Chapter 3 The Vampire Lord's Bargain

The air froze the moment he said his name.

Lord Verenthas.

Lyra's breath caught in her throat not because of the title, but because of the way he stood there like he owned time. As if the walls bowed for him. As if light dared not touch him too long.

Tall. Impossibly still. Hair blacker than night itself. Skin pale enough to shimmer beneath the low candlelight. He was carved from aristocracy and ruin, draped in obsidian silk. And in his hand her hand was the Crimson Pact.

Lyra didn't speak.

Didn't breathe.

Didn't dare.

Because this was no vampire noble. No brooding, bloodthirsty royal. No shadow-fed tyrant told in bedtime terrors.

This was him.

The one whispered about war camps and rebel fires.

The Vampire Lord who disappeared centuries ago the last known wielder of the Pact before it vanished.

And he was very much alive.

"Give it back," Lyra said, voice hoarse.

Verenthas twirled the dagger slowly between his fingers. It didn't resist him. It purred.

"Such boldness for someone so breakable."

"Give. It. Back."

He looked at her with unsettling calm, head tilted as if studying a relic. "You remind me of her."

Lyra flinched. "Of who?"

"The girl who last carried this blade. She screamed when it marked her. You didn't. That... intrigues me."

"I'm not here to entertain you."

"No," he murmured. "But you will. One way or another."

He extended the dagger toward her handle first.

Lyra hesitated.

She didn't trust him.

But the moment her fingers curled around the hilt, she felt it again that pull. That heat. That hunger. The dagger melted into her palm like it belonged there, like it had waited for her all its life.

Verenthas watched her closely.

"You're already bonded. It can't be undone."

"I didn't ask for this."

"And yet it chose you." His smile never reached his eyes. "The Pact is not a pet. It doesn't play fair. I won't forget."

Lyra tightened her grip. "Why are you here?"

He turned away, pacing toward her frost-laced window.

"To offer you a choice."

"I don't make deals with monsters."

He glanced over his shoulder.

"But you are one now, little thief."

She froze.

He took a slow step forward. "You bear the seal. You've touched magic that predates kingdoms. You think Eldermire will let you live?"

"I'll survive."

"No," he said softly, "you'll run. You'll bleed. You'll watch everyone you love rot in dungeons or worse because they know you. And then, when the dagger has eaten your name and hollowed out your soul, you'll come crawling to me."

Lyra's hands trembled.

"What... Do you want to?"

Verenthas stepped close enough that she could see the silver veins pulsing under his porcelain skin. His voice dropped to a whisper.

"Wield it for me."

Her heart stopped.

"What?"

"I'll teach you. Control. Power. How to bend the Pact to your will without losing your mind. The wolves want it destroyed. The humans want it buried. But I..." He smiled, slow and dangerous. "I want it awake."

"And what do you want with me?"

His gaze dipped to her marked wrist.

"I want you to become what you were meant to be."

She didn't answer him.

Didn't sleep that night either.

The dagger hummed with tension, like it knew something had shifted. And it had.

Verenthas hadn't threatened her.

He didn't need to.

He offered something more dangerous understanding.

Lyra had spent her life running from everyone who feared what she was. Now, for the first time, someone looked at her and saw potential. Dark, terrifying potential. But potential nonetheless.

By dawn, she'd made a decision.

She needed answers.

And Verenthas had them.

The Crimson Court had been abandoned for decades so they said.

A ruined castle on the outskirts of Eldemire, swallowed by mist and stories. No one went near it unless they wanted to vanish. But when Lyra walked through its gates, the stone groaned like something breathing.

And the doors opened before she even knocked.

Verenthas was waiting in a hall of broken mirrors and black marble.

He didn't smile.

He simply said, "You came."

Lyra stepped forward. "I want rules."

"Ah," he said, voice like velvet. "You want a bargain."

"No manipulation. No blood-binding. No soul-selling. Just... terms."

He nodded once, amused. "Very well."

They stood face to face, the pact between them like a third presence.

"You'll teach me how to use it," she said, voice firm. "Not just wield it control it."

"In return," he said, "you give me loyalty. Not blind. Just... chosen."

Lyra hesitated. "What does that mean?"

"It means that when the day comes, you must decide who bleeds and who rises... you choose me."

She felt the Pact stir in her veins.

The dagger pulsed.

Her mark ached.

And her heart whispered something that frightened her more than anything else so far:

He already has your loyalty. You just haven't admitted it yet.

She reached out her hand.

"Deal."

Verenthas's fingers closed over hers.

The temperature dropped. The dagger flared crimson.

And the bond was sealed not in blood.

I will.

The first lesson nearly broke her.

Verenthas led her to a chamber carved into the side of the mountain. There were no walls only jagged cliffs and a void that stretched into nothing. Runes lined the floor, ancient and cracked.

"Draw the dagger's memory," he said.

Lyra frowned. "It's what?"

He circled her slowly. "The Pact doesn't store spells. It stores moments. Pain. Rage. Regret. You must summon one."

She thought of the night her father left.

Of her mother's body, cold and still beneath a wolf's claw.

Of being hunted by the people she tried to save.

The dagger screamed in her hand.

The floor cracked.

Verenthas nodded.

"Good."

Then shadows poured from the edge of the cliff shapes, memories twisted into forms. A boy she once stole bread from. A soldier she'd let die. Her own reflection, eyes hollow and cruel.

They attacked.

And she had to fight them all.

With nothing but a dagger of memory and a vampire lord watching like a judge, or a god.

She collapsed hours later, bleeding from the lip, fingers raw, lungs burning.

Verenthas knelt beside her.

"You lasted longer than I thought."

Lyra didn't look at him. "Was that another test?"

"No." He tilted her chin up. "That was only the beginning."

Later, in the quiet of the shattered throne room, Lyra sat alone with the dagger in her lap. It no longer felt foreign. It no longer felt separate.

It was becoming a part of her.

She traced the mark on her wrist. It had stopped glowing.

For now.

But something inside her knew...

The Pact wasn't done with her.

And neither was he.