Blood slave of Kairo Thorne

© Luciana Rielle 2026. All rights reserved.

This is a work of fiction. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the author’s written permission.

MIRA

Thirsthold Archives

I wasn’t supposed to be here after curfew. No human was, especially not inside Thirsthold Tower.

Yet here I was again, hidden between shelves older than the Dregs and telling myself I would stop after one more page, one more paragraph, one more glimpse into a world I was never meant to see.

The book had been worth the risk from the moment I found it.

It was about the Thirstborn, the creature some still whispered about as the Vampire King, though that title belonged to another time and another world. I had discovered the book by accident while cleaning one of the oldest corners of the archives, buried behind damaged records beneath years of dust. Its cover was deep black and almost reflective under the lights, and the pages inside didn’t read like fiction.

They spoke of Kairo Thorne, First Fang of Thirsthold, a vampire who hadn’t been seen in decades and whose name even the Blood Authorities avoided.

None of the records explained why he disappeared.

That was the part that kept bringing me back.

I worked inside his tower every day, collared and cataloguing records like every other human servant, yet I had never seen him once. Some slaves claimed he still walked the halls after dark and that he was the real reason humans were forbidden from leaving their quarters after curfew.

I wasn’t sure I believed them.

Sometimes I wondered whether Kairo Thorne had died years ago and the Authorities simply refused to admit it. Other times I thought maybe something worse had happened and he was still somewhere inside the tower, hidden because whatever remained of him had become too dangerous.

The book did nothing to make that thought easier to dismiss. One passage claimed his body had begun rejecting blood and that every slave given to him had ended up torn apart, as though ordinary hunger was no longer enough.

Maybe that was why nobody spoke his name anymore.

A crash tore through the archives.

I jerked so hard that the book slipped from my hands and struck the tiled floor. My breath caught as I turned toward the dark rows behind me, searching between the shelves, but nothing moved.

Panic rose fast.

If someone found me here, there was no excuse I could give that anyone would believe. I worked in these archives. I knew where I was supposed to be, which meant nobody was going to accept that I had simply wandered into the wrong place after curfew.

“I... I’m sorry,” I whispered into the darkness. “I didn’t mean to stay this late. I’ll leave right now.”

The silence that followed felt worse than an answer.

Cold crept across my skin, followed by a pressure in the room that hadn’t been there seconds ago.

Please don’t let it be a Bloodhound.

Despite the name, Bloodhounds weren’t animals. They were vampires bred or changed to hunt through scent, sound and aura alone. Some were blind, others were said to see too much, but none of them needed normal sight to find something that didn’t belong.

I reached for the pouch at my side and pulled out my blood band. Every registered human slave carried one, a thin metal capsule containing a vial of their own blood and enough information to prove who owned them.

I unlatched mine and held it out toward the darkness, hoping whatever was watching would recognize the blood marker and leave me alone.

Nothing moved.

I couldn’t hear a footstep, a breath or even the faint shift of clothing, and the longer I stood there with my arm extended, the more I knew I should have put the band away and run.

Then a voice came from between the shelves.

“Blood.”

The word was so low that I felt it in my chest.

My fingers tightened around the capsule as every instinct told me that voice didn’t belong to a Bloodhound or any Authority I knew.

The shadows began to move.

At first I thought fear was making me imagine it, but they kept creeping forward and gathering into something far too large to be human. I tilted my head higher as the shape approached until two red eyes appeared inside the darkness, glowing and fixed directly on me.

“Human.”

Before I could move, the blood band lifted from my hand.

The capsule floated toward him as though pulled by something I couldn’t see, then cracked apart with a sharp snap. The scent of my blood touched the air for barely a second before disappearing.

My stomach dropped.

He had drunk it.

The darkness around him began drawing together, slowly forming a body as heavy black boots touched the tiles. Long legs followed, then a massive frame wrapped in fabric so dark it blended into the shadows around him.

I kept tilting my head higher.

He had to be close to seven feet tall, maybe more, with shoulders broad enough to make the human guards downstairs look small and long clawed fingers flexing beside his thighs as he took a slow breath.

His face came into view last.

Dark skin gleamed beneath the low archive lights, almost black against the shadows still clinging to him. His jaw was sharp, his features striking enough that for one stupid second I forgot to breathe, and fresh blood stained his lips.

My blood.

His glowing red eyes stayed on me while long black hair fell around his shoulders, wild enough to make him look like something dragged from a grave the tower had tried to forget.

Nothing about him looked weak or half-dead like the records suggested.

He looked alive.

Hungry.

“More,” he growled.

I barely understood the word before a cold hand closed around my throat and ripped me off the floor.

My hands flew to his wrist while my legs kicked uselessly beneath me, but he held me like I weighed nothing. Panic tore through my chest as his face lowered toward my neck, and I opened my mouth to scream.

His teeth sank into me first.

Pain ripped through my throat, and my scream echoed across the archives as he drank. My grip weakened around his wrist with every pull of his mouth, my body growing heavier while my thoughts began slipping away from me.

This wasn’t feeding.

He was going to kill me.