Chapter Two
CRAVE
Another Century Later
Time dulls everything but my insatiable hunger.
Civilization rose from mud and blood, building cities where villages once begged for mercy. Humans grew smarter, faster, and harder to hunt. But I didn’t leave my family because of them, I left because of me.
The craving became a sickness, a constant whisper promising ruin if I didn’t control it. I saw what I’d become, what we all were, and for the first time in my long existence, I wanted something different. So, I walked away from the Coven of Crows.
Renounced my claim to their Eternal Night and built something new in its place.
A brotherhood of the supernatural.
A haven for monsters who want more than chaos.
The Eternal Sins MC.
Now, I feed only when I must, with blood sourced through quiet deals and medical hands. Sometimes from the wicked, when the world demands balance. But the hunger never truly dies, it waits, patient and familiar, like an old lover I can’t quite forget.
A melody stuck in my mind, repeating over and over.
A constant hum, plaguing me.
Slowly driving me mad.
“Motion to expand our territory into the eastern sectors. We’ve got three rival clubs operating there, but none of them know what they’re dealing with.”
Rogue’s voice pulls me back to the present. I blink, focusing on the table in front of me, the faces of my brothers gathered around it.
The clubhouse.
Right.
Church meeting.
Not a blood-soaked village square millennia in the past.
I lean back in my chair at the head of the table, the leather creaking under my weight. The room smells of motor oil, whiskey, and the faint musk of supernatural beings trying to coexist in close quarters. There’s nothing like the copper-sharp scent of fresh death.
Nothing like it used to be.
“Crave?” Rogue stares me down, concern flickering in those gold-tinged eyes. My vice president. My lycan guardian. The wolf who traded his freedom to walk beside darkness. “You with us, brother?”
I force myself to focus. “Yeah, eastern sectors. Rival clubs.” I wave a hand, dismissively. “Do whatever you think is necessary. You’re VP for a reason.”
Around the table, the others shift. They can feel it, that restlessness in me, the boredom that’s been eating at me for decades. Centuries. When you’ve lived as long as I have, time starts to blur.
Scorch catches my eye from his position to Rogue’s right. The dragon shifter looks perpetually annoyed, smoke literally curling from his nostrils. “We could always burn them out,” he offers, voice rough as gravel. “Faster that way.”
“Too much attention,” Hex cuts in, fingers flying over his laptop even during a meeting. The warlock’s eyes glow faintly blue, his technomancy active, probably monitoring six different surveillance feeds simultaneously. “We need to stay clean. Law of Silence, remember?”
Dread grunts from the end of the table. The not-so-human-but-we’re-not-sure-what-the-hell-he-is radiates low-level menace even when he’s sitting still.
“Let them come at us. I’ll make them forget why they thought it was a good idea.
” Whatever the hell he is, he instills the fear of God into anyone or anything.
“Lotta dead bodies,” Hades observes quietly, his necromancer’s calm never wavering. “I can handle cleanup, but I’d rather not.”
Grizz doesn’t speak. The bear shifter watches everything with those ancient, patient eyes. Beside him, Oracle studies me with an intensity that makes even my old bones uncomfortable.
The Phoenix sees too much.
Always has.
This is my club.
These are my brothers.
And I’m so fucking bored I could scream.
It’s not their fault. They’re good men, well, as good as monsters can be. We run a tight operation, keeping the peace in our territory, and we make money through legitimate and less-than-legitimate means. We protect humans from knowing the supernatural beings that walk among them.
We’re civilized.
And I fucking hate it.
I remember when we were gods.
When mortals whispered our names in terror and raised altars of trembling light, hoping their candles could keep the dark away, could keep us away. When the sight of a crow made grown men bar their doors and windows, I didn’t have to pretend to be something I’m not.
When I could hunt.
“Brother,” Oracle’s voice cuts through my spiraling thoughts. He leans forward, firelight reflecting in his eyes, literal fire, the kind that never goes out. “The blood remembers what the heart forgot. Your shadow’s been too clean for too long.”
The table around us goes quiet.
I meet his gaze, furrowing my brow. “Meaning?”
“Meaning you’re restless. Meaning you’ve been playing at mortality for so long, you’ve forgotten what you are.” His smile is gentle but knowing. “Meaning something’s coming. Something that’ll remind you.”
