Amara’s POV
I jolted awake in the dead of night, a searing agony tearing through my chest like molten silver.
The pillow beneath my face was drenched with tears by the time the worst of it subsided.
My legs refused to support me as I crawled to the bathroom on trembling hands and knees.
Under the flickering fluorescent light, I lifted the hem of my worn t-shirt with shaking fingers.
A bruise had bloomed beneath my ribs.
Deep purple, almost black at the center, fading to a sickly yellow-green at the edges.
In the middle of it, a thin split in the skin wept clear fluid tinged pink with blood.
I hadnt fallen.
Nothing had struck me there.
I knew exactly what this was.
The blood contract.
The cursed bond Killian refused to honor, refused to break, taking its brutal toll on my body every time he touched her.
Every time he fed from Lydia instead of me, his true blood mate.
Mist whimpered somewhere deep in my mind, a broken sound from my dormant vampire spirit, and I lacked the strength to comfort her.
Somewhere in his grand estate, in silk sheets and candlelight, Prince Killian had his fangs in Lydia’s throat.
And the blood contract we shared, the one the Blood Moon had forged between us, punished my human flesh for his betrayal.
My ribs.
My bones.
My very soul.
I pressed my palm against the weeping wound and breathed through clenched teeth.
If I did this to him, if a half-blood like me dared make a pureblood prince bleed from within, he would drain me dry.
Publicly.
As an example to every other low-clan mongrel who forgot their place.
I opened the medicine cabinet with trembling hands.
Half a roll of gauze.
A strip of medical tape, its edges curled.
I dressed the wound the way my father had taught me before the Pendleton family had him killed.
Fold.
Wrap.
Tape.
Dont cry where the neighbors might hear.
I pulled my shirt down and returned to our threadbare couch.
The sky was gray when I heard my mother moving in the kitchen.
The electric kettle.
A spoon against chipped porcelain.
The soft creak of the chair that should have been replaced years ago.
I smoothed my expression into something neutral before sitting up.
“Morning.”
“Morning, sweetheart.”
She was already dressed for another endless day, dark circles under her eyes like bruises.
Her skin had the translucent quality of someone who never saw sunlight anymore.
“Mom,” I said carefully, studying her face.
“Another double shift today?
Which job is it this time?”
She attempted a smile that never reached her eyes.
“The blood bank this morning.
Then the late shift at the twenty-four hour clinic.
If my feet hold out, I might pick up some cleaning at the Moonlight Diner.”
“Mom…”
“Dont, Amara.”
She wouldnt meet my gaze.
She lifted her mug to her lips without drinking.
“I need to tell you something,” she said finally.
“I wasnt going to mention it this morning, but you have a right to know.”
Something cold slithered down my spine.
“Know what?”
“Prince Killian increased the tribute for this hovel last week.”
My blood turned to ice in my veins.
“How much?”
She swallowed hard.
“Fifteen hundred a month.”
The mug nearly slipped from my numb fingers.
“Fifteen hundred?”
“Yes.”
“For this?” I gestured furiously at the water-stained walls, the cracked linoleum, the ceiling that leaked every time it rained.
“Hes an absolute monster, Mom!
A complete—”
“Amara, keep your voice down,” she whispered urgently, reaching across the table to grasp my wrist.
“There are no other vampires for miles.”
“There are always ears.
Always watchers.
And you know the Blood Council never sides with humans against purebloods.” Tears threatened to spill from her eyes.
“Just give me more time.
Please.
Let me figure out how to get us away from here before I have to watch you limp to that school again.”
I looked down at my swollen ankle, then back at her exhausted face.
“Youll be late,” I said quietly.
“Ill walk.”
She kissed my forehead with lips that felt like ice.
“I love you.”
“I know, Mom.”
The door closed with a soft click.
I walked on an ankle that screamed with every step, and each movement sent fresh fire through the wound beneath my ribs.
I spotted him before I made it through the front doors.
Nigel, Killian’s lieutenant.
Standing at the entrance like a stone gargoyle, his pale eyes tracking my approach.
He fell into step beside me without a word as I limped toward my first class.
“No,” I said flatly.
“Princes orders,” Nigel replied in his emotionless monotone.
“You should know Prince Killian is monitoring the school’s security system personally today.”
I stopped dead, the wound under my shirt throbbing with renewed heat.
“Then tell him something for me,” I whispered, my voice dripping with pain and venom.
“Since you can speak to him through the blood link so easily.”
Hugos expression remained unchanged.
“Tell him,” I hissed, “if I am truly his blood mate, he needs to stop feeding from that pureblood bitch.”
Hugos eyes went distant for half a second—the telltale sign of a vampire communicating through the mental link.
Almost instantly, the heavy classroom door burst open.
Killian stormed in.
He didnt stop until his fingers closed around my upper arm like a steel trap.
He dragged me into an empty classroom, Nigel following to block the exit.
Killian released me, his crimson eyes flashing dangerously.
“Are you spying on me?” he demanded.
“How else would you know what I do in private?”
Instead of answering, I let out a bitter laugh and lifted the hem of my shirt.
I peeled the gauze down just enough to expose the proof.
I didnt look at it myself; I watched his face instead.
The dark, agonizing bruise and the weeping wound were undeniable evidence of what our blood contract was doing to me.
His jaw dropped slightly.
For one fleeting moment, genuine guilt flickered across his aristocratic features as he stared at the physical price of his betrayal.
But just as quickly, his expression hardened back into cold marble.
“Lydia stays,” he announced with arctic finality, before turning on his heel and stalking from the room.
Nigel shadowed me for the rest of the day, sitting beside me in every class.
At lunch, he stood nearby while I ate alone in the courtyard, the wound under my shirt burning with each breath.
During final period, I was called to the main office.
The secretary handed me the phone with a grim expression.
I pressed it to my ear.
“Amara, this is your mothers supervisor at the blood bank.
She collapsed during her shift.
The paramedics are taking her to the hospital now.”
The phone clattered to the floor.
I sprinted from the office, down the hallway, and burst through the front doors into the pale afternoon sunlight, ignoring the searing bolts of agony shooting up from my injured ankle.