Blood Freed (Vampire-Cursed #4)

15. Chapter 15

15

Chapter 15

Soren

I feel it the moment it happens. First, there’s the sense of belonging that I’ve known since the instant of my making. Then…nothing.

“Maxwell!” I gasp.

The void tears through me, centuries of connection severed in a heartbeat. My legs buckle. The walls blur as reality fractures around me. Without conscious thought, I reach for the shadows.

The containment field around my apartment should stop me. It doesn’t.

I materialize in Maxwell’s darkened entrance hall, abandoning the decades of propriety that always had me knocking at the front door first.

“Maxwell!” My voice echoes through the mansion’s hollow chambers. There’s no reply, just artificial darkness and a sense of emptiness. I move through the UV-protected halls, scanning each room.

The silence grows oppressive, until the stench hits me – fire and burned flesh. I follow it, each step heavier than the last. Down the corridor. Past the portrait gallery where generations of our line stare with accusing eyes.

I stop outside his study, where the air almost threatens to choke me.

I push open the heavy oak door.

The morning sun streams through the tall windows, searing my flesh as it touches me. I hiss at the pain, slamming the door shut, but not before I get a good look at the room. It’s an image that feels burned into my mind.

The windows are open wide, drapes pulled back to let in maximum sunlight. Maxwell would never be so careless. He was meticulous about protection from the sun, had special UV-filtering glass installed. These windows are broken, the protective glass shattered.

In the center, a heap of ashes and charred bone fragments mars the antique Persian rug – Maxwell’s favorite. On the edge of the rug is Maxwell’s signet ring, untouched by the flames, lying perfectly positioned. Too perfectly. Maxwell never took it off, not in the five hundred years I’ve known him. The placement is deliberate, theatrical.

This was no suicide. The scene is staged, arranged to tell a story that isn’t true.

I slump back against the wall, mind reeling at seeing the remains of the vampire who gave me immortality. Who taught me everything I know about power and control and survival. Who I defied to save Mia.

My maker. My father.

“I’m sorry,” I whisper. I don’t fight down the pain. I deserve it.

The bond’s absence claws at my chest, a physical ache where Maxwell’s presence used to be. Five centuries of connection, guidance, loyalty – even when strained by recent events – gone in an instant. The magnitude of the loss threatens to overwhelm me, but I force myself to focus on the details that don’t add up. The broken windows. The pristine ring. The calculated positioning of everything.

This is Lucien’s work. A message and a warning wrapped in one brutal act. And a reminder that he holds all the power now.

A soft noise behind me makes me turn. “Emma?” I say. A woman stands in the doorway, her slight frame trembling. My sister – not by blood, but by Maxwell’s gift of immortality. She’s one of the eldest of his line, turned shortly after I was.

“Is it true?” Her voice cracks. “I felt it…the bond…it’s gone.”

I nod, unable to find words, as she stumbles forward to the door.

“Don’t,” I say when she reaches for the doorknob. She shoots a look at me.

“Did he…?” Pale blue eyes lock with mine from beneath a wave of fair hair. She still bears the accent she picked up on London’s streets before the plague took her.

“He’s gone,” I tell her. She doesn’t need to know more. “It isn’t safe,” I add.

She drops her hand, her chin lowering, her eyes shut. A sound flutters from her chest, a low groan of pain that I understand all too well. But there’s something more. A pallor to her skin. A tremble. She’s weak, and it’s not just because of what’s happened here today.

I stay silent, watching her as her shoulders shudder, sobs wracking her. It’s a pain I feel, too. A grief so profound that I don’t know what to do with it.

Finally, she turns to me. “He left this for you.” Emma pulls a letter from her jacket, hands shaking so badly she nearly drops it. “Said if anything happened…you needed to know the truth.”

I frown. “How did you know…?” I begin.

“He was afraid,” she says. “Worried that he was in danger.”

The envelope bears Maxwell’s seal and my name in his elegant script. Inside, several pages of his distinctive handwriting unfold. My eyes skim the lines.

My dearest Soren,

If you’re reading this, I am gone. There are truths you must know about our line. We are cursed, all of us, descended from an ancient vampire who betrayed a powerful witch. Her vengeance was terrible – she cursed his blood, ensuring all his progeny would eventually develop the Bloodbane.

God forgive me, I knew this. My own maker had warned me when he’d brought me back from death. He’d given me new life, only to damn me to a world of isolation.

You see, Soren, before I was turned, I was a different man. I had a family, friends, joy, purpose. But immortality cursed me. Doomed me to watch all I’d loved wither and die. I fought it. I swear to you, I did. But the loneliness…dear God, it was intolerable. And so, knowing the risks, I made you. You were my first hope at happiness. And when decades passed, and you seemed to thrive, daring to believe we could escape the curse, I turned others.

My children. My family.

It was a mistake. I knew that when I watched the first of my children die. The Bloodbane. Others followed, each one taking a part of me with them.

You see, there’s no escaping Destiny. And ours is written in stone.

Emma’s sob breaks through my reading. I look up to see tears of blood streaming down her face. “He knew,” she whispers. “He knew I was starting to show symptoms.”

“You have it?” I stare at her, the pages in my hand trembling slightly.

She nods. “Yes. And others, too. Maxwell wept when he found out. He swore to me that he was going to do something to save us. Said it might damn his soul to hell, but he’d fix things.”

