Chapter Twenty – Lucian
CHAPTER TWENTY
LUCIAN
Standing before my brothers, their glaring judgement is fixed on me. “Have at it.” I gesture, knowing the shit they’re about to throw at me.
“How? It isn’t done, it breaks the code,” Silas fumes, his jaw set tight.
“I don’t fucking know. It was happening before I could stop it,” I counter.
Silas shakes his head. “We control the marking. You marked her because you wanted to. So don’t try to play it off as something you couldn’t control.”
He’s right, in a way. When we mark our partners—mates, whatever you want to call it—we do it.
It’s not some outside force of fate at play.
We feel it when we come together, like a small spark.
At first, it’s tiny, almost insignificant.
But you feel it there, simmering, wanting to burn brighter.
We choose whether to ignite it. Not many of our kind do.
But with Evelynn, it was different. There was no small spark, no simmering. It was there, burning so fucking bright inside me I couldn’t pull away. I couldn’t and wouldn’t stop. She is mine, and I wasn’t about to let anyone else take her from me.
“It wasn’t the same as the usual marking,” I state. “I don’t know if it’s to do with what the old nun said, but it was fucking different.” I grind the words out, knowing they won’t understand it.
“How did she not die?” Rook asks. “I was always told we couldn’t mark mortals because it would kill them, and then there’s the code.”
“So, what? You going to report me?” I question.
My brothers shake their heads. “You’ve broken the code, the laws set by our kind, but we are your family, your brothers, your goddamn coven. If the Dominion come, then we will deal with it,” Silas says firmly. The others all nod.
“Plus, you know, I think there is something bigger at play here, with Anathema, the nun. The fact that you have marked her and she has survived.” Viktor shakes his head.
“I’ve searched tomes after tomes and nothing.
” He looks at me, his gaze pinning me. “You are a part of something, whether you like it or not. You and Evelynn. What the fuck that is, I have no idea. But I will figure it out,” he fumes, rubbing his face, no doubt exhausted from reading and researching every book he can get his hands on.
I nod, offering them my thanks, though gratitude feels cheap compared to what they’re giving me. Knowing they have my back, no matter the cost, is something no words could ever repay.
“You going to change her?” Diesel asks.
Clutch shakes his head. “For him to do that, he’d need approval from the Dominion. And if he makes that request, they’ll see she’s already been marked.”
“So, what?” Talon presses. “You just let her stay human?”
I nod, and the room fractures into a brutal silence.
Then Cain’s voice cuts straight through it. “You will die.”
I nod again. I’d accepted that long before this moment.
When vampires mark each other, they’re bound soul to soul, blood to blood. The only way out is death itself. For vampires, that’s usually a minor inconvenience.
But I didn’t mark another vampire. I marked a mortal. A fragile, fleeting thing of breath and heartbeat. And when she takes her final breath, I won’t grieve.
I will turn to dust.
No sound comes from my room, just her deep, slow, heavy breaths. A smile plays at my lips as I silently enter, closing the door behind me. In a blur of silent speed, I’m beside her, my fingers searching for her soothing pulse.
I’m not afraid to die, not afraid to fade away into nothing, but I am afraid of losing her.
She slowly stirs, a soft sigh escaping her lips. Her dark eyes flutter open, and she smiles. “Hey, Luci,” she whispers.
I tilt my head at the nickname. “Absolutely not,” I dismiss.
Her grin deepens. “But it’s just short for Lucian.” The playfulness in her tone has me fighting my own smile.
“Never call me that again. Not unless you want to be punished,” I warn as I cage her with my body.
Her cheeks flush. “Honestly, I don’t know if I’m into that kink. If I have a kink.” She shrugs. Her innocent yet blatant statement has my smile widening. Her face twists in thought. “Hmm, I might like it. Not too hard, though. What about you? Want me to spank you?” she asks, wiggling her eyebrows.
My dick stirs at the possibilities of having her restrained, begging.
Her amusement fades as the atmosphere shifts from playful to electric.
I close my eyes and draw in her scent. Her arousal.
I brush my lips over hers, feeling her shudder beneath me.
My mouth, my tongue, ready to taste her, to take what’s mine.
Then heels click against stone, the sound slicing through the moment. My head snaps toward the door.
“What is it?” Evelynn asks, confusion threading her voice.
I spring off her. “Stay there. Don’t move.” My tone leaves no room for argument.
I barely take two steps before the door is blasted off its hinges. Seraphine strides in, murderous eyes locked on me. Instinct takes over, and I move in front of Evelynn, shielding her with my body. Behind me, her terrified heartbeat echoes through my bones.
“You are not welcome here, Seraphine,” I growl.
Her eyes blaze. “Not welcome? That’s a first, Lucian. I remember being very welcome when we fucked in that bed, on that chair—” she gestures lazily “—against the wall, on the floor—”
I hear Evelynn’s breathing hitch.
“Enough,” I bark. “Get out.”
