Then, she lifts her head slightly, pushing back her hood to reveal herself.
"I was right. It's you, Draculaura." My voice is low, edged with something unreadable. "How could I not recognize your scent?"
But before I can react, she moves a sudden swift. Her arms wrap around me in an embrace that feels too familiar, too bold.
"You don't seem to miss me, though," she murmurs, her voice laced with quiet disappointment.
I do not return the gesture. Instead, I pry her off me, hands firm but not rough. "What do you think you're doing here? In the human realm... and in my house, without so much as a warning?"
She steps back, unfazed, and returns to the couch, sinking into it like she owns the place. "I knew it," she sighs. "You do not miss me."
I exhale sharply. "That's not the point."
"But I am here." She tilts her head, lips curling slightly. "I came to keep you company."
"I do not need your company." My voice is flat and dismissive.
Before I can finish, she cuts in... seamlessly, as if she already knows what I'm about to say.
"I know, I know." She waves a hand. "You don't need my company because you have humans around you. Human women." Her tone is teasing, but there's something sharp beneath it.
Vampires aren't supposed to read each other's minds... our thoughts are our own. Only humans are weak enough to be pried open. But I am not like other vampires. I can do it. With effort, with time. though it's a frustrating, tedious process that I rarely bother with.
Yet Draculaura doesn't need such abilities. She's always been perceptive, knowing exactly which words will press the right buttons.
She leans back, crossing her arms. "You were about to say I'll be a nuisance, weren't you? That I cause trouble wherever I go?" I do not respond.
She exhales a slow, exaggerated sigh. "Never mind, heartbreaker."
A smirk plays at the edge of her lips, but it doesn't reach her eyes.
Then, as if the thought just occurred to her, she asks, "Is there any woman you're currently seeing?"
Her gaze is unreadable, but I know better. There's always meaning behind her questions.
---
But I brush past her question, ignoring the way her gaze lingers. Instead, I ask, "You still haven't answered me, Draculaura. How did you get here? You aren't strong enough to."
Something flickers in her eyes... hesitation. She's hiding something, something that doesn't quite make it past her lips.
"It's because I miss you, Duvall," she blurts out. But almost immediately, she straightens, shifting her tone as if to cover up her own sentimentality. "We miss you," she corrects. "It's been almost a week since you left. You seem to like the human world. Love them more than us. Right?"
Her words are laced with something unspoken, something I do not have the patience to unravel.
"Draculaura," I exhale, rubbing the bridge of my nose. "It's barely been twenty-four hours since I've been here."
But as soon as I say it, I realize the mistake. The time difference.
I fall silent, momentarily at a loss for words.
She studies me, then speaks again. "I turned a full-grown vampire... three days ago." Her voice is steady, but there's an edge to it. "I waited for you. Even stopped the celebration, thinking you would come. But you didn't."
She leans forward slightly. "So I had to come to you."
In my mind, I know she's right.
I inhale deeply. "I'm sorry." The apology comes out heavier than I expect. And this time, I mean it.
A beat of silence passes before something else resurfaces in my thoughts... something I should have done but didn't.
There was a spell Clawden once taught me. She had said I would need it someday.
A time spell.
I've used it before. Every time I crossed between realms, I cast it to ensure time blended smoothly.
But this time, I had been in too much of a rush. Too consumed by her... the human who now possesses Clawden's pendant. Too curious that I had forgotten to cast it.
---
Draculaura has always been in my life.
She liked me once... or maybe she still does. But to me, she has always been like a sister. Someone I was bound to, not by choice, but by a promise.
Her parents died in battle, their bodies barely cold before they made me swear to protect their daughter with their last breath. She was young then, barely a century old. Fragile. A delicate thing compared to what she is now.
I, on the other hand, was already four thousand years old. A newly crowned leader of my clan, burdened with power and the weight of too many expectations.
Draculaura was reckless even then. Stubborn. She always believed she was doing the right thing, no matter the consequences. And I... I was always the one cleaning up after her. Talking sense into her. Watching as she ignored every warning I gave, as if my words were nothing more than passing wind.
She used to be so small. So cute, even, in a way that made it impossible to stay angry at her. But now… she is the exact opposite of who she once was.
What changed her? I still do not know.
I think back to the moment I first stepped out of my realm, three thousand years ago.
Little did I know then that when a vampire is on the brink of becoming a full-grown adult, they are given a rare privilege to step outside the boundaries of our world. It happens only once in a lifetime, a fleeting moment of freedom before reality pulls you back. It lasts only a week.
That was when I met Clawden.
She was the one who defied all logic. A halfbreed. A witch's daughter who never waited for fate's permission to meet me. She bent the rules of the world itself, casting her magic, stepping through the veil and appearing before me whenever she pleased.
Draculaura was nothing like Clawden.
Draculaura came to me, yes, but never in the same way. Never with the same fire, the same reckless devotion. She was simply there always lingering in the background, always finding a way to be close.
But now, as she sits on my couch, her legs crossed, andhood pulled low over her face, I can't shake the feeling that she is hiding something. Something big.
Something I won't let her leave without telling me.
---
Before I can say a word, she moves. In a blink, she's above me... too fast, and close.
"Let me stay in the human world," she insists, her voice urgent and her breath unsteady. "I promise I won't be a problem. What you're afraid of... it won't happen."
Her hands grip my collar...not roughly, but with desperate urgency. "You have the power to allow it," she pleads, her crimson eyes burning into mine. "Please, Duvall."
I exhale slowly, trying to push down the unease curling in my chest. It's not just about her. If Draculaura stays, others will want the same forbidden freedom. They aren't like me, they're too weak to resist the hunger. A single taste of human blood would unravel them.
Yes, human blood sharpens our instincts and magnifies our power. But it also drags us into something darker, something uncontrollable. And if the victim lives, the bond is unbreakable—a chain that turns them into servants, hunters, slaves to the hunger. A cycle of chaos I cannot allow.
But then... there it is again. That strange, pulsing energy radiating from her. I sensed it before, subtle and unclear, but now…I know.
"Draculaura…" I begin.
She cuts me off before I can speak. "I know you won't allow it. You want to protect me. You'd tell me to go back... and you'd even escort me yourself," she says with a knowing smile as she tilts her head. Then she steps back, her expression unreadable. "So, I did the needful instead."
The words hit me like a cold wave. A murmur escapes me... a confirmation of my darkest suspicions. No. No, it cannot be.
My jaw tightens. "Tell me you didn't..."
"It's done," she whispers softly, regretfully. "I'm sorry, Duvall. I know it isn't what you wanted. But I've made up my mind. I belong here now."
A sharp silence falls between us. I stare at her, my pulse steady but cold, and my mind racing with grim possibilities. There is only one way a vampire can remain here without permission... she has tasted the human blood.
I can almost feel the dark power coiling beneath her skin, humming in her veins, tangible in the air between us. I swallow the anger rising in my throat and force my voice to remain calm.
"Who?"
She doesn't answer. I take a step forward, locking my gaze onto hers. "Who did you take, Draculaura? is the person dead?"
I silently beg her to say yes... say it's over. say you didn't leave someone alive to suffer the consequences. But she only stares at me. And in that moment, something shifts.
Her pupils dilate, her lips part slightly as if she's about to answer... but then, suddenly, she stiffens. Her breathing slows, and her eyes glaze over. "Draculaura?" I call, panic rising. yet nothing. She is far away now, as if slipping somewhere beyond my reach. Her body wavers, caught in an invisible current.
"Draculaura!" I shout, desperation edging my voice. But she doesn't hear me, as if she can't hear me anymore.
The silence deepens, and the air around us deepens...
***