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Hugh

Darkness pressed against my consciousness like black tar, thick and suffocating.

I floated in a void where up and down held no meaning, where time stretched into endless moments of nothingness.

But then Madison appeared.

She stood before an ancient mirror, but the reflection that stared back at her wasn’t her own.

It showed Ravina's silver-white hair and ageless face. Her cruel lips curved into a smile I had never seen on my wife's features.

“He trusts me completely,”

she said to her reflection, her voice carrying Ravina's musical cruelty.

“Just as I once trusted completely.

But in this life, I shall be the one to strike first. In this life, as Madison, I shall have my revenge.”

The scene shifted, making my head swim.

Madison knelt beside my sleeping form, her hands glowing with her golden, healing light.

But now the light looked malevolent, It seeped into my skin. My sleeping face contorted with madness as she smiled with satisfaction.

“Sleep, my love,”

she whispered.

“Dream of your own destruction.”

Another vision crashed over me.

Madison stood in my study.

My private papers scattered across the desk while she copied sensitive information into her own journal. Political correspondences, financial records, magical texts passed down through generations of Trent lords. All of it exposed to her calculating gaze.

I have been reborn.

I have come to finish what was started centuries ago.

The voice spoke with such conviction that I felt my sanity crack under its weight.

Every tender moment we had shared, every whispered declaration of love, every touch that had made me believe in redemption… It was all a lie.

Madison was Ravina.

They were one and the same.

Pain lanced through my skull as more images flashed through my mind.

Madison standing over Eleanor's body, her hands still glowing with that golden power.

Eleanor's face frozen in an expression of absolute terror, her mouth open in a silent scream that would echo through eternity.

“I needed to have you as my own,”

Madison said, making the vision dissolve into crushing despair.

I’d been such a fool.

Such a willing victim.

Madison's abilities, her knowledge of ancient curses, her convenient appearance at precisely the moment my family needed a political alliance. None of it was coincidence. She’d orchestrated every moment, every touch, every breathless confession of love.

I tried to scream, to rage against the bonds that held me in this nightmare realm, but my voice emerged as nothing more than a whisper lost in the void.

But then came a feeling of warmth… It touched the edges of my consciousness, carrying with it emotions as strong and sure as my own heartbeat.

I felt love.

Genuine, terrified love that called my name across the darkness.

Hugh.

Come back to me.

Please. The visions are lies. Learn to see through the deception.

Madison's voice reached me not through my ears but directly into my mind.

They were carried on waves of power that made my being sing with recognition.

This was truth… This was real.

The golden light grew stronger, burning away the poisonous visions like sunlight dissolving morning mist.

Madison's consciousness merged with mine.

The curse feeds on betrayal, on the fear that love will always lead to destruction.

But feel this, Hugh.

Feel what I truly am.

Pure emotion bombarded my senses.

Madison's wonder when she first saw me, her fear of the arranged marriage transforming into genuine attraction, her growing love despite every rational reason to maintain distance.

I felt her confusion and terror when the voices began, her determination to understand the forces arrayed against us, and her absolute refusal to let the curse claim another victim.

I see you, I projected back to her, marvelling at this new connection between our minds.

I feel your truth.

The darkness cracked around me, and I saw Madison as if from above.

Tears streamed down her cheeks as she pressed her hands to my temples.

Elizabeth stood behind her, face pale with shock at witnessing magic she could never have imagined.

“Come back to me,”

Madison whispered aloud, and I felt myself rising through layers of consciousness toward the surface of waking.

I opened my eyes and found Madison's face inches from my own.

Tears still streamed down her face, but her green eyes shone with fierce determination.

The scent of lavender surrounded me, grounding me in reality while the last vestiges of the visions crumbled away.

“Madison.”

A sob escaped her lips, and she collapsed against my chest when I called her name.

“I thought I’d lost you,”

she whispered.

“The shadows pulled you so deep I could barely sense your presence.”

I wrapped my arms around her, holding her against me while my body remembered how to breathe, how to exist in this world rather than the nightmare realm of Ravina's making.

The stone floor was cold beneath my back, and Elizabeth's breaths were sharp as if she struggled to process what she’d witnessed.

“How long?” I asked.

“Over an hour,”

Madison said as she lifted her head to meet my gaze.

“You collapsed, and the shadows rushed in, and then you spoke in a voice that was not your own.”

Elizabeth stepped closer.

“The things you said...

they were not the words of a sane man. But…”

I sat up slowly, keeping Madison close while the room settled back into focus.

“I think Ravina speaks through the curse.

She shows us visions designed to destroy trust, to make us reenact her tragedy.”

I looked at Elizabeth directly.

“Eleanor heard those same voices.

She saw those same lies. But I never experienced them during our marriage because...”

Madison's grip tightened on my hand.

“Because you never loved her,”

she said.

“The curse only activates when there is real love to corrupt.”

I nodded and huffed out a deep breath.

Shame burnt through my soul.

“Eleanor loved me. She deserved so much better than the cold arrangement I offered her. But I felt nothing beyond duty and respect. There was no love for Ravina to poison, no trust to betray.”

I cupped Madison's face in my hands.

“With you, everything is different.”

Elizabeth's composure finally cracked completely, and she sank into the nearest chair.

“Then Eleanor took her own life because of this curse.

The voices drove her to madness.”

“I failed her,”

I said, the words heavy with a guilt that had haunted me for two years.

“I couldn’t help her because I couldn’t understand what she experienced.

I thought her delusions were symptoms of an affliction.”

Madison pressed her forehead against mine.

“You couldn’t have known.

But we understand now, and we can use that knowledge to break the curse entirely.”

“The rings,”

I said, finally accepting the truth beyond my doubts.

“They truly are cursed by Ravina just like Astor’s crown.”

Madison nodded.

I thought of Eleanor, of my mother… Were there others who suffered mysterious ailments and early deaths? Others who had been claimed by Ravina's revenge? I shook my head.

Countless generations could have paid the price for wearing cursed gold?

“We have to destroy them,”

Madison said.

“Both rings, completely.

Only then will we be free.”

Elizabeth leaned forward in her chair.

“How do you propose to accomplish such a thing? These artifacts have survived for centuries…”

“The family chapel,”

I said, the answer coming to me with sudden certainty.

“If we are to face Ravina directly, it should be in the most sacred space on the estate.

Hallowed ground will provide some protection while we work.”

Madison's eyes lit with understanding.

“Do you think she’ll manifest when we attempt to destroy the rings?”

“I’m certain of it.

She’ll not relinquish her hold without a fight.”

I rose to my feet and helped Madison to hers, before offering Elizabeth my hand.

“Will you witness this?”

I asked before adding that it was sure to be dangerous.

Elizabeth studied my face for a long moment before nodding.

“I have wronged you both with my assumptions.

I owe it to my niece to help however I can.”