Scent of Betrayal

The sun didn't set. It died. 

As the black mist poured from the Queen’s unhinged jaw, it infected reality, a shockwave of silence rippling out from the Solspire tree, and wherever it touched, color vanished, seen in how the crimson banners of the festival turned had to ash-grey, in how the golden armor of the Royal Guard dulled to the color of rus and most notably in how the vibrant blue of the sky was bleached into a suffocating, infinite ash-grey void.

The world was now a black-and-white photograph, burning at the edges and in the center of this grayscale nightmare, the mist coalesced, forming a figure that floated above the Queen’s hollowed-out corpse, amalgamating towards the center of the sky like a black Sun was forming right before their eyes. It was humanoid in shape, but its proportions were wrong with its limbs too long, fingers like spiders, and a face that was nothing but a smooth, white porcelain mask with a single, vertical crack running down the center of it.

Malevolent had arrived and he didn't roar. nor did he attack. He simply inhaled.

"Ah," a voice whispered, echoing inside the skull of every living thing in the Academy. "The scent of betrayal. It has aged... beautifully."

Meanwhile, down in the ground, Ezekiel and Runa were engaging a lethal game of tag!

"London Bridge is falling down... falling down..."

The Jester sang, a blur of motion as he dismantled Runa with terrifying precision while the century old loli screamed, golden threads tightening around her limbs, slicing into her skin, as she tried her damndest to use her gravity magic to defend herself.

However, the Jester was too fast, bouncing off the walls, his movements defying physics.

"You killed him!" Ezekiel shrieked, his voice vibrating with demonic static. "You broke my student! You broke the set!"

He slashed his claws across her chest causing Runa to gasp with agony, blood spraying the air. However, the wound immediately knitted itself back together in seconds as the Jester paused, tilting his head, tightening the golden strings around her neck, choking her, but she didn't die, simply glaring at him with eyes that were filled with hatred.

"You can't kill me, you fool," Runa rasped. "I am tied to Him. As long as Malevolent stands, I am eternal."

Ezekiel stared at her, the madness in his eyes clearing for a split second to reveal the sharp intellect of the Instructor.

She is a battery, the voice in his head whispered. She feeds him. He feeds her.

"Boring," the Jester sighed, flicking his wrist. The golden strings didn't cut her head off, they wrapped around her completely, encasing her in a cocoon of hardened gold dust, mummifying her, leaving only her eyes visible.

"If I can't break you," the Jester whispered, leaning close to the cocoon, "I'll just put you in timeout."

He kicked the golden cocoon aside, turning his attention to the center of the arena where he saw a black mist swirling, the massive, rotting form of Malevolent descending from the sky.

He saw Rain, sobbing over Kami’s body, how Summer hugged her own frame, staring up in despair, and for a split second the Jester’s smile faltered. He touched his own face, feeling the tears that wouldn't stop falling.

God has never played his role, Ezekiel thought. So I have to write the ending.

"Hey!" Ezekiel shouted up towards the shadow forming in the sky "Big Guy! Down here!"

He started walking toward Malevolent, leaving his humanity, his grief, and his sanity behind in the dust. The Jester had one last joke to tell, and it was going to be a killer.

Meanwhile, a different tragedy was unfolding in the shadow of the Solspire Tree, in the private garden of the Valentino estate, bordering the Academy, where Aureli saw red, standing over a corpse. It was Margaret, the perverted nanny, the woman who had tormented and loved him in equal, twisted measure.

She had been butchered. Her limbs were scattered like discarded dolls parts, and the killer had left a signature, stuffed right into Margaret’s severed mouth; a bouquet of crimson roses.

Aureli’s favorite flower.

"You really have no sense of subtlety, do you?" Aureli whispered to the empty garden.

"Subtlety is boring, my Lord."

Aureli turned and found Arachna standing under the archway of the garden, looking absolutely breathtaking. She wasn't wearing her usual stern teaching robes anymore, sporting a ruffled shirt and tailored trousers, adorned with gold ornaments that chimed softly in the dead air. In the monochrome world, she was a statue of pale perfection.

"So you finally revealed your host body to me after all of this time." Aureli called out to her, his voice tragic. Arachna didn't seem afraid of the apocalypse happening only a few hundred yards away. She looked... excited.

"Azrael found your diary, but I'm sure you led him to it. Given the perfectionist you are, you'd never leave it out of your sights." Aureli revealed, his voice devoid of its usual playful lilt. "He told me about the thrill you get. About how you feel nothing unless you're watching the light leave someone's eyes."

Arachna smiled, but it wasn't a cruel smile. It was the innocent, terrifying smile of a child pulling wings off a fly.

"He is a sharp boy," Arachna said "But you didn't really need the diary, did you? You smelled the roses on me this morning."

Aureli looked at her, seeing the woman he had flirted with, the woman he had fought beside, the woman who had healed his hand in the library, and he realized, with a sinking heart, that he had fallen in love with a mirror, one that reflected his own brokenness. However, where he hid pain, she hid a void of insanity.

"I wanted to protect you," Aureli said softly. "I wanted to believe you were just cold. Not... empty."

Arachna stopped inches from him, reaching up and twirling a lock of his black hair.

"Lying suits you only when you are trying to charm me, Duke Valentino," she whispered.

Aureli chuckled, a dry, broken sound as he leaned in, his forehead touching hers. The intimacy amongst the massacre was not only misplaced, it was suffocating.

"Who said I am not trying now?" Aureli murmured. "What do you like, Crimson? Words? Promises?"

Arachna shook her head. Her eyes, usually dull, were sparkling with a manic anticipation.

"Actions," she breathed. Aureli closed his eyes.

He kissed her.

It wasn't a gentle kiss, but rahter desperate, hungry, and full of grief, and yet Arachna melted into it, her arms wrapping around his neck, pulling him closer and gor a second, the grey world didn't matter to them. The screaming of the dying students didn't matter, only the heat of their bodies and the scent of roses existing in that moment. Until...

SHLUCK.

Arachna gasped against his lips, her eyes flying open, wide with shock as she looked down.

Aureli’s sword, materialized from thin air, was buried to the hilt in her stomach. The blade was red, not from blood, but from the enchantments of the Valentino bloodline.

Arachna stumbled back, blood spilling from her mouth, staining her pristine white shirt.

"Damn you," she wheezed, a wry smile tugging at her lips at having been caught off guard. "You... you actually did it. I didn't think you had it in you..."

Aureli dropped the sword, refusing to raise his hands to defend himself. He just looked at her with infinite sadness.

"I couldn't let you keep killing, Crimson. And I couldn't let them lock you in a cage. You would hate a cage."

Arachna laughed, coughing up more blood as a light flared from her wound, ice magic trying to seal the puncture, but she waved it away, summoning her own weapon for the final battle, a rapier made of jagged ice.

"So this is your solution?" Arachna asked, her eyes burning with the thrill she had chased all her life. "To kill me yourself?"

"It's a mercy," Aureli whispered.

"No," Arachna grinned, lunging at him. "It's a date."