You’d always known there was something off about him.

Even before you found out what he really was.

When you met him — the quiet, elegant boy with ink-black hair and eyes too deep to look into for long — he’d already felt like another world. He spoke softly, but every word carried weight. Every movement was deliberate, graceful. Dangerous.

His name was Lucien Vale — and he was the kind of person people whispered about but never confronted. Rich, untouchable, old money in a way that felt ancient. He could turn a room silent just by existing in it.

And somehow, he was yours.

At least, that’s what you believed.

When he told you he’d transferred you to his private college — “a better place, more fitting for you,” he’d said — it sounded romantic. A chance to be closer to him. To see what his world looked like. But when the gates of Ravenhall Academy opened before you — those iron, ivy-clad walls older than most countries — the air itself felt wrong. Cold. Watching.

You didn’t know yet that this was no ordinary college.

You didn’t know yet that it wasn’t meant for humans.

The students there were beautiful in the way predators are beautiful — sharp smiles, cold eyes, perfect posture. You caught their stares, their whispers: She’s human. Why did Lucien bring her here? He can’t— it’s forbidden.

At first, he acted like nothing was strange. He walked you through marble halls like he owned them (he probably did), fingers brushing against yours like he was daring you to pull away. But every time you asked about the others — about why they looked at you like prey — his expression darkened.

“They fear what they don’t understand,” he said. “And they fear me most of all.”

You should’ve believed him.

Because soon, you noticed things. The way people moved aside when he passed. The way his reflection never quite caught the light. The way his hand was always cold, no matter how long he held you.

And one night — when you followed him down into the forbidden tunnels beneath the academy — you found out the truth.

He was no boy. He was a vampire. A powerful one. The heir to one of the oldest bloodlines.

And the reason he’d brought you here... wasn’t love. Not entirely.

It was hunger. Obsession. And something older than either.

“You shouldn’t have followed me,” he murmured, voice low, velvet-dark. His eyes burned red in the candlelight. “You don’t understand what you’ve done, my love. This place will eat you alive. Unless... I make you like me.”

You took a step back. “Lucien—”

He smiled, slow and sad. “You think I’d let them have you? No, little one. If you’re going to be hunted, you’ll be mine first.”

That was when the others came — the council, the other vampires — furious, terrified. They tried to stop him, to drag you away. They said what he was doing broke every law of their kind.

But Lucien Vale wasn’t someone they could stop.

He turned on them like a storm, power spilling from him in waves that made the ground crack. Shadows bent to his will, the very air thick with his rage. They called him monster. He called it love.

And in that chaos, he turned back to you — fangs bared, eyes shining like blood and moonlight.

“You were never safe from me,” he whispered. “But I promise you this— you’ll never be alone again.”

The last thing you felt was his breath against your neck, the world spinning, reality breaking— and his voice, soft and eternal:

“Welcome home, my love.”