The Reborn Blood Servant No Longer Craves Her Masters Fangs

I was reborn at the exact moment I picked up the wrong crystal goblet—the one meant for my Master and employer, Lord Julian Blackwood, laced with a potent, forbidden vampire aphrodisiac known as Blood-Lotus extract.

The heavy, metallic scent of the crimson liquid filled my nostrils, layered with the sickeningly sweet aroma of the drug. I stood frozen in the dimly lit, velvet-draped executive suite of the Nightshade Syndicate. My hand hovered over the silver tray. In my past life, driven by a foolish, all-consuming devotion, I had intercepted this very glass. I had known it was spiked by a rival coven, and rather than let Julian succumb to the mind-altering frenzy, I had consumed it myself.

I remembered the excruciating heat that had followed. The way the drug had boiled in my human veins, turning my blood into a siren song that Julian, a centuries-old vampire, could not resist. When the frenzy hit my system, I hadn't cared that he had been frantically trying to leave the tower to get to the woman he truly loved: Seraphina.

I remembered grabbing the lapels of his tailored suit, offering my neck, my wrists, my very soul. I had begged him to stay. And the beast within him had answered. The memory of his fangs piercing my flesh, the euphoric, agonizing drain of my life force mixed with a dark, twisted ecstasy, still made my phantom scars ache.

Not long after that fateful, blood-soaked night, I discovered the impossible: I was pregnant. A dhampir child, a forbidden union of human blood-servant and pureblood vampire.

Julian, bound by the ancient laws of the Blood Council, was forced to take me as his mate to legitimize the heir. But on the night I went into premature labor—my fragile human body tearing apart under the supernatural strength of the child within me—he received the news. Seraphina, utterly destroyed by grief over our forced union, had thrown herself from the parapets of a rival coven’s keep.

I remembered lying in a pool of my own blood on the delivery bed, my vision fading, screaming in agony. Julian had stormed into the surgical ward, his eyes glowing with a murderous, feral crimson light. He violently dismissed the coven doctors. Then, he stood by the edge of the bed, a statue of cold, beautiful marble, and watched me bleed out.

The last thing I heard before the cold embrace of death took me was his voice, dripping with pure, unadulterated venom: "If you hadn't gotten pregnant, I never would've been forced to bind myself to a pathetic human like you. Seraphina wouldn't have met the sun. You deserve this agony. Die, Elara. Die and give me my heir."

A sharp gasp tore through my throat as my eyes snapped open. The opulent surroundings of the executive suite rushed back into focus. I was back.

Back to the exact night, the exact hour I almost drank that drugged blood-wine.

"Elara! Call Seraphina right now. Tell her to come to the penthouse."

Hearing that familiar, commanding baritone again sent a violent jolt through my spine. I hadn't just hallucinated my death; I had been reborn. I looked up. Julian was pacing by the floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the neon-lit city. His impossibly handsome face was flushed, the veins under his pale skin throbbing with a dark, unnatural hue. His fangs had already descended, resting sharply against his lower lip. The Blood-Lotus extract he had consumed minutes prior was already tearing through his undead system, igniting a blinding, primal lust.

Without a single second of hesitation, I pulled my phone from my blazer pocket and dialed Seraphina's number.

Julian groaned, gripping the edge of his mahogany desk. His eyes, usually a cool, calculating obsidian, were burning with a terrifying, hungry crimson. The drug was fully kicking in. The predatory aura rolling off him was suffocating, heavy with the scent of pine, dark chocolate, and the metallic tang of impending violence. In my past life, I was the one who drank from that glass to spare him this loss of control. I was the one who threw myself at his mercy, believing that my sacrifice would finally make him see me, love me.

It had only led to my gruesome death.

This time, I stood completely still, watching with cold, detached eyes as he struggled against the fever burning in his icy veins.

"Julian," I said, my voice eerily calm, devoid of the trembling adoration that used to color my every word to him. "Just hold on. Seraphina will be here in ten minutes."

He let out a guttural, animalistic growl, his gaze snapping to me. For a terrifying second, the beast in him recognized the pulse beating rapidly in my throat. He took a predatory step forward, the sheer magnetic pull of his vampiric allure trying to drag me into his orbit. But I felt nothing. The love I had harbored for him had been brutally bled out of me on that delivery table.

I turned on my heel and walked toward the heavy oak double doors.

"Elara..." The moment I stepped into the hallway and pulled the door closed behind me, I thought I heard his voice—a low, desperate rasp—call my name, thick with a need that sent shivers down my arms.

But I pretended the sound never reached my ears. I shut the heavy doors firmly, the click of the lock sealing him inside with his torment. I walked to the end of the long, dimly lit corridor, folding my hands neatly in front of me, leaning against the cold marble wall to wait.

Exactly ten minutes later, the private elevator chimed. Seraphina rushed out. She was breathtaking, as always—a delicate human socialite who moved with the grace of a swan, wrapped in a designer silk trench coat. Her large, doe-like eyes found me, filled with a complicated mix of anxiety and a possessive glare.

When her gaze swept over me, noting that my tailored skirt suit was perfectly intact, that not a single hair was out of place, and that my scent carried no trace of Julian's arousal or blood, a profound wave of relief washed over her flawless features.

She stepped up to the executive doors, placing a delicate, manicured hand on the brass handle. Before pushing it open, she threw a haughty glance over her shoulder at me.

"You can leave now, blood-servant," she said, her voice dripping with aristocratic condescension. "I don't need you standing guard. I am all he needs."

I didn't offer a bow. I didn't offer a polite smile. I simply turned, walked to the elevator, rode it down seventy floors to the mortal streets of the city, hailed a night-cab, and went back to my empty apartment. I didn't care what happened in that room. Let him drink from her. Let him claim her. I was finally free of my curse.