12__An escaped Vampire Queen
Damon was pacing about Viktor’s large, dark library, dramatically working himself into a fit of rage.
Viktor watched him with calm scrutiny.
“How could he open his mouth and accuse me of that?! Me?! Kill a human?!” Damon growled. With a huff, he stalked all over the room, his platinum blonde hair bouncing up and down like a pair of dove wings.
“That bastard! I’ll feel the life leave Rogan with my own hands, I swear it!”
He paced more for a few minutes then suddenly stopped and turned to Viktor, his green eyes flashing flames.
“Why aren’t you saying anything?!”
Viktor calmly raised his brows. “What do you want me to say?”
Damon huffed and pushed his hair back. “Really? After everything we’ve been through together? Like brothers for over five hundred years!”
Viktor groaned. “Fuck, okay! Relax.” When Damon only crossed his arms and sulked, Viktor got up and walked over to him. “Look, Damon. I know you didn’t do it. I know that, there’s no doubt. What I want to know, however, is why I’m smelling human every time I merely sniff in your direction.”
Damon frowned, slowly puckering his pink lips. Viktor knew the look and scowled. “Don’t think up some half- assed excuse to give me, Damon! I’ll know you’re lying.”
Damon scoffed. “I know! I’ve been unable to lie to you for five hundred years, I won’t start now! Do you no longer trust me? What’s a friendship without trust, V?”
“Don’t call me ‘V‘ and don’t change the fucking topic. Explain.”
Damon swallowed hard and turned away. “It’s… it’s personal.”
Viktor’s temper threatened to splinter so he clenched his jaw. “Personal? Damon.” His voice was strained from lack of patience and Damon saw it. “Those elders are thirsty for someone’s blood, they want yours and they think I’m protecting you, hiding your mess. Now I know that if any one of them tries to lay a hand on you, you’re going to fucking rip their heads off, next thing we know the Onyx is a mess. I’m trying to avoid a fucking bloodbath. here.”
Damon’s mouth quirked up on one side. He almost wished that would happen so he’d get the chance to rip Rogan’s head off his neck.
With a sigh he looked at Viktor. “Fine. It is human blood on me, but… it’s not from a killing. I swear.”
“Where’s it from, Damon? A fucking bottle store?”
Damon snorted with laughter. “Oh, if they sold blood in bottles. Paradise.”
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12 An escaped Vampire Queen
“Answer the question.”
Damon sighed, but before he could answer the door opened.
Viktor groaned in annoyance and turned to the open doors. Demetrius.
“What?!” he demanded.
Demetrius jumped and held a hand to his racing heart as he entered. “Uhm, forgive me, My King. I was looking for Kamilla.”
Viktor frowned, waving a hand in the air. “What’s this with everyone calling her by her name? Have you no respect?”
Demetrius shrugged. “She comes very close to punching me when I call her ‘my queen‘.”
With a sigh, Viktor walked away and sunk into his chair, resting his elbows on the heavy wooden table before him. “What is it you want from her?”
Demetrius smiled, his slanted eyes becoming even sharper. “She wanted us to go for a walk so I got her a cloak, but when I returned for bottled water, because she’s mostly human and would probably die of thirst, I returned and she wasn’t there anymore. I thought she was with you since she missed you when you went for the meeting.”
Viktor was watching Demetrius with sarcastic distaste. Kamilla missed him? “Why do you talk so much?” he asked instead. Demetrius opened his mouth to speak, but Viktor held up a silencing hand. “So what you’re saying is, you don’t know where in the castle she is?”
Demetrius scratched his jaw. “Uhm, well… where I left her is beyond the second entrance. She couldn’t have gotten back in the castle without me, you or Damon. That’s why I thought… she was… with you…”
Viktor’s eyes narrowed. “Are you saying… that she’s not in the castle right now? And you don’t know where…?” Demetrius nodded and Viktor trailed off, feeling his fists begin to tremble from rage. “Get out, Demetrius. Get out before I make dust of you!” Viktor growled and Demetrius quickly left, turning into dark air.
“You think she ran?” asked Damon pleasantly as he rocked back on his heels.
Viktor glared at him and stood, throwing back his chair. He was surrounded by madmen.
