The Hunter's Dilemma
Holden POV
I stand across the street from Ember & Sage, watching Rosemary through the bookshop's front windows as she presses her back against the locked door. Her hands tremble around the coffee cup I brought her—the one prepared exactly how she likes it, information I shouldn't possess but do thanks to abilities I've spent thirty-four years learning to hate.
She's figured it out. I can see it in the way she holds herself, rigid with terror and understanding. The hidden room revealed everything my family spent over a century concealing, and now she knows she's walking toward her death in twenty-six days.
The smart thing would be to feel satisfied. The covenant requires willing participation, or at least the absence of active resistance, and fear often breeds the kind of desperate compliance that makes the ritual cleaner. Easier. But watching her struggle with the truth doesn't bring satisfaction—it brings something that feels suspiciously like guilt clawing at my chest.
My phone buzzes against my ribs like an angry wasp.
"Father." I answer without looking at the screen. Elliot Ashworth's calls follow a pattern as predictable as the eclipse cycles.
"How is our girl adjusting to her inheritance?" His voice carries the smooth authority that once terrified me as a child and now just makes me tired. "I trust you're maintaining appropriate contact."
"She's settling in." I turn away from the bookshop, unable to watch Rosemary's fear while discussing her like livestock being prepared for slaughter. "The discovery process is proceeding as expected."
"Good. Twenty-six days doesn't leave room for complications." Papers rustle on his end of the line—probably the ancient texts he consults obsessively as each ceremony approaches. "The entities grow restless when their schedule is disrupted."
The entities. He speaks about them like business partners rather than the ancient horrors they are. I've felt their hunger pressing against the boundaries of reality, patient and endless and utterly without mercy. They've waited twenty-seven years for this feeding, and they won't tolerate delays.
"She's stronger than the others," I find myself saying, though I hadn't planned to share that observation. "More spiritually aware. It may take additional time to—"
"Are you developing feelings for the merchandise, Holden?"
The question hits like ice water. I force my voice to remain steady. "I'm ensuring optimal conditions for the ritual. Emotional connection strengthens the bond. You taught me that yourself."
"I taught you to simulate connection, not experience it." His tone sharpens with disapproval that makes my shoulders tense with old conditioning. "The difference is crucial to your survival. Remember what happened to Marcus."
Marcus. My older brother, dead at nineteen because he fell in love with his assigned woman and tried to break the covenant. I found his body myself after the entities finished with him—or what was left of it. Father used his remains as a cautionary tale throughout my childhood.
"I remember." The words taste like ash.
"I hope so. Because if you show the same weakness Marcus did, I'll handle the preparation personally."
The threat hangs between us like a blade. Father handling things personally means drugging Rosemary insensible and dragging her to the ritual site like cargo. It means no chance for her to fight back, no possibility of the kind of willing transformation that might let her survive what's coming. It means certain death delivered with surgical efficiency.
"That won't be necessary."
"Prove it. The next phase requires deeper integration. She needs to trust you completely before the ceremony." His breathing changes, becoming heavier. "Have you touched her yet?"
"Father—"
"Physical contact accelerates the bonding process. Skin to skin connection allows the covenant to recognize its claim." He pauses, and I hear liquid being poured—probably the whiskey he drinks when the entities' hunger affects him too strongly. "The ritual requires her life force to flow willingly. That only happens if she's emotionally invested in the exchange."
My stomach turns. He's talking about manipulation at the deepest level, about making her care enough to die for me. About weaponizing whatever feelings might exist between us.
"I understand the process."
"Do you? Because from where I sit, it sounds like you're developing the same dangerous attachments that killed your brother."
"I'm not Marcus." The words come out harsher than intended.
"No. You're not. Marcus was weak and sentimental. You're practical. Focused. You understand that individual desires matter less than family survival." His voice drops to the tone he used for bedtime stories that were really lessons in ruthless pragmatism. "Our bloodline has maintained power for six generations by honoring the covenant. We don't break tradition for fleeting emotions."
Through the bookshop window, I catch a glimpse of Rosemary moving through the main floor, her dark hair catching late afternoon light. She's examining the protective symbols carved into door frames—symbols that should repel supernatural influence but don't work against covenant bonds. She looks small and alone and determined to fight something she doesn't fully understand yet.
"Twenty-six days, Holden. Don't disappoint me."
The line goes dead, leaving me alone with the weight of expectation that's shaped my entire existence. Six generations of my family have completed this ritual successfully. Six generations of women have died to preserve our supernatural abilities and extended lifespans. The pattern is carved in stone and sealed in blood and sanctified by entities that predate human civilization.
But watching Rosemary through the window, seeing her courage in the face of impossible odds, something shifts inside my chest. Something that feels like the first crack in foundations built on murder and tradition.
I walk toward my car, but my steps feel heavier than they should. The covenant's compulsion runs through my bloodline like genetic code, making resistance almost impossible. In twenty-six days, when the crimson eclipse reaches totality, I'll stand in the ritual circle with an ancient blade in my hands. Every instinct will scream at me to complete the ceremony, to claim her life force as payment for another generation of power.
But for the first time in thirty-four years, part of me wonders what would happen if I said no.
The thought is treason. Suicide. The entities don't accept defiance, and Father has made it clear that weakness won't be tolerated. If I fail to complete the ritual, I'll join Marcus in whatever hell awaits those who break covenant bonds.
But as I drive away from Ember & Sage, I catch myself checking the rearview mirror for one last glimpse of the bookshop. One last look at the woman who's supposed to die for my continued existence.
The woman I'm starting to care about more than my own survival.
The realization hits like a physical blow. This isn't just attraction or appreciation for her strength. This isn't strategic manipulation designed to ensure her compliance. This is something deeper and more dangerous—something that could get us both killed if I'm not careful.
I'm falling in love with my intended victim.
The covenant responds to this treacherous thought with a spike of pain that nearly makes me swerve off the mountain road. It knows. The ancient bonds that tie my bloodline to supernatural forces can sense emotional rebellion, and they don't approve.
Twenty-six days to figure out how to save Rosemary without destroying myself. Twenty-six days to find alternatives that don't exist, loopholes that were closed centuries ago. Twenty-six days to accomplish the impossible or watch the woman I love die by my own hand.
The worst part is knowing that if Father suspects how I really feel, he'll take the choice away entirely. He'll handle the preparation personally, and Rosemary will face the ritual drugged and helpless instead of aware and fighting.
I press harder on the accelerator, racing toward a future that seems to narrow with each passing hour. Behind me, Thornwick Hollow shrinks in the distance, but I can still feel Rosemary's presence like an anchor in my chest.
Love is supposed to make you stronger. But falling for the woman you're bound to kill might be the cruelest joke the universe has ever played.