Burn For Me

Wicked Challenges

Vesna screamed loud and frantically. He let me go! He actually let me go!

She was plummeting down at unimaginable speeds, her body turning, twisting, her hands grasping at thin, sharp air. Futilely.

The ground came closer and closer the more distance she covered. She couldn’t think. She couldn’t breathe. Oh, God! Oh, God! Oh, God! I’m going to die!

Amidst the dread and fright, a thought conjured in her mind.

Vampires had the gift of teleportation, among many others. Many of which that remained out of reach due to her human blood. But teleportation, it was a skill she hadn’t mastered but knew the use of. She could only cover a feet or so.

But at such a distance? At such speeds? Her bones alongside her organs would explode upon impact.

When the ground neared, she quickly shielded her face like a coward and tightly squeezed her eyes.

A fraction of a breath before impact—whoosh.

An arm of steel caught Vesna midair.

Wind cracked. Her fall stopped so violently her body jerked upward like a puppet pulled by its strings. A gust of force scattered dust and leaves in a wide ring on the ground, and Vesna gasped sharply.

And there he was. The abominable Zacharel the Ass.

His wings beat once—once—to steady them mid-air. His face bore no emotion. No anger. No satisfaction at saving her. Just... duty.

She was tucked against his chest again, one arm around her back, the other beneath her knees. His silver eyes did not meet hers.

“You lack discipline.” His voice was stern and merciless. "Lesson one: you cannot threaten me. Lesson two: I will not tolerate being struck again. Lesson three…”

He finally looked down at her. His gaze burned—not with heat, but with judgment.

“I do not drop what I am commanded to carry. No matter how violently it kicks.”

Vesna shuddered, narrowed her eyes. Eyes that were now scalding with tears.

Without a word more, he flew. Smooth, relentless, cutting through the skies like an arrow loosed by the divine. Carrying her somewhere. Somewhere only he knew.

She silently bared her fangs at him in a silent vow.

Lesson four: no one hurt Vesna Nightingale without paying the price. I’m going to make you swallow ash, Guardian.

***

Zacharel didn’t look at Vesna. Didn’t acknowledge the fire crackling in her eyes like a curse spat from hell.

He felt it, of course. Her hatred. Her heat. The insult of it—like a thorn lodged to his side. He wasn't enjoying being tasked with the mission of protecting and training her either.

But it wasn't Zacharel's place to question what has been decreed. His task was to simply deliver. Unfailing and without hesitation.

But he gave her nothing.

Not fury. Not interest. Not even disdain.

Only silence.

For miles they flew, over black forests and silver rivers, the moon chasing them like a hound. Her hatred boiled. His indifference froze it. Between them was a war of wills—hers volatile and flaring, his silent and immovable.

Finally, Zacharel spoke. “We are arriving.”

He didn't offer further explanation.

Ahead: a mountain monastery bathed in eerie moonlight. The temple’s towering spires touched the clouds. And carved into its stone gates were the sigils of Guardians—etched in light, pulsing faintly with living energy. A realm between realms. Not quite the human world. Not quite holy ground. But sacred, nonetheless.

Zacharel landed on the smooth stone path with a thrust of his wings. And then, just as coldly and suddenly as he had swept her away—he dropped her.

Vesna gasped as she fell on her behind. Then she came up sputtering.

"What is your problem!"

“Walk.”

She wobbled on her feet, perhaps begrudgingly aware that she had gotten too comfortable in his arms during their flight here. Her throwing her arms around his neck and allowing her body to relax was not missed by him.

Vesna leaned against a cool stonewall for support before taking her next steps.

Zacharel shadowed her from behind, his gait unhurried. But watchful. She tossed him a glare full of invisible daggers from behind her shoulder.

“Where are we, anyway?”

Zacharel didn’t answer immediately.

Boots silent against sacred stone, he followed her like a ghost. The only sounds were the wind winding through the monastery’s high arches and the faint hum of ancient wards embedded in the walls. Light shimmered along the runes like watchful eyes.

