“Why do you say that?” she said somberly, memories of their relationship all the way back to their first encounter flashing through her mind. Her voice lowered to a whisper. “It was you from the very beginning, Dean... don’t you remember?”
*
"Italia, she's magic bound I'm afraid." Aleksei spoke softly, "However, I've an inside source working in the shadows to see about freeing her." Vera had a knack for slipping into the most secured places and getting out without getting caught. She's a natural.
*
Pitying him now, wasn't she? Here to rub it in? And yet her words leaned toward the opposite, as if she didn't just make it clear in her actions whom she'd chosen. Was she just playing him now?
"Find that hard to believe, you made your choice, didn't you?" He crossed his arms, trying to tone down the wild fluctuation of power crackling around him. She shouldn't get close, he's a danger now. "You even played a song for him."
Adacio shook his head. He remembered the vile extremes the royal Italians would gladly go to to protect and ensure their power. Their fortress was virtually impenetrable, protected by a force of black magic witches whose practices dated back to the pre-Babylonian era.
He knew this because they had once forced his hand into their court. As the Lord of Hell, they regularly employed his dominion over the demonic forces of the underworld through conjurings and dark rituals.
They would sacrifice their own to retain their superpower status. The only ones that rivaled them were the French, who were known to barter with Fallen Angels, though their loyalty was questionable as it was volatile.
“We will have no choice but to face them soon, I’m afraid...” Adacio said, looking toward where the Nephilim and his fated love would be. “Do you think they are ready for this, Aleksei?”
*
Isabella stepped forward defiantly, her hair rising all around her face and reaching toward Dean like a million tiny hands. It truly was like static cling, the way his energy pulled her toward him.
“I played a song for him?” she repeated, furrowing her brows. “Look, I don’t know how to explain this to you. It was like a dream. It wasn’t me. I don’t even know how to play the piano.”
She crept even closer, this time reaching a hand toward him. Goosebumps erupted all over her flesh, making her hair stand on end from his electric pulse. Her fingers laced around his arm, crackling loudly as she did so.
She winced slightly, but held on as the shock vibrated through her body. The pain would wane—she didn’t know how she knew, but she was certain it would.
“I-... I get these visions...” she said. “From another time and place. Please, Dean, you have to believe me.”
"I'm aware, it's inevitable." He may have sent Vera to keep an eye on things, but without back-up, she might well meet her match. Or her end. But she wasn't going to take those chances.
Mina approached him, her gaze steady, at his side once more.
To the query he sighed, "Whether they are is yet to be seen." In the end, they had to stand up and fight or all would be lost.
[/center]*[/center]
She didn't know? Dean blinked and glanced up at her, was she messing with him? But the look in her eyes would prove even that wrong. At her approach, he kept still, weary. Then she touched him and he swore it did something--everything fizzled out--like she was canceling out the crazy. He couldn't explain it. But there it was, her touch was like an ocean wave, cascading over him.
Another time and place huh?
It aligned with what the vamp had mentioned.
Explained what that entire thing was about. In a way.
He let out a heavy breath in an attempt to force out the tension. "What, did you envision his old lover or something? I swear, you're a magnet for all things weird." Less heat in his tone this time.
Isabella shook her head. The woman she envisioned wasn’t just a lover. She was something else entirely. Almost the same way Aleksei and Isabella couldn’t title their connection, this woman she saw in her vision transcended her beliefs.
“I don’t know, Dean...” she said softly. “I can’t see her face. It’s like we share the same soul, or something... we’re connected in a way I can’t describe or understand. I can see a different world in her eyes, and feel a million things, and remember memories I know aren’t my own.”
She tugged on his arm slightly, as if trying to pull him into her mind.
“In my most recent visions, she is trapped in what looks like a temple of some sort. There’s sand under her feet, falling from above her head, and glass all around. There’s a million candles, and a woman, a priestess—“
Her words would resound through the halls and reach Adacio, who would stiffen the moment he heard them. He looked knowingly at Aleksei. Did he know about these recent visions of her? Did he know about the priestess?
So, a reincarnation? Of all creatures did she have to have any ties with a vampire? It couldn't be helped eitherway. He sighed.
Then she tugged at him as though she really wanted him to listen, or believe her.
He already did.
"Wait, if you're her reincarnation wouldn't that mean her soul is in you?" He was trying to understand, "Then she's alive if she's trapped somewhere else right? Maybe you're a descendant?" Or tied by more magic. Further proving his point.
A priestess?
He slowly nodded, going by her tone it looked like bad news.
"Ok, then, if we're going to find her my bet is on whatever is linking you to her could lead us to wherever she is." If it was that strong to possess Isabella to the point of granting her piano skills she's never had or seeing another life, it had to be enough.
"Luckily we got Angel Uber to whoosh us over." Because he had no idea how to make portals so don't ask him to.
