Page 20 of Of Spindles and Nightfall
“J-Joy.”
“Joy, look at Aryana. She is a vampire. She is not your friend, she was never your friend. She led me here. I would never have noticed your pathetically insignificant existence until this moment.”
“Joy, I’m sorry. I never meant to hurt you. I only wanted to live my own life…I…I…” What was she saying? Whether or not she meant to, she had brought Uncle here. And he wouldn’t have noticed her if it weren’t for Aryana. She uttered a helpless cry as she strained against the ropes digging into her arms.
King Fallor smiled, watching Aryana struggle. He looked down at Joy, who stood trembling in his grasp. “I’m going to end your life now. Is there anything you’d like to say?”
The scent of Joy’s fear became more poignant. Aryana swallowed the wetness coating her mouth. Fighting the way her body yearned torespond. With greater force, she tugged against her restraints. She had to free Joy. She had to get her to safety.
“Terrance! Terrance, help me!” Joy cried at the top of her lungs. She fought King Fallor’s grasp, twisting and crying, trying to escape.
“Terrance!” Joy bellowed.
Seconds later, Aryana heard him come barreling through the trees. He came to a standstill as he took in the scene: Aryana tied to the tree, Joy in the clutches of her uncle. “What is going on here? Let them go!”
Other vampires surrounded him and he struggled as they subdued him, punching him in the stomach, then shoving him into the dirt, holding him down.
Aryana’s heart beat out of control. This couldn’t be happening.
“And then there were two,” King Fallor said.
“Uncle, Uncle. Stop, I beg of you.” Her throat clogged and tears streamed over her cheeks, but she didn’t care. “I‘ll go back. I’ll do whatever you want me to do. I swear, I swear, please, leave them alone.”
“You’ll return with me. You’ll do exactly as I say.”
Aryana glanced at her friends. King Fallor had Joy half lifted off the ground and she was sobbing. Terrance still struggled against those who held him captive, though he had to realize by this point it was useless. Tears dripped from Aryana’s chin, wet and crimson. She’d do anything to save them. “Yes. Yes.”
The king nodded as if it were settled. “Tie the man to a tree,” he said to the guard. He drew Joy closer, his incisors dipping beneath his lips. “I’m still thirsty.”
Joy’s scream and Terrance’sroar of rage penetrated right to Aryana’s bones. And then King Fallor sank his teeth into Joy’s neck and a second later, her screams stopped as her body fell limp in his hands.
No. No. No. “Uncle, Uncle. STOP! We had a deal! WE HAD A DEAL!”
But her cries and Terrance’s struggle against his vampire captors as they bound him to a tree went unheard. King Fallor gripped Joy’s helpless body closer, his grasp tightening on her still form dangling like a rag doll in his clutches. Aryana detected his pounding pulse, his moans of pleasure as he drew her blood ever through her veins. She smelled Terrance’s rage and fear flowing from him as if from a river.
And she heard Joy’s heart slow.
Struggle.
And stutter to a stop.
King Fallor dropped her body into the dirt, her eyes unseeing, devoid of that spark that made her Joy. “What a lovely little meal.” He looked at his guard. “Leave the man. Destroy the town. Kill everyone. When you’re done, unbind the princess.”
“No, Uncle, please,” Aryana pleaded in a strangled whisper.
“This is what happens when you disappoint me. I love you so much that I had to punish you, to teach you a lesson. Remember that.” And without another word, he disappeared into the trees.
Terrance stared at his sister’s pale, unmoving form, a look of utter devastation on his face. “Sh-she’s gone.”
“Terrance,” Aryana sobbed, her tears mixing with the blood on her face. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
He slowly, painfully, dragged his eyes from his lifeless sister to meet Aryana’s gaze. She sucked in a breath…it was as if something had crushed the light out of him, leaving him as empty and soulless as Joy’s unmoving corpse.
Then a spark of icy rage filled the void. What else could fill such emptiness?
“Don’t speak to me, vampire,” he growled, the cold, unforgiving pull of his mouth twisting his expression. “This is your fault. I should have let you rot where I found you.” He spat in the grass. “You are a devil from hell and I wish I had left you to die.”
The words were a brand on Aryana’s skin. Blood dripped from her chin, was tangy in her mouth. Devil. Demon. That was what she was. She would never be anything else.
