Page 130 of Fratelli: Eternal Bloodlines

Chapter 52

The True Death of Don Vittorio

Vittoria’s Home - Syracuse, Sicily

April 21, 2018

Midnight (Day of Death)

“Answer me, Father!”Darlene’s demand echoed through the ancient stone walls of the Sicilian villa.

Vittorio sipped slowly from his goblet. The rich, dark blood coated his lips, and he savored its taste. Vittorio’s eyes drifted shut. His mind slipped further into the haze of madness that had taken him before. “If what you say is true,” he muttered, voice barely rising above a whisper, “why haven’t you brought this to your brothers? To me, before now—on the eve of my death?” His hand trembled, and the goblet shook. “Where is my salvation from my boys?”

Darlene straightened; cold determination settled in her bones. “Me,” she replied, her voice as hard as the stone floors beneath them.

Vittorio’s head twitched, eyes blinking rapidly as he drifted between lucidity and the darkening abyss of his dementia. Hiswords grew more disjointed. He no longer acknowledged her, lost in a more familiar world of shadows and whispers.

Darlene’s patience snapped. She clenched her fists. The charade had ended. She took a step toward the Don, summoning her powers.

“I have four sons,” the Don murmured. His voice filled with distant pride, but before he could continue, a violent blast rocked the villa. The force of it splintered the walls and shattered the tall, arched windows.

Darlene was ripped from Domencio’s form and thrown backward, crashing hard into the stone floor. Her body trembled, naked and exposed, her plan undone in an instant. She scrambled, desperate to regain control—to slip back into Domencio’s skin before the Don realized her deception. But the moment she tried, the air shifted, and a heavy presence flooded the room.

Domencio swept into the chamber, a dark vortex of power. Shadows coiled around him, his form shrouded in a swirling mass of black smoke. The force of his presence kept Darlene pinned to the floor. She’d never experienced his power in such a raw form. It exhilarated and scared her.

“Stay down!” Domencio snarled.

She nodded obediently.

Domencio’s darkness pushed against the ancient stone floors and walls as if the villa itself bent to his will.

Vittorio’s eyes gleamed with the fire of theDraquria. The ancient dragon-like power, long dormant, surged within him. It burned away the fog of madness that had plagued him. The Don’s gaze shifted from Darlene—naked and emotionally wounded on the ground—up to Domencio, who hovered above, surrounded by a storm of swirling black energy.

Rage twisted the Don’s face. His mind cleared in an instant as the full force of the Draca returned to him. “What madnessis this?” Vittorio snarled, his voice reverberated with fury as fire and shadows danced behind his eyes. He pointed a shaking finger at Darlene, the ancient power within him now outraged at the sudden offering. Because the old Don’s ego would not allow him to consider her presence was because she had fooled him earlier into believing she was his son. No. Her presence had to be some kind of penance from Domencio, revealing that Lucio had indeed betrayed him.

Domencio’s eyes mirrored his father. “You tell me!” he thundered and launched himself at his father with supernatural speed. The two collided in a vortex of shadow and flame, crashing through walls, their battle electrifying. Each strike sent cracks rippling through the stone, debris flying in every direction. Darlene backed away to the furthest corner. It was the only movement Domencio’s grip on her would allow. Vittorio, once the master of death and destruction, had regained his savage prowess, narrowly evading the lethal strikes of his son.

The room darkened. The only light came in from the fire burning within Vittorio’s eyes and the blood-soaked walls around them. The Don, his flesh torn and dripped with blood, suddenly he understood the prophecy—the curse laid upon him and his sons. The destiny he had tried so hard to escape was now before him.

Domencio’s strikes became fiercer, his power amplified by the gem that glowed in his hand. The surrounding air was now aglow with dark magic as if the villa itself was groaning under the weight of their battle. Vittorio, weakened by centuries of sin and blood, faltered, thanks to the gem and Domencio’s fierce determination to save Darlene over a father who set him up all his life to be second best. He moved in for the final blow. With a snarl, he ripped his father’s heart from his chest, the ancient organ still beating as it was torn free.

The moment Vittorio’s heart left his body, the room exploded.The Draquria—an ancient, bloodthirsty creature of the dark realm—erupted and climbed out of Vittorio’s caved-in chest and grew larger than life within milliseconds. It was free from its prison, deep within Vittorio’s rotted soul.

The sheer force of the deity’s emergence hurled Domencio backward. He landed near Darlene. Immediately, he threw up a protective shield to cover Darlene.

“Let me go! I can defend myself!” she fought back. He ignored her protests and kept his eyes trained on his childhood horror. He never wanted to meet the beast that lived within his father. And when the Draquria raised in stature and dark delight, both he and Darlene stared upward in awe and terror.

The ethereal dragon, made of blood and shadow, was before them. Its form shifted like liquid, a terrible fusion of the physical and the metaphysical. It exhaled flames, but not of ordinary fire—this heat carried the weight of a thousand suns, a hunger that could consume souls. Its wings stretched, made of darkness itself, and its blood-red eyes gleamed with malevolence. The beast let out a deafening shrill of power, nearly bursting their eardrums.

As it towered above them, it looked at them with pure hatred. Each movement is a ripple through the fabric of reality. The Draquria sought to meld with its next host. It could not exist in its present state for long. Once it claimed a soul, it would transform the vessel into a supreme vampire, a creature of limitless power and eternal darkness. Another Don Vittorio.

Domencio knew Draquria’s next target:Lucio. He could feel its pull, the desire to merge with his twin brother and unleash devastation on the world. He wanted to stop it, to slay the beast before it escaped. But then—Papa Legba emerged from the shadows.

The air grew still, cold. Thehoodoo Godgrinned, and he beamed with cruel delight. Dressed in his spectral finery, with his tall black top hat and cane, his presence was a tangible force in the room. He extended his hand toward Darlene, who lay naked, powerless on the floor.

“You failed, girl. That Dragon isn’t mine. But you are… a bargain is a bargain.”

The surrounding air thickened, her body trembling as Legba’s magic bound her.

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