[ON HOLD]
'love?' when you live as long as I have, 'love' is a surprisingly rare occurrence, something that many would have given up on. Yet, as I looked into the eyes of the man in front of me - his innocent blue eyes filled with hope of what life...
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What's left?
Early 16th Century, the Clearing – Night
The moon hung low and pale, casting a cold silver wash over the silent clearing where the Brotherhood of the Five had gathered. Five battle-hardened hunters, their breaths misting in the frosty air, oblivious to the death that had already come stalking—dark, merciless, and unrelenting.
Isabella moved through the shadows like a ghost of night itself—no spells, no magic. Just the lethal grace of an Original vampire, the quiet power in her every step, and the deadly intent behind her sharpened blade. The hunters didn't stand a chance.
One by one, they fell—silent screams stifled beneath her fangs and steel. A throat torn open beneath the ancient oaks, a hunter's body crumpling in the snow, the cold earth swallowing desperate gasps and shattered hope.
Then Alexander.
He staggered forward, eyes wide, heart breaking in slow, agonizing disbelief.
"Isabella... why?" His voice trembled, the hunter's bravado shattered in the presence of the woman he loved—the woman who now stood as his executioner.
Her eyes, once full of warmth and promises, were now cold and unyielding as winter ice—empty of mercy.
"You loved me," he whispered, his voice cracking, "You said—"
A bitter, hollow laugh escaped her lips. "I loved you enough to end this," she said, her words sharp as the blade she raised.
The steel gleamed in the pale moonlight as it pierced his chest. His body went rigid, then slack, his blood staining the snow like a dark, cruel testament.
He crumpled at her feet, eyes searching for a flicker of the love that had once bound them. But all he found was the shadow of a killer.
Her final words, cold and absolute as a death sentence, cut through the night like a frozen blade:
"Better you dead than I."
Alexander's last breath shuddered out—an echo of broken trust and love lost forever beneath the unforgiving moon.
---
Flashback
Riverbank near Mikaelson Mansion – Early 16th Century, Night
[The event happens after chapter 35]
The forest split open like a wound near the river's edge, trees pulling back in jagged lines to reveal the water — black as spilled ink, slow-moving and deep, as if it remembered every secret ever whispered into its current. The moon hung above it like a blind eye, pale and watching, casting the world in the silver hush of sorrow.
