The morning sun was a pale, anemic sliver against the horizon, bleeding through a thick mountain mist that clung to the Old Imperial Road like a burial shroud. At first light, the princesses were already back within the confines of their carriages. The rhythmic, heavy thrum of iron wheels against stone marked the steady pace of what many whispered was a death march. The caravan stretched out like a long, segmented serpent, winding toward a battlefield that felt both impossibly distant and encroaching with every passing mile.
Princess Fox yanked her hair into a bun, her fingers trembling with a sharp, jagged irritation. She stared down at the map in her hands, desperately trying to find some plan that would lead to their survival. Her frustration caused her powers to act erratically; frost bloomed across the velvet seats, thick and opaque, spreading until the entire interior was a jagged cage of ice. The marching Sentinels around her carriage shifted their weight, leaning their armored shoulders closer to the frozen wood to steal the chill as the mountain sun beat down on them. Her cold fury was a welcome reprieve from the heat.
Pushing open her carriage door, the Gargolian soldier nearest to her frowned as he watched the ice. Princess Fox sat at the edge of the door, her feet dangling in the open air as they marched beside the carriage.
"Do you have another question, Princess Fox?" Polar asked. He marched with a steady stride, unsure of why she was being so reckless. One bump and she'd fall to the muddy ground, likely to be impaled by a sharp rock or poisoned by the foliage.
Holding the map before her face, she shook her head. She just needed to feel less trapped. Being stuck inside the carriage all day was starting to drive her mad, and she needed space to think.
Noticing the commotion, Princess Salinas stuck her head out of her own carriage window. Seeing Fox's odd behavior, she gathered her skirts and opened her door as well. She gave a polite nod to Fox before sitting at the edge, allowing her feet to swing languidly as she basked in the sun. Death was looming closer; she had already chewed her fingernails down to the nubs, and clumps of her hair littered the carriage floor. None of it made her feel better, and none of it guaranteed her survival, but the sun was nice. It couldn't hurt to enjoy the small things. Every moment, she looked for an opportunity to run, but there were none.
Daniela sat by her window, her cheek resting against the cool glass. Ahead, she could see the open doors of the other carriages, but she paid them no attention. Jasper's seat remained empty, the velvet upholstery undisturbed. He had not returned from his trip into the shadowed woods, yet Daniela felt no flicker of the anxiety that plagued the others. He would come back when he was finished, and not a second before.
Turning her gaze outward, she lost herself in the landscape. The world outside was a masterpiece of serene beauty. Ancient trees soared high enough to rival the sky, their gnarled, silver-barked limbs overhanging the road. Their leaves shimmered with dew that looked like scattered diamonds as they descended to the ground, as if someone had thrown diamond dust into the air.
The scent of pine needles and damp earth reminded her of her first life. Her family home had been surrounded by juvenile pine trees; every time she'd opened her bedroom window, it was the only thing she could smell. It brought back memories of the youthful dreams that would never be fulfilled. She remembered sitting and typing away on her laptop with the window open, that pine breeze filling the room. Her younger self had no idea of the torment that would become her life.
Recently, she'd been thinking more about her previous lives and how Jasper had intersected them. In every life, there was always a moment with him where she could have turned in or kept walking. She wondered what always made her turn away. Perhaps even then, she could see the darker parts of him so close to the surface. In her first life, she wasn't ready; in her second, she was too scared; her third had been a mess. But this time, everything had fallen into place. The right time, the right place, and the right version of herself.
Shadows painted her face as the dwindling light was chased away by the moon. As the carriage rolled through the dappled darkness, she felt the weight of unseen eyes. They were being watched—not by the mindless hunger of a beast, but by a cold, calculating presence hovering just beyond the treeline. Close enough to feel; far enough that she couldn't pinpoint the source.
They traveled for another day, the silence occasionally shattered by the desperate snarls of wayward beasts. A pack of shadow-wolves lunged from the brush at midday, but the Sentinels moved with mechanical, lethal grace, dispatching them without the caravan ever stopping.
As evening bled into a bruised purple twilight on the fourth night, the scouts located a natural hot spring nestled in a rocky clearing. The camp was struck with frantic energy. To Daniela's left, the other princesses were practicing battle magic. Flying daggers of translucent ice whistled through the air; windblades mowed down swathes of tall grass; earth barriers erupted with bone-shaking thuds. Daniela watched them with detached boredom. To her, these were nothing more than parlor tricks for those who feared what they refused to face.
