Page 111 of Claimed In Darkness

I should sleep.

But I don’t need to anymore.

I should eat.

But I am not hungry.

At least—not for food.

I don’t realize it until I stand at the river’s edge, watching my own reflection.

It should be the same.

The same eyes.

The same face.

The same lips he has kissed, the same throat he has bruised, the same skin he has touched.

But it isn’t.

Because see it now.

The shift.

The small, sharp wrongness in my own body.

My veins are too dark beneath my skin, the color just a shade too deep, like the relic inside me is bleeding into every part of me.

My pupils are too sharp at the edges.

And my mouth—gods, my mouth.

I lift my fingers to my lips, parting them slightly, pressing against my own teeth.

Not fangs.

Not claws.

But sharper.

More defined.

More made for tearing.

Horror should fill me.

But all I can think about is the last time I tasted blood.

And how much I liked it.

Not the men I killed.

Not the High Council’s warriors.

His.

Zephiran.

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