The past was a blade with two edges—each sibling carried one half. In the hush before dawn, their parents woke haunted by memories they'd long tried to bury.
Dusk draped the Demon Citadel in smoldering shadows the night he first spoke Irene's name. He was barely more than a blade-wielder then, brown-haired and lithe, eyes still pure ember rather than coal. At his side stood his mother, younger, and more cautious.
"You must learn to love her," his mother hissed, voice curling like smoke. "Not for her light, but for the fracture it can open." Her voice still echoes in his head.
Daemon bowed, lips twisting into a smile he did not yet own. "And when the fracture widens?"
His mother tapped a jeweled dagger at Daemon's belt. The steel gleamed with ancient runes: the glyph of sovereignty and the promise of blood. "You drive it home."
Later, Daemon found Irene in the Hall of Ancient Prayers, her wings furled, eyes closed in silent song. The angels did not notice him slip behind the pillars. He inhaled the scent of jasmine and candle-wax — scents forbidden and precious to her.
He stepped into her light. "Lady Irene."
Her eyes opened, crystalline with surprise. "K-King Daemon."
He knelt, inclining his head. "Forgive my intrusion, but I have heard only of your beauty. I wanted to see the truth, I want to see more."
She studied him, cautious as a stray doe. "My beauty is gift and burden."
He brushed a fingertip across her knuckles. "I would bear any burden to stand in your light. To stand with you. I promise."
In that moment, Daemon felt something unfamiliar: the weight of a promise he'd never intended to keep. He bowed again, masking the tremor in his heart as he withdrew.
Across moonlit corridors, he traced his parent's path of instructions: learn her hopes, catalog her fears, turn her trust into vulnerability. And vulnerability into death's embrace.
He practiced words of devotion at night, smiled for gatherings of nobles, and left daisies at her chamber door—white petals stained with a drop of demon-touched blood. Each act was a stitch in the web that would lure her consent.
Only once, as he watched her play with twilight's glow on her feathers, did he pause. The knife's promise in his hand hissed with impatience. The target that had once seemed distant and faceless took shape in the curve of her jaw and the tilt of her brow.
He closed his eyes, tasting the inevitable betrayal. In the darkness behind his lids, two flames danced: one of defeat, one of regret. He wiped the sweat from his palm and sheathed the dagger. The ruse demanded perfection—emotion was a distraction.
The next dawn he knelt before her again, recited vows that would bind her heart, and fled before any spark of truth could kindle in his voice.
Years before the twins were born, Irene wandered her father's vast library in search of a prophecy no one spoke aloud. Scrolls lined shelves as high as angel-forged archways, inked in runes older than the Covenant.
One brittle manuscript drew her by its crackle alone. Its cover bore a single symbol: a falling star cleft by a horn and a halo. She unraveled the ribbon of age-yellowed silk and read:
"An angel enamored of demon flame, will bear the seed of fractured claim. Two shall rise—one of shadowed grace, and one of light mislaid its place. From that sundering seed, the two heirs awake: one drenched in dusk, the other bright yet false of make. When angelic hosts conquer and crowns are lain, the other side will rise and reckon flame. When the demons win and the angel is slain, the cycle will then start over again." – Dae.
The words tasted of warning and promise. Irene traced each line; palms cool on the brittle parchment until it landed on Dae. Her heart thudded at the thought that love—her greatest calling—could become a betrayal written in prophecy and future.
Footsteps crunched behind her. Merinia, the family maid and Ire's childhood best friend, loomed with arms crossed. "You shouldn't meddle in forbidden lore, Miss Irene."
Irene lifted her chin. "Prophecy shapes the future only if we believe it, and please, call me Ire, Merinia."
Merinia nodded and her gaze softened. "Or if someone uses it to break you, Miss—I mean... Ire."
That night, Irene dreamed of a demon king with coal-black hair and smoldering eyes whispering vows in a language older than mercy. She dreamed their children—one with violet bruised eyes, one with sunrise wings—reaching for her as the world burned. And finally, she dreamed the king's blade flashing in betrayal.
She woke with her breath caught in a web of fear. If the prophecy was true, the covenant's penalties would pale before the loss of everything she held sacred. If false, it was still a story she would never forget—an ache she could never unlearn.
In the candlelit study of their shared estate, Daemon closed his eyes and traced the faded scar beneath his sleeve. The memory of that blade-kiss against her throat lingered like poison. Irene laid a hand on his arm—a question and an apology in one gentle touch.
He opened his eyes and saw the same fear he'd once displayed in her hazel gaze, the fear of a hunted innocence. He nodded once, as though granting permission to acknowledge the past.
Across the hall, the twins waited in silence. They had inherited more than blood; they had inherited the echoes of both their parents' rivalry. Allisiario's jaw clenched, Ellinaskariya folded her wings tighter. Neither spoke, but the weight of history pressed on them—and on the fragile covenant their very existence had forged.
In that hush, all four understood: the future would be haunted by these betrayals until they chose to write their own prophecies in the ashes of the old. And in the widening dawn, as war drums thundered beyond the gates, they steeled themselves to become legends that no scroll could command.