The morning sunlight pierced through the fog like pale gold threads, doing little to warm the bones of Veyruhn. Elian woke with her head pounding and her chest tight, the memory of the dream or vision still clinging to her like frost.
She hadn't told anyone about slipping out in the night. Not Mira, not Mr Calderon. No one!!
She splashed cold water on her face in the small bathroom of the inn and stared into the cracked mirror. Her reflection looked normal messy auburn hair, tired green eyes, pale skin but something about her felt… altered.
She hadn't just seen a figure. She had felt him.
"Elian," Mira said from the other bed, her voice groggy, "are you okay? You were tossing around all night."
Elian hesitated. "Just a bad dream."
"Was it about that creepy cathedral again?"
"Yeah," she lied. "Probably."
Mira yawned and rolled over. Elian dressed quickly, stuffing her notebook into her satchel before heading down to the inn's modest library. She needed answers. Something, anything that could make sense of what she was feeling.
*******************
The innkeeper was an old woman with eyes as sharp as blades. She barely glanced at Elian as the girl scanned the dusty bookshelves, finally pulling out a weathered leather book with no title.
Inside, faded ink scrawled across brittle pages.
"…And thus the Bloodbound Oath was sealed when a vampire of the Veil Court dared to love a beast born of the moon. The punishment was swift. The curse eternal."
A chill prickled down her spine. She flipped through pages of forgotten rituals, stories of blood magic, star-forged chains, and oaths that could bind souls across lifetimes.
Elian's fingers paused on a small, hand-drawn sigil. An open circle with thorns at the edges and two crescent moons within it.
This were the same symbol she saw in her dream.
**************
Beneath the Cathedral – Damian Awakens
Far below the earth, past the crumbling foundations of Veyruhn Cathedral, Damian Valerius stirred.
His eyes opened for the first time in decades, though he didn't need them to see. The darkness welcomed him. The stone tomb that had held him since the fall, was cracked. Weeping cold moisture. And the silence that had pressed against his mind for so long… Was no longer absolute.
He felt her.
A heartbeat familiar, fragile and alive.
Elian.
Or rather, what remained of her.
She wasn't his Elian, not yet. But her soul pulsed with echoes. Fragments of their bond had awakened, and now, like coals fanned to flame, he could feel his strength returning.
He rose slowly from the stone dais, his long black coat draping like a shroud around him. Dust and time fell away in pieces.
Nearby, a faint shimmer drifted from the shadows. A cloaked figure with hollow eyes and drifting smoke in place of feet.
Nyra.
"You rise at last, my prince," the wraith said, her voice like crumbling parchment.
Damian tilted his head. "She's here."
"I know."
He closed his eyes, tasting her in the air. "It's not time yet. She does not remember. But the bond has reawakened."
Nyra hovered closer, her translucent face unreadable. "And what will you do, when she does? Will you run from her truth… or from your own?"
Damian turned his back on her. He walked to the edge of the crypt chamber, placing his pale hand on the ancient stone wall.
"I never stopped loving her."
"Love did not save you," Nyra replied. "It cursed you."
"It defined me." His voice cracked, briefly ancient sorrow breaking through the elegance.
Damian had spent the centuries in half-slumber, speaking in the minds of birds, slipping into the dreams of pilgrims, searching. Always searching. Occasionally, someone would pass close enough to leave blood traces in the stones enough for him to draw scraps of memory, of warmth, of time.
But now she was here.
And the blood moon would rise again in less than a month.
**********
Elian – At the Cathedral
Elian stood before the cathedral under the late morning sun. Its façade was cracked and beautiful, its iron door sealed shut with rusted chains. The townspeople said it had been abandoned since a fire over a century ago. No one entered, No one dared.
She pressed her hand against the cold iron.
And far below, Damian froze.
His hand rose to mirror hers, feeling the faint warmth echo through layers of earth and enchantment. For the first time in hundreds of years, he smiled not out of joy, but out of recognition.
"She's come back to me," he whispered.
And the shadows stirred.