Dante's voice came out forcibly even. "All of them?"
"Every single empty husk he created." Thessa's tone was soft but grim. "We've spent the past two days returning fragmented souls to their proper domains. Piecing together what was left of them after his... harvesting." She said the word like it tasted foul.
"The Mourned realm is stable," Vex added, his usual levity completely absent. "The souls who survived, those he hadn't fully drained yet, are still there. Living in that paradise he built for them."
"But they need a leader." Seraphina crossed her arms. "Someone to guide them. To restore what natural death should actually mean, not Caelum's twisted version of it."
Dante's shadows drew in, defensive. "I'm not taking another domain." He could barely manage his own court right now, and Brynn needed him.
"We know." Vex stood, his usual laziness dropping away to reveal the power beneath. "Which is why we brought someone else."
A figure stepped forward from the shadowed alcove near the far wall where Dante's wards should have alerted him to their presence but apparently hadn't.
Dante went completely still.
He was tall, with blonde curls falling to his neck and light blue eyes that held none of Caelum's false warmth. There was a calmness to him. Peace, not the artificial serenity Caelum had manufactured.The kind that came from guiding souls gently, not consuming them.
"Gabriel," Dante said slowly, searching his memory for the last time he'd seen this Death Lord. Centuries ago. Before Caelum claimed he'd faded into nothing.
"Lord Reaper." Gabriel inclined his head with respect that felt earned, not performed. "It's been a long time."
"Caelum said you diminished." Dante studied him, shadows reaching out to test his presence. “Long ago. That you faded from existence."
"He lied." The words came out bitter, edged with rage that Gabriel was clearly fighting to control. "I discovered what he was planning. The soul harvesting. The paradise prison. I tried to stop him, tried to make him see it was wrong."
Gabriel's hands clenched at his sides, knuckles white.
"He locked me in the deepest chamber of the Mourned palace. Bound me with wards I couldn't break, wards keyed to my own power so that fighting them only made them stronger." His voice dropped lower, thick with anger and helplessness. "Forced me to watch as he collected souls, drained them, turned them into empty shells. Made me see his plan manifest piece by piece while I could do nothing to stop it."
Dante's gut twisted. His jaw clenched so hard his teeth ached.
Trapped. Helpless. Watching atrocity unfold and being unable to prevent it. He knew that particular hell. Had lived it while Brynn lay dying and he could do nothing but count her breaths.
"I'm sorry," Gabriel said, meeting each of their eyes in turn. The guilt in his face was genuine, carved deep. "I should have found a way. Should have broken free sooner. Should have warned you before it came to this."
"That wasn't on you." Seraphina cut through Gabriel's self-recrimination. "Caelum was powerful. If he wanted you contained, you stayed contained. We all know what that's like."
"We all missed the signs," Vex added. "His deception ran deep. He fooled us all this time.”
"The betrayal is his alone," Thessa said gently. "Not yours."
Gabriel's shoulders eased slightly, but guilt still shadowed his features.
"There's something I still don't understand." Dante moved closer, his power reaching toward Gabriel as if testing his sincerity. "How did Caelum sabotage the wards in our realms without us noticing? Each court would have felt his presence the moment he crossed our boundaries."
Gabriel's face darkened, lips pressing into a thin line. "The power he gained from harvesting souls, it wasn't just about quantity. He learned how to use it to mask his signature. Make himself undetectable to even the most sensitive wards."
"Impossible," Seraphina said flatly. "We would have felt the void where he should have been."
"Not if he replaced his signature with borrowed souls." Gabriel's voice was hollow, haunted by what he'd witnessed. "He would drain a soul nearly completely, then wrap himself in what remained of their life force like wearing someone else's skin. To your wards, he appeared as nothing more than a wandering spirit, something beneath notice. Too weak to be a threat."
Vex cursed under his breath.
Dante's hands clenched into fists. His shadows surged outward before he wrestled them back under control.
"He used to brag about it." Gabriel’s expression hardened with disgust. "After he'd return from one of his sabotage missions, he'd come to my cell and laugh about how easy it was. How you were all too ignorant to notice him walking through your courts. Breaking your wards. Planting the seeds of collapse right under your noses while you looked right through him."
The violation of it hit Dante. His vision tunneled. His skin crawled.
