Nailed to the Wall, Reborn for Vengeance

On the altar, thirteen blood-moon lamps burned, their scarlet flames lighting every pale face.

Count Louis Ashford knelt before me, silver-white hair falling over his shoulders, a black rose crest pinned to the collar of his formal robes.

He raised his hand and held up a silver ring carved with ancient runes.

"Isela Vane, I swear by my blood, my soul, and the endless night. I ask the Council of Elders to approve our eternal blood pact."

Prayers of blessing rose all around.

In my last life, it was in those prayers that I lost my head, believing I had finally won Louis's heart.

My family carried the First Ancestor's bloodline, but we had fallen into decline in the Night War a century ago.

Louis, meanwhile, was young and powerful, with three Nightborn cities under his rule.

I once believed he wanted to marry me because he loved me.

Only later did I understand that it was never me he wanted.

He wanted the power passed down through the Vane bloodline: the power to awaken the Sacred Blood Crystal and mend the Night Veil.

I looked up at the Council of Elders on the high platform. As a child, I had once drawn on the Vane bloodline without meaning to and summoned the fading shadows of my dead forebears.

Grand Elder Cyrus Blackwood had warned me sternly then: never use the Blood Echo unless it was a matter of life and death.

And today was exactly the time to use it.

"Isela?"

When I did not move, impatience flickered in Louis's eyes, though his smile never slipped.

I was about to raise my hand when hurried footsteps sounded from beyond the altar.

"Grand Elder! Something's happened!"

One of Louis's attendants, Owen Mercer, rushed into the hall with a wooden box in his arms.

As Owen dropped to his knees, the box struck the stone steps with a crack.

Grand Elder Blackwood frowned.

"Who gave you leave to barge into the sanctum during the Bloodline Rite?"

Owen trembled violently, his voice pitched high.

"I was ordered to take inventory of the Sacred Blood Vault, and one of the Sacred Blood Crystals offered to the First Ancestor is missing."

"I traced the lingering scent, and I found these in Lady Isela's chambers!"

He threw open the box. Inside lay several crystal shards.

A layer of blackened ash clung to their edges. Their power had been stripped away by forbidden arts.

The hall went silent.

The Sacred Blood Crystals were relics offered to the First Ancestor, kept in the deepest part of the Sacred Blood Vault. Only the Elders and the vault keeper could go near them.

Stealing one was worse than secretly drinking a clanmate's blood. It was enough to mark someone as a traitor.

Owen pressed his forehead to the floor.

"I also found a forbidden curse hidden in Lady Isela's amulet, one that veils blood scent."

"If she hadn't hidden her scent on purpose, the crystal could never have left the vault!"

Murmurs rose at once.

"Isn't Isela a descendant of the First Ancestor? How could she do such a thing?"

"She might have stolen the crystal to strengthen her bloodline..."

Ellie Marlowe sat among the witches, clutching her gloves, her eyes rimmed red.

She looked up at me as though the sight of me broke her heart.

"Isela, the First Ancestor has watched over the Nightborn for thousands of years."

"If you were afraid your bloodline was failing, you could have asked the Council for help. Why go this far?"

Louis rose slowly. He looked first at the shards in the box, then at me.

Shock and disappointment flickered in the eyes that had once made my heart race.

"Isela, tell me it isn't true."

In my last life, that one sentence had thrown me into a panic.

I rushed to explain, to prove myself, to grab the way out he was offering.

But this time, I only looked at him and slowly smiled.

The moment I came back, I had already sent word to Cassian Helmer, Commander of the Enforcers.

Now I wanted to see what kind of spectacle they had planned for me!

I lifted my skirt and curtsied to Grand Elder Blackwood.

"Grand Elder, since Owen says this was found in my room, I will of course cooperate with a full investigation."

I paused, then drew a shard of black blood crystal from my sleeve.

"But first, Grand Elder, I have a pact of my own. I ask the whole clan to bear witness."