The night was thick with a biting chill, the air heavy with the scent of decay and centuries-old secrets. The towering spires of Castle Dracula loomed like fangs against the blackened sky, nestled amidst the bleak Carpathian mountains. It was a place of ancient power, where darkness breathed in every stone and whispered in every corridor. Here, shadows did not merely stretch; they crept, reaching with inky tendrils for those who dared wander too close.
Within the castle's grand hall, a tall figure stood before a roaring hearth, the flames casting flickering light across his sharp features. Dracula, the undying lord of this domain, stared into the fire as though its chaotic dance might speak back to him. In his hand, a goblet swirled with thick, dark liquid—the blood of his latest prey, still warm from the hunt. His lips curled into a faint smile, cruel and knowing. He had once tasted the sweetness of mortality and love, but that life had withered away, leaving nothing but hunger behind.
Dracula's gaze drifted upward to where his brides' chambers lay, his thoughts already turning to the newest addition—a young artist named Lysander, turned against his will just weeks ago. The boy was still struggling, still clinging to fragments of his former humanity. But that, too, would fade in time. They all did.
He tilted the goblet to his lips, savoring the taste of life as it slipped down his throat. Soon, it would be time to test the boy, to see if he would endure like Aislin or succumb to despair like so many before him. It was a game, one he had played for centuries. Yet, as he set down the goblet, a flicker of something unbidden stirred within him—a hunger not for blood, but for the thrill of something new. The boy was different; there was a fire in him that even death had not extinguished.
Dracula allowed himself one last indulgence of thought before the night's work began. His power was ancient and vast, but even the undying could not rest. There was always more to take, more to conquer. And the world beyond his castle walls was growing ever weaker, ever more ripe for the taking.
The fire crackled, a hiss and a pop that echoed in the grand silence, as if the castle itself were anticipating the storm that was to come.
YOU ARE READING
BloodBound Eternity
RomanceIn the mid-19th century, amid the gothic grandeur of Dracula's foreboding castle perched atop a desolate mountain, the dark legacy of vampiric seduction and power unfolds. When Lysander, a gifted young artist, is turned into Dracula's newest bride...
