Rain tore down from the heavens like vengeance.
Not a gentle fall—this was a storm made by teeth and fury, thunder cracking open the sky as if God Himself was screaming.
Trees bowed. Shadows shifted. And through it all, Selene ran—barefoot, bloodied, and broken—her arms wrapped around two swaddled infants.
Her cloak was soaked through, mud streaking up her legs as she stumbled through the dark forest, every step jagged with pain.
The twins were barely three months old.
Born under an eclipse in a leap year.
On the 12-12 day in the dead of a new day.
Born in silence.
Born into a curse.
Xena, the girl, rested heavily against her chest—eerie still despite the chaos. Xavier, her twin, stirred and whimpered in her other arm, his small fists clenching as if he could sense the danger that had already torn his family apart.
Selene didn't speak. She couldn't. Her lips were split, her body shredded by thorns and gravel. But in her mind, a single scene replayed—again and again—like a curse that refused to fade.
Her husband.
Lying in pieces on the obsidian floor of their cottage. His throat slit. His chest cracked open like a broken door.
And standing over him—not a man, not anymore—But a being wrapped in shadow and ancient hunger.
AdrianVortigern Raventhorne.
The devil.
She had tried to run that night too—but he whispered something before she escaped, and everything changed.
He whispered words in an ancient tongue, older than the moonlight itself, and the wind carried his voice into the town like poison.
The towns people eyes turned white. Their mouths slackened. They dropped their tools, their children, their morals.
And they followed him.
Their voices had become a single monstrous chant:
"Kill the witch."
"Spill the devil's blood."
"Don't let her escape."
"Kill her."
"Burn her and her spawns "
"Don't let her escape."
And so she ran. For days. For nights. Until now.
The forest clawed at her like it wanted to keep her. Mud sucked at her feet. Roots snatched at her ankles. The rain soaked her bones, and still she ran—driven by fear, by magic, by the desperate need to save what little she had left.
The torches came again. Flickering in the trees like cursed fireflies. And with them came the voices—louder this time.
Crueler.
"Don't let her escape!"
"She's bleeding!"
"She has the Devil's heirs—stop her!"
Torches flickered in the dark like angry stars, weaving through the trees in pursuit. Metal clashed. Dogs barked. The night was no longer natural.
And neither was she.
The woman—Selene—once a high priestess of the blood moon who many feared and adored, now just a hunted witch—kept running.
Her breath came ragged, shallow. Blood dripped from beneath her torn garments, staining her thighs and knees. Every pulse in her body screamed. But still, she ran.
The children were all she had left.
Lightning slashed the sky in blinding white. For a moment, the forest lit up—and so did the horror.
Five men. No—six—were cutting through the trees, their blades out, mouths chanting something in a language soaked in old hatred. Selene didn't look back. She couldn't. She pressed her lips to Xena head and whispered a prayer that burned her tongue.
Then—
She stumbled.
The forest floor rose up like a fist. Her knee buckled. A cry tore from her throat as one child slipped from her arms. Xavier hit the ground, wailing, his tiny voice splitting through the rain.
"No!" Selene screamed crawling through mud and blood.
Her scream wasn't human. It was older than grief—laced with knowing that she might die here with them.
She grabbed Xavier with trembling hands, pulling him back into her arms. She clutched them both to her chest like shields.
"Shut up," she whispered, eyes wild. "Please, baby. Please be quiet."
Thunder cracked again, so loud it nearly masked the shouting.
"She went east!"
"Kill the witch! Kill the witch! Kill her!"
Selene turned sharply and ran again—through tangled thorns, over shattered roots, into the jaws of the unknown.
And then—
Like falling through a veil, she passed the edge of the forest… into a strange town she didn't recognize.
The air shifted—thicker, heavier. The rain felt different here. Slower. Like the town itself breathed beneath her feet.
Cobblestone streets slick with rain. Candlelit windows blurred by mist. The architecture was old, worn, timeless. It smelled like smoke and something sweeter beneath it—like rot dressed in perfume.
No one screamed here. No torches chased her. Only silence.
She ducked into the alley of an empty bakery, her body folding like paper. She pressed her back against the brick wall and gasped for breath, her arms wrapped tight around the children. Her blood pooled at her feet.
Then she looked up.
Above her, the old iron sign swung in the storm.
And carved into the rusted wood was a name she didn't remember—yet it made her bones ache:
PARADIS HILLS
The name hit her like a memory she'd never made. Something ancient stirred in her veins.
She was not safe. Not here. But the magic... it was different. Faintly familiar. This place had been hidden.
Protected.
Or cursed.
Selene clutched her children tighter as she thought,
If the Devil had called the others…
Then this town would either silence his voice—
Or become his new altar.