Total pages in book: 85
Estimated words: 79692 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 398(@200wpm)___ 319(@250wpm)___ 266(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 79692 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 398(@200wpm)___ 319(@250wpm)___ 266(@300wpm)
He forced himself to shrug, to turn away once more and move towards the door. “I’m going to check on what your cousin is up to—-”
“Look at me,” she begged.
He reached for the knob.
Behind him, Calys said brokenly, “You don’t really care, do you? You just want this to be over. You’ve lost interest in me because I’m no longer a challenge. I thought I was different, but I wasn’t. After everything, I’m just l-like a-all t-those w-women. You took them and left them.” She choked on a sob. “I’m right, aren’t I? Aren’t I?”
His hand shook as he turned the knob. It took everything in Alejandro not to say a word, not to look back, not to stop moving until he had shut the door behind him. The last thing he heard was Calys crying.
Warriors never cried, she liked to say, but she was crying now. Crying so damn hard it was as if she could no longer breathe.
God. God. God. Make her stop crying. Make her realize what he knew.
It was safer this way.
Part Three
Chapter One
Once upon a time, there lived a race of winged creatures. Their wings were every shade of the rainbow, and they could soar so high into the skies it was as if they could knock on heaven’s doors. These creatures were known as Souri, and the first of them were angels sent to earth and made mortal. They lived quietly among themselves, deep in the forests and high in the mountains, so quietly they faded into myths and legends.
The innocent and the just, wise humans and loyal non-humans, all of them eventually forgot about the Souris' existence. But not the damned. Those with evil in their hearts circled their land day and night, waiting, skulking, knowing there would come a time they would have a chance to destroy and desecrate the Souris' idyllic existence.
One day, that moment came.
Jealousy had filled the heart of the King, for he thought his people loved the Queen more than him. Blinded by greed, he became vulnerable to the insidious whispers from the dark. Day by day, his angelic blood was poisoned by his own thoughts until there was no trace of humanity left in him. And so amidst beauty that only the gentle-hearted could create, the King turned into the first Vidange. Like the Souris, this new, soulless race was not immortal, possessing wings a thousand times more powerful than the largest and fiercest bird. But unlike the Souris, they were not heaven’s children. They were from below, and forever they would dwell underneath the earth.
Half of the angels’ offspring became Vidange, seduced by promises of power and wealth by the King. The other half remained loyal to the Queen, their hearts grieving for the loss of innocence in their land.
A battle then ensued, and no part of the earth was saved from it. Blood rained down from dueling warriors, fires razed fields that once bloomed with the rarest flowers, and dead bodies drifted among lakes that had turned crimson from azure.
Up in the tower, a young Prince was able to defend his beloved mother by killing his own sire. But alas, it was not the end of their cursed days. The King’s first act as Vidange was to strike an unholy alliance with the soulless. Guided by his traitorous words, vampires and the sin eaters were able to find the chamber where three precious babes rested. They took all three, knowing one of these infant girls was the Queen’s beloved daughter.
It was their hope that they could one day force the Queen’s daughter to mate with the King’s bastard son, a Vidange like him. Such an offspring would have great power, perhaps enough to rule the world.
But fate intervened. Tormented by his guilty conscience, a Souri who had not yet completely lost his soul and become Vidange sought atonement. At the cost of his life, he was able to escape the Vidange and hide the babies in the mortal world.
One of those babes was Calys.
When the Queen discovered her princess living among the panthers, she chose to love her daughter from afar, knowing that Calys’ life was safer with the shifters. She had hoped that Calys, despite being known as The Human Monster, would be able to lead a life blessed with peace and happiness. But it was not to be.
Vampires had found their way into Calys’ world, and sooner or later, they would know that she was no human monster. She was more, and when they realized who she was, they would come for her.
CALYS
It was the fifth day for the Panthera to gather, this time to hear the sides of both accuser and the accused. The room was vast and airy, large windows allowing rays of sunlight to turn the wood-paneled walls a darker shade of brown. The room was the largest in the inn, where locals and guests mingled for town festivities. But this morning was completely different, with one person’s sentence the only thing to be celebrated.