Chapter 64: Shackles

Chapter 64: Shackles Blaze POV After that damn mutt finally stormed out like the hot-headed beast he is, silence fell heavy in the room. I should have left too. No—I wanted to leave. Hell, I regretted coming in the first place. Regretted the second I launched myself at her window like a lovesick idiot with no self-preservation left. Regretted every goddamn emotion clawing at my chest since the moment I saw her curled up, blood in the air, pain on her face, and something inside me crack like old stone under pressure. I turned toward the window again. The open night air called me. Freedom. Cold distance. Control. But they wouldn’t shut up—those voices. The cursed ones. "Do what she needs." "Fix it for her." "Protect what’s yours." Mine. I snarled at the thought. She wasn’t mine. I didn’t want her to be. A human. A fucking fragile girl with fire in her eyes and fury in her blood. She couldn’t possibly be my beloved. The universe must be drunk off its own cosmic power. But even with my fury rising like bile, my feet didn’t move. My eyes flickered to the ground, to the shards of glass from the mirror we shattered mid-brawl, glinting like tiny daggers under the dim light. The broken bedside table. Splinters and jagged wood, raw and sharp. And then the images came. Her, barefoot, stumbling. Falling. Her delicate skin tearing on glass. Blood pouring—again. The scent of her pain so thick it’d suffocate me. Her pulse weakening in my ears. That unbearable silence that would follow. No. I cursed—loudly, violently, viciously—and dragged my hands through my hair like that might rip the demons from my skull. "This is bullshit," I growled to no one. I was a fucking prince. Heir to the vampire kingdom. A creature feared by half the realm and hated by the other. I didn’t clean. I didn’t care. I didn’t cater to broken furniture or spilled blood unless I was the one who spilled it. And yet... here I was. On my knees. Sweeping up shards of glass into a discarded book cover I found on the floor. Using a damn towel to gather the splinters. I worked in complete silence, save for the occasional hiss of air between my teeth when my thoughts got too loud. My muscles screamed against the indignity. My pride flared like a beast cornered. But the thought of her walking in here and getting hurt again—it did something worse than bruise my ego. It terrified me. I was afraid. That was the truth of it, bitter and sharp as the glass I was scraping off her floor. The fear coiled in my gut, ancient and unfamiliar. Not the kind that comes from a rival kingdom or an enemy blade—but the kind born of something fragile and real. She was real. Her scent. Her heartbeat. Her fury. Her fucking stubbornness. And this bond? It wasn’t just a cruel joke from the fates anymore. It was an anchor. It hurt when she hurt. Burned when she bled. Pulled when she moved. And I hated it. I hated her for making me care. For making me feel anything other than hunger and power. For unraveling two hundred years of stone and shadows with nothing but a glare and a body made of breakable things. I stood once the glass was cleared, surveying the damage with disgust. The room still looked like a war zone, but at least she wouldn’t bleed out on my conscience. The splinters were gone. The danger reduced. She’d never thank me. Would probably scream at me again. But that was fine. I wasn’t doing it for gratitude. I was doing it because my demons wouldn’t let me walk away. Because despite every instinct in me to flee, I was still here. Still orbiting her. Still losing the war against a bond I swore I’d never have. "Fuck this bond," I whispered again. But I stayed to clean up. ***** I hadn’t left because I wanted to. Hell no. I made it look like I didn’t care—walked out with that same blank face I always wore when I was on the edge of losing control. But deep down, I was suffocating under this impossible pull to her. It wasn’t just the bond. It wasn’t just the scent of her blood. It was... her. The way she glared at me like she could tear out my throat with nothing but words. The way she didn’t flinch. The way she felt everything so loudly it made the silence in me scream. I needed space. A distraction. Something that would let me pretend I was still in control. So, I ended up at the cafe down the streets. Yeah. Fucking cafe. Melvin was there—our gang’s newest recruit. A vampire barely a century old, still smelling of sun-touched blood and poor judgment. But he was managing the place during the night shift, since the human assigned to it nearly lost his life last time. Idiots. All of them. Humans weren’t made for the night. Not unless they had a death wish. You’d think the store owner would’ve figured it out after the third "unexplained incident." Whatever. Not my problem. I walked in like I owned the place—which, technically, wasn’t far from the truth. My crew controlled most of the after-hours business