Lucette drew a deep breath of nighttime country air. After two weeks at her grandparents’ house, she found the freedom of country living exhilarating, and although she missed her father and sent him letters nearly every day, she loved being here. Strolling along the dirt path to the barn, she looked up to take in the stars filling the sky above the distant mountains. They shone so much brighter away from the gaslights and candles in the village that surrounded the palace.
Startled by a noise, she pulled a stake from her quiver and quickly spun toward the sound. A rabbit darted across the path.
She shook her head and stifled a laugh. Killer bunnies. How scary. Now that she was living in the relative safety of the country, she needed to learn how to relax. She stashed her stake.
Her mother and grandparents had fallen asleep two hours ago, but Lucette loved taking these short walks at night and saying good night to the barn animals. The only way she’d ever been able to walk alone back at the palace had involved sneaking around, trickery, and often climbing down a rope from her bedroom window. She liked the barn after dark, when the animals were quiet and the only light came from the moonbeams that streamed in between the wooden slats. Besides, if the worst happened and her nights all became solitary, wouldn’t it be better if she got used to it first?
Lucette pulled the barn door open and followed the moonlight inside. A few pregnant sheep waddled over to their pen’s fence, and she reached through the carefully sanded wooden slats to pat their woolly coats. When one nuzzled her hand, she felt a strong urge to pull off her glove to feel its wool, but stopped herself. Whether it was sanded or not, she wasn’t so reckless as to put her bare fingers near wood.
Thunder, her grandfather’s favorite stallion, neighed, and Lucette left the sheep to see what had upset him. Probably a mouse scurrying through the stall, or maybe the horse was jealous she’d been paying so much attention to the sheep. She smirked. That wasn’t likely. In the two weeks she’d been here, Thunder had barely let her get near him, even after her grandfather gave her sugar cubes to tempt him. She’d tried a few times and could only assume the horse was put off by her gloved hands, because he would never accept her sweet gifts.
She stepped in front of Thunder’s stall and he reared up, his hooves rising high. Then he walked forward and put his head over the top slat of the gate.
“Thunder,” she said softly, “what’s wrong?” She spotted the box of sugar cubes and, determined to win the horse’s favor, she pulled off her right glove and tucked it into the waistband of her slacks. She could be careful.
The cool night air felt good on her hand, and taking three sugar cubes, she placed them in her bare palm and held the cubes out to Thunder. But he twisted and kicked and backed up, as if he didn’t even notice her offering. Stubborn horse. She’d seen him gobble sugar from her grandfather’s hand.
Weighing the danger, she used her gloved hand to open his gate. The risk of Thunder barging out of his stall and trampling her seemed lower than the risk of sliding her bare hand between two slats of wood, and she hoped that the closer she got to Thunder, the more she showed that she trusted him, the better the chances that he’d trust her back.
Thunder pawed the straw on the barn floor, then slowly clopped closer. Her heart thumped as he nudged his nose and mouth into her hand and gobbled up the sugar. His hot, moist breath tickled her palm and the thrill sent little chills racing through her. With a shock she realized that she’d almost never felt another’s touch—human or animal—on her bare hand.
Thunder raised his head sharply and kicked behind him.
Startled, Lucette grabbed the stall door—with her right hand!
As she checked her fingers for splinters, her heart raced even faster and harder than Thunder’s hooves when he galloped across an open field, but after finding her fingers prick-free, she replaced her glove, the soft leather suddenly comforting. Thunder kicked again, so she slowly stepped forward, hoping to calm him.
Then she spotted the problem.
A vampire. Thunder reared on his hind legs, and the vampire eyed her from the back wall of the stall. Her heart raced and she pulled out a stake.
The vampire licked his fangs and snarled. “I was planning on horse blood for breakfast, but you will do.”
Thunder kicked again, and the vampire ducked to the side, protecting his head with his arms. Lucette marveled that such a strong, vicious creature felt threatened by a horse. Couldn’t he take Thunder down if he wanted to? She felt sure that he could, and it was up to her to protect the horse, to protect herself.
“Get out of here!” she shouted.
The vampire bared his fangs. “Not before eating. I’m starved. Now, scat before I change my mind about horse and choose girl.”
His words were threatening, but something in his voice sounded less so. But Lucette couldn’t be certain and didn’t plan to die.
