Page 113 of Fallen: Darkness Ascending, Vol.1

SOLARETH

S he held the blade like it might set her free. But I watch her fingers tremble around the hilt—so fragile, so human. Something cold coils in my chest. Not fear. No, fear is beneath me. It’s something else. A bitter shadow I thought I’d cast off centuries ago.

“Angelica,” I breathe, dragging her behind me ignoring her kicks and struggles. “You disappoint me.”

Brave little spark. Always thinking defiance is the same thing as power. My cock twitches, hungry to put her in her place again.

She doesn’t think I notice the exhaustion behind her eyes. The guilt she clutches like a relic every time she thinks to deny me. And beneath it all—the thread that binds us. The prophecy. The bond. The hunger.

“You would throw away everything,” I say, my voice lined with fire as I drop her outside of the chapel, in the middle of the woods, “just to pretend you had control.”

She scrambles to her feet, stumbling backward until her spine hits the trunk of a gnarled tree. Her breath comes in sharp bursts. Fear in her eyes. Or maybe that’s just what she wants me to believe.

Good. Let her feel the shift in the air, the way it thickens like a storm gathering in the marrow of the world. Let her believe she still has choices. That she still holds the leash on this dance we’re caught in.

But perhaps this is her ploy. A tactic. The game she’s grown so fond of—playing the prey, pretending she fears I’ll grow bored of her.

Foolish. Because she doesn’t yet understand the truth that burns beneath my skin.

I’m just as bound to her as she is to me. Caught. Entangled. Ensnared in her little mortal web. A god caged by a trembling heartbeat and a name whispered like defiance.

Does she think she’s the only one torn by this?

Her resistance cuts at me—but so does her silence. Every time she looks at me with those wild, searching eyes, something fractures deeper inside me. Something ancient. Something sacred.

I was not meant to be weak.

And yet, she is the wound that refuses to close.

We are both denying what we already know. That we are the curse and the cure. The fire and the ash. The storm and the stillness after.

And no matter how far she runs, I will follow.

Because I can no longer imagine the end of this world without her in it.

“Is this the next game between us, angelica? Your refusal to give me your voice?” My cock strains as her high-hipped, double-slit dress sways around her—offering a tantalizing glimpse of temptation, and perhaps my ultimate downfall.

Her eyes are distant, glazed over like she’s miles away, yet she turns to me and tilts her head back as if she’s giving me her full attention. It’s infuriating—this hollow act, this half-hearted focus that feels more like a mockery than everything we’ve been through together.

“You think I haven’t held back? I could have crushed your town when I first rose.

Reduced it to ash and salt. I could have strung up your aunt, whom you love so dearly by peeling her flesh, wrapping her intestines around her neck as a noose.

But I didn’t.” My wings flare out behind me in perpetual agitation. “I left it untouched—for you.”

Her lips part, but no sound escapes. My cock engorges further with pain, needing to fill all her holes again.

There’s a pressure building in my chest—this volatile alchemy of wrath and longing. I was supposed to rule. To remake the world in the image of something unbroken. But she… she makes me hesitate. And I hate her for it.

No. I hate what I’m becoming because of her.

“You are the axis, Mayang. The fulcrum on which the old world ends and the new begins. My blood burns because of you.” I lower my voice, a growl simmering beneath each word.

The journey to reunite my fallen brethren is only possible because of the covenant her bloodline made me with long ago. I am so close to bringing back Velamaris.

“And yet here you stand, threatening to sever the only thread that holds this world together.”

Her voice cracks like dry kindling. “You’re delusional.”

“Maybe,” I say, smiling without warmth. Quietly satisfied that she’s surrendered once more. “But the delusion is beautiful, isn’t it? Almost as beautiful as you.”

I move toward her, slower now, as though she might vanish like mist. She doesn’t run. She never does. That’s why she was chosen. That’s why the prophecy binds itself to her blood.

“You don’t understand what you are,” I say. “What you were made to become. I need you, yes—but not out of weakness. Out of necessity. Out of design.”

I reach out and grip her shoulders. She just watches me like she’s already halfway to some other realm.

There’s a rustling nearby and a voice calls her name.

My eyes snap toward the chapel entrance. A young, foolish, human male stands in the doorway, eyes wide, breath ragged. I recognize the scent of mortal anxiety and misguided loyalty. One of her coworkers who didn’t think I noticed, hiding among the cult members.

One of the last threads tying her to a life she can no longer claim.

