The acrid smell of stale beer and sweat stung Lyra's nostrils as she wove through the gyrating bodies of the dancers. This bar, "The Cauldron," was a veritable anthill on weekend nights, and the atmosphere was particularly agitated this Thursday. An insistent brush against her backside made her jump, and she turned, ready to shoot a venomous glare at the audacious client.
A predatory smile on his lips, the man—a hulking figure with a scruffy beard and dark-ringed eyes—grabbed her arm with disconcerting force. "What's a pretty flower like you doing in a place like this?" His voice was a guttural rumble lost in the ambient din. Lyra tried to pull away, but his grip was iron. Fear, cold and insidious, began to spread through her veins, threatening to paralyze her.
Suddenly, an immense shadow fell over them. A man whose face was obscured by the dimness of a hood grabbed the brute by the collar with unsettling ease. "She said no," a voice rumbled. It wasn't a shout, but a deep, almost animalistic growl that cut through the bar's cacophony. In a flash, the client was lifted from the floor, then slammed against the counter with a dull thud, before collapsing, unconscious.
The stranger slowly turned to Lyra. His eyes, an icy blue, gleamed with a strange, intense light, like two shards of ice beneath the moon. A scar ran along his temple, disappearing beneath the dark strands of his hair. He didn't look like a hero, more like a predator emerging from the shadows.
He extended a hand toward her. Lyra hesitated, her heart pounding in her chest. She expected questions, pity, but what he said left her speechless, breathless. His voice was low, almost a whisper, yet it resonated through the bar's chaos like a clap of thunder.
"You're mine, now. The contract is sealed."