Chapter 25 Alaric #2
I scoffed and looked away from Nerina. “What? You are mistaken. She’s useful. A way to break this curse. After that, I’m done with her.”
The words were out before I could stop them and my stomach dropped. Too fast. Too revealing. Séraphine didn’t miss things like that.
Her head tilted, eyes narrowing just slightly. “Mm. Dat so?” Her tone was light, but her expression wasn’t. “An’ what makes you think a lil’ mermaid could break your curse, Cap’taine?”
The room suddenly felt smaller. I hadn’t meant to expose that piece—not to her, not to anyone.
Shit.
“She’s convenient. That’s it.” I said, keeping my voice even.
Séraphine tilted her head, eyes flickering. "You looked at me like that once. So don’t go tellin' me you ain’t sweet on that girl. I sees right through ya."
I didn’t respond right away. I glanced toward Nerina, still standing near the doorway, and something in my chest pulled taut.
Even like this—wind-tossed, salt-kissed, exhaustion smudged beneath her eyes—she was breathtaking.
Not just in the way she looked but in the way her presence alone made this haunted place feel less daunting.
Like maybe, just maybe, there was still light left in the world.
I didn’t know when it happened—when helping her started to matter more than saving myself.
When her laughter became more than a sound—it was a promise, a tether.
Like a melody I'd forgotten I used to believe in, before the curse, before the hunger.
She made me feel... alive again. She was light.
Stubborn, infuriating, reckless light. And saints, how it cut through the dark in me.
She didn't understand what she was doing.
How she challenged me. How she made the ache in my bones feel like a heartbeat again.
I couldn't help but want to be near that light. Maybe it was selfish. Maybe it was stupid. But for the first time in so long, I didn’t feel like a shadow. Not entirely.
The way she smiled, even when the world tried to break her, cage her—she still believed it could be beautiful. It made something twist in my chest. It made me remember I used to feel things. Before the curse. Before blood and silence and centuries of shadows.
In the way Séraphine had once drawn out the darkest parts of me—our love forged in blood and fire—Nerina did the opposite.
She lit me up. Not like a spark, not like a match. Like the sunrise I don't remember. Like warmth after centuries of cold. She didn’t demand the shadows from me. She didn’t want the monster. She just… looked at me. To her, there was still something worth seeing.
Séraphine taught me how to burn. Nerina showed me there was something worth surviving the fire for.
And I hated it. I hated how much I noticed her.
How much I was starting to care. Because caring got people killed.
And if she ever died because of me... No.
I wouldn’t let that happen. Even if she didn’t belong to me, I would protect her. Even if it destroyed me.
Then, the room shifted. The air, once thick with magic, stirred. A whisper curled through the space, slithering into Séraphine’s ear. She closed her eyes, listening, and then—she smiled.
"They done found it," she murmured, voice dripping with satisfaction. "The Eye o' Nareth."
"Where?"
Séraphine took her time, letting her fingers glide slow around the rim of that still bowl, sticky with the remnants of what she’d offered the spirits. "Told ya once already—knowin’ like that don’t come free."
I rubbed a hand over my mouth. "What do you want? Gold? Spices? A favor?"
She let out a low chuckle, her voice thick with syrup and shadow. "Mm-mm. You know better’n most, Cap’taine—I don’t deal in no coin. I trade in what’s real—blood."
Séraphine’s contrasting eyes flickered toward Nerina. "Hers."
Nerina’s fingers curled into fists at her sides. "Why?"
Séraphine tilted her head, a slow grin curling her lips. "Power hang on ya like fog on mornin’. I gotta know why. Just a lil’ vial o’ your blood, that’s all. A taste, nothin’ more."
I stepped forward before Nerina could speak, planting myself between her and the threat like a wall made of bone and fury.
“Take mine,” I said, stepping forward. “Vampire blood carries weight. You know that.”
Séraphine didn’t even look at me. Her attention stayed on Nerina—focused, intent, almost reverent.
“Oh, I know exactly what your blood worth, Cap’taine,” she said softly. “I done tasted hunger. Curses. Monsters. Men.”
Her mismatched eyes glanced my way. “Yours sings,” she continued. “But hers?”
Her attention returned to Nerina, narrowing. “Hers don’t sing at all.”
The room stilled. “It listens.”
She turned back to Nerina, eyes glinting like broken glass, voice laced with a slow drawl. "It’s your blood I need, or we ain’t got no deal."