Seraphine smirks, shaking her head. “You can’t honestly have feelings for this.” Her attention slides to Evelynn. She inhales sharply, scenting my mark. My bond.
Her lips part, and pain flickers across her face before rage consumes it.
“Seraphine,” I say more softly, trying to reason with her.
Her gaze snaps back to mine, molten fury burning straight through me. “You marked her.” Her voice breaks, half devastation, half violence. “I’m going to kill her. I’m going to snap her pathetic little neck like a twig.”
She launches.
I intercept her mid-air, slamming her into the stone floor. It cracks beneath her body as my hand closes around her throat.
“You will not harm a single fucking hair on her head,” I snarl. “Try again, and I destroy you.”
Her eyes widen. The sound of my brothers’ footsteps is a reassurance as they enter the room behind me.
“You’d kill me to save her,” Seraphine wheezes.
“I would,” I confirm without hesitation.
“I waited,” she whispers. “I was patient. We were meant to be together.”
Guilt coils briefly in my gut. “I’m sorry if you thought it was anything more than sex.”
Her pain evaporates into pure darkness. “She’s twisted your mind.”
“She hasn’t,” I counter.
Seraphine explodes with strength, throwing me across the room. My back slams into the wall. “Fuck.”
She’s already moving, lightning fast. She appears behind Evelynn, dragging her to her knees. One hand clamps around Evelynn’s throat, the other fists in her hair.
Possessive rage detonates inside me.
“I wouldn’t, Lucian,” Seraphine taunts, her razor-sharp nail slicing Evelynn’s skin. Blood trickles slowly down her neck.
Evelynn looks at me, panic-stricken, pleading and begging me to save her.
Seraphine licks the blood from her nail. “Maybe I’ll feast on her, drain her slowly. Make you watch while you’re helpless.” She yanks Evelynn’s head back, causing Evelynn to cry out.
Every instinct screams for slaughter.
“Actually…” Seraphine grins. “Maybe that’s what it’ll take for you to remember who you are. Taste her. Be the monster I know you are.”
“He’s not a monster,” Evelynn grits through the pain. Seraphine curls her lip and jerks her hair harder. “You’re the monster,” Evelynn whispers.
Seraphine sneers. “Pathetic mortal. I’ve hunted with Lucian. Fed with him. We’ve fucked beside screaming victims while they begged for mercy.”
Evelynn’s gaze nearly breaks me. Then Silas steps beside me.
“Leave now,” he says coldly, “and your life will be spared.”
Seraphine laughs. “You’re fast, Silas, but not fast enough.”
“You kill her, you kill Lucian,” Cain adds. “Is that what you want?”
Seraphine hesitates. “She’s mortal. The bond can’t be the same.”
“You sure?” Cain presses.
Silence.
Every instinct in my body is screaming to move, to kill, to tear her open where she stands, but one wrong step and Evelynn dies.
Then Seraphine’s eyes flick, calculating. “Fine,” she says coldly. “She lives, for now. And you let me go.”
She releases Evelynn, then backhands her hard.
Evelynn’s body crumples before I can reach her.
Seraphine is gone in a blur of shadow and spite.
I’m at Evelynn’s side instantly, scooping her up, crushing her to my chest, my hands frantic as they search her throat.
There. A pulse. Alive.
The relief doesn’t soothe me. It only sharpens the fury into something unholy.
Silas turns on the brothers. “Go after her,” he barks.
Clutch hesitates. “But the deal…”
I lift my head slowly.
They feel it before I speak. The shift in me. The predator in me rising.
“She hurt what is mine,” I growl. “She will try again. You will find her.” My arms tighten around Evelynn’s limp body. “And when you do, you will not show mercy. You will tear her apart. Limb from fucking limb.”
No one argues. They vanish.
I don’t watch them go. All I see is Evelynn, caged in my arms, her face pressed over my dead heart. My hand slides into her hair, trembling despite centuries of control, my thumb brushing over her cheekbone, her mouth, her closed lashes.
My marked. My human.
Mine.
Rage and terror coil together in my chest until I can’t tell where one ends and the other begins. I press my forehead to hers.
“I will never let anyone hurt you,” I whisper, my voice rough with bloodlust and need. “Not after I’ve claimed you. Not after I’ve tied your soul to mine.”
I bare my fangs without realising, brushing my mouth over the fragile pulse beneath her jaw.
“I will slaughter cities for you,” I murmur against her skin. “I will burn the world down piece by piece. Anyone who touches you dies. Anyone who looks at you wrong dies.”
My grip tightens, possessive, violent, absolute.
She stirs faintly, and it nearly breaks me.
I press a kiss to her brow, slow and reverent, like a vow carved in blood.
“Wake up, Petal.” I rock her gently, wanting to shield her from everything, even the air.
My fury coils deep and patient, waiting for the inevitable.
Seraphine will be found. She will scream, and I will inflict such pain on her that only Lucifer himself is capable of.
She will beg me for death.