Demon Kissed (Cursed Angel Collection)

by Michelle Madow

  I was lost in the moment—so lost that I didn’t see the patch of rocks ahead until it was too late. I wasn’t prepared for the jump, and instead of landing gracefully, I ploofed to the ground, wiping out so hard that both of my skis popped off of my boots.

  “Wipeout!” Grant laughed, holding his poles up in the air and flying past me.

  “Are you okay?” Mom asked from nearby.

  “Yeah, I’m fine.” I rolled over, locating my skis. One was next to me, the other a few feet above.

  “Do you need help?” she asked.

  “No.” I shook my head, brushing the snow off my legs. “I’ve got this. Go on. I’ll meet you all at the bottom.”

  She nodded and continued down the mountain, knowing me well enough to understand that I didn’t need any help—I wanted to get back up on my own. “See you there!” she said, taking the turns slightly more cautiously than Grant and Dad.

  I trudged up the mountain to grab the first ski, popped it back on, and glided on one foot to retrieve the other. I huffed as I prepared to put it back on. What an awful final run of the trip. My family was nearing the bottom of the trail—there was no way I would catch up with them now.

  Looked like I would be placing last in our little race. Which annoyed me, because last place was so not my style.

  But I still had to get down, so I took a deep breath, dug my poles into the snow, and set off.

  As I was nearing the bottom, three men emerged from the forest near the end of the chute. None of them wore skis, and they were dressed in jeans, t-shirts, and leather jackets. They must have been freezing.

  I stopped, about to call out and ask them if they needed help. But before I could speak, one of them moved in a blur, coming up behind my brother and sinking his teeth into his neck.

  I screamed as Grant’s blood gushed from the wound, staining the snow red.

  The other two men moved just as fast, one of them pouncing on my mom, the other on my dad. More blood gushed from both of their necks, their bodies limp like rag dolls in their attackers arms.

  “No!” I flew down the mountain—faster than I’d ever skied before—holding my poles out in front of me. I reached my brother first and jammed the pole into the back of his attacker with as much force I could muster.

  The pole bounced off the man, not even bothering him in the slightest, and the force of the attack pushed me to the ground. All I could do was look helplessly up as the man dropped my brother into the blood stained snow.

  What was going on? Why were they doing this?

  Then his gaze shifted to me, and he stared me down. His eyes were hard and cold—and he snarled at me, baring his teeth.

  They were covered in my brother’s blood.

  “Grant,” I whispered my brother’s name, barely able to speak. He was so pale—so still. And there was so much blood. The rivulets streamed from the puddles around him, the glistening redness so bright that it seemed fake against the frosty background.

  One of the other men dropped my mom’s body on the ground next to my brother. Seconds later, my dad landed next to them.

  My mother’s murderer grabbed the first man’s shoulder—the man who had murdered my brother. “Hold it, Daniel,” he said, stopping him from moving toward me.

  I just watched them, speechless. My whole family was gone. These creatures ran faster than I could blink, and they were strong enough to handle bodies like they were weightless.

  I had no chance at escape.

  They were going to do this to me too, weren’t they? These moments—right here, right now—would be my last.

  I’d never given much thought to what happens after people die. Who does, at eighteen years old? I was supposed to have my whole life ahead of me.

  My family was supposed to have their whole lives ahead of them, too.

  Now their lifeless, bloody bodies at the bottom of this mountain would be the last things I would ever see.

  I steadied myself, trying to prepare for what was coming. Would dying hurt? Would it be over quickly? Would I disappear completely once I was gone? Would my soul continue on, or would my existence be wiped from the universe forever?

  It wasn’t supposed to be this way. I didn’t want to die. I wanted to live.

  But I’d seen what those men—those creatures—had done to my family. And I knew, staring up at them, that it was over.

  Terror filled my body, shaking me to the core. I couldn’t fight them. I couldn’t win. Against them, I was helpless.

  And even if I stood a chance, did I really want to continue living while my family was gone?

  “We can’t kill them all,” the man continued. “Laila sent us here to get humans to replace the ones the new prince killed in his bloodlust rampage. We need to keep her alive.”

  “I suppose she’ll do.” The other man glared down at me, licking his lips and clenching his fists. “It’s hard to tell under all that ski gear, but she looks pretty. She’ll make a good addition to the Vale.”

  He took a syringe out of his jacket, ran at me in a blur, and jabbed the needle into my neck.

  The empty, dead eyes of my parents were the last things I saw before my head hit the snow and everything went dark.

  Jacen

  One Year Later

  The screams. The hunger. The blood.

  I’d never forget the terrified looks on each of my victim’s faces as I’d sunk my fangs into their necks and drained the lives from their bodies.

  They haunted my dreams since the massacre. I re-lived it every night. The lust for their blood—the scent of it so tantalizingly delicious that my entire body burned for it, my fangs pushing through my gums and craving the silky feeling of the warm, smooth blood flowing down my throat. The way my soul parted with my mind as it gave into the craving—the desire for more and more until I’d consumed so much blood that every inch of my body was bloated and bursting with it.

