Page 1

Chapter One

Alaric

I was always in control. Every word I spoke. Every move I made. Controlled.

Even when I allowed my bloodlust to come out and play, I did it carefully and in situations where I’d mitigated the risks.

Most Moroi viewed the tight control I kept over myself as a disadvantage. We lived in a world of predators, and our bloodlust was what gave us enough of an edge to survive. By letting it rise, we became just that much faster and stronger.

Of course, if we let it out too much, we might never be able to pull it back. Some Moroi were willing to risk that. I was not.

But as I looked around the meadow that I’d turned into a sea of blood, a cruel smile spread across my lips. I’d pit my controlled brand of violence against their bloodlust any day.

My eyes scanned the tall grass, looking for any other threats, but only the broken bodies of howlers—canine-like beasts—littered the ground. With nothing left to vent my rage on, the desolation I’d been feeling all week started to creep back in.

“Bit much, don’t you think?” Samara’s voice said dryly in the back of my mind. I could practically envision her toeing one of the corpses with a smirk on her face. “You could have just gotten me flowers.”

But Samara wasn’t here. She hadn’t been for almost two weeks, and we only had rumors to go on for where she was.

Hence the carnage.

Several shadows moved from a patch of the meadow where the grass had grown over six feet tall, the tips ending in seed pods. Looks like I missed a few. Exhilaration replaced the despair as three howlers crept closer.

The howlers didn’t make a sound. Even if I hadn’t known they were sick, that would have been a clue. Normally, the beasts were loud, letting out excited yips and howls as they closed in on their prey, but these ones—like the ones I’d already killed—were rabid and not acting normal.

I watched them draw closer, fighting the revulsion as I slowly slid my sword back into its sheath and drew the bow from my back.

Howlers were always a little freaky looking, having only a passing resemblance to the canines I was familiar with—mostly the lycanthropes.

There were a few Fae murals that depicted domesticated dogs that, apparently, they’d kept as pets once upon a time.

“Can you imagine?” Samara’s voice once again spoke to me.

Maybe I was finally losing it. “Keeping cute little dogs as pets? Such luxury.” She’d have drawn out that last word in a way that would’ve made me instantly hard.

I still didn’t know how she did it. Somehow, she could make any word sound obscene.

Gripping my bow with one hand, I pulled an arrow from the quiver.

The largest of the three split off, and I adjusted my stance as I aimed the tip of the arrow towards it.

Two pairs of eyes, one stacked on top of the other, watched me from a long, narrow head.

The madness that rotted their minds did the same to their flesh.

Its sleek black coat was missing large patches of fur in places, and its ribs were starting to show.

Howlers were built with speed in mind—a lean body that cinched and narrowed at the hips sat on long legs.

Once they got going, they could almost outrun a horse, their stamina definitely better.

Bits of rotting flesh hung from its teeth as its mouth gaped open.

The other fun part about howlers was they could open their jaw almost to a perfect hundred eighty degrees.

Their teeth curved backwards, and their favorite way of bringing down large prey was for several of them to latch onto it, slowing it down, while others in the pack did their best to trip the panicked prey.

Once the prey was on the ground, the pack wouldn't bother to kill it, they’d just start feasting.

I couldn’t fall. Howlers might be low on the food chain, but it was still three against one.

A little of my bloodlust rose, and I let some remain while pushing most of it back down.

It wasn’t enough to actually do anything other than change my eye color, but I found it easier to control if I let a small amount linger.

It would’ve been smarter to let more of it come to the surface. I was bleeding from at least half a dozen wounds that I hadn’t healed yet. Plus, I’d need every inch of speed I could muster up for this fight.

But I couldn’t bring myself to trust the bloodlust that hummed in my soul, begging to be set free.

Samara was confident that I would never turn Strigoi, especially if I continued to drink from her regularly. But it’d been weeks since I’d sunk my fangs into her soft flesh and swallowed the sweet elixir that was her blood.

As much as I wanted to share her faith in me, I’d seen my cousin turn Strigoi. The funny boy I’d grown up with was gone, and all that had remained was a monster that’d tried to rip out my throat. And he wasn’t the only one in our family who had been lost.

