with another woman.

She swallowed the bitter feelings. “I’ll save the congratulations for when Felicia delivers.”

Death placed a gentle hand on Emma’s shoulder. “You are overthinking this.”

Emma shook her head. “It’ll get better with time.”

“Let your heart guide you,” Death advised in a soft, comforting voice. “Even if it leads you somewhere wrong, you will only have one more regret added to the dozens that every human carries. What is one more, against the possibility of something real?”

“Let my heart guide me,” Emma whispered. She had spent too long building walls around her, and now, she had forgotten how to break them down or let someone through. “I don’t think I’m capable of that.”

“You will be. In due time.”

Death squeezed her shoulder one more time, then she was gone.

Emma was left to her own thoughts once more.

***

Meanwhile, Osborn Mansion.

Harry relaxed alone on a couch in a luxurious silk robe. The television across him was on, casting a shifting blue-white glow in the dark room.

Jameson was behind his desk with a woolen sweater jacket on and his mustache done to perfection.

“Ghost Spider!” he bellowed like the name was an accusation rather than a hero’s alias. “She calls herself that, folks. Not a person, but a ghost. And you know what ghosts do? They haunt you. They bring tragedy with them wherever they float.”

“She is not a hero. She is a liability!”

Harry nodded faintly.

“What happened at the Westfield Mall wasn’t a coincidence. Me and you sitting at home caused it!” He stabbed a finger toward the screen. “The Green Goblin got the strength to rise as a freak because of Ghost Spider. She invited that calamity and killed people. She is a MURDERER.”

Harry settled deeper into the couch cushions with a pleased smile to his face. Any shade at Ghost Spider’s name was music to his ears.

“If a police officer caused that level of collateral damage, we would have their badge before sundown. But Ghost Spider gets to swing back to wherever she sleeps and gets no blame.”

Jameson shuffled his papers and kept going.

“And then there is Skullfire.”

JJJ took a long pause for dramatic effect, giving another ten out of ten performance to provoke the masses at home.

“Yes, he reversed the destruction. Yes, Manhattan looks more or less the way it did before he tore a hole in it. But let us ask the question that no one in this city seems willing to ask out loud: what kind of human being has that much destructive capability in the first place? What happens when he decides a cleanup is not worth the effort? What happens when something makes him angry enough to stop caring? We held our breath and called it a miracle. I call it a warning. One day, people. One day, this city will not be so lucky, and we will all wish we had asked the question sooner.”

Harry threw one leg over the other with a smirk. “He won’t live long enough to be a villain.”

The segment cut to a commercial.

Harry turned off the television and closed his eyes, thinking about the morning. The chain of events made him grin.

“Harry...”

A haunting whisper reached him. He looked around the room but couldn’t find the source.

“Harry…”

His attention was dragged to the mask sitting on the glass coffee table. It stared at him with hollow eyes that suddenly blazed with red light.

“Harry…”

Harry scrambled back on the couch, his heart pounding like crazy. “What?”

“Listen to me,” the voice roared, filled with palpable hunger. “Do not let Jameson hoard all the glory. Be the reason Skullfire is humiliated. Make him trampled by the masses. Make them fear him, then make them hate him, then make them beg for someone to save them from him.”

Harry should have questioned why a mask was speaking to him. He should have thrown it into the fireplace and booked a psychiatric appointment. But the words resonated deeply with him. So instead of recoiling, he found himself nodding.

Skullfire could destroy a city and reverse time. A talking mask was not even the strangest thing in the world anymore.

“Take me,” the mask roared, and the red light in its hollows pulsed like a heartbeat. “Use me to avenge your father. That is your destiny, Harry Osborn.”

Harry slowly reached out and picked up the mask. “My destiny…”

He had been an ordinary young man until he had found the case hidden in his father’s vault, which had a serum locked behind. With no motivation to continue living anymore, he had injected himself with just to see what it was. The pain had been like a nightmare, but the rewards had been worth every screaming second.

Now, all that remained was taking his revenge on Dante and his accomplice, Gwendolyn Stacy.

“Would you look at that?”

Harry turned toward the voice and saw the face he loathed most in this world. An immense wave of hatred surged through him. It took every ounce of control not to rush forward and choke the life out of him.

