Page 36 of Married to the Vampire Prince

“Everything’s good,” she finally said, and my shoulders relaxed. “You got all the answers right.”

“Great,” I beamed.

“That’s excellent,” Silas pitched in too.

The praise coming from my husband made my cheeks heat up.

“We can move on to the next part of the material then,” Ruth said. “Finally you will learn about the battle that Lord William mentioned.”

I sighed. I grabbed a clean sheet of paper for taking notes and gave Ruth a firm look.

“I’m ready,” I said.

During the next hour Ruth told me about a war much older than me, and I wrote down every detail.

Next came my embroidery and etiquette lessons. I was praised by my teachers for making quick progress.

When the sun rose and the servants closed the curtains, Silas and I retired to my bedroom. We slept little again that night, unable to let go of each other or to resist being as close as possible.

I wasn’t afraid of my husband anymore.

Chapter Fourteen

Silas

It took me a week and a half to prepare Estone for war. Together with Luke I informed the Heads of the Houses to ready themselves to march on Rosworth. Of course, not every House wanted to comply with my declaration of war. There were some households who insisted that they had done favors for my father and been promised favors in return – and they wanted to call in those favors by abstaining from battle now.

However, I remained adamant about the need for their participation. I needed every able-bodied vampire ready to protect our country. Begrudgingly, all the Houses eventually agreed to take part in the war.

Luke and I organized supply lines and worked out strategies for the coming week. Soon we were marching to the Rosworth border, supported by supply convoys. We were a force of a thousand vampires, armed with oak stakes, ready to strike at the hearts of our enemies.

Estone had to be protected at all costs.

As I left Grace behind in the castle, my heart felt heavy. I didn’t want to part ways with her, but she would be safest staying in the capital. I couldn’t bring her to the battlefield. She was a fragile human with no fighting skills. There was no place for her in a vampire war.

I hoped the war wouldn’t go on for a long time, but I knew that idea was a pipe dream. No matter how long I was needed on the battlefield though, I swore to myself that I would visit the castle from time to time. With my vampire speed, traveling toand from the border and the royal palace wouldn’t be difficult or take long at all.

When the day to march to the Rosworth border finally came, I pushed all thoughts of Grace aside, focusing only on the task at hand. As the army’s general, I had to put all of my mental energy on the war. I couldn’t be distracted.

The supply convoy slowed down our march, but we finally arrived at the border after traveling on foot for four days.

Rosworth’s army was already waiting for us.

A battle broke out immediately, our forces clashing on the plain between our two countries. I commanded the main group of vampires while Luke took over the left flank. The right flank was under command of the representative of one of the Houses, Thomas, who had fought against Rosworth with us in the previous war twenty years ago. I trusted him to serve well again.

As I was acting as our General, I didn’t go out onto the battlefield myself. Instead, I observed the fighting from a nearby hill and issued my orders as needed. I was on full alert. I couldn’t let Rosworth defeat us in the first battle; such a loss would seriously harm our morale.

However, I quickly discovered that defeating them was nearly impossible unfortunately. The fight continued for hours, both our sides too evenly matched for one to win or lose. The fight was a perfect stalemate. Our side gained advantage for an hour, pushing harder against Rosworth’s force, but just when I felt a glimmer of hope that we would win, Rosworth made another push against us and regained their equal position.

Finally, after the battle had gone on for eight hours, I issued the command to retreat.

We fell back into the woods in Estone, and Rosworth didn’t follow. They understood our forces were at a stalemate and now needed a rest and chance to recuperate.

When we were safe again, I addressed Luke, Thomas and the heads of the Houses that had returned from the battlefield. “Rosworth forces and ours are too evenly matched. I have no idea how we can defeat them since we have the same strength and numbers.”

My words made the atmosphere in the tent where we’d gathered grim. A large map of the region was lying on a table in the middle of the shelter, several pins and pawns scattered around the border between Estone and Rosworth.

We strategized for a few good hours but still couldn’t come up with a suitable conclusion for how to break the stalemate.

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