He didn’t care for her glare. He had stood against the stares of kings and monsters, saints and devils alike. Her ire was a flickering match in a storm.

Only when they crossed through a towering arch flanked by two statues of weeping angels did he finally speak. His voice was cool, clipped, detached.

“Sanctum Thirteen. A holding ground between realms. Forbidden to the unclean. Dangerous to the damned. No one enters here unless summoned.”

He paused beside her then, silver eyes falling on her, half in shadow, half in light.

"You are here because I carried you in. That is the only reason you still draw breath.”

Her brows furrowed in the middle.

He stepped past her, and motioned to the dark stone corridor ahead. It led into the heart of the sanctum—a place no mortal or half-blood like her should ever have seen.

“Move. The longer you linger, the more this place will reject you. I will not catch you again.”

A warning, not a threat.

He was not here to coddle.

She mimicked his last words in a mocking, voiceless whisper behind his back, thinking he wouldn't notice. Foolish girl. Nothing escaped his senses.

“You sound like caring for me is hell. Nice. Because tolerating your oh, so righteous presence is getting a wee bit tiring for me as well. Let’s come to an agreement where you let me go and I never have to see your face again. What do you say?”

Vesna walked around him and forced him to stop, tilting her head up.

“You can’t make a Saint out of me, Guardian. Monastery or not. Unforgiving or not.”

Zacharel stopped. Her defiance had weight, and it pressed against something buried deep—an instinct, perhaps, or a faded irritation now stirred.

His eyes dropped to hers. Silver and sharp.

“Saint?” he repeated, voice low and smooth like distant thunder. “You mistake me for a savior.”

He leaned down, only a fraction, enough that his breath ghosted over her cheek like frost, devoid of all warmth. He thought he felt her shudder.

“I do not purify the tainted. And I certainly do not redeem the damned. You’re not here to become holy. You’re here because the Crown willed it. That is all.”

He walked past her again, and this time, his shoulder lightly brushed hers—deliberate. Icy. Reminding her who carried the power between them.

She followed him with an expression of a million swallowed groans.

Trying to keep up with his long strides with her short ones must've been a pain. She watched his broad and defining back. He did not summon his wings of holy flames, lest he char her, so his stature was casting a great shadow over her.

She must've been lost in her thoughts, because she didn't notice him stop before two halls—and slammed into his back.

Vesna stumbled back, barely catching herself. She cursed lowly under her breath.

“The hell are you made of, freaking uranium?”

She clutched her forehead, most probably bruised now.

Zacharel just stood there, unmoved by the impact, as if her entire body were no more than a leaf brushing against obsidian.

“Titanium,” he said flatly. “Infused with divine wrath.”

He glanced over his shoulder—not because he cared if she was injured, but because her noise was distracting.

His eyes flicked down to the hand she held to her forehead, then rose to her face. He studied her briefly, as one might assess a broken blade—useless in current form, but perhaps... reforgable. If ordered.

“You’re louder than necessary,” he said, then turned away again. “And clumsier than I expected for one who claims to need no protection.”

Then, as if struck by some mild, passing irritation, he added under his breath:

“You reek of sentiment. It’s why they hunt you.”

He resumed walking into the second hall.

The corridor widened now, a vast chamber up ahead bathed in ethereal twilight. Statues of fallen Guardians lined the walls—wings shattered, weapons broken, some still weeping stone tears.

He halted at the center.

“This is where you’ll remain.”

He turned toward her, the halo of power around him dimming but still cold and pulsing like distant lightning.

“Do not attempt to leave. Do not attempt to fight. And do not test the limits of my patience again. I am not merciful, Vesna. I am obedient.”

With a roll of her eyes, she walked around him with a scoff, made loud on purpose. She also chose to deliberately nudge her body against his to get past, and semi-succeeded with how solid his frame stood in the way.

