Sorry, My Love: The Adventures of Lovers-Chapter 38: The Black Storm

Gabriel entered the great hall, his boots sticking to the gleaming, blood-soaked marble. The clangor of steel and cries of death still hung in the castle air, a sharp-tasting reminder of the devastation that had devastated Maranaqua. His armor clinked softly as he moved, spattered with the lives he could not salvage, with the ghosts that would accompany him.

King Marcus stood at the opposite end of the hall, his silhouette a splintered, battered form against the leaping torches. He stood on his massive sword, the blade torn and smeared with ichor, his breathing in ragged, shallow gasps. His kingly robes were in shreds, torn by claw and flame.

"The battle. it's over," Gabriel gasped, his voice raw and shaking.

Marcus issued a harsh, racking laugh. "Over? No, boy. it has only just begun. The world is unraveling, and you are on its edge of unraveling."

Gabriel inched slowly, his boots squelching in pooling blood. "What have you done to her? To Sally?"

A twisted, distorted smile contorted Marcus's broken lips. "She has taken the core, Gabriel. It has chosen her. Its magic has seeped into her bones, tainted her flesh. She is. reborn."

Suddenly, the large doors at the back of the room creaked open. He turned to face them, sword partially drawn, but out came no more the Sally he knew.

Her complexion had darkened to an opulent, unearthly purple, reminiscent of the blackness of an abandoned sea at midnight. She was dressed in a fluid black jumpsuit that clung to her body like darkness, capturing sparks of starlight that streamed down her contours, each movement sending ripples through the emptiness. Whisps of diaphanous purple flame licked her shoulders, her hair a violet flame crown that flowed in defiance of gravity, waving in an agitated, wrathful motion.

There was a pale, triangular stone that glowed on her forehead, its soft light pulsing in time with her heartbeats, casting spooky shadows over her high, sharp cheekbones.

"Gabriel," she whispered, her voice a low thrumming sound, like a heartbeat in the dark. "You left me to die."

"Sally. no." He took a step back, his own heart pounding in his chest. "This isn't you."

She stepped forward, and the air around her rippled, a soft, electric thrum pulsating in the rocks. "Aren't you? I remember everything now. My pain. My anger. The betrayal."

Marcus' voice sliced through the tension, his voice tough and rasping. "She remembers because the heart woke up her true self. She is not a girl, Gabriel. She is the granddaughter of the demon enchantress. Your grandmother."

Gabriel's blood ran cold. His grip on his sword tightened. "What. what do you mean?"

Marcus's eyes blazed with an aged, corrupted sorrow. "Your grandmother. she was a demon sorceress from the underworld. She murdered your great-grandfather, her own father, in a rage of madness. The townspeople turned on her, tortured her, burned her alive with her family. Her last words, through charred lips, were of vengeance, of a foundation set deep beneath the market, and a promise of blood."

Sally's eyes sparkled, the corners of her mouth curling up into a bad smile. "Get it now, Gabriel? I am her heir. She has blood running through me. I remember all of it. Every lash, every scream, every last gasp."

Gabriel's thoughts reeled, the world spinning around him. "But. why? Why did she do that?"

Marcus's teeth clenched, his hands centuries old as he held his sword. "Because she loved a man who chose another. A second woman. You kissed another girl, Gabriel. You gave her reason to awaken."

Sally's purple flames roared, her eyes darkening. "I felt it, you know. Each kiss, each word you said to her. It shattered me. It brought me back."

Gabriel stepped back, panting in short, frantic gasps. "No. this is not possible."

Marcus's tone fell to a whisper, his eyes on the stone floor. "And besides that, Gabriel. Besides that. There is a traitor among us. One of our own. The boy, Matt. He betrayed Maranaqua. He killed his family in a fit of rage and escaped to another world, where he constructed his own tainted kingdom."

Sally's laughter rang down the corridor, icy and scornful. "You are among the liars and the ghosts, Gabriel. You will never get out of this."

Gabriel's determination faltered, his legs buckling under the weight of the revelations. The atmosphere around them was charged, the darkness closing in, the fire dancing as if the castle itself trembled with the truth.

"Run," Marcus breathed, his face white and empty. "Get away, before she destroys you."

But Sally smiled on, her jewel flashing in the shadows. "Run, Gabriel. Run if you can."

The door slammed closed behind him, the sounds following him down the crimson halls as he ran into the dark, turning night, his mind a vortex of shattered vows and shattered recollections.

