🎵 Music Suggestion:
"Waking Up" by Explosions in the Sky
(Builds like slow lightning through mist, the kind of sound love and war are born from.)
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Kyrell stood in the corridor as the chamber doors slammed shut behind them, torches flickering violently along the walls. The air was thick with the residue of power, of voices silenced too late, of truth finally bared—and yet, all he could hear was Lucian breathing beside him.
Lucian didn't speak.
Didn't move.
Didn't blink.
Not until Kyrell stepped forward and pressed two fingers beneath his chin, lifting his face like something sacred.
> "You would have burned the whole room down for me," Kyrell whispered.
Lucian's voice was ice wrapped in hunger.
> "No," he said. "I would have burned the world."
Kyrell leaned in.
> "Then burn me too."
---
Lucian's hand found Kyrell's throat—not cruel, not rough—but reverent. His thumb traced the scar left by a hunter's blade, a memory Kyrell had almost forgotten. It glowed faintly now, as though reacting to his touch.
Kyrell's breath hitched. His skin heated, not from fear, but from that low simmering ache that never quite left him since their bond awoke.
> "Say it," Lucian murmured. "Say you believe me now."
Kyrell nodded. Then, softly:
> "I believe you. I believe… us."
The kiss that followed was quiet devastation.
No fire. No ferocity.
Just mouths brushing like secrets being shared in the dark.
Just lips learning to trust again.
---
Behind them, the castle moaned. Magic still trembled in the walls. The elders were gathering again—angry, disoriented, fractured.
Lucian pulled back, eyes glowing red-gold now, the restraint inside him breaking, piece by piece.
> "They'll come for us."
Kyrell licked blood from his own bottom lip.
> "Then let them come."
---
Far across the kingdom, a bell rang from the old monastery ruins.
A woman cloaked in ash raised her hand and murmured to a pale child beside her:
> "The prophecy's changed."
The child, eyes empty, tilted its head.
> "Which part?"
> "The ending."
---
Back at the fortress, Renak sat alone in the chamber where Silas' scroll once lay. His hand trembled as he reached into his robe and pulled out the second letter Silas had hidden—one not meant for the Council's eyes.
He opened it slowly.
Then froze.
Lucian's name was scratched beside a seal Renak recognized but had never dared to speak aloud.
The Royal House of the First Blood.
Lucian wasn't just a vampire.
He was heir to the throne Silas once tried to erase.
And Kyrell?
The boy prophesied to bring ruin to it all.
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