The ritual chamber had been cleansed with fire.
The old symbols had been replaced—drawn by Asra herself, in a language Ariana couldn't read but could feel in her blood.
She stood at the center again, this time with Damien beside her. Gone was the ceremonial robe—he wore only his skin and the inked runes along his ribs, pulsing faintly in the candlelight. Every inch of him was taut, coiled, and burning with restrained power.
Ariana's breath caught as she met his eyes.
There was no going back now.
"Asra and the guards will seal the doors once it begins," Damien said. "If I lose control—"
"You won't."
He didn't smile. "If I do, you run."
"I won't."
He stepped forward and placed his hand over her heart. "Then listen. Once I mark you, you will feel me inside you. Not just in body. In mind. In every breath you take. You'll feel my hunger. My rage. My need. There will be no lies between us after tonight."
"Then strip me bare," Ariana whispered, voice trembling. "I have nothing to hide."
Damien didn't hesitate.
He reached up and untied her cloak, letting it fall to the floor.
The silence that followed was reverent.
She stood exposed in the circle, but not afraid. Her body ached for him, her heart thundered—but she stood tall.
He dropped to his knees before her.
And kissed her stomach—right over the place where her mark would soon form.
"I will not be gentle," he murmured against her skin. "Not tonight."
"I'm not asking you to be."
The ritual began.
Damien sliced his palm with the obsidian blade and held it over the glyphs on the ground. The blood sizzled as it touched the symbols, igniting a violet glow that crawled up the walls like living flame.
Ariana took the blade.
Her hand didn't shake.
She cut her own palm, pressed it to his.
A jolt of pure, unfiltered power surged between them. Her knees buckled—Damien caught her.
Their hands still locked, he guided her to the altar behind them—a stone slab warmed by the runes pulsing beneath it.
She lay back.
Damien climbed over her, settling between her legs.
His blood-streaked fingers traced her ribs, her hips, her throat.
"You are mine now," he growled.
"Then claim me."
He didn't hold back.
Their bodies collided with brutal, unrelenting force. It wasn't just sex—it was searing fusion. Magic and desire and rage all woven into one explosive rhythm. Ariana cried out—not from pain, but from the overwhelming truth of what they were becoming.
His fangs grazed her throat.
Then plunged in.
The bite was molten fire.
Her scream tore through the chamber—but she never tried to stop him.
Because in that moment, she saw everything—his memories, his pain, his centuries of loneliness, his guilt over Selene, the blood spilled for power, the silence that followed every victory.
She saw him. All of him.
And he saw her.
When the ritual seal flared, her back arched off the altar—her skin burning as the mark etched itself above her heart: a jagged glyph of shadow and flame.
Damien roared into the night.
And when it ended…
They collapsed into each other's arms, gasping.
The room went still.
No flames. No screams. No death.
Only the thrum of two hearts now beating as one.