The Blood Toll

Malia KilsythThe smell of beeswax and burning incense usually brings people peace. To me, it just smells like cold marble and dead promises.I stood in the far transept of St. Patrick’s Cathedral, hidden in the shadows of the massive bluestone pillars, watching the candlelight flicker across the portrait of my older brother, Callan. Four years. Four years since they pulled his body out of the Yarra River, full of Calaby lead, and not a single day had passed where the taste of ash in my mouth felt any less bitter.Outside, Melbourne was drowning in a miserable autumn downpour, the rain beating hard against the stained-glass windows. Inside, I was drowning in my own silence.I reached out, my fingers trembling slightly as I touched the edge of the brass votive stand. The metal was icy. My sun-bronzed skin looked almost ghostly beneath the dim nave lights, but my grip on the small lighter was steady. I lit a single candle, watching the yellow flame spring to life, reflecting in the dark

Last Updated : 2026-08-30

THE PATRIARCH’S DEMAND

MALIA KILSYTHThe air inside my father’s study always tasted like old mahogany, expensive scotch, and dead dreams.I stood in front of his massive oak desk, my posture rigid, my fingers dug so tightly into the leather of my handbag that my knuckles were stark white. Outside the arched windows of the Kilsyth estate, the Melbourne drizzle slicked the dark glass, blurring the distant lights of the city. Down at the docks, the port war was tearing our territory apart, byte by byte, bullet by bullet. But inside this room, the silence was far more lethal.Alastair Kilsyth didn't look up from his papers immediately. He let me bleed in the silence. It was a powerful move, one he had perfected over fifty-eight years of ruling our family with an iron fist. He took a slow sip of his neat Macallan, the ice clinking softly against the crystal, before finally raising his obsidian eyes to meet mine."Sit down, Malia," he said. His voice was a low, gravelly rasp, devoid of any paternal warmth."I’ll

Last Updated : 2026-08-30

THE WARDEN’S SHADOW

MALIA KILSYTHHis thumb was still warm against my lower lip, a phantom brand burning long after he pulled his hand away.I didn't draw the knife tucked in my waistband. I didn't scream for the guards stationed outside the heavy double doors of the estate. My body remained locked in place, paralyzed not by fear, but by the sheer, suffocating gravity of the man standing inches from me.Jarrah Calaby didn't look like a Don who had fought his way to the top of Melbourne's bloody underworld; he looked like a natural disaster carved into the shape of a man. The sharp angle of his jaw, the faint trace of a scar cutting through his left eyebrow, the broad plane of his chest beneath immaculate black wool.everything about him broadcasted absolute, lethal control."You shouldn't be here," I breathed out, forcing the words through a throat tight with fury. "This is Kilsyth territory. If my father’s men catch you""Your father’s men are currently taking their orders from me," Jarrah interrupted, h

Last Updated : 2026-08-30

SISTERLY SECRETS

MALIA KILSYTHThe quiet in the eastern wing of the estate was a fragile thing, brittle as ice and just as easily shattered.I stood by the window of Elena’s conservatory, watching the rain beat a relentless rhythm against the glass. Below, on the gravel driveway, the dark sedan carrying Jarrah Calaby had long since vanished into the Melbourne fog, but the ghost of his touch still burned against my skin. My lower lip still felt heavy, warm, and branded by his thumb. My blood was a chaotic storm of hatred, disgust, and a sickening, electric pulse of awareness I refused to name.Behind me, the soft rustle of silk drew me out of the spiral."Malia?"I turned to see Elena standing in the doorway. In the dim, amber light of the conservatory’s floor lamps, my sister looked like a watercolor painting left out in the rain delicate, washed out, and entirely out of place in a family built on blood and narcotics. Her pale, porcelain skin seemed almost translucent under her soft cream cardigan, an

Last Updated : 2026-08-30

All Chapters of BOUND BY THIS BLOOD CONTRACT : Chapter 1 - Chapter 4

The Blood Toll

THE PATRIARCH’S DEMAND

THE WARDEN’S SHADOW

SISTERLY SECRETS