Midnight came with the kind of silence and he screaming had stopped hours ago. Even the rats had gone quiet, like they knew something was about to break.
Seraphiel knelt before her chains, hands trembling. Not from fear but from exhaustion. From the death magic coiled beneath her skin like a second heartbeat, hungry and patient.
"Last chance to back out," Nyx said from his cell. He'd been watching her for the past ten minutes, utterly still. "Once you start, there's no stopping halfway. Either the chains break or you do."
"Encouraging."
"I don't do encouragement. I do honesty." He shifted, chains clinking. "So make the call, Oracle. Are we doing this or not?"
She placed her scarred palms against the blessed iron.
The metal recoiled at her touch—she could feel it.
Words bubbled up from somewhere deep in her memory. This was older... Revenant incantations, the language the dead spoke to death itself. She'd never learned them cause she didn't remember learning them.
But her mouth shaped the syllables anyway, and the black flames answered.
They erupted from her palms like reverse stigmata, crawling across the blessed iron in hungry tendrils. The chains actually screamed, a sound like metal in agony, like sanctity being violated.
Pain hit her at her chest.
She'd thought she knew pain. Three years of torture, of burning, of dying slowly. This was different. This was her own power eating her from the inside out, consuming her mortality piece by piece to fuel the flames.
Blood poured from her eyes. Hot and thick, blinding her. She could taste it flooding from her nose, feel it leaking from her ears in warm rivulets.
The chains cracked as hairline fractures spreading like lightning across blessed steel.
"Don't stop," Nyx's voice cut through the agony. "You stop now, it'll rebound and fry you from the inside. Finish it."
She pushed harder. The black flames roared, and somewhere in the palace above, she knew Caelum was sitting up in bed, feeling holy wards shatter like glass.
Finally, the chains exploded.
Shards of iron embedded themselves in the cell walls. Seraphiel collapsed forward, hands raw and smoking, blood still streaming from every orifice on her face.
"Huh." Nyx flexed his freed hands, examining his wrists where the manacles had been. Burned flesh, blisters, but he barely seemed to notice. "You actually did it. Impressive." He looked at her crumpled form. "Also looks like you're dying. That would be inconvenient."
"Not... dying," she managed through blood-slicked lips. "Just... hurts."
"Everything worth doing does." He stood—actually stood, for the first time since she'd woken down here. Gods, he was massive. Six and a half feet easy, shoulders broad enough to block doorways, scars mapping his torso like topographical charts of violence.
He moved to the bars separating their cells and gripped them. As his muscles corded across his back as he pulled.
The iron bent and screamed one last time before it broke.
"Show-off," Seraphiel muttered.
"Said the woman who just melted blessed chains with hell-fire." Nyx stepped through the gap. "Can you stand?"
She tried to but failed. Tried again. This time Nyx caught her elbow a littlerough, but functionally, keeping her upright.
"I expected you to run," she said.
"Where? There's fifty guards between us and freedom." He cocked his head. "Besides, we haven't—"
Suddenly, footsteps echoed own the corridor.
Nyx's entire demeanor shifted. That relaxed, almost conversational energy vanished, replaced by something cold and surgical. He moved toward the cell door, pressing himself against the wall.
Three guards entered for routine check, probably. They didn't even get to shout.
Nyx moved in water given lethal intent—grabbed the first guard's helmet, twisted. The crack of a breaking neck echoed obscenely loud. The second guard raised his spear. Nyx caught the shaft, yanked the man forward into his knee, then used the collapsing body as a shield against the third guard's sword.
The blade sank into his fellow guard's back. Nyx dropped the corpse, closed the distance in two steps, and crushed the third guard's windpipe with his bare hand. Just... squeezed casual as wringing out a washcloth.
Five seconds. Maybe six.
Seraphiel stared at the bodies. Blood spreading across stone in dark pools. The guards' eyes still open, surprised.
Nyx wiped his hands on his prison rags, leaving red streaks. He picked up a sword, tested its weight, nodded approval. Then he looked at her.
"Still want that revenge?" His voice was flat. Matter-of-fact. "Because this is what it looks like. This is what I am. Not metaphorically. Not in theory." He gestured at the corpses. "Literally. This is the monster you're partnering with."
She should've been horrified. Should've run. Three years ago, she would've.
But three years ago, she hadn't burned to death. Hadn't clawed her way back from whatever hell the black flames had dragged her through.
"Yes," she said. "I still want revenge."
Nyx studied her for a long moment. Then he nodded, satisfied. Drew a guard's knife, tested the edge against his thumb. Blood welled.
"Then we do this properly." He let the blood pool in his palm. "Blood pact. Unbreakable. I help you destroy Caelum Thorne—expose him, ruin him, kill him, whatever you want. You use those prophecy skills to help me reclaim my throne and slaughter everyone who killed my family." His eyes met hers, unwavering. "We're bound until both debts are paid. Either party betrays the terms, we both die screaming. No loopholes. No escape clauses."
Seraphiel's throat went dry. Blood pacts weren't folklore—they were ancient magic, the kind that predated gods and law. Once made, the bond carved itself into your soul. Violation meant death, messy and guaranteed.
"That's—"
"Extreme? Yeah." Nyx's expression didn't change. "But I don't trust you, and you sure as hell don't trust me. This way, we have to trust each other. Mutually assured destruction. Beautiful in its simplicity."
Caelum's face flashed in her mind. That gentle smile as he condemned her. You're perfect for the role.
She took the knife. Cut her palm without hesitation. Blood welled, darker than it should be—the death magic staining even that.
They clasped hands with blood mingling, hot and slick.
Nyx spoke in that same dead language she'd used on the chains. The binding words. Power surged through the point of contact, crawling up her arm like lightning, like roots burrowing into bone.
The visions came back again. This time, hundreds of futures exploding across her consciousness. Nyx on a throne built from the bones of his enemies, crown dark as midnight. Herself beside him, eyes hollow and burning, no longer human. Caelum screaming as black flames consumed him from within. Two kingdoms—the realm and Nyx's—burning, merging, reborn in violence.
And there, at the center of it all, a choice. A single moment where the futures branched.
Either save the kingdom. Or save herself.
She couldn't see which she chose. Both paths led to blood.
She gasped, crashed back into her body. Nyx caught her before she collapsed, one hand still gripping hers, the other steadying her shoulder.
"What did you see?" His voice sharp, demanding.
Seraphiel met his eyes. Lied. "Everything I needed to."
He searched her face, looking for deception. Found it, probably, but didn't call her on it. Maybe he'd expected the lie. Maybe he'd done the same when the pact showed him his futures.
Alarm bells shattered the moment. All across the palace, the sound cascading, overlapping. Someone had found the dead guards. Or noticed the holy wards breaking. Either way—
"Time to start a war." Nyx's grin was savage and delighted. He grabbed the dead guard's sword, tossed Seraphiel the dagger. "Stay close. I'll clear the path. Try not to die—you're important now."
"How reassuring."
"Wasn't meant to be." He moved to the cell door. Kicked it open.
The corridor beyond was chaos. Guards flooding in from both ends, swords drawn, faces grim.
Seraphiel counted quickly. Fifty. Maybe sixty.
"Nyx—"
"I know." He rolled his shoulders, bones cracking. Then he looked back at her, and his grin widened. "Try to keep up, little prophet."
He charged into the corridor. And Seraphiel, with dagger clutched in her bloody hand, followed the monster she'd bound herself to.