Royal shuffle: Vampire’s mate

ANDREA

The first body popped up at the palace, dismembered, chopped up onto little pieces save for the head, packed into a box, wrapped up like a gift, and deposited at the palace gates to be discovered. It was a child, and in the dismembered hand of the boy, it held a wooden toy with a dismembered head. The toy wore a tee shirt that said ‘Leovanni’.

My heart skipped several beats as I held the toy in my hands. This was a clear message. Someone was out for my boy. I looked up and saw Leo looking at me, and for the first time since that night ten years ago, I saw fear in my husband’s eye. I looked at the guard who had discovered the package.

“Where did you see this?”

“Inside the palace, your majesty. In the cellar.”

“How did it get there? How did it get past all the security?”

The guard lowered his gaze, and bared his neck, “I cannot say, your majesty.”

I turned around and ran up to my son’s room, happy and relieved to see him sleeping peacefully on his bed. I sighed and creeped into his room, and opened the adjoining door that led to Adela’s room. I rolled my eyes and entered her room when I saw that she was halfway off her bed. I readjusted her and was about to leave when my son called me back.

“Mom, is that you?”

“Yes, baby. You’re awake?” I said, walking over to him and sitting next to him on his bed.

“Yes. I heard you moving around,” he replied.

“Your hearing is amazing. I was being very quiet.”

He rolled his eyes at me, “I am a werewolf, Mom.”

There was also the issue of that. If he would be a werewolf or a vampire. Or if he would be both. We wouldn’t know until he clocked the age of 12, but he always claims he’s a werewolf.

“Did you forget something here again?”

I furrowed my brows in confusion, “What do you mean?”

He sighed. “I’m asking you if you forgot something here. This is your second time here today.”

I looked at him, praying that the panic I felt wasn’t showing on my face.

“Really? I must be getting old. What time did I come here today?”

Leovanni lowered bow head for a moment, and thought back to said time, “The clock read…some minutes past the hour of two.”

I laughed nervously, and stood from his bed. I wasn’t here at that time. I was in my ed, sound asleep. I walked over to his window and looked down the walls of the palace, trying to see if I’ll see any signs of someone scaling the walls. There was none.

“Are you sure, love?”

“Do you now sleepwalk that you don’t remember being here?”

“Check that tone,” I warned him.

“I’m sorry, mom.”

I closed his windows and locked them. “Listen sweetheart, you don’t open this windows. Ever.”

He smiled at me and nodded. I kissed him on the forehead, checked up on Adela one last time. I looked around both their rooms, wondering how whoever got in here was able to. Their chambers was on the same floor as ours. I had insisted, how was the person able to get in here?

More bodies began to pop up all over the palace. Most were children. Human children. All of them holding the same doll in their hands with my son’s name written on them.

“Ten bodies, Leo. Ten bodies.”

“I just feel someone is trying to scare us.”

“Well, their plan is working. I’m scared for my boy.”

“We can’t be too sure that they want Vanni,” he replied.

I gave him a look that implied that he couldn’t be serious and he held up his hands in mock surrender.

“I don’t want him leaving my sight for any reason. If he isn’t with me, he’s with you, or his grandfather or his uncle and aunties.”

“Don’t you think we’re pushing this a little too far.”

“I’d rather push it than have anything happen to my children.”

Leo hated the new arrangement. He has always enjoyed going outside the palace and playing with other children of all species, but thankfully he understood that it was for his own safety, and complied. But even at that, my mind wasn’t settled. The palace security and the secret service weren’t coming up with anything. They haven’t been able to find out who was killing these children and how they were able to get into the palace.

I gasped and woke up from my slumber, startled by whispers in my room. I looked over at Leo to see that he was sleeping soundly and snoring lightly. I heard the whispers again, I turned my head to see that my room was covered in smoke. Red and green smoke. I swore under my breath and tried to get up only to see that I was stuck. I looked down at my body and saw that I wasn’t bound. My body was free, so what was the problem? I looked up and saw three people in my room. They wrote thick robes that were as dark as midnight, and the hood covered their faces such that only their lips shouted. And their robes had a rather weird diagram on it. A star attached to the top of a cross. They were walking around in circles, holding candles and chanting something under their breathe. I looked over at Leo again, how could he be sleeping amidst all these. Was I dreaming?

I looked at the trio again, and saw that they had stopped and were smiling at me. But something about their smile screamed malevolence. I began breathing hard and fast as they began to walk closer to me. I opened my mouth to scream only to find that my mouth alongside the rest of my body couldn’t be used.

The one in front brought out a knife from under her sleeve, and raised it above her head. I closed my eyes and waited for impact, my breathing coming in short, hard pants. I opened my eyes when I didn’t feel anything, only for me to open my eyes and see the knife come down on me. I let out a high pitched scream as the knife seared through my skin and impaled on my body. I writhed around in my bed as they held on to the knife and pushed it in till the hilt. Suddenly, I could move.

Leo jumped from the bed, alert, aware and ready to blood. He turned to me and immediately rushed to my side of the bed. I closed my eyes in pain, and felt tears roll down my cheeks.

“What the fuck are you doing?!”

“I didn’t do anything. They tried to kill me.”

“Who?!” He asked.

I looked around the room and saw that it was just the two of us again, and I was the one holding the knife with both hands.

“What the hell?”

Leo scoops me in his arms, knife still stuck in and blood dropping all over the expensive carpet, and ran out of our room to the hospital located within the palace. I wanted to tell him about the people in our room but he wasn’t listening to me. I could hear his heart rate increase with every step he took, adrenaline was pumping through him.

“Leo…”

“Don’t speak, love…”

I heard gasps and curses as Leo burst into the small hospital. The once quite place suddenly became a buzz of activities. I could feel the sweat break out on my forehead, and my vision was getting blurry. The sounds and sights of everyone was fading, and I knew I didn’t have long. I tried focusing on Le’s face but it wasn’t doing much good. I closed my eyes and sighed.

“Open your eyes, love. Stay with me, please…”

I opened them slowly to find Leo’s worried eyes on me. “I need to tell you something…” My voice was coarse and fading.

“Shh…don’t speak. You’ll tell me everything when you’re better.”

I felt myself slowly lowered down to a soft mattress, and a lot of people instantly surrounded me. Leo was pushed back, and I immediately reached out my hand to him.

“Leo…”

“You’ll be okay, my love…” he replied.

“I need you to vacate the room, your majesty,” I heard the doctor say.

The last thing I heard was the doctor screaming at the nurses to get blood and begin the process, and Leo asking if I was going to be okay.