He sauntered in, feeling proud and confident. His tousled brown curls frolicked as he marched into the cellar; the torches seem to dim as his glowing presence diminished them. Devlin Mathews was like a living angel, or rather the devil, without wings and a halo concealed from sight. The cold damp air wrapped around him like a heavy coat of chainmail, but he was unaffected, after all he was cold blooded, literally.
“I’m glad you decided to meet me.” His voice rumbled deep from his chest, a thrilling hum that sent the whole room into an acute awareness.
Amora lay against the mouldy cellar walls, shackled yet still defiant, her wrists bruised and bleeding, bound in century old chains. Her once luminous skin was blackened from the rust of the chains that seemed to become one with her flesh. Her hair was matted with blood and grime, and a laceration ran from her right temple down to her jawline, barely avoiding her right eye. A lace scarf, curled around her mouth like a white serpent, tattooed red from her bleeding lips. It seemed to resemble the loss of her innocence, her ideals and her hopes. What made it infinitely worse was that the scarf was in fact her wedding veil.
This of course brought them back to why she was tied to the wall, and in the presence of one notoriously known for crimes worse that Lucifer’s himself. It all started two months ago, on the eve of their wedding night.
“They say an engagement can be a commitment of love… or a declaration of war, one must enter every battle without hesitation, willing to fully engage the enemy…” Devlin paused, “…till death do us part.”
Two Months ago.
Death- that black hole, impasse, shadowy enigmatic creature that stalks you throughout your life. A figure of speculation and fear, a symbol of trepidation, an emblem of darkness. It emerges from the gloom, wings of death upraised, eyes swivelling and mouth poised to devour it late prey. Though death may be may be an object of mystery, it is inevitable- no man is immortal, or so Amora had always thought.
“Do you Devlin, take Amora, to be your lawfully wedded wife, to have and to hold, from this day forward, for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, till death do you part?” Amora felt herself stiffen as the priest continued on with the ceremony. Sweat trickled down her back in never ending streams, with every minute, her breath became shallower, as if the whole room was being sucked of all its air. Nervousness was expected on a day like this and also love, but certainly not dread. She could not understand why but Amora felt almost like she didn’t want this and that this was quite possibly the biggest mistake of her life. And it was, she just didn’t know how big.
“Till death do us part.” Devlin repeated. He slipped the golden band over her slim finger. Perhaps her eyes were fooling her, but Amora thought she saw darkness around him, fluttering, deepening and stretching… shadows almost like faces, shapes almost like hands, long fingers reaching out, beckoning her with a slow hypnotic pulse, wishing to consume her.
“Amora,” the priest called, repeating the words he’d recited to Devlin. She knew she had to answer him, yet she stalled, perhaps to prolong the moment she still felt control over herself. Her instincts told her to flee, but love does a lot of things to someone.
“I do.” She watched as a smile spread crookedly over his handsome face warming her heart, and sending shivers down her spine. In that time and moment, it was that smile that erased all her doubts and along with it her hopes for freedom. She relinquished her hold and opened her heart, unaware that she just sold her soul to darkness. It was both of them together, forever. “Till death do us part.”
