37. 36

36

Serina

T he venom had scorched through my veins like wildfire, an agony so profound that it eclipsed all sense of time and existence.

I lay trapped within my own body, unable to scream or flee from the relentless burn. It felt eternal, as though I'd been suspended in a torturous loop of fire. Was this hell?

Then, abruptly, the torment ceased.

My eyes snapped open to the dim light of a familiar room, the pain replaced by a hunger that crawled beneath my skin like spiders.

I was thrown into a world where everything was magnified—the soft rustle of fabric, the muted echo of footsteps in the room, the faintest whisper of wind against the windows. And there it was, the rhythmic drumming that seemed louder than thunder, my cousin’s heartbeat.

I knew it was her, for I could smell her scent.

It was disorienting, this newfound strength that coiled within me, waiting to be unleashed.

But more consuming than any power was the hunger gnawing at my core, a primal urge for blood that surged with each beat of her heart.

I clenched my fists, nails digging into my palms.

Fighting the desire to lunge at her, to sate the monstrous craving.

“Serina?”

Their voices were a lifeline, pulling me back from the brink. Bastian, Nox, and Thorne surrounded me, their faces etched with emotions I couldn't quite decipher.

Was it fear? Sorrow? Guilt? All of the above?

It was overwhelming, the flood of feelings that coursed between us—a current charged by the gravity of what they had done. I could feel them in a way.

I could always read them well, but this seemed deeper. Before, it was nothing but my instincts, but this seemed almost tangible.

They had changed me. Turned me into the very thing I had always hunted and killed.

I had never wanted to be a vampire, at least I had never thought about it until them . Bastian, Nox and Thorne were different. They weren’t monsters—not to me.

“I… I can feel you somehow. All of you,” I murmured, gazing between them.

“It’s a sire bond. It makes everything between us feel more… connected ,” Nox explained.

Acting on impulse, I reached out with trembling arms and pulled them close, enveloping them in an embrace that felt like a lifeline amidst a stormy sea. My vision blurred with tears that I hadn’t known had formed in my eyes.

“Thank you,” I whispered, my voice a broken hush. “For saving me.”

The hug was frantic and almost savage in its intensity, as if I could merge our souls into one being and forget the word. I clung to them, tears leaking from me with reckless abandon.

Bastian's voice cracked the stillness, his words heavy with an apology that clung to the air like a thick fog.

“Serina, I'm so sorry, I—we—couldn't live without you. We thought we lost you… we did lose you…” His eyes were a storm of sorrow and relief, mirroring the turmoil that unraveled within me.

I reached up, my movements unfamiliar in their newfound grace, and placed my fingers against his lips, finding them warm and inviting.

“I'm okay now… I'm not mad. I love you,” I murmured, silencing the guilt that threatened to consume him, consume all of them. I was changed but still here, still theirs. And although I had never thought this would be the path I’d end up on in my life, I wasn’t mad about it because I loved them.

With a tenderness that surprised even myself, I pressed a soft kiss to Bastian's lips. He kissed me back, cupping my face in his calloused hands, holding me as if he thought I might disappear. I had to pull back before I lost myself in him.

I turned to Nox, whose blue eyes held mine with fevered intensity. My lips grazed his jaw, then his lips, an acknowledgment of the strength he'd always given me, the one that told me to face my demons.

And Thorne, ever the kind protector, smiled as I pulled him into a kiss, too.

They chuckled, a sound that felt like sunlight piercing through the dense darkness, a sound that I didn’t know I would hear again.

And then I caught sight of Sam.

She was a portrait of heartache, her eyes red-rimmed pools reflecting emotions too deep for words.

Her hair, usually so meticulous, formed a chaotic crown on her head, and the redness of her cheeks and puffiness around her eyes told me she had been crying.

“Serina, I—” She broke then, the words crumbling before they could fully form, and my heart splintered at the sight.

Instinctively, my arms reached out to her, but Bastian's hand shot up, a barrier built from concern rather than rejection. “You’re new , love, the hunger,” he warned, his tone gentle yet firm, a reminder of the beast that now stirred beneath my skin.

