We walked across the unforgiving barren lands, barely having any sort of conversation until the coldness of sundown surrounded us.

"I've noticed something," said Shade, capturing my attention.

"What?" I asked curiously.

"I know nothing about you" he replied with an inviting smile.

I watched my feet as I walked and sighed.

"There's not much to know," I said honestly.

"Come on, entertain me" he smiled, tilting his head slightly to the side.

"Well, my supposed mother died when I was young so I never really had the chance to meet her, my fake father never talked about her either, which now that I think about it, isn't even that surprising since I doubt that she was my real mother." I blurted with absolutely no emotion in my voice "Oh and let's not forget that my real father is the psychopath that we are trying to kill"I finished with a large sigh and a humourless laugh.

"As interesting as that makes you, I want to know a bit about the real you" he laughed.

I looked up at him in curiosity, not many people had asked me to tell them anything about the 'real me', it was always just the case of rehearsing the same story, with the same stupid monotone, to give off the fabricated impression that I was ok with it all.

"Like what?" I asked, not knowing what to tell him.

"Well, what your favourite colour?" he asked in amusement.

I thought hard for a moment, it was a seemingly easy question, but there were so many different colours out there.

"Probably some form of a dark blue" I replied after a moment of thought.

"Why" he questioned.

"I guess it reminds me of the sky, you know, when it holds its last before fading into darkness," I said thoughtfully.

"What about favou-" he began, but I cut him off before he could finish his question.

"Wait! what about you?" I asked "If you get to know about my life, I should get to know about yours, besides, you know a lot more about me than I do of you" I finished convincingly.

He looked at me in thought so I raised my eyebrows at him and imitated his signature smirk.

"Fine, my favourite colour would have to be a certain deep shade of purple," he said, shaking his head slightly.

Before I had the chance to ask him why, a loud shriek cut through the calming air, followed by a range of voices and whispers.

"What is that?" I asked, clutching my ears tightly.

A sharp pain, followed by a louder chain of voices instantly shot through my ears and travelled around my body, making me stop dead in my tracks.

"What is it?" questioned Shade, looking over me in concern.

I screamed out in pain and dropped to my knees, desperately trying to drown them out, it felt as though somebody was pushing two daggers into my ears in some horrible form of torture.

"Can't You hear that?" I whispered, not knowing if he heard me.

He looked around frantically before his eyes landed on something in the distance, he dropped down in front of me and grabbed my arm, immediately making the voices stop. I took in a deep breath and slowly moved my hands away from my ears to see that they were coated in blood.

"How?" I asked, desperately trying to push back the tears that threatened to fall.

"This place is a passageway for demons" began Shade, still deep in thought "You're angel blooded... and I'm demon-blooded" he finished, pulling me to my feet.

I nodded my head and wiped the blood off my hands before linking my right hand in Shades. I suddenly felt relief in the fact that we had left the others behind, I dreaded to think what would happen if Shade couldn't protect them all from the forsaken souls.

"Then we will do this together," I said, pulling him forwards with me.

He jogged slightly to catch up and protectively tightened his hold on my hand.

"Don't let go of me, the voices will return if you do," he explained, voicing what we both knew aloud.

I nodded my head and walked in silence until the river came into better view, it stretched horizontally as far as my eyes could see and contained various twist and turns. As we neared it, I noticed that the water was a ghostly grey colour and had some sort of faint lights that formed swirls and spirals flowing gently through it.

"What are they?" I asked, not sure if I actually wanted to know.

"The voices" replied Shade seriously, the river's depths clearly putting him on edge.

I looked above the river's water, to see a faint glimmer here and there, leading me to believe that there was some kind of forcefield in place.

"How are we going to cross?" I asked, looking for my own solution to cross the river as the question lingered in the air.

"We have to swim... its the only way across" whispered Shade in an awful realisation.

An unnatural wind immediately picked up and surrounded us in a grey blur, at first I believed that Emrick was going to show up but, after a minute had passed I realised that it was another way that this cursed place was making our journey harder, it seemed that even the universe didn't want us to help Sebastian.

I continued to scan the area in calculation, trying to spot the best area to swim, but the foggy wind made things difficult.

"Look at me" said Shade softly.

"Over there!" I exclaimed, pointing to the thinnest part of the river that I could see.

"Look at me!" he shouted louder, quickly gaining my attention.

"If you let go of me, your soul will be lost forever," he said, a hint of pain flashing through his eyes. "It's a fate worse than death" he finished in a sudden panic.

"I won't... I promise," I said confidently, grabbing his other hand in mine.

"You can't promise something that you have no control over" he shouted over the raging winds.

I opened my mouth to say something but he immediately grabbed the side of my face with his free hand and looked down at me with an unreadable expression on his face.

"Do you know why purple is my favourite colour?" he asked in a softer tone.

I shook my head slowly and looked up into his deep crimson eyes.

"It reminds me of you," he said sincerely, making my heart skip.

"Sha-" I began, only to be cut off.

"No, listen to me... please," he said, his features softening. " I could never survive losing you Aurora...and that means that I would walk through hell and back one hundred times over if it meant that I could keep you safe, so I have to do this... even if you feel nothing" he finished, a mixed emotion of fear and determination crossing his features.

"W-what do yo-" I started.

Shade let out a small sigh before he quickly stepped forward, closing the gap between us, he looked down at me one last time before he crashed his lips onto mine, I froze in place as thousands of stray thoughts that roamed my mind drifted away until only this moment existed. I began to kiss him back slowly but the kiss immediately turned passionate, causing a familiar electricity to course through my body, but there was no pain, no wrong feeling, everything felt... right.

A loud rumble of thunder sounded above us, causing him to pull away all too soon. As soon as I opened my eyes, I was met with his, but they weren't their usual blood red...they were gold. I blinked multiple times and watched as they faded back into their deep crimson.

"Its always been you," He said with a slightly shaky voice.

He kissed my forehead and pulled me into a tight hug, a bolt of lightning struck the floor behind him, making me tightened my hold on his torso. I closed my eyes and inhaled his foresty scent, wondering how I could be so blind... how only the thought of losing him made me realise my true feelings towards him.