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“I was with my father. Just there, underground. Like it was happening, like I was just there…” My words spilled out in a jumble. Was I making any sense at all?

Tears stung my eyes, but they weren’t flowing. Everything in my body felt wrong.

“I was just with my father…”

The memories slammed into me of that day in the forest, when the vampires had arrived. Father’s blood stained the white flowers, streamed all over Sion.

“You killed him.” My voice cracked, and the wind roared in my ears. “And now, what am I? I’m like you? I spent ten years fighting not to take lives. And I only just started to master my magic, to stop myself from hurting people like Leo, and now…” I swallowed hard, my throat tight with grief. “Now I have to kill to live? I’m an even worse threat to Leo?”

Sion’s grip tightened around my waist, pulling me closer once again, but that time, it only made the emptiness inside me swell.

My eyes drifted to the castle in the distance, a dark, looming shadow against the sky, and I felt its coldness settle in my bones. “There’ll be time for all that later, Elowen,” he said quietly, though his words barely reached me. “Emotions and senses will overwhelm you. I’m just going to get you back to your room.”

I wiped my fingertips over my mouth, and they came away stained with Sion’s dark red blood. I knew what needed to happen next, but… “What happens if I don’t drink from a human?”

“Then, my love, you will die. I will make it easy for you…”

But the sound of the waves drowned out his voice. They were deafening, pounding in my skull, relentless—so loud when my heart was so still and quiet.

It wasn’t just the waves, though. Voices echoed from within the castle, piercing the stone.

I glanced up at the stars and flinched at the way their light hurt my eyes.

I leaned into him, slumping in exhaustion.

CHAPTER 29

Isat in an upholstered chair at the window, mutely watching the waves crash against the shore. The noise pounded through the glass, raising the hair on the back of my neck. In the castle, the buzz of conversation floated in the air. A disturbing stillness settled in my chest…

Outside, a woman dressed in white marched along the shoreline, a line of soldiers following behind her. She looked like a ghost leading an army…

Was I seeing things?

My thoughts roiled wildly.

And then the screaming started.

It was faint at first, a nagging at the edges of my thoughts. But then it rose, ragged and wild, drowning out the sound of the sea, a keening cry in my skull.

It wasn’t just sound, though, was it? It was hunger, like a scream in my thoughts. Raw, brutal hunger that clawed at my chest, raking at the dead place where my heart once beat.

I never wanted this.

I pressed my hands to my head, trying to block it out.

The hunger claimed my thoughts.

“Elowen.” A deep voice broke through the chaos.

I whirled to see Sion standing by the doorway, his golden eyes catching the light, bright as stars. They pierced the mess of my thoughts.

“I’m hungry.” My voice belonged to someone else.

“I know. I brought you something to drink. Are you ready?”

The sweet, coppery scent of blood filled my nostrils. Ineededthat in my mouth, filling my body.

He stepped into the room, moving closer, holding the cup in one hand and a carafe in the other, its dark liquid swirling like night in a glass.