God, Maxwell…

Things are beginning to make sense as I keep reading. My heart goes heavy.

…I turned to Marlowe because he promised a solution. The blood farms… God forgive me, Soren. I knew what was happening there, but I couldn’t watch any more of my children die. The witch blood sustained them, bought time for those who hadn’t found a blood match. I know it was wrong, but I’d seen it, son… what the Bloodbane could do to our kind. The death is a cruel one. Slow, torturous. Some starved over decades, and there was nothing I could do.

When Marlowe spoke of the Blackwood witch’s power, I saw hope. Her blood could save our line…

Maxwell’s elegant script blurs as pieces of my own history slot into place like a macabre puzzle. The growing distaste for human blood over recent decades. The shame-filled visits to witch blood dealers, telling myself it was just a peculiar preference, a fetish I’d developed.

Emma’s quiet sobs echo my thoughts. How many others in our line are showing symptoms? How many are already hiding their condition?

My fingers trace the words on the page. All this time, I’d credited my sympathy toward witches to Ingrid’s influence. Her death in the witch trials had shaped my views on vampire-witch relations, or so I’d believed. But looking back, I’d felt drawn to their kind long before meeting her. Perhaps some part of me had always known what I truly needed.

“Did you know?” Emma’s voice breaks through my thoughts. “About the blood farms?”

“Yes.” My voice is hoarse. There’s no way I can tell her about my involvement. Shame consumes me.

The paper crumples slightly in my grip as I continue reading Maxwell’s confession.

…Lucien knew my weakness. Used it to control me. But that wasn’t enough for him. He wanted more – he wants everything, Soren.

When you defied me to save the Blackwood woman, I felt such pride. Such hope. You proved stronger than the Maker’s Bond. Something I never managed myself. You’ve always been stronger in every way, son. You resisted the urge to make more of your kind the way that I couldn’t. Yet now, I’m resting my burden on your shoulders because I couldn’t find a way to change things. It is a regret I will take to the grave with me.

My throat tightens. All those times I’d seen the pain in Maxwell’s eyes, the conflict when he gave me orders about Mia. He’d been fighting it, too, in his own way.

“There’s more,” Emma whispers, pointing to the final paragraph. Her hand shakes as she wipes blood tears from her cheeks.

Lucien will try to silence me; I know this much. There is always a price to be paid when you make a deal with the Devil. He’ll come for you next. The Blackwood witch is the key – not just to saving our line but to breaking his power. You must fight this, Soren. Fight him with everything you have. For all of us.

I only hope it isn’t too late.

The letter ends with his typical flourish, the scrawled initials almost at odds with the content of the letter.

My maker’s final words.

I fold the letter carefully, tucking it into my jacket. The weight of it feels like a death sentence against my chest. Emma watches me with desperate eyes, waiting for direction, for hope.

I don’t know if I have any for her, and now I feel the burden that Maxwell must have been carrying.

I’m so sorry.

If I’d known… I heave a sigh, rubbing my eyes. Would it have changed anything if I’d known? Would I have made the same choices my father had made for his children?

“We need to leave,” I tell Emma. “It’s not safe here.”

She nods, but her legs buckle. I catch her before she falls, feeling how frail she’s become. Without Maxwell’s protection, without access to witch blood…

I push the thought aside. One crisis at a time.

“Will you be okay?” I ask, helping her steady herself.

“I’ll manage.” She smiles. It’s sad.

“I won’t abandon you, Emma. I’ll find a way.” I put a hand on her arm, praying that I can keep this promise.

She doesn’t answer. Just keeps smiling that sad little smile as she steps back into the shadows and disappears.

I stand there, staring at Maxwell’s study door for what feels like forever as I process all that I’ve just learned.

I have the Bloodbane.

The thought of it should shatter me, but somehow, it doesn’t.

In fact, aside from the pain of loss that’s flooding me, I feel better than I have in decades.

It’s Mia. Drinking from her has changed something in me. The rush of power, the sense of rightness. Not just desire or hunger but something deeper. Something that felt like coming home.

I step away from Maxwell’s study, my mind racing with new clarity. All this time, I’ve been fighting against the connection with Mia, believing distance would keep her safe. But Lucien’s brutal message lies behind that door – there is no safety in separation.

Her blood runs through my veins, a constant reminder of her. Even now, I can feel her presence at the edges of my consciousness, worried yet resolute. The wall I built between us seems pointless now. Maxwell’s death proves Lucien will eliminate anyone he considers a threat, whether they stand with me or not.

My maker tried to protect his children by yielding to Lucien’s demands. His death proves the futility of that approach. I won’t make the same mistake.

This strange bond with Mia has changed everything. I feel it in my bones, in the way my body hums with renewed strength despite the grief weighing on me. This connection between us isn’t just about hunger or desire – it’s evolution, adaptation, perhaps even salvation.

I straighten my jacket, touching the letter resting against my chest. The Blood Assembly will meet soon to determine my fate. They expect a broken vampire, weakened by his maker’s death and trapped by Lucien’s machinations.

They’re wrong.

I am changed, transformed by witch blood and ancient magic. Pushing Mia away won’t protect her – it will only leave us both vulnerable. Whatever comes next, we face it together.

Time to show the Assembly exactly what that means.