Daughter of the Night

It was after the sermon, when she was just leaving the church, when she felt the eyes on her. It was a beautiful day, with clouds like cotton puffs in the sky, yet that did nothing to appease the feeling of icy fear that suddenly seemed to smother her. She dropped the books she was carrying in her arms and whirled around, looking for the source of her terror.

A deep chuckle rolled out from a dark alley. At first, there seemed to be nothing unusual about it, but the longer she concentrated, the more the darkness coming from the alley seemed to be unnatural. Slowly, she approached, although her heart hammered in her ribcage and she could hear her pulse in her ears.

She put her back against the brick wall of the building next to the alley, terrified of what lay beyond yet knowing that she must face it.

She took a deep breath and turned to look into the alley. It was as dark as it would have been in the nighttime, yet although she couldn’t see she was confident there wasn’t anything inside the alley.

She took a step inside, to make sure. Nothing. She took another step. A hand, cold and deathly white with long black nails caressed her cheek. She whirled around and opened her mouth to scream, but the hand clamped over her mouth with an iron force.

Bloodred eyes looked down on her, leering. “So pure,” a black voice whispered in her ear. “So… alluring.”

A razor sharp thumbnail pressed against her cheek, drawing a drop of blood. It mixed with a tear rolling from her eye.

The thumb wiped the mixture of blood and tears from her cheek and vanished into the shadows, although she thought she saw a deep red tongue flash out.

“Remember,” the black voice hissed. “I will be back. For you are mine, and I will come to collect you.”

The pale hand released her suddenly, and she fell forward on her knees. Too weak to stand, she had to crawl out of the alley.

I awoke to the feeling of silk pressed against my cheek and the faint buzzing of a hangover, although I knew it to be from an anesthetic. I could feel that it was about three in the morning, in which case, I hadn’t been out that long.

It was several seconds before I had firmly barricaded my memories behind their walls and was prepared to return to the present.

I opened my eyes slowly, and then wished I hadn’t. Shards of light sharper than glass went all the way back to my head. I quickly squeezed my eyes shut and held my hand up to the light. Although it had been a very long time since I had had a hangover, I knew that this was certainly comparable to one.

I was on my side, so I rolled onto my stomach and pushed myself onto my knees. There was a crick in my neck that wasn’t going away no matter how much I rolled my shoulders. I pulled my long raven-black hair over my shoulder to get it out of the way and then I rose to my feet.

The room I was in was small, but the walls were made of limestone. The lights above were fluorescent, and plants of all shapes and sizes surrounded me. I recognized hibiscus flowers, strawberry plants, and even a cacao tree. The air, also, was relatively humid and very hot. Where I had found myself was on a small pallet built up with feathers and blankets of silk. Quite accommodating, considering I was a prisoner.

I looked up to the lights and nearly blinded myself. I held up one pale arm and realized that my skin was taking on a reddish tinge, almost as if… I was getting sunburned. All right, those lights had to go. Odds were it was the source of my hangover symptoms too.

However, when I studied it, I realized that there were no electrical wires anywhere. So I did the next best thing and ripped the lights out of the ceiling.

I distastefully dropped the rack of lighting to the floor, casting the room into darkness, and that was when my faerie escort walked in. Light cascaded through the open door, but the room was darker and therefore more comfortable.

“You know,” I told him, “I hadn’t passed out once since I became a vampire, and now that I’ve met you, my record’s three and counting.”

“Yeah…” Aaron said. “Sorry about that.”

“So are you going to explain what you’re doing running around with the Fae?” I asked, “because this is definitely the part where I demand an explanation.”

“Well, you’re going to find out in, say, five minutes, so I think you can hold out a bit longer. And anyways, considering the circumstances, you seem to be taking this rather well. I was expecting you to have me pinned against a wall right now.”

“I’m considering it. But I hold no illusions that your little faerie guards are piled up outside the door waiting for a distress signal.”

Ignoring that, Aaron’s eyes fell to the shattered lights on the floor. “Man,” he grimaced, “those are expensive.”

I leaned back against the wall and crossed my arms. “Why are you here?”

He looked up briefly, and when his eyes caught the light I realized that I had underestimated him. Significantly.

“You need to be prepped on protocol before you’re presented to the Summer Queen,” he said.

My eyebrows rose. “Protocol?”

He shrugged. “The Summer Court is mired in tradition, after all. It would help your appearance if you could adhere to at least a few of the basic rules.”

My eyes narrowed and my lips peeled back. “You seem to be forgetting that I am a vampire, and while I hold nothing against the Fae save a mild hangover and sunburned skin, I will present myself as I see fit. I will never bow to your queen. I will never bow to anyone. And the more you piss me off, the ruder I’m going to get. Is that clear?”

Aaron turned around and stuck his head out the door. “Told you,” he called. Turning back to me, he gave a boyish grin. “Totally clear. Protocol is a bitch. Ready to go?”

My patience was getting more and more frayed with every passing second, so instead of responding I just shoved by him and out the door. The faerie guard was indeed hovering just outside, waiting for a distress signal. I hissed at them. Startled, they fell back slightly before coming into position surrounding me. If anything, they were bristling with more weapons than before. I got the impression that they hadn’t had to deal with too many vampires before.

The maze of corridors and hallway I was led through was quite impressive. Plants and flowers of all sizes and colors grew throughout the hallways, and ceilings could be twelve feet or two hundred feet tall. I knew for sure that I was in the summer palace, although how such a massive building was hidden in such a high-security city, I had no idea.

Marble statues and fountains were commonplace, and tapestries and paintings decorated the walls. I had never been in a place so bright, so vibrant.

Finally I was led to a grand hall, where the ceiling was arcing and had thousands of small scenes painted on the ceiling. The architecture was brilliant.

“The Court is ready for us,” Aaron said. “Just be patient, and you can get out of this.”

Steady advice, I thought, but who was it from? The boy I had saved in the back alley, or the self-assured, confident man who commanded Fae with an air of power?

I kept my silence.