Bloodlines 1 Alliances
Page 11
“Well, due to biological circumstances, I don’t believe that’s possible.” He laughed. She loved the sound of his laughter she suspected he hadn’t laughed a lot in his life.
“The sun will break the sky soon,” she said, turning serious.
“Yes, I know,” he said quietly.
“Thank you, Khaelen, for everything.” She connected their hands.
“Do not thank me, Princess, you have no idea what you have done for me.” He turned his head, his hazel eyes staring deep into hers, looking more gold from arousal. “You have to be careful on this journey, I do not want to lose you.” It was as close as he could come to telling her he loved her. That somehow she had become his whole world, the very essence of his life. Now was not the time, there would be later.
“I will be careful,” she whispered. Seeing the sun beginning to take its toll on him.
Khaelen scanned the area around them and sensed no one lurking. The door in the woods closed and locked itself at his mental command. He made the dirt and leaves cover the entrance so there were no telltale signs of its existence. “You have until tomorrow to start your journey. Rest with me, we’ll talk more tonight.” He gathered her in his arms a moment before the day completely robbed him of another morning.
Allantra closed her eyes and allowed herself to sleep a few hours. When she woke, she suspected it was noon. She looked down at Khaelen’s peaceful face and kissed him on the lips. “Goodbye, Khaelen, my mate. I love you,” she whispered to him, aware that the first time she declared her love to him, he would never know it. She could not say goodbye to him if he was awake, it would be too hard. She certainly did not want to wait another day.
Allantra removed herself from his tight embrace and stood beside the bed looking down at him. She blew him one last kiss, and then shifted into her wolf form and tried to use his sent to find the door she had seen in the woods. After a couple of dead ends, she found it. She sat on her hind legs and prepared herself for the shift she had been working on for the past two years. She concentrated hard; it was still so new and difficult.
After minutes of deep concentration she felt her body go light, so light that it matched the weight of the air. She was nothing but a fine vapor and she streamed through the hinge openings, as soon as all of her emerged she fell in a heap in the grass. Resuming her natural state, she took off in an easy run, trying desperately to see through the tears that were for Khaelen.
* * * *
Rage consumed Dominica as she floated angrily to the secret rooms she had built in the chambers. She glided past the mindless guards watching the door and drifted right in. The dark cell reeked of feces and rotting food, it was a good thing she couldn’t smell it, she knew it was bad from the way the guards reacted when they entered from time to time.
Chained to the wall, two prisoners of Royal Birth hung almost lifelessly. The woman’s dirty hair curtained her face. Since she was conscious, Dominica entered her mind and knew the terror she struck in her. The man was unconscious from repeated beatings. Beatings they both had endured for what seemed an eternity.
“Look at me, bitch!” Dominica snarled at the woman. The woman slowly and painfully raised her head. “Isn’t it wonderful that Shifters have such a long lifespan to endure so much torture?” Dominica said in an almost fanatical childlike voice. The woman’s chestnut eyes looked glazed and empty, the drugs rendering her helpless and unable to shift. “I saw your whelp today,” she spat at her.
The woman looked blankly at her, until the realization of what she said dawned on her. Her Allantra? Alive? Impossible! She knew her brother was dead, she’d seen Dominica kill him with her own eyes. She had told her parents, the reigning king and queen, it was foolishness to try and reason with them, but they insisted on trying in a peaceful way. The woman, her brother and her husband did not trust them. When she had felt the injuries of her mother and father, she had told Allantra to hide and they would come for her. But in trying to rescue her parents they had been captured, only to learn they were already dead. This evil vampire told her stories of how they had massacred her people. She did not think any True-Bloods had survived in the Civil Lands.
“I will kill her!” the vamp declared, venom in every word. “She seeks others like yourself and when she finds one, I will have enough of you to reverse my curse!” Dominica approached the woman, floating in front of her, she couldn’t physically touch her but she could certainly cause mental pain. She reached inside the woman’s mind and showed her hideous pictures of her husband’s torture. Making her relive every moment. When the woman’s screams reached the pitch she liked, she abruptly cut off the images in her mind and called the guards into the room.
“Follow her, when she acquires another like herself capture them by any means necessary, but do not kill them. Be absolutely sure, they are True-Blood!” she ordered. The human guards with no mind of their own, save for what Dominica left them to serve her, exited the room. “Now, my pretty, where were we?” Dominica smiled cruelly.
To be continued…
The End
About the Author:
Toni is a woman of mystery.