He takes a step forward. “Mayang? UNESCO said you were missing… and then pronounced dead.”

“Chang?” She flinches at my glare, and something inside me snaps.

Jealousy. It is a human word. But the feeling is celestial in its scope when it touches something divine. I am not meant to feel this. And yet I do.

He is irrelevant. His blood will christen the path toward the destruction of her hometown.

The chapel ruins tremble beneath our feet as Chang steps forward, the air thick with tension and the subtle scent of… nephilim blood. His eyes burn with something fierce.

“I knew they were lying. Knew it in my bones. So I dug. And the things I discovered… the timing of the plagues and massacres…” He grips an ancient relic, its surface etched with forgotten sigils that pulse faintly in the twilight.

I laugh, a sound like thunder rolling over broken skies. “You dare challenge me?”

Though his blood still holds a faint trace of the fallen, it’s been so diluted over time that any powers tied to that bloodline have long since vanished .

His gaze never wavers. “I’m not here to bargain, Solareth —one of the fallen. I’m here to end this— for her .”

With a sudden roar, I unfurl my wings—dark, spiked shadows blotting out the fading light. The ground cracks beneath me as I launch forward, a tempest of wrath and divine fury.

Chang braces, raising the relic. A burst of blinding light explodes, forcing me to shield my eyes. The holy energy sears against my corrupted flesh, burning with the purity I’ve long been denied. Yet, rage fuels me, and I shrug off the pain, closing the distance in a blink.

My claws slash through the air, ripping at his defenses, but Chang is swift—dancing around my strikes with the agility of desperation. Each time I lash out, the relic flares, repelling me, creating a barrier of sacred fire.

“You think this will stop me?” I hiss, fury bubbling beneath my calm.

Chang’s lips curl into a grim smile. “No. But it will bind you.”

He chants in a tongue older than kingdoms, weaving the relic’s power into a chain of light that wraps around me like molten silver. I roar, wrenching at the bonds that burn and constrict, but they hold fast—anchoring me to the mortal realm.

I glance back at Mayang—her eyes wide with terror and something else… hope. The sight stabs me sharper than any blade—a cruel cut of betrayal that twists alongside an aching longing. How could she look at him that way? How could she hesitate for even a breath?

The relic pulses bright, relentless, searing through flesh and soul like wildfire. I roar, wings snapping open as I fight through the pain and grab the human male, launching into the stormy sky above the ruined chapel. Lightning cracks around us, thunder rolling like the drums of war.

Chang’s voice rises in fierce chant, each word a blade that carves through the air, weaving chains of blinding light that snake around me, tightening with cruel precision.

I tear at them with claws of shadow, claws of flame as my body contorts and reshapes itself in retaliation to what’s happening.

Chang fights, but I’m stronger as I wrap both my hands around his neck, craving more than bloodlust for his demise.

But the bindings from the relic hold fast.

The vortex swirls beneath us—a maelstrom of shadow and flame, a deathtrap pulling me downward.

I spiral into the storm, wings beating against the crushing force, fighting to stay free as Chang slips from my grip and descends to the ground.

The sky itself seems to close in, a cage forged of light and dark.

I’m falling—drowning—dragged toward a prison not made of stone, but of fury and despair. Death seems certain, but my roar splits the heavens—defiance still burning in my veins.

Then, a shock—the chains falter.

It’s her .

Mayang steps forward, her hands trembling yet resolute. She whispers words I didn’t think she could, words that shatter the spell and silence the relic’s power.

Chang’s eyes widen in horror as his grip falters, his final desperate grasp slipping.

She chooses me.

The initial betrayal still cuts deeper than any wound. Yet beneath the fury, a flicker of awe and something darker weaves in through my being—gratitude.

The light collapses, and I’m free.

Mayang’s sacrifice leaves Chang crumpled on the shattered floor.

I rise, breathing heavy, victorious yet unmoored.

“You chose me,” I murmur, more to myself than her.

Without a word, Mayang begins to move—slow, deliberate steps toward Chang’s broken, motionless body. My lip curls, a snarl ripping from my throat, raw and full of rage. What is she doing? My fists clench, blood roaring in my ears, ready to strike—but then, she kneels.

And I see it.

She’s not reaching for him. She’s reaching for the relic .

The fury in me curdles into something sharper, more frantic. My snarl chokes off, strangled by the weight of realization. No, no, no—she can't. She won’t . I lunge forward a step, heart slamming in my chest like a war drum.

“Don’t,” I rasp, too late.

The relic is already in her hands.