53 | ACT III, SCENE I

P R E V I O U S L Y

"You killed your sister, didn't you, Tristan Valmont?"

His face turned a deadly shade of pale white.

That was all the answer I needed.

[TRIGGER WARNING: THIS CHARACTER SUFFERS FROM MILD ANXIETY AND TRAUMA. READ AT YOUR OWN DISCRETION!]

[NOTE: THIS CHAPTER IS A FLASHBACK. ALSO, GOOD LUCK FINDING THE HARRY POTTER REFERENCE!]

[TWO HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS AGO, DURING THE TREMAYNE - VALMONT FIGHT OVER THE RIVER DERWENTWATER.]

HARTINGTON CASTLE, ALNWICK, STORMHOLT.

TRISTAN

IT PLAYED OVER AND OVER, again and again, the memories refused to stop - the sounds refused to stop, the screaming - oh lord, the screaming refused to stop.

Strike. Kill. Move.

Strike. Kill. Move.

Move, my head urged. The screaming didn't stop.

It played over and over, the screams etched into my mind, yet it was unwilling to let the images, the screams go. Simple actions - walking, moving - they hurt. Survival slipped across the cracks of my soul, draining away like sand in an hourglass.

Screaming.

Someone was screaming.

I wanted to stop. I wanted it to stop. Wanted to be out, away - the walls were getting closer, closer, stifling me, choking me, as if cold hands of iron intending to squeeze the life out of my body.

Stop, I tried to cry out. Stop, let me go.

I didn't want to be a part of this war my father had started. I couldn't - I couldn't stand the screaming, it raked down my nerves like grated metal, unable as I was to drop the blade from my hands and stop killing the men.

"Help!"

There it was. The screaming. Again.

All these men I had killed, all these lives I had taken, all their cries for mercy as they fell to my feet even as I buried my sword in their hearts.

All the oceans in Endollon would never clean that merciless blood off my hands.

"Help me! Please!"

I had to find - I had to find that voice, I had to stop, I had to help. I had to, I had to, I had to-

"Please! Help!"

The bloodcurdling scream was a helpless cry for mercy - begging for help with undeniable despair, tearing into my thoughts. The sound inched further into my head, destroying any sanity I had left. The only thing I knew, the only thing I felt was the pain.

I burst the door open and went colder than ice.

It was my sister.

The screams came from her.

Right from the dagger of Bloodstone embedded deeply into her bloodstained chest.

"No. No, no, no. No," I gasped, disbelieving. "No, Elodie, no!"

She was trying to drag herself across the floor, bloodstained feet finally beginning to give way as she collapsed while my heart fell right at my feet.

"Tris," she whispered, frail and feeble. More blood coughed out even as she tried to speak, muffling her speech to slight noises of a plea for help. Strangled cries left me as the despair sunk in, and I dropped to my knees beside her, anguish gnawing at the roots of my brain.

"El!"

"Tristan," she cried softly, the strength drained away from her voice. Her thin fingers tried to grasp my hand as her body shook even more, blood pouring down her sides and staining her ivory skin.

"Who did this - who did this to you, El, I'm going to kill them - wait!"

"Tristan-" she choked out slightly, her hands wrapping around the knife and attempting to pull it out. My hands wrestled with her to keep her from doing it, yet they seemed to be made of lead, running and feeding only on my sobs of anguish.

"No - wait!" I protested. "Don't pull it out - I'm going to find the healer - NO, ELODIE, NO!"

Full blown sobs emerged from my ragged lips as she weakly pulled out the knife, and blood flowed all over her clothes in a crimson tide. Her body collapsed onto the floor, shaking and writhing in unbearable pain, the red seeping right over the tiles and matting her raven black hair.

"El! What have you done?" I sobbed quietly, her eyes filling with tears as I deftly tore off thick strips from the fabric of my robes.

"I'm... I'm sorry, I'm so sorry," she whispered and whimpered softly, doubled up in unceasing pain. Gently, I tried to turn her to her back to use the cloth to stem her bleeding. Her big blue eyes filled with more tears, a perfect mirror to my own.

