His Divine Queen

Changes

Alaric could feel the sun shining on his face, rousing him from his sleep as it tickled at his nose. He didn’t want to wake up, tried to burrow himself back into his dream. It was almost like he had really been there: he swore that he could smell her sweet scent, had been touching the soft strands of her hair, and could still hear the tinkling of her laugh as it finally graced his ears again. Alas, the dream disappeared, and all he could focus on was the barren air that wrapped itself around his nostrils, the feeling uncomfortable as he laid stationary on the tent floor.

For a single moment – a moment caught between his subconscious recollections and nightmarish reality, he forgot where he was – allowing himself to relax in the warmth that the Sun offered his aching body. But then the memories of the past few months came rushing back to him and he opened his eyes in a hurry.

The escape, the deaths, her, and them.

He couldn’t let his guard down. Ever. He was surprised that he had managed to fall asleep as it was, considering he’d become so used to escaping his sleepy desires. He was in dangerous territory, couldn’t afford to turn his back for a second if he wanted to keep his life. He wished he was exaggerating, really, but he had been in those meetings where they had planned their attacks. He knew what they were capable of, and what lengths they would go to in order to get what they wanted.

And she was the worst. The woman who had ‘saved’ him, only to drag him into an even deeper mess than he had been in already. He wished that he declined that night, that he had just stayed in that cell to rot like he was supposed to, but instead he had foolishly taken the opportunity with welcoming hands.

How silly of him.

And now Lissandra had him wrapped around her little finger. He owed her his life, and she made sure that he always remembered the fact – ordering him around, beating him, and feeding off him.

It was utterly repulsive.

A Prince of the Moon Kingdom, the one and only Crowned Prince himself, reduced to nothing more than a food source for some evil creature.

The rustling of movement was heard outside his tent, and Alaric sat up just as the tent flaps were pulled back, a tall and willowy figure bending through its opening.

“Rise and shine, pet. You’ve got a busy day today,” Lissandra’s jarring voice rang through the small space. As soon as he heard her, his teeth clenched together in restrained panic, his heart setting off on its irregular, nauseous thumping as it usually did every time she was around. Her perfume invaded his tent, penetrating his nostrils with its sickeningly sour scent as he fought to repress a gag.

He hated her with everything that he had, wished with every breath that the Sun would burn her to a crisp just like in all those lore books about her kind he had read as a child.

When he had first arrived here, he had tried to remember everything from those books that he could. When he discovered that they were vampires, he had tried to escape them using the knowledge he had obtained during his studies. As it turned out, none of those books had been correct.

He had tried to escape under cover of daylight, only to be captured minutes later and dragged back to Lissandra, where he had collapsed after a rather violent blood-taking. Another time, he had tried to shift and bite one of his guards – remembering that bites from a Were were meant to be fatal to them – yet instead was only met with an annoyed strike to the head. He thought that there must be more, forced himself to try and remember them, but his thoughts were as grainy as sand in the wind.

Therefore, he had been forced to remain a prisoner again. A different prison, but still as trapped as he had been in that dark and dreary dungeon. Although, he probably would have been safer there, he thought quickly as he cautiously touched a particularly painful bruise on his arm.

Her horrid voice cut through his tent once more, the nasally tone grating his ears, “Smile, dear, you look ugly when you frown like that. And get a move on, I don’t like waiting.”

He deepened his frown, taking a sliver of joy in his small act of defiance. Hatred easily sought its way into his heart, chasing away the semi-relaxed state he had managed to achieve this morning as he slowly dragged himself out of the tent. He winced as he straightened up, the creaking of his spine amplified by his stretched, bruised skin. He looked around himself, noting the rushed atmosphere around him. Strange, considering that usually they liked to get up later into the day. Something must be happening, he thought, hopefully something that would seriously maim them all.

He didn’t get his wish, unfortunately. Instead, Lissandra’s second in command – a woman that Alaric now knew as Spike – pushed him roughly in the direction of his greatest fear. He caught himself before he fell, but he suddenly realised why they had woken him so early. Well, early for them.

