The Gray Moors had turned into a frozen wasteland. Inside the cottage, the fire was a dying ember, its warmth unable to penetrate the supernatural chill that now clung to Jeremiah. He was no longer the man who had stood boldly in the cathedral; he was a withered rose, his petals falling one by one into the encroaching dark.
The Tenebris Cor had reached his heart. The black veins on his temples now pulsed with a rhythmic, ghostly light. He lay in a state of semi-consciousness, his breathing so faint that Celestine often had to lean her ear against his chest to ensure he was still tethered to the world.
Celestine was frantic. She had spent the last three days scouring the woods for the few herbs that grew in winter, trying to find anything that might act as a counter-agent to the curse. But she knew, deep down, that this wasn't a biological ailment. It was a spiritual tax.
She stood over her small table, grinding dried roots with a mortar and pestle, her tears falling into the powder.
"I gave up the spells," she hissed at the walls. "I gave up the power. Isn't that enough?"
She looked at Jeremiah. He stirred, his eyes opening—now almost entirely clouded by the silver-black film of the disease.
"Celestine," he rasped. It was barely a sound, a dry leaf skittering on stone. "Don't... don't fight it anymore. Come sit with me. The time for potions is over."
"No!" she cried, dropping the pestle. She ran to his side, kneeling on the cold dirt floor. "I won't let you go. I'll go back to the Bishop. I'll tell him I forced you. I'll tell him I cursed you and that you're innocent. Maybe if I'm punished, you'll be spared."
Jeremiah reached out, his hand feeling like brittle parchment as he touched her cheek. "You think... the Bishop has more power than the Love that made us? He is just a man in a tall hat, Celestine. Let him have his stone buildings. I have you."
As the night deepened, Jeremiah's heart began to falter. Each beat was followed by a terrifyingly long silence.
In a moment of sheer, glass-shattering desperation, Celestine remembered a forbidden ritual from her mother's grimoire—a ritual of 'The Great Exchange.' It was the only way to divert a bloodline curse: the bearer had to offer their own life-force in a direct, physical trade.
She took a small silver knife she had kept hidden in her trunk.
"If the universe wants a life for this love," she whispered, "it will have mine."
She pressed the blade to her palm, slicing deep. She then took Jeremiah's hand and did the same, pressing their wounds together. She began to chant, not the manipulative lyrics of a love spell, but a raw, guttering plea. She tried to visualize the blackness leaving his veins and entering hers. She tried to pull the rot out of him with the sheer force of her will.
"Take it," she groaned, her head falling back as a wave of coldness washed over her. "Take me. Spare the priest."
A sudden, violent wind slammed against the cottage, blowing the door off its rusted hinges. Snow swirled into the room, extinguishing the last of the fire.
In the sudden darkness, the black blood between their palms began to glow with a sickly, violet hue. But instead of flowing into Celestine, the liquid simply hovered, suspended in the air.
The air in the room didn't just grow cold; it grew still. The kind of stillness that exists only in the heart of a vacuum.
Celestine felt a presence. It wasn't the heavy, judgmental weight of the Bishop, nor was it the chaotic hunger of her ancestors' spirits. It was something vast—something that felt like the hum of a thousand suns. It was a gaze that stripped her bare, seeing the spell she had cast, the games she had played, and finally, the absolute, terrifying sincerity of the woman who was currently trying to die for a man she had once intended to toy with.
Jeremiah's eyes snapped open. He wasn't looking at Celestine. He was looking at the corner of the room, where the shadows seemed to be folding in on themselves.
"You've come," Jeremiah whispered, a look of profound recognition on his face.
Celestine turned, but she saw nothing but the swirling snow. Yet, she felt it—a curiosity so intense it felt like a physical touch. The Divine was no longer just watching from a distance. The Architect had stepped into the ruins of their house.