The warehouse reeked of blood and decay.
Kieran pressed his back against the cold metal wall, silver dagger gripped tight in his right hand, holy water vial ready in his left. His breath came slow and controlled despite the adrenaline coursing through his veins.
Three vampires. Maybe four. Hard to tell with the way sound echoes in here.
He'd been tracking this nest for two weeks. The disappearances in the port district—twelve humans in a month, all drained of blood—led him here. To this abandoned warehouse on the edge of the city where the vampires thought they were safe.
They were wrong.
"I can smell you, hunter."
The voice echoed through the darkness, cultured and amused. A vampire who'd lived long enough to perfect the art of sounding human. Those were always the most dangerous.
Kieran didn't respond. Talking gave away position. Instead, he moved silently along the wall, his enhanced senses—courtesy of the hunter serum he'd been injected with since age twelve—tracking every sound, every shift in the air.
"Playing shy?" The vampire laughed. "I appreciate the challenge. It's been so long since prey put up a decent fight."
Arrogant bastard.
Kieran reached the corner and peered around it. The main floor of the warehouse spread out before him, lit by moonlight streaming through broken skylights. Shipping containers were stacked haphazardly, creating a maze of shadows and hiding spots.
And there—standing in a pool of moonlight like he was posing for a portrait—was the vampire.
He looked young. Maybe twenty-five when he was turned. Beautiful in that inhuman way vampires always were—perfect features, porcelain skin, dark hair that fell artfully across his forehead. He wore an expensive suit, completely at odds with the industrial setting.
But his eyes gave him away. Blood red and ancient.
"There you are." The vampire smiled, revealing elongated fangs. "I was beginning to think you'd lost your nerve."
Kieran stepped out from cover. No point hiding now. "Viktor Sokolov. Vampire lord. Turned 1847, Moscow. Estimated kill count: 347 humans." He raised his dagger. "By the authority of the Hunter's Guild, I sentence you to final death."
Viktor's smile widened. "How delightfully formal. Tell me, young hunter—what's your name? I like to know who I'm about to kill."
"Kieran Ashford."
"Ashford?" Something flickered in Viktor's expression. Recognition. "Oh, how delicious. You're one of those Ashfords. I knew your parents."
Ice flooded Kieran's veins. His grip tightened on the dagger. "You're lying."
"Am I?" Viktor circled slowly, predator assessing prey. "Jonathan and Elizabeth Ashford. He was a hunter too, wasn't he? She was a researcher. They had a son—ten years old when they died. Ripped apart by a vampire in their own home." His red eyes glittered with malice. "That was fifteen years ago. Which makes you..."
"Twenty-five." Kieran's voice was flat, emotionless. He'd learned long ago not to show weakness. "And if you knew them, that gives me even more reason to end you."
"Oh, I didn't kill them." Viktor waved a dismissive hand. "That was Marcellus. Though I must admit, I did enjoy hearing about it. The great Jonathan Ashford, taken down in his prime. It was quite the scandal in vampire circles."
Red hazed Kieran's vision. Marcellus. He knew that name. The vampire lord who'd orchestrated his parents' death was still out there, still alive, still—
Viktor moved.
One second he was ten feet away. The next, he was in Kieran's face, hand wrapped around his throat, lifting him off the ground.
Fuck. Distracted. Rookie mistake.
"You're angry," Viktor purred, squeezing just enough to make breathing difficult. "I can hear your heart racing. Smell the fury in your blood. It's intoxicating." His free hand traced down Kieran's chest. "Such a waste to kill you quickly."
Kieran's hand shot up, splashing holy water directly into Viktor's face.
The vampire shrieked, dropping him instantly. Smoke rose from his skin where the blessed liquid burned like acid. He stumbled back, clawing at his face.
Kieran didn't hesitate. He lunged forward, silver dagger aimed straight for Viktor's heart.
Almost made it.
A massive force slammed into him from the side, sending him flying across the warehouse. He hit a shipping container hard enough to dent the metal, pain exploding through his ribs.
The other vampires. Forgot about them.
Two more vampires emerged from the shadows. One male, one female. Both old enough to move with that preternatural speed that made them nearly impossible to fight.
"Careless," the female vampire tsked. She was blonde, elegant, wearing a red dress that probably cost more than Kieran's entire arsenal. "Viktor, darling, you're getting sloppy. Playing with your food."
"He burned me, Anastasia." Viktor's voice was a snarl now, all pretense of civility gone. His face was a ruin of blistered skin, slowly healing but still grotesque. "I'm going to make him suffer for that."
Kieran pushed himself to his feet, ignoring the screaming pain in his ribs. Probably cracked. Maybe broken. Didn't matter. He still had his weapons. Still had a chance.
The male vampire—tall, dark-skinned, with eyes like amber—stepped forward. "Three against one, hunter. You're outmatched. Surrender, and we might make your death quick."
"Not my style." Kieran pulled out two more daggers from his coat. Silver-coated, blessed by priests, sharp enough to cut through vampire flesh like butter. "How about this instead: you let me leave, and I won't report the location of your nest to the Guild. They'll send fifty hunters to burn this place to the ground."
Viktor laughed, a wet, ugly sound. "The Guild? You think we're afraid of the Guild?"
"You should be."
"Oh, we were. Once." Anastasia examined her perfectly manicured nails. "But times are changing, hunter. The old treaties are crumbling. The balance of power is shifting. Soon, your Guild will be nothing but a memory."
