Chapter 13: The Choice

Zayven wakes beneath the blood-stained sky.

The forest is silent. Ash falls like snow.

He sees her collapsed beside him as her light glowing faintly, but fading.

He touches her hand and says. "What did you do…?''

Kael appears, wounded but alive.

He says the truth: "She didn't cure the curse. She took it into herself and twisted it, changed it."

Zayven speaks with so much pain in his voice: "So she's dying?"

Kael answers and said: "No. She's becoming something else. But it will burn her alive unless she completes the bond.

Kael explains the ancient ritual, one that hasn't been done in generations.

Only one marked by both light and shadow can channel the curse into balance.

To do this: She must give Zayven a piece of her heart, If her body rejects the transfer, she will die. If it works, they both live, as something new.

Zayven refuses to let her go through with it saying;

"I'm not worth of her glow."

She smiles weakly: "You already have it."

He breaks down , for once, not angry, just afraid, They sit under the blood moon.

She places her hand over his mark, it glows bright gold, then white.

Zayven grips her hand, focuses, and lets the pain in.

Their memories flash: First touch, First vision, she whisper: "I trust you."

As the ritual nears the end, her glow flashes violently, like hope flickers

She gasps, body seizing, the curse inside her fights back.

Zayven says: "No! Stay with me! you can do this, i know you can.''

He tries to pull it back , to stop it , but she whispers:

"Don't… I chose this.

There is a sound, like a heartbeat cracking, that opened in the sky.

A blinding white burst explodes around them , light and shadow twisted together.