Lucas' POV
"Fucking Kings and Queens! A bunch of mother fuckers and losers!" I shouted.
Derek looked intimidated and turned his head towards Lucian.
"Don't you fucking look at him! Nobody can fucking save you today!" I kicked him. "I should have killed you long ago! You're a fucking cancer!"
He rolled on the ground for a couple of laps and coughed out some sticky muddy fluid from his mouth.
"Master... I'm already dead... For a dead man, there's nothing on earth that matters... But my brother... He served you... I forced him to do a lot of bad things, but he was innocent... Please spare his life..." Derek said.
"You have no right to negotiate anything with me! I'm going to let you witness I torture your brother to death!" I said angrily and grabbed his neck. "Now, break this fucking ice shield and give my fucking woman back to me. Give her back!"
Then, I heard a faint voice.
"Leave... my brother... alone..."
It's Darren's voice.
I turned my head and saw Darren crawling towards us.
"Fucking imbecile piece of shit! How dare you talk to me like that?!" I threw Derek on the floor like a fucking paste of meat and said.
"I've... had... enough of you..." Darren said in a shattered voice.
He wasn't loud, but every single word coming out of his mouth was determined.
Then, he stood up. Wobbled and staggered, he was slowly walking towards me.
I saw a glare of angry fire in his eyes. And then, his whole body was lit on translucent blue fire.
Fucking warlock! Now you want to burn me? I'll fucking toast you!
I triggered the imprint in my mind. But to my surprise, it didn't work at all.
Then, I saw the hole in his left chest.
"Fuck! Did you rip your brother's heart out?!" I shouted at Derek.
Derek lay in a pool of muddy blood and replied in a whisper, "No... Master... My brother is the quiet one... But like they said, still water runs deep... He had the courage that I had never had... He ripped his own heart off... He'd rather be a living dead to be controlled and manipulated by you..."
Before I could react, Darren had already grabbed my arms and pulled me against himself.
I tried to push him away, but he became surprisingly strong and kept holding me back.
"Ahhhhhh!" I screamed because of the excruciating pain caused by the burnt.
"Let go of him, Darren!" Lucian grabbed his shoulder to pull him back, but he couldn't do it.
His hands were burnt, but he didn't want to let go.
Darren's eyes turn red and then dark purple. It seemed that he had already lost his mind.
The smoke, heat and burning smell of flesh made me overwhelmed.
At the edge of life and death, Finn took over.
My body transformed into a giant black wolf and Finn broke away from Darren's grip.
Then, he jumped up at Darren and pressed him against the ice statue.
"I don't want to kill you, warlock," he said in a calm voice. "But you're already dead."
The fire on Darren's body started to melt the ice shield of the statue.
With more ice and snow melting, I could see my woman's face beneath the ice.
"She's there, Finn! She's right there!" I shouted.
"Yes, she is. And I'm working very hard to get her out. So shut up right now," he said.
His paws were burnt and I could see that he couldn't hold Darren anymore.
Lucian joined him. So did Colt, Alex, and the tuna head druid.
"Sorry, Darren, but I knew you would want us to do this when you regained consciousness," Colt said.
With a glaring ray of light, the last piece of ice was melted.
My woman dropped to the ground and all the skin and flesh over her body was burnt and started falling off.
"Why is her skin falling, Finn?! Is she still alive?!" I asked in a panic.
"The sudden change of hot and cold made her body expand and shrink. I don't know if she can make it or not," Finn said.
He circled around her body anxiously. He wanted to touch her with his snout, but he didn't dare to.
Then, she opened her eyes.
"Darren..." she gasped in air and called out.
Louisa's POV
I felt that I had just been through a nightmare.
In oblivion, all my senses were deprived.
My eyes were clouded. My ears were stuffed. But I could somehow feel the heartbeats inside of me.
Then, I regained my senses.
In the darkness, I could see a boy running around in front of me.
He was riding on the back of a giant black wolf, pulling the hair on the back of its ears and kissing its furry head.
He wasn't wearing anything on his bare feet, and I was so worried that he would feel cold.
I wanted to call him to put on shoes.
I opened my mouth, but my voice was melting in the air.
He suddenly stopped and looked at me.
Then, he cracked a big smile on his face and ran towards me.
"No, don't come here," I waved my hands at him and shouted.
"Mom's dying!" I shouted.
But the more I shouted, the faster and closer he ran towards me.
Then, I opened my eyes.
"Louisa!" I could hear someone calling my name in a distance.
I lowered my head and saw my whole body melting, but I couldn't feel anything.
I turned my head and saw Darren's deformed face right in front of my eyes.
He was lying next to me. We were so close.
With his fringe hair covering his face, he looked as if he was just waking up from a bad dream.
"Louisa..." he whispered. "Is this... a dream?"
"No, Darren. I'm with you," I whispered and tried to stroke his face. But when I lifted my hand, I could only see a skeleton.
I panicked, but Darren held me in his arms.
"I thought it was a bad dream... But how could it be a bad dream... when you're in it..." He said in a soft voice.
"Darren, are we dying?" I asked.
"I'm already dead, Louisa..." He said and placed my hand in the empty hole in his chest. "But it's OK because you'll still be alive... You and your baby..."
"No, Darren... No!!!" I tried to hold him in my arms. I thought if I held him tightly enough, I would stop time and stay with him forever.
"Louisa, I've always wanted to tell you..." Darren said in the tenderest voice.
"Darren, I know. I want to tell you as well..." I lifted my head and stared into his eyes. I could see sparks in his eyes, like thousands of stars melting into the darkest of nights.
"I love you, Louisa," he said.
"I love you, too, Darren," I said.
Then, I curled up and ignited the Element Fire all over my body.
"Brother, wait for me!" Derek shouted and stretched out his arms towards Darren.
Darren stretched out his arms, but they turned into ashes.
Derek held the remains of Darren in his arms and caught fire as well.
"Brother, in the next life..." Darren said in a trembling voice.
"We'll be brothers... again..." Derek said before both of them changed into flakes of fire and ashes.
I lifted my head up.
Through the floating flakes of snow and fire, through the cracks of the ceiling, I saw the eclipsed sun and the darkness of the sky. Through the darkness, I could see millions of stars cruising through the dense, translucent aether. They moved forward, following their paths and destinies.
I knew everything in this world happened for a reason, like snow falling to the ground, like fire dimming without oxygen, like the mortality of the mortal.
Destiny is like the inevitable force of nature, pressing forward with indomitable will, despite being eternally doomed.
I've been trying so hard to get stronger to protect my friends and beloved ones.
But it turned out that no matter how powerful I became, I still couldn't fight my own destiny.
So, what now?
Do I really want to live a life like this? Living an eternal life, knowing that I could never get my mate's love, witnessing all my friends dying on me one after another?
And what if the prophecy's true? What if the baby in my belly would one day turn into a monster just like his father and bring doomsday to this world?
If you were me, what kind of decision would you make?
Make your decision right now, because I have already made up my mind.