Shattered Skies: Beginning's End (6 page)

I remembered the way that his lips felt on mine and the way that everywhere he touched seemed to come alive and add to the need of him. I didn’t, however, remember what happened after the darkness. I had passed out but when? Obviously it happened before he had a chance to force sex on me because he was still alive, well,
as alive as the half dead could be. I had never passed out before though no matter how much I had drunk. Maybe it had something to do with the blood loss, though someone bleeding out because of a little nick on their tongue would be a new one to me.

“Oh my god, Cat you are alive. I thought you were gone. I thought I had lost you,” Akia whispered, not able to hide the relief in his voice. 

At least he was being considerate of my headache. What in the world was going on? I mean I knew I drank a lot but come on. I should have been more worried about the fact that he stuck around to try to figure out what was wrong with me than I was. I just wasn’t thinking straight yet. 

“Ok, two things your highness.” I had never spoken one on one with the King sober. I forgot last night I am sure, but I knew now that you never called him by name if you were beneath him and since I wasn’t sure where we stood, better safe than dead.

“One, how the hell did you know my name? I am sure that I didn’t tell you, and two, what do you mean you thought you had lost me? You never had me to begin with and if I am remembering correctly you wouldn’t let me leave, so how did you lose me?”

“Has anyone ever told you that that sharp tongue of yours is going to get you in trouble someday?” he was teasing me, acting like what was going on here was completely normal and I was in no mood for it. 

“Answer my question.”  I didn’t think he was going to kill me, though I probably should have tried a little harder to be a little less rude, but I felt like I had been hit by a train and I was in no mood to play head games with someone whose ego was bigger than my apartment. 

“Ok, I am sorry. Well let’s see
, when I woke up....” his words slowed and I could tell that he was still trying to make sense of things in his own mind. Was it possible that he was as confused as I was? How was that even possible, that we both just slipped into the blackness? Why did the thought of him not knowing any more than I did scare me so much?

“Wait a minute. What do you mean, when you woke up? Did you pass out too? I didn’t even know that you had been drinking.”  Finally the thought of him drinking brought with it the first little glimmer of hope for me to grasp for dear life. The fact that it was possible that he was drunk enough to pass out made me feel a little bit better, but just a little bit. Maybe I had gotten lucky after all. If he was that drunk, there was a good chance that some, if not all of his memory would be a little foggy. Maybe he didn’t remember a lot of what I had said. “I was getting to that; we must work on your patience kitten.” He said kitten with such smug confidence that it was all I could do to not kick him. 

“Don’t ever call me that again unless you want your balls served to you on a silver platter.”  

To my threat he just smiled defiantly, not the reaction that I was going for, but at least he was nice to look at. It is hard to be threatening when the other person is smiling at you. Anyone else, I would have strangled for
such a display of cockiness. I guess being the King and all, cockiness works for you. So I did the only thing that I could at that moment, which was sit and glare, though at this point I am sure that it looked more like I was pouting. Hard to be a scary badass chick when your bottom lip is stuck out and your eyes are so sore they are watery instead of steaming.

“If you want me to answer your questions then I must insist that you calm yourself.”

I so badly wanted to tell him to go straight to hell where he belonged. The look on his face at that very moment made me want to be the one to send him there, but I wanted to know what happened even more, so with a heavy sigh, I leaned back and snuggled in for a story. The bed that I was on felt like a cloud; I had never laid on anything so soft before in my life, and for this, my body was grateful. Now if I could just manage to stay awake and listen to the words of wisdom that he was going to share that would be another plus.

“There, happy? Go ahead.” I sounded more tired than pissed off. Damn it! What was wrong with me?

“Very well then, as long as you promise to stay still, I will continue. I don’t want you to hurt yourself because you are a little ball of anger that someone should have attempted to tame a long time ago.” Who in the hell did this man think he was? There were so many colorful things that I wanted to say to him, but instead, I settled for saying nothing at all. I felt that it would save me a lot of grief. “As I was saying, when I woke up I figured that I had just passed out, even though I hadn’t been drinking. I thought maybe I had suffered a bad reaction to something that I ate. I didn’t think much of it but when I tried to move, something on my chest was burning. I have never felt tired before in my life. I am always so full of energy but it was like something had zapped the life force out of me. I didn’t even have the strength to lift my head. When I finally managed to work up enough energy to sit up, I discovered these.” He paused and lifted his shirt. On his perfect chest there were three slashes that resembled a cat scratch.

“How the hell did that happen? Was there someone or something else in the room with us?” Yeah I had a real problem with interrupting. I know we all have an annoying habit or two. 

“Well, I was hoping you would be able to tell me. Anyway, when I sat up I became totally disoriented. I thought maybe I was alone and something attacked me; a cat maybe. Then I saw you lying there. You were so pale; I thought whatever had shredded my chest had killed you. I searched your entire body, but you didn’t have a single mark on you; not a single drop of blood anywhere on your perfect skin.” I felt myself blush when he said he had searched my entire body. Just the thought of him being that close to me, so intimately touching me was awakening the places again that I never prior to him knew existed. 

“None of it made any sense. I didn’t know what to do. I had never been in a situation like that one before, and I was pretty sure that you weren’t going to wake up unless I could figure out what had happened to us. I started to look for something that made any kind of sense whatsoever. I knew that I was running out of time and I needed to find the missing pieces of the puzzle before it was too late. I found your
wallet, that is how I knew who you were. I tried to get out the door, but they were still locked and no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t get out. I yelled until my throat was numb, but no one was around to hear me. I found out later there was an incident in the parking lot with some rogue Vampires and all the staff and guards were trying to fight them off. I didn’t know what to do so I tried sharing blood with you and each time you drank my blood, your vital signs got a little bit better.”  

