Page 48 of Bitten by Bloodmoon (Mateless Shifters #2)

Lumi

A random location was chosen at the last minute, hoping that it would make it safer and ensure the other packs, covens, and vampires wouldn’t be able to find us until after the full moon was over.

But we are all on alert—we all know the likelihood that we will be found before the ceremony can be completed.

Everyone will hunt us tonight. It’s the full moon—the only night that we can complete the marking ceremony.

This is the only night when the curse can be broken.

And everyone will want to find us, to ensure that we break the curse for them.

The stakes couldn’t be higher. Sylara, Riven, Brax, Talonis, and Kael are on security duty. Everyone keeps their eyes peeled as we wait for Ambrose to arrive.

I’m wearing a simple black dress with matching boots and loose curls in my hair. Nyx is in a suit. We chose formal attire to match the mood, but the clothes won’t change anything about tonight.

I’ve run through my plans a million times.

I’m ready. Even for the idiotic plan, I know Nyx and Ambrose have most likely planned to try and “protect” me.

But I don’t need to be protected or saved.

This is my destiny. I’m not afraid to face it anymore.

Even if it kills me, I know what I have to do next.

“He’s here,” I say to Nyx.

Nyx shifts next to me, trying to drop my hand, but I don’t let him. I keep our fingers interlocked. I don’t care if Ambrose sees us together.

Ambrose starts walking toward us through the tree line to the clearing where Nyx and I stand. He’s flanked on either side. Emeric is on his right, and a woman I don’t recognize is on his left.

He nods at both of us in greeting. Even in this somber mood, Emeric flashes me a smile that’s so infectious, it has me grinning right back.

“This is Florence. She’s a Moonfire witch that I trust,” Ambrose says.

Nyx eyes her suspiciously, but says nothing.

“Thank you for coming,” I say.

She nods. “Of course. I think it’s silly that everyone is fighting over who your mate is and who you can or can’t break the curse for.

You are both shifters. It makes sense that you break the curse for the shifters.

Plus, I need to see how exactly you break this curse in the hopes it helps me figure out how to break the witches’ curse later. ”

“Well, I appreciate the risk you’re taking by being here,” I say.

“It’s no risk at all. I’ll just wait over there until you’re ready to start,” she says to me.

Tension fills the air between the four of us.

Emeric hesitates and then says, “I’m going to do a sweep with the others.

But you should do this quickly. We don’t have much time before we’ll be found.

” He looks directly at me when he says it, like I don’t already know the stakes.

Then he runs into the woods that surround the small clearing, shifting as he jumps between two trees.

Ambrose is also dressed in a dark suit with a golden yellow tie. He looks good, too. We look like we’re all about to go to a party, not a ceremony that could cause the deaths of any one of us.

“Ready?” he asks me.

I look from him to Nyx. “Yes.”

Nyx stands on my left, Ambrose on my right, as we walk toward Florence. We all stop at once in front of her as she turns to face us.

With a wave of her hand, a soft, bed-like mat appears in front of us.

Suddenly, my heart is beating out of my chest.

“Breathe, Lumi,” Nyx says.

I take a long breath as I feel Ambrose give my hand a gentle squeeze. I forgot about joining as humans before being marked as a wolf.

I look at the two men I’m being forced to choose between. But it’s not really a choice. Mates are not about free will. They aren’t about making a choice. They sure as hell aren’t about love.

I link my fingers into both of their hands as we step forward—the three of us, stopping just in front of the bed that Florence has created.

She looks over all three of us and then back to me. “It’s time to choose. Who will you allow to mark you? Who do you think is your mate?”

“I love you. But choose him, not me. Live, survive, he’s your mate. He’s the only one whose mark you can survive,” Nyx says in my head.

“Now who’s being the martyr?”

“I’m not being a martyr. Just facts. If you choose me, I won’t accept you. I’ll reject you.”

I grind my teeth together. “You don’t get to choose for me, Nyx.”

