A Saint funeral
1427 Words
Seraphina’s world was unraveling.
The prophecy—the inked image of herself draped in darkness, holding a bloodstained dagger—mocked everything she had ever believed about herself.
"She will rise from purity and burn in sin."
The words etched into the old parchment seared into her mind, repeating like a cruel hymn.
Her hands trembled as she set the book down. “This has to be some kind of mistake.”
Dante tilted his head, his golden eyes studying her. “You don’t really believe that.”
She did. She had to.
But doubt crawled through her veins like poison.
Lucien had saved her from the church, but he had kept things from her. Dante was offering her the truth—but at what cost?
She needed answers. Real answers.
With a deep breath, she straightened, her voice steadier than she felt. “Tell me everything.”
Dante’s lips curved into something between a smirk and a warning. “Once I do, there’s no turning back.”
Seraphina met his gaze head-on. “I stopped believing in salvation a long time ago.”
Something flickered in Dante’s eyes—approval, maybe. He reached for another book on the table, flipping to a section filled with more sketches.
“This prophecy dates back centuries,” he began. “It speaks of a girl born into purity, raised in devotion, but destined to fall. Not just into darkness, but into power.”
Seraphina swallowed hard. “And you think that girl is me?”
Dante lifted a brow. “Do you really think it’s a coincidence that Lucien found you? That your entire life led you here?”
She wanted to argue. To deny it.
But something deep inside her knew.
This wasn’t just chance.
And Lucien—
Seraphina clenched her fists. “Lucien knew, didn’t he?”
Dante leaned back against the table, watching her with quiet amusement. “Lucien’s been keeping you in a cage. A gilded one, sure, but a cage nonetheless.”
Her chest tightened.
Lucien had pulled her from the flames of the church’s control, but had he only placed her in another kind of prison?
She thought of his touches, his whispers, the way he had called her his little angel.
Had she been nothing more than a prophecy to him? A puzzle piece in a game she hadn’t even known she was playing?
Dante pushed off the table. “He won’t let you go easily.”
Seraphina lifted her chin. “I’m not asking for permission.”
Dante chuckled. “That’s what I like about you.”
She ignored the way his words sent heat curling through her.
“Tell me something,” she said, voice quiet but firm. “If I am the girl in this prophecy… what exactly am I supposed to become?”
Dante’s smirk faded. He stepped closer, his golden eyes dark and unreadable.
“You’re supposed to burn,
The room felt smaller, suffocating under the weight of what Dante had just said.
"You’re supposed to burn, Seraphina. And take everything down with you."
His words didn’t just hang in the air—they wrapped around her, seeping into the cracks of her fragile reality.
She should have run. Should have screamed that it was a lie.
But instead, she stood there, feeling something new—a slow, dark ember flickering in the hollow of her chest.
“Say I believe you,” she murmured, her voice dangerously steady. “Say I was always meant to fall. Why are you telling me this now?”
Dante smirked, but it wasn’t playful this time. It was knowing.
“Because you’re at war with yourself.” He took a step closer. “And the moment you decide which side wins, the world will feel it.”
Seraphina swallowed hard.
A war.
One between the girl she used to be—the one who prayed, who believed, who thought salvation was something she could hold onto—
And the girl she was becoming—the one who felt the rush of power when she danced in the dark, who found pleasure in sin, who wasn’t sure she wanted to be saved anymore.
Dante reached out, brushing a strand of hair from her face. “You think you’re just another lost soul, but you’re so much more, Seraphina.” His touch lingered, rough yet deliberate. “Lucien knows it. That’s why he keeps you close, keeps you tied to him.”
Her breath hitched.
Lucien.
The man who had saved her.
The man who had kept her.
The man who had whispered devotion in her ear, his hands mapping her body like she belonged to him.
Her pulse pounded. “Lucien wouldn’t—”
Dante scoffed. “Lucien would. And he did.”
She didn’t want to believe it. But something in her gut—the part of her that had always doubted the chains around her—was screaming that Dante wasn’t lying.
Her fingers tightened around the prophecy’s pages. “So what now?” she whispered.
Dante’s eyes gleamed, the golden hue burning like firelight. “Now, you decide if you’re ready to bury the girl you were.”
Seraphina sucked in a sharp breath.
He was asking her to let go.
Not just of Lucien.
Not just of the past.
But of everything.
The innocence. The faith. The part of her that had still been waiting for redemption.
A saint’s funeral.
That’s what this was.
She exhaled slowly, lifting her chin. “Tell me what I need to do.”
Dante’s smirk returned, sharp as a blade. “You already know.”
And the terrifying part was—
He was right.
Deep down, she did know.
She had always known.
The fall had already begun.
And for the first time, she wanted to see how far she could go.
Seraphina felt the shift inside her like the tightening of a noose.
Everything—the prayers, the sermons, the belief—had been nothing more than a fragile illusion.
And she had clung to it like a drowning girl clings to a cross, believing salvation would come.
But salvation never came.
Dante’s voice was velvet and sin. “You feel it, don’t you?”
She did.
It was like standing on the edge of a cliff, wind howling around her, urging her to jump.
Lucien had kept her from the edge, whispered words that kept her from falling. But Dante—Dante was the storm. He wasn’t stopping her. He was pushing her.
And she was no longer sure she wanted to resist.
“I don’t know who I am anymore,” she admitted.
Dante reached for her wrist, his fingers ghosting over her pulse. “Then let’s find out.”
She didn’t flinch from his touch. She let him guide her away from the prophecy, away from the books, away from the cage she hadn’t even realized she was in.
The corridors were dark, torches flickering like shadows were alive and breathing.
She should have been afraid.
Instead, her heartbeat quickened for a different reason.
Dante led her into a vast room, where a heavy mirror stood against the farthest wall.
Not just any mirror.
A blackened one, the kind that seemed to drink in the light, swallowing it whole.
Seraphina hesitated. “What is this?”
Dante stepped behind her, his breath warm against her ear. “A doorway.”
Her stomach twisted. “A doorway to what?”
Dante’s lips curved into something dark and knowing. “To the truth.”
She swallowed. “And if I don’t want to know?”
Dante’s fingers skimmed her shoulder, his touch both reassuring and dangerous. “You already do.”
Seraphina inhaled sharply.
He was right.
She stepped closer.
The reflection in the mirror was wrong.
The girl staring back at her wasn’t just her—it was something more.
Something darker.
The white gown she had been wearing in her mind—the symbol of purity, of faith—began to blacken, like ink spilling through silk.
Her face was the same, but her eyes…
They weren’t the eyes of a saint anymore.
They burned.
Something inside the mirror whispered her name.
Seraphina.
Her breath shuddered.
Dante’s voice was low. “What do you see?”
She didn’t know how to explain it.
So instead, she said the only thing that felt true.
“I see her.”
Dante smiled. “Then it’s time to set her free.”
Seraphina reached out—
And the mirror shattered.
- Writer
