Chapter 82

“You think they see you as an equal?”

I lift my chin. “I don’t care how they see me. I know who I am.”

Arya turns her back to me. Just stares at the broken edge of the wall Seth hit. Her voice is low, just a fraction. “Then prove it. Pick one.”

I blink. “What?”

She turns to me. “If you’re not a blood bag then stop playing both sides. Pick one.”

My breath stutters. I open my mouth, but nothing comes out.

She walks to the door, opens it. Doesn’t look at me. “Otherwise,” she says, biting the words, “don’t come back here again.”

The door clicks shut behind me.

🥀 🥀 🥀

Griffin

Blake enters my office before I call her.

Golden-brown hair pulled into a sleek twist, throat bare. The dark red silk of her training uniform hugs too well. She doesn’t knock.

She doesn’t look down. Good. I’ve taught her that.

She shuts the door behind her and walks to the center of the room.

I take my time watching her. The line of her delicate neck. The way her hazel eyes dare me to speak first. She doesn’t know yet that she was made for me. Fated.

Her task tonight is memorization. Lineages. Politics. The currency of survival in the Vampire Court.

She devours it.

But the moment she stumbles—“Try again, and it’s Thorne, not Thorn, Blake”—I push away from my chair.

Her breath hitches.

I cross to her, my eyes locked to hers. Blake’s perched at the edge of my desk, legs crossed, gold-brown hair tumbling over one shoulder. My name is written all over her without a sound—neck marked, lips bitten red.

“Say it again,” I murmur.

Blake exhales. Frustrated. Not at me. At herself. Then she swallows. “House Thorne. Neil Thorne, Three sons. Alric, Marcus, and—”

I grab her wrists and lift them above her head, pinning them to the wooden wall behind her. Her spine arches slightly. Her thighs part on instinct.

“Cyrus,” she breathes.

I smile against her skin. “Correct. Good girl.”

I lean down, mouth brushing her throat. “But not perfect.”

She shudders.

I drag it out—my lips grazing her pulse, fingers curling tighter around her wrists. Her breathing quickens, but she doesn’t move.

Every time she makes the smallest mistake, I make her repeat it with my mouth on her skin. Neck. Collarbone. The inside of her thigh. I don’t give her what she wants, not fully. That’s the lesson.

By the end of the hour, she speaks every name like she was born to rule them.

She learns quickly.

🥀 🥀 🥀

Later that night, we spar.

No weapons. Just bodies.

The training room is empty except for us. Aemon had the sense to excuse himself when he felt the shift in the air between me and her. My brother knows me too well. And he trusts me too much.

Blake’s human, but she’s quick. Sharp. Trained by Aemon’s hands and patience. He built her speed. But I know her tells. Every twitch of her weight before she moves. Every sharp inhale before a strike.

She’s human, after all.

I let her land the first blow—twist, pivot, heel to my thigh. “Faster,” I growl.

Blake grins. “Make me.”

I sweep her legs. She gasps, catches herself with a hand, flips—tries to take my back.

Bold.

I grab her hips, wrench her around, and press her to the mat. She twists again, slips free, and lands astride me.

I don’t stop her.

She plants both palms on my chest, panting, lips parted. Triumph glowing in her flushed cheeks.

I drag my hands up her thighs firmly, and squeeze. “Is this how Aemon trains you?”

She falters.

My hands slide higher. Waist. Ribs.

I flip her.

In a blur, she’s under me, wrists pinned, my thigh slipping between hers.

Her breath stutters. Blake looks up at me. Lips parted.

“Tell me to stop,” I say against her mouth.

She doesn’t.

Blake’s gaze drops to my mouth.

I kiss her. Hard.

She kisses back and a sound that breaks from her throat. Like my mark’s already burning in her skin. But then again, it’s just an extension of my own feelings for her.

I tear my mouth away and press my forehead to hers. “Again,” I say.

We spar until she’s breathless, sweat dampening the curve of her spine, and I have her pinned again. And again. And again.

🥀 🥀 🥀

By the end of the week, she walks differently.

Head higher. Movements slower. Measured.

Blake enters rooms the way I do now—silent, and already seen. Aemon watches her with soft pride. But I see the way his jaw tightens when others look at her. Because mine tightens as well.

I see the way he touches her waist when she’s in my arms like a warning.

But he hasn’t stopped me.

He won’t.

I watch her spar with Aemon the next morning, fast and brutal. He pins her for a breath, but Blake flips him with a smile.

He laughs, all teeth and dimples.

My heart is cold but I could swear my heart was warmer.

🥀 🥀 🥀

Blake leaves with teeth clenched. She doesn’t slam the door, but she doesn’t close it gently either.

I pour myself bloodwine after she goes. I feel Aemon before he enters. He doesn’t knock.

Of course he doesn’t. Just like her.

He leans against the frame. Blue eyes sharp. Dimple nowhere in sight.

“Training going well?” he asks, too even.

I drink.

“She learns quickly.”

“She always does.”

He walks in. Picks up the stack of scrolls Blake left behind.

“She beat me in our last sparring match,” he says. “Used your trick. The feint then counter.”

I raise a brow. “I wonder who taught her that.”

He gives me a look. Then he pours himself a drink, too. The room fills with the silence only we can share.

“You love her,” Aemon says quietly.

I nod. “Enough to give her space to hate me. Enough to kill for her.”

“Would you die for her?”

I look at him. “Wouldn’t you?”

The question hangs between us.

I don’t answer.

Because we both know the answer.

“Then you should tell her about the fated bond, Fin. I mean it.”

🥀 🥀 🥀

She’s warm on my lap.

Her weight settles like she belongs there. Legs folded neatly beside mine, spine held too straight, like she’s trying not to notice my hard cock. Her long golden-brown hair brushes my jaw when she tilts her head slightly, looking at the book I’d handed her. She pretends to study it.

She’s not fooling me.

Not with how her breathing skips when I lean closer.

“Wrong,” I murmur against the shell of her ear.

She stiffens.

I slide one hand up the side of her neck, the other gripping her hip. “House Mevius didn’t defect. They were executed for treason.”

Blake huffs. “I knew that.”

Every night she grows sharper. Every night she sits closer.

And tonight, I have to tell her. I need to tell her that she is mine.