“Dante…”

“Harry, my friend.” Dante gave a warm smile as if they were old friends meeting to hangout. “I didn’t know you were that Green Goblin.”

Harry didn’t hesitate. If the secret was out, there was no point in pretense. He pressed the mask against his face, feeling the edges seal to his skin. His muscles twisted and expanded, making the silk robe tight as his body ballooned with new mass. His skin flushed, then darkened into an unnatural green.

When he looked up again, his vision was sharper.

“Dante.” The mask didn’t distort his voice. The sheer anger in his chest did. “I know you’re Skullfire.”

“Whoa, you are so intimidating,” Dante said, raising both hands in a gesture of surrender. “How about we sit down and talk? I do not have the energy for a fight right now. Used it all up in that time-reversal event.”

Harry grinned behind the mask. “Even more reason to kill you now, while you are weak.”

“Why, though? Is it because I made your girlfriend lust after me?” Dante slowly started counting on fingers. “Because Gwen loves me? Could it be because I destroyed your dad’s new marriage? I kinda ruined your chances to get a hot stepmom.”

Harry’s grin disappeared, and he clenched his fists until he felt his own claws digging into his palms. None of those reasons touched the center of what he felt. They weren’t even surface wounds compared to the feelings buried in him.

Dante suddenly made a face of realization. “Ah, is it because I made this city better by killing the cancer? What was his name again? Normal—Norman Osborn, right?”

He knew Dante was provoking him on purpose, using words to make him angry and stupid. Knowing didn’t change the outcome. Rage coursed through every drop of his altered blood. Dante had poured gasoline on a fire that had been burning since the funeral.

“YOU TURNED ME INTO AN ORPHAN!”

He lunged at Dante and punched him in the face. Dante flew and crashed into the wall behind, falling face-first on the floor.

Harry looked between his hand and Dante struggling to get back to his feet. Had he become powerful, or was Skullfire this weak?

“What… about the hundreds of kids he orphaned?” Dante asked, kneeling on the ground. “Is your father’s life more important than theirs?”

“IT IS,” Harry growled through clenched teeth. “Because he was my dad.”

Dante barely got back to his feet and wiped the blood from his lips.

“Talk about love,” Dante whispered. “Real talk. Will you stop if I surrender myself to the NYPD?”

Harry was stunned. Of all the outcomes he had imagined confronting Dante, he had never expected Skullfire to surrender himself to the NYPD.

Still, he couldn’t help but ask, “Why?” 𝙛𝒓𝒆𝙚𝒘𝒆𝓫𝙣𝓸𝙫𝓮𝒍.𝒄𝒐𝓶

“All the work I do for people, and they still hate me. I’m quitting for a peaceful life. It starts with making amends…”

Harry found the reason believable. Everything Skullfire did got scrutinized in the media. Even though he was protecting them, a vocal minority loathed him with passion and they let him know that by participating in JJJ’s interviews.

Dante looked miserable as he stood there. “I just don’t want anything happening to Gwen or anyone close to me.”

“That middle-class girl,” Harry scoffed, contempt clear in his voice. “I’ll make her pay for it.”

Dante looked at him with a slow, deepening frown. “I’m surrendering, but you’ll still do that? Isn’t that too extreme?”

“Extreme? You’ll understand the meaning of that word soon.” Harry put a hand on his masked face and chuckled sinisterly. “The face she made when I blasted the innocents, and she couldn’t help them—it’s just the beginning.”

Dante remained quiet.

Harry stomped on the glass table, shattering it into a thousand glittering shards. “I’ll get her father killed and pin the crime on Ghost Spider. I’ll keep torturing her until she breaks down and loses it.”

“How fucking dare she support my father’s killer.”

Dante let out a sigh. He ignored Harry and looked to his side. “Do you need to hear more?”

Where there had been empty space, Gwen suddenly appeared there. She wasn’t the friendly young woman he had known since high school. Her eyes were red and swollen. Her face had traces of tears that she hadn’t bothered to wipe away.

But fragile was not the word that came to mind as Harry looked at her.

If anything, he felt chills looking into her eyes.

“Harry, you’ll hurt my father?”