Nerina hesitated only a moment before nodding. "Take it."
I shifted without thinking, stepping in front of her, shielding her from something I couldn’t name but felt in my bones.
A cold dread slid down my spine, sudden and familiar.
My stomach plummeted, not just from fear—but from the instinct, the demand, to protect her.
To keep her safe. “No,” I said, voice low, tense. “You don’t owe her a damn thing.”
She stepped in front of me, her expression steady. “If this is the price for the Eye, then I will pay it. I have to pay it.”
A muscle ticked in my jaw, frustration burning in my eyes, but I could see she would not be swayed.
"Damn it all, this isn’t a game. You don’t know what giving her your blood will mean."
Séraphine merely watched, and I couldn’t shake the weight of what lingered in her words. Blood magic was no parlor trick. It was ancient, binding, sacred—and dangerous. I’d seen what it could do, what it could take.
Séraphine let out a throaty laugh. "She don’t belong to you—don’t belong to no one. That girl can make her own decisions."
She reached for her blade, the motion slow, deliberate. My mind flickered with the unease of déjà vu, of promises broken and truths left unspoken.
The candlelight glinted off the edge of the steel as she extended her free hand toward Nerina. "Your palm."
Nerina swallowed hard but did not waver. She raised her hand, placing it in Séraphine’s waiting grasp. She ran a thumb across her skin, feeling the hum of something beneath the surface, before drawing the blade in a swift, clean slice.
Nerina flinched, a strained breath escaping her as the cut bloomed against her pale skin—and in that instant, her crescent mark flared with a sudden, searing light.
I tensed beside her, fists clenched at my sides, every muscle wound tight, resisting the urge to pull her away.
I could barely stand to see her in pain, especially when it hurt enough to trigger whatever magic pulsed beneath her skin.
But then—before a single drop could fall—the wound closed.
The skin knit itself back together, the blood retreating, vanishing as though it had never been shed.
Séraphine’s eyes widened slightly, surprise flickering across her normally unreadable face.
For the first time since we had stepped into her domain, true intrigue stirred in her expression.
She lifted Nerina’s hand again, turning it over, expecting to see some lingering sign of the wound.
But there was nothing—not even the faintest scar.
Her lips parted. “Well now…” she murmured, the words thick with wonder and that old Shadeau drawl.
Then she looked at me, her eyes glinting like coals stoked too long. “An’ you say she jus’ a lil mermaid?”
Séraphine was right. Mermaids needed water to heal—and even then, it wasn’t that quick.
Nerina flexed her fingers testing them, her own eyes wide with confusion as she looked at me. "Wh—how did it do that?" she whispered.
Even I, despite everything I had seen in this cursed existence, went still. I had witnessed quick healing before—my own wounds mending faster than mortal men’s—but nothing like this. This was instantaneous, unnatural, beyond anything even Séraphine had ever encountered.
Séraphine stepped back, satisfaction curling at the edges of her lips.
She turned, moving with deliberate grace toward one of her shelves.
Glass vials clinked softly as she searched, finally pulling free a slender syringe that shimmered darkly in the dim candlelight.
The tool gleamed between her fingers as she turned back to Nerina, golden eyes alight with curiosity.
"A vessel such as yours requires somethin’ more precise. "
Nerina stiffened as she eyed the syringe, her fingers twitching slightly at her sides. I stepped forward, barely restraining myself. “You said just a taste.”
Séraphine didn’t look at me. "And this is merely that."
My entire body tensed as she reached for Nerina’s arm, rolling back her sleeve.
Just as Séraphine uncapped the syringe, I saw it—the quick flicker of fear in Nerina’s eyes. It wasn’t the blood. It wasn’t the pain.
It was the needle.
She stiffened, going rigid like she was preparing for death. But before I could say anything, her hand found mine without hesitation.
Small. Cold. Shaking just enough that I could feel it in my bones. I didn’t let go. I couldn’t.
There was a moment—half a heartbeat, half a lifetime—where my instincts screamed to pull away. To retreat behind centuries of practiced distance.
But the way her hand trembled, the way her eyes clung to mine—Saints, she wasn’t just reaching for comfort. She was reaching for me.
In that moment, I didn’t want to be anywhere else.
It felt foreign—being someone’s safety instead of their ruin. To have someone reaching for me instead of pulling away.
I didn’t squeeze—just let her hold on. Ground herself. Let her know I was here.