Slowly, weakly, my sister raised a loving hand to touch my cheek, slick with her blood.

My shoulders dropped and so did the tears from my eyes.

"I'm so sorry, Tristan," she sobbed, voice thick with blood, trying to calm my fluttering hands - hopelessly trying to reassure me. "It hurt... it hurt so much, I had to pull it out."

"You're not dying on me, El. No," I shook my head as more tears slid down my nose as I tenderly stroked her hair, trying to help - to help stem the blood - there was so much blood - the bleeding didn't stop-

"Tris," El intervened, her voice weaker than a whisper, barely decipherable. She tightly clutched my hand, fingers cold and clammy. I put my hands under her to lift her up, I had to take her to Vertgate - I had to find Vivian so that he could help save her-

"Stop, stop - no!" she wept out. "Listen to me, Tristan, please!"

"You can't give up - you're going to live, I'm not going to let you die!"

"Please," she tugged at my shirt, her neck looked so pale that I thought it would burst, all the blood and colour had drained out of her face. "My time - my time as come... let me go," she urged.

"No, no-" I gasped, as moisture coated my cheeks.

"I'm dying, brother... please make it stop, it hurts so much, I can't take it."

"No, don't be stupid-"

"Please," she gasped. "Let me die, Tris. It hurts. It burns. I will not survive this. I can't even breathe. Let me die," she begged harder, now my vision was clouded with tears so badly that I couldn't even see.

"I can't live without you - please don't give up on me," I pleaded her, my voice hardly a whisper, dry and ragged and hoarse with pain. "Please don't go - please, let me help you, El!"

Her eyes begin to fill with blood - the whites, the pretty blue pupils - all coloring a deep red as she writhed in pain in my arms, bright blood spurting down her wounds. She clung tightly to the safety of my arms as I shook and sobbed and held her close to my heart.

"Kill me," she asked softly. "Let me go. Spare me the pain, please. Let me go, Tris."

"Someone help me!" I shouted, my voice a pitiful beg. "Someone save my sister. Please! Please save my sister!"

"Tristan," her hand grabbed my wrist, and I looked into her bleeding, red eyes. "Please. Do me one last favor. Kill me-"

"No," I sobbed, pulling her to my chest as her nostrils began to bleed, and she coughed up more blood, choking. "Please. No. Please - El - you can't give up."

"Sing me a poem," she whispered, fingers clutching my shirt feebly. "Sing me a poem, Tris."

"Please-" I stammered hysterically, "pl-pl-ease, El, don't do this - don't leave -" My voice choked with tears as I tried to get the words out, and she closed her blue eyes, her frail body wracking and thrashing in my arms as I uselessly tried to help her.

She had been beyond help before I even found her.

"It hurts," she whimpered, "make it stop, please, Tristan."

"HELP ME!" I cried out, frantic, but my voice only ricocheted off empty corridors. "HELP ME, PLEASE! SAVE MY SISTER!" I shouted desperately, and Elodie clung to my shoulder, eyes wide and pleading. "I can't live if you are gone, El, I can't, what will become of me?"

"You're going to be just fine, Tris-" my sister stuttered, lips outlined with her own blood, "-breaking girls' hearts just fine without me," she whispered, hot tears spilling over her cheeks as she watched me sob. "The poem," she asked, my heart breaking, forcing me to oblige. "Please... sing to me."

"She's in the sun, in the wind, and the rain. She's in the air with every breath that you take," I began in a soft voice, hardly my own, painted with tears and harsh sorrow.

"I'm sorry for throwing you off that tree. I'm sorry for daring you to jump into the lake. I'm sorry for pestering you every time to get married, Tris," Elodie quivered in my arms. I gently kissed her on the forehead as she buried her head in my neck.

"She sings a song of hope and cheer. There's no more pain, or no more fear."

"Tell mother I love her," she cried. "Tell her to not stop picking the blueberries after I'm gone. Tell father I'm... sorry."