Turning to him, she bared her fangs at him again.

“I don’t reek.” Her lashes fused in silent rancor. “And I’m certainly not sentimental. You just have bad senses. Maybe you should get a full medical check up. How old are you, anyway? A billion?”

Zacharel clenched his teeth, lest he fall bait to her juvenile attempts at a taunt.

Twirling, she eyed the simple yet divine space. Tilted her head in question. Slowly, she rotated back to him.

"Uh, where are my meals?” Her hands went up in question, all ‘hello!’. “Maybe you forgot the part I was half vampire—your failing senses, I know—but I require blood. It is a necessity. If I don’t drink, my vampire side turns against my human side, and that’s not something you want to witness. Trust me. Spat out my own liver once.” She shuddered at the memory. "I was too young to know the ways of vampires and thought I could survive on human food alone. Wrong. The day my liver was chewed up inside like some morsel and my body had to terminate it was a day I will never forget. Or relive again. So."

She arched a brow at Zacharel.

Zacharel watched her performance with all the expression of cold marble—unimpressed, unmoved, unbothered.

“Noted,” he replied to her outburst. “But you will not die here,” he continud. “Your needs have been calculated. Provisioned. You will be sustained.”

He extended a hand toward one of the ancient statues. The Guardian’s fingers glowed faintly—barely a flicker of his true might—and in response, the statue split open with a groaning sigh of stone.

Inside, a chamber: spartan and cool. At its center, a crystal basin carved with holy runes, now beginning to fill with a dark, viscous crimson.

“Sanctified donor blood. Sterile. Balanced. Non-fatal. Monitored,” he explained, as if listing ingredients on a label. “You will take only what is needed.”

Then, a slow pivot of his head—silver eyes boring into her, sharp and frigid, as if already sensing the thoughts running wild in her head.

“If your hunger grows unstable, you will be restrained. If your behavior escalates, you will be subdued. Drink. Behave. Obey. Or I will break every law of mercy the Crown has tried to instill in me.”

She eyed the basin filled with blood with reawakened hunger. Frenzy, even. His words of no consequence before such divine sight.

Zacharel saw her mouth salivate and her fangs thrum.

"Mmm. Come to mama."

The muscle under his eye twitched. Did she not hear him? Did this woman not think?

“At least give a girl a straw.”

***

With a feminine chuckle, Vesna skipped over to the basin, all giddy. There, she dipped a hand and cupped a small amount of blood in her palm, and slurped.

Moaned in delight.

"Delicious. Yum, yum, yum me. More."

She went in for another round, drinking her fill. Blood trickled down the sides of her mouth, sliding down the length of her pale throat as she divulged.

It was heavenly. Satiating. So, so good, but…it was not Zacharel’s blood.

His, she could never forget. Never wanted to. It was unparalleled.

Licking her palm and fingers clean, her gaze landed on the oblivious Guardian standing a few feet away, and her thoughts turned ravenous.

But not for blood. Not this, anyway.

His.

Her lids hooded, and her eyes turned dark with want. She eyed the calm pulse on his neck, and her blood ignited.

“Yours was better,” she purred.

Stillness.

Tension so sharp it felt like the entire monastery held its breath.

He turned his head, slightly. Just enough for one silver eye to lock onto hers.

Unblinking.

But so ruthlessly cold.

“That was not given for pleasure,” he said, voice edged. “It was survival. You were dying. I fulfilled my charge.”

He stepped forward. “Mention it again with lust on your tongue, and I will see to it that your meals come intravenously.”

Vesna shrugged. "Whatever you say, handsome."

His eyes narrowed. He turned away from with a sharp glare.

“Rest. You will begin conditioning at dawn.”

No room for argument. He strode from the chamber, leaving the scent of a fresh storm in his wake.

Vesna ran her tongue against her teeth, a terrible idea blooming in her mind.

Oh, Guardian, you have no idea what you've started.