Chapter 32: Mary
The further I entered into the forest, the more quiet it got. It made me nervous, I wasn’t naive, I knew
there were monsters in these woods, monsters more evil than the ones who pretended to be in touch
with their humanity. These monsters were rouges, they’d lost all traces of their humanity to the beasts
inside of them. I walked stealthily through the woods, hoping to not attract to much attention. I cursed
when my foot landed on a stick, making a loud cracking sound. The birds in the trees took off, flying
through the skies. I glanced around at my surroundings, holding my breath, hoping that no other animal
had heard the sound.
I let out a sigh of relief, no one had discovered my presence, at least not yet. I continued to trek through
the forest, the trees getting denser, making the forest darker. I knew that soon I would have to stop and
make camp somewhere, unlike the supernatural creatures that roamed this forest, I couldn’t see at night.
I knew that I would need to find somewhere relatively safe to camp through the night. I looked at the
trees around me, trying to find one that I could climb into, the further away I was from the forest floor the
safer I would be. While looking up at the trees a rancid smell assaulted my nose. I grimaced, trying not to
vomit, the smell growing stronger with each step I took. I turned and looked behind me, thinking about
the safety of Nikolai’s castle, but I knew that if I headed back and didn’t revenge my family, that I would
never forgive myself, and I would grow to resent Nikolai, for doing nothing to stop their deaths. While
Nikolai hadn’t taken part in their killings, he was as guiltily as the hunters. Everyone knew hunters
Follow on NovᴇlEnglish.nᴇtexisted and that they ransacked human villages, taking the young and the woman; murdering the men.
Nikolai had the power to stop them, but he didn’t instead he turned a blind eye to it all, allowing the
slaughtering of my kind to continue through out the years. But somehow through our connection, I had
forgiven Nikolai for the part he had played in the deaths of my family, he had showed me his kind and
loving side, he had one me over, and I could feel myself falling…No, I knew that I had fallen in love with.
As I continued walking, my thoughts still on Nikolai, I tripped over a large uprooted tree branch, falling
forward, and rolling down a cliff, I hadn’t noticed, how I was able to fall without hitting a rock or a tree, I
didn’t know, perhaps the Gods had finally decided to watch out for me, it was about damn time. “Fuck.” I
hiss as I try to get up, my ankle throbbing with pain. It hurt to put any pressure on it, I looked down at my
ankle, it was swollen, and already turning a bluish shade of purple, the rest of my body, surprisingly ache
free. I took in my surroundings to see how safe I’d be if and noticed that I was standing in the middle of a
clearing, there were no trees in sight. “Perfect,” I thought to myself, “Just fucking perfect.”
I stood up and hobbled further into clearing, hoping by some miracle, there would be an old underground
bunker somewhere that I could hide in. Before the humans were captured and made into slaves, we
would hide as best as we could from the predators. Underground bunkers were common in wooded
areas, being under the ground kept you relatively safe, and they were easier for people for families to live
in. As I approached the middle of the clearing, I was once again assaulted by the rancid smell, except for
it was stronger now. I tried to hold my breath as I felt the urge to puke, looking everywhere around me to
see where the smell was coming from. It didn’t take me long to locate it. Less than a hundred feet ahead
of me there was a corpse, rotten and decaying, the body swollen from how long it had been left in the
sun. The corpse was that of a bear shifter, halfway through their shift.
I could just barely make out the the snout in place of where a nose would have been, and their hands
that had long sharp claws. What being was quick and strong enough to kill a bear shifter mid shift.
Shifters shifted quickly, it was very rare to ever find the body of one that was partially shifted, unless they
died from old age. I walked closer to the body, needed to inspect it to see just exactly what I would be up
against. The first thing I noticed as I approached the body, was that the chest cavity had been torn open,
where the heart should be, there was nothing. Next I noticed the shriveled skin, like he had been lying
there in the sun to long, and the sun had absorbed all of the liquid in his body. The body didn’t look like it
had been there very long, maybe a week at most. I grabbed a jagged rock from
und, wanting to see if my suspicions about what the killer was, was correct. I shivered, terrified that I
would be right. I sliced into the man’s body arm, my heart skipping a beat, there was no blood coming
from the wound. I sliced further through the skin, hoping that the blood wasn’t flowing because his heart
had stopped beating. I sliced all the way down past the subcutaneous tissue, through the muscle, and
down to the bone, there was still no blood. The killer was a ghoul, a rouge vampire, who had lost their
humanity. A creature that didn’t hesitate to kill on sight, draining its victim completely, ripping the heart
from the victim’s chest, and chomping into it like it was the best cut of steak that they had ever had. I felt
myself starting to panic, my vision going in and out. I couldn’t afford to pass out now; if I did I would never
Follow on Novᴇl-Onlinᴇ.cᴏmwake up again.
NIKOLAI
We had been searching all night through the woods, with no luck on finding Mary. The trackers couldn’t
scent her anywhere. The forest was semi safe during the day, at night a human didn’t have a chance of
surviving.
“Your majesty,” Gregor called, approaching me with caution. “We haven’t found any trace of Lady Mary in
these woods, are you sure she went this way?”
I felt myself losing control, my vampire side becoming more and more unstable. He didn’t want to hide
anymore, he wanted to come to the surface and show the entire world how much of a monster we
“I don’t fucking know where she went!” I roared at Gregor, “I entrusted her safety to you! You were
suppose to be watching her, you should know where she went.” I growled out, flashing my fangs.
Gregory’s legs began to shake, I could scent his fear. It was like a bright light beckoning my monster out.
He wanted to crush every single person that stood in the way of him and his mate. I took deep calming
breaths as I calmed my monster down, knowing that if I lost control now that I would never find Mary.
Gregor was stammering some sort of apology but I wasn’t listening. The wind had picked up, and I
inhaled the sweet intoxicating scent of my mate
“She’s here, she’s in these woods, No one leaves these woods until she is found.” I bellowed letting my
voice echo out, so my men could hear my command. Shortly after scenting her, I felt something through
the mate bound, a feeling that made my heart stop beating. Mary was terrified, I could feel her panic, I
could feel her fighting her instinct to panic about whatever it was that had scared her.
“I’m coming love,” I whispered hoping she could hear me through the link. “I’ll protect you always,