Chapter 2

He built a little villa just for me, and he punished every servant who had bullied me, banishing them all.

After that, every morning, a fresh flower wet with dew waited by my pillow. I learned later that he picked them himself in the garden behind the castle, before the night was even gone.

He couldn't cook, but for me he learned to make soup.

He set the kitchen on fire three times, and the steward got so angry he threatened to quit.

The fourth time, he stood in front of me holding a bowl of barely drinkable pork rib soup, sleeves rolled to the elbow, his arms spotted with grease.

"Taste it," he said. "This one shouldn't make you throw up."

I took a sip. It was so salty it turned bitter. But I finished it.

"It's good," I said.

That night, I reached out and took his hand.

His hand was cold, but the way he held mine was light, like he was afraid of crushing something.

"Nora." He said my name.

"Mm."

"Do you know why I didn't refuse when they sent you to me?"

I shook my head.

"Because of that one look on the bridge," he said. "When I signed for the 'gift,' it was because I knew it was you."

I froze.

"You recognized me?"

"From the first day," he said. "Your eyes haven't changed."

We held a wedding in his castle. But the happiness was short. Word got out that we were in love.

The Elders of House Karstein learned through the castle servants that I was a hunter's descendant.

To a pureblood vampire family that had passed down six hundred years, a hunter is a born enemy, a blood feud written on the first page of the family records.

The Elders were furious.

The Great Elder, an old vampire who had lived twelve hundred years, leaned on a silver-headed cane and questioned Lucian in front of everyone in the council hall.

"Do you know whose descendant she is? Her ancestor killed seventeen of our kin. Hunter's blood runs in her veins. You keep her, and you betray the whole bloodline."

Lucian stood in the center of the hall in that black tailcoat, the silver crest at his collar catching the candlelight. His back was very straight, his voice low but every word clear.

"I know who she is. I know what runs in her blood. But she's mine."

"Yours?" the Second Elder sneered. "A hunter? A hunter her own family threw at us like garbage? You think you're worthy of the Karstein bloodline?"

"Take that back." Lucian's voice dropped, and the temperature in the hall fell several degrees all at once. That was the pressure of his pureblood line. Even facing an Elder who had lived a thousand years, his power was not something to dismiss.

The Second Elder shut his mouth.

The Great Elder was silent for a long time. At last he said, "I'll give you a month. Either you send her away, or you bear the consequences yourself."

Lucian didn't answer. He turned and walked out of the hall, went back to the castle, shut the door, and came to stand in front of me.

"Nora."

"Mm."

"Let's go."

"Go where?"

"Away from here," he said. "Somewhere they can't find us."

Lucian took a few changes of clothes from the castle, a pouch of gold coins, his father's silver crest, and that photo of me. He left the castle key at the front gate and walked away without looking back.

We ran for two years.

The first year, we hid in a small town on the northern border. He worked at a tavern in town, and I helped out at the tailor's next door.

We were poor, but happy.

Every evening he came home with a piece of bread the tavern owner had given him, or half a bottle of cheap red wine.

We tore the bread apart, dipped it in the wine, and sat on the windowsill of our rented room watching the town's stars.

Back then he still had his power. He was a pureblood noble, strong, and he beat back the people House Karstein sent after us several times. I thought we could go on hiding like that forever.

But in the second year, the Hunters' Guild found my trail too.

I had betrayed the hunter's blood and taken up with a vampire. To the Guild, that was unforgivable. They sent a kill squad, led by my cousin Caleb Holt, to "clean house."

Caleb stood across from me, a silver stake in his hand, and looked at me with nothing but disappointment in his eyes.

"Nora, do you know what you're doing? You're with a vampire. Your ancestors are watching you."

"I know," I said.

"Then come back with me. The Guild will let it go, as long as you kill him yourself."

I glanced at Lucian. He was looking at me too, and in those deep red eyes there was no fear, no tension. Only a calm that looked like he already knew the answer.

"No," I said.

Caleb’s face darkened. “Then don’t expect me to hold back because we’re blood.”

In that fight, Lucian took on five hunters alone. He won, but he was badly hurt. A silver dagger had opened a long gash across his chest, and the bleeding took a long time to stop. I knelt beside him, bandaging him with shaking hands, my tears dropping onto his wound.

"Stop crying," he said softly. "It doesn't hurt."

"You always say it doesn't hurt."

"Your tears hurt me a hundred times more than these."

The Hunters' Guild and the Vampire Council found our hiding place almost at the same time.

It was a rainy night. The fireplace was lit, and Lucian was reading me an old book of poems.

Then the lights went out.

I stood up and pulled the silver dagger out from under the pillow, the one Lucian had given me. He always wanted me to keep it for protection. Lucian moved in front of me, his eyes glinting dark red in the black.

The door was kicked open.

Caleb looked at the two of us and sneered. "Nora, don't you understand yet? You're with a vampire, and neither side will let you go. The Guild sees you as a traitor. The Council sees you as an enemy. You have one road out. Kill Lucian, and come back with us."

An Elder of House Dragomir spoke too, his voice like rusted iron scraping. "Lucian von Karstein, you betrayed the bloodline and sided with hunters. Your crime is beyond pardon. But the Council is willing to give you one last chance. Execute this woman with your own hands, and your noble standing will be restored."

Lucian held my hand and tightened his grip.

"Nora." He bent his head and looked into my eyes.

"Mm."

"Are you afraid?"

"No," I said. "With you, I'm not afraid of anything."

He smiled. Then he turned to face both forces and said something that left them all stunned.

"I won't kill her. And I won't let her kill me. If you want us dead, kill us together."

Caleb's expression changed. So did the Dragomir Elder's.

"As you wish, then."

The fight lasted less than ten minutes.

However strong Lucian was, he couldn't hold off five hunters and six pureblood vampires at once. I tried to help him with the silver dagger, but Caleb kicked the weapon out of my hand and pinned me to the ground.

"Watch," he said. "Watch the man you chose die."

The Dragomir Elder bound Lucian's wrists with a silver chain. His chest, his arms, his back were all wounds. Silver leaves injuries that don't heal fast, and his blood spread across the floor.

Lucian was stripped of his noble title, all his property confiscated. The family lands and the castle were handed to House Dragomir. His pureblood power was sealed by the highest magic the Council had, sealed away forever. From then on, apart from being ageless and deathless, he was no different from an ordinary human.

As for me, the Guild's punishment was crueler. They didn't kill me. They activated the ancestral curse in my blood. Caleb did it himself.

"From today," he said, pressing his hand to my forehead as he finished the incantation, "you must stand against this vampire. If you go soft on him, the curse will activate. The first time is a needle. The second time, a knife. The third time, your heart will be torn apart from the inside by your own blood."

"If you make him leave you, make him hate you," Caleb said, "the curse will stop. That's your only way to live."

I lifted my head and looked at Lucian. Two vampires held him up, and he was covered in wounds, barely able to stand. But he was still looking at me.

"I'm sorry," he said, his voice raw.

I didn't cry. I smiled at him, and I said the thing I'd regret most for the rest of my life.

"Lucian, let's break up."

He went still.

Then he said one word. "No."