I wouldn’t risk it.

Besides, I was looking forward to more physical pain. Anything was better than the sharp, bitter feeling of loss and failure that I felt every waking moment.

I focused on everything Samara had taught me about shooting. Exhale when you draw the string and keep that exhale slow and steady through the release.

The sound of the bow string snapping echoed across the meadow, followed by the thunk of it sinking into the neck of the large howler.

Damn it. Missed. I’d been aiming for its fucking eye, but instead, I’d hit the meaty part of it’s neck. So all I’d done was piss it off.

Samara wouldn’t have missed.

One of the smaller howler’s heads swung away from me and towards the larger one, its nostrils flaring at the scent of fresh blood. Usually, they weren’t cannibalistic, but when they were this far gone, they’d go after anything that was potentially food—even each other.

The beast launched itself at its larger packmate and the two of them tumbled across the ground.

I tossed the bow aside and pulled my sword free.

It didn’t take long for the larger beast to overpower the smaller one, gripping it by the neck and shaking vigorously.

I heard the telltale snap of a neck, but the beast didn’t halt its assault.

My instincts screamed at me to move, and I barely managed to step to the side as the third howler lunged for my throat. I brought my sword down on its neck, severing its spine with one stroke.

Pain lanced up my right leg as the large howler clamped down on my thigh. Flesh tore and bone snapped, forcing a scream from my throat. The howler shook its head back and forth, trying to tear my leg away, and my vision darkened for a second, the bloodlust trying to surge forward.

No .

My back hit the ground, and I dropped my sword. Shoving the pain into the same box I locked my bloodlust in, cool metal met my bloodsoaked fingers as I reached for the dagger holstered on my hip. The howler opened its jaws and bit down again, shattering the bone it’d already broken.

With a guttural yell, I slammed the blade into its eye.

The blow didn’t slow the beast down at all; instead, it just started shaking its head again, slamming me into the earth. I gripped its head with my other hand and drew the dagger out.

Stab. Die . Stab. Fucking die already !

Its jaws finally loosened and the howler collapsed partway on top of me. I shoved it off with a groan and left the dagger buried in its flesh.

I needed to heal the wounds—rationally, I knew this; aside from the pain, I was losing too much blood. Moroi were hard to kill, but I’d been a little reckless in this fight, and I was fairly certain one of my arteries had been hit during that last round.

That explained the lightheadedness and my darkening vision.

“Yep. You’re the epitome of control,” the imaginary Samara teased. But as amazing as she was, Samara didn’t have telepathy.

She wasn’t here.

I was definitely losing it, but I couldn’t bring myself to care. “I miss you. Please be safe.”

My body protested as I forced myself to sit up and draw the glyph for healing on my leg with shaking fingers.

I panted through the pain of bone fragments piecing themselves back together along with my torn flesh.

Once that was done, I set to fixing the other wounds, and twenty minutes later, my body was healed but my soul was still aching.

The sound of hoofbeats drifted to me, and I turned to watch three rangers approach.

I was surprised but glad that it’d taken them this long to get here.

A few rangers had seen me leave alone earlier, and I had no doubt they had reported that to their superiors—who, in this case, were the rangers before me.

“Damn it, Alaric.” The lead ranger glared at me, her blonde hair shining brightly in the afternoon sunlight. “I told you we would handle this.”

I shrugged, picked my sword up off the ground, and swung it into the sheath on my back, ignoring the reproachful look the oldest of the rangers gave me over not cleaning it first. There wasn’t a patch of my clothing that wasn’t coated in blood—mine or the howlers’—and I hadn’t bothered to bring a pack of supplies with me since I wasn’t far from House Harker.

“Adrienne. Emil,” I said in greeting before glancing at the third ranger, who had dismounted and was surveying my work close up. “Nyx.”

The young ranger glanced up at me. “Nice work.”

I grunted. Howlers were some of the least dangerous of the monsters that prowled the forests.

They were pack hunters and really only posed a problem if the pack got particularly large.

Occasionally, some type of madness would infect them.

We didn’t know what caused it, but if one of them got it, the entire pack would and, worse still, would transfer it to any other pack they came into contact with.