The fog in the forest floor look like a thick, silver blanket, swallowing sound and light until the world was nothing but shadows and whispers. Lucien moved through the forest without a sound, his footsteps as soft as a sigh.
The night air was very cold against his skin paler than moonlight, more colder than death, but it can't touch the fire burning inside him. The vow has bound and held him prisoner for centuries, and yet it also gave Lucien a purpose.
Isla, Lucien said.
He knew her name as if it were the first word he would ever learned. Her scent was like a song he could never forget repeatedly singing in his head, a melody haunting and sweet, mixed with the sharp tang of fear and something deeper.
Lucien had not seen her before the blood moon, but he had known she would come. The moment the moon turned red, the world shifted, the veil between life and death thinned, and old promises whispered to life again.
He stepped lightly over tangled roots, the dense forest alive with the sound of distant animals and his own steady breath. Every movement was calculated and controlled. Years of training, survival and endless waiting had made him a shadow no one could see or catch.
But tonight was different.
Tonight, he was no longer alone in the dark.
His mind flickered to the vow, a promise sealed in blood and pain. A promise made to a girl long gone, whose face now lived in Isla's. The bloodline had returned, and with it lies hope and danger.
Isla.
She stopped suddenly, sensing him.
His voice was barely more than a whisper.
"Isla."
She turned, eyes wide with fear and confusion.
"You don't understand what's coming," he said, stepping more closer to her. "You shouldn't be here."
Her lips parted, she wanted to talk and ask a question, but no sound came out.
He could clearly see the mark on her wrist now, faint but glowing softly in the moonlight. The crescent rose, the seal of their bond.
Lucien's chest tightened. The bond was not meant to happen so soon. Not even like this.
"Why?" she finally breathed and said. "Why me?"
The question echoed in the quiet woods.
He knelt down, trying to meet her gaze without frightening her further.
"Because you carry a legacy older than this forest, a Blood that was cursed long ago. And because I swore a vow to protect you, no matter the cost."
She shivered, not from the cold but from what Lucien has said.
"The world now is not a safe place. There are people who hunt your kind, and those people would use you."
His words hung heavy between them.
Lucien could feel the pull of the blood moon above, its light weaving magic through the night air, stirring old powers in both of them.
He reached out, brushing a strand of hair from her face. The touch was electric, pulling memories from a past neither fully understood.
"I will keep you safe," he promised.
"But I don't know what I am," Isla whispered.
"Not yet," Lucien said.
Lucien rose, his senses sharpening.
"We need to move. They're coming."
Isla followed, trusting him despite everything.
Together, they walked into the fog, two people bound by fate, walking into a night where love and danger would likely collide.