Blackstar

“Are you sure you don’t want anyone else to go with you?” Queen Vittoria asked.

It was time for King Bartholomew and Prince Alexi to leave. We were all gathered in the kitchen. The King and Alexi were both dressed in commoner’s clothing. The Queen and Vera were standing by them, holding each other’s hands and keeping back tears. I was working on making sure their clothing was appropriate. My hands were shaking as I wrinkled up Alexi’s shirt sleeve. He took my hands and kissed them.

“It’s going to be okay,” he whispered.

“We’ll be back in a week,” the King promised. “All the servants have been told that we’ve gone to negotiate with an ally near us.”

“It will take us two days to travel there and back,” Alexi said, still holding my hands tightly. “We’ll spend three days among them and learn as much as we can.”

“And if they find out who you are?” I said.

He smiled gently at me. “Then we’ll fight. They’re not hurting you anymore, Raven. Not while I’m around.”

He kissed me gently and the King hugged his wife and daughter. The three of us stood, arm in arm, as Alexi and the King disappeared into the night. As soon as the back door closed, the Queen sank to her feet, sobbing.

-Alexi’s POV-

It was raining. How appropriate. I mounted the horse prepared for me while the stable hand prepared what he thought was food for a trip to the kingdom of Felden.

“Are you sure you don’t want to take the coach?” he asked me while my father mounted his horse. “And why are you dressed in commoner’s clothing?”

“It’s just for the ride there,” my father lied smoothly. He gestured at the rain. “And it will make travelling in the rain much more comfortable.”

He nodded and stepped out of our way. With a deep breath, I urged my horse forward. We didn’t speak for the first six hours. It was dark but we didn’t bring a lantern. We didn’t want to draw more attention to ourselves. Before we had left, Raven had punctured our necks with a needle.

“I’m sorry to do this,” she had said when he winced in pain, “but makeup would wash off too easily.”

“They’ll heal over quickly,” my mother promised, dabbing at the blood.

“It itches,” I said now, tapping at the scabs. I didn’t want to scratch and reopen the wounds. “I hadn’t anticipated that.”

“Neither did I,” he admitted, also tapping his neck. It was raining harder. “Are you tired?”

I shook my head no, pushing my wet bangs to the side of my head. “I got plenty of sleep before we left. Besides, I’m too nervous to sleep.”

We didn’t dare talk about our plans on the open road. We spent the whole day sleeping. I wanted to get there as soon as possible. If we didn’t sleep, we’d get there in a day and a half. But that wasn’t realistic. However, when we got to the coven….

“I doubt they sleep,” I muttered to myself.

“It didn’t say in the book?” my father whispered.

“No. All it said was they have thralls to feed on. It didn’t go into detail about sleeping habits.”

My father frowned. “Do you think he tried to make Raven into a thrall?”

I nodded. “It’s quite possible,” I said. “Although I hate the idea,” I added darkly.

We fell into silence again. Finally, the rain let up and the clouds began to clear the sky. To our left, the sun was beginning to rise and I watched it. I always enjoyed watching the sun ascend to the sky. It was a promise of a new day.

The book had said that vampires, despite legends, could live in sunlight but they preferred not to. Their eyes were sensitive to the light and, since most of their activities happened in the evenings, they had time to reflect and plan more.

“What if it’s not this coven?” my father asked.

It was late in the evening. Still we hadn’t spoken much. We had stopped for the night, though, to get the horses some food and water. We made a fire and sat down, passing each other the food.

“Then we go to the next one,” I said. “But Raven seemed pretty certain it was this one. If this being has her as his thrall, then she would know, wouldn’t you think?”

My father nodded thoughtfully, chewing on his bread and staring into the fire.

“I wonder what would have happened to her if we hadn’t found her,” he said.

I popped some nuts in my mouth. “She would still be attacked. But I don’t think she’d have as much help.”

“She cares a lot about you,” he said, smiling. I shifted, fully aware I was blushing. “And I know you care about her, too.”

“I was surprised when I found out who she was,” I admitted. “I never thought she would be the one. She danced and spoke like royalty.”

“Well of course she danced like royalty. I taught her!”

We laughed and I stretched.

“Let’s get some rest,” I said as the fire started to die. “I don’t want to give anything away tomorrow.”

My father nodded in agreement and we stretched out on the few feet of dry ground we could find.

-

The sun woke us up and we ate hurriedly, both of us too nervous to speak. We tossed our food bags on the ground, keeping only the feed for the horses on the saddles.

I did my best not to pick at my scabs again. Our story would be we were turned recently and abandoned by our turner. It was a common occurrence according to the book.

I knew we were close when the sky started to get dark. The sun was still high in the sky, but still it felt like heavy clouds blocked it out. I shivered slightly. I could feel eyes on us.

Suddenly, my horse reared up on its back legs, whining in fright. Before I could react, I was thrown off. By the sound of squelching mud and grunt, the same had happened to my father. I struggled to my feet only to see the horses running off down the trail.

“Wonderful,” my father grumbled, rubbing his lower back. “Now what?” he sighed, looking around. “I don’t see anyone.”

“What are you doing here, strangers?” a voice said.

I looked around, my hand reaching for a sword that wasn’t there.

“Who’s there?” I called.

A man emerged from the trees. He was in a hooded cloak, his face shrouded in shadow.

“Who are you?” my father asked as the man walked closer.

He lowered his hood to reveal a pale face with long black hair. His eyes were red. He watched us for a while before approaching me. I took an instinctive step back. Without a word, he grabbed my face and bent my head, looking at my neck.

“Hmm,” he said slowly and did the same to my father. “You have the marks yet you don’t smell of vampire blood.” He tilted his head, eyes narrowed in suspicion. “You must be thralls….”

“We’ve come seeking your coven,” I said evenly.

At first, he remained silent. “And what do you bring with you?” I blinked. I didn’t read anywhere about bringing some kind of token. The man pressed his lips together. “I see. You are unaware of our traditions.” He sighed. “Follow me, then.”

I shared a nervous look with my father and followed behind the man, praying he wouldn’t realize who we really were.