17. Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Seventeen
Julian
T he Infernal Council doesn’t frighten me—not in the way it used to. I’ve stood before them more times than I care to count. I know the weight of their gaze, the way silence folds under their authority like ash under pressure.
But Ophelia? She’s another story entirely.
It isn’t fear for her that tightens my chest—it’s fear of her reaction. Not because she’s fragile. She far from it. It’s that she doesn’t filter herself when she should. She’ll speak when silence is safer. Push when stillness is survival. And she doesn’t yet understand that down here, boldness isn’t admired. It’s tested.
She has a way of challenging power that makes the ground shift. And in this room, the ground is already alive.
The Council’s chamber is not what mortals would imagine. There’s no judge perched above two tables. No gavel. No script of polite arguments exchanged in hushed tones. That kind of structure can’t exist in Hell. It wouldn’t last a second.
This place is older than that. Older than order.
The hall is vast, carved from what feels like the ribcage of the underworld itself—vaulted high above, the ceiling lost to shadow. No benches. No jurors. No comfort. Only jagged crescents of cold flame floating overhead, casting flickering light onto obsidian walls that drink sound whole. The floor beneath us doesn’t just exist—it breathes. Slow and deep.
At the far end of the chamber, the thrones await.
Seven in total. None of them the same. None of them empty.
One is forged from bone, yellowed and cracked. Another from molten gold that still bubbles at the edges like it remembers fire. There’s one woven from petrified roots and cinders, another etched with screaming faces frozen mid-agony. One throne flickers with shifting shadows, its form changing by the moment. The rest are carved from materials I wouldn’t name even if I could.
They don’t simply sit. They loom.
Figures cloaked in darkness—no faces, only hints of glowing orbs where eyes should be. The light from their forms pulses faintly, like stars hidden behind storm clouds. Ancient. Watching. Waiting.
Ophelia’s voice is quiet but steady. “Julian… is this the Infernal Council?”
I expect panic. Instead it’s the curiosity in her voice that unnerves me.
Before I can answer, the violet flames above shift—colder, more focused. One of the seven speaks, voice like iron dragged across cathedral stone. "Julian Duvain. Blood of the Old Line. Son of War."
Another follows, slower, deeper. "And the soulmatch."
The thrones remain still, but something glows beneath their hoods—no eyes, only pulsing light. Like stars flickering behind storm clouds.
“She who bears the mark. Chosen.”
“Formerly Arden... now Duvain.” The words land heavy. She doesn’t flinch. Their voices wrap around us like a closing door. "You were summoned for a purpose."
Ophelia tilts her head. “What purpose?”
The silence isn’t quiet. It’s watching. Judging. The flames twitch. The floor tightens beneath our feet.
“You stand before the Concord. You will not question. You will answer.”
"You are no longer mortal."
"The bond has chosen. The bond has sealed."
"You belong to this realm now."
"To linger too long in the mortal world is to unravel."
"You are Duvain. Claimed. Changed."
One last question hangs between them, weighted like a blade.
"Do you accept what you are?"
“I accept.” She lifts her chin, not in defiance, but in pride.
The flames stir again. Violet curls rise from the floor, licking the air between us.
"Step forward," one says. "Let the fire show you why."
The Concord falls silent. They don’t need to speak.
The flames rise, not from torches or wood, they build from the space itself. Breathing through cracks in the obsidian floor, coiling upward into a wall of flame. Towering. Alive.
It doesn’t burn like mortal fire. It pulses—violet and gold, white at the center—like lightning caught mid-breath.
The flames twist, curling inward as if aware of her presence.
Ophelia steps forward. She pauses, not because she doubts but because she recognizes it.
The Concord speaks again, voices layered like pressure through stone. "This is the Truthfire. It answers only to fate. To truth. To what is."
I’ve stood before it. I’ve seen warriors fall apart in its light. I’ve seen kings weep at what it revealed. It doesn’t show what you want to see. It shows what you’ve buried.
