A red feather materialized as Arthres’s form crumbled into fleeting embers. Wrath snatched the feather. Crimson flame devoured it. The flame burned a deeper shade of red. The feather slipped away from her slender fingers, fading away along with the ashes of its fallen kins. Luther stayed still where he was. The battle. No, the execution of Arthres in the hands of Wrath went out one-sided.

Surrounded by the ashes of her own kin, the Sinner of Wrath gazed the ashes faded into her fiery crimson flame. She erased them completely. The wrath turned her attention to him. They locked eyes. Heaven and the abyss.

“Your eyes tell me everything in your mind. How could she kill them? Her own kin, who shared the same fate as hers.” A pair of black, scaly horns emerged from her head. Luther held his hand on his sword. He expected something was coming towards him. Luther waited for her to strike first. He kept her in his sight. Silence stretched over between them. Water dropped and echoed the stone wall, ticking the passing seconds.

She’s not doing anything.

The wrath had both her arms on her side. Crimson eyes peered into his gifted eyes. Though he had his agreement with Gizem to find the wrath, he won’t expect himself being dragged around on the devil’s palm. If she had only attacked him first right there and now, Gizem’s speculation of her true nature will shift his mission from protecting her to ending her now. However, the sinner whom he thought to be a devil in disguise did nothing, not even when he went unconscious after the fight against the Sinner of Sloth.

Why won’t you fight?

Luther sighed in defeat. He relaxed his shoulders and returned his sword back to its scabbard. The knights were looking for him. He ought to return to them soon before they found the sinner.
Wrath raised her brows. She mumbled something in a low voice when one of the scarlet butterfly rested on her shoulder. As he turned his back away defenseless, the flowery pattern on his silver bell illuminated. He waited for the surprise.

“You’re an odd one,” Wrath commented. “Why won’t you brandish your sword and judge my sin?”

Luther turned over his shoulders. Her arms spread opened, revealing nothing of her tricks placed in her words. “Cleanse me off from this land so your people could be free.”
This time, it was Luther’s turn to raise his brows. He didn’t expect those words to come out from a sinner’s lips.

She wants me to kill her.

A shadowy hand emerged to her chest, holding something in its palm. A short chime of a bell rang inside his head as it called out to its master. The sinner held it up towards him. “This caught your attention.” It was the bell he lost along with the red silky ribbon. Here he thought the bell swept away with the torrent of the waves.

“Why a righteous mortal such as you carry a sin?” Her finger twirled the ribbon around.

Luther held his palm out to her. "Give it back."

His voice rang inside her. The crimson eyes tore away from the bell and looked at him.

“That voice…How is that possible?“

He beckoned his hand towards the bell again. “The bell and the ribbon. Return them to me.”

The corner of her lips lifted in amusement. “Well, isn’t this fascinating? You can talk without the need of your mouth.”

Footsteps approached where they were. Voices of his knights called him out.

“Now!” Luther panicked.

She unwrapped the red ribbon, tossing the bell to him. Luther caught the bell in his hands. He turned back to the ribbon.

“That too—”

Wrath interrupted him. “You shouldn’t carry anything that’s red.” A shadow of an arm behind her took the ribbon away. “I’ll take away this sin.”

She twirled away in the opposite direction. The cloak wrapped around her, bursting into scattering fiery embers of scarlet butterflies. She flew away from his sight again. Luther watched her disappeared. He got used to the same sight.

Clink!

The bell in his hand rang. Before he realized it, his head split opened by the next sound. Unfamiliar voices whispered in him.

“You’re being too soft. That thing isn’t a child.” A female exasperated.

“Is this alright? Letting a product of Mael’s run free like this. I can kill him.” A male asked.

“Really Fallon? You’ll do it despite that painful look on your face. I doubt you can finish this brat.”

A sigh silenced them. “Leave him. Even if we bring him with us, he is already bound to death.” It was the wrath. The only voice he recognized. Then, the other voices were her comrades. Why was he listening to this conversation that he wasn't involved in?

“Leaving him only let the wandering shadows kill him.” Another male voice added. “Weren’t you furious about its existence? You should end it here like you were supposed to years ago.”

The wrath said nothing for a moment. They waited for her answers. “I did and I still do. But I can’t kill him anymore. Whenever I looked at him. I could only see Mael. He is a part of Mael. His master created him not out of love as a father or creator, but to get rid a part of him. Even after betraying us, Mael never truly left us. That was someone else. Our Mael is here.”

Luther gasped out for air as the voices faded. His breath shivered. The bell gripped in his hand, almost shattering it. Some cracks were visible on its metal. He only heard mortal and heaven. Not a voice of a sinner passed to him. Yet, he was listening to voices among the seven sinners.

Dear heaven, have I become tainted by the devil's voice?

 

*      *      *      *      *      *

 

The cloak unraveled her to the light. Scorch left on its wake when her feet touched the ground. She ignited her flame in her palm. Devouring what was a part of Mael filled most of her empty energy. She can now travel further in the shadow of this land without the restraint of the daylight. Before she knew it, she was right in front of a forest, close to Ashendel.

