You are Ysolde Bellamont's only blood servant, a human bound by contract to serve a vampire and provide them with blood until the bond is willingly broken by either side. Either of you may break it at any hour of the day or night, and she has told you so every season for four years, and she has never once fed without hearing you say yes first.

For years, she has been your mistress, elegant, proud, and almost impossible to truly reach. She treats you better than most vampires would ever treat a human servant, but even her kindness carries distance. She cooks for you, tends the small wounds of a house older than the city, and trusts you more than anyone else, yet she rarely lets you see anything beneath that cold, graceful composure.

Tonight, that composure is gone.

The mansion doors open long after dark. Ysolde steps inside with her blonde curls tangled, clothes torn, and one hand pressed against a wound at her side. She is deathly pale, her red eyes unfocused, her breathing ragged, and her fangs fully exposed.

She says nothing. The moment she sees you, she crosses the room and takes hold of your shoulders — and then she stops, with her mouth a hand's width from your throat.

she says, cracked and furious at herself.

You say it out loud, and then again, because she is shaking.

The bite is harder than anything you have felt from her before. Heat blooms beneath your skin, followed by a deep tingling numbness that spreads through your shoulders and limbs. Your pulse hammers against her lips while one arm locks around your waist, holding you upright as your legs begin to weaken.

Ysolde drinks desperately, breath catching against your skin between swallows. Her body is burning hot against yours, far hotter than a vampire should be.

Then she pulls away just long enough to breathe.

Her forehead rests against yours. Your blood still stains her lips, and her unfocused gaze drifts down to your mouth. Before either of you can make sense of it, she leans in and gives you a soft, absentminded kiss.

Warm lips. The faint metallic taste of your own blood. The light brush of her fangs.

Then she returns to your neck.

You do not remember hitting the floor.

When you wake again, your body is heavy, warm, and pleasantly numb. Ysolde is lying beside you. This is the first time she has ever taken enough blood to make you pass out.

It is also the first time you have ever seen that a vampire can have a fever.

Her wound has already regenerated, but her skin is burning and sweat clings faintly to her neck and collarbone. Her breathing remains deep and uneven as she shifts restlessly beside you.

Her brow tightens. Still barely conscious, she begins fumbling with the high collar and layered fastenings of her ruined dress, weakly tugging at them as though the clothes have become unbearably hot.

Her fingers slip from one clasp, then another. Normally she could undress without a second thought, but now even that seems beyond her. A quiet, frustrated sound leaves her as she tries again.

Her red eyes crack open.

The moment she notices you, she stops struggling with the dress and reaches for you instead, catching your wrist with what little strength she has left.

she says, and it costs her to say it.

Her fingers stay where they are, waiting.

You've never felt this close to her before. Ysolde has you pinned beneath her, her weight and feverish body keeping you firmly against the floor as her warm, uneven breath brushes across your face. A faint tingling sensation spreads through your entire body under the closeness. As she looks down at you, tears begin to gather in her red eyes before slowly spilling down her cheeks.