FORBIDDEN BOND

CHAPTER 1 They say I’m the best hunter the northern packs have ever bred. That I don’t hesitate, don’t question orders. But tonight, with the wind sharp against my skin and the forest holding its breath, I hesitated. The mission was simple: track the vampire and finish him off. He was a threat to the treaty, a prince gone rogue. A name passed in whispers and warnings. Draven. I expected a monster. Fangs and shadows. Maybe a trap. What I found instead made my breath hitch. He was crumpled in the center of the clearing, silver hair matted with blood, eyes half-lidded, chest rising shallowly. Not dead. Not even unconscious. Just–broken. One wing of his coat had been torn, revealing the mess of claw marks that tore across his side. My claws itched to finish the job. But something made me stop. Maybe it was the way his lips moved, like he was trying to speak even now. Maybe it was the way his gaze flicked to mine–sharp, lucid, knowing. Or maybe it was something deeper. Older. That strange thrum in my chest like I was standing on the edge of something dangerous. I’ve never believed in fate. But something about him felt like the start of a story I hadn’t meant to step into. And I don’t do stories. I do kills. I tightened my grip on the hilt of my blade, still half-hidden beneath my coat. The steel was laced with mountain ash and moonstone–lethal to his kind. One strike. That’s all it would take. But I didn’t move. Because no matter how I tried, I couldn’t ignore what clawed its way to the front of my mind: the night my brother vanished. He’d been tracking a vampire, too. Young, reckless, trying to prove himself. We never found his body. Just blood on the trees and a name carved into the earth beneath it Draven. I hadn’t heard that name in five years. Not until last week when the High Alpha summoned me and said, “We have a lead on the one who took your brother.” So I followed it. Tracked him alone. No backup. No questions. But now, staring down at the man I’d sworn to kill, I realized something wasn’t right. This didn’t look like a predator who lured hunters into traps. This looked like prey. “Go on,” he rasped, voice rough as gravel. “Do it.” I froze. He laughed–low, bitter, and broken. “You think I don’t know what you are, little wolf?” “You don’t know anything about me,” I snapped, but my voice cracked. He tilted his head, studying me like he could see straight through my skin. “You’re not just here for duty. You’re here for revenge.” I didn’t answer. Because he was right. And suddenly I hated him more for it. I took a step closer. He didn’t flinch. He just looked… tired. Bone-deep tired. There was something wrong with this picture. Vampires healed fast. Even gutted, he should’ve been fighting to survive. Instead, he looked like he was waiting to die. He shouldn’t have been able to speak. But he did. One word, added to the list he had been struggling with. “Adela.” My chest constricted, heart thudding like it wanted out of my ribs. I hadn’t told anyone where I was going. No vampire should know me by name. And yet here he was, bleeding and broken, saying it like it meant something. “What did you say?” I asked, stepping closer despite every instinct screaming at me to run. His head lolled. “I saw you. In the dream.” My stomach flipped. This wasn’t right. This was wrong. “No one dreams of me,” I said flatly. “Especially not leeches.” A half-smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. “You don’t believe that.” I didn’t know why, but my fingers trembled as I reached for the dagger. End him. That was the order. But when I stepped into the circle of ruined stone, a heat flared across my skin–searing, electric. Like fire kissed with ice. My pulse roared in my ears. Something rippled between us, alive and ancient. I felt it snap into place. I stumbled back, gasping. “What the hell did you do?” Draven’s breath hitched. His eyes glowed faintly, silver smothered in shadow. “It wasn’t me.” “Liar.” I looked at the wound on his chest again–deep, dark, not caused by blade or claw. This wasn’t just blood loss. This was a curse. A binding. And now... now I was part of it. I felt it. Like a thread winding from his chest to mine. Faint, but pulsing. Connection. “Break it,” I snarled. “I can’t.” I drew my dagger. The blade gleamed under moonlight, carved with sigils old as our war. “Then I’ll do it myself.” He didn’t flinch. “If you kill me now, Adela, it’ll kill you too.” I froze. “Liar.” His voice was soft, but certain. “Try it. You’ll feel it.” I couldn’t breathe. I could feel him–his pain, his exhaustion, the cold beneath his skin. Not like scent. Not like tracking. Like something deeper. Deeper than instinct. The bond. “No,” I whispered, stepping back. “Yes,” he said. This wasn’t how it was supposed to go. I was supposed to end him. Quick. Clean. Quiet. This was the vampire prince–Draven, son of the last Highblood king. The one we all knew to be cruel and lethal. The one I itched to drill my dagger into. But this… this wasn’t a prince. This was something else entirely. A curse. A bond. A question I didn’t have the answer to. And somehow, I was in it. “Tie him up,” I told myself out loud. “Find the coven. Cut the bond later.” He watched me through half-lidded eyes. “You’re not going to kill me.” “Don’t be so sure.” “Because you feel it too.” I hated that he was right–again. The cold truth coiled in my gut. I did feel it–this thing between us, alive and strange and so wrong. I didn’t know if it was magic or fate or some twisted vampire trick. But it was there. Tethered. Breathing. And deep down, I wasn’t sure I knew how to break it. That was the part that scared me. A branch cracked behind me. I spun, blade ready–but the clearing was empty. Only wind, only trees, only darkness. When I turned back, Draven was unconscious, head slumped, black blood dripping from his mouth like wine. For a moment, I didn’t breathe. Then I whispered to the wind, voice raw: “Tell me this isn’t real.” But the bond hummed through my bones, and the stones around us pulsed faintly,like a heartbeat, echoing something old. And I knew. It was real. And it had only just begun.