“I’m not. I’m just telling you that I’m not a choice. So choose Ambrose or don’t mark. But I’m not going to be the one to kill you, and we both know that if I mark you, you’ll die because we aren’t mates.”

Without warning, Nyx vanishes—uses his vampire speed to disappear into the woods.

I look at Ambrose, who isn’t at all shocked by what Nyx just did. “You two planned this together?”

“Nyx doesn’t want to watch us together. He’ll be in the woods, protecting us.”

I shake my head. “I thought it was my choice.”

“It’s never a choice, and you know it. I’m your mate. Every seer says so. You know it in your heart. Complete the ceremony. Break the curse. Live. We can figure out what tomorrow brings together. Please, Lumi.”

“Only if you make a blood deal with me first.”

His eyebrows jump in surprise, but he says, “Anything.”

I look to Florence, who is staring at me intently. I can’t chance her knowing what I’m about to say, even if Ambrose trusts her. But I make sure to close off the part of my mind that lets Nyx in when I speak.

“Nyx triggered his vampire curse when he used his mind control to command me to shift into my wolf. He’s going to lose his mind, go slowly rabid until he wants to do nothing but kill mercilessly.

He won’t let himself get to that point. He’ll have someone kill him first.” I bite my lip, preparing myself to say the next part.

“I’ll accept you as my mate; I’ll complete the marking ceremony with you if you make a blood deal with me that we break the curse for the vampires, not the wolf shifters.

We save him.” Tears hang from my eyelashes, but I refuse to let them fall.

I have to do this. I don’t have a choice.

Ambrose is my mate. Every seer agrees. He’s the only way to break the curse.

But Nyx—I love him. If I do this, I can protect him. I can keep him alive. I can save him.

“How do we do that?” he asks.

“The strongest between us gets to choose who the curse is broken for, which would be you. So when the time comes, you choose to break it for the vampires.”

“You love him?”

“Don’t ask me that.” I prick my finger on my blade, holding it out to him. “Do we have a deal?”

I hate what I’m doing. I hate that this feels like I’m rejecting Nyx. That I’m choosing Ambrose. But I’m doing the only thing I can think of to save him. I know Nyx doesn’t plan on living after I’ve completed the marking ceremony if his curse isn’t broken. He won’t chance hurting anyone he loves.

“You know what this means, right? After we become mates, I don’t know if—”

I cut him off. “I know what it means.” I might not ever be able to be with Nyx again. The bond between us as mates will most likely prevent that. But I’ll figure out how to undo my bond with Ambrose after I save Nyx’s life.

Ambrose pricks his own finger, holding it up to me, but not making contact.

“I swear to it,” he says.

I press our fingers together, sealing our blood deal.

The tear falls. I can’t help it.

I reject Nyx as my mate. He’s not my mate.

I feel the threads connecting me to Nyx severing one by one.

Unlike when I rejected Ambrose, I let the magic of my bond with Nyx untangle itself from my mind.

I watch as each thread rips, shreds, and severs itself until I can’t find even a single inkling of his icy, cold shadows in my mind.

I’ll get you back. I’ll find a way to get you back. Just not now. I can’t force you to live in my mind while I’m mated to another man.

I look to Florence and give her the slightest of nods. The moonlight hits my skin, and it’s time. I blink back my tears and steady my mind for what I’m about to do.

“Have you made your choice?” Florence asks me.

“Yes, Ambrose is my mate. He’ll be the one marking me,” I answer.

She looks from me to Ambrose, a scowl slowly forming on her face. “So be it.”

The entire Moonfire coven instantly appears behind Florence, as if uncovering an invisible veil.

“What the hell are they doing here?” Ambrose asks, positioning his body in front of mine.

“I knew you’d betray us,” Isolde says, walking up to stand next to Florence. “Florence is an excellent mind reader; some might even say she’s the best. She overheard your little blood deal conversation between you two. That just won’t do.”

“Blood deals can’t be undone,” I say.

“Everything can be undone. Blood deals, magic, curses—all of it!” Isolde answers. “You can release him from your blood deal, Lumi.”

