They dressed her in white again.
Not silk.
Not lace.
But bone.
Knucklebones, ribs, vertebrae — woven together with strands of black hair and sinew. The skull of a lamb rested against her chest, hollow and cold. Her veil was smoke, stitched with whispers.
Isadora stood before the cracked mirror in the vestry of the ruined church, unable to look away. Her reflection twitched when she did not. It smiled before she did.
> "You are beautiful," it whispered.
"You are becoming."
Behind her, the Devil's hand smoothed her shoulder. It left a red print where it touched.
> "You have never been more radiant," he said, voice like oil over fire.
"Tonight, the heavens will watch and turn blind."
"You will be mine forever — body, breath, and blood."
Isadora turned slowly. The firelight cast no shadow behind the Devil. Only ahead — as if the world bent away from him.
> "And Lucien?" she asked, voice hoarse.
"What becomes of him?"
The Devil's smile twisted.
> "He is the offering."
"You are the altar."
---
In the crypt beneath the church, Lucien was bound with chains of thorns and iron. They had cut into his skin, kissing the bone. His breath came in shallow gasps.
But his eyes — they still burned with defiance.
With love.
Even now.
> "You don't have to do this," he croaked, when she came.
"You don't have to become what he made you."
Isadora knelt beside him, the bones of her dress clacking softly.
> "I was already becoming long before I met him," she whispered.
"You only slowed the fall."
She touched his cheek, tenderly, though her hands were shaking.
> "I remember what you did. I remember the orchard. The letters. The garden of glass you built me in the mountains."
"But I also remember the contract. The mark. The blood oath."
Lucien's voice cracked.
> "You were seventeen."
"You didn't know—"
> "But I do now."
---
The Devil waited at the altar.
The ruined church had been rebuilt in nightmare — pews of splintered coffins, windows filled with crying mouths, not stained glass. The crucifix had been inverted and bound in thorn vines that bled.
The guests were not men.
They wore faces made of soot and smoke, dressed in funeral shrouds. Their applause was silent, their smiles too wide. Somewhere, a choir sang — not in voices, but in bones being broken slowly.
And still, the bells rang.
Isadora walked the aisle alone, firelight flickering through her bone veil, each step bleeding into the next.
Lucien knelt before the altar, bound in rusted chains.
The Devil spread his arms.
> "My bride returns."
---
> "One choice," the Devil said. "That was our pact."
A scroll unrolled from the air, written in blood and teeth.
> "You may save the boy, your beloved Lucien — his breath, his body, his soul."
"But you must stay with me. Forever. In this realm. As my wife. As my queen."
"Or you may leave, walk free, return to your world."
"But he dies here. Alone. Forgotten. And you shall remember every moment."
Isadora stared at the scroll.
> "This is not a choice," she whispered.
> "But it is," said the Devil.
"All love ends in fire or in forgetting."
"Decide."
---
She looked at Lucien.
He shook his head, tears streaking the blood on his face.
> "Don't. Please. Don't do this for me."
"Don't damn yourself."
> "I already am," she said.
She stepped forward. Her bare feet touched the line of salt drawn around the altar. The air shimmered.
> "I am already damned. I only ask one thing."
The Devil arched a brow.
> "Speak."
> "Let me kiss him goodbye."
A pause.
Then: "One kiss."
---
She knelt beside Lucien. He was trembling, broken, near death. She took his face in her hands and kissed him.
It was not soft.
It was everything. Their youth. Their ruin. Their love twisted into grief.
The Devil waited.
The congregation watched with empty eyes.
And when she pulled away —
Lucien whispered something into her mouth.
> "Now."
And then — Isadora spat flame into the Devil's face.
---
The kiss was a distraction.
Lucien's chains were false.
The sigil on Isadora's skin had been branded over with a counter-curse, forged in stolen fire.
The Devil screamed — a sound that shattered two stained windows and ten spines in the audience.
Isadora stood, fire dripping from her fingertips, eyes black with defiance.
Lucien rose beside her, the thorn chains falling away like snakes.
The church began to collapse. Walls twisted. Guests melted into rot. The bells screamed.
> "You think this breaks the bond?" the Devil hissed.
"You think you are free?"
Isadora's voice was cold.
> "No."
> "But I can make you bleed."
---
Together, they set the church alight.
Lucien carved runes in blood on the altar. Isadora whispered the language of the Old Flame, taught to her by the mirror.
The Devil howled.
The flames reached Heaven.
And for a moment — just one — the sky turned its gaze back. And did not look away.
---
Lucien and Isadora fled into the forest, fire behind them, ashes in their lungs.
The ruined church burned again, but the Devil did not die.
He waited.
Because Isadora had broken the pact.
Because her kiss was still his.
Because one day, all fire returns to its source.
End of Chapter Twelve.