And he would hear it.
Every scream. Every sob. Every time she called for him and he couldn't answer.
Her voice echoing through his realm for eternity while he stood on the other side of barriers he couldn't cross. Unable to free her. Unable to grant her peace. Unable to do anything but listen while the woman he loved suffered in his own domain.
Forever.
The image gutted him. His hands spasmed against her shoulders. For a moment, he couldn't see anything except that vision. Brynn screaming, Brynn suffering, Brynn calling his name into darkness.
His hands started shaking.
"Please." The word came out strangled. His throat closing. "Take anything else. Everything else. But not her."
No answer came.
Another thread snapped.
Her soul lifted higher. Connected by only the thinnest strands now.
He could see the courts fighting for her. Golden light from the edges of where the Mourned had been. Red from the Violent. Hungry darkness from the Consumed. Mist from the Lingering. And his own shadows, reaching without his permission.
All of them wanting pieces of her.
She didn't move. Didn't react.
Three threads left.
Through the death-link, he felt his commanders' confusion and concern. They couldn't see what he saw, her soul departing, but they felt his anguish bleeding through the network.
My lord?Aldric's voice came through the link.Are you?—
Dante couldn't answer. His throat had closed completely.
Could only watch as she died.
Two threads left.
He'd held her with these same hands just hours ago—her body warm and alive, her heart beating strong against his palm, her skin flushed with heat and life and want.
She'd looked up at him with those fierce eyes and said she wasn't doing this alone, that they'd finish it together. That whatever happened, they'd face it side by side.
And now she was slipping away while he knelt here uselessly.
He was death incarnate. The Reaper. One of the most powerful beings in any realm.
He could destroy armies. Could harvest souls with a touch. Could unmake a Death Lord so completely that reality forgot he'd existed.
He had just erased Caelum from existence. Had consumed ages of stolen power like it was nothing. Had made the walls of reality tremble under the weight of his rage.
And none of it mattered.
Because he couldn't save her.
All that power. All that destruction. All that time of being the thing every soul feared.
And he was kneeling here watching her die like the most helpless creature in any realm. His hands were useless on her body. His power useless in his veins. Everything he was. Useless.
One thread left.