Feeling a rush from the danger, she gripped her stake tightly, every muscle in her body ready for battle. Nearly three years of training and she was finally face-to-face with her first vampire, alone. But right now, getting around Thunder seemed a much bigger obstacle than staking her enemy.
As she advanced down the side of the stall, the vampire kept Thunder between them as he moved along the back of the stall and then started up the other side. “Get lost, or I’ll bite you,” he said menacingly.
“You’re the one trespassing,” Lucette said. “Come near me and you’ll die.”
“Murder?” The vampire looked startled. “That’s a bit extreme.”
Lucette narrowed her eyes. “You threatened me first.”
“Not with death,” the vampire said.“I’m just hungry. I haven’t eaten for three days.”
“That’s not my problem.” She shivered. “And no excuse to bite me.”
The vampire shook his head. “If I wanted human blood I would’ve headed for the house, not the barn, don’t you think?” He moved toward Thunder, licking his lips. “Now let me eat.”
“Leave Thunder alone.” She drew back her stake.“If you don’t want human blood, then go back across the mountains and get your blood in Sanguinia.” She didn’t fully believe his claims and, as the only one awake, she had to defend her family, these animals, and herself.
“I’d eat at home if I could.” He looked down, ashamed. “I lost my job. And when the queen came into power, she canceled the blood stamps program, so I have no money to eat. The farm animals in Sanguinia are guarded at night, and if I get caught stealing blood there, I’ll end up in jail. A friend told me if I crossed the mountains it’d be easy to get a free meal in Xandra.”
“You cruel, cruel thing, killing defenseless animals.”
“I don’t kill them.” The vampire looked genuinely offended. “Why would I kill my food source?” He leaned back against the stall’s wall. “If you want cruel, talk to the vampires who drink human blood.”
“How do I know you’re not one?”
He made a face.“No self-respecting vampire bites humans. I’ve never even tasted human blood, but”—he leaned forward and flicked his tongue on his fang—“if you don’t leave me alone, I might try a taste.”
A shiver traced through her, but she refused to show fear. She’d trained to kill vampires, to defend her kingdom, and she wasn’t going to back down. “You’re lying,” she said. “Vampires do drink human blood. Innocent people in my kingdom are attacked every night.”
He shrugged.“There’s money in drinking Xandran blood. Especially around the palace.”
Lucette gasped. “If you want to live, you’d better explain.”
“Not unless you lower your stake.”
“Not a chance.” She raised her stake even higher and she struck her strongest fighting stance.
“Okay, okay.” He held up his hands. “Someone in Sanguinia is paying vampires to attack Xandrans, especially around the palace. They pay extra if you prove you’ve taken blood from a member of the royal family.”
Startled, Lucette accidentally banged the back end of her stake against the wall behind her, and Thunder reared up.
Fear raced through her. Her family was in danger—big danger. This vampire claimed he didn’t plan to bite her, but he had no idea she was the princess. He’d admitted he needed money. This was not the time to show weakness, so to quell her trembling she gripped her stake harder.
To cleanse the fear from her voice, she drew a deep breath before speaking. “How would vampires prove they’ve fed from the royal family?”
“They bring back a blood sample. Whoever’s behind this knows the royals’ scents.”
It was the vampire queen. It had to be. Anyone who would curse a small baby must be insane with anger and hatred. And for some unknown reason, all that malice was targeted at her, at her parents. As if the curse weren’t enough. The vampire queen wanted to see her dead, too.
Suddenly, Lucette felt sick and she bent over, sucking in air, trying to regain her composure, but the smell of horse urine rose up from the straw and sent her into another round of nausea.
Thunder whinnied, and she straightened. But she was too late. The starving vampire had taken advantage of her distraction and attached itself to the vein in Thunder’s neck. Without thinking, she stepped onto an upturned bucket, vaulted over Thunder, and brought her stake down into the vampire’s back.
The vampire slumped to the floor. She kept her stake raised in case her first strike hadn’t hit the vampire’s heart. No chance was this creature going to do any more damage on her grandfather’s estate.
From the barn floor, the vampire shrieked and looked up at her with terror in its eyes. Its body shook violently and its eyes turned back in its head. After a few horrifying seconds, it was dead.
