Green Eyes

The next morning when I woke up, I found myself staring into a pair of brown eyes. Screaming, I jumped back, yelping in pain at the hurt it caused my chest.

‘I’m so sorry I startled you.’

Hang on, what? Since when were people here nice to me? I looked up and saw a girl about my age standing there, dressed in a ripped dress, her long black hair in knots. She had a worried expression on her face as she looked down at me, waiting for me to move.

‘Are you going to hurt me?’ I whispered, examining her eyes for any hint of evil.

She laughed and smiled, showing her pearly white fangs. ‘No. I’m here to watch you while you have a bath. Master Layton says you need to be clean today.’

I winced in disgust. Watching me bath? That was a bit of an invasion of privacy. Oh well, at least he gave me a female.

Noticing my expression, her eyes became full of sorrow. I forced myself to smile at her, after all, it wasn’t her fault. She smiled back before gesturing me to follow her. Before we left, she turned to me. ‘Umm, I’ve been told to tell you that if you think of escaping now I’m a vampire so you won’t have much of a chance. But I don’t see how you could do that anyways – you look like you’re in a lot of pain.’

I nodded grimly and forced myself up, trying desperately to ignore the pain in my chest and stomach. I felt a cold hand grasp my arm and pull me upwards, and I turned to see the girl. ‘Thanks’ I muttered.

She kept her arm grasped around mine as she led me out of the cell and to the right, stopping when I was in pain. We stopped outside a door and she briefly let go of me to open it, revealing a large bathroom. She gripped my arm again and led me towards the bath, before turning back and locking the door.

‘I’ll give you privacy while you get ready if you like. Just turn the bath on to your liking.’

I thanked her and turned around before hesitantly undressing. Once I was done, I turned the bath taps on and waited for the water to fill before hopping in. ‘I’m ready.’

She turned around and walked towards the bath, gasping when she saw the bruises covering my body. ‘I’m sorry for what they’ve done to you. It’s horrible!’

I smiled up at her and shook my head, dismissing her apology. ‘It’s not your fault. I hate to be blunt but why are you being so nice to me? Everyone else here hates me.’

She hung her head grimly as she began washing my hair. ‘I’ve been a servant here for over 20 years. They hate me too. I have no reason to hate you, I even feel sorry for you.’

‘What’s your name?’

She looked down at me briefly before going back to washing my hair. ‘Kaylee.’

I smiled at the similarity between our names. ‘If you don’t mind me asking, how did you become a servant?’

She paused to pour some shampoo on her hands before answering me quietly. ’I don’t really think you want to know my life story.’

I looked up at her, catching her eye. I smiled. ‘Well, what else is better to pass the time?’
She smiled back, before starting to rub shampoo into my hair. ‘Well, I used to live with my parents. My mum was a vampire and my dad was a human. During that time, it was frowned upon to be in love with a human when you were a vampire. Even if they were soulmates.

‘My parents decided to run away so they could be together. They hid in a forest, my mum catching food so she could feed herself and my dad. About a year later, my mum became pregnant with me. At first it was a shock, seeing as it was never heard of that a vampire should be able to have a baby.

‘About 3 months later, I was born. I was born a human, except I had fangs. I couldn’t use them though.

‘I grew up as a normal person. I went to school, played sport and had fun. I knew what my mother was but I wasn’t ashamed. In fact, it made me feel special.

‘About two months after my 18th birthday, we were sitting down to dinner when there was a knock at the door. Mum told me to stay quiet as she answered it. When she opened the door, she screamed out for us to run. My dad began to push me towards the back door, telling me to get away. I began to run but turned around when I noticed my dad wasn’t behind me. I watched as he was killed instantly by a large vampire who began to drink him dry. I noticed my mum was in a fight with another vampire, while two more came to help. She turned to face me, mouthing for me to run. I turned around and ran as fast as I could, crying the whole time. I ran into the forest and hid behind a tree, to scared to look back at my house.

