(Damien's POV)
The night they call the Red Moon burned itself into me like a scar.
It was the first time I laid eyes on Adrian Veylor. Vampire king. Enemy. A creature I had been raised to despise before I was old enough to hold a sword.
And yet… I had never forgotten how he looked that night.
Even now, years later, the memory steals into my chest, unsettling my heartbeat.
The air had been thick with tension when we arrived at the clearing for the parley. My warriors flanked me, every step heavy with distrust. The village at the border had been butchered, wolves blaming vampires, vampires blaming wolves. As the newly crowned king, it was my duty to show strength. To show that the wolves would not be cowed.
I expected a corpse in royal robes. That's what I thought the vampire king would be some ancient, withered tyrant kept alive by blood and shadow.
But when he walked into the clearing, the world tilted.
Adrian wasn't ancient. He wasn't rotting or brittle. No, he was terrible in a different way.
He was beautiful.
Sharp lines, pale skin glinting like ivory under the blood-red moon. His eyes, ice blue, cutting, didn't falter even when every wolf in the clearing growled low at his presence. His crown caught the firelight, silver gleaming against black hair that looked like it belonged in midnight itself.
And the way he moved. Calm, controlled, as though he were untouchable. As though my warriors and I were nothing more than children playing at war.
I hated him for that composure.
I hated how much it made my chest tighten.
He wasn't supposed to look at me that way, either. Like he saw through the titles, the furs, the weapons. Like he wasn't staring at a king, but at a man.
"King Adrian," I said, my voice sharper than my blade. "I expected someone older. Colder. Less… alive."
It was meant to wound. Instead, he smirked. The bastard actually smirked. "And I expected a beast. Not a man who hides teeth behind charm."
Something in me shifted then. My blood, my instincts, they weren't snarling for his throat. They were snarling for something else entirely.
I pushed it down, burying it beneath duty. I couldn't let my pack, my generals, see what flickered in my chest. So I stood straighter, louder, angrier. I argued, accused, growled until my throat ached.
But the truth? I barely heard half the words exchanged that night.
I was too busy watching him.
The way he didn't flinch when my warriors growled. The way his hand lingered, just for a heartbeat too long, when we exchanged scrolls at the end. His fingers brushed mine, cool against my skin, and it was like lightning cracking through my veins.
I told myself it was hatred. A sharp, dangerous hatred.
But hatred doesn't make you lose sleep.
Hatred doesn't make you ache.
Hatred doesn't make you imagine what that mouth would feel like against yours.
I left that clearing furious with myself. Furious with him.
Because for the first time in my life, I had looked at the enemy… and wanted.
I roll onto my back now, staring at the wooden beams of my chamber ceiling. The fire in the hearth has burned low, glowing embers painting the walls in restless shadows. My wolf stirs beneath my skin, restless too, because I'm thinking of him again.
Always him.
Adrian.
Damn him.
Every time we've met since, it's been the same. My body moves like it knows something my mind refuses to admit. My eyes find him before they should. My temper flares hotter when he smirks at me.
And when I kissed him in the woods not long ago, when I finally closed that space between us, it felt less like a mistake and more like fate catching up.
I grit my teeth, dragging a hand over my face. Wolves aren't meant for this. We burn, we take, we claim. But this? This is a slow poison. A fire that doesn't burn out, only spreads.
I should end it. I should rip him from my thoughts and crush this desire under the weight of duty. My people wouldn't forgive me if they knew. The council would tear me apart for even entertaining it.
But the truth?
I don't want to end it.
Not when the memory of that night, his eyes, his voice, his damn smirk still lives in me.
That was the night I stopped seeing Adrian Veylor as a monster.
And started seeing him as mine.
My wolf growls low inside me, restless, hungry. Not for blood. Not for conquest.
For him.
Always him.