Night did not fall gently on the house.
It pressed down.
The corridors were quiet, the walls old and breathing with a sound that only those awake could hear. Every room held a body that refused sleep.
All five of them were awake.
Not by choice.
Carlson Valentino sat upright in his bed, spine straight despite the hour, fingers resting on the carved headboard as if he were steadying himself against a tide. His expression was unreadable, but his eyes—ancient, sharp—had narrowed. He had felt it before. Long ago. Not this clearly. Not this close.
Lucien stood near the window of his room, one hand braced against the glass. His jaw was tight, teeth clenched, breath slow but heavy. Something in his chest pulled forward, aggressive, possessive, demanding movement. His instincts screamed hunt, yet his body refused to obey blindly. That alone unsettled him.
Alaric did not move at all. He sat in the dark, elbows on his knees, head lowered, watching the floor as though the force might crawl across it. He was already dissecting the sensation—how it arrived, how it spread, how it shielded itself even as it called. That contradiction disturbed him more than the pull itself.
Severin smiled.
Not widely. Not openly. Just enough to bare intent. His fingers twitched at his side, resisting the urge to act. Whatever this was, it was not prey. Prey did not summon. Prey did not protect itself while bleeding power into the air.
And Darian—Darian lay back on his bed, one arm thrown over his eyes, chest rising too fast. Of all of them, the pull struck him the hardest. Not because he was weak, but because he was closest. He could feel the direction of it. The center. The source.
The boy.
Eline.
At the same moment—precise, synchronized, unnatural—the sensation peaked.
A call.
A lure.
A warning.
It slid through them like heat under skin, seductive without being kind, intimate without permission. It did not beg. It did not command.
It invited—and locked the door behind the invitation.
And in the smallest room at the far end of the house, Eline writhed against his sheets.
Sleep had abandoned him hours ago.
His body burned—not feverish, but overloaded, as though something inside him had been turned up too far. His skin felt too tight, his blood too loud. Every nerve demanded release from a pressure he did not understand.
He turned onto his side. Then his back. Then sat up, fingers digging into the mattress hard enough to ache.
"Stop," he whispered—to his body, to the air, to nothing.
(Why it is so intense today ,i feel like my body could turn raw eggs into omelets.
Am I really going to die this early ,gosh!!)
It didn't stop.
The feeling was stronger tonight than it had ever been. Before, it had been whispers in his veins. Tonight it roared. His chest felt full of heat and emptiness at once, a contradiction that made his breath hitch.
He didn't know what he needed.
Only that staying still was unbearable.
Eline swung his legs off the bed and stood, swaying slightly. The house was silent. Too silent. Surely no one would be awake at this hour. Surely the dark would belong to him alone.
He pulled on a thin layer, opened the door without turning on the light, and stepped into the corridor.
The moment his bare foot touched the floor—
All five of them felt it shift.
Not louder.
Closer.
Eline walked toward the back of the house, toward the garden doors, driven by a simple, desperate thought: cold air. If he could just breathe something cool, something real, maybe his body would calm.
~In The Garden
The garden was colder than the house.
Eline felt it the moment he stepped outside—the night air biting into his overheated skin, sharp and real. Gravel crunched softly beneath his slippers as he crossed the narrow path, breath uneven, fingers trembling as though his body didn't quite belong to him tonight.
A stone bench waited beneath the old tree, pale in the moonlight.
He sat.
For a moment, he just breathed.
The fabric of his nightwear clung uncomfortably, damp with heat. He undid two buttons at the collar without thinking, pulling the cloth slightly away from his chest, letting the cold reach places it hadn't been able to inside. His head tipped back, eyes closing, throat exposed to the sky as he searched for relief that refused to come.
The heat didn't fade.
It pooled deeper.
Above him—two floors up—Lucien's room faced the garden.
He hadn't meant to look again.
At first, he'd thought it was fog. A trick of moonlight drifting where it shouldn't. Then the shape shifted, settled, breathed.
White. Still. Human.
Lucien's body reacted before his mind caught up.
His vision sharpened instantly, predatory focus locking onto the figure below. The moment recognition struck, something inside him snapped into alignment—every restless instinct suddenly certain.
That's it.
The source.
The disturbance.
The thing that had invaded his blood for nights.
Lucien didn't think.
Thinking was already too late.
The pull intensified the second his eyes fixed on Eline, no longer abstract, no longer distant. His body surged with the urge to move, to close the distance, to confront whatever dared to call to him like this.
The window was already open.
He didn't leap like a beast.
He didn't rush.
He dropped—controlled, silent, precise—landing in the shadows of the garden as if the earth had been waiting to receive him.
