Chapter 6

The hallway stretches ahead with arched ceilings, velvet drapes, and flickering wall sconces that don’t seem to cast enough light for human eyes. But I already knew vampires prefer the dark.

While my footsteps echo too loud against the stone, the blue-eyed vampire walks like a whisper. Of course he does.

His shirt’s still half-unbuttoned, revealing the kind of chest that makes your thoughts stutter. Not that I’m thinking about that.

Much.

I don’t know his name. It’s stupid how much that bothers me.

I glance up at him. “You never told me your name.”

He doesn’t stop walking, just tilts his head slightly toward me. “Aemon.”

Aemon. It settles over him like a tailored coat, elegant, dangerous, and a little too smooth.

“It fits,” I murmur before I can stop myself.

He raises a brow. “That so?”

“Yeah. It sounds like something with teeth.”

That earns me a quick, low laugh. It wraps around my spine like a silk ribbon pulled tight.

And he's got dimples. It was a flash, but I know what I saw. Good Goddess, he's handsome!

Why do I want to make him laugh just so I can see them again?

We round a corner, and a heavy set of double doors loom ahead. Carved with ornate sigils I don’t understand, but the weight behind them hums in the air.

“Where are we going?” I ask, trying not to sound as wary as I feel. The shackles are gone, but I can still feel the phantom weight against my wrists. I rub one idly.

He glances down at me sideways. “Griffin asked for you to be branded.”

“Yeah, I got that part. I meant where.”

His mouth twitches—half smile, half something else, he looks forward again. “It’s not far. A private chamber.”

“Of course it is,” I mutter. He doesn’t laugh this time, but the air between us hums.

After a pause, I ask, “That man. On the throne. Who... is he?”

Aemon slows. He turns his head slightly, pale profile sharp in the dim corridor. “That’s Griffin.”

I wait for more. When he doesn’t elaborate, I fill in the silence with my own ignorance. “He’s the one in charge?”

“Yes.”

“The vampire king of this place, or…”

“Griffin is the leader of House Draven,” he adds as if that clarifies anything.

It doesn’t.

But then I remember. Draven. That name again. The one the announcer had practically salivated over when he said it. I file it away along with Griffin’s name.

I process how his name makes me feel in silence as we walk again.

“So he’s the one who bought me.”

Aemon doesn’t answer. Doesn’t need to. The silence is enough.

We pass a wide set of windows. Through them, the lake glows black under the heavy sky. The wind howls like it knows something I don’t.

“I don’t know much about vampires,” I admit.

But I know that one big difference between werewolves and vampires is how they find their mates. Wolves know their fated mates by their scent. But vampires? They taste theirs. They know in the blood.

He glances down at me. “No?”

I shrug. “Never left the pack before. Spent most of my life babysat by wolves.”

His brow arches.

“I mean that literally,” I deadpan.

A flicker of amusement glints in his eyes.

“But now I’ve been auctioned, threatened, chained, and apparently, I’m about to get branded like cattle,” I add lightly. “So I’m learning fast.”

We turn into a narrower corridor. This one is colder. The sconces here burn blue.

“Griffin,” I repeat his name aloud, echoing my inner thoughts. “Is he… your sire or something?”

He stops in front of a door. Ornate. Dark wood. Silver inlaid vines. He rests one hand on it and looks at me. “My brother.”

I blink. “What?”

He opens the door.

I follow him into a small, elegant room with a fireplace, dark tile floors, and strange iron instruments neatly lined against one wall. There’s a low, padded bench in the center. I try not to look at it for too long.

Aemon waves off the other vampires already inside. They hesitate, then leave.

“You’re his brother?” I ask again.

“Only five years apart,” he says, walking to a nearby cabinet and pulling out a small silver box.

“How old are you?” I ask, half-joking.

Aemon doesn’t answer.

Typical vampire.

“You’re doing it yourself?” I ask, surprised.

His jaw tightens. “Yes.”

I start to retort, but then he moves, precisely toward the bench. He gestures to it.

I hesitate. Then walk.

Aemon helps me onto it. His touch is careful—too careful for someone about to sear my skin.

He steps closer. His fingers are cool when they tilt my chin, exposing the side of my neck. He lingers there. I feel his breath, too close, too steady. Something shifts in his expression, but it’s gone too quickly to catch. As well as his touch.

“It hurts, doesn’t it?” I ask because I need to fill the silence.

He doesn’t look at me when he speaks next. “Yes, Blake.”

I stiffen. “How do you know my name?”

His blue eyes finally look at me again. “I was there when you were offered up, remember?”

Offered. Not traded. Not sacrificed. Not sold. Not requested.

Offered.

The word makes my stomach twist.

I glance at the fire. “You could lie, you know. About the pain.”

His jaw tics, but he says nothing.

He opens the box and sets the seal inside the fire’s flames. It’s shaped like a flower—some dark thorned thing, delicate and cruel.

Then Aemon unrolls a cloth, brushes my long light brown hair aside, and places one hand on my back. The other reaches for the brand.

The pain is sharp. Immediate. Like fire and frost at once. I grip the armrest, biting down hard on the scream until it tastes like blood in my mouth.

Fucking hell. It hurts.

Aemon doesn’t look away. Doesn’t blink. Just works, careful and methodical, like he’s trying to keep the agony from being worse than it has to be.

“It hurts,” I whisper. When I can speak again, my voice shakes. “Aemon.”

His name feels like a lifeline.

He doesn’t answer at first. But his hand tightens on my back.

Then, I hear his low, controlled, barely audible voice, “I know.”

Then he finishes, placing the final piece of something hot against my skin. I whimper, and then it’s done.

He doesn’t let me fall. Instead, he eases me back into the chair, then kneels beside it, pulling me gently to his lap like I weigh nothing.

My body curls into his without my permission.

I’m crying.

I hate that I am, but the hot, traitorous tears slide out anyway.

“It will pass,” he murmurs in a rough voice, his lips almost at my temple. “I promise, love.”

I want to ask what he means by that. By love. But I can’t speak. Not yet.

The love word lands somewhere I didn’t expect.

So I let myself stay in the circle of his arms, just for a moment longer.