Ophelia steps into the center. The heat doesn’t burn her—it welcomes her. The flames part, curling around her like a memory. And they begin to show her everything.
One of the figures leans forward, the molten gold of their throne glowing gently beneath them. “You have crossed the threshold. Now you must understand how to live beyond it.”
Another voice joins, steady and calm. “There are laws that govern soulmatches. Not punishment. Protection.”
“The bond must not stretch more than seven days apart. Distance weakens it. Weakness breaks it.”
“You are to reside in this realm with him. This is not exile. It is realignment.”
“You may reach across realms—speak, feel, listen—but only when allowed.”
“You are not ornamental. You are instrumental.”
“You will be summoned when the Loom calls for you. You will answer without resistance.”
“And above all,” the final voice softens, “you will not pretend to be what you were. You are Duvain. You are immortal. You are not returning. You are becoming.”
The flames ripple, curl inward and show her the truth.
Melanie stands beneath studio lights too bright for comfort. Her makeup is flawless, her hair styled to perfection. But none of it matters—her eyes are wrong. Distant. Empty.
It’s a memory, but we’re watching it unfold like it’s happening now.
A scene begins.She faces her co-star, voice trembling just enough to suggest emotion. “No one else ever mattered. Just you,” she says, delivering the line like it’s been drilled into her spine.
It lands with a thud.
“Cut,” someone barks from behind the camera.
Harrison Drake stands, tight-lipped and frowning. He exhales through his nose. “Let’s go again.”
Another take. Same line. Same emptiness. “Cut.”
Melanie’s brows furrow as she steps forward, tension tightening her shoulders. “I don’t know what else you want from me.”
“I want you to feel it,” Harrison replies, stepping into the light. “Not recite it.”
She stares back at him insulted, but she doesn’t argue. However, the silence that follows says enough.
The fire flickers.
Melanie walks down a pristine hallway, her heels clicking like a clock winding down. A studio rep waits for her. Cool. Distant. Not offering a seat.
“We’re recasting,” he says flatly.
Melanie stiffens. “You’re joking.”
“You’re not right for the role.”
“You said I was the lead,” Melanie snaps, voice brittle.
The rep doesn’t flinch, doesn’t pause. “You were. Until you weren’t.”
The fire shifts.
She storms into her agent’s office, the smile she perfected years ago faltering. Her headshot is gone from the wall. The space where it hung now just empty drywall.
“You’re not serious,” she says, eyes narrowing.
He shrugs, stepping around the desk to collect a few loose folders. “You’re not marketable anymore.”
“I’m Melanie Arden.”
“That used to mean something,” he replies, not unkindly. He extends a hand to shake.
She doesn’t take it, instead she turns and slams the door as she leaves.
The fire coils again. Heat rising.
A red carpet premiere. Not her film, not her night. Still, she poses.
The photographers barely glance at her. Their attention flits past—onto newer faces, younger names. She adjusts her posture anyway. Puts on the smile.
By morning, the reviews flood in, each one more brutal than the last.
?? Cardboard couture ?? A mannequin in mascara ?? She emotes like a haunted mirror. Something’s there, but it isn’t human
Ophelia shifts beside me, the echo of those words hitting like a slow bruise. She watches as Melanie stares at her own reflection, glassy-eyed.
The flames tense, hardening to a point.
Melanie’s apartment. Pristine marble counters and white, emotionless walls. A phone buzzes across the table.
Her breath catches when she picks it up, eyes wide. Photos flood the screen. Her and Harrison Drake. A shadowed hallway. His lips on her throat. Her hand tangled in his shirt.
The phone slips from her grip. Her expression doesn’t change. She already knows what’s coming.
The fire swells again.
Dominic. He’s sitting on the couch, dress shirt still tucked, sleeves rolled, the knot of his tie loosened like he couldn’t decide whether to breathe or fight.
He stares at the phone in his hand. The headlines glare back, merciless.