‘I heard footsteps coming towards me. I tried to disguise myself with the trees but they soon found me, grabbing me and pulling me away. I thought they were going to kill me. But instead, they bit me, making me a vampire. Then they took me back to this castle, and I’ve been working here ever since.’

I looked up at her in shock and noticed there were tears in her eyes. I pulled her into a hug and though she was surprised at first, she hugged me back.

‘Kaylee, you and me are going to get out of this together. I promise.’

After that we talked for a while, telling each other about ourselves while she helped me bath. We made a pact that neither of us would leave without the other – that we would stick together at all costs.

Once we were done I got dressed and we headed back to my cell. When we got there, I noticed Layton standing in my cell, looking pissed. He walked over to Kaylee and slapped her across the face, before picking her up and throwing her against the wall. ‘Where the hell were you? I told you to give her a bath, not have a slumber party!’

I gasped and ran over to her, picking her up off the ground. ‘Don’t help her!’ he sneered. ‘She’s scum, just like you.’

He walked over to her and yanked her up, dragging her out of my cell. ‘See you later princess’

As he dragged her out, she turned and looked at me, her eyes full of pain. I silently mouthed ‘we’ll get out of this.’

A bit later on, Kaylee came back to help me get ready. She said that there was something important that Layton needed to bring me to. I noticed she was now covered in bruises, but when I asked her about it she dismissed it.

First, she treated my bruises and cuts, strapping around my chest to support my ribs. She brushed my hair and put my makeup on, before helping me into a dress. We talked casually throughout the process, but were careful not to talk about escaping because I could sense that someone was nearby.

When we were done she smiled and hugged me quickly before leading me out of my cell. Just as I suspected, Layton was standing just around the corner. When he saw me he smiled widely, flashing his fangs. ‘My my, princess don’t you loom nice. It’s such a pity loverboyisn’t here to see you.’

I glared at him and he chuckled. He grabbed my arm and threaded it through his, before dismissing Kaylee. As she left she mouthed a ‘good luck’.

He forced me forward and I winced in protest but he just laughed and continued pulling me. We walked up a couple sets of stairs until we were standing outside the same door that I had been outside of a couple of days ago.

My palms started to sweat as I remembered what happened when I was last here. Layton grabbed me forcefully before leading me through the door.

I was expecting a big party. I was expecting the room to be full of couples dressed in fancy dresses like mine, dancing or something. But it wasn’t.

It was empty, except for a few servants cleaning up. We walked across the familiar room until we were standing in front of a massive chair.

‘She’s here!’

Layton turned to me and smirked. The doors opened again and I gasped as I noticed it was Vercro. Oh crap. I’m in for trouble.

He smiled as he walked towards me, greeting Layton quickly before turning back to me. ‘Why, hello Kayla. I hope there’s no hard feelings over our last encounter.’

Out of fear, I shook my head. He smiled. ‘Good.’

He walked towards me, stopping right in front of me. I took a step backwards but he grabbed my arm, pulling me to him. He licked his fangs before smiling at me once more. ‘I’m not sure if you’ve heard, but it’s customary for us to have a little taste of each of the prisoners we bring here. Why, we’ve already tried a bit of your friends.’

I growled in anger. I fought the temptation to strike out at him, biting my lip instead. I tried to turn around and run but he grabbed me around the waist and pulled me backwards, throwing me to the ground.

Layton pinned me down as Vercro smirked at me, leaning down towards me. I fought against Layton as best I could but I couldn’t get away.

I felt Vercro’s fangs on my neck as he ran them across my skin. I screamed as I felt his fangs pierce my flesh, and I felt the blood flow through. I could hear Vercro moaning in delight as I felt the pain course through my body. I couldn’t handle it. I wanted it to stop. This was worse than it had been with Layton.

I felt my body begin to go weak and the blood continued to flood from my neck. Just as I felt like I was going to black out, it stopped.

I lay on the ground, motionless as I heard a chuckle. I heard some talking but I couldn’t make out the words. I felt myself being picked up and carried somewhere but I couldn’t open my eyes.

I felt my body hit a cold floor before I blacked out.