Chapter 28 #2
“Welcome.” His voice echoed throughout the room. Everyone came to a grinding halt in their soft-spoken conversations, all eyes pulled towards him as a knowing smile slid across his lips. “Thank you all for coming. I promise your long travels won’t be in vain.”
Every single eye was stuck upon him as if he were the next Goddess of Fate, speaking words of promise out before them. It was eerie.
“Cora, was it always like this?” I questioned softly, as if anyone here would hear what we were saying. She nodded, her eyes scanning the room back and forth. “Was this before or after Silvana left?”
Her eyes met mine then and she blinked before they returned forward, but this time they weren’t on Keres, they were behind him.
In the shadowed darkness stood Cora and Silvana, the gold gowns I’d come to hate draped across their bodies. A woman was clutched between them, but this one was human, her eyes wide in fear as she tried to scramble away, but one look from Cora had her stilling almost immediately.
“A bit of influence,” she whispered from beside me. “This was a few winters before I was able to get Silvana out. In the beginning of me trying to take any ire and attention off of her. Becoming something and someone new for him. Someone who’d… support his dreams and goals.”
Questions tried to slip from my mouth—why would you do that? How could you?
But they were all questions based in judgement for something I was beginning to realize I didn’t fully understand.
Keres began speaking once more.
“My father, King Cyprian, the one true vampire king, wanted what we all want. He was taken from us too soon, cut down by those lesser than him. Those who didn’t understand the vision of what we want.
” He paused, his eyes scanning the room, as the attention rapt upon him.
“I procured this castle, not by force, but by truth. I am the one true heir left behind. My father’s last true born vampire, and I’m ready to bring you all along with me to rule as we rightfully have always been born to do. ”
I felt sick to my stomach, because I knew what was coming without the speech coming to a close.
“Creatures of the night, the Fates made us. Power they bestowed upon us. Why should we not rule over everything and everyone weaker? Aren’t you tired of hiding in the shadows?
Wasting away, scavenging for food? For bits and pieces while the humans find our homes in the middle of sunlight hours?
Drag us from our slumbers while we barely survive off the bare minimum blood they allow us? Keeping us hungry and compliant?”
Keres shook his head in disgust, the snarl in his voice clear as he waved a hand towards Cora.
She glanced back at the human in her arms, and muttered beneath her breath as she shoved the woman forward.
Silvana released her opposite arm, stepping back as her hands were clutched in front of her, her knuckles straining so hard I could see it from across the room.
Keres grabbed the human and held her delicate body in front of him for the rest of the vampires to see.
“Aren’t you ready to hunt? Can’t you smell her fear?” He leaned down, running his nose along her throat. “She smells delicious.”
Silence echoed throughout the space as they all stared at the woman, her sobs the only noise being let out as she tried to pull herself from Keres’s grip.
“What do we need to do?” a tall male asked from the middle of the group. He seemed genuine enough and I wondered what Keres saw when he looked at him.
“I need loyal vampires within my ranks. Vampires I can trust to leave here and bring back more who’d feel the same as we do. Vampires who want to rule beside us. Vampires who want to return to the old ways where hiding wasn’t necessary. Where they hid from us.”
At least half the vampires present began smiling, fangs glistening in the candlelight as they nodded, the hunger in their bodies clear.
“Pledge yourselves to me, to my ruling of Kostbare, and you shall see what being a vampire is supposed to be.”
A few grunts and cheers sounded around us, but one voice was above the rest.
“And if we don’t?” a female a few rows over questioned. “May we leave?”
Silence once again enveloped the room as Keres smiled.
“Of course. Your name is?”
The female paused, the second-guessing of her question clear.
“Leora.”
He nodded in response. “Go, child, the door is just there. Meet your fate without our protection and ambitions. I wish you well.” His arm swept in a motioning type of movement towards the two doors on our left.
It was clear Leora was questioning herself every step of the way as she moved towards one of the doors.
Briefly, I wondered if she saw the same thing in Keres’s eyes that I did when I peered into them, but I’d never get a chance to find her and ask.
As she pulled open the wooden door, there stood a tall vampire, his long blond hair something I saw in my nightmares often.
A smile appeared across his face as his eyes bounced to Keres for confirmation, and Keres nodded subtly.
“Hello, lovely,” Voss said to her. I couldn’t see her face from where we stood, but I knew his look well.
He didn’t even touch her as the screams began, flames erupting from her feet as they climbed her body.
Mere moments was all it took for the entirety of her body to be a charred carcass falling to the floor in a pile of unidentifiable ash.
“Does anyone else wish to leave?” Keres questioned the group, his face calm as he scanned the room.
Two more vampires sprinted towards the second unopened door, but instead of an escape, they found Vega. The small vampire reached forward, grabbing the male closest to her, her face the picture of calm as he fell to his knees screaming.
The second vampire also erupted into flames as Voss stepped into the room, his eyes trained on the male.
The screaming died down, the vampire left on his side, his eyes pure white and unmoving.
“I think you’ll find the future we’re creating together to be quite… fulfilling,” Keres finally said with a smile.
My gaze finally turned next to me in search of Cora, but she wasn’t there.
“Princess?” I questioned, turning in a circle. I spotted her in the back corner of the room, her back against the stone wall as she sat on the floor, her knees pulled to her chest, her eyes closed.
I forced us out of that memory and into our field—I wasn’t sure when it became our field, but it wasn’t something I was willing to look into just now.