SEBASTIAN
Pacing in the small enclave tucked behind the throne room—the very space where dozens of bloodthirsty lords and ladies waited to watch me marry a human—I rubbed the back of my neck as frustration pulsed through my veins.
My footsteps echoed off the stone floor, and if it wasn’t for the privacy wards I’d placed over the room, every single gods-damned vampire in the entire castle would have been able to hear me.
Queen Marguerite of Eleyta, the most powerful vampire in all the Four Kingdoms and the female who Made me—my mother, for all intents and purposes—watched me from where she reclined on her dark red velvet sofa. Her long black hair was twisted into an elaborate knot, and a black crown inlaid with dozens of onyx jewels gleamed in the moonlight.
A human female who had the misfortune of being one of Mother’s Favorites sat on the queen’s lap, straddling her thighs. Facing outwards, she was as still as a statue. Her lifeless blue eyes stared straight ahead, and she seemed unaware of the icy breeze blowing in from the open window, ruffling the two sheer strips of red cloth she wore to cover her nakedness.
Mother eyed me carefully from behind the Favorite, her manicured hand petting the human’s strawberry blonde hair as though she were a dog. Two small puncture wounds marred the human’s neck, and twin trails of bright red blood ran down her pale skin. The human didn’t even flinch as Mother reached over, pressing her hand against her freckled stomach. The female might have been physically present, but her mind was long gone.
The Favorites were always docile—whether or not they wanted to be. Mother ensured their compliance. A hand-picked selection of a dozen males and females, the Favorites served the queen’s every whim—inside the bedroom and out of it.
No one dared speak against the queen’s treatment of the humans, even though sometimes the Favorites would turn up dead after an especially long night in her chambers. They were Mother’s playthings. Every vampire in their right mind knew never to touch a human dressed in sheer red cloth.
Ignoring the human, I ran my hand through my hair. The black crown on my head fell further to the side, and despite my urge to throw it against the wall, I merely adjusted it until it rested comfortably on my brow.
“Are you seriously going to make me go through with this… this… charade?” I asked. “Since the night you Made me, I’ve done everything you ever asked of me, but this…”
“It’s a marriage, Sebastian,” Mother said calmly, licking the blood trailing down the Favorite’s neck as her hands tightened around the human’s waist. “Not a death sentence.”
I scoffed, ignoring the display in front of me. “It might as well be. I went there, to that place they called a ‘castle’ in Ipotha earlier tonight, and I saw her.”
Mother looked up, her brow raised. “Oh?”
“The human is young! Barely twenty. And you want me to marry her?”
Pursing her lips, Mother studied me through hooded eyes. After a moment, she released her grip on the Favorite’s hips and tapped the statuesque human on the bottom. “You can go now, Milani. Get dressed and find something to eat before coming back to my rooms before dawn.”
“Of course, Your Majesty,” Milani mumbled. Pushing herself off the queen’s lap, the Favorite left out the small door that led to the servant’s chambers without even adjusting the red strips of cloth that covered her nudity.
Once the door slipped shut behind the Favorite, I turned back to the queen. She remained on the blood-red sofa, her position one of relaxation, but I saw behind the facade.
Mother was never relaxed. She was always on edge, always ready to prove once and for all why she was the Queen of Eleyta. Vampire rulers were not chosen by birthright, but by power.
If, by some strange circumstance, a vampire arose who was more powerful than Queen Marguerite, they would be eligible to take her crown by force. No one had ever come close in all of my years.
My vampire mother looked the same as she had the night she drained me of my blood and replaced it with the shadow magic that now ran through my veins. Only this time, I wasn’t a foolish human. I knew exactly what that hard glint in her eyes meant, and I understood the depth of violence that ran through the queen’s veins.
Some people might have called her evil. I disagreed. She wasn’t evil—she lacked morals. Mother had seen several millennia come and go, and as a result, she cared little for the welfare of others. All she cared about was power.
The queen’s black eyes were hard and her skin, so pale it was nearly white, glinted in the violet light as she met my gaze. “Not only are you going to marry the human, Sebastian, but you’re going to Bind yourself to her.”
I blinked slowly, staring at the queen and wondering if I had misheard her.
Ever since I was Made, I dideverythingshe asked. But this?
“Bind myself?” My words echoed through the large chamber, but I didn’t lower my voice. “Marriage is one thing, but you want me to take her on as a Bound Partner?”
The queen stared at me, raising a black brow. “That’s what I said, Sebastian.”
“Mother, she’s human,” I protested.
The last time I let myself get close to a human…
The shadows in my veins pulsed and visions of blood flashed before my eyes before I could stop them. As if she knew where my mind went, a cruel smile crept over Mother’s face.
“Yes, she is,” the queen said calmly as if we were discussing a lunch menu and not the matter of meBindingmyself to a human.