*
At the glance, Aleksei nodded, "It's a delicate situation and time isn't on our side. If we're to act, we must do so with caution." They all had to be on the same page here. "Let's not rock the boat anymore than it's already been. We've a plan in the works, but could use a valuable back-up."
Isabella sighed a breath of relief at listening to Dean’s words. Though they described her strange predicament, she found comfort in knowing he was at least trying to empathize with her. It was short lived, however, as soon a deep feeling of dread swept over her.
Reincarnation.
Why did she get the feeling that this anomaly would prove to be fatal?
Goosebumps erupted all over her flesh as if Dean had shocked her again with his light. She was searching the memories in her mind of books she read about reincarnated beings, and one factor almost always remained the same—they were the product of unfinished matters, perhaps as an avenger of some sort—and their lives rarely ever ended well.
Her eyes traveled over to the corridor toward Aleksei, searching almost pleadingly for him, then for Adacio, and finally back at Dean. All three of them were linked somehow, and she was one of their points of contact.
“I need to channel her,” Isabella finally said. “I need to access her memory in a more concise way. And—“ She held a hand to the golden etching along Dean’s heart, where a faint, warm glow emanated from. “You should speak to Adacio about his relationship with her.”
He watched her as she took in this bit of info, she definitely looked freaked out. And who wouldn't? It's not like she asked for any of this. Hell, she'd probably wish her life had been normal. The only issues then would've been school and maybe gossip stuff. Make up. Though she didn't have to worry about that, she didn't need it.
At her touch he blinked and peered down at her hand, that same glow had yet to fade.
"... It's awkward, you know?" He still couldn't wrap his head around having a celestial father when his dad was a hunter.
Isabella nodded at him, offering a gentle smile. All of this was awkward. From the very beginning, the moment they met was awkward. She almost giggled at the thought. Since their lives had entwined, all they’ve ever known was awkward.
“Imagine being the reincarnation of your guardian’s old lover,” she quipped, then her countenance fell slightly after a long pause. She wanted to remain hopeful, but her heart was growing heavy.
She studied Dean, his aura radiating like a halo around his head. Why did she suddenly feel heartbroken? Like they were going to be permanently star-crossed? She feared her time with him would be short, but she didn’t know why.
“I know, but he has a lot of the answers you and I are looking for.” She finished calmly.
That quip made his lips twitch. Alright. So, she wanted to play who's got it worse, huh? "Or living a lie your whole life. Well, too bad we can't just imagine it away." But it's the same crap that wounded up with them meeting. Couldn't give that up could he? "Still, as messed-up as it's gotten, I met you through it. That's gotta count for something." Regrets? Didn't know him. He stared right back her, that light in her, she had to keep that burning or else they'd all be fucked to hell.
It's the only thing that kept him going.
His hand found hers, fingers shaky as they held on. The one life-raft keeping him afloat in the sea of monsters.
"Yeah, right... But I lost you for a second." He touched his brow to hers, when were they ever going to catch a break? The stock-pile of crap would just keep coming wouldn't it? He closed his eyes, taking a breath, "But all I can think about right now is keeping you safe. Can't lose you again." He whispered.
That gentle smile blossomed into a full blown grin at his sweet words. It was the first time since they met that he had admitted anything like this to her. Was it the Nephilim in him surfacing? Or had she somehow finally managed to break through one of the many layers of his hard armor?
Feeling his warmth, and the electricity cracking softly from his flesh, her hair rose all around them again, a static cling unwilling to let go, as if sharing his sentiments. With one hand still on his heart, she brought the other to his face, her topaz eyes staring deeply into his.
“You will never, ever lose me, Dean,” she assured him, her voice serene but her tone unwavering. “I promise I will always be here with you. Until the stars fall from the sky.”
She pressed her palm gingerly into his chest, as if implanting herself where his heart was. As she did so, the glow brightened beneath her fingertips, as if her own light had joined his.
Then a chorus of voices echoed around them in faint whispers, but their tone was the polarity of what had taken place in the crypt. These Enochian murmurs were pleasant, like lovers speaking to each other in a language only they could understand between themselves. When Dean pressed his brow to hers, a tiny twinkle of light erupted upon impact.
Sigils appeared beneath their feet, encasing them in a diagram, but these were not written with the same urgency as Adacio’s tomb engravings. These looked as if they were written carefully with loving hands, sprawling slowly all around them like petals unfurling.
And then, in the film reel of her mind, Dean was suddenly not quite himself anymore. His face, though almost a stark doppelgänger, had now become Adacio, though much younger. His hair was the same sandy blond, but his eyes were that distinct steel grey.
Isabella pulled away only a few inches to observe him. He wore the robes of a royal, and his wings were milk-white, almost silvery feathers that gleamed as if reflecting sunlight.
It was that moment she knew she was in a memory.