“What blood deal?” Nyx asks, he’s flanked by Sylara, Emeric, Kael, Brax, Talonis, and Riven.

“The idiotic blood deal she made to try and save your life,” Florence answers.

Nyx looks to me, trying to speak to me in my head. But he blinks in horror when he realizes that I’ve severed our bond. There is nothing there. I haven’t just blocked him. I’ve destroyed our connection permanently.

His head snaps back toward the witches. “She has to complete the marking ceremony tonight.”

“We agree, but when she does, she’ll choose the witch’s curse to break, not the vampire’s curse,” Isolde says.

Nyx’s eyes widen as he finally realizes what I’ve done.

“No, I refuse. And now, because of my blood deal with Ambrose, he has no choice. He has to break it for the vampires, or he will die.”

“Foolish girl,” Isolde says, turning her attention to Ambrose.

He freezes, his body going completely rigid.

“Ambrose? What’s happening?” I prod into his mind.

But when I speak, my words are thrown back at me as if I spoke them into a wall, and not a wall of his own making. Isolde is in his mind.

I growl in her direction. “Get out of his head!”

Her lips curl up. “He’s a witch because I made him so. His powers are linked to me and the Moonfire coven. He is under my control.”

“You can’t kill him. If you do, your hopes of ending the curse die with him.

He made a blood deal. He can’t get out of it.

Saving Nyx is the only way to break your curse now.

Let us break the curse, end it for the vampires.

Keep Nyx alive. Thalia saw in the prophecy that Nyx is the one who breaks the other two curses.

If you help me keep him alive, he will break the wolf shifter and witch curses,” I say.

I look at Ambrose, but he hasn’t blinked. I’m not even sure if he’s taken a breath.

Isolde won’t kill him, she won’t. But every second this drags on, I’m afraid she’s going to call my bluff and end his life.

“Say it,” Isolde says, looking at Ambrose with a dark evil in her eyes.

Ambrose’s body twitches, his eyes fall closed, and his lips snap shut.

“Say it,” Isolde snaps again.

He clenches his fists, and every vein in his body is popping out, straining against her words. She’s cast a spell on him, and he’s fighting it.

The rest of us are ready to attack. I hope it doesn’t come to that. If a fight breaks out, there will be no time left to complete the marking ceremony tonight before dawn approaches.

“Say it,” she hisses, a snap of her wrist flooding Ambrose with her magic.

He’s fought her. Fought her with every fiber in his being. Fought her so hard, but he can’t fight her any longer. He doesn’t have a choice.

“I’m sorry,” he whispers through our bond.

I shake my head. This isn’t his fault. Whatever she’s making him do, it’s not his fault.

He grinds his teeth together, trying one more time to keep the words inside, but his lips move and he finally speaks the words, “I love you, Lumi.”

I feel his curse locking in place. I’ve been marked for death.

“Now, you have to decide whose life you’re willing to save. Your vampire lord or your own. The only way to prevent Ambrose’s curse from killing you is to break the witch’s curse,” Isolde says.

I glance from Ambrose to Nyx, who looks back at me in horror at what Ambrose just did and how he sealed our fate. My time left is limited. I’m not afraid of dying. I’m afraid of what will happen to Nyx if he’s forced to kill me.

The only way to save Nyx now is to break both the vampire’s and the witch’s curse. But if I complete the marking ceremony tonight, it will only break one. I need more time.

“Run!” Ambrose shouts to me through our bond. He read my thoughts. “I’ll buy you time. Run!”

I turn and run, leaving everything behind.

Ambrose, my friends, Nyx.

Gods, Nyx.

The world will be destroyed if Nyx actually kills me. They think he’s a killer now—I can only imagine the predator he’ll become if he kills me.

Nyx’s words haunt me as I run. “For whatever reason, the universe has tasked me with fulfilling his curse and making me the one who has to kill those he falls in love with. Don’t…don’t give him any more time to fall in love with you. I won’t survive having to kill you.”

Thank you for reading Bitten by Bloodmoon!