Regis Lucis Caelum Novels & Stories

Just the smell of ozone and unfinished responsibility lingering in the air. Selena stood there alone, blinking at the decaying altar while water from the storm began trickling across the stone floor like it was staging a coup. Her eye twitched. Her soul twitched. Her lower back twitched because she’d landed like a sack of wet laundry. God knew she tried. She recited every spell she vaguely remembered from internet rabbit holes. “Abracadabra,” “Leviosa”—not “Leviosar,” she corrected herself mid-prayer—and even, in desperation, “Escucha las palabras de las brujas, los secretos escondidos en la noche...” while raising her hands like she was in a soap opera for witches.

She began to read the Latin spells and as she did so, the winds outside blew even stronger and the thunder began to boom loudly. “A regno Salem, utriusque mundi potentia, te ab imo extraho. Alligo spiritum tuum et haec vasa sancio. Egredere, quia non es destitutus, relinque et nunquam redi, quia non tibi opus est,” Selene read as fast as she could.

Cole mind-linked me that it was Latin. “Velum temporis, nunc discede, Ostende umbras quae latuerunt. Umbrae praeteritae, secreta tua revela, Veritatis lux in silentio splendeat. Hoc carmine, scaena redeat, Concede mihi visum hesterni diei.”

Igor’s priority had simplified: the child, Caelian’s body, and the removal of anything he considered a threat to either. On the third afternoon of the week, the air in the smaller solar folded open without warning. Lucifer stepped through as if he had simply walked in from an adjoining corridor rather than crossed the barrier between realms. The heavy horns caught the light from the windows. He looked first at Caelian, at the clear curve of the pregnancy under the soft robe, at the tiredness around his eyes, and something complicated moved through his expression before it settled into the usual ancient calm. “You look better than the last time I saw you,” Lucifer said. “Less like a strong wi

He only gave Darius that level, knowing look—the one that had haunted him since boyhood, as if Lucien could read all the truths Darius tried to bury. With a sharp gesture, Darius dragged a dagger across the map, scoring the parchment at the northern pass. “Send word to our outposts. We move within the week. If the girl is the fracture line, then I’ll decide where the break happens.” Lucien inclined his head, though his eyes lingered on his Alpha for a moment longer. “As you command, Caelum.” The name hung between them—Caelum—the legacy title, heavier than chains, colder than crowns. And as Darius Caelum looked back at the fire, his golden gaze burned with a promise only he could hear:

I'll love you until the day I die and every day after. Please, for the love of God, don't come back. Don't try to save me. Don't try to save us. Just live. Live well. Live happy. Live like I never existed. That's the only gift I can give you now. — Julian I read the letter three times. The words blurred and refocused. My tears spotted the paper. Then I walked downstairs to the kitchen, where Julian was making breakfast. Lily was at the table, drawing a rainbow with crayons that had escaped their box.

"Would you finally be willing to tell me your name, beautiful?" Rebecca had not yet answered when Celeste moved. She stepped in front of Rebecca, placing herself between the young woman and the two bodyguards flanking Lucius. Her expression turned sharp and guarded. "Who are you?" The instant she moved, the bodyguard named Hugh reacted as well. He stepped in front of Lucius without waiting for an order. "Sir. Be careful." Lucius ignored him. His gaze settled on Celeste, and his eyes lit up once more. "Hello, beautiful. I'm Lucius. Lucius, as in light and innovation, illuminating young minds."

POV: Rhea Mooncrest "Close your eyes, Rhea! Don't look at it! It's trying to pull your mind apart!" Rhea heard the scream, but it felt like a sound drifting from the bottom of a deep, dark well. She couldn't obey. Her body was no longer hers to command. The golden blood Lucien had forced into her veins was singing—a high, piercing note that resonated with the colossal, violet eye tearing through the fabric of the heavens. The pressure was immense, a physical weight that pinned her to the ice altar while the cathedral around her began to dissolve into shimmering particles of frost and shadow.

The following morning, the sky bore a hazy gray shroud. Rain tapped gently against the cathedral’s stained-glass windows as the air hung with a chill that seeped into the bones. Isabella stood in the hallway of the church’s eastern wing, her gaze fixed on the statue of Saint Lucia—protector of vision and light. There was something poetic about it, something that echoed her current torment: clarity through affliction.

Like the world below doesn’t exist. Like the swarm isn’t coming. Just this. Just us. Suspended in mist and heat and need. He pulls back—eyes golden, wild, pupils blown. **Lucian (voice rough, breath ragged):** “Hold on.” Wings beat—powerful, thunderous. We rocket upward. Through the clouds. Into clear sky. The sun—my sun—flares brighter, answering my racing heart. Wind screams. Cold bites. His heat anchors. We break the cloud layer—sun blinding, warm on wet skin.