  It had been nearly a year since the massacre, and the nightmares hadn’t stopped. I didn’t think they ever would.

  I would never forgive myself for the pain and heartbreak I’d caused that night when I lost control of my bloodlust and slaughtered those humans in the village. So many of them had died that Queen Laila had to send out troops to replenish their stock.

  Stock. As if they were crates of meat, or animals waiting to be slaughtered.

  In my dreams, I saw the face of my final victim—the young boy who must have been no older than twelve. Then I woke up with a sharp breath, my fangs out and my gums aching for blood.

  As always, a glass of it waited on my nightstand.

  I reached for it, downing it in nearly one gulp. It tasted bitter—refrigerated blood always did—but it satisfied the craving enough that after a few deep breaths, I was able to pull my fangs back up into my gums and keep them there.

  Still, my body craved more. But I didn’t need more—I just wanted it. The craving was in my mind. It was an addiction—it wasn’t real. What I’d just consumed was enough to sustain me for the rest of the day.

  The blood I craved was my greatest desire and my greatest enemy.

  After first turning, the lust for it controlled my every thought. But as the days had passed—slowly but surely—I’d improved at controlling my cravings. Three glasses in the morning eventually became two, and then became one.

  Still, Laila refused to let me leave the palace. Not until I could prove that I could control my bloodlust around humans. After all, she couldn’t have me killing any more of them. Not after the inconvenience I’d caused a year ago when I’d lost myself to that bloodlust filled haze.

  Never mind the inconvenience she’d caused me by turning me into a vampire against my will.

  And while I was strong, I wasn’t strong enough to take down a group of guards on my own. Trust me, I’d tried. It hadn’t ended well.

  It was hard to believe it had only been a year ago that I’d been a human, unaware of the existence of supernaturals at all. After being locked in this palace for
all that time, that year felt like an eternity.

  This extravagant palace hidden in the wilderness of the Canadian Rockies—in an enchanted valley that the vampires called the Vale—had become my prison. Every day, I was suffocating. I needed to get out.

  Which was why I’d been working daily on controlling my bloodlust. And slowly but surely, I’d been getting better.

  Now, I placed the glass down on my nightstand and looked out my window as the last rays of the sun sunk over the horizon. I took deep, measured breaths, and the craving disappeared, my veins cooling down entirely.

  I smiled, knowing this was it. I was ready to prove that I’d gained control of the monstrous creature I’d become.

  I was ready to be free.

  Jacen

  “Your Highness,” my vampire guard Daniel said as he stepped inside my room.

  I didn’t think I would ever get used to being called that. After all, I was no prince. As a human, I’d been an eager swimmer, ready to conquer my first Olympics and get gold medals in as many categories as possible.

  That person had died the moment Laila sank her fangs into my neck and damned me to an eternity of hell.

  Daniel glanced at the empty glass on my nightstand, no hint of emotion flickering across his eyes. “Would you like another glass of blood?” he asked.

  “No.” I walked over to the window, observing the nearby village. Lights were starting to flicker on in the small houses the humans lived in. Just as I, they were preparing to start their day. Well, night, since we operated on a nocturnal schedule in the Vale.

  I turned back to face Daniel. “I would like to speak with Queen Laila,” I said.

  He pressed his lips together, saying nothing. “Is it an important matter?” he finally asked. “As you know, the queen just returned from visiting the European kingdom, and she has to catch up on everything she missed in her absence.”

  “It’s important.” I held his gaze with his, flexing my arms by my sides. “I’m ready.”

  “For what?” he asked.

  “To put myself in the presence of a human.”

  Laila entered my room thirty minutes later, her trusted witch advisor Camelia following obediently behind her.

  Camelia, as always, wore a glass pendant around her neck with a piece of wormwood inside. As a witch, she was the only mortal in the kingdom allowed to use wormwood to protect herself. Laila wore a short, flowing blue dress, and her raven colored hair flowed behind her, making her look more like a teen Hollywood starlet than a centuries year old monster.

  She was the worst kind of monster—the kind you never saw coming.

  I sure hadn’t.

  On the night I’d met her in a bar, all I was thinking was that she was a beautiful girl, and that I wanted nothing more than to bring her back to my hotel room and see how far she was willing to go with me.

  If someone had told me what she really was, I would have laughed in their face.

  Because Laila wasn’t just an ordinary vampire. She was one of the original vampires.

  There had been seven of them in all. All part of a cult of witches who were so determined to stay young and beautiful forever that they’d created a spell using dark magic to make them exactly what they’d wanted—immortal.

  None of them knew it would turn them into monsters. At least, that’s what the six living originals claimed.

  But I didn’t believe it. Because none of them seemed to hate what they were. In fact, they seemed to relish in it.

  “Jacen,” Laila said my name, the slight lilt in her accent the only evidence that she wasn’t from this place and time. “Are you sure you’re ready?”

  “Especially after what happened last time,” Camelia added with a smirk.

  As always, the green-eyed witch loved to taunt me. I knew she was referring to four months ago—the last time I tried to drink from a human. They hadn’t been able to bring him through the door before I’d caught a whiff of his scent and lost myself to the haze of my bloodlust.