Sally floated over the ruined throne room, her own eyes ablaze with an unholy fire, Maranaqua's heart writhing in her hand. King Marcus, his shattered golden armor clanking, struggled to get up from the shattered marble floor, red streaming from his mouth. His great crown of old lay in a pool of blood, staining the rubies and sapphires like a dying god's tears.

"You have sinned against me," Sally's voice thundered like a tempest, her hair flying about her head like the branches of a charcoal blaze. "You betrayed your own mother!"

With a wave of her wrist, the center she held in her hand whirled even more motionless, dark energy pulsating like a living heart. The castle trembled, pillars crashed, and the world beyond winced back. From the farthest extremities of Maranaqua, earth heaved into serrated hills, seas convulsed, and the skies shattered into hurtling chaos. Lightning flashed about the rent clouds, and fury crackled out of the very air.

As Marcus drew near to the balcony, Sally picked him up with strength unknown, throwing him against the broken stone railing. She strode towards him, casting a shadow over him like wings of an angry angel.

"See what your rebellion has wrought," she hissed, the hub churning in anger in her hand. "See what your kingdom looks like."

She shoved him out of the shattered door, and he tumbled, broken body rolling across broken marble until it struck the collapsed pillar against which he came to rest. His mouth began to bleed as he gazed up into the churned wreckage, eyes flashing one final, raging spark of defiance before fading.

Sally spun, the center core in her hands rotating as she sensed a presence. Gabriel. She moved out of the destroyed hallway, her voice ringing like a death knell's clang. She found him at the opposite end of the balcony, his eyes empty, his breath coming in ragged gasps as he stood to greet her.

"You have offended against me!" she screamed, her voice splintering the atmosphere, a grotesque imitation of maternal wrath. "You, my own son!"

She bound the core, and the world reacted. The ground beneath their feet heaved and bucked, surging in serrated spires that ripped the castle walls asunder, sending crashing towers into the depths below. In the outside world, the darkened sky contorted, and a portal tore itself open with a scream like the razing of flesh.

From the portal, a shape came, sliding along the warping stones. Matt, his eyes blazing, his body smudged with blood and dust, charged toward Gabriel, fists clenched. He did not stop, flinging himself at combat, his scream lost to the screaming tempest.

"Give me back Margo!" he bellowed, his words ringing out above the chaos. Lightning ripped the air between them, the spitting flames screaming in their faces as Sally unleashed all her wrath. She stood before Matt, face contorted with rage, as she lifted the core high, the black energy wrapped about her like a serpent.

In the midst of the destruction, Neah's eyes snapped open in her bedroom, the ground under her bed shaking, the walls creaking. She fell to her knees, her silver dress ripped, her hair disheveled and tangled. She staggered onto the balcony, her breathing catching as she gazed down at the ruin below. The kingdom of Maranaqua was beyond recognition, its formerly shining spires now nothing but rubbles, its people fleeing through the curled, shattered streets as the ground cracked open beneath them.

As she sprinted, her bare feet pounding against the icy stone, a bolt of lightning hit the tower to her side, sending shards of marble like miniature hailstones. One sliced into her shoulder, turning her around as the shock of the blast propelled her off the balcony. She fell, her scream drowned by the storm, her form tumbling down the slope of a collapsing hill until she was swept up in a passing tornado, her form lost in the churning blackness.

Outside the gates, the Samanas flooded in through the smashed gates, their goblin-like, monstrous bodies sliding across broken stone. Owen and Zoe, already running hard through the heavy forest, spun at the snapping of wood and stone. Owen fell, catching for Zoe's arm as something swept by overhead, the wind howling like a chorus of the damned.

Zoe's eyes screwed up as she caught the glimpse of boats sailing through the waves that were pounded by the storm. She poked into her satchel, her hands brushing against the icy metal of her bombs. She hurled one, and then another, the blasts shredding the boats, sending shattered planks and torn bodies out into the surf. The dying screams of the Samanas rung through the trees, their blood coloring the surf a sick, pulsing red.

Far off, Queen Hanna sensed the vibrations through the stones of her far-off palace. She whirled round, her heart pounding, her breath slicing as she gazed towards the storm-surrounded kingdom of Maranaqua. She had heard the gossip, the whispers of Sally's return, and now she sensed it in the bones of the world itself. She gripped her staff tightly, knuckles white with tension, and gritted her teeth as she stepped into the churning wind, her cloak whipping back behind her like a tattered raven's wings.

She would locate Margo. She would put an end to this madness, whatever it took to keep her out of the tempest's core.