The Dying Bride

Elara Voss had always known she was not an ordinary vampire.

She was Death’s attendant—on her eighteenth birthday, she would be recalled to the Underworld, returned to the Reaper’s side.

Yet her entire clan believed it was her twin sister, Celeste, who was “destined not to live past eighteen.”

Thus, they gave the finest gowns, the purest blood, the gentlest embraces—all to Celeste.

Even the centuries-old betrothal contract to Lucien Ashbourne, the heir of the ancient vampire House Ashbourne and future Patriarch—was being broken, to be rewritten in Celeste’s name.

On the thirteenth night before her eighteenth birthday, Elara intercepted Lucien in the clan’s long gallery—the nineteenth time he had avoided the matter of their Blood Oath.

“Lucien,” her voice was soft, yet sharp as a blade held beneath the tongue, “do you no longer wish to swear the Oath with me?”

Lucien wore a dark tailcoat, the silver-and-onyx crest of House Ashbourne pinned over his heart. Those eyes, cold as the deep sea, avoided hers for the first time.

“Elara…” he began, the words sounding like swallowed glass, “Celeste said—she must be the first woman I ever blood-bind.”

“She will not see her nineteenth year.”

His throat moved, his voice dropping lower. “Her only wish before the end is to become my Consort.”

In that moment, Elara’s heart clenched as if seized by an invisible hand, the pain stealing her breath.

“And you?” She held his gaze. “What do you want?”

Lucien looked away, unable to meet her eyes.

“Elara, we have an eternity ahead of us.”

“But Celeste… has less than two weeks.”

Elara felt as if plunged into a frozen crypt.

In their world, a Blood Oath was not mere lovers’ words. It was public claim, a name carved into the clan lineage, a tether felt with every breath in the night.

She should have sworn her Oath after her Rite of First Feeding at fifteen. Yet the ceremony had been delayed again and again. Over two years had passed; she was nearly eighteen, and Lucien had grown only more silent.

Until this moment, she finally understood—

He was clearing the path for Celeste.

They had been born on the same storm-lashed night, when a wound-like crimson fissure had briefly split the sky. The Seer had proclaimed:

“One shall be recalled to the Underworld; the other shall endure.”

The clan had decided—Elara was the false one, Celeste the true.

Because Celeste was frail, plagued by nightmares, often claiming to hear “a voice calling her name from behind a black door.” Everyone believed she better fit the cursed profile.

“Elara.” Lucien’s voice was hushed, as if reasoning with someone who should not make a scene. “You have always doted on Celeste… You would not want her to leave this world with regrets, would you?”

He reached out, his hand almost closing over hers.

“Promise me this. Please.”

Elara stared at him as if staring at a door that once offered warmth but now let in only a cold draft.

Her throat tightened painfully. It took a long moment before she forced out a single word:

“Fine.”

Lucien seemed to exhale in relief, his expression softening. He took her hand again, his tone now sweetly persuasive.

“I swear, once her final wish is fulfilled, you and I will be together for eternity.”

Elara’s knuckles turned white. She said nothing.

They had no eternity.

Because she was the one who would not live past eighteen.

Since her earliest memories at age three, Elara had recurrently dreamt of a man: shrouded in black robes, his presence cold as frost, standing before a throne in the Underworld.

She could never see his face, but she knew—he was the Reaper.

And she was Death’s attendant.

She had told her family. She had told Lucien.

They said she was “seeking attention,” jealous of Celeste, weaving stories.

Now, Lucien was using “Celeste is Death’s attendant” as the very reason to wed her, to swear the Oath.

Elara no longer wished to explain, nor to plead.

On the night of the Crimson Eclipse—her eighteenth birthday—she would return to the Underworld.

To the place that belonged to her.

After parting from Lucien, Elara returned to the Voss ancestral manor.

The moment she entered, her mother summoned her to the subterranean Prayer Hall—a place dedicated to the Sacred Icon of the Night, where cold damp seeped from stone walls and candle flames flickered like labored breaths.

“Elara, I know this is unfair to you,” Lady Isolde Voss’s tone was gentle, yet it felt like the blunt edge of a knife. “But Celeste truly has so little time left.”

“Be patient a while longer. I beg you as your mother.”

Elara looked into her mother’s loving face and found she could not refuse. She merely nodded.

“Very well.”

To “prolong Celeste’s life,” her mother subjected Elara to a monthly “Penance Rite.”

On the new moon, she was scourged with chains soaked in holy water and silver nitrate—to “cleanse the taint of birth” for Celeste.

On the full moon, she knelt on cold stone, striking her forehead until it bled—pleading with the “Night Deity” to protect Celeste.

Tonight was the new moon.

Elara lay prone on the wooden platform at the back of the Prayer Hall, allowing the attendants to raise the silver-laced, barbed chains and bring them down upon her back.

Agony lanced through her with each strike. Sweat beaded on her brow, her back soon a ruin of torn flesh.

Two hours later, the scourging ended.

Gritting her teeth, she pushed herself up and limped from the hall. The night outside was dense, mist clinging to her skin like a damp shroud.

Passing the rose garden, she saw—

Celeste sat upon a wrought-iron swing twined with white roses, Lucien standing behind her, pushing gently.

The look in his eyes as he gazed down at her was a tenderness Elara had never witnessed.

Then, she heard Celeste look up and ask:

“Lucien… has sister agreed to let us swear the Oath?”

“Yes,” he murmured.

Celeste pressed on, “If I die after my eighteenth… will you then swear the Oath with her?”

Elara’s heart tightened in her chest.

Lucien was silent for a beat, then spoke each word with deliberate clarity:

“Whether in life or death, you shall be my only Consort.”