Darkness carved in bone

Chapter 48

Helen

Her hand grasped onto Ten for as long as she could, he was the only connection she had left to his world, as everything collapsed and burned around her. She was in a... place. At least her mind, soul or consciousness was. It felt like she was dancing with the darkness, pushing, and burning it away until a strange door appeared in the distance. She knew that was the door she needed to close and shut forever. Shut out that destructive darkness that would kill them all.

She didn't exactly inhale because of exhaustion, but she could feel how her body was starting to weaken, and there was too much darkness left for her to fight. A pulse of fear became conscious in her mind; how was she supposed to fight all this darkness?

This strange place was filled with darkness, and she was the only source of light that could send the darkness away. She pushed herself forward, pushed her body towards the door.

Her body started shaking as she walked forward, the tiredness overwhelming her again. With the light still left inside her blood, she kept on pushing and pushing the darkness back. She reached the door after fighting and fighting the darkness back through that door, and there was only a small pool of darkness left. Perhaps she could do this? Hope bloomed in her chest. She hissed at the darkness and pushed the last drops of light that was left inside her at it, and it scurried behind the door vanishing back into its own world.

All that was left for her to do, was to close the strange door. It looked heavy, and when she tried to close it, nothing happened. She grabbed at the door of darkness and heaved her body against it crashing every ounce of power and strength she could muster at it. Nothing happened.

Terror crept up her spine as she looked at the door. What if it could only be closed from the other side? What if she would have to step into the world of darkness and close the door in front of herself? Sealing herself into that dark world? Her mouth grew dry at the thought. Death seemed so much more appealing than surrendering herself into a world where she did not belong.

She tried to close it again, tried to push her body against it again. Again, nothing happened, only more panic filling her.

Then she took the handle on the wrong side of the door and tried to see if she could move the door then.

With utter horror and grief, the door moved willingly, so easily it would be nothing to close it.

She gasped for air as she realized this would be her end. She would die in another world, a world of horrible darkness. Her body wanted nothing but run back to her own world. To embrace Ten one last time, kiss him forever and forget everything about this darkness. But that would mean that she had let this door stand open. That she let her own world be vulnerable to this terrifying darkness.

No, she couldn't do that. She would have to close the door and let herself cease to exist.

Tears streamed down her cheeks as she looked to her own world. Looked at Ten one last time and felt that burning rage and power fill her again. That power that threatened to burn everything just because she was not allowed to love Ten. That her unused and unspent love contained such rage and fire that she feared for her own world if she would die now.

But perhaps that was something that every person who died with its love not fulfilled felt. That this was normal.

She looked down at the wedding band that still sat on her finger and felt a tinge of comfort spread across her body. It felt good to know that she would have some small part of Ten with her until the end.

She looked at him one last time, where he stood beside her next to the tree and holding her hand. She filled her heart with the love she felt for him and tugged on the handle and stepped into the wrong world. She stepped into the world of darkness and closed the door to her own world behind herself, the door emitting no sound at all as it closed shut. Fear and dread filled her as she took in what this other world was.

It was utter darkness, nothing but waves and waves of darkness.

As soon as she entered their world it felt as if every fabric of the darkness noticed her, and the light that still lingered inside her.

It wanted her dead immediately. The darkness became frantic and consuming when it noticed that she, that light had entered its world.

A massive wall of darkness started building up before her, as if the darkness mustered every ounce of power it had, welling itself up into a massive tidal wave that would crash down upon her once it was at its maximum.

This world smelled of nothing, sounded like nothing. There was nothing here but darkness, and now this darkness wanted her dead.

The tidal wave rose higher and higher.

Helen's body shook as light started emitting from her body, as if the darkness squeezed the light from her body, forcing the light to leave her.

Her heart stopped beating, her chest stopped rising and falling as the tidal wave stopped growing and hovered over her like an unending mass that would destroy her so completely, that it would be like she never existed.

The darkness almost glittered against her light, ricocheting from her light in a strange way. It was as if this darkness was the opposite of light, rather than the absence of light

Her body went numb and frozen as she realized she was dead now. She might still live in this world, but she was dead in her own. She felt no pain, but at the same time she felt nothing but pain.

Tears fell as it truly dawned upon her that Ten was lost for her forever. That her love for him would be nothing more than it had been. Her love was lost, her love was nothing more. Her mouth opened, as if she wanted to cry out, but her no longer working lungs did not respond.

The tidal wave crept towards her, but not falling or crashing down just jet, as if there was still some darkness that could be harnessed in this world, some more darkness that could kill her.

Her blood started boiling inside her chest as her heart started beating frantically in her chest again, her lungs screaming for air as they heaved violently for air.

And that was when the wave came crashing down, so violently and unending that darkness became Helen's world.

The rage and burning she had instinctively known would rage and destroy the world if she died with unfulfilled love for Ten started seeping through her veins, as light poured out of every pore in her skin, shielding her from the crashing wave before her.

No, not shielding her, but burning the darkness away. The all-consuming rage and fire burned and burned with such an intensity that the darkness just fizzled away when it came in contact with her light. With her inner light that was her love for Ten. The love he had for her. What they had shared in her own world.

She would burn everything away, until there was nothing left of this dark hole of destruction. She would destroy everything.

Her world became that fire, and each drop of darkness just burned and burned, until nothing was left.

She kept on burning, emitting the strongest light that had ever existed, too strong for the very fabric of this world. And it incinerated the world of darkness, destroying abyss after abyss, until nothing was left.

That was when she saw it, the path home. The path to Ten.

She stepped forward, her heart beating frantically in her chest. First her steps were slow and weak, as if she were wading through some kind of filter that lay between her conscious self and her body. Then her steps became strong and fast as she cast away her fire, cast away the burning and leapt forward until she was in his arms again. Until she was back home in her own world where both light and darkness existed, and she gazed upon a silver moon that hung in the sky.