Kieran's blood ran cold. "What are you talking about?"
"You'll find out soon enough." The male vampire smiled, fangs gleaming. "But you won't live to tell anyone."
They attacked simultaneously.
Kieran moved on instinct and training. Fifteen years of preparation, of combat drills, of learning to fight creatures faster and stronger than any human had a right to survive against.
He ducked under Viktor's swipe, slashed at the male vampire's arm, rolled away from Anastasia's kick. Silver met flesh. Blood—black and viscous—splattered the ground.
But there were three of them. And only one of him.
A fist caught him in the stomach. Claws raked across his back. He tasted blood—his own—in his mouth.
He kept fighting.
Took down the male vampire with a dagger through the heart. The creature crumbled to ash, his death scream echoing through the warehouse.
Two left.
But Kieran was bleeding now. Slowing down. His enhanced healing could only do so much against vampire venom working through his system.
Viktor caught his arm, twisted, snapped bone.
Kieran bit back a scream.
Anastasia grabbed his hair, yanked his head back, exposed his throat. "Such pretty skin," she murmured, running a finger down his jugular. "I haven't fed on a hunter in decades. I wonder if you taste different."
This is it. This is how I die.
He'd always known it would end like this. All hunters did. The question was never if, but when.
At least he'd taken some of them with him.
Viktor leaned in close, his burned face inches from Kieran's. "Any last words, Ashford?"
"Yeah." Kieran smiled, bloody and defiant. "Go to hell."
"After you."
Viktor's fangs descended toward his throat.
And then—
The warehouse doors exploded inward.
Not opened. Not kicked in. Exploded. Metal and wood flying like shrapnel, propelled by a force that made the air itself scream.
Kieran felt the shift in the atmosphere before he saw anything. A pressure building, ancient and primal, that made every instinct in his body scream DANGER.
Viktor and Anastasia released him immediately, backing away from the entrance with expressions of genuine fear.
What the hell could scare vampires?
A figure stepped through the destroyed doorway.
Tall—easily six and a half feet. Broad-shouldered, muscular, moving with a predator's grace that made vampires look clumsy in comparison. He wore black leather and armor, his long dark hair pulled back from a face that was both beautiful and terrible.
But it was his eyes that froze Kieran in place.
One silver. One gold. Glowing in the darkness with an otherworldly light.
And his aura—gods, the power radiating off him was suffocating. Ancient. Deadly. Wrong in a way that made Kieran's hunter instincts scream to run, to get away, to—
"Beast King," Viktor breathed, and Kieran had never heard such naked terror in a vampire's voice before.
Beast King?
The figure's lips curved into something that might have been a smile if it wasn't so threatening. "Viktor. Anastasia." His voice was deep, resonant, carrying an accent Kieran couldn't place. "Feeding on humans in my territory. You know the rules."
"We didn't know!" Anastasia's composure cracked. "We thought this was unclaimed land—"
"Ignorance is not an excuse." Those mismatched eyes swept over the warehouse, cataloging everything in an instant. They landed on Kieran.
And stopped.
The Beast King went utterly still.
Kieran felt pinned under that gaze. Examined. Assessed. And something else—something that made his skin prickle and his heart race for reasons that had nothing to do with fear.
"Impossible," the Beast King whispered.
Then he moved, and Kieran's enhanced senses couldn't even track it. One moment he was by the door. The next, he was standing directly in front of Kieran, so close that Kieran could see the flecks of amber in that silver eye, the predatory focus in that golden one.
A clawed hand—part human, part beast—reached out.
Kieran tried to move, to dodge, but his body wouldn't obey. He was frozen, caught in the gravity of this creature's presence.
The Beast King's fingers touched Kieran's face. Gentle. Almost reverent.
The moment they made contact, the world exploded.
Power slammed into Kieran like a physical force. Magic—raw and primal—surged through him, igniting every nerve ending. He gasped, his back arching, his vision whiting out.
He felt it. The bond. Snapping into place with the finality of a prison door slamming shut.
No. No, no, no—
"Mine," the Beast King growled, and the word resonated in Kieran's very bones. "My mate."
Kieran's world tilted sideways.
Mate?
No. That was impossible. The mating bond only existed between supernatural creatures. Humans couldn't—
Unless...
Cold realization washed over him.
I'm not human.
The Beast King's arms wrapped around him, pulling him against a chest that was far too warm, far too solid. "Finally," he breathed against Kieran's hair. "After all these centuries. Finally."
Viktor and Anastasia were backing toward the exit. "We'll just... we'll be going now—"
The Beast King's head snapped up, his eyes blazing. The temperature in the warehouse dropped ten degrees. "You touched what's mine."
It wasn't a question. It was a death sentence.
The last thing Kieran saw before consciousness slipped away—from the venom, from the wounds, from the sheer overwhelming power of the mating bond—was the Beast King transforming.
His body shifting, expanding, becoming something massive and terrible. Part wolf, part bat, part nightmare made flesh. A beast from ancient legends that hunters told stories about to frighten children.
The screams of the vampires were cut mercifully short.
Then darkness claimed him.
But even in unconsciousness, he could feel it. The bond. Pulsing. Alive. Connecting him to a monster he didn't know, couldn't fight, and—horrifyingly—couldn't bring himself to reject.
What am I?
The question followed him into the dark.