Chapter 6 #3
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.
” He’d gotten away with that before and thought that this man was just stupid enough to believe him.
But if his face was any indication, he wasn’t buying it.
“Look, there’s been a misunderstanding about this.
I’ll just go back to where I was if you’d allow it and not do this thing again.
I’ll even find myself a respectable job and work for the money that I need. ”
“You will be killed on the spot where you stand now.” He saw the large claw-like hand reach out for him, and he couldn’t move.
Instead of slicing through his body as he had assumed that he would, he simply pushed his long nails into his flesh and let him bleed.
“You will suffer with this wound for all time until such time that you die. I have spoken.”
He found himself where he’d been before and weaker than he’d ever been in his life.
As he was trying to walk back to his lair, he stumbled twice and nearly fell.
This was ridiculous. Why was he being treated this way all of a sudden when he’d gotten by with so much before?
He was going to have to appeal to the council and see what they had to say.
He’d been talking to the three of them for decades, and he’d been able to get by with a great deal.
Now, all of a sudden, he was in trouble with the king of his kind.
“Damn it, this wasn’t fair.” He wasn’t ready to quit his profit-making deal. It was too much money to just give up on a whim of some man claiming to be King. “I’m not going to bleed to death either. That’s just a stupid notion. He can’t just say something and have it happen.”
But he had a feeling that was just what was going to happen was just as he’d been told. He had too much to do in this life for it to be taken right now. He was going to have to do something before he died unfairly.
He’d always been weak in the first place.
He knew that it was because he’d been drinking from the dying, but he saw no reason to let all that good blood go to waste.
Plus, since losing his ability to use shadows, it was keeping him from drinking from humans when he needed to.
Then there was the reason that he thought that humans should want to feed his kind.
We were far more superior to them than any other race, he thought.
He was weak by the time he got back to his lair.
It was just an abandoned building on the outskirts of town.
It was perfect for his needs, and he saw no reason to waste money on fine hotels or even a house when he could spend his money on other things, like fine paintings and good art.
He had a collection worthy of a king—he had to laugh about his pun and decided that the king didn’t have as much fine art as he did.
What was going to happen to his collection when he died?
Nothing because he wasn’t going to die, and that was final.
Resting during the hottest part of the day, he hated that he wasn’t old enough to forgo that; he woke to a bed covered in his blood.
While he could clean it up easily enough, he was too weak to do anything more than to leave it until later.
The man had really done a number on him, and he wasn’t the least bit happy about it.
By the time the night was over for him and the sun was coming up, he could barely walk to the couch to lie down; he was so weak.
This wasn’t fair, and he was going to tell someone about his treatment as soon as he was strong enough to get up and get going.
He was beginning to think that he was surely going to die, and for what?
He’d done nothing wrong. He’d always believed that humans were there for their pleasure, and he hadn’t changed his mind on that in all the years that he’d been turned into a vampire.
He remembered fondly the day he’d been turned.
Not wanting anyone else to know that he’d been changed, he killed his maker.
It had been much easier than he thought it should have been, him newly turned and all.
However, his maker hadn’t been that much older than he was at the time, and it had surprised them both; he thought that he’d been able to slice open his throat and be finished with him.
Laughing just a little, his body was beginning to hurt some, so he decided that he’d do well to take another nap and try to get some rest. He usually felt better after his nap during the evening hours, and he hoped that today was no different.
His fitful rest did him no good. Again, he woke covered in blood and decided that he was truly going to die today.
All he could think about was the unfairness of it all and how he’d been made to do the things he’d done because no one had shared the rules with him.
Laughing again, he thought that wasn’t right.
He knew the real rules better than most. Knowing them was what had gotten him into all the things that he’d been into because knowing them is how he was able to work around them.
He wasn’t as stupid as anyone thought he was.
Unable to drag himself up and off the couch, he was surprised to see Winter again.
She was saying something to him about the king going to inherit his worth, and he didn’t like that either.
Of course, as weak as he was, there was little to nothing he could do about it, so he just laid there while his things disappeared one at a time from his walls and floor.
“Those are my treasures that I paid for with my own money.” Again, Winter spoke to him, but he couldn’t make out what he was saying.
Something about humans again, and he didn’t have the strength to answer him.
“This is so unfair, you understand? I have these things here so that it doesn’t look so dreary. It’s my stuff.”
“You own nothing.” She was close enough that he could have snatched her right out of the air, but he couldn’t lift his hand. “You’re ready to die now. Do you have any last words?”
“Why me? Why was I singled out over anyone else?” He said that he was a monster to the humans, and that was why he was targeted. “I don’t believe that I’ve done anything wrong. I don’t deserve this. I demand that you allow me to live on with my life as I see fit.”
“Nay, you are the monster that small children have nightmares about. That is not meant as a compliment either. You have done them wrong by taking their fathers and mothers away. Humans don’t deserve to be treated as cattle, nor are they there for your entertainment.
” He couldn’t form words and knew that he was at the end of his life.
One that he’d enjoyed until the king had gotten a burr up his ass about him.
“When you die, no one will ever remember your name, nor will they care a bit that you’ve gone.
Goodbye, Ruby James Frank. Your life is at its end. ”
The pain was too much as he was turned to ash. He didn’t deserve this and would tell anyone who would listen to him in the afterlife. However, just then, he thought that there would be no afterlife for him. He’d royally screwed up, and there would be nothing of him left.