(Trigger warning)
Mentions of suicide and death.

GODHOOD DAWNED ON ETHAN LIKE A SUN RISING INSIDE OF SKIN AND BONES. His stance was that of a fighter, elegant and set. His golden hair seemed to glow, his fierce crimson eyes cut through the darkness of the night.

The boy was too young to be damned. And he'd never been so beautiful.

"Aren't you worried about what I'm gonna do?" He asked Nyx with a harsh chuckle.

Afraid Nyx's careless bitter comment provoked the boy turned demon Gola defensively jumped in front of her. The act shocked herself more than anyone else. Why die protecting a fake friend? But she knew it was a little more complex than that.

"Don't hurt her!" She screamed, her arms thrown open wide as if somehow they could shield them from everything.

Ethan snorted, shaking his head in amusement. "Enough of the melodrama, Elenora. You've watched too much television."

"Gola. And I'm the one that's melodramatic? I didn't kiłl myself after hearing rumor that my girlfriend had died."

He was cold now. There was no humor in his chuckle. "Ouch! I know we've never got along much but I'd imagined you'd be a bit more grievous than this. I know Yona isn't dead. I became what I am to ensure that."

The bitter laughter that erupted from behind her was startling and familiar. "You've done nothing but ensure your own demise."

"Perhaps, brother." Ethan replied coldly. Taking a calculated step closer to the two girls. "But not mine alone."

The speed in which Ethan lunged was unnatural. In the blink of an eye he was there and then he was gone. With fist wrapped tightly round Nyx's neck.

Impossibly so, he hadn't been fast enough. Nyx already had a gun to Gola's chest.

"You've always been so precious to me." Nyx was whispering in Gola's ear. It wasn't Nyx's voice she heard but Levi's instead.

BANG!

The sound of the gun rang out and bounced off the trees. Birds squawked and fled, Gola shrieked. Collapsing into herself. Her blood pooled and seeped into the ground.

Nyx fell unconscious beside her.

Shocked, she choked on her own blood. The boom of the gun danced in circles around her skull. "I-i don't think, I don't think...."I don't think I want to die. She meant to say but death did not care.

She felt the lush, soft hairs of an animal gently nuzzling against her cheek. It was a magnificent crimson eyed goat.

"The memory of you will eternally burden this heart, it is a woe almost too sweet to horde." Levi sounded sincere. He was in his demon form. She had the gut feeling that this was his true form.

It was unknown if she'd chosen her poison in the form of a broken boy with a crown of golden thorns. Perhaps her hands were outstretched, reaching to fist his neck in between her fingers. It was all a blur, her vision was darkening around the edges, the world was losing her.

She fought against the weight of her lidded eyes. Prying them open, again and again, if only for a few seconds. Grasping with every bone in her body to hold onto some semblance of life.

To no avail.

Darkness came and veiled her eyes. She hadn't known that she'd fallen under until upon looking up and saw a moonless sky embroidered with stars and felt the warmth of someone kneeled beside her. The metallic stench of her blood mingled with the smell of cold wet earth and engulfed her senses. A song was sang by bare branches of trees surrounding her along with the hoot of an owl.

It would seem that everyone had vanished. But Gola knew it not to be so. She was the one that was gone. Or would be if she didn't wake up soon.

She could hear faintly Levi and Ethan fighting. Growling, and butting horns. She was also certain of the weight of Nyx's presence beside her. Who was rousing from her own sleep with pained groans.

But there was someone else at her other side.

She felt him before she had any sense that he was there. She could feel his eyes on her face, the icy immortality in his veins. Now not even death could mask her memory of him.

"Gabriel?" She called out, her voice was hoarse and foreign to her own ears. Her arms outstretched to grasp at shadows.

They took a deep breath in sync but still he did not speak. Although he rested a heavy arm on her shoulder, forcing her to lay back down.

"You're getting what you always wanted." She wheezed, slapping his hand away with great effort. "My heart severed on a silver platter."

She was provoking him. She wanted to hear his voice. She didn't want to die with her loneliness.

The shadow prince was not as gentle when he thrusted her back to the ground a second time. "Remain still you fool." He demanded, lowly. Unable to hide the edge to his voice.

"This is all my fault. This is the price of my greed. All of this was supposed to be to protect you but I've only protected me."

She intertwined their hands and pressed the back of his to her heart. Hushing him she sighed, "What of it matters now? Breath with me."

Her breath was wearing with each second. His breaths were uneven and ragged.

He was about to watch the love of his life die, again. And for all his grasping at power. He was just as hopeless as the first time.

"But you must know, The witch was of no coincidence. Mother thought she, only a talented herbalist. But I knew she and her sister were witch doctors. The crows and I had  long since been searching for them in fact."

Gola snorted, "I knew you were a crow boy."

Gabriel could feel her silly grin even in darkness. At it he felt some of the tension release from his shoulders. Feeling human, remembering the burden of the heart wasn't an easy thing. Especially with one so heavy.

"Offering protection wasn't hard. The two were being persecuted. Hunted down like dogs. In exchange the witches would offer each of us wish. They couldn't make our wishes come true but they could give us enough luck for the wishes to be impossible not to come true.

One crow facing family bankruptcy secured a fortune, another spoke one last time to deceased grandfather, one chose to become a bird. There were few other wishes, but me...I asked for you." He paused, his breaths becoming heavier and heavier.

But she soothes him, hushing and rubbing a warm thumb against his frosty skin. "Breath."

And he did. The shadow prince released a shaky breath. Only in Elenora's presence could he breath. Or feel alive at all.

When she touched him, the monster inside slept. And everything was suddenly vibrant in a tsunami of colorful emotions. She was sunrise after over a century of darkness.

"All my life my heart has been a void, ravenous for something for which it cannot name. That fateful night we accidentally danced, I saw it buried deep beneath the midnight winters of your eyes. A comprehension of chaos.

I am nothing if not an intense longing to be known. And you knew me, better than I."

His voice was low and throaty, a pure strain of desperation. "I have loved you as I have loved nothing else before. I have loved you as no one or anything will ever be loved again."

A Raven is squawking overhead. Preaching ill-fated omens. This is when she knows their time is up.

She is being consumed by the raging fires of his eyes when she says, "In death I may have forgotten your face, your voice, the feel of your skin on mine but I have never forgotten you. Not your eyes, your warmth or the way we used to breath in sync. You'll eternally be familiar to me."

And then Gola was gone. She awoke and remembered everything.

A/N: (I'd like to clarify that Gola is waking up from nearly dying and that this isn't the end of the story. Ok, bye.)