Seeking solace, she sought the spring. The water was a deep, steaming turquoise, cradled by smooth basalt stones. Daniela undressed slowly, her movements fluid as she stepped into the heat. She leaned back and closed her eyes, letting the steam dampen her hair. The silence was absolute until the air changed.
Three figures materialized from the shadows, creeping with the silent lethality of vipers. They were no more than two meters away, daggers raised, when the world simply stopped for them. They didn't fall; they froze mid-step, seized from the inside out.
Daniela's power emulated gravity, creating an immeasurable amount of pressure that slowly crushed their organs within. The force ignored their skin, restricting the beating of their hearts and the exhale of their lungs.
The men began to gasp, a wet, rattling sound. The blood vessels in their eyes popped, turning their sclera into masks of solid crimson. Daniela didn't move. She kept her eyes closed, a small, dark smile playing on her lips. They were in her Killzone now. She had felt their presence for days and had wondered who they were after and when they would strike.
Slowly, she shifted, resting her slender arms on the edge of the stone basin. Her damp hair fell in dark emerald ribbons down her back as she finally opened her eyes. "Who are you?" she asked casually.
The lead assassin managed a single, strangled word. "Please..."
His eyes were solid, blood-red orbs—the mark of the Vampire Kingdom. Daniela rose from the water, naked and glistening. She walked toward the first man, her bare feet padding softly through the grass as it soaked up the blood leaking from their eyes. She took the dagger from his paralyzed fingers and drew the edge across his throat. The spray was hot against her skin. He twitched, fighting to put pressure on a wound he couldn't reach. Daniela stood before him as he died slowly. Even after his body stilled, he remained suspended upright, her power refusing to let him fall. She moved to the next, then the next, her pace deliberate as each warrior died in a silent struggle.
She saved the speaker for last, keeping his heart hammering against the invisible cage of her magic. She stepped into his space, her face inches from his.
"You're an assassin," she whispered. "A pathetic irony at the moment."
The man tried to speak, the strain visible in the cords of his throat, but all she could hear was a gargling, wet sound. A cruel smile painted Daniela's lips as she looked at him sweetly.
"Use your words," she said. "Speak."
The evening air tore open. A pillar of black flame erupted three meters away, turning the grass to ash. From the eruption, Jasper stepped out. His movements were off—twitchy and jagged. He had a wide, frantic smile that showed too much teeth, and his fingers drummed a restless, silent beat against his thighs. His dark, predatory eyes immediately found Daniela, raking over her nude form glistening with spring water and blood. The drug was still working through his system, the haze remaining, but seeing her like this was a fantasy made reality.
"I leave you for a few days and you've already found a new playmate," Jasper remarked, his voice a low, rough vibration. He walked toward her, his boots crunching on the blood-soaked earth as he slipped through the perched corpses. He stopped inches from her, his presence a towering heat. He glanced at the trembling, dying vampire. "He's a bit scrawny. He might break too quickly."
Daniela's thoughts reeled. She had an idea. Something fun. "I think he'll be a good toy," she replied, her green eyes meeting his. As she stared into his bottomless depths, she realized even his scent had shifted—it was richer, far more potent than the dark spice she remembered, as if his body were radiating its own jagged aphrodisiac.
She had always known Jasper was dangerous, but looking at him now, the lack of his usual fluid grace was unmistakable. He wasn't as in control of himself as he normally was. He was a live wire, pulsing with a restless, chemical energy that made her own blood hum in response.
The steam off the spring was a thick, wet weight, smelling of sulfur and the metallic tang of the slaughter. Beyond the water, the stone floor was fractured; blood trickled through the cracks in dark-red veins, pooling at the lip of the pool. Above them, the assassins hung like morbid puppets. The only sound was the faint, wet crunch of the vampire's ribs splintering and his muffled groans.
Jasper didn't care about the mess. He stared at her with territorial hunger, running his fingers from her jawline down, carving a clean path through the drying blood on her chest.
"Come," he said, his voice a low, gravelly scrape.
He roughly gripped her waist, his fingers bruising her hips as he hauled her over. He shoved her into the hot spring, and the once-clear water turned a murky, sickening pink as the blood washed off her skin in ribbons. Daniela stared up at him, fascinated by the frantic, volatile edge to his behavior. She watched as he stripped with predatory efficiency and stepped in after her, circling her like an animal.
