Eight
Kaius
I slouch on my throne in a way that’s unbecoming of my station, but with my time with the vampires growing shorter by the minute, I can’t find it in me to care about the petty squabbles and politics of my fellow demons. Dravon and I meet often, ensuring that we quickly put an end to any unrest, take count of our livestock, and address any concerns of demon hunter activity in the area.
Instead of listening to Dravon, I sip my blood-laced wine and watch as my pet viper uses my arm as a branch to wind itself around.
This peculiar creature has been with me for over four hundred years. I found him in the Blackwood during a hunt.
Back then, we used to find small caravans of human demon hunters in that wretched place. The plants in the Blackwood and the demons that live there have unique medicinal properties that are incredibly valuable to human apothecaries. Demon hunters make their living by harvesting and collecting these ingredients.
Vampire fangs are incredibly rare and valuable, but for their intoxicating and hallucinogenic affects when crushed into a fine powder and inhaled. One fang could fetch a high enough price for a demon hunter to feed their families for a year, and while I can recognize the irony, we do not enjoy the thought of being hunted for sport and dismantled as trophies.
So, we kill them first. During the hunt where I found Cassius, I traveled with about fifteen vampires. Their orders were to slaughter the hunters, but not before I questioned them, searching decades upon decades for my cursebreaker. When I finally grew tired of always being let down, we simply killed them on sight.
As I was feeding on one of them after our slaughter, I saw this viper coiled up on a rock, watching intently with white eyes. Its scales were black as the void.
Cassius, as I’ve come to call him, is a puzzling creature. I had suspicions that he was no ordinary viper from the peculiar eye color, but when he long outlived the normal lifespan of a snake, the suspicions were confirmed.
A supernatural being. What, though, I don’t know. Perhaps a lost experiment of the Priestesses. It matters not to me. He’s been a fine companion. Never one to intrude on my business as a spy would. He comes and goes as he pleases. Sometimes I won’t see him for months, only to find him slithering down the corridor or in my study where he likes to sleep between the tomes lining the shelves.
“Lord Kaius,”
Dravon says, clearing his throat. I glance down from my dais and find him staring at me with bewildered eyes, awaiting intently for my response. “Shall I repeat myself, my Lord?”
Dravon is among the oldest vampires in existence, and for good reason. Even as a human, he was a skilled fighter but even more so, a survivor. He could be stripped naked and pushed into sunlight, and the man would still find a way to slit your throat. He’s dangerous, and the entire vampire race knows it, myself included.
But he is no threat to me, and for that I am certain. My demise would only bring about his, and that makes me the most powerful vampire of them all. An immortal king with no subjects brave or stupid enough to challenge my rule.
In another lifetime, in other circumstances, I might even consider Dravon my heir. He is very much my opposite. He’s impulsive, short-tempered, melodramatic, and most irritatingly, messy at the dinner table. But what he does or does not do with power and leadership will really be no concern of mine once I’m human.
I wave my hand in a dismissive motion, telling Dravon I’m not at all concerned with what he just said, but still have the decency to let him hear himself talk.
“I asked about the girl.”
He flips a loose strand of black hair out of his eyes with a quick twitch of his head.
That gives me pause. “The girl?”
I reply curtly as I watch Cassius slither around my forearm.
“The human girl that you so clearly wish to keep to yourself. You’re not keeping her in with the other cattle?”
I give him an unimpressed glare. When I don’t respond, Dravon’s lip turns into an untrustworthy grin. “Ah, not cattle then, but a bed warmer. Do allow me the pleasure of ripping her throat out when you are done with her. She does smell divine.”
“You will do no such thing,”
I warn, though my voice is calm. I want to rouse no suspicions of Adelasia’s lingering presence nor her importance to me. She’s too valuable for that. Best I let him believe she’s just filling my bed. “Are you so concerned about what I do or do not do with my human toys?”
As soon as the words leave my mouth, I feel a tug in the very essence of my being. It catches me off guard and in that insignificant second that I lose focus on my magic, the chandelier hanging from the ceiling falls to the center of the room and shatters the crystals hanging from it.
Cassius slithers away, startled by the loud noise, and Dravon simply steps a foot to the left and kicks away a crystal shard that landed near his boot, unconcerned.
I regain my wits and allow myself a smirk.
I do love it when she’s angry.
