Updated Dec 14, 2025 • ~7 min read
They buried my brother on a Tuesday.
The Silverfang pack gathered in the sacred grove, dressed in mourning white, faces painted with ash. Three months since his execution. Three months since I’d watched from the crowd as the vampire prince drove a stake through Kael’s heart in the center of their blood-soaked courtyard.
Three months, and I still couldn’t breathe right.
“Cassia.” My mother’s hand on my shoulder. Theia Moonstone, pack elder, powerful witch, the woman who’d raised us alone after Father died in the Blood Wars. “It’s time.”
Time. As if there was ever a right time to bury your brother at twenty-four. As if grief operated on a schedule.
I stepped forward. The pyre was already built—cypress wood and sacred herbs, Kael’s body wrapped in white linen. Custom dictated I speak first. Custom could go fuck itself, but I’d do it anyway.
For him.
“Kael Silverfang was innocent.” My voice rang clear across the grove. Fifty pack members watched. “The vampires called him a traitor. Said he was passing secrets to their enemies. They lied.”
Murmurs of agreement. Good. I needed their rage to match mine.
“My brother was trying to broker peace. Trying to end the centuries of bloodshed between our kinds. And they killed him for it.” I looked at each face. “Prince Alaric Ravencrest personally carried out the execution. He drove the stake. He watched my brother die. And he felt nothing.”
That was a lie. I’d seen the prince’s face in the aftermath, caught the flash of something that might have been regret. But regret didn’t bring Kael back.
“So I’m making a vow.” I pulled my ritual knife from my belt, sliced my palm. Let blood drip onto the pyre. “I will make them pay. I will infiltrate their court. I will get close to the prince. And I will drive a stake through HIS heart. Blood for blood. Life for life. This I swear on my magic, on my pack, on my brother’s memory.”
The blood hit the wood and burst into flame—magic accepting my vow. Binding it.
No turning back now.
“Cassia, no—” my mother started.
“It’s done.” I met her eyes. Saw fear there, and grief that matched my own. “I won’t let his death be meaningless.”
Sage stepped forward—my best friend since childhood, silver hair braided for battle, always ready to fight beside me. “I’m with you. Whatever you need.”
“I know.”
The pack began the death chant. Old words in the old language, sending Kael’s soul to the Summerlands. I mouthed the words but couldn’t speak. My throat was too tight.
I watched my brother burn.
Kael had been twenty-seven. Brilliant. Kind. The best of us. He’d believed peace was possible, that witches and vampires could coexist, that the Blood Wars didn’t have to last forever.
He’d been wrong.
The vampires had proven what they were: monsters who killed anyone who threatened their power. And Prince Alaric was the worst of them—cold, ruthless, executing a man who’d only wanted to save lives.
I would make him suffer.
The pyre burned for hours. Pack members came to offer condolences, to touch my shoulder, to murmur useless platitudes. “He’s at peace now.” “The Summerlands will welcome him.” “His sacrifice won’t be forgotten.”
But he was dead. And no amount of ritual magic would change that.
When the fire finally died to embers, my mother pulled me aside.
“You can’t do this,” she said quietly. “Infiltrating the vampire court is suicide. They’ll kill you like they killed him.”
“Then I’ll die avenging him. Better than living with this.” I gestured at the emptiness in my chest where my brother used to be.
“Cassia, please—”
“Don’t.” My magic flared, sparks dancing across my fingertips. “I can’t. I can’t just move on. Can’t pretend he didn’t die for nothing. Can’t let his killer walk free.”
“It won’t bring him back.”
“No. But it will make me feel better.”
She looked at me for a long moment. Then sighed. “You’re so much like him. Stubborn. Idealistic in your own way. Convinced you can change the world through sheer force of will.”
“He tried peace. I’ll try war.”
“And what happens when war gets you killed too?”
I didn’t have an answer for that. Didn’t care about survival anymore. Only revenge.
That night, I performed the blood magic ritual alone in my cabin.
Drew the circles. Lit the candles. Spoke the words of power. A curse, ancient and deadly, meant to bring suffering to its target.
I whispered Prince Alaric Ravencrest’s name and felt my magic reach across the distance, seeking him out.
It hit a wall. Bounced back. Failed.
Impossible. Blood magic never failed. Not when powered by grief this raw.
I tried again. Same result. Something was protecting him. Some power I couldn’t identify.
“Fuck.” I extinguished the candles with a wave of my hand. Frustration burning hotter than the flames.
Fine. Magic couldn’t touch him from afar. But a stake through the heart would work up close.
I just had to get close enough.
Sage appeared at my door an hour later with wine and determination.
“Planning phase,” she announced, settling on my floor. “How do we get you into vampire territory without them killing you on sight?”
“The diplomatic summit next month. Mother mentioned it—vampires are sending a delegation to neutral ground for peace talks. Prince Alaric will be there.”
“Perfect. You attend as her aide, get close, strike when—”
“No.” I took the wine, drank straight from the bottle. “Too obvious. Too fast. I need to be smart about this. Patient.”
“Since when are you patient?”
“Since I realized charging in blind got my brother killed.” The words tasted like ash. “I’ll attend the summit. But I’m not attacking yet. I’m learning. Watching. Finding his weaknesses. Then, when he least expects it, I strike.”
Sage raised her own bottle. “To vengeance.”
“To vengeance,” I echoed.
We drank until the wine was gone and the cabin spun. Until grief became something manageable. Until I could breathe without feeling like my chest was caving in.
But even drunk, even numb, I could feel it: the hollow space where my brother used to be. The future we’d planned—him brokering peace, me protecting our people, both of us building something better than the endless war our parents had known.
Gone. All of it, gone.
Because one vampire prince had decided duty to his crown mattered more than justice. More than mercy. More than the life of a good man trying to save both their peoples.
I would make him understand what he’d taken.
And then I would take everything from him in return.
Sleep, when it finally came, brought nightmares. Kael’s execution playing on loop. His face as they bound him to the stake. His voice, calling my name. The prince’s silver eyes, cold and emotionless as he gave the order.
“Execute him at dawn.”
I woke screaming.
Sage was there immediately, holding me while I shattered. “He’s gone,” I sobbed. “He’s really gone.”
“I know. I know.”
“It should have been me. I should have stopped it. Should have—”
“You couldn’t have saved him. The vampire court would have killed you too.”
Maybe that would have been better. Better than this—surviving while my brother was ash and memory.
“We’re going to make this right,” Sage promised. “We’re going to kill the prince. We’re going to honor Kael’s memory.”
I nodded against her shoulder. Let myself believe it.
Revenge wouldn’t bring Kael back. But it was all I had.
And I would burn the entire vampire court to ash if that’s what it took.
Starting with Prince Alaric Ravencrest.
The man who’d killed my brother.
The man I would destroy.
I didn’t know, couldn’t know, what fate had planned. Didn’t know that in four days, my world would shatter again in a completely different way.
Didn’t know that the moment I laid eyes on the prince, every cell in my body would scream one impossible, devastating word:
Mine.
Reader Reactions