MistNovel - Read Web Novel Stories & Fiction Online

The dream came on the fifth night, and this time Victoria did not wake up.

She was standing in a throne room carved from black stone, every surface polished to mirror perfection. The walls rose impossibly high, disappearing into shadows that moved like living things. Torches burned with flames that shifted between red and blue and something darker, casting light that seemed to devour rather than illuminate.

Victoria looked down at herself and found her body different. Taller, draped in black fabric that moved like smoke. Her hands, when she lifted them, wore rings of silver and bone. Power thrummed under her skin, ancient and vast, a living thing that answered to her heartbeat.

This is wrong, she thought. This is not me.

But it was. The knowledge settled into her bones with the weight of absolute truth. She was Queen Nerezza, ruler of the Crimson Court, sovereign of the demon realms. This throne room was hers, carved by her will from the bones of the earth. The power that moved through her veins was hers, earned through blood and sacrifice and choices that had cost her everything she once was.

The throne itself sat at the far end of the hall, massive and terrible, carved from a single piece of obsidian. A crown rested on its seat, not made of metal but of living flame that burned without consuming, its light the color of fresh blood.

Victoria walked toward it, her footsteps echoing in the vast space. She knew this path, had walked it a thousand times. The crown called to her, recognizing its mistress, eager to return to her brow. She reached for it, and the flames leaped to meet her fingers, warm and welcoming.

The weight settled on her head like coming home.

The throne room doors opened, and he walked in.

Kael, but not the cold, controlled security officer. This version moved with lethal grace, dressed in the black armor of the Shadow Guard, twin blades strapped to his back. His eyes found hers across the distance, and the connection that had crackled between them in the white room became a living storm.

He crossed the space between them in long strides, and Victoria's heart raced with joy and desire and bone-deep recognition. This was her champion, her shadow, the one who had stood at her side through countless battles. The one who understood the weight of her crown and the cost of her power.

The one she loved more than her kingdom, more than her immortal life.

Kael stopped before the throne, dropping to one knee in a show of deference that was purely for form. When he looked up at her, his eyes held nothing but hunger and devotion.

"My queen."

"Rise," she commanded, and her voice resonated with power that made the flames dance higher. "We are beyond ceremony, you and I."

He stood, moving close enough that she could feel the heat of him, smell the leather and steel and something uniquely his. "I have come to tell you something you will not want to hear."

Fear touched her then, cold and sharp despite the fire burning on her head. "What have you done?"

"What I had to." His hand came up, cupping her face with a gentleness that contradicted the regret in his eyes. "What you would never allow me to do, if I asked permission."

"Kael..." His name was a warning, a plea, both at once.

"I love you," he said, and leaned in to kiss her.

His lips met hers, and the world caught fire. Not metaphorically but literally, flames spreading from her crown, racing down her body, consuming everything in their path. But there was no pain, only the overwhelming sensation of his mouth on hers, the way he kissed her like he was trying to memorize the taste, like he knew this would be the last time.

When he pulled back, his eyes were wet with unshed tears.

"Forgive me," he whispered.

And then the throne room exploded.

Victoria screamed as the vision shattered into a thousand burning fragments. Not from pain, but from the overwhelming betrayal that crashed through her like a physical blow. She could feel Kael's kiss still burning on her lips, could taste his goodbye, could see the throne room crumbling around her as the spell he had triggered destroyed everything she had built.

He had betrayed her. He had loved her and betrayed her, and she had died still trying to reach him through the flames, her hand outstretched toward him even as the magic consumed her.

She woke gasping, her hands clawing at sheets that were too white, too sterile, too wrong. The monitors were screaming, her heart rate spiking as she struggled to separate dream from memory from impossible truth.

The door burst open. Kael rushed in, his professional mask cracking as he took in her state. Behind him, alarms blared, and she could hear running footsteps in the corridor.

"Victoria." Her name was rough in his mouth, urgent and raw. "Breathe. You are safe."

"You killed me." The words came out broken, accusing, torn from somewhere deep inside. "You loved me, and you killed me."

His face went white. For a long moment, he just stared at her, and she saw it all written in his eyes like words carved into stone. Recognition, guilt, ancient grief that matched her own impossible certainty.

"You remember," he said quietly

Not a question. A confirmation of what they both knew to be true.

Before Victoria could respond, Aster shoved past him, medical equipment in hand. "What happened? Her vitals are everywhere."

"A nightmare," Kael said, not taking his eyes off Victoria, his gaze holding hers like a physical weight. "Just a nightmare."

But they both knew it was a lie. It was a memory, pulled from lifetimes ago, and everything between them had just become impossibly more complicated than either had prepared for.