They were going to train.

Back home, Alaric would have taken joy in training. It was a nice reprieve from the depressing meetings his father used to drag him into. But here, it wasn’t anything like the training that he was used to.

Their training was brutal – and he was always, always the target.

He was pushed through the shifting sands, stumbling in the blistering Sun that beat down on his weakened body.

“Do we have to do this today?” He groaned, eyes blearily taking in the group of vampires that had gathered in a circle around their leader. That b***h, Lissandra.

Spike, ignoring his comment, shoved him one last time. His legs finally gave way, hands coming up to catch himself just before he faceplanted into the coarse sand. He forced himself up, compelled himself to show a strong face that could take anything they threw at him. He didn’t feel like that inside though, as all he wanted to do at that moment was crawl back into his tent and grasp at the quickly fading memories of his dream. But he would not let himself crack. He may have been bloodied and bruised, weakened by all the daily beatings and forced blood-letting, but he would not let them break him. He was a Prince, and he had a wife waiting for him back home.

When he next looked up, Spike had moved to stand just behind her leader, her hair for which she got her name shining like ebony in the bright sunlight. His eyes fell to Lissandra next, the general, and sole reason for all his misery. He wished he could hide his emotions and thoughts better, understood that it would prevent at least some of the pain he was often put through, but he knew that every time he looked at her the hatred he felt was plainly written across his face.

“Begin.” She said, her soulless eyes boring into him as a small smirk played across her face. The power she had, he thought, shivering as hisses suddenly erupted around him. Goddess, they all seemed so excited to get started today.

Spike stepped forward, voice ringing out across the small crowd as Alaric swayed on his feet in its centre, terrified once again as he locked eyes with the smirking leader. Her crimson eyes stared at him, seemingly into his very soul as he shifted miserably on the spot.

“You know what you have to do. But please, for the love of Vlad, don’t use your teeth. We don’t want to kill our dear friend here too prematurely.”

This wasn’t the first time he’d had to do this, but he sure hoped it would be one of the last. His body was tired, aching and bruised. His bones wouldn’t be able to take much more; all the hits he had suffered were adding up, weakening him more than when he had been imprisoned.

He looked up into the sky, squinting into the bright sun as it started to sink towards the horizon. It was going to be a long afternoon, he thought. Hopefully this one wouldn’t be as long as others, as he wasn’t sure if he could hold out today.

He stood still in the centre of the small circle of vampires that surrounded him. Sharpened teeth and crimson eyes glinted through the daylight, teasing him with their power over him. Alaric sighed, resigned to his fate as he felt his willpower leave his body. Let’s just get this over with, he thought.

And soon they were upon him, scratching at him, claws invading his body as he was ripped from this side to that. They were relentless, some tasting his scarlet essence that seeped out of his body. He lay beneath the mass of tangled limbs, quietly taking all the pain that they gave him.

There was little he could do, had learnt that it was pointless to try and fight back. He may have been a Prince, but he was only a mere mortal against this legion of cursed monsters.

It was all going as normal, just like the other sessions he had been through. But then he felt something strange - a searing pain that ripped through his shoulder. With the little remaining strength he had, he forced his head up and saw a red-haired boy backing away from him. His face was covered in blood.

My blood? Alaric wondered, a wooziness coming over him suddenly as the other attacks on his body stopped at once. They all retreated, gasps and whispers replacing the hisses and whimpers that had surrounded him only moments ago. A space quickly formed around his broken body, the Sun shining again on his broken body that lay upon the soft sand. Sleep called to him now, accompanied by a strange sensation spreading throughout his body. It almost felt pleasant, like a rush of fire that soothed his damaged soul and tried to piece it back together.

The fire escalated, growing into a crescendo, until finally it grew too much. The bright light of the Sun above him slowly fading into the darkness of his eyelids.

Rest, finally.