The earth groaned beneath their feet.
Selena held Dante tight as he writhed in her arms, his scream ripping through the silent atrium like a curse torn from the pit of hell. Above them, the moon bled a deep, poisonous crimson, painting the world in apocalypse's hue. The once-calm pool nearby shattered its reflection—now roiling and crimson, a swirling mirror of blood.
"Dante—!" she gasped, her voice cracking with raw panic as his muscles convulsed violently. His eyes flickered—first golden, then coal-black, then a horrific red so deep it seemed carved from darkness. Ancient wrongs clawed their way to the surface.
Cassius lunged forward, his midnight-blue robes flaring around him in a windless gale. He pressed an ornate talisman to Dante's spine and chanted with guttural authority. The symbols etched on the talisman glowed—pulsing to some unseen rhythm.
But his magic shattered.
Dante arched backward, his spine contorting with unnatural sinews, then froze.
Too still.
