Sour Beginnings

Chapter 1: Emily's P.O.V.

!!! *** WARNING! CHAPTER CONTAINS MATERIAL THAT SOME READERS MAY FIND DISTRESSING! SUCH AS GORE, AND MURDER! READER DISCRETION IS ADVISED! *** !!!

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I met my mate when I was very old. I had lived for so long. So many years I spent living alone.

I appeared young on the outside, but in truth... I had been alive for several years.

I was born in a time that has almost been forgotten now. When kings and queens reigned over the world. When all you could do was work from sun up to sun down to make ends meet.

The year was 1601. It was late May, on a warm sunny day. I don't remember the day, but I remember what my life was like since I was a child.

For 19 long years, I worked day in and day out with my family. My parents had moved from the North to settle in what is now the United States. We lived in a small village. We rarely had outsiders that came. As a matter of fact, the king that owned that village rarely ever came to collect taxes.

Why, you ask?

Because that land was said to be haunted by monsters.

People had no idea how right they were about that. Only it wasn't multiple monsters. It was only one. A Demon.

My mother came from a very powerful line of Witches. Actually, her older sister, my aunt, had become High Priestess shortly before my parents had come here. It was said that the Anderson women held such intense power that they were more like Gods.

Apparently, there is always one out of every group of siblings that was born with this intense power. It's a dark power that the coven tries to use for good deeds. It doesn't always work out that way though. Sometimes that power takes control of the Witch.

Little did that coven know... It was not my aunt who held this special power, but my mother. My aunt's power was great, and they were able to fool the coven together. They did it so that my mother could run away to be with the man she loved. Another Witch from the coven. They were mates.

Unfortunately, this new life was not what my parents expected for us.

I was the third born out of my siblings. I had two older brothers, three younger sisters, and three younger brothers. It wasn't common in that time period to have so many children, but my family was special. The Anderson bloodline was fruitful.

The women in my family always bore many healthy children. Strong men, who grew to be skilled warriors. Beautiful, smart women, who grew up to be powerful.

It all started the day that my 5th sibling had died. My father was killed on the same day. By this time, I was nearly used to death in my family. It was hard on all of us, but I was broken.

Within my siblings... I was the one that had inherited the special Anderson power. I knew that from a young age. Magic was easy for me, and that made my everyday life easy.

On the night that my first sibling was taken, I lost control. Seora was the youngest out of all of us. Our sweet baby sister was mauled by that damn monster.

Every night it was the same. Everyone went into their huts before the sun finished setting. They locked their doors, and left out sacrifices of all kinds of dead animals. Every night we could hear the screams and cries of the animals left out of barns, or the poor souls that were caught out of their homes too late.

I never thought much of it. It was just... life. Simply the way things were.

When Seora died, though, it broke a small part in me. I was so enraged and devastated that I accidentally started a fire. One that could not be put out. It burned down half of the village.

Which only fed into the monster's bloodlust.

At the time, Demon's were not well known to the world, not even the supernatural world. As far as us Witches knew, there were other kinds of supernatural creatures, they just stayed in their own realms. We had no idea what we were dealing with.

When we lost my father and yet another sibling, my mother had enough. She didn't get out of bed for two weeks. We were growing more and more worried about her.

It seemed that the Anderson family had gone from blessed, to cursed,

The few of us that were left had no choice but to move on. We took turns caring for our mother while taking care of the small piece of land we had. It was difficult, and the closer winter got, the more worried we became.

Until one special night when our mother had finally gotten out of bed. My older brother and I had come home to see our mother cooking along with our younger sister and brother. They all seemed so happy. Everything started to seem... good. Like we could get back together.

And then it all went bad. Really bad.

Shortly after, we began eating... All of us started to faint. Our younger siblings were the first to pass out, their heads thunking onto the table. Then my elder brother. It took me longer, and my mother knew that. The last thing that I remember from my old life was my mother's sobbing face as she apologized over and over again.

When I had come to, something was different. My head was throbbing, and my throat felt like I had just drunk lava. I was instantly terrified, and began searching for something to put out the fire in my throat.

Water didn't help. Not even my father's hidden stash of wine was no help. I was growing more and more scared, and that was when I realized that I was in my hut alone.

And it was dark outside.

The fear of the last of my family being dead overpowered everything else. The burning in my throat was long forgotten, along with the fact that if I ran outside, I would surely perish too. Honestly, I'd rather perish with the last of my family than live on without them.

When I had run out of my house, I wasn't expecting it only to take me seconds. I was moving far faster than what was humanly possible. When I had made it outside, I found that I could see clearly in the darkness.

I looked around confused. How is this possible? I shouldn't be able to see this well. I shouldn't be able to move this fast.

What is going on?

A loud scream in the distance distracted me.

Then there was another, and another. I quickly turned in that direction, and ran. The screams continued, increasing my worry.

When I finally made it to the source, shock had frozen me in my place.

I thought that I would be met by the monster that had killed over half of my family. Instead, I was met with three new monsters.

My siblings.

My brothers and sister were tearing villagers apart. Literally tearing them limb from limb. They... didn't look like themselves at all. Large fangs had grown from their teeth, their eyes were glowing a fiery orange color, and they were... drinking the blood of the villagers.

I had to put my hand over my mouth to try to keep out the scent. It wasn't that it smelled bad, but... Rather, it smelled amazing. My gums started to tingle and throb. The burning in my throat came back with a vengence.

I couldn't help myself...

I became a monster that night too.

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My siblings and I spent that night slaughtering every single villager. We even tore children apart. Our bloodlust was too great. We drank ourselves into a stupor, and passed out.

The next morning, we were awoken by our younger sister burning to death. The sun had set her on fire somehow. It happened when my brother's tried to touch the light as well.

Not me though.

My brothers and I made it back to our home. That was where we had found our mother dead with a note. Her note had told us that she had put a spell on the last of her children. She couldn't bare to lose another child. Mother said she was sorry to leave us alone, but this spell required a great sacrifice.

My younger brother lost his mind for a while after that. He curled into a ball in the corner of the room, and sobbed. My elder brother grew quiet just like me. I was able to create a spell embedded into a talisman for my brothers to be able to go out in the sunlight.

After Barron and I tested it, we got to work. Together, the two of us cleaned up the horrific mess we had created. We buried the bodies, and cleaned up as much blood as we could.

By the time we were done, it was nightfall. It was strange how neither my brother nor I were afraid of the monster that had hunted our village our entire lives. Neither of us said a word. I'm not sure the thought of that monster even passed our minds until we realized it was well into night.

I'm not sure if that was just because we were ready to die after what we had done, or if we were simply that numb.

"My, my," came a deep amused voice from the shadows. "What do we have here?"