Copii Defalcate

I woke up with sweat beading down my forehead and cold shivers running down my back. It was the same old nightmare I had every night. It never left me.

I walked into the bathroom, and tamed my wild hair. After I deemed it presentable I grabbed a make-up case from under the sink. I had practice hiding bruises. It was one of my best skills. I don't know if I should be happy or terrified that it was.

I lightly applied foundation to my black eye trying to not hiss in pain at every touch. The cut on my check would have to stay. I could wear a long sleeved shirt and pants to conceal most of the bruises I had, and I had to slowly slide my wedding ring down my finger over the swollen, bloodied knuckles.

I walked down stairs through the many corridors trying to ignore the pain screaming at my ribs and everyone where else. I didn't remember the last time I got beat this bad, but at least I still won.

The kitchen was desolate. I grabbed some food from the fridge and threw it in the microwave. I was pressing the buttons when a tired looking Frank walked into the room.

"Good morning." He said.

"What's so good about it?" I muttered shoving food in my mouth quickly. "Did you sleep well?" I asked loud enough for him to hear me this time. He nodded. "Did you?" He asked. There was an underline tone in his voice asking me about what he saw last night. I ignored it and nodded my head.

"Gerard said that I was supposed to come to you first thing in the morning. He didn't tell me why though. I didn't know that you got up this early, so do you mind if I have some breakfast?" He asked. I nodded my head before saying, "What do you mean this early? It's like nine. The only ones who have an excuse to sleep this late is the marcators because they stay up late in the night." He just shrugged and poured himself some cereal.

After he finished his breakfast I led him to the garden. We walked to one of my favorite parts, the back corner. Everyone would assume that the center of the garden would be the most beautiful, but the vampires had actually made the back corner more extravagant because the shade of the neighboring tress blocked it from sunlight.

The flower and vines draped along the walkway, and large plants, bushes, and small tress lined it making it like a hallway of living creatures. We sat down at a bench that had over grown vines and leaves laying mindlessly on top of it.

"So why did you bring me here?" Frank asked.

"I thought I should show you one vision of beauty before you hear my words."

"What are your words?" He asked.

"I'm going to tell you the history of marcats and why you are here. It's not the most pleasant story, so I thought the scenery would throw some of that off."

"Well, go ahead with it then." He said.

"First off, everything you know about vampires is wrong. They don't boil in the sunlight, they don't kill humans for their blood, they can't be made, and they are definitely not solitaire creatures. The first vampire was said to be made at the same time as humans to show the humans what a perfect, strong, and intelligent creature was. The vampires could never truly over power the humans because of their population. Vampires quickly learned that female vampires could not bare children, so a vampire invented the mark. You know it just as well as I do, it's burned onto your skin forever." I started.

I touched over the mark on my arm making Frank look down to his mark as well.

"First, the marks were only used to control the human a vampire was trying to bare their children with. After a while vampires seemed to grow fond of their human companions so they invented a new mark. A romance mark, not to be confused with the original mark of slavery. We wear the romance mark. It is usually shown by a rose. Ours may look similar but they are actually very different. They aren't big differences, but enough for another vampire to know who we belong too. The slave marks are usually shown by chains or shackles with the small differences like ours. Just know that no matter what type of mark it will only show one thing. Possession. You now are practically a slave in a sense, but you get as much respect as a queen or king who got married into royalty." I said.

"The mark is only shown on marcats, which is what we are. Our owners are the marcator. Every vampire has the ability to be a marcator, but there are some who never mark anyone. It is possible for a marcator to have more than one marcat. Supposedly, there was once a vampire who had 19 romance marcats and 34 slave marcats. No one really knows the limit. Most vampires only have one or two romance marcats though because humans are born naturally jealous and we are humans. We can never grow old once the mark is put on us, and it is thought that the mark changes all the flaws the marcator sees in you. We won't start aging until our marcator dies, or if we are killed we will obviously die." I continued.

"There are many duties a marcat has in public, and some in private. You are to act a certain way when you are around other marcators, but what you do with your own is none of my business. We will start training tomorrow for proper etiquette. Any questions?" I asked.

"Just one. You say we are basically a possession, but what happens if we change our mind or go against the marcator?" He asked.

"Hm well, hopefully you will never know this, but a marcat can only go without seeing their marcator for so long. After a while, a burning sensation will start where your mark is. It gets worse every second, and it feels like your arm is on fire and you can't do anything about it. This also happens when you hurt your marcator. Physically, mentally, any way really. I remember once, Max was intentionally flirting with another guy because he was upset with Ronnie about something. Ronnie didn't know he was doing it, but his anger had caused the mark on Max's arm to turn red and to burn. Does that answer the question?" I asked.

"Yeah, thanks. So, is that it for today or do you want to talk more?"

"No, that's it. Enough with my boring speech. If you have any more questions you can always come and ask me." I said.

We walked back to the house quietly. There wasn't much to say. I knew he wanted to know about last night, but my marcator just found about that man so he would have to wait in the dark for a while. When we got to the house, Frank said he needed to do something in his room and that he would be down for dinner.

I sat in the living room for a while just watching the trees sway in the gentle breeze of the day time. Ronnie, Max, and Oli walked into the room and sat down on the table in front of the couch.

"What can I help you boys with?" I asked.

"We need to talk." Oli said.

My breath caught in my throat no one said those four words unless something bad happened. Really bad.