here. Illegal sales. Information exchanges. Safe feeding grounds. Melvin gave me a stiff nod when I passed the register, but he didn’t say anything. Smart. He knew better than to poke the bear when I was brooding. I went straight to the back room, locked the door, and sat in front of the dusty computer we used for logging shipments and occasionally hacking into security feeds. And then I did something I never thought I’d do. I opened a browser. Typed in the word: "Periods." Ridiculous. The vampire prince of the Eastern Courts, heir to the Crimson Throne, predator of predators... googling periods. If anyone ever found out, I’d have to kill them. No hesitation. But I needed to know. She’d said the word like it was normal. Like it explained everything. She was curled in on herself, in pain, bleeding. I thought she was dying. And maybe that was what scared me most. Fear. The kind of fear I hadn’t felt in over two hundred years. Fear that she was in pain and I didn’t know how to stop it. I scrolled through articles. "Menstruation: A Monthly Cycle." "Symptoms of Period Pain." "Why Periods Happen." There were diagrams. Charts. Words that made my head spin. Uterus, ovulation, hormones, lining— I didn’t understand half of it. But I understood enough. It wasn’t fatal. It wasn’t a wound. It wasn’t caused by some outside force. It was her body’s way of cleansing itself. Of preparing for something it wouldn’t get. And it hurt. A lot. She was bleeding because she was supposed to. And here I was... ready to tear out throats, to scorch cities, to destroy him—the mutt who hovered too close—because I thought someone had hurt her. But no. Nature did. Motherfucking biology. I slumped back in the chair, hands clenched into fists against the desk. I should’ve felt relief. Instead, I felt rage. Not at her. Not at Reed. Not even at the universe. At myself. Because this—this—was what being bonded to a beloved meant. The ache when she hurt. The madness when she cried. The desperation to fix something I didn’t understand. And I’d fought it every second since I met her. I called it a curse. I denied her existence. I told myself I didn’t need her. But now? Now, I was sitting in the backroom of a Melvin reading about periods like my entire existence depended on it. And maybe, in a way... it did. Because no matter how many reasons I gave myself not to care—she was becoming the exception. And I was starting to think I didn’t want to fight it anymore. Why the fuck did the universe play such a cruel joke on me? A human. Out of all the cold, cunning, battle-hardened vampire noblewomen, out of all the seductive she-wolves who could rip a throat with a smile, even the damn sirens who’d sell their soul just to claim a prince — the gods above and demons below decided she was mine? Her? A girl whose body bleeds every month like it’s trying to kill her from the inside out. A girl whose bones would snap under pressure, whose scent was like sin wrapped in sunshine, whose fury was unmatched — but whose mortality was louder than anything else. If my enemies find out... and they will, eventually. The second anyone realizes who she is to me — the second they see me flinch when she’s hurt, see the darkness vanish from my eyes when she breathes — she’ll be marked. Hunted. Used. The rogue wolves won’t care that she’s human. They’ll rip her apart just to watch me bleed. The vampires will see her as leverage — a way to make the immortal prince suffer. Witches will curse her, goblins will try to trade her, and the worst of them — the ones who once feared me — will suddenly smile, knowing I have something to lose. This is why I never searched for my beloved. Why I prayed to stay untouched by that cursed bond. Because unlike me, she can die. She’s not like us. She doesn’t heal in seconds. She can’t throw someone through a wall and walk away. One cut — one misstep — and it could be over. And if something happens to her... if I lose her before I ever get to have her — it would ruin me. And what’s worse? She doesn’t even want me. She hates me. Sees me as a threat. Every time I look into her eyes, there’s fire and resistance — no trace of trust, no hint of affection. Just rage. And I deserve it. I chose this fate when I refused to believe. When I ran. When I thought I could fight the bond. Now the universe laughs, watching me burn in silence. Torn between wanting to keep her close and needing to stay away — for her sake. Because if I stay, I’m the danger. But if I go... I leave her in a world that wants to devour her. And broken glass on her bedroom floor already brought me to my knees — what would I do if I ever saw real blood spill from her because I wasn’t there to stop it? She’s a walking, breathing, defiant hurricane in a human body. And I’m a prince shackled to her by fate, rage, and something dangerously close to love. I didn’t ask for this. But I’ll burn the fucking world before I let it take her from me.