In a grand, cold halls of Sir Marudas's estate. The polished marble floor echoed with every step as he returned home, weary from his long journey. The quiet didn't last long. As soon as he stepped through the ornate front doors, his wife, Lady Kate, appeared at the top of the stairs, arms folded, her expression hard.
"Well?" she asked, voice clipped. "Did you find her?"
Sir Marudas sighed, setting down his gloves and belt on the carved table by the entrance. "I did."
She descended the stairs, her footsteps sharp and deliberate. "And? Where is she? Why isn't she here with you?"
"She's... being cared for. By a woman named Madam Helen."
"Being cared for?" Kate sneered. "You left your bastard child with her?"
Marudas's shoulders stiffened, but he remained silent.
"You're too soft," she snapped. "You always were."
His eyes narrowed, the tired lines on his face deepening. "She's our only chance now."
Kate scoffed. "Our chance? Don't say 'our.' She was never mine."
The tension simmered before Kate walked past him toward the fireplace, where a sealed letter lay on the mantle. She picked it up with distaste.
"You remember this?" she asked, waving the letter.
Marudas gave it a glance. Of course he remembered. The wax seal of the head council still shimmered faintly.
Flashback...
A week earlier, both had stood in that very room reading the letter together. The council's demand was clear: to solidify the truce between humans and the ancient bloodline of vampires, the King had decided that a daughter of the human representative in the court was to be married to a high-ranking council member — a vampire of his choosing.
Kate's face had paled with rage as she crumpled the letter in her fist. "They want me to send my daughter—our daughter—to one of those monsters?"
"It's not a suggestion," Marudas had said quietly. "The council needs this marriage to avoid war and to assure people that the vampire isn't the one behind the killings happening."
"Then let them marry their own kind!" she had barked. "No daughter of mine will ever lie beside a blood-sucking corpse!"
There was a silence. Then she turned her sharp gaze to her husband.
"You do have a daughter. An illegitimate one. Send her."
Present...
Kate tossed the letter back on the mantle. "So? Have you told Lord Theron you found her?"
Marudas turned away, his voice low. "I will bring her soon."
"You'd better. That Lord's patience runs thinner than vampire skin in sunlight."
****
Back in the council office, Lord Theron cleared his throat heavily and glanced between the two other seated members—Lord Evander and Lord Nikos.
"There's one issue left we need to address," Theron said, his tone unusually cautious.
Evander raised an eyebrow. "Another one?"
Theron pushed a folded parchment toward them. "The King has sent final word. The chosen member of the council to marry the human girl... is Lord Kael Blackthorn."
A loaded silence followed.
Lord Nikos chuckled dryly. "You're joking."
"I wish I was," Theron muttered. "You know Kael. He's not exactly... open to binding himself to a human."
Evander scoffed. "Human?. It's bad enough the King wants this farce of a treaty sealed with marriage, but giving Kael a bride he didn't choose—"
"—a human bride," Nikos added, shaking his head.
Theron exhaled and rubbed his temples. "Exactly. Which brings me to the actual question: who's going to tell him or how do we inform him?"
Another silence. Then they all looked at each other, none volunteering.
"We all know he'll explode the moment he hears it," Nikos said, amused. "Last time he was assigned a human as an aide, he nearly burned down the court chamber."
"And that was just an aide," Evander added.
Theron sat back, eyes narrowing. "Still... orders are orders. He'll marry the girl. If not by will, then by threat."
"You sure that's wise? Binding him like that?"
Theron gave a slow, knowing smirk. "Sometimes, even the strongest of vampires need a leash."
Outside, thunder cracked distantly — though the skies were clear.
And far away, Nerine's fate began to intertwine with powers she never knew existed.
Her blood was already whispering. The past was catching up.
And the monsters weren't just stories anymore.