“You’ve never taken a human lover,”
Dravon continues, unfazed by the interruption. “I’m simply…curious about what changed.”
“The times, Dravon.”
With that dismissive tone, Dravon makes his way out of the throne room via the underground passages that allow our kind to wander the valley when the sun is out. When I sense he’s gone, I stand to go find the source of the chandelier disturbance.
She’s in the center courtyard, watching an insect flutter in a small patch of wildflowers that I suspect she grew herself. They stand out among the dead and decaying foliage that I never cared to tend to.
Unfortunately, the courtyard is one of the few places where the sun is allowed to infiltrate the palace. We vampires use it mostly for admiring the moon and stars. In the daytime, it’s lifeless, just like the plants that once grew there.
Adelasia is sitting on the ground with her knees tucked up under her chin. I can smell the anger in her blood, and I can only suspect it stems from the conversation I just had with Dravon.
“Darling, that’s what you get for eavesdropping,”
I say from the safety of the awning that lines the perimeter of the courtyard. Adelasia turns her head and scowls at me.
“Go find another toy to play with,”
she snaps, and I simply snicker, which only makes her more furious with me. She stands abruptly, conjures a stone in her hand, and throws it.
It lands three feet to the left of me. “Please Adelasia, finish your temper tantrum quickly. Anger spoils your blood, and I do love the way you smell.”
“I hate you,”
she sneers.
“And I hate you.”
“I haven’t even done anything to you!”
“You’re violent towards me. You’ve smacked me, stabbed me, thrown things at me, made a mess of my throne room. You give such an uncivilized response to my hospitality.”
Adelasia looks up to the sky and then back to me. She takes a single step backward. “The sun is out. I could run away right now, and you could not chase me.”
I use my hand to make a sweeping motion across my body. “Be my guest.”
She takes off in a run and I scoff to myself as I watch her disappear down a hill. She’s heading East. It’s a straight shot from here to the Eastern cave entrance to the valley. She can’t miss it.
One of the supernatural abilities vampires possess is speed. I’ll use the underground tunnels and cut her off at the cave entrance before she can even make it a mile down the road.
I lean against the cave wall as I wait for her, with my arms and ankles crossed. I can hear her erratic heartbeat and heavy breathing long before she appears in front of me. She nearly falls over as she abruptly stops her sprint when she catches me wave at her from the shadows with a knowing glint in my eyes to reflect her frustrated expression.
Her chest is heaving with effort and she uses a hand to brace herself against the cave wall. Her hair is plastered to her milky skin, covered in a glistening sheen of sweat. Even from across the cave, I can see her pulse in her neck. It’s tempting. Intoxicating. I can hear how quickly her blood is running through her veins and I feel my fangs lengthen with the need to lick the salt from her skin before burying them in her neck. Thirst quickly replaces my teasing.
Ever since I tasted that small drop of blood that first night, it’s been driving me insane with need. Instincts have me pacing the hallway outside of her bedroom while she sleeps, contemplating another thousand years of immortality just for the divine pleasure of drinking every last drop of her blood.
I know she can see the change in my thoughts.
When vampires are hungry, our eyes turn black, our demeanor becomes dangerous. Every muscle in our body grows taut and ready to pounce. Our vampiric blood rushes to our eyes, our nose, and our ears to heighten our senses for the hunt, making us look even more of a monster than we already are.
Unable to control myself, I have her pinned against the cool cave wall in an instant. Her blood hums with adrenaline and fear and my fangs grow even longer, desperate to drink deeply from that pounding vein in her neck.
My mouth falls open with a thousand words I want to say, but the thirst keeps them trapped in my throat. “I…I need to taste,”
I whisper. I close my eyes and growl as my fingers dig into the stone of the cave wall, crushing it under the ruthlessness of my grip. “Adelasia, run into the sunlight.”
When she doesn’t move, I punch the wall, causing the entire cave to rumble. “Now!”
I can only stop myself for a second before I chase her out of the cave. She falls to the black stone ground lit by the bright sun just as I reach the entrance. My body trembles as I glare at her neck; I’m still wild with thirst at the sight of her. I can’t think about anything else.
I need it. I need her.