?? On-Set Chemistry Becomes Off-Set Scandal ?? Melanie Arden Caught in Affair With Director ?? Dominic Forsythe Betrayed by His Leading Lady
He doesn’t say a word. Just sets the phone down on the table like it’s suddenly too heavy.
Melanie steps into the room, still in heels, still wearing the perfect dress. She freezes when she sees him.
He stands slowly. “You slept with him.”
She opens her mouth. “It wasn’t—” she starts, but he cuts her off with a look that could silence fire, it holds no anger, but something far colder.
“You lied.”
“It meant nothing,” she says, crossing her arms, but her voice breaks at the edges.
He lets out a breathless laugh, there’s no humor in it. “You mean nothing too,” he says—and walks out.
Behind him, a glass shatters.
The fire twists.
Dominic stands in the hallway of a legal office, one hand holding his coat, the other clenched into a fist.
The door behind him opens. His lawyer steps out, eyes already tired. “She won’t settle privately. She’s pushing for court.”
Dominic closes his eyes like he expected this. Like he hoped he’d be wrong. “I wanted to make it easy,” he mutters. “No spectacle. No mess.”
“She doesn’t want clean,” the lawyer replies. “She wants the spotlight back.”
The fire tightens.
The courtroom. Dominic sits on one side, composed and worn.
Melanie sits across from him, draped in black silk like it’s a funeral. Her expression is half-grief, half-performance. She watches the cameras more than she watches him.
Dominic doesn’t look at her once.
The judge reviews documents. Pages shuffle.
Dominic’s voice cuts through the stillness. “This marriage is over. I asked for nothing. Just space. I want it done.”
Melanie leans into her lawyer. Her whisper is sharp enough to sting.
She doesn’t look like someone fighting for love. She looks like someone who can’t bear to lose—even if she already has.
Later that night, her social media floods with carefully curated grief.
?? There are betrayals deeper than infidelity. There are silences louder than screams. ?? Truth will come out. Until it does, I’ll heal in private.
The comments are split. There are some that pity her, but most don’t.
Dominic never responds. But a photo goes viral the next day. It’s him, leaving the courthouse. His sunglasses are on, his suit is pristine clean, and he’s carrying a new script under one arm.
The caption below the photo spreads like wildfire.
?? Dominic Forsythe Signs Onto New Project Days After Divorce Filing
Beneath it, more headlines pile up, bitter as ash.
?? Not Even Forsythe Wanted to Keep Her ?? Melanie Arden Alone and Out of Time ?? Affair, Abandonment, and the End of the Arden Reign
The last flame holds longer.
Melanie, alone in her apartment. The white marble gleams too bright. Her makeup, usually so perfect, is smudged. Her dress is wrinkled like she hasn’t changed in days.
She stares at her phone, waiting for it to ring. It won’t.
The city hums outside her window, oblivious. And she is surrounded by silence. The kind that is louder than applause ever was.
The fire pulls back.
Leaving only the echo.
The flames dim but don’t die. They linger, flickering low like they’re catching their breath.
Ophelia stands still, her arms at her sides, fists loose. Hollowed out in a different way. “She didn’t fall,” she says, her voice low. “She just got everything she asked for.” There’s no pity in it. “She never took from me. It was given to her,” she adds, quieter now. “Cassius made sure of that.”
She turns her head slightly toward the Concord. Her tone shifts—no longer dazed, but direct. “Is this what happens when the balance resets?”
The Concord answers in unison, their voices like distant bells tolling through stone. “This is not punishment. It is a correction.”
“She fed on what was never hers to hold.”
“And without you,” another says, “her cup runs dry.”
Ophelia exhales slowly, lifts her chin. “Show me him.”
The fire ripples—colder this time.
The vision blurs, reforms.
Cassius.
Not in court, nor at some high-powered gala. In his house. The Arden house.
