Eternal Sins

•Chapter Two•

Five Months Prior

In time, floating feathers found rest in soft pillows of deep emerald hills and mountains. Fingertips of divine warmth, breaths of endearing favor crowded life. Racing ropes of brightness, of sparkling fragility, wrapped and tightened against Eva and Ben's throats.

They were fire together. Somewhere, they had found fondness. Made a home in the other's open palm.

It had been a raining afternoon when war struck it's first arrow into their glass house.

Eva's head rest against a ten foot tall window, the rain slapping aggressive against the outside pane. Her elbows bunched in front of her chest, braided hair swung behind her shoulder.

Ben was pacing within the secretary room, sifting through mindless papers to prepare for the upcoming harvest.

"Your grace!" Henry's dark call turned both of their heads, door flinging open with frantic approach. "I beg for your counsel."

Ben pauses in his step, fingers haulting their graze down a ruffling page. All three pairs of eyes meet in the dusty air, thunder rumbling.

"There's been an attack. Twelve men dead, only three our own."

Eva jumped to her feet, racing to Henry, interjecting the conversation. "What happened?"

Ben stood with distant eyes, listening, waiting.

"A captured soldier from the West, from Edgair & his mother. He awaits you in the cellars. I will explain more as we go." Henry ushers with fast hand movements, willing with great speed.

Ben doesn't hesitate to set the book down at the nearest desk and begin marching behind his old friend. Eva flanks, following them through the winding halls. Wind blew past them a few times, flickering the fires with the storm raging outside. The castle walls echoed with the sounds of heavy droplets.

As they reached a familiar stairwell, Eva felt her throat beginning to close. This had been where Ben had dropped her into hiding, the night of the Samhain Ball that changed everything.

Feeling her fall behind, Ben turned halfway down the last set of stairs, meeting her darkened eyes.

He reaches a hand up to her, face stoic. "I have you, my dear."

Snapped out of a bad memory, Eva nods, stepping down to take his hand. They walk, Ben's arm stretched behind him, hers pressed against his back as she walked a little too close.

Henry leads them down a barely lit hall, the sounds of the rain muffled, only leaving the crackling of the earth as lightening struck.

Four doors in they turn to greet a man tied in a chair. The room was damp, floor wet with sweat, piss and blood.

The restrained prisoner looked dirty, simple, like any man who could live within their own kingdom. No armor, just one weapon on his person.

This was a message.

Henry moves to grab at the prisoner's gag while Ben stands in the doorway, Eva peering from behind his side. "Go on," Henry gruffs.

The stranger eyes Henry, smirking. "This is a declaration of war against King Kye. I come with proclamation from the Western throne of King Edgair."

"War?" Ben's voice was dark and heavy, angry in an instant. "We are peaceful with Edgair, never a problem." Ben's hand linked to Eva's became fist, squeezing her flesh and bone tight. Eva winces, yanking back.

"They've been made aware of your secrets," the prisoner goes on to explain, "they were made wise of your magic abilities and it is their responsibility to correct this imbalance in power. They must remove you from the throne."

"They will die trying!" Ben yells, stomping forward to take the prisoner's head into his hands. "And you have died for a useless cause."

With all the restraint in the world, Ben turned his back to the prisoner as he nodded to Henry. He blocks Eva's view, the man shrieks a "long live King Edgair!" before his head rolls from his shoulders. Clean, precise, Henry's handiwork.

As Ben's chest pushes Eva from the doorframe, she catches the movement of mousey matted hair roll behind his feet. Wide eyed, Eva turns and sprints back up the stairs from the cellars. Her stomach turns a bit. She had killed men, killed men in blind powerful rage. But that was months ago and for the most part Eva tried her best to shut the part of herself away. She was thriving in her infatuating love with Ben. There was no time to dig up the blood and gore of how they came together.

The Eva with black eyes and dark popping veins of power was not the warm, normal Eva she swore to remember moving forward. Up until this moment, it was successful.

Seeing such an act again caused moments to flash within her mind. She had beheaded a man once, she could remember now.

Hands pounding against the stone of a wall, Eva shakes her head, trying to push away all the blood she saw at her feet. Dripping, seeping into the soles of her shoes. The tearing of flesh from her bones, fingers prying, she can't ignore it in her mind's eye.

Ben placed a hand on her shoulder, offering comfort. She takes it, turning viciously into his chest and slamming her palms against him a few times. He takes it with grace, chest muffling her aggression.

"This is nothing new for us." Ben could only remember fucking Eva in the blood of their enemies. How could she forget all the power? The blood lust within her was strong. She repulsed it in this moment and it confused him.

"I try to forget," she admits. "I try to be happy."

With deep breaths, she finds a calming center in Ben's arms, in the warmth of his body near hers.

"Eva," Ben sighs, his hand reaching for her face, grabbing her cheek to look her straight in the eyes. "The days of war will come for us. They are inevitable. We are powerful and that power will be challenged. Surely you knew this day would come."

She shrugs, staring back, "I hoped it wouldn't. I just want to be happy with you."

"We will be happy. Between furious and exhausted and fearful, we will be happy. That is the future of a white witch, of a king." He kisses the top of her head, her slender arms locking around his midriff.

"I don't know if I am ready just yet for war, Ben."

"We must be. There is no choice."

Eva nods her head against his chest, breath shakey.

"What if I change?"

"Hmm?"

"What if I become someone else? Lose this.. part of me? The normal woman parts of me."

"War will change us, yes. But I do not fear that change. In time we will change, war or not-that is the human way. We just have to trust each other, be honest about when things may become too much. It does not forbade me, either, that I have been on a battlefield whereas you have not." He reels his head back to look down upon her, Eva stretching her neck up at him.

"I have confidence in your elegant success, my dear." He adds finally. Eva smiles softly. "And I will die protecting you if you faulter."

"I promise you all the same." Eva whispers in response, the shock of death still ringing through the shell of her skull.

"Then there is nothing to fear. Victory is ours."

In the coming weeks, Eva and Ben found themselves preparing for a battle that would stretch far beyond their expectations. Gehanna had spread news of them and their abilities beyond Edgair, causing even more forces to join their rivals. The battles dragged on, more troops appearing, becoming involved. But King Kye perservered, Eva proving herself more lethal than ever.

Dark clouds hung low, voltures sat upon Eva's shoulders, waiting to be fed. She was a force all her own to be reckoned with. A ticking bomb of anger and fear, levels building and bursting, as Ben struggled to upkeep her peace.

They were winning the war but Eva was losing herself infinitely. Graveyard bells clanged with urgency. The reaper was here to collect.