Amara’s POV
The word hung between us like smoke.
He didn’t flinch.
He didn’t rise.
He set his pen down with the same care a vampire uses to close a coffin.
“Sit.”
“No.”
His jaw tightened.
“Sit, Amara.”
My name in his mouth did something terrible to my insides.
Deep in my mind, Mist stirred weakly, a faint whisper that barely registered under my consciousness.
I gripped the chair harder and stayed standing.
“How long have you known?”
He leaned back.
The leather creaked.
His crimson eyes raked over me, slow, clinical, like he was appraising livestock for the blood harvest.
“Long enough.”
“That’s not an answer.”
A muscle jumped in his cheek.
“Years.”
The floor tilted.
“Years,” I repeated.
“I was older.
You were a child.” His voice didn’t change.
No apology.
No softness.
“My spirit Caius caught your scent at a clan gathering.
I followed it.
I saw a scrawny half-blood child with scraped knees and a dead warrior’s legacy.”
“So you walked away.”
“I walked away.”
My hands were shaking.
I pressed them flat against the back of the chair so he wouldn’t see.
“My father died for yours.” My voice came out thinner than I wanted.
“He bled out on a battlefield protecting your father from the ancient ones.
And you let us starve.
You let my mother work until her hands crack from serving pure-bloods.
You knew what the blood moon destined us to be, and you still—”
“Sentiment.” He said it like a curse.
“Your father did his duty.
That’s what blood-sworn warriors do.”
“He was your fated mate’s father.”
“You were not my blood mate yet.”
The sound I made wasn’t quite a laugh.
He stood.
God, he was tall.
Taller than me, which didn’t happen often.
He came around the desk slow, platinum cufflinks gleaming, and stopped just close enough that his ancient cedar scent curled into my mouth.
Deep in my mind, Mist threw herself against the walls of my consciousness so weakly I almost didn’t feel it.
He’s in pain too, came the faintest whisper.
Look at his aura, Amara, look—
I didn’t look.
“Here is how this blood contract will function,” he said quietly.
“I will not formally reject you.”
Relief tried to rise.
I crushed it.
“That’s not mercy.”
“No.
It isn’t.” His mouth curved, bitter.
“The blood moon’s will does not forgive severed fated bonds.
A formal rejection would bring the ancient curse down on this clan.
Failed harvests.
Stillborn offspring.
Warriors turning to ash.
I will not gamble the lives of my people on the pride of one half-blood girl.”
“Then acknowledge me.”
“Absolutely not.”
The words came flat.
Final.
“You are ranked below the blood servants, Amara.
Your family is a cautionary tale in this clan.
I will not stand before my people and tell them the blood moon chose you to be their Blood Queen.
They would laugh.
My alliances with the pure-blood houses would crumble.”
“So I’m nothing.”
“You’re a problem I am managing.”
Tears burned.
I refused them.
I had not cried in front of this vampire as a child, and I would not start now.
“Here are the terms,” he continued, like he was reading harvest quotas.
“You speak to no one of this blood bond.
Not your mother.
Not a friend.
No one.
You will not approach me in public.
You will not touch me.
You will not let another male feed from you.”
“And you?”
His eyes flickered.
“I will continue as I have.
Lydia remains.
She is advantageous.
Her uncle’s territory borders ours, and pure-blood alliances require displays of commitment.”
“Your blood companion.”
“My political arrangement.”
“You expect me to exist like this.” My voice rose.
“Watching you with her.
Feeling it through the bond.
Every time her blood calls to yours.
Pretending—”
“You will adapt.”
“I won’t.”
“You will.”
I stepped back from the chair.
My knees had stopped shaking somewhere along the way.
A cold, clean fury was taking their place.
“I graduate soon.”
“And?”
“And then I’m gone.
I’m taking my mother and leaving this clan.”
He watched me.
Didn’t blink.
“You’ll do as you’re instructed until then.”
“Or what?”
A faint smile.
Not kind.
“Don’t ask questions you can’t afford the answer to.” He gestured at the door like he was dismissing a blood servant who’d finished changing the linens.
“Out.
I have territories to inspect before nightfall.”
Mist was whimpering now.
Actually whimpering inside my mind like a wounded animal.
Don’t go, please, he doesn’t mean it, he’s in agony, stay, fight, he is ours—
I turned on my heel.
I yanked the door open and walked straight into a wall of expensive perfume.
Lydia.
Tight crimson dress.
Heels I couldn’t have run in if someone paid me.
Lipstick painted on like a blood seal.
She took one look at me, split cheekbone and all, and her perfect nose wrinkled.
“Darling, why is there refuse in your office?”
“Careful, sweetheart.” Killian’s voice had gone silk-smooth behind me.
His hand landed at the small of her back, light, practiced.
“A school altercation.
Nothing worth your concern.”
“She’s bleeding on the Persian rug.”
“She was just departing.”
He didn’t look at me.
Didn’t glance back.
He steered Lydia past me like I was furniture, murmuring something about a boutique in the city, an hour’s drive to the pure-blood district, whatever her heart desired.
Her heels clicked away down the marble hall.
I stood there in the doorway until my lungs remembered how to work.
Outside, the perpetual twilight had deepened to full darkness.
Grand Duke Nigel stood on the stone terrace, hands folded behind his back, watching the long black car pull around for his Prince.
His grey eyes caught mine.
For one blink he looked sorry.
Genuinely, quietly sorry.
Then his expression closed and he looked away.
I walked.
Down the drive.
Past the iron gargoyle pillars.
Onto the cracked road that led back to the human quarter.
My boots hit puddles.
My cheek throbbed.
Mist was barely a whisper inside me now, pacing weakly, bargaining.
He said he wouldn’t reject us.
That means something.
That means—
“It means he’s a coward.”
He has a clan to protect—
“He has a reputation to protect.”
Please.
Please, Amara.
We could make him love us.
We are his destined.
The blood moon chose—
“The blood moon made a mistake.”
Mist flinched like I’d struck her.
Then, small and stubborn: He’s ours.
“He’s not.
And we’re not his.”
I cut between two buildings to save time.
A narrow service alley behind the blood banks.
Dumpsters.
A puddle of something dark rainbowing in the gutter.
My shortcut home.
Halfway down, a shape peeled off the brick wall.
Dorian.
Gauze taped across the bridge of his ruined nose.
Both eyes already turning purple-black.
Behind him, four more pure-blood academy brats.
Heath.
Cyrus.
Quentin.
Gideon.
My stomach dropped.
“Half-blood.” Dorian’s smile split his scabbed lip.
“I’ve been waiting.”
Something glinted in his hand.
He let it swing lazy on its chain.
Silver.
Worn metal.
A warrior’s pendant, too meaningful for his worthless neck.
My father’s honor medallion.
The one that had gone missing from our trailer weeks ago.
“Recognize it?” Dorian purred.
“Found it in a pawn shop in the human quarter.
Paid practically nothing.
That’s about what a dead warrior’s worth, right?”
Mist snarled weakly.
“Put it down,” I said.
“Come take it, worthless trash.”
Five pure-bloods.
One half-blood.
No Prince.
No clan protection.
No one coming.
I squared my shoulders.
Lifted my fists.
Set my feet.
I would not cry.
Dorian moved first.
His knuckles cracked across my cheekbone, right on top of the split from this morning, and white sparked behind my eyes.
Cyrus’s boot drove into my stomach and the air left me in a wheeze.
Arms locked around me from behind.
Hot breath reeking of fresh blood in my hair.
I slammed the back of my skull into his face.
Cartilage gave.
He howled.
Then all five of them came at me at once.