Taming Darkness
Chapter 8

~Aleena~

The fumes were horrendous, and the liquid bubbled like a potion that film directors portray only in sci-fi movies. The fumes were like a living entity, writhing with each breath, as if it wanted to escape the confines of the vial. The liquid's heat radiated from the bowl like hot metal pulsing in a furnace.

I keep watching Darius as he crushes up the devil's bane, a determined look on his face. My eyebrows furrow in silent question as I try to get a feel for what he is thinking currently, he feels strangely numb. What was he planning to do with that thing? It was extremely toxic to demons, so getting a hold of that much of it had to be challenging. Was he trying to kill his own father?

Darius adds sulfur and a heap of another strange herb, one even more dangerous. I couldn't stop wondering where from, who, and how the heck he got his hands on such poisons.

It's such a wide variety of dangerous and toxic materials that Darius must be aware of what he's dealing with. It can't be a coincidence. I refuse to believe or even think that he had no idea what he was handling.

Besides, the book he had opened looked like it could have been at least a hundred years old. It wasn't some plain old recipe book, either. And I knew he wasn't baking a cake unless it was a death one.

My heart thunders against my rib cage as scenarios run through my mind. I know he wasn't trying to hurt himself, or at least I hope so, yet fear creeps in while watching him choke on the fumes. Darius must not have done anything too deadly, as he's still alive outside these memories. That's all that matters.

A movement catches my attention as I involuntarily hold my breath, prepared for the worst. When Darius is done mixing up the dangerous plants, he takes off the mask he had on. I gasp at the view of him choking on the fumes, his cough ten times worse without the mask.

But then, out of nowhere, he does something I could have never anticipated. The beaker is a transparent, cylindrical container made from glass. It's filled, nearly brimming, with a thick, green liquid. It looks like a pitcher of slime, thick and gooey with an aquamarine tinge. A crackling sound fills the room from the beaker. My heart beats faster and faster as I slowly realize what's happening.

Darius throws back his head and swallows every last drop. I stare at him, terrified. My body locks up in horror, watching him as the last drops disappear.

He drinks straight from the beaker. Darius drinks the toxic cocktail until nothing is left without so much as a grimace! No second guessing, not a thought before he does it, just chugs it down as if it tasted like pure nectar. Only it wasn't a sweet drink, it is the nectar of death.

It takes literal seconds for him to pass out and everything fades. The world around fades, gray and darkening at the edges. His room disappears, and suddenly, I replace myself with no surroundings to grasp, I see nothingness, complete and absolute blackness. There is no horizon, no borders, no distance, no air, no light, no matter, nothing but me and empty space.

For what feels like ages, all I can see is black. For ages, I could only listen to the harsh thumping of his heart in his ears. The sound is awful, painful even, before it stops abruptly. Not a thump, not a sound or movement. I still couldn't believe I witnessed this, I couldn't believe he did it.

He killed himself. Darius killed himself to ensure no more plagues were created from his blood. Darius, as just a teenager, killed off any chance of anyone ever manipulating him and using him for everything he hated.

But the price it took had to be too high, and soon after Darius killed himself, he came to realize the actual price. When he came back, he realized that when he drank the poisonous concoction, he not only killed himself, but also killed off his Harmony side and woke up something else, his Demonic side.

Darius didn't know better when he decided it had to be done. Yet, now what was left of him was so dark, so empty, and so wild in its roots, Darius had to face the new reality-the new him. Maybe it was worse than being dead.

I already knew that with killing off that part of him, Darius killed off what little control he used to have over his incubus magic. Anything he did have was lost and forgotten.

His Demonic side emerged far harder than he knew was possible. The very thing he tried to hide and control now was the only part of him that truly existed. The monster that lurked between him now became a dominant part of him.

It had more power and freedom than ever. Darius wasn't in control anymore, every moment of his life, the monster could break free and prove it had the upper hand.

Darius constantly needed to fight against the monster inside him to keep it at bay. It explained so much about the man I have come to know, even the worst parts of him. And just when I thought Darius might get some reprieve from the horrors he lived, I was wrong. It was only two days later that Molly died. The pain, even if only a memory, that surged through him was indescribable. It targeted his heart, shattered his soul, and drove his mind into a frenzy of regrets.

His mother begged Darius to save her, begged Darius to bring her back. And he tried, oh god, how he tried, but nothing worked. Darius couldn't do anything to save his sister, to save the one person who was his true weakness. No matter how he hated that she was used as a weapon to control him far too many times, Darius still refused to let go of her.

He didn't give up. He couldn't. Over and over again, he tried everything, but the more time passed, the harder it became to admit that he didn't have that kind of magic anymore. If only he still had his Harmony side, he could have saved her. He didn't want to give up, but there was nothing he could do to save her. Not without his Harmony-Fae magic, the very thing he destroyed thinking he was saving the world from further damage. It was the only thing that could save her.

Darius knew that if he took the risk and chose to resurrect her, she wouldn't be his sister anymore. His sister was dead, what remained was the outer shell. She was gone, forever. Posted by Narugi.com; visit us for more free novels.

Darius knew the risk of bringing his sister back from the dead was too great for him to take. Even if they managed to summon her, it wouldn't be Molly anymore-instead, a darker version of her would exist. It would be something far more powerful than his incubus, and something far more sinister than death itself.

The black magic that would be used to revivify her was unbinding and unpredictable. He had seen its power before, felt the depths of its darkness when he faced the shadows of death himself. If he brought Molly back, there was no telling what kind of monster she would become or what she would do once she was fully alive again.

So Darius made the difficult decision to let Molly go and keep what remained of his family as safe as he could. He cried for days after he had decided, but eventually, he accepted that this was the only way for now.

It didn't mean that he stopped searching for ways to bring her back, though; for days he tried, and for days he failed. He was tempted so many times to use his incubus just to stop his mother's pain.

But Darius knew his sister would never be able to live with them. She was purer of light than he ever was, softer, and the shadows would ruin everything he loved about his sister, make her hate herself. The shadows were something else, something dark and sinister, something all consuming, cold, and angry. Something dead and untamable.

Tears stings in my eyes as the memory fades. Though the pain disappeared, and the heartbreaking view was nowhere in sight, it left a sour aftertaste and more sorrow than my heart had ever felt. The memory moves to the next, and out of nowhere, unexpectedly, I feel my soul shudder.

Intense pain courses through me. I know it has nothing to do with this past ghost of his reality, but with the real world. Our world-our reality. Back home.

Darius! I pull and push on the veil, knowing my mates need me. I know something has gone terribly wrong while I am imprisoned in the memories and can't break free. The more I push back against the veil, the sturdier it becomes.

The memories don't stop as my mates' panic bleeds into me, it consumes my senses and overtakes every thought running through my mind.

Pain. Such intense pain I could not have even fathomed before I felt it. The emotions I feel, however, can't compare to the rage simmering inside of me. I can feel my soul darken, feel this sense of entrapment. Yet, it isn't just being trapped within my mind, I can feel Darius' magic wrapping around me like a cocoon. And our mates are trying to break his power down.