Now that they were blood bonded, Victorija could only be satisfied with Daisy’s blood, and if she didn’t drink from Daisy, she would slowly slip into madness. Every impulse she had was demanding she drink from her.

Normally she wouldn’t have given it a second thought, would have taken what she needed, but Daisy MacDougall was different, she was special. When Victorija first felt the effects of the blood bond, she needed to know why she was unable to take Daisy’s blood.

Victorija found out Daisy was a descendent of the Brassard family, and her whole world came crashing down. Angele Brassard was the one woman she had loved in her life. They were star-crossed lovers, the Brassards being French vampire hunters, and the Dreds, a royal clan made up of born vampires.

She heard Angele’s voice in her head. Promise me, you will never hurt or drink the blood of my descendants without consent.

She remembered the words she’d said in return. I swear on my life. It’ll be the only vow I ever keep. I swear, Angele.

And that vow was now coming back to haunt her. She felt her hands start to shake with the knowing hunger inside of her. Victorija quickly pulled out a hip flask, containing whisky mixed with a potion given to her by Anka, a dark witch who was aligned with the Dreds.

It helped with the symptoms, helped her bear the pain of not drinking the blood of her bonded soul. As she put the lid back on the flask, she saw the other physical symptom of her body’s rebellion. The blue veins in her wrist had been changing slowly to green, inch by inch.

This wasn’t another symptom of the blood sickness. Her father had been cursed with blood sickness, too, and she’d never noticed this happening to him. She had told no one about this. Not her Duca—her second in command—Drasas, nor the witch Anka who made her potion.

She was showing enough weakness as it was. If her clan saw she was further compromised, then they would be less fearful, and less willing to follow. Victorija had already heard whispered wonderings about her continuing state of poor health. They weren’t stupid. And it wasn’t just the blood bond that was turning her life upside down. She was dealing with the cascade of her formerly repressed emotions that were released just before she murdered her grandmother, the Grand Duchess Lucia, the matriarch of the Debrek clan.

The Dreds were once part of the Debrek clan, until Victorija’s father, Gilbert, would not accept the Debreks’ sacred vow of only taking blood by consent. In response, Gilbert set up the Dred clan and took Victorija and his wife with him. He emotionally and physically abused them, and Victorija felt abandoned. She blamed her former family, especially her grandmother, for failing to protect her and her mother.