Before I can respond, before I can tell him he’s wrong, that nothing’s coming because nothing ever changes, the door to the office slams open.
Rogue is on his feet instantly, claws already extending.
Scorch’s veins start to glow, and Dread’s fear projection ripples outward like a wave.
But as we all face the door, Eden staggers inside.
Her usual goth look, torn jeans and a tank top, is gone.
She drops to her knees, a ghostly figure, her body glowing with a sheen of silky smoke that coils around her, drowning her in grief.
Her face is as white as the death she’s predicting.
The Banshee’s eyes are wild, unfocused, and the air around her vibrates with the energy exploding from her.
“Eden?” I move before I realize it, vampire speed carrying me to her side. “What’s happeni—”
“Aaahhh-eeeiii-aaahhh-iiieeeaaahhh!” The sound rips from her like a soul being torn in half, high, piercing, and seemingly endless.
It isn’t human, it isn’t sound, it’s grief made weapon, slicing through air and sanity alike.
Windows explode, glass rains down, and every light in the room flickers before dying.
The scream keeps climbing in intensity, vibrating through my chest, through the floor, through the night itself, until it feels as though the whole world is holding its breath to survive.
It’s not a normal scream, it’s a Banshee’s wail—the sound of death given voice. Every supernatural being in the room flinches back from the assault on their senses. Everyone cowers, covering their ears, as if somehow that will stop the sound.
The scream goes on and on, building in intensity until I swear I can see the air rippling around her. Then, just as suddenly as it started, it cuts off.
Eden slumps forward, breathing hard. When she looks up at me, panting for breath, tears of blood streak down her face, the fear of God sweeps through her as she looks up at me in a panic. The smoke of her Banshee slowly dissipates, bringing her back to her normal form.
I hold her tight as she slowly finds her voice again, but it is raspy.
“Someone’s b-breaking the Law of S-Silence.
” She gasps, breaking on a few words through her hoarse tone.
“They’re exposing us. A-all of us. I can hear them dying…
humans who’ve seen too much. I can h-hear their names, Crave.
Backward. Over and o-over.” Her voice trembles.
“Someone’s forcing the Coven of Crows’ hand. ”
The temperature in the room drops ten degrees, and if my face could turn any paler, I am sure it just did.
Around me, my brothers tense. The other two club girls, Seraphine and Reyna, have appeared from the bar area, drawn in by the commotion.
Ronan and Jet hover in the background, the prospects smart enough to stay out of the way.
I stare down at Eden, and something cold settles in my chest. Not fear, I haven’t felt fear in millennia, but…
… anticipation?
Recognition?
The Coven of Crows.
My former family.
The ones I left behind when I traded apocalypse for this mundane existence.
If someone is breaking the Law of Silence badly enough that a Banshee across the world can sense the deaths…
If the Crows are being drawn out…
“Well,” I say softly, and even I hear the predator creeping back into my voice, the monster I’ve been suppressing. “I guess Oracle was right.”
Something is coming.
And for the first time in centuries, I feel something other than boredom.
I feel alive.
The shadows in the corners of the room seem to deepen, reaching toward me with the familiarity of old friends.
Remembering what I used to be.
What I’ve been running from.
What I might need to become again.
Rogue steps up beside me. “Orders, Prez?”
I look around at my club. My brothers. These beings who followed me into exile, who traded their chaos for structure, their freedom for family.
“Lock it down,” I order. “Full security protocols. Hex, I want eyes on everything… digital and magical. Hades, start pulling death records, see if you can trace back to where this is happening. Grizz, Reyna, prepare for war. Because if the Crows are coming…” I pause, letting the weight of this news sink in. “They’re not coming to talk.”
The club mobilizes instantly, each member moving to their roles with practiced precision. But I stay frozen, staring at Eden’s bloodstained face, and all I can think about is the scent of a burning village.
The taste of terror-laced blood.
The thrill of the hunt.
The darkness I thought I’d left behind.
Oracle’s words echo in my head. ‘Your shadow’s been too clean for too long.’
He’s right.
And somewhere out there, someone is about to remind me exactly what happens when you wake a sleeping monster.
A slow smile creeps across my face, my fangs descending on their own in delight.
“Let them come,” I murmur.
Because the truth is—the truth I’ve been hiding from for centuries—I’ve been waiting for an excuse.
And they just gave me one.