Everlasting Curse

Lucien:

The iron door groaned as I shoved it open, its echo ricocheting down the stone stairwell like a warning bell. Good. Let them hear me coming. Let them think twice. The air in the wine cellar was damp and metallic, cold enough to bite through my shirt. Old barrels loomed in crooked rows, the scent of oak and age and forgotten spills mixing with the sharper tang that fueled my darkest desire.

I found the cask farthest back, turned the brass tap, and let the red spill into a goblet until it nearly overflowed. My throat burned for it—anything to quiet the gnawing in my veins. I swallowed the first glass whole, the liquid slick and warm, nothing like what I truly craved. A poor imitation.

The second pour trembled in my hand, not from weakness but from the thing thrashing inside me. Hunger, rage, desire—so tightly wound they were indistinguishable. I tilted the cup, watched the dark surface ripple. Not enough. Never enough.

Because what I wanted wasn’t in this cellar.

Her.

Damn her.

Isadora’s scent still clung to me, a phantom sweetness laced with power. Her blood was a melody I’d been forced to memorize, every beat of her heart a note that haunted my skull. I’d followed without realizing, silent and inevitable, until the door of her classroom swung open and there I was, stepping inside like a storm.

I should have left.

Instead, I pulled a chair beside her. Close enough to hear the rush in her veins, to watch the subtle quiver beneath her porcelain skin where her pulse danced like a dare. Every inhale drew her scent deeper, each breath a slow torture.

I couldn’t have her. So I did what I do best.

I pressed. I needled. I found every raw edge she tried to hide and dragged my words across them until she snapped. Her voice cracked, her eyes shone, and finally—finally—she broke.

A small victory. It would buy me distance. Maybe keep her safe from me. Maybe keep me safe from myself.

I leaned against the cold stone wall now, letting the chill sink into my back, pretending the glass of crimson was enough to drown the taste of her. My heartbeat steadied—until the heavy door upstairs slammed.

Footsteps. Quick, deliberate, carrying heat.

I knew before I saw him.

Kai.

The golden boy with darkness in his marrow, all righteous fury wrapped in a grin sharp enough to cut. So much like me it was nauseating.

I kept my eyes closed, savoring the last flicker of calm, until his shadow spilled across the cellar.

The next instant he was in my space, a blur of motion, his daggerlike nail biting into my chest.

“What did you do to her?” His voice was low, but it scraped like gravel.

I opened my eyes slowly, letting the blackness rim my irises show. “Who?” I asked, the small syllable dripping with a mock innocence I didn’t feel.

“You know who,” he hissed. “Isadora. I found her crying.”

The name was a blade, and he knew it. I let a laugh scrape free—a sound that didn’t belong to anyone sane. “So weak,” I said, leaning into the pressure of his nail until it threatened to pierce. “So frail. She won’t last here.”

“She will,” Kai snapped. His breath smelled of iron and ozone. “Whether you want it or not.”

I tilted my head, a slow, deliberate mockery. “I’m guessing she left you for her lover boys, then. You had to settle for the aftermath?”

His eyes narrowed, storm-dark and dangerous.

“You think she’ll ever fall for you?” I let the words drip like venom. “The mischievous trickster? The king of chaos?” I gave a soft, humorless laugh. “I doubt it.”

Kai’s jaw flexed, but he didn’t move the nail. The air between us thickened, charged with something feral.

The cellar suddenly felt smaller, the stone walls pressing in. The old wine barrels loomed like silent witnesses.

I could smell his anger—wild and sharp—matching the ache in my own veins. We were two predators circling the same flame, and she was the spark neither of us could afford.

But I didn’t step back.

I wanted him to strike.

I wanted the fight, the distraction, anything to burn away the taste of her that clung to my tongue.

Kai’s nail still pressed to my chest like a threat he hadn’t decided to finish. The wine cellar hummed with silence, a low vibration in the stone walls. Dust swirled between us, catching the torchlight like flecks of blood.

“Why?” he bit out, his voice a low growl that promised violence. “Why do this to her? Why do you hate her so much?”

The question slid under my skin, sharp as his nail. Hate. The words almost made me laugh.

“Hate?” I repeated, savoring the taste of it. “That’s a simple word for something far more… complicated.”

Kai leaned closer, his breath hot against my face. “Don’t play games with me, Lucien. You shattered her. For what? Your own amusement?”

A dark chuckle rumbled up my throat. “You think I have the luxury of amusement?”

He pressed harder, enough to draw a bead of blood, if I wasn't already dead. My skin healed as fast as he broke it. His eyes flared, but I held his stare.

“She’s a liability,” I said finally, the words a cold confession. “One I can’t afford.”

Kai’s jaw tightened. “She’s human.”

“She’s dangerous, Kai,” I corrected. “More dangerous than you realize. And I can’t—” I stopped, the next word a stone lodged in my throat. Lose. No. I wouldn’t give him that. “I can’t let her unravel what I’ve built.”

He scoffed, but the sound carried a flicker of uncertainty. “You talk like she’s a weapon.”

“She is,” I said, and my voice lowered to a whisper that echoed like a curse. “Not because of what she can do, but because of what she makes me want.”

The torchlight wavered. I felt the familiar burn in my veins, the gnawing hunger that had only sharpened since the first moment I scented her. Sweet, reckless, maddening.

Kai’s eyes narrowed, reading too much. “You want her.”

I bared my teeth in a smile that wasn’t a denial. “Want is a fragile word, Kai. This is need. And need is a curse I refuse to carry.”

“She isn’t yours to torture, to turn,” he snapped.

“You think I don’t know that?” My voice rose, a low thunder that vibrated through the stones. “Do you have any idea what it costs me to stay away? To watch her walk into this world of teeth and shadows, utterly unprepared, while every instinct I have screams to—”

I cut myself off, jaw locking.

Kai’s gaze sharpened, triumphant. “To protect her?”

“To consume her,” I hissed.

The air thickened, wine-soured and electric. The truth hung between us, pulsing like a vein ready to burst.

“She doesn’t belong here,” I forced out, softer now, the arrogance a brittle mask. “And I can’t let her stay. If she stays, I will ruin her. I will destroy everything that keeps her human. And when that happens, I’ll be the monster you already think I am.”

Kai’s grip faltered for the first time. The nail eased back a fraction. “So you break her heart to save her?”

“I break her to save myself,” I said, and the honesty tasted like ash.

For a long moment, neither of us moved. The torch flickered, casting jagged shadows across the stone.

Kai finally lowered his hand, though his eyes never left mine. “You’re a coward,” he said, quiet but lethal.

“Perhaps.” I reached for the goblet at my side and drained what remained, the metallic tang bitter on my tongue. “But I am a coward who survives. And survival, Kai, is the only thing I’ve ever been good at.”

I brushed past him, the scent of iron and old spirits following me like a cloak.

Behind me, his voice carried, rough and certain. “She will outlast you, Lucien, if you hurt her. No curse can stop that.”

I didn’t turn. I let the door slam shut and the darkness swallow the echo of his words—because a small, damned part of me feared he might be right.