++++++++++

High Priestess

++++++++++

A cool tingling swept over her skin, almost as though countless feathers were stroking her body.

Her long silver hair clung to the sides of her face as the icy breeze sent shivers down her spine.

Luna couldn't say how much time had passed as they watched the moon crept slowly, inch by inch, until only a sliver of light was visible, and then nothing.

She pressed her forehead, and she almost collapsed on the ground-- her knees buckling at the onslaught of emotions bombarding her.

Lights flared, and she glanced up at Apollyon, who had caught her and gripped her waist.

Luna wrapped her arms around his shoulders for support.

There was tension all over his muscles as if the Vampire King had clenched his fists so hard that his knuckles must have had turned white.

"What is happening to me?" Luna choked out at the Vampire King.

Apollyon's eyes met hers.

She was no longer alone in her mind.

Something was invading her thoughts.

The Vampire King was in her mind – his emotions, burning hotter and brighter than her own.

Worry and guilt mixed with a hint of passion and desire built in the back of her skull until Luna almost forgot her fear.

"Stop!" Luna screamed, her voice rising above the loud chatters of the crowd. "Get out!"

Her entire vision fell into darkness, and Luna's mind fractured, breaking into a million pieces of black glass.

+++

She saw three glowing threads in the darkness of her consciousness: blue, silver, and gold.

These three colours—she recognized--were the energetic cords currently attached to her soul.

These soul ties had been bonded to her because she had allowed them.

Now she had to cut them and see what will happen.

She experimented on the blue thread first so that she will figure out its full effect.

Now, she had access to the Vampire King's mind.

Luna noticed that the walls of his mind were blue--like the deepest oceanic ice.

It was frighteningly beautiful.

It was so different from what she had seen before when she tried to bring him back to the underground shelter.

Luna knew for a fact that the blue thread was connecting her to the Vampire King's soul.

She was close to cutting their mental cords through it.

She envisioned Hecate's death scythe in her mind and sliced their link into two.

At that exact instant, the Vampire King's consciousness hit her with shockwaves of pain.

His overwhelming power crashed into her, shocking pain into every synapse.

The true horror of breaking the Blood Bond hit her so hard, her inner walls shook, but there was no time to think.

Her mind was silent.

Everything stopped for her.

In the blackness, there were no stars, only desolation.

Every nerve in her body was in excruciating pain.

There was this strong sense of urgency to re-create the mind link.

She screamed awake in Apollyon's hold.

The agony was everywhere.

The hot lava of torment coursed through her that it felt like she was being skinned alive. Yet, Luna still forced herself to be numb the wound she felt and prevent her severed mental link from trying to reaching out.

It hurt--like being stabbed with a wooden stake to the heart.

Her mind shouted and raged, begging, desperate for the mind link to make it through, alive.

She clawed at Apollyon's chest, unable to breathe.

The darkness crept in around her, pressing down harder than the Vampire King's attempts to crush her mind and reattaching the cords to their original state.

She was going to choke to death.

Alone.

She was so alone.

Alone. Dark. Black. Cold.

+++++++++++++++

Vampire King, Apollyon

+++++++++++++++

The Vampire King was terrified by what he saw in the High Priestess' eyes.

There were such deep golden depths when she had opened her eyes, and he thought he could see the Blood Beast's eyes in her--whenever he looked at his reflection in the mirror before.

"Luna." He shook her, ignoring the attendants who had run to help them at the sound of her screams.

Only she mattered.

"Luna, Wake up!" She didn't respond.

She pretended she couldn't see him.

That was when he saw it in his mind's eye—rather than felt it.

The bond between them had snapped taut.

The Vampire King recognized the bond, though he had never felt this deep.

The Vampire King calmed down his racing mind to think clearly, holding fast even as Luna's heartbeat stuttered.

He closed his eyes, trying to bring her back.

He had no idea what he was doing. All he knew was that his wife would live as long as their blond bond remained strong.

++++++++++++

High Priestess

++++++++++++

Insanity beckoned.

Luna bit back a whimper as she felt her mental walls crumble.