“Each time?” I choked out in a whisper and my throat suddenly went dry. “H-how many times did I feed from you?” My world was suddenly spinning.

“Um, four or five I think; but why is that important to the story?” 

My heart sank. I thought for a second I was going to pass out again. When the room steadied again I said, “No, it isn’t of any importance. I just wanted to know how close to really gone I was. I never thought that I would have to worry about dying. We are supposed to be pretty much indestructible you know.” I was shocked at how matter of fact I sounded when inside, my world just about crumbled in around me. 

The truth was, if a human drank the blood of a Dominus six times, they would fall away into a dead sleep and wake several days later as immortal themselves. It was the one threat that the Vampires had not accounted for on their quest to make the perfect being. With their arrogant self-importance, they never thought they would have to worry about a Dominus falling in love with a human. Humans were nothing more than animals, and there was no reason to ever develop feelings for them. 

Much to the surprise of the Vampires, there had been about ten executions in the past 15 years due to Dominus’ trying to turn the humans that captured their heart. The Dominus swore that they had found their soul mate in one of the house servants, or a regular meal, knowing that no matter what, they couldn’t live the rest of eternity without them so they attempted to make the human
s immortal so they could keep them forever. Once the humans became Dominus they could even have sex, making their love even stronger. No matter what methods the self-proclaimed soulmates used to hide what they had done, someone always figured it out. All it ever took was one human tick presenting itself in the wrong place and their relationship was brutally over. I always found it kind of ironic; all of the ten Dominus that died had said that they couldn’t live without each other, but if you wanted to get technical about it, they truly couldn’t live with each other, considering they were all executed by way of public beheading to teach everyone a lesson. A lesson that should have scared anyone that was even toying with the idea straight, then again, maybe it is true that love makes you do stupid irrational things. Stupid things like staying in a room and making out with a man that could snap you like a twig? The little voice taunted me from the back of my mind almost making me to tell her to shut up out loud. Of course maybe I should have just gone with it. Maybe if he thought I was nuts he would let me leave.

“Cat, are you even listening to me?” Akia’s voice startled me away from my thought.

“I am. I am. Sorry your majesty. Please go on. My mind is a little cloudy.”

He just stared at me for a moment with a genuinely worried look on his face, and then he continued. “I was hoping that if and when you woke up you would remember a little bit more about the other night then I have been able too.”

“Wait what do you mean the other night? How in the hell long have I been out?”

His expression went from worry to pity so fast that it was frightening. “The ball was eight days ago. You really don’t remember anything at all do you?”  Every little bit of hope that his voice held before was completely gone now.

“I have been out for eight days?  How in the hell did this happen? Has anyone been looking for me?”  I really was hoping that the answer to the last question was no. I really hoped that they were all smart enough to stay away. I had to get out of there. Darien and the others must be out of their minds with worry, thinking I was dead or worse. I had to get to them before Darien flew off the handle and sought revenge on the man that he thought killed me. That would mean certain death for him and the others. 

“No, no one has bothered themselves with the task of finding you. In fact, this Darien man that you were s
o adamant about getting back to has made no attempt to find out if you are still alive, let alone OK. I shouldn’t even tell you this, but just last night, he was at some bar dancing the night away with an unknown slut, and mind you, I am using that term loosely. This woman was a mess.” 

He wasn’t even trying to hide the hatred in his voice; I could feel the disgust that he was feeling for the most important man in my life radiating off him. The last bit of hope that I had been holding onto disappeared. I was hoping that with everything else that had happened, Akia would have forgotten that I had let Darien’s name slip in my drunken stupor. We were all in trouble and it was my fault. I wasn’t sure how I was going to fix this, but I needed to do something soon. 

“Wait a minute. How do you even know who Darien is?”

“I had my people do some checking on your little boyfriend. You wanted to go back to him the other night so bad badly I figured he would be out of his mind worrying about you. I was going to have one of my men bring him here so that he could help you. I didn’t want him to think that something happened; I thought maybe he would be better able to take care of you than I was. I just wanted you to wake up and from the way you sounded when I wouldn’t let you leave to go to him the other night, I realized that you two were in love. Now mind you, I believe that all is fair in love and war and I fully intended to fight for you. Still, I figured if there was a slim chance that he could help you, I wanted him here. Then, when my men reported back to me and told me he wasn’t acting the least bit worried or concerned, I had them follow him some more. The next time when they reported back to me, it was the night when he was hitting on the slut. This confirmed what I had thought all along; this Darien of yours is a worthless waste of your time. Not only was he not worried about you, but I am certain that he was trying to have sex with this other woman.” 

Akia wasn’t jealous; he wasn’t happy by all means but he was willing to give me Darien because he thought that it would save me. That alone should have made me feel a little bit better. However, although he might not be the jealous type, he was mad; mad because he thought that Darien was stringing me along, even angrier because Darien wasn’t mourning my potential loss the way he thought he should be. I was oddly flattered, but even more scared. The only thing that was worse than a jealous Dominus, is a pissed off vengeful one that has his sights set on your best friend.

I took the fear and did the only thing that I knew how to do with fear, I turned it into anger, an emotion that I was very good at controlling and using for my advantage.  Yes that is what I needed. I was angry now and I was glad. I would take anger over confusion or fear any day. I jumped out of bed and started collecting my things. I was sure I would pay the price for moving around as fast as I was later, but right now I didn’t care. I felt like the room was closing in on me and I couldn’t stand it any longer. Being so close to him without touching him on top of everything else was making it even worse.