The Serpent and the Wings of Night (Crowns of Nyaxia, #1)

by Carissa Broadbent

greatest love would also be his ruination—nor that either would come in the form of a tiny, helpless human child.

Hundreds of years later, historians and scholars would look back upon this moment. This decision that, one day, would topple an empire. What a strange choice, they would whisper. Why would he do this? Why, indeed. After all, vampires know better than anyone how important it is to protect their hearts. And love, understand, is sharper than any stake.

“Maybe our skin doesn’t scar the same as yours, but our hearts do. Sometimes they never heal.”

Because he looked at me in sheer awe—like I was the most incredible thing he had ever seen. Like I was a fucking goddess.

“That wasn’t how I’d imagined making you come for the first time,” he remarked.

“Fuck you,” I managed. “You wish I would.”

“You are the most stunning thing I’ve ever seen, Oraya.”

“Don’t fucking touch her,” he growled

But I threw my arms around his neck and kissed him.

“I would beg,” he murmured. “For you, I would. You have fucking destroyed me, Oraya. Do you know that?”

“I wish that Raihn had won.”

Red ink had spread over my chest. Cairis gasped, “She’s a fucking Heir.”

“Oraya of the Nightborn,” he murmured. “I give you my body. I give you my blood. I give you my soul. I give you my heart. From this night until the end of nights. From daybreak until our days are broken. Your soul is my soul. Your heart is my heart. Your pain is my pain. I bind myself to you.”