Shaking as she went even deeper, she poured everything she had into her inner defences.

She felt the Vampire King's mind welcome hers.

When Luna slammed into a temporary block in her mind, she advanced through the second layer of her shields just as the block on the outer shields crumbled.

Luna didn't want Apollyon to be there.

Something slammed into it a second later—the Vampire King's mind trying to shove into hers, destroying hers.

"Let me in, my beloved." She heard Apollyon's voice speak in her thoughts. "I will not hurt you."

He pushed at the hollows of her mind as one would poke at a wound.

Luna didn't respond--every ounce of concentration focused on getting back into her mind and keeping the Vampire King at bay.

The Vampire King repeated. "If you keep doing this, you will destroy yourself."

"No. I can destroy the Blood Bond so that I could set you free." Luna insisted, determined to get her point across. After all, it was for his own good. "You deserve to be free from me. It was the Archdemon of Gluttony's doing. You didn't sign up for this."

"Neither are you."

Cracks appeared in the already fragmented shields.

"Nevertheless, I will not let this chance slip away."

The crushing walls of his mind came to a standstill.

"I know I didn't sign up for this, but we are already married." The word was flat, emotionless. "Are you turning your back on me every time you get a chance to leave--like this?"

"I would prefer the bond ended," Luna hissed. "Or better yet, I wish it never happened at all."

"We have the same opinion, dearest wife," Apollyon said drily.

"However, it's something we'll both have to get used to."

"I don't want to." Luna pulled her consciousness away, recoiling from his touch. "I don't want you to know my thoughts and emotions. I will not be vulnerable, Apollyon. I will not let you control me."

"I had no desire to control you."

"You said you would not control me," Luna asked precisely, with venom. "What else will you do if you wouldn't even love me?"

"You demand love from someone incapable. Do you even know what love is?" The Vampire King said softly and half to himself. "How about you, Luna? Are you capable of loving me?"

Luna paused because she didn't even know the answer to that.

How can someone who lived in an Amazon tribe--a community where only women existed--know about loving someone of the opposite sex?

Where a female-only knew how to worship and fight for a goddess' territory all her life and deal with nothing but friendship or worse... betrayal?

"See?" The Vampire King smiled faintly as he felt her mind move out from the dark recesses of her anxiety to reach for him. "Now, come back to me, and we will figure this puzzle out. Together."

Luna had gently merged with Apollyon's until she thought patterns began to echo his subtly.

+++++++++

Vampire King

+++++++++

The High Priestess pulled back with a gasp, allowing their two minds to separate, allowing them to think private thoughts once more.

Her eyes flickered open again a minute later.

The golden orbs of her sight were now replaced by glittering emeralds, futility darkening her expression.

His wife must have thought it was strong enough to break this ultimate binding spell.

He felt Luna search for their mental link.

Felt her try to cut it—his heart almost stopped—but it wasn't something she could influence because the Blood Bond was for eternity.

The mating bond is uncontrollable.

Unbreakable.

The Vampire King was beyond furious at her for attempting to deny him his mate, but beneath the anger were longing, need, and hunger.

Such intense, furious hunger that it had no beginning and no end.

For one instant, their minds were one, and he saw how Luna desperately, how wildly, how unreasonably she wanted to be free from him—enough to break her promise as his mate when they just got married just hours ago.

Triumph flashed across his face.

Luna was his, and he was hers for a bloody long time.

Until one of them ceased to draw breath, one heart stilled, one body is consigned to dust.

++++++++++

High Priestess

++++++++++

Luna's glow lights blazed again in the darkness after the occurrence of the lunar eclipse.

The Vampire King avoided eye contact, but he didn't move further from her side.

He unclasped one of his hands around her back and lifted it in front of their faces.

Luna's fingers dug into his left wrist to examine it—which now bore a mysterious blue lace pattern and a black crescent moon tattooed at the back of his hand.

Her attention was now brought to her right hand—staring at it in horror when she realized she also had the same marks imprinted on it.

"I guess the lunar eclipse had made our mating bond much more official then."