"You'll see her in the clouds above, hear her whisper words of love. You'll be together before long, until then, listen to her song," I finished, my voice trembling and she whimpered softly, hands pressed to her chest as I held her, hugging her as she took her last few breaths.

"It hurts so much," she cowered.

"Just a few more seconds," I quietly whispered, too numb with tears and pain, pressing my cheek to hers. She mewled with another wave of pain as her tears leaked from under her closed eyes, the suffering drowning out all my shouts for help.

No one deserved to die alone.

"I'm scared," Elodie cried. "I'm scared, Tristan, please stay with me."

"Don't be," I reassuringly squeezing her frail hand. "Everything is going to be okay. Just breathe."

"I want to be brave," she gasped.

"You are."

"Will it hurt?" her big, trusting eyes looked at me.

"No," I said, trying to keep my voice strong. "It will be easier than falling asleep."

She closed her eyes again, trying to breathe, it came in short, successive gasps. The final wave of spasms rolled over, and she uncontrollably twitched and jerked in my arms as I tried to prevent her head from crashing with the ground.

"Please, Tristan, make it stop!" she shouted. "KILL ME! PLEASE!"

"No!" I said helplessly, trying to control the steady flow of tears, as I eyed the Bloodstone dagger on the ground. What kind of man could kill his own sister?

Only a beast.

"Please!"

"Elodie, please, don't make me do this," I pleaded, but her twitching body now began to shake violently, signalling that she was on death's door, her eyes dilated and jumping around, lips spitting up blood. I couldn't bear to see her like this.

"Please, Tristan - I beg you, please, I would fall to your feet -" she choked, "-but please, please, kill me, please, make it stop."

It was barbaric to let her suffer.

And I was a beast.

My hands closed around the wicked stone as I gave my twin sister a heartbroken smile. Her eyes misted over completely, lips parting in sweet relief at the pain that would soon end quickly.

"Please, Tristan," she urged softly, and my head bent and my shoulders slumped brokenly. My hand curled around the dagger, still shaking violently as she prompted me to go on. The tears mingled my vision, I could barely see as the grief covered me like a blanket.

I plunged the dagger into her weeping heart.

Her last piercing scream wrecked the air as I broke down with her in my arms, trembling uncontrollably as heartbroken sobs emerged from my throat.

"I'm... I'm so sorry," I lamented, watching the light slowly leave her eyes. Her lips curled up slightly, in a small smile to the world that had treated her so unkind.

"Thank you," she whispered, fingers clutching mine for a final time.

After a second, her grip went limp.

Her heart stopped.

Shock still, I closed her eyes, hurled the dagger across the ground. The only thing I felt was the grief piercing my heart, cutting into me like a thousand needles that sunk in to my bones, a dull ache that tore apart my soul and my very being - trying to make sense of the fact that she was gone - and that she was never coming back.

That was the thing about death. You thought you had time, you thought you had forever - but you don't. I found myself wishing I had held her hand tighter, that I'd hugged her closer, that I'd told her I'd loved her even more often.

I thought we'd have forever.

And in that moment, the world stopped spinning for me.

The time stood still. It refused to move, it refused to change - the world fell away in the blink of an eye as if all the curtains had closed, and I was left with nothing but her memories which would haunt the rest of my life.

Suddenly, a cold hand touched my arm and my head whipped up in terror.

And it looked right into the pair of eyes above me, eyes belonging to the most powerful couple of Endollon besides the King and Queen - I looked into the eyes of death and life.

Thanatos, the god of death.

And his sister Ambrosine, the goddess of life.

And the deathly cold, freezing hand - it belonged to him.

Thanatos.

The reaper of the dead.

Father to Deimos and Eros, he was the one god a man could never dare cross. For he reaped the souls of the dead gods himself, and he knew when their time would come - it would always be on the list created by the three fates or Moroi - the list that kept every detail of when, where and how an immortal was destined to die. The death god would take back their souls to the immortal prisons, which were guarded by his wife, Ambrosine - the goddess and giver of life.

