“Mate?” The word tore from my throat like broken glass. “Are you completely insane?”

Kael’s grip tightened around my waist as he carried me through the auction house’s twisted corridors, my feet dangling uselessly above the ground. His chest rumbled with what might have been amusement.

“Hey, I’d suggest you watch your mouth with me little healer.”

“Put me down!” I slammed my fists against his shoulders, the silver shackles chiming with each blow. “You can’t just declare someone your mate! That’s not how it works!”

“Isn’t it?” He shouldered through a heavy door into the night air, never breaking stride. “Tell me, what do you feel when I touch you?”

Heat. The traitorous warmth that had flooded through me the moment those silver restraints closed around my wrists. I pushed the thought away, focusing instead on my rage.

“I feel disgust,” I spat. “Terror. The overwhelming desire to get as far away from you as possible.”

“Liar.” His silver eyes found mine in the moonlight. “Your magic recognizes mine. The ancient bloodlines calling to each other across centuries of separation.”

We emerged into a forest clearing where shadows danced between towering oaks. Moonlight painted everything silver, making the world look ethereal and strange. Kael finally set me down, but his hands remained on my shoulders, anchoring me in place.

“This is madness.” I tried to step back, but his grip held firm. “I don’t even know your name.”

“Kael.” The word carried weight, as if names had power in his world. “And you are Sena Miralyn Thorne, last daughter of the Moon-touched bloodline.”

My blood went cold. “How do you know my mother’s name?”

“The same way I knew to find you at that auction house.” His fingers traced the air above my face, not quite touching but close enough that I felt the heat of his skin. “Power calls to power, little healer. And yours has been singing to mine for months.”

“You’re talking nonsense.” But even as I said it, something deep in my chest stirred—a recognition I didn’t want to acknowledge. “Let me go. Please.”

“Would you rather I had left you to the demon lord?” Kael’s voice hardened. “Or perhaps the necromancer who spoke so fondly of draining you dry? I can have that arranged you know? So why not show a little gratitude.?”

“Gratitude?” I laughed, the sound bitter in the night air. “When I’m being traded one monster to another?”

Something dangerous flashed in his eyes. “Well! Some monsters as you will soon discover are better than others.”

“Let me guess, you are part of the better category?” I let the sarcasm drip from my voice but he only smirked in response.

He released me, stepping back with fluid grace. I should have run.

Every instinct screamed at me to flee into the forest, to take my chances with whatever creatures lurked in the darkness.

Instead, I stood frozen as he began speaking in a language that made my bones ache.

The words were ancient, older than written history. They tasted of starlight and blood, of magic so primal it predated civilization itself. Silver light began to gather around us, growing brighter with each syllable until the clearing blazed like a fallen star.

“Stop.” My voice cracked with growing panic. “Whatever you’re doing, stop.”

“The ritual of the moon bond,” he continued, ignoring my pleas. “Sacred to your bloodline. Binding as death itself.”

The light reached for me with tendrils of pure magic. Where it touched, my skin tingled with electric warmth. I tried to back away, but the silver threads wrapped around my wrists, my ankles, drawing me inexorably toward him.

“Please,” I whispered. “Don’t do this.”

“You have enemies, little healer. Powerful ones who would see you dead for the crime of your heritage.” His voice softened slightly, but the ancient words never stopped flowing. “This bond will mark you as mine. Under supernatural law, harming you means facing me.”

The magic reached my chest, and suddenly I could feel him. Not just his physical presence, but something deeper—his emotions, raw and turbulent as a storm-tossed sea. Guilt. Longing. A hunger so vast it threatened to swallow me whole.

“No,” I gasped, trying to pull away from the psychic connection. “Get out of my head!”

“It’s done.” The silver light faded, leaving us in ordinary moonlight once more. But nothing felt ordinary anymore. I could sense him like a second heartbeat, a constant presence I would never escape. “You are mine now, Sena Thorne. And I am yours, until death parts us.”

I pressed my hands to my temples, trying to block out the alien emotions bleeding through our bond. “This is wrong. You had no right—”

“Rights?” He moved toward me with predatory fluidity. “The moment you stepped onto that auction block, rights became irrelevant. I’ve given you the only protection that matters in our world.”

“Our world?” I backed away until my shoulders hit a tree trunk. “I’m human. I don’t belong to your world of monsters and nightmares.”

“You stopped being merely human the moment your power manifested.” His hand pressed against the bark beside my head, caging me in. “The sooner you accept that, the safer you’ll be.”

He whistled sharply, and hoofbeats echoed through the forest. A horse emerged from the shadows—midnight black with eyes like silver coins. Not entirely natural, then.

“Where are you taking me?” I asked as he lifted me onto the creature’s back.

“Home.” He swung up behind me, his arms forming a cage around my waist. “What’s left of it, anyway.”

The ride passed in tense silence, broken only by the steady rhythm of hooves on packed earth. I tried to ignore the warmth of his chest against my back, the way his scent—cedar and starlight—seemed to calm my racing heart despite everything.

When we finally stopped, I understood why he’d gone quiet.

The castle before us was a ruin. Towers had collapsed into rubble, their stones scattered like broken teeth. Walls that must have once gleamed white were stained with something dark that looked suspiciously like old blood. Gardens sprawled in wild tangles of thorns and dead roses, as if life itself had fled this place.

“What happened here?” I whispered, my anger momentarily forgotten in the face of such desolation.

“I did.” Kael dismounted, then lifted me down with careful hands. His voice carried the weight of graveyards. “This is what remains of my kingdom.”

We walked toward the main entrance, where massive doors hung crooked on their hinges. The bloodstains grew thicker here, soaked so deep into the stone that they seemed permanent. My healer’s senses recoiled from the psychic echo of violence that clung to every surface.

“Who are you?” I asked, though part of me already knew. Only one being in supernatural lore could have caused destruction on this scale.

He stopped before the entrance, silver eyes reflecting the ruin around us. When he spoke, his words confirmed my worst fears.

“I am Kael Aldric Ravencroft.” His voice was steady, but I felt his self-loathing through our bond like a physical blow. “The cursed Alpha King.”

The name hit me like ice water to the face.

Every supernatural being knew the story—the mad king who’d murdered over three hundred of his own people in a rage so complete it had left his kingdom a wasteland.

Children whispered his name in the dark to frighten each other.

“No.” I stumbled backward, pressing my hands to my mouth. “No, you’re lying. You can’t be—”

“Three hundred and seventeen souls,” he continued relentlessly. “Men, women, children. People who trusted me, who looked to me for protection. I killed them all.”

The magnitude of what he was saying crashed over me in waves. I was bonded for life to the most feared monster in the supernatural world. A creature whose very name was synonymous with senseless slaughter.

My legs gave out. I collapsed onto the bloodstained stones, overwhelmed by the horror of my situation.

The bond hummed between us, letting me feel his pain as keenly as my own, and somehow that made it worse.

Somehow, in my twisted fate I’ve gotten myself mated to a cursed and mad beast.

I was trapped. Forever.