“It's okay,” Sam insisted, her voice steadfast despite the tremble that laced each word. She edged closer. “I trust her. She’s my cousin, and we're more like sisters than anything. Besides, if she kills me, I probably deserve it.”

She settled beside me on the bed, and I enveloped her in an embrace, feeling Nox, Bastian, and Thorne tense around us.

The scent of her blood was delicious, sending a shiver of need coursing through my veins. But I was stronger than the thirst, stronger than the monster I feared I'd become.

I held her, letting her warmth remind me that we had made it, both of us. Well, mostly.

I brushed a stray lock of hair from her damp cheek. “You don’t deserve that… I know it wasn't you,” I whispered softly. “You wouldn't intentionally hurt me, Sam. But the first thing we are going to do when this is over is get that tattoo on you. I don't care where, but it's happening. Fear of needles or not, we will get it done. I will not have you be used in such a way again.”

Sam nodded, acknowledging the pact without hesitation as she fiddled with the vervain necklace around her neck. I couldn’t trust a little piece of jewelry; she needed something permanent. Bastian, Thorne, and Nox needed one, too.

I moved to the side of the bed and stood, my legs firm as if they'd never known the fragility of human bones. No longer did I feel any pain, only the power rolling under my skin like thunderclouds ready to burst.

It was intoxicating, this sense of invincibility.

I turned to Bastian, Nox, and Thorne, who watched me with a mixture of concern and pride.

“How have you guys been avoiding his compulsion?” I asked, curiosity lacing my words. “He said he can compel anyone, and you don’t wear any jewelry or have any tattoos to keep him out of your head.”

“Vervain,” Bastian began, his voice a low hum that vibrated through my heightened senses. “We started ingesting the stems and blooms. It weakened us, but it kept him out of our heads.”

I mulled over his words, the bitter taste of betrayal still lingering on my tongue, but now it was mixed with a hint of admiration for their resilience. The lengths they went to protect me.

“Then all those times,” I started, hesitant, “when you were watching me and my dad, when you kept pressing for a deal… was that Victor pulling your strings or was it actually you?” My heart thrummed in my chest, aching for the truth.

“We had been ordered to watch you before your dad’s death, keep tabs and report back. By that time, we were trying to break the compulsion little by little. Unfortunately, we didn’t do it fast enough to stop what he had planned… And then we were too late. We had found you the day of the accident, and we took you to the hospital. We were there all that time, watching as you ripped the world apart for your vengeance.”

Bastian's eyes were heavy with unspoken apologies, his hands clenching into fists at his sides.

“But eventually we didn't have to give Victor accurate information anymore, didn't have to tell him the full truth because the vervain had started working more and more until he didn’t control us anymore. We played along with his games, spinning lies about other hunters that were doing the killings, and stayed in line until he figured out that you were alive.”

A glance passed between him and Sam, laden with meaning, a silent exchange that spoke volumes.

When Victor had caught her, the fragile veil of deceit they had woven came crashing down, revealing that it was me all along and that they had been lying.

That was how he knew I was coming, because of Sam. That was how he knew everything .

They had been there this whole time, their presence a constant I hadn’t even been aware of, trying to protect me while ensnared in Victor’s twisted web.

My heart swelled with an affection that felt too vast for my chest.

Nox stepped closer, his presence enveloping me in a familiar warmth. “Bastian was the one who came up with the idea of easing into taking vervain. We started with a quarter of one of the petals, and then after a month or so we would up the dose little by little,” Nox explained.

The room seemed to spin as I pieced everything together.

“That’s why none of you were healing correctly… You were poisoning yourselves… are poisoning yourselves,” I said to no one in particular, but they all just nodded.

They had been walking a razor's edge, caught between servitude and the fight for freedom.

To be with me, to keep me safe.

“Fuck, you guys…” My voice broke, a mix of gratitude and sorrow washing over me. “You played a dangerous game.”

Bastian reached out, his fingers brushing mine, sending a jolt of something electric but soothing through my veins. “For you, love,” he said, “we'd play that game a thousand times over.”

