Page 84 of Blood Day: Part One

My lips parted. “Moon chase…” The words were barely audible, but his responding nod told me he’d heard them just fine.

“Yes. Tonight’s exercise is about testing your merit for a moon chase. And do you know what lycans love?” His thumb stroked my wrist, the touch deceptively tender.

I tried to speak, but I couldn’t even manage to swallow. I was too busy processing the concept of tonight’s test.

For the first time, I didn’t want to pass.

I didn’t know much about the moon chase, but I knew enough about the requirements—run until caught. Then die.

It was a game for the lycans, a way to play with their prey.

Vampires were given walking blood slaves. Lycans were given prey to hunt.

“They like a fight,” Master Cedric continued when I didn’t reply. “They adore prey that doesn’t submit. And sexually skilled prey is even better. Because the harder a human works, the more aroused a lycan becomes.”

He pressed his groin into the apex between my thighs, allowing me to feel his own interest.

It branded me even through our clothes, eliciting a whimper from my lips.

He tsked. “You’re exactly the kind of prey a lycan will take as a temporary pet. A human to indulge his needs until the next moon chase. If you’re lucky, you’ll die quickly in his care. If you’re unlucky, he’ll use you until your spirit is broken and then send you to a breeding camp.”

Tears threatened my eyes at the brutal future he’d just described.

That fate was worse than a harem. Worse than the service industry. Worse than anything else imaginable in this world.

“Continuing the fighting courses after I failed you only proves you have spirit. And your sexual aptitude marks are quite impressive, too. Now you’re among the last of the humans to scream during this exercise. What do you think all that means, little flower?”

I stopped breathing, the realization strangling me from the inside out.

I’d been training all this time for the moon chase. Not to be a Vigil. Not to join a harem. But to become a temporary human pet to a lycan.

Ice drizzled through my veins.

And the world around me began to sway.

“A spirited human with a virgin pussy,” Master Cedric drawled, his words doing nothing to thaw my frigid interior. His tongue clicked at me, the sound reminding me of a ticking time bomb.

I couldn’t believe I’d wanted to run toward him, that I’d been craving his touch all these months.

He was a monster.

A monster who was clearly enjoying my torment now.

Because he waschucklingat my response.

Except the sound didn’t come off as amused. It was too harsh for that.

“You know, I don’t typically enjoy this annual event, little flower. I usually just track down a random human and break a bone to make the prospect scream. But I’m rather enjoying drawing this out with you.”

Of course he was enjoying this. He always enjoyed torturing me.

Was that why he’d taken me to his palace? To give me a day of hope to hang over my head for months in glorious agony?

His lips whispered across mine, his desire still pressing intimately against me.

But my body didn’t respond the way it would have mere moments ago.

I was too cold now, too… tooinfuriated… to indulge in it. Because he’d taken everything away—ripped away the false beliefs from my soul and used that residual hope to pierce my heart.