There was no longer peace between Lina and Andra.
There was only consumption.
Each night, the palace walls pulsed with their presence—desire and dominance twined together like serpents in the dark. Fire lit by her will, shadows bled from his. It wasn't tenderness that bound them. It was something far more sacred in Hell: mutual destruction.
Andra worshiped her with his ruin.
Lina loved him with her rage.
But love in Hell is never safe.
In the days that followed their kiss beneath the blood moon, something began to change inside her. It wasn't just the fire anymore—it was something colder, deeper. The Heart had given her more than power. It had given her secrets.
Visions bled into her dreams—memories not hers, voices of queens before her, their stories unfinished. Their ends were violent.
Each had ruled briefly.
Each had risen.
And each had been taken by the Heart itself.
One night, Lina stood at the throne, alone. The shadows whispered again—low, feminine, ancient.
"You rise too fast, flameborn. Do you know what the Heart truly wants?"
She turned, and there in the reflection of the throne's molten gold, she saw herself—eyes black as void, fire crawling across her skin like veins of hunger.
Not Lina. Not anymore.
Andra appeared behind her, but this time, he didn't reach for her.
He watched.
"You've seen it," she said without looking. "The other queens. The ones the Heart consumed."
He stepped closer. "Yes."
"Did you think I would be next?"
His silence was the answer.
"You would've let it take me," she whispered.
"No." His voice was low. "But I would've let it change you. I needed you to survive this place, Lina. And you have. You've become the one thing I could never command."
She turned to him, eyes glowing with cruel, divine light. "And now you fear me?"
He stepped closer, chest to hers, voice rough with craving. "No. I belong to you."
Her fingers slid up his chest, slow like molten glass. "Then kneel again, my king. Not for power." She leaned close, breath against his mouth. "For penance."
Andra fell to his knees—not for forgiveness, but because his soul demanded it. Because even in all his cruelty, all his dominance, he knew—
She had become something not even Hell could tame.
Lina placed a hand on his head, fire glowing between her fingers. She didn't need chains. She didn't need a crown.
He was hers because the flame had rewritten fate itself.
And in the silence of that throne room, fire curled around them. Not in rage.
But in worship.