And in that moment, amidst the chaos of my new existence, I felt it—the bittersweet tang of a bond that had defied everything.

We were a tangle of souls, bruised but unbroken, and in their eyes, I saw the reflection of my own resolve. In the end, we had all been after the same thing, but we had found something greater along the way.

“I love you,” I whispered, letting the weight of those words carry all the love and pain that filled the cavernous spaces of my undead heart. They wrapped me in their embraces in one big group hug, and I never wanted to leave, but I knew we still had work to do.

Sam sat on the bed. “I hate to break up the love fest… but what’s next?”

“Right now, we need to focus on you learning to control your… impulses,” Nox said, looking at me as we all let go of each other, but his hand reached out, brushing against mine.

“And learning how to use your new abilities to your advantage. Victor has plenty of Vampires backing him, not because they necessarily want to. They’re being forced to,” Thorne added.

“Is that why you guys haven’t killed him yourselves?” Sam asked from where she sat, biting her lip.

“Yeah, the changelings don’t have a choice. The moment they’re brought to Victor, they’re put under his spell. They’re innocent; they didn’t get to choose if they wanted to be good or bad,” Bastian answered, eyeing me knowingly.

My father had always believed in choices, and if they had been watching for as long as they had said, they knew that. I had veered so far off the path of what was right, but I would fix it.

I’d be better for those who didn’t get the choice.

The hunger clawed at me then, insistent and savage, a drumbeat pounding against my skull.

My brow furrowed, the fight to remain myself against the newborn Vampire instincts becoming extremely hard. Sam’s heartbeat was drumming in my mind, along with all the other creatures in the woods nearby.

They noticed; of course they did. They always noticed.

Nox's hand reached out. But it wasn't time yet.

I wouldn't let this hunger dictate who I was. Not when I was surrounded by those who had risked everything just to stand by me.

“Serina?” Thorne's voice was a whisper, tentative, as if he feared one wrong word might shatter me.

I met his soft gaze, found the steely resolve there, and nodded.

Sorrow and strength, love and vengeance, human and monster—I was all of it now, and somehow, with them, I'd find a way to weave these threads into something new.

Something fierce. Something undeniably me.

Nox's fingers closed around mine. “Come on, we need to get her out of here. She needs to feed,” he murmured, his voice rough like gravel after a storm.

I glanced back at Sam behind me now still on the bed, her figure shrinking as I walked down the hall, her face etched with worry and love. She was staying back, knowing all too well about changelings.

Nox nodded to the front door, his usual smirk absent as he scanned the windows. Shit, I forgot, I wouldn’t be able to go out in the sun anymore. The thought made me frown.

Bastian's hand rested around my waist as he walked behind me, grounding me. Did he feel my unease? It was as if his touch could tether my soul from spiraling into the abyss that gaped within me in this newfound existence.

“We’ll find you a daylight ring, love,” he murmured in my ear.

We moved through the house, my father’s cabin, one I hadn’t been to since he died. What would he think of me now?

My footfalls were silent. The floorboards didn't creak under my steps like before, my senses sharpened to the point where I could hear the softest sighs of the night outside.

“This first hunt, it's not just about feeding. It's a test, to hold onto yourself. To not get lost in the bloodlust. You’ll want human blood, but we need you to eat a few animals first to take the edge off before we move to a human,” Bastian explained, his hand resting on the small of my back.

The cool breeze greeted us as we stepped out, the sun almost completely gone behind the trees, and the smells of the world hit me all at once.

Earth and decay, life and growth, musty and rich, all twisted together in a scent that assaulted my nostrils. But then my body tensed, every muscle coiled, ready to leap at the prey I couldn't yet see but felt lurking in the woods.

“Stay close,” Thorne instructed, his arm brushing against mine. “It's easy to lose yourself the first time.”

Nox added, his hand still clasping mine, “But we've got you, baby.” He winked with that bad boy smile, and I couldn’t help my own grin then.

Whatever lay ahead, I knew one thing for certain.

Victor had underestimated me, and together, we would kill him.