The Bite Mark That Isn’t There
528 Words
Aria didn’t remember leaving Eclipse.
One second, the vampire’s red eyes were on her like a lock clicking shut. The next, she was moving fast through a back stairwell that smelled like bleach and concrete, Damon Voss behind her like a shadow that had teeth.
“Keep going,” he said.
Her legs shook. “I can’t.”
Damon’s hand hovered at the small of her back, not touching, just there. A barrier. A warning to the world.
“You can,” he said, voice low. “Because if you stop, they’ll take you.”
They.
As if monsters were a normal category.
Aria burst into the alley, the cold night slapping her face. The city glittered. Cars passed. People laughed on the sidewalk like nothing had happened upstairs, like no one had just been fed on.
She spun toward Damon. “That man was drinking at her.”
Damon’s jaw worked once. “Yes.”
“And you,” her voice cracked. “You called him.”
“I called him what he is.” Damon’s eyes sharpened, tracking movement at the end of the alley. “And now he knows what you are.”
Aria’s stomach dropped. “I’m not anything. I’m just”
Damon moved in close, too close, and her body reacted like it recognized him. Heat flashed under her skin, sudden and humiliating.
His nostrils flared.
His gaze dropped to her wrist her hospital band, and his expression turned dangerous in a way that wasn’t aimed at her.
“Don’t lie,” he said. “Not to me.”
“I’m not”
A breeze cut between them.
Damon went still.
Aria felt it too, like the air had been replaced with something thicker, older. Her pulse hammered.
From the darkness at the mouth of the alley, a voice drifted out, amused.
“You ran,” they purred. “How cute.”
The vampire prince stepped into the light like he owned it, coat flawless, smile elegant. Two men behind him too pale, too quiet moved like trained predators.
Aria backed up instinctively.
Damon stepped in front of her.
Protective. Final.
The vampire’s eyes flicked over Damon’s stance and he smiled wider. “Alpha Voss. Always playing hero.”
Damon didn’t move. “Leave.”
“Not without my property.” The prince tilted his head, looking past Damon to Aria. “Little human… do you know what your blood smells like to us?”
Aria swallowed. “I’m human.”
The prince laughed softly. “No. You’re a door.”
Damon’s hand finally touched her, just two fingers wrapping around her wrist.
The contact hit like a spark.
Aria gasped.
Because under her skin beneath the cheap hospital band something lit up. A faint ring, like an invisible bracelet, suddenly visible for half a second… then gone.
The vampire’s smile died.
Damon’s eyes widened just a fraction.
And in that moment, Aria understood something terrifying:
Whatever she was… Damon hadn’t known either.
The vampire prince took one step forward, hungry, turning his face beautiful and ugly at the same time.
“Congratulations,” he whispered. “The Key has awakened.”
- Writer
