30 Day Image Prompt Competition

Day 15 Prompt 2 - The Bride

         The lock gave with easily under one well-placed kick, thrusting the door back into the room with such force it split into two halves as it hit the wall. Luca burst into the room, weapon drawn as he swept the room with his silver eyes.
         “Is she here?” Dante asked as he joined his brother in the room.
         “No, there is no sign of Rosita. She must have gone up to the chapel.” Luca’s mouth thinned in frustrated anger as he holstered his weapon. “Dammit!”
         “If she’s gone to the chapel, Nico will get her. She won’t get away, this time.” About to turn around and exit the room, he paused as he caught site of a door hidden in the shadowy corners. “Luca,” he called, pointing to the door.
         Luca turned and looked towards the door. He could feel his muscles tensing as he neared the barred wooden door. His hand reached out, hesitated for a second, before closing in on the rust coloured bar. What if she wasn’t in there? What if they were too late? Doubts assailed his mind, freezing his body until he was unable to move.
         Sensing his brother’s fears, Dante placed his hand over his Luca’s forearm. “It will be alright, Luca. We will find her.”
         Taking strength from his brother’s unending support, Luca slid the bar across the door and pushed it open. The squeaking of hinges sounded loud in the silent room as they stepped forwards into a small bedchamber. It appeared to have been abandoned for many years, fine white cobwebs spread down from the ceiling and from the edges of the few items of furniture that had been left behind.
         Dante picked up the lantern and moved it around the room. Wallpaper was peeling from the walls where the dampness had seeped through. There was no carpet on the floor or drapes at the windows. The air smelt stale and musty as though no one had disturbed it for a long time yet there was a faint trace of something sweet, something spring like that had caught their attention. Feeling hope rising, Dante swung the lantern around once more before halting at the image the flickering flame revealed.
         She sat on a bare bench by the window, dressed in the white wedding dress she had worn on the morning of her disappearance. Her glossy black hair, piled on top of her head in an elegant chignon, looked dull and lifeless beneath the fine silver cobwebs that were entangled within it. Her eyes, stared sightlessly at them, no trace of recognition or life within their once vibrant depths.
         Luca approached her with hesitant steps as he tried to find signs that his beloved bride was still alive but there appeared no response to his presence. He reached out, his hand trembling slightly, and touched her cheek, his heart faltering at the coldness he felt. He was too late. He had lost her. Rosita had won. He wanted to howl his heartbreak to the moon, to find someone and rip them limb from limb to ease the pain the was searing his soul.
         “Let me see her.” Dante, aware of his brother’s tortured soul, slipped past Luca and crouched down in front of Callie. He moved the lantern with long, slow sweeps past her vacant eyes searching for some form of reaction. For several long seconds there was nothing but then he stood, sweeping the empty birdcage onto the dusty floor so that he could lay Callie flat on the bare bench.
         The crashing of the falling birdcage roused Luca out of his stupor and he looked at his brother with confusion in his eyes. “What are you doing? Leave her alone. We are too late.” His voice was thick with emotion, his accent pronounced as he stared down at Callie’s still body.
         “We are not. She is still in there but we don’t have a lot of time.” Dante rummaged around in his bag before pulling out a small vial they had collected earlier. “Luca, we can save her.”
         Snapped out of his sorrow by his brother’s words, Luca crouched down beside him and looked at Callie’s serene face. “What can I do?”
         “We need to get this antidote inside her, to start with,” Dante replied as he started to trickle the contents into her mouth. He massaged her throat in an effort to get her to swallow but there was no response. “Dammit. This won’t work unless she swallows! She’s too weak!”
         Luca watched his brother for a moment before standing and shrugging out of his padded jacket. “I know what to do,” he said as he rolled his white cotton sleeve up, revealing a tanned, muscular forearm covered by a faint dusting of dark hair.
         Dante stilled, recognising what his brother was about to do. “Luca, are you sure about this?”
         Luca nodded. “We had discussed this before the wedding and she had said that she was not averse to it, she just needed time.”
         “She hasn’t had a great deal of time,” Dante pointed out.
         “Neither had she got a great deal of time,” Luca rejoined. “If we are to save her, this is the only way.”
         Recognising that his brother would not be dissuaded from his course of action, Dante nodded and stepped backwards to allow his brother better access to Callie. Luca’s fangs elongated, their tips glowing in the lamplight. He raised his wrist to his lips and tore a deep hole, piercing the arteries exposed to his bite. As the blood pumped from his wound, his talons lengthened into lethal points, sharp enough to shred the toughest flesh.
         “Forgive me,” Luca whispered against her unresponsive lips before he dripped his blood over his talons, coating them in the rich, dark liquid. Without warning he plunged the talons deep into her chest, straight to her heart so that his rich blood would mix with hers and be pumped around her body. He kept the talons buried deep for several seconds before removing them and sitting back to wait for a reaction.
         After a few long, drawn out seconds where his heart felt like it would never beat again, Luca almost wept with joy as he watched her body twitched into rigidity before she bolted upright, her bloodied chest rising and falling rapidly as she fought to get her breath. As her breathing started to ease, the jagged holes in her chest started to pull themselves together, healing almost instantly, leaving barely a scar against the golden flesh. With a deep, shuddering breath, Callie turned and looked at Luca, her green eyes sparkling like emeralds in the golden light.
         “Luca,” she breathed as she caught sight of him, her voice a gentle caress across his nerves. “What have you done?”