  The next thing I’d known, I was staring at his corpse on the ground, the last bits of his blood dripping off my fangs and onto the polished marble floor by my feet.

  “I suppose the loss of one human won’t be too big of a deal.” Camelia waved her hand and turned to Laila. “But of course, the decision is yours, Your Highness.”

  Laila eyed me up thoughtfully, tilting her head and softly biting her blood red lip. “The loss of one human would be irrelevant,” she confirmed. “Daniel—go fetch one from the dungeons. An old one, who wouldn’t be much use to us anyway.”

  Daniel rushed out of the room in a blur, returning ten minutes later dragging a thin, older man with a chain. “Sit,” he commanded the man, throwing him onto the nearest armchair.

  The man cowered in the chair and curled up into a ball, shaking and not looking up at any of us.

  I smelled his blood—the rich, thick liquid pulsing through his veins, and it was so tempting that my fangs itched to protrude. His jugular pulsed and pulsed, calling me closer.

  But I swallowed down the urge, forcing my breaths to become shallow. I could control myself. I had to control myself.

  It was the only way to prove that I was able to leave the palace.

  “Very good.” Laila nodded after a full minute had passed.

  “That’s it?” I asked her. “Are we done here?”

  “No.” She pressed her lips together, mischief dancing in her bright blue eyes. “You’ve only proven that you can be around a human.”

  “Isn’t that what I needed to prove?” I asked. “That I can be around them without losing control?”

  “You’re a vampire prince.” She ran a finger along one of my arms and pulled away, smiling sinfully. “Your stamina needs to be stronger than that.”

  “How so?” I clenched my fists tighter, ignoring her touch. Instead, I stared at the man’s neck again, dreading her next words.

  “I want you to drink from him.”

  Jacen

  “You want me to kill him?” I kept my gaze on hers, unwilling to look at the human in question.

  “No.” The smug smile remained on her deceivingly innocent face. “I want you to drink from him and to control yourself. I want you to pull away before killing him. To enjoy your meal and leave him alive.”

  “I don’t think I can do that.” I stared her down, since she must know I was right. She was asking me to do this because she wanted me to kill him.

  I shouldn’t have expected anything less from her.

  The vampire queen looked young and innocent, but her soul was dark and twisted.

  “You can do it,” she said simply. “As a great scientist once said—if you put your mind to it, you can accomplish anything.”

  “That’s not a real scientist.” I glared at her. “It’s a quote from a movie.”

  “That’s irrelevant.” She waved my point away. “The point is that it’s the truth. You’re a vampire now, Jacen. The strongest of all species.”

  Camelia gave a small huff, but Laila ignored her.

  “When I turned you last year, I gave you a gift,” Laila continued.

  “A gift I never wanted.”

  “Nevertheless, I gave it to you,” she said. “You’re a vampire prince now, Jacen. Show me that you deserve the title.”

  “And if I don’t?” I challenged.

  “You do.” She laughed, light and melodic. “You may not see it now, but you will. Someday, you will. But for now—feed from him.”

  I eyed up the human man. How did he get in the prison? How old was he? Did he have a family?

  I couldn’t ask in front of Laila and Camelia. They viewed the human blood slaves as animals instead of people. Angering them would get me nowhere.

  Instead, I created answers to the questions to myself. I imagined that this man had a family—a newborn grandchild he was excited to get to know. That he wanted his family to have more food than their rations allowed, since the rations only afforded bare survival for
the humans. So he stole—bread from the vampires. The bread that vampires didn’t even need to eat to survive, but enjoyed anyway, simply because they could. He got caught, and was unfairly locked in the dungeons, doomed to become a personal blood slave for the vampires in the palace—doomed to have them drink and drink from him until he died of blood loss and his remains were fed to the wolves outside the enchanted boundaries.

  I looked into his eyes, trying to convince myself that this story I’d created for him was true.

  Humanizing him might be the difference between if I was able to stop myself from losing myself to the bloodlust or if I killed him.

  “Are you ready?” Laila sighed and tapped her foot impatiently. “We don’t have all day.”

  “I’m ready.” I stared at the man—examining his wrinkled face and reminding myself of the story I’d created.

  I wouldn’t kill him.

  I would let him live.

  I inched toward him and lowered myself down, my fangs sliding out of my gums as the scent of his blood filled my nose. Then my teeth sunk into his flesh and I was gulping down the warm, fresh blood.

  How had I thought that the bitter, refrigerated blood could compare? How had I convinced myself that I could live off that garbage for the rest of my immortal existence? Noble vampires in the Vale were afforded the luxury of drinking straight from humans—I should enjoy the indulgence, not cower away from it.

  It wasn’t like I had much else to look forward to anymore. Not after my mortal life—my soul—had been taken from me against my will.

  If the intoxicating taste of fresh blood was all I could enjoy, then so be it.

  Just when I was beginning to enjoy myself, the blood supply stopped. I sucked deeper on his neck, trying to will out the final drops, and I squeezed his arms harder, as if that could push out more blood.

  But there was nothing left.

  He was drained dry.

  Camelia

  I loved watching Jacen feed.