Vampires Realm Prophecy 01 - Child of Light

dark with anger.
    Was she in love with him? She’d barely known him a few days and there was so much bad blood between their families that it seemed impossible to him. But she was young, perhaps young enough to get caught up in the fantasy and not see the reality. No, he had seen in her eyes before that she knew the consequences of what she’d spoken of, and she knew that this was no time for falling in love.
    There was never a good time to fall in love.
    He knew that from bitter experience.
    He couldn’t let her love him, not because he could never return those feelings, but because he would never be certain that it was true love, as she put it, on her part. She had never been in a situation so fraught with danger before and his heart kept telling him that it was the only reason she believed she had feelings for him. He was the only one with her. She was bound to feel a bond to him and want to stay close to him at all times. He was the only person she had in the world, the only one standing between her and death.
    He found her staring at the wooden bridge that crossed the Grand Canal.
    She was frowning but he knew it wasn’t because of what he’d said.
    “Something wrong?” he said quietly not wanting to disturb her if it was going to upset her further.
    She shook her head as if rousing herself from a daydream and blinked.
    “Just... I think I’ve seen this before,” she said, looking at him.
    “In your vision?”
    She nodded, her gaze returning to the bridge. He knew what was on the other side. He knew exactly where her vision had shown her. He’d thought nothing of it until they’d found the curator butchered and then it had dawned on him. They had been destined to have to turn to the contact he knew in Venice. It still didn’t mean that Prophecy was going to like it and he got the feeling that he needed to tell her soon.
    When she went to step onto the bridge, he caught her wrist. “Come this way.”
    She would cross that bridge soon enough but he wanted to keep her hidden for as long as possible.
    She gave him an expectant look as she walked beside him, down from the bridge and into the maze of alleyways again. He could see she wanted an apology or at least an explanation for the things he’d said back at the square, but he didn’t have the words. He couldn’t believe how difficult everything was when it came to her. She didn’t have to do anything and he was tied up in knots inside, a shadow of his former confident self. He’d dealt with the girls of Aurorea on a daily basis, had amused countesses with his idle talk and was so socially groomed to perfection that at the last Creator Day masquerade he’d attended, someone had believed him to be a prince, but whenever he tried to speak to Prophecy, he became nothing more than a youngling.
    Even Mathias had said he was acting like one.
    Around her, he lost every ability and skill he had gained in his three centuries and he knew she was beginning to notice it. He’d tried to get the better of himself and maintain the professional distance he’d sworn he would, but it was growing impossible. She drew him in completely. She had enthralled him the moment he’d laid eyes on her.
    The gondolier’s words haunted him and he turned his head away, as though he could physically avoid them.
    She wasn’t in love, and neither was he.
    It was a childish infatuation on her part, and on his, he didn’t know what it was, but it wasn’t love.
    He looked down at the marks on her neck, wanting to blame it on her blood but knowing that wasn’t the problem any more and it never really had been. He laughed internally at himself. This wasn’t like him. He hadn’t been like this since Lucya, and he’d sworn he’d never be like it again.
    “Valentine?” Her voice reached out to him, luring him out of his thoughts.
    He found himself staring at the floor, his fists clenched and his jaw set tightly as he stood rooted to the spot. People were walking past him in both directions along the narrow street. They brushed against him, making him want to growl and take everything he felt inside, all the frustration and confusion, out on them.
    He raised his eyes to meet Prophecy’s. He wanted to take it all out on her. He wanted to slake his thirst and desire for her, wanted to get it out of his system in the hope that it would allow him to go back to how he’d been before she’d wandered into his life. He narrowed his eyes hungrily on her and hers widened, her hand