THE BLOODBORN'S CROWN
"You smell like salvation and damnation wrapped in one fragile human body. Do you have any idea how dangerous that makes you?"
Aria Blackwood thought the mysterious invitation was her miracle—a full scholarship to Thornveil Academy, a school no one had ever heard of, hidden deep in the mountains. Free tuition, room, board, and escape from the stepmother who'd spent three years treating her like a servant in her own father's house.
She didn't ask questions. She just ran.
But Thornveil Academy isn't the fresh start she imagined. On her first day, she's targeted by the elite "Crown" girls—beautiful, cruel, and unnaturally cold to the touch. They circle her like predators, ready to tear apart the scholarship nobody who doesn't belong.
Until he intervenes.
Lucian Ashford - student council president, devastatingly beautiful, with eyes like molten silver and a smile that promises both salvation and sin. He stops the Crown girls with a single word, his authority absolute, his presence commanding every eye in the hall.
Aria can't stop staring at him. Can't stop noticing things that don't make sense.
His skin is too pale, like marble. His hand, when he touches her arm, is ice-cold. And when she presses her fingers to his wrist in shock, she feels... nothing.
No pulse. No heartbeat.
Just an amused smile as Lucian leans close and whispers: "Welcome to Thornveil, little human. Try not to bleed."
Vampires. The academy is full of them. And Aria—with her ordinary life, her absence of supernatural power, her complete human fragility—is surrounded by immortal predators who view her as either prey or an amusing pet.
But then strange things start happening.
When Aria bleeds from a cut in alchemy class, every vampire in the room freezes, eyes darkening with hunger and something else—recognition. The scent of her blood causes chaos. Lucian physically restrains three students from lunging at her.
Kieran Draven - the dangerous rebel vampire with a scarred past and hatred for authority—tracks her down afterward, his voice rough: "What the hell are you? Your blood isn't normal."
Dorian Nightshade - the mysterious TA who's actually a 300-year-old vampire posing as a student—appears in her room that night with ancient texts: "You're not human. Not entirely. You're Bloodborn—the first we've seen in a century."
Bloodborn. A human born with the blood of the First Vampire, giving them power vampires crave and fear. Their blood can strengthen vampires beyond measure... or enslave them. Bloodborn are hunted, coveted, and dangerous.
Aria's stepmother didn't mistreat her out of cruelty. She knew what Aria was and kept her weak, compliant, powerless—until she could sell her to the highest bidder in the vampire world.
Now the academy knows what she is. The Crown girls want her eliminated. A dark faction of vampires wants to capture and use her. Her stepmother is coming to drag her back.
And three of the most powerful vampires in the academy have decided something else entirely.
They want her. All of her. Forever.