Chapter 1: The Blood Oath
The carriage wheels creaked against the stones, a slow dirge to mark the death of her freedom.
Elira Ansleigh kept her hands folded tightly in her lap, knuckles pale, as the cold mist of the northern hills coiled around the moving vehicle like silent phantoms. Outside, bare trees passed like shadowed sentinels. Inside, her lungs burned from holding in every emotion that threatened to rise.
This was not how she imagined her life ending—but it wasn't death she was headed toward.
Not exactly.
It was worse.
The letter had arrived four days ago.A summons bearing the crimson seal of the Blood Court. Her brother's name scrawled in shaky ink at the bottom. Disgraced. Accused. Condemned. But no trial, no grave, no word of his fate. Only a demand:
"One blood in exchange for another. You may claim his place. You may serve."
And so she had.
Without protest. Without tears. Without goodbye.
Because if there was even a chance that Calen was still alive... she'd do it. Even if it meant walking straight into the devil's arms.
A sudden jolt snapped her upright. The carriage slowed.
The driver's voice echoed from outside, muffled and sharp. "We're here, milady."
"Milady." The word hung in the air like a mockery. She was no lady—just the daughter of a herbalist barely tolerated in the borderlands. No noble blood. No Court ties. No protection.
And yet, she had willingly signed herself into the service of Lord Lucien Thorne Vaelric, the Duke of Ashvale and one of the Blood Court's most feared nobles.
"His pet," the papers had said. Bound by law. Bound by blood.
The manor rose before her like a gothic cathedral carved from obsidian. Towering spires stabbed at the gray sky. Windows glimmered like eyes, too many to count, and the wrought-iron gates groaned open as if in protest of her arrival.
She stepped out, boots sinking slightly into damp earth. The air smelled of pine, snow, and the faint coppery tinge of blood.
A man in black stood by the entrance. Pale. Impeccable. Not Lord Thorne—but clearly of his house.
He didn't bow.
"Miss Ansleigh. Follow me."
She did.
Inside, the manor was cold enough to make her breath cloud. Stone walls rose high with ancient tapestries and flickering lamps that threw long, twitching shadows. Footsteps echoed against marble floors as the servant led her deeper—past corridors that twisted unnaturally, through doors that opened without a touch, and down a hall lined with portraits whose eyes almost followed her.
She shivered.
The servant stopped before a pair of enormous blackwood doors.
"He's waiting."
Elira's heart beat so loud it blurred the edges of her hearing. But she nodded.
The doors opened.
He sat alone.
A high-backed chair of carved bone. A fire that did not warm. A crystal of dark wine in his gloved hand.
And Lord Lucien Thorne Vaelric—exactly as the rumors whispered.
Tall. Impossibly still. Pale skin like porcelain drawn too tight. Hair black as void, falling past his collar. And eyes—
Eyes the color of dying embers.
He didn't rise. Didn't greet her. Just watched.
"So," he murmured, voice smooth and low, "this is the sister they send me. I expected more bone. Less fire."
Her mouth opened before she could stop it. "You expected a corpse?"
A pause.
Then—soft laughter. Cold, refined, amused.
"Not a corpse. Just silence. But perhaps I overestimated your fear."
He stood.
And gods, he moved like mist—no sound, no effort. One moment he was seated, the next he was before her, fingers lifting her chin before she could flinch.
"You smell like birch and foxglove," he said. "Your blood is loud."
She held still, breath shallow. "Do you always sniff your pets?"
"Only the interesting ones."
A pulse of heat flushed her face. She hated it.
With a flick of his hand, he summoned something small and gleaming from the nearby table.
A collar.
Silver and Lined with runes.
She stared at it.
"I believe you understand the terms of the agreement?" he asked, voice now flat and precise.
"Yes," she said, though her throat burned.
"No escape. No disobedience. No lies. And in return, I grant you safety. Shelter. Protection from the Court's teeth. All that I own, you serve."
He stepped closer, and the collar hovered at her neck like a noose.
"Do you consent, Elira Ansleigh?"
She hesitated.
She thought of Calen. His smile. His ink-stained hands. The way he used to tuck a sprig of mint behind her ear.
She nodded.
"I do."
The moment the collar touched her skin, it sealed with a sound like a whisper swallowed by wind. Cold sank into her bones. Runes flared faintly, then dimmed.
Pain bloomed sharp beneath her ribs—a prick, then a pull. Something inside her shifted. A bond. Not quite seen. Not quite known. But there.
Lord Thorne stepped back.
"And so the oath is bound," he said. "You are now mine."
Elira steadied her breath.
"No," she whispered. "I'm here because I chose to be."
He tilted his head, smiling like a predator indulging prey. "That's what all the pets say. In the beginning."
As she was led to her chambers, Elira glanced back at the vampire lord one last time.
And for just a breath—beneath the cruel lines of his face, behind the fire in his eyes—she saw something that startled her more than anything else.
Loneliness.
Deep. Ancient. Empty.
It vanished as quickly as it came.
But it lingered in her mind as the door shut behind her.
And in that silence, she realized—
She had not just entered a contract.She had entered a prison with velvet walls.
And the monster guarding it was not nearly as heartless as he wanted to be.