The hunger inside him reached a boiling point. He reached out, his hand clasping around her throat. He felt her steady pulse beneath his fingers and closed his eyes in ecstasy. Soft, warm skin—no pain. His elongated nails traced the vein in her throat. One deep push and he could snuff her life out. Daniela leaned back, her wet form plastered to his chest. His pupils were blown, his breathing heavy.
Jasper's lips crashed down on hers. Their kiss was hot and sloppy, passion clashing with a fever-pitch of lust. His tongue dived past her lips, tangling with her own. Daniela moaned into his mouth, a startled gasp escaping as her hips were pressed firmly into the stone lip of the spring.
His lips trailed down her throat, kissing and biting his way down the curve of her shoulders. His growing erection pressed between her slick ass cheeks. He reached out, his hands bruising her thighs as he lifted her until her hips rested on the lip of the pool. Her glistening pussy spread wide, exposing her completely.
"Already wet," he growled. His large palm slapped against her ass cheek, pushing her legs even wider until she hissed with the strain. His thick digits swirled in her wetness, plunging between her swollen lips. She moaned like a bitch in heat, squirming to force his fingers deeper.
He lined up his thick, heavy cock against her ass. With a brutal, single shove, he buried his shaft deep inside her. The fullness was immediate and overwhelming, a blunt force that made Daniela's breath hitch in a choked sob of pure pleasure. She felt the stretch, the agonizingly right sensation of him filling every inch. Her nails clawed at the bloodied earth, arching her back to meet him thrust for thrust.
"Look at them," Jasper hissed into her ear, grabbing a fistful of her hair and yanking her head back to force her eyes onto the suspended vampire.
He hammered into her at a relentless, aggressive pace. Every thrust was a wet, heavy thud of his pelvis. The grip of her ass was tight, clamping down on his cock like a vise. The friction was fire, a visceral heat that made his inky black smoke-wings burst from his back, beating the air in slow, rhythmic thuds. His hand never stopped working her pussy, his thumb grinding her clit while his cock wrecked her from behind.
Jasper's aggression boiled over. Massive, rigid horns of obsidian burst from his forehead. His teeth sharpened into serrated points and he leaned down, sinking them deep into the meat of her shoulder, drawing fresh, hot blood. Daniela screamed in a mixture of pain and pleasure.
Jasper thrust harder, a punishing, frantic rhythm. Daniela's emerald magic exploded in a blinding pulse, her internal walls squeezing his cock so tight it was nearly painful. She screamed as her climax hit her like a physical blow, her body going limp and still under him.
Jasper did not stop. Even as Daniela reeled, hypersensitive and gasping, he continued to hammer into her. He slammed into her wet cunt with a relentless, brutal force, each thrust dragging her sensitive skin across the rough stones beneath her. He chased his own peak for a long, agonizing minute while she was left shivering and undone beneath his weight.
Finally, his body spasms. The beast within forced a roar of conquest from his throat as he reached his peak, his seed filling her to the brim and leaking out white against her skin.
As their bodies stilled, their powers surged outward in a final, involuntary pulse. Daniela's effervescent emerald swirls lashed into the air, tangling violently with Jasper's inky black shadows. The two magics entwined above the spring, a beautiful, haunting spectacle of light and darkness dancing in the steam. For a few heartbeats, the clearing was illuminated by the flickering green glow and the void-like weight of his smoke, a visual echo of the violence and pleasure that had just occurred.
As the adrenaline began to level out, the heavy, rhythmic thud of his wings slowed. The haze of the hollow glass drug finally began to alleviate, the chemical fog lifting from his mind. He felt his normal, icy control settling back in, finally feeling like himself once again.
He remained buried deep in her, his chest heaving against her back, his obsidian horns still sharp and rigid. He buried his face in the crook of her neck, his teeth still grazing the bloody mark on her shoulder. His clawed fingers stayed dug into the stone lip of the spring, anchoring them both.
Jasper finally lifted his head. The obsidian horns receded, sinking back into his skull. He tightened his grip on Daniela, pulling her spent, slick body closer. He looked over her shoulder at the pathetic, shivering creature trapped in his smoke.
"What do you want to do with him?" he rumbled.
Daniela's limp body curled easily into his arms. Her heavy-lidded eyes looked toward the vampire and she smirked.
"Kill me, please. Please," the assassin begged, tears dripping uncontrollably. He had never felt as much fear as he did in this moment. Death seemed the greatest mercy either monster could offer him. He didn't beg for his life; he knew a monster when he saw one.
Author's note:
Hope your enjoying the book!!