And now, his pitch black scythe gleamed dangerously in the dimmed room, edge poised to strike - his granite dark eyes honed right at the body of my dead sister.

"Move," he intoned harshly, stepping forward as I fell back, holding Elodie's body tight in my arms. I would never let her go, ever.

"Never," I spat out, remorse tinging the brutality in my voice.

"Move, I said," he snapped. "Let me do my job."

"You'll be damned if you think you can take her away from me!"

"Well then," Thanatos let out a cold, cruel laugh, "you leave me no choice, Tristan Valmont."

His sister's and his combined force clamped down my arms with unyielding brutality as I let out a yelp of terrified cries, a second later Elodie's body was out of my arms and sliding onto the floor, and even as I tried to struggle out of the hard grasp, Thanatos dropped to his knee and sliced the scythe through her neck.

My scream pierced the air as he let out a cruel laugh, coldly observing the shimmering, silver soul clung to hard metal - the soul of my sister.

"Let her go - please," I begged desperately, even as Ambrosine's sharp nails clawed into my skin.

"It's too late," she hissed, the air around her turned whiter and colder than frost.

"Death waits for no one. Not even a god," Thanatos declared with a vile smile, his dark eyes flicking to the soul twisted on his scythe. "But you, Valmont-" his gaze turned hard, "-you killed her before her time. She wasn't even destined to die, but you killed her."

"What - what do you mean?" I whispered in a hushed voice.

His grin turned wider.

"Her name was not on the list of the Moroi. It was not her destiny to die, not today. Yet you killed her anyway. Had you not given in to her wishes, and taken her to Vivian Emmerson, he would have been able to save her. She would still have been alive. The blade had just missed her heart. But you, being the native fool you are, you killed her," Thanatos snapped.

"You disrupted the scales of fate, Tristan Valmont," the slender hand belonging to Ambrosine raked her sharp nails down my neck. "You disturbed the balance of life. Your love for your sister blinded you, and she made you take away a life. Life which was not yours to take. Life which is mine - and only mine to give."

"But-"

"-there are no excuses in death, Lord Valmont," she softly hissed right in my ear, her breath chilling and making my body shake. "Now she's gone. Because of you. She was fated to have a long life, and you," she pointed her accusing finger at me, "you took that life away from her."

"And for that, you will pay," Thanatos growled ominously.

Ambrosine softly tinkled a deadly laugh.

"Pay you will. I curse you, Tristan Valmont. You will give back what you took from us. Only death will pay for life. Your death. At your sister's own hands."

"I-"

"-her body will remain resistant to time. And on the day your curse fulfills itself-" Ambrosine smiled a wicked smirk, "-that day your sister will rise and kill you with her own hands."

Another tear rolled down my cheek.

"Have a good day, Lord Valmont. I will see you again on the day you die," she cruelly laughed, and then took her brother's arm, vanishing into nothingness.

Leaving me with an invisible blade hanging above my neck, the dead body weighing down my arms as the tears continued to flow.

Then I threw back my head.

And then I wept.

• • • • •

Now you know.

I'm sorry.

It's just the way this was all going to pan out. He's going to die one day, and he's cursed. It's not going to end well, that's for sure. If you think this book has a happy ending, you haven't been paying attention :( I'm sure you must have figured out what's in the forbidden room Tristan keeps locked all the time. That's the reason he's so reckless, just so... restless. It's because he knows he's not going to have forever. He's spent more than half his life regretting this mistake. I don't even want to begin to think what doing such a thing does to your mental health. It's the worst thing I can ever imagine being made to do, and then being forced to live with. Tristan Valmont looks perfect, but he's far from it.

Love is important. Love yourself, chicas.

Did you spot the Harry Potter reference? Also, the poem Tristan sings to Elodie I found from Pinterest, but I can't remember who had written it (deleted the screenshot by mistake, sorry!) So if you spot the poem and know who I need to give credit to, please let me know!