He pointed at Damon. “You stay here, I want an explanation when I get back.”
Kamilla peaked around a corner at the bustling street. There were vampires everywhere, gorgeous women and men socializing and mingling as they bought and sold goods to their heart’s content. Kamilla stared at their beauty.
A large black carriage hobbled its way along the cobblestone street, its passengers talking and laughing loudly.
A little boy darted past her, making Kamilla gasp in fright. She shot back against the wall, tugging the black hood to cover more of her face.
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12 An escaped Vampire Queen
With a hand resting against her heart, she peaked back out at the street. It was the most crowded street she’d come across since she slipped out from under Demetrius’s nose. She could make herself invisible, couldn’t she? Surely no one would pay attention to the new queen skulking about like a wanted criminal.
Kamilla bit her lip, suddenly unsure of herself. Was she doing the right thing here? She sighed, failing to keep thoughts of Viktor out of her head.
Since she’d darted out of the tall, black gates back at the castle, he’d occupied her mind like a guilty conscience.
Was she really going to leave him? What if he needed her?
Wait. Pause, Kamilla frowned. Why was she feeling guilty? He’d kidnapped her in the first place hadn’t he?
And then he’d gone on to constantly threaten to hang her from Witcher’s! He was mean and scary and… and… the only man who’d ever made her heart race like that. A gasp escaped her and Kamilla’s mouth dropped open.
She peaked around guiltily and pulled her hood lower. What was wrong with her? How could Viktor possibly make her heart race?!
He was a Vampire. A scary one. One with eyes that amazed her when they switched colors from that entrancing green to that swirling blue, one who made her afraid of what he made her feel.
So connected. She felt him, all of him, within herself. And Kamilla knew what she felt.
Viktor needed her.
She remembered how troubled his sleep was that morning, how tortured his face had been the first time she saw Charming come out. The sadness in Charming’s eyes.
There was something very wrong with the King of Onyx.
Kamilla bit her lip, staring down at her fiddling fingers. With an irritated sigh, she grabbed the bottoms of her gown together with the long black cloak and turned back into the dark alley.
She swore as she ran back through the dark path. She was crazy. An idiot! Freedom was right there! She could be with her mother again! What kind of madness had she developed in Onyx to willingly go back to her prison?!
Kamilla suddenly gasped, her feet slipping on the smooth stone ground as something appeared in front of her.
Shit, had Viktor caught her? A big, dark figure rose and straightened in front of her. It stepped forward and
became a man.
She froze. Not Viktor. He wasn’t Viktor.
Kamilla scrambled up and moved back away from the stranger, cold fear filling her heart.
His vampire beauty did nothing to hide the evil that lurked within him, his green eyes glowing hypnotically.
“Hello, little one,” he said, his voice a rasp, a reptile hiss. “Why are you all alone?”
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12 An escaped Vampire Queen
He advanced on her, walking in an arch, slowly cornering her. Kamilla could hardly breathe, her lungs struggling to inflate beneath her pounding heart.
“Please don’t hurt me,” she heard herself say.
He laughed. “Now, now. Just give me a little kiss, that’s all.”
Holding a hand out to hold him back, she inched away. When her back hit the cold wall, Kamilla nearly cried from fear.
The vampire’s blood–red lips spread in a sinister grin and his long fangs glinted.
Before she could think of anything, he was suddenly at her side, grabbing her arms roughly as he did so.
“No!” Kamilla was blinded by tears, her hands pushing at his chest. Her mind was too preoccupied with fear to realize that she was currently managing to hold off a Vampire whose power was a hundred times higher than her human strength.
She held him off, but couldn’t get him off. He hissed at her, fangs bared in hunger. When Kamilla’s arms burned from the strain, she panicked, knowing she was losing.
Her elbows buckled and she screamed just as the Vampire leaped for her neck. An inch away from sinking into her flesh, Kamilla watched in fascination as the Vampire went flying back with a yelp and slamming into the wall across her.
She shrieked when he immediately got up and darted for her again.
But he never reached her.
Kamilla watched with wide eyes as dark air swirled and out of it came Viktor, trembling with rage.
Viktor caught the stunned Vampire and held him up by the throat, settling a dark glare on him.
“What the fuck are you doing?”
