Somewhere Between Flame and Flesh
That night, Seraphine did not sleep.
Sleep was not possible when the scent of burnt roses clung to your skin like a secret trying to resurface. Nor when the crown of thorns you never wore still pressed against your forehead in phantom pain.
She had returned from the Throne Hall in silence, Lucien trailing behind her like a shadow too wounded to speak. No words had passed between them. None needed to. The moment the Queen had spoken of the flame, Seraphine had seen it in Lucien's eyes:
Recognition.
Not of her face but of her death.
And perhaps… of something worse. Of a promise broken long ago.
---
The mirror greeted her again when she entered her room.
Still cracked. Still waiting.
The burn on her hand had faded, leaving no mark. But the sensation lingered like invisible ash embedded in her skin, humming faintly with every heartbeat. Her gown lay abandoned on the floor. She barely remembered undressing.
She stood at the window now, staring into the bleeding sky. The moon hung lower tonight, as though watching her through the glass.
The words of the Queen echoed like a curse:
"Will you burn again for love?"
But she did not remember loving anyone.
She remembered only the dreams.
---
They came swiftly, like always.
One blink, and the world tilted.
The chamber was gone.
The air thickened with smoke and whispers.
The moon turned black.
And the dream took her.
---
She stood on the edge of a cliff, barefoot on scorched stone.
Beneath her, a valley of fire and bones.
Before her, the ruined cathedral the same from all her nightmares loomed in jagged silhouette, its spires reaching for the heavens like blackened fingers.
Her veil floated behind her, longer than her own shadow.
The wind screamed her name, though it never sounded like her own voice.
"Seraphine…"
But that was not what she had been called here.
In the dream, they called her something else.
"Serastra."
---
The name hit her like a blow.
It felt right. Like it belonged to her bones.
She turned toward the voice.
And there he stood.
Tall, garbed in crimson, with eyes like eclipses silver swallowed by shadows.
The groom.
The man she never saw clearly in her dreams now stepped forward, the veil of smoke lifting from his face.
And the moment she saw him truly saw him her breath caught.
It was Vaelric.
Lord Vaelric Dravenn, the Eternal Noble. The one whose portrait hung in every blood-stained hall of Velmoria. The one said to have crafted the first blood vow. The vampire who had not walked among mortals in centuries.
But here he was, in the cathedral of her dreams.
And he was smiling.
"Did you forget me again, flame of my vow?"
His voice burned.
---
She opened her mouth.
Nothing came out.
Vaelric reached for her, not with tenderness, but with reverence like a man touching the ruins of his lost temple. His fingers brushed her cheek, and her skin flared with heat not of passion, but of memory.
"You burned for me once," he whispered. "You will burn again."
"I… I don't remember," she said, voice hoarse, like it had screamed too much in lifetimes before.
"But your soul does," he said. "That is why the mirror cracked. That is why the flame found your hand again."
He stepped closer. "Do you want to remember, Serastra?"
She stepped back.
"I am not her."
"You are. Just lost."
---
The cathedral bells tolled behind them.
A hundred candles lit by unseen hands.
A thousand roses bloomed in flame.
And the altar stood as it always had in ruins, but waiting.
Vaelric extended his hand.
"Come. Let us finish what was never allowed to begin."
---
Seraphine took one step.
Then another.
And when her hand touched his, the world turned red.
Fire roared beneath the stone.
The veil lifted.
The bridal crown appeared above her head.
But just as her fingers brushed the stem of a rose on the altar—
A scream tore the dream apart.
Not hers.
Not his.
But a scream that came from a mirror shattering in another world.
---
She jolted awake.
Drenched in sweat.
Gasping.
The room around her was dark—but wrong.
The mirror was missing.
Not broken.
Not cracked.
Gone.
---
Lucien burst through the door seconds later, sword half-drawn.
"You felt it too?" he said.
She stared at him, breath ragged.
"The dream," she whispered. "He was there. Lord Vaelric. He called me Serastra."
Lucien closed his eyes.
"I prayed this cycle would not repeat…"
"What cycle?"
He didn't answer.
Instead, he walked to the wall where the mirror had stood.
Only scorched stone remained.
"I saw it shatter," she said. "In the dream."
"It wasn't a dream," Lucien replied. "Not entirely."
"Then what was it?"
Lucien turned to her, his eyes too old for his face.
"A memory."