Though she’s in the sunlight, I find myself less aware of the pain of the sun and grab her ankle and pull her to me, grunting through my teeth as the light burns the skin of my hand. Adelasia whimpers as I drag her beneath me, pinning her legs down with my weight. I use one arm to tug her head to the side by her hair and the other to pin her remaining hand above her head. Adelasia struggles underneath me as hard as she can, but it’s no use. I’m too strong. Too thirsty. Too uncontrollable.
“Kaius, please,”
Adelasia begs. “Please don’t.”
“I need to,”
I growl against her throat.
“Don’t hurt me.”
“It won’t hurt. You’ll feel nothing…but pure…euphoria.”
My fangs touch the delicate skin of her neck. I can practically taste her sweet blood already.
“Lord Kaius,”
a voice grumbles from behind me just as her skin is about to give way to my bite. I glance over my shoulder to see Dravon grinning. The shadows fall over his sharp features and dark hair, making him appear more dangerous. “You know it’s rude to feed in public and not offer to share.”
The sense returns to me at his voice.
He wants Adelasia. He wants what’s mine. He wants to taste her blood as I have.
I suddenly become territorial in a way that's almost foreign to me. I pull her and I to our feet, turn around, and shove the girl behind me so that Dravon cannot see her. I hold her there by her wrist so she cannot run.
“Perhaps I wasn’t clear in the throne room, but she is not for sharing. She is mine. Find a female from my collection of cattle if it pleases you. Take ten of them if you must, but you will not have her. This is the last we will speak of it.”
Dravon’s head tilts up in acceptance though his face shows he’s insulted by the obvious dismissal. He’s never liked being told no. “Very well,”
he concedes, and then he peeks around my body to look at Adelasia. “Perhaps I’ll enjoy my feast in the room next to hers, so she can hear them scream.”
“Leave her be,” I warn.
Dravon snickers. “You do love it when they scream, don’t you, my Lord?”
I don’t answer. Dravon scoffs and then enters a set of tunnels that connects the opposite side of the valley to this cave, directly across from the one I came through. I face Adelasia once again and with a forceful but not painful grip on her toned bicep, I lead her back to the palace through the tunnels.
When we reach her suite, I let her go roughly. She stumbles into the room and clumsily tries to shut me out with the door. I stop her efforts with my foot.
She gasps and looks up at me. I can see the fear still in her eyes. There’s a red scratch on her neck from where my fangs dug into the skin, though not deep enough to draw blood.
“Be careful the next time you run. There are worse monsters than me lurking in the shadows,” I warn.
I move my foot, and she shuts the door in my face. I can hear her collapse to her knees just inside. Her erratic heartbeat and uneven breathing tell me she’s in a panic.
I’d offer her no comfort, so I leave her alone with her distress.
I need to feed before I break down her door. I was feral in that cave. I haven’t been so blind with bloodlust in centuries. I was in such a craze I was truly considering ruining my first and possibly only chance at a mortal life.
I’m not a man who worries about many things, but that is concerning on a level I can’t even begin to describe.
I run into one of the human servants in the hallway outside my bed chamber, carrying an armful of fresh linens. A male. Tall. Strong. His blood will be good.
I shove him against the nearest wall. For the first time in centuries, I completely lose myself in the bloodlust and feed until I feel him go limp and lifeless in my arms.
But I don’t stop there. I feed and feed and feed until the palace is littered with bloodless human bodies.
Dravon finds me at the end of my bloodletting, hunched in a corner attempting to regain control of my own body, nearly in tears at how badly I want to stop but can’t.
Dravon has witnessed this many times in our years as vampires, but he is not one for sympathy. In fact, I think he finds it borderline pathetic how hard I fight against my supernatural instincts.
However, when he finds me in my craze, he simply approaches me in silence and hands me a cloth from his jacket to wipe my face.
I take it, and then I hear him snicker, but it doesn’t quite sound like him. There’s something too eerie about his voice. Something off. I look at him with suspicion, but he continues to give me a knowing grin.
“Why fight it, my Lord?”
My hand is still shaking with the bloodlust, but I meet my friend’s eyes and give him a stern warning with nothing but my expression, before shoving his handkerchief into his chest and entering my bedchamber.
I conjure myself a bath, and while I sit in the hot water and remember the ghostly feeling of warm blood in my veins, I listen for Adelasia’s heartbeat.
I tap the edge of the marble tub to the same rhythm with my index finger.
Tap tap. Tap tap. Tap tap.