”We were never meant to get this far, mío amore,” Adacio said, his voice deep with melancholy.
“Is there nothing else that can be done?” Maria questioned him almost pleadingly. “Please tell me there is another way, Carino. There must be!”
Adacio looked away.
“There is not, Tesoro. Perhaps in another lifetime, you and I will be together,” he said. “It cannot be in this one.”
Tears filled her eyes as she desperately clutched his robes. His gentle hands attempted to soothe her, his own eyes becoming misty.
“Please, don’t do this,” she begged. “We can find another way.”
“Ti amo, mío amore,” Adacio whispered, before a cloaked seraphim came behind him with a blade set ablaze, and struck his wings. Immediately, he was consumed in a pillar of wildfire that stripped his wings of their beauty, leaving wretched, taloned, membranous deformities instead. His blond hair turned a charred black, and then he was cast from Maria’s grasp with an agonized cry while Maria screamed in horror after him.
Isabella came to, not realizing that tears were silently streaming from her face. She looked up at Dean, then sank her face into his chest, where the etching was still glowing brightly.
Dean opened his eyes again unsure of what look he had except it sure as hell was a little too raw for his liking. Yet, he didn't mind it so much with her anymore. He leaned into her touch, shoulders dropping at the ebb of his tension falling away at the contact. How she did that, who knew? "Let's hope they don't fall anytime soon, yeah?" His voice took a lower quality, husky sounding.
He embraced her harder and that light in him brightened. As if she were rekindling a dying flame, roaring to life.
The voices chimed in, more like a chorus, he ignored them best as he could. But when a glow at his feet made him falter, what the hell was this now?
She pulled back and stared with that far-away look in her eyes. A vision? Again?
"Isabella?"
Hand still linked with hers, he waited it out, she started crying. Whatever she was seeing must've been rough. His fingers gave hers a squeeze, a reminder that she wasn't alone.
Then he pulled her back into his arms, would this end after they saved Maria? He sure hoped so.
Isabella needed her life back.
"It's alright, you're okay." He whispered into her ear. They had to get through this somehow. They had angels, fallen angels, vamps and one pissed off hunter on their side. Had to even the odds.
Right?
“Dean, your father...” Isabella murmured into his shirt through her tears. “...your father is—“
“Lord of the Underworld,” Adacio finished as he stepped through the corridor into their line of sight. “A Fallen Angel, yes, but Lord nonetheless.”
Isabella straightened up at once, wiping her tears and turning to observe Adacio, who was watching them carefully with no expression on his handsome features.
He stepped closer to them, his hands folded behind his back, steel grey eyes alight as they fixed themselves upon the girl. Although she clutched Dean tighter, she did not cower despite his almost menacing countenance.
“I know that look, Lombardi. I’ve seen it before, from a woman I dearly loved, many lifetimes ago,” he continued, stopping at an arm’s length away from the pair. “I do not need your sympathy. Do you know how I came to be Lord of Hell?”
Isabella shook her head, her brows furrowed.
“I conquered it.”
At once, the sigils that surrounded Dean and Isabella glowed brightly, causing Adacio to take a step back and raise a hand to his eyes. The voices began again, though their loving tone has distorted into a more threatening decibel. Isabella’s hair fanned around them again, and Adacio smirked.
“God’s favorite daughter,” he chuckled, shaking his head almost in disbelief. “Fallen in love with my Nephilim son. Do you realize the magnitude of this fated union?”
Isabella held onto Dean, turning to meet his eyes, though she knew they would be fixated on his father, ready to refute him.
“There are ones who pray, battle and wait for lifetimes for just a taste of what you two share.”
"Couldn't be further off the range of normal. Welcome to the club." Dean quiped, his dad was a hunter. That wouldn't change. But sure, his father was the great Lord of Darkness. Ok. Cool. He regarded the stranger with at least some civility. The man looked capable of destroying everything in sight.
But Dean could look him in the eye without wanting to shit a brick. So that meant something.
He held on to her regardless, she was connected to him too?
At the revelation Dean sighed, conquering Hell of all places. Must be a badge of honor.
And then their world out up again as his approach activated the sigils again. A protective barrier? Would it work on vamps too or was it just angel—lord of hell proof?
The question made him look up, why did Adacio make it seem like they were a Royal couple or something?
Wait. Did he just say fallen in love? Isabella?
"When are you going to start making sense?" He gripped at Isabella's shirt. "Why are you acting like it's a big deal?"
Sofia elicited a ear piercing shriek that rang through the temple halls like an explosion. Her hands were violently trembling, and blood was weeping from her eyes and nostrils.
“Separate... THEM!!” She snarled, her eyes rolling to the back of her head as she did so. A thick, inky blackness slithered from her open mouth, echoing that phrase over and over.
At the demonic sight, the monks that had joined her recoiled in horror.