Lucien straightened slowly.
The closer he got, the stronger it became.
Eline was restless on the bench, hands pressed briefly to his chest as though trying to hold himself together. The air around him felt dense, charged, wrong. The scent—not blood—something warmer, older, unfamiliar—wrapped around Lucien's senses and pulled hard.
This was temptation.
This was provocation.
Lucien stepped closer, his presence cutting the moonlight, blocking it from Eline like an eclipse.
Only then did Eline feel it shift.
The air changed.
The heat spiked—sharper now, invasive. His breath caught, unease crawling up his spine. Slowly, instinct screaming, he opened his eyes.
And found himself staring into Lucien Valentino.
The night held its breath.
The moment ,
When their eyes met, Lucien's gaze deepened.
The red didn't flare—it unfurled, slow and heavy, like embers stirred awake. It held Eline in place, pressed into him with quiet authority, as if those eyes already knew how his body worked better than he did.
Eline's breath stuttered.
Heat rushed through him, sharp and sudden, pooling low in his chest, in his stomach, in places he didn't want to acknowledge. His fingers curled against the bench, fabric brushing his skin too lightly, too sensitively. The cool night air no longer helped—it only made him more aware of how warm he was.
Too warm.
His body leaned forward on instinct, drawn by something dark and magnetic. Not desire—not exactly—but a need to be closer, to step into the space Lucien occupied and let whatever was happening finish.
Lucien felt it immediately.
The scent shifted—sweet, warm, dangerously alive. His control tightened like a clenched fist. Every predatory instinct urged him forward, urged him to cage that fragile heat with his body, to block the moonlight completely and see what Eline would do in the dark.
He stepped close enough that Eline could feel him.
Not touching.
Just there.
The warmth intensified, unbearable now. Eline's lashes fluttered, lips parting as a quiet sound escaped him—half breath, half loss of control. His body burned his shadow ,his pale chest reflecting the moon light , his nose,cheeks and ears all red from the heat inside his body and the translucent fabric couldn't hide his hard and red nipples For one terrifying second, his body offered itself, soft and unguarded, answering a call his mind was screaming against.
No.
Fear snapped him back.
He pushed himself up abruptly, the movement clumsy, breath uneven. His heart pounded hard enough to hurt as he turned away, refusing to look again, refusing to let his body decide anything more.
"I—I need to go," he said, voice unsteady, barely holding together.
He didn't wait for an answer.
As Eline hurried away, heat still crawling under his skin, Lucien remained in the garden—motionless, jaw tight, eyes dark—watching him disappear.
Whatever that boy was…
It wasn't safe.
And Lucien wanted
Lucien didn't stay behind.
Watching Eline walk away only sharpened the ache in his body. The pull didn't fade—it snapped tight, ruthless and immediate. Waiting was no longer an option.
He moved.
The distance vanished in a blink. One moment Eline was stumbling through the garden path, breath uneven, the next he collided with something solid—warm, unyielding.
Strong arms closed around his waist.
The contact hit them both at once.
Eline gasped, the sound breaking from his chest as his body settled, the unbearable heat suddenly easing, as if the storm inside him had found its center. His back pressed instinctively into Lucien's chest, breath slowing despite the shock.
Safe.
That was the terrifying part.
He opened his eyes, heart pounding, and met Lucien's reflection in the dark glass of the garden doors—too close, too real.
"Lucien—"
The name barely left his lips before Lucien tightened his hold.
Relief flooded Lucien's veins like poison-sweet blood. The heat that had been clawing at him finally dulled, replaced by something heavier, darker. His forehead dropped to Eline's shoulder, breath harsh, control fraying thread by thread.
"You shouldn't walk away from me like that," he murmured, voice low, strained—not a threat, not a promise. Something worse.
Eline trembled.
Their bodies fit together too easily, like they had learned each other long before this moment. The night air wrapped around them, but neither felt cold. If anything, the world narrowed to breath, warmth, and the unbearable awareness of how close they were.
Lucien's restraint broke—not violently, not fully.
He turned Eline just enough to face him, one hand firm at his waist, the other braced beside him, caging without crushing. His mouth brushed Eline's—brief, hard, desperate—a kiss stolen more than given, burning and abrupt.
Then he stopped.
Pulled back as if the contact had shocked him.
Eline stood there , lips parted, breath shaking, body aching with a calm that felt far too dangerous to trust.
Lucien looked at him like a man staring at the edge of a cliff he knew he would eventually jump from.
"This," Lucien said quietly, eyes darkening again, "is exactly why you should stay away from me,but its too late for this advice now."