Born For Blood
1223 Words
Ishra's Pov
The first thing I noticed was the cold.
Not the air. Not the room.
The absence.
He was gone.
The bed still held the imprint of my body. My thighs still ached. My lips were sore from silence, my heartbeat a bruised rhythm beneath a blanket that smelled like him. But Rael—the storm, the sin, the silence—was nowhere in sight.
I pressed my hand into the sheets. They were warm.
So why did I feel so alone?
The night before had blurred into heat and hunger. Into his mouth, his hands, his whispers. Into surrender I didn’t know I was capable of giving. But now? The silence pressed down like punishment.
And louder than that silence—
Was my father’s voice.
"She’s the vessel. She’s mine."
I flinched. The memory was too sharp, the words too fresh. My hands rose to my ears as if I could block it out, but it didn’t stop. His voice crawled under my skin, wrapped around my lungs, sank into my bones.
Then it spoke again.
Not memory.
Not a ghost.
“Return.”
I gasped, stumbling to my feet. My chest burned—like a chain had snapped tight across it.
Pain exploded behind my ribs. I dropped to my knees, choking on air that tasted of ash and copper. My vision blurred, the room swimming in and out of focus. My hands scrabbled against the stone.
Return to me.
“No,” I choked. “You’re dead.”
The magic didn’t care.
It clamped around my lungs like iron jaws. I screamed—or tried to. All that came out was a broken sob.
And then—
Rael was there.
Like shadows obeyed his name. His body knelt beside me, arms wrapping around me with a possessiveness that made my blood hum.
"Who did this?" he growled. Not gently. Not with comfort. Like a promise of war.
“It’s him,” I gasped. “The Prophet. He’s in my head—he’s still in my blood.”
Rael swore under his breath. He pressed his palm against my chest, and light bloomed between us—red and silver and ancient.
"This is a tether," he hissed. "Blood magic—he linked himself to you when you were too young to know."
"Why?” I rasped.
"Because it let him control you. Follow you. Breed you for prophecy.”
I recoiled. “You mean… like I was… cattle?”
Rael’s eyes darkened. “You were his key. That’s all you ever were to him.”
“No.” My voice cracked. “He loved me.”
“He owned you,” Rael snarled. “That’s not the same.”
He helped me sit, brushing the sweat from my brow like I was made of glass. I clung to his arm, dazed and shaking. My thoughts fractured between betrayal, fear, and something far worse:
Doubt.
“You knew,” I whispered.
Rael stiffened. “I suspected.”
“You used me too.” It wasn’t a question.
He flinched, just slightly. “No. I claimed you.”
“You keep saying that,” I snapped. “What does that even mean?”
His eyes met mine—and something old and broken rippled behind them.
“You freed me,” he said. “But I wasn’t buried. I was the altar.”
I went still.
“What?”
“They didn’t bury me beneath it. They built it from me. My body. My power. Every stone, every rune, every prayer whispered there—it was carved from my suffering. For centuries. And every blood sacrifice they made? Fed me. Hurt me. Cursed me deeper.”
My stomach turned.
“Every girl before you… was an attempt to break the seal. But your blood—your pain—worked.”
I wanted to scream. “So you’re telling me I was never meant to save this land?”
“No.” He stepped closer. “You were made to kill me.”
Everything spun.
“No. You’re lying. He said—he said I was sacred. He said I was chosen—”
“You were. Chosen to die.”
My heart cracked.
I turned and ran.
Or tried to.
But my body betrayed me again. My knees gave out, not from magic, but from the weight of too many truths crashing down. My fingers scraped the wall. My breath hitched. Rael caught me before I hit the floor.
“Let go of me!” I screamed, hitting his chest. “You’re just like him!”
His hand cupped the back of my neck, not harsh—but firm.
“No,” he said. “I’m not like him. I didn’t put a chain in your blood. I didn’t groom you from birth. I didn’t stand on a pedestal and call you divine just to slit your throat. All I did was take what you offered.”
I sobbed. “I don’t know what’s real anymore.”
“You are,” he said. “You’re more real than any of them.”
The chamber suddenly went cold.
Not a chill. Not wind.
A presence.
Rael’s head snapped toward the archway. He stood slowly, sliding me behind him with an instinct that made my stomach drop.
“He found us.”
“Who?” I whispered.
“Not your father.”
Rael's hand extended. Magic surged from his palm in threads of red lightning. The wall shivered as something—no, someone—stepped through.
A robed figure. Taller than human, but not massive. White robes. No face. No feet. Just form. The shadows bent around him like worshipers.
“You have defiled the vessel,” the voice said—not from his mouth, but from everywhere.
Rael growled, “You’re late, old god.”
“She was meant to ascend. Not burn beneath your mouth.”
My stomach lurched.
“Ascend?” I whispered.
Rael snarled. “They meant to turn you into a gate.”
I didn’t understand. My mind was spinning again. “A gate for what?”
“For them,” Rael spat. “The gods you were taught to love? They feed on blood. On purity. They needed you to open the next era of their rule.”
The god turned to me. “You still belong to us.”
“No,” Rael said. “She belongs to herself.”
A silence fell.
Then the god raised a hand—and the walls screamed.
Not groaned. Not cracked.
Screamed.
Rael shoved me backward as fire and ice collided mid-air. Light split from the god’s hand—but Rael moved faster. The blast that should’ve turned him to ash bent backward like wind bending to his command.
“You’re not strong enough,” the god warned.
“I don’t need to be,” Rael said. “She is.”
I stood, shaking, caught between the truths and the lies. Between faith and fire. And in that moment, I realized—
I didn’t care if he was a vampire.
I didn’t care if he was a monster.
He was the only one who didn’t lie to me.
So I stepped beside him.
And whispered, “Then let’s burn them down together.
- Writer