He paces the study floor, barefoot, dressed in a tailored shirt unbuttoned at the throat, sleeves rolled up, like he’s been fighting his own skin. The once-pristine space is fractured—papers everywhere, books pulled from shelves, contracts torn at the corners. His desk is a ruin of ink and shattered glass.
He mutters to himself, sharp and fast, eyes flicking like they’re chasing shadows.
“They said she’d rise. They said—” His voice breaks off, twisting into a growl. “She was chosen. She was promised.”
He slams a fist against the desk. The frame of one of Melanie’s old awards clatters to the floor, the glass splintering.
In the reflection of the window, he looks older. More withered than powerful. Like the mask of legacy has started to crack.
The house groans.
He storms toward a stack of legal files—some old, some fresh. Names scrawled in red ink. Melanie. Arden Holdings. Film options. Lawsuits pending.
On the floor beside the fireplace lies a scorched contract. The original deal. The infernal markings barely visible now, the blood-written seal faded.
He picks it up like it still might burn.
“You said she’d be eternal,” he whispers. “You said she’d carry the line. That we’d rule.”
The fire doesn’t answer.
Phones ring in the distance. He doesn’t pick them up.
Later, he’s in a boardroom. Cassius sits at the end of a long black table, suit immaculate again—but his hands won’t stop shaking. The executives around him glance at one another, nervous, careful.
“We can’t protect your name anymore,” one of them says, voice thin. “The investments—”
“I built this industry,” Cassius snaps, slamming both palms on the table. “You owe me your careers!”
A pause. “No, Mr. Arden,” another replies, folding her hands. “We owe you nothing. And frankly… you scare people now.”
The room empties. Not one of them looks back.
He’s back in his house again, alone. The rooms are too quiet. The halls are too long.
Cassius stands at the fireplace, fingers grazing the frame of an old family photo.
Melanie, young and beaming, front and center. Ophelia stands beside her. Arabella too. But they’re out of focus—blurry, unimportant.
Only Melanie is clear. Only Melanie ever mattered.
He doesn’t speak this time. Just stares into the embers.
And the fire closes.
“He chose her,” she says. “He made his deal. Let him live with it.”
No anger, no sadness. Just a quiet dismissal. She’s done carrying that weight.
She turns to the thrones, her voice steady. “Can I see Rosalind? And Bella?”
A figure shifts. The one cloaked in ash and root leans forward, voice low.
“You must ask the flame.”
Ophelia steps forward, like she knows exactly what to do, like she was born for this. The fire responds, curling inward, brighter, sharper.
“Show me Rosalind,” she says. “Show me Bella.”
The flames shift.
A kitchen appears, cast in gray morning light. Rain pecks gently at the windows. Rosalind sits at the table, shoulders tense, one hand wrapped around a chipped mug, the other pressed against her forehead. Bella paces the floor in wide circles, hair tied back in a messy knot, her voice strained.
“She wouldn’t just disappear,” Bella says. “She always checks in. Even when she’s spiraling.”
“She didn’t disappear,” Rosalind replies. Her tone is calm, but her eyes are raw. “She was taken. Or something worse.”
“No one’s seen her since Melanie’s premiere of The Sun Will Forget Us ,” Bella murmurs. “No new posts. No calls. Nothing.”
Rosalind looks down at the phone in front of her—Ophelia’s. Cracked. Cold. Still locked.
“She didn’t run,” she says. “I don’t care what they think.”
The fire shifts again.
A bulletin board covered in flyers and maps. A timeline drawn in color-coded markers. Photos of Ophelia tacked between newspaper clippings and missing person posters.
Rosalind stands before it all, arms crossed, lips tight. A detective beside her flips through his notes.
“With all due respect,” the officer says, “the public fallout with her sister, the premiere—it fits a certain emotional profile.”
“She’s not hiding,” Rosalind snaps. “She’s missing.”
“She’s humiliated—”
“She’s stronger than that.”
The detective doesn’t press further.
The image shifts again.
