The morning after the ritual, Ariana awoke in Damien's bed.
She wasn't alone. His body was wrapped tightly around hers, like he was anchoring himself to her in his sleep. His skin was cool, his breath slow.
And her chest ached.
Not from pain. From memory.
But not hers.
She saw it—flashes.
A battlefield. Fangs dripping. A silver dagger lodged in Damien's thigh. The scent of blood and betrayal in the air. Xander's laughter echoing from the trees.
Ariana gasped—and Damien's eyes snapped open.
"You saw it," he said, voice rough from sleep.
She nodded. "Is that… what it's like now?"
Damien sat up, muscles taut. "The bond is still settling. Our souls are syncing. Sometimes that means memories leak through. Emotion. Pain. Desire."
She touched her throat—his bite still throbbed faintly.
"And it goes both ways?"
"Yes," he said, glancing down at the mark on her chest. "Now, when you suffer—I'll bleed."
Ariana turned away.
"There's something you should know," she said quietly. "About before. Before you took me."
Damien stilled.
She sat up, dragging the silk sheet with her. Her voice was low. Raw.
"I was studying medicine. I had a scholarship, a small apartment, a cat named Rook. I was engaged once, briefly. He cheated on me with my best friend. I didn't cry when I found out. I just packed and left."
Damien said nothing.
"I thought I was building a life for myself," she said. "And then your shadows came."
"I regret that," he said. "But I don't regret you."
Ariana looked at him.
Neither of them said it, but they both felt it—through the bond.
He didn't just want her now. He needed her.
Which meant one thing.
So did Xander.
---
Far away, in the mountain crypt where Xander made his private residence, the blood mirror shimmered.
Tania stood beside him, expression unreadable.
"So, the girl is fully marked," she said. "And still she survives."
Xander's fingers danced over the pool's surface, images flickering—Ariana's face, the glowing glyph over her heart, the way she reached for Damien in her sleep.
"Yes," he muttered. "But she left something behind."
The mirror shifted.
A photograph appeared.
Faded. Human.
Ariana, smiling, standing outside a campus library—beside a younger woman with auburn hair and green eyes.
Xander smiled coldly.
"Her sister."
Tania arched a brow. "You plan to use the humans?"
"I plan to remind her where she came from. Before Damien stole her soul."
"And if that doesn't break her?"
Xander's gaze turned to flame.
"Then I'll burn her past down myself."