An intoxicating smell tickled her nose. Her skin crawled as the sweet and seductive aroma tempted her closer. She knew right away what the smell was — Roses.

A gust of wind blew away red petals of roses in the forest and rained down everywhere. They fell on her bare skin. Sinful desire disguised as harmless petals touched her. She could feel those hands slowly stripping down her cloak, her skin, then to the deepest side of her soul. Ethel let those hands bare their claws on her until the flame inside her burned their touches.

I won’t let it touch you. The butterfly claimed. Touch of Wrath cloaked her immediately before the petals touched her.

“Good, let’s be on our ground. I don’t want to repeat the same mistake.”

An outburst cackle of female laughter came from deep within the forest. Ethel followed the sounds, ignoring the petals falling on her. Anything came into contact with her turned into cinders.

Soon, the overbearing intoxicating rose was replaced by the pungent smell of blood. In an open field of roses, a woman in a white dress drenched in a blood sat among the thorns. On her lap was a young boy. Flesh ripped out from his body. From his mother’s embrace, a chunk of his meat and blood dropped from his mother’s lips that once whispered a lullaby. The woman devoured her own kin as if he was her last meal. The boy’s lifeless eyes stared at the clouded sky. To his despair, the heaven was closed as dark gray curtains shut its gate.

“It’s alright. Everything will be fine. Your mother will give you a new vessel. You’ll just have to enter my body again so you could be born healthy and young. Again and again.” The mother brushed her cheek against the boy’s.

Ethel tore her eyes away from the sight of the blood. It was disgusting. An act committed by her own friend — Ophelia, the Sinner of Lust. The youngest among the seven sinners. Ethel never thought the naive girl clueless about love would go to such madness.

“There she is!”

Ethel snapped from her daze when mortal presences approached the area. She buried herself inside the shade of a tree. They stepped into the horror. They had the same reaction as her. One of them couldn’t hold it anymore and went far away from the scene. They shut their eyes and mouths upon hearing their comrade emptying his stomach.

“We’re too late.”

The mother shushed them with her finger. “Shh, don’t wake my child.”

“The abyss clouded her mind. Let’s end this quick.”

A sword drew out from its place. The knight walked behind the mother’s side. Its blade sliced the mother’s neck swiftly. They threw their torches into the field, burning the vessel of a fallen mother and son together in the bed of roses. In her last moment, the mother clung to her son close.

“Dear gods, forgive this mother. Forgive us.” They prayed to the closed heaven.

Ethel left the field to the mortals. Blooming spots of red were all she could see. She stroked the petal, reminded of herself brushing the red hair of a sinner. They considered Ophelia as the youngest one among the sinners. Although they remembered nothing of her age, Ophelia acted similar to a mortal girl who dream of love and affection. A naïve and childish thought to someone who died and lived for more than a thousand years.

Red rose was her abyssal. Roses came in distinct color including the red. They doubted Ophelia being one of the seven. Ethel trusted Ophelia the moment she touched the flower presented by Ophelia herself. It didn’t burn. It was her time touching the silky petals without burning them. Now the same flowers killed a mother and a son. It even tried to kill her. Through those acts, it erased everything she once knew of the naive girl. Ophelia shown herself becoming a true sinner.

When Ethel finally reach the end of other side, she stepped into a cliff which overlooked the whole town of Ashendel. Smokes rose from the hearth of homes. Buildings sat closely together. Walls closed off the town. The sight brought nostalgic memory. It didn’t look any different from the former Lamifel. She left Lamifel with nothing but embers. But these mortals rebuild the town from its ashes.

She reached her hand out to Ashendel. Her eyes shut to shift her attention to her sword. Small embers appeared, scattering behind the walls of their homes.

“Weird. It’s only one sword, so why am I seeing many of them?”

A decoy perhaps?

“Maybe. No mortals can remove the sword without being burned. Still, a decoy?” Ethel examined the scattered embers. It had a distinct feeling of its flame. A fleeting ember barely could live up for a half a day. Some already extinguished itself and depart away. Then, new ones would move from one place to another.

“I should check on these first. Something must have happened to the sword without my knowledge.“

As she took a step away, a figure brushed past in the corner of her eyes. Startled by its sudden presence, she turned to it. A braided black hair girl swayed side to side as she run down the hill.
Ethel’s hand raised towards the girl. “Be careful or you’ll fall.” She gasped at her own voice. Her lips shut closed in shock, but her own voice echoed inside her.

The girl twirled around and waved back. Red eyes lit up in glee. “My Lady, better start running or I’ll leave you. I heard the mortals are sealing those rabbit-like-candies.” She ran off without a care. The stumbling rocks on her path didn’t stop her. Meanwhile, Ethel stayed rooted in the same place. The further the girl went, the smaller her figure became.

“Emma, wait for me.” Ethel held her hand out. The girl disappeared in second. Waves of crimson fire flooded Lamifel. The scarlet butterfly rested on her hand, weighing her hand down. The scene returned to normal.