Bella curled up on the couch, wrapped in one of Ophelia’s old sweaters. Rosalind watches from the window, her reflection pale in the glass. She holds the phone like it might still ring.
But it doesn’t.
The room is quiet.
And Ophelia just watches.
She doesn’t cry. She doesn’t speak. But I can feel it—how still she becomes. How much she feels. She watches them try to find her like someone peering into a version of the world she can’t quite touch anymore.
Someone learning how to grieve what she hasn’t even lost.
She turns toward me, eyes wide, shimmering with something between guilt and disbelief. “I thought I still had time.”
“You do,” one of the Concord says, voice quiet, but not unkind. “Not to undo the past. But to close what remains.”
Another speaks, the molten gold of their throne glowing faintly beneath them. “You may return—for a short time.”
“Not to stay,” a different voice clarifies, older, clipped. “But to say what must be said.”
“You are no longer mortal,” comes the next, calm and precise. “But the ones who knew you deserve the truth. And you deserve peace.”
Ophelia lifts her head, steadier now. “You want me to tell them.”
“To say goodbye,” the Concord confirms. “To leave the world as you found it—with clarity, not shadows.”
“To speak your truth,” says another, “before you begin weaving others.”
The fire flickers again, but it doesn’t show visions now. Only soft light, curling like smoke around her feet.
“You will not return to live among them,” the voices continue, layered like wind through a hollow. “But you may return to remind them of who you were—and who you have become.”
“And after?” she asks. “What happens next?” “That’s when you begin again,” says the Concord. “As a Duvain. As soulmatch. As Weaver.”
Her hand moves instinctively to her chest, fingers brushing the place the bond first took root.
No flames rise this time. Only stillness. But I feel it. The shift, the weight of fate settling into her shoulders—not as a burden, but as something real. Something hers.
And she nods, not for them, but for herself.
She presses a hand to her chest like she can feel time there, ticking differently beneath her skin. The threads. The bond. The world she used to know pulling tight against the one she stands in now.
“I’ll go,” she says, voice quiet. “But… does this mean I never see them again?”
One of the figures leans forward, the glow beneath their hood softening—just barely. Still cloaked in shadow, but not in cruelty.
“No,” they say, and the word settles like a balm. “This bond is not exile. It is expansion.”
Another speaks, voice like polished stone. “You are not lost to them. Only changed.”
“They may still call to you,” says a third, older than the others. “And when they do—you will hear them.”
Ophelia turns to me, eyes wide, searching. “How?”
“I’ll show you,” I tell her. “The hallways. The paths that thread between worlds. If they reach for you with truth, you’ll feel it. You’ll know.”
She exhales shakily. It’s not relief, it’s something deeper. Permission.
“So I won’t have to cut them off?” she asks. “Bella. Rosalind. I can still—”
“If you choose,” one of the Concord interrupts gently, “you may answer.”
“The bond was never meant to sever,” another adds. “It was meant to bind. To bring you to where you’re most needed. To who you truly are.”
“And to those who truly see you.”
I watch her shoulders ease—not drop, not collapse—just settle. Like for the first time, she understands that becoming something new doesn’t mean losing everything old.
She turns to me. The fire behind her fades, but the glow hasn’t left her eyes.
There’s no fear there. No doubt. Only resolve, she’s whole.
“I need to do this,” she says, not asking for permission—just making it known.
“I know,” I say. And I do. Because this part—closing the door on the life that hurt her, choosing the one that’s hers now—it has to be her choice. Her path. Her hands tying the last threads.
I step back, just enough to show her I trust her to go alone. But not alone forever.
“When you come back,” I murmur, “we start everything.”
A small smile ghosts across her face. It’s soft, real.
“I’ll be back,” she promises.
One second she's there, the next, she’s gone.
No sound, no spectacle. Just a shimmer in the air where she stood. The weight of her still lingering in the space between.
I close my eyes and hold it. Not her absence. Who she is becoming.
And if anyone dares to touch her— I’ll burn them out of every realm they try to hide in.