Lucette’s entire body shook. What had she done? Yes, this vampire had threatened to bite her, had bitten her grandfather’s favorite horse, but did that mean it had deserved to die? Had the creature been telling the truth when it claimed it hadn’t ever tasted human blood?
She’d never know the answer because she’d killed it.
She’d killed him. She’d killed a living, breathing creature.
Lucette backed up a few steps and collapsed onto the straw-covered floor. Somehow taking a vampire’s life hadn’t yielded the rush of pride she’d always assumed it would. And now, unsure she could ever kill a vampire again, she knew for certain that her family was in grave danger.
When Lucette’s grandfather came in from burying the vampire, his hair was damp from rinsing himself under the garden pump. Arms crossed, he stood on the other side of the kitchen table. Lucette pulled her feet up onto the chair and hugged her knees. After the danger she’d faced and the horror of taking the vampire’s life, she could deal with whatever scolding she now faced.
Her grandfather spread his large hands on the table. “You should have woken me, Lucette. You should not have taken on that monster by yourself.”
Lucette bit her lip. She’d been thinking the exact same thing, but coming out of her grandfather’s mouth, the words sounded patronizing, so she straightened her back and squared her shoulders. “I’ve trained as a slayer. Have you?”
Her grandfather’s face remained calm, but his eyebrows drew closer together. “Young lady, princess or not”—his voice was deep and low—“you will not talk back to me. Not while you are living in my house.”
Lucette dropped her feet to the floor and her cheeks burned. “I’m sorry.” She kept her eyes on the blue and white checks of the tablecloth. Everything about this place had seemed a paradise, and now it was ruined. Ruined by her. Ruined by that vampire. Ruined by the stink of his death.
Her grandfather pulled out a chair and its legs scraped along the stone floor. He sat opposite her. “Sweetheart, even with your training, going outside alone at night was reckless. You might have been bitten or killed.”
“I thought you said you didn’t get vampires out here.”
“Not ones who go after humans,” he said. “There’s never been a human vampire bite in these parts.” He drew a deep breath. “Foolish as it was, what you did was also brave.” He pressed his big hands into his knees and leaned forward. “I thank you, and Thunder thanks you, too.”
She kept her eyes down.“I don’t think he drank much of Thunder’s blood, but some venom will have been transferred.” Her head snapped up. “Has he been bitten before?”
Her grandfather ran his fingers through his red hair, and a few gray strands sparkled in the early morning light. “No—thankfully. One small mercy is the vampires who attack my animals don’t seem intelligent enough to strike the same animals three times.”
“Or,” Lucette interrupted, “they’re intelligent enough not to kill their food source.”
“Hogwash.” Her grandfather frowned. “Has that father of yours been filling you with his ridiculously liberal ideas about vampires?”
Lucette realized where some of her mother’s misconceptions about vampires had come from. She wasn’t sure of everything, but she did know vampires weren’t dumb creatures. “Gramps, I believe vampires have as much intelligence as we do. In fact, the first time I met one, I mistook him for human.”
Her grandfather stood sharply and his chair skidded back on the floor. “You’ve been cavorting with vampires?”
“Cavorting?” Lucette wasn’t even sure she knew what that meant.
His expression darkened. “I should have insisted that Catia bring you here years ago. With all the trouble he caused in this family, I knew Stefan was not a man who could be trusted to keep his family safe—king or not.”
Anxiety crept through Lucette. As if causing fights between her parents weren’t bad enough, now she was throwing fuel on some feud between Gramps and her father, too. No wonder she hadn’t spent much time with her grandparents before now. Still, she felt an overpowering need to defend her father.
“My father has done a lot to keep me safe. You have no idea. If he’d had his way, I’d have never trained with a slayer or met a vampire. I disobeyed him, lied to him. He’s very protective and knows how to keep his family safe.”
Her grandfather grunted. “Knows how to pit family members against each other is more like it.”
Lucette wanted to ask what he meant, but her mother entered the room.
“Isn’t it a beautiful morning?” She smiled and stretched.“Lucette, I didn’t even hear you get up.” She bent over to kiss her head. “Did you sleep well, darling?”
Sunlight streamed down over Lucette, heating her skin. She sat on a big rock in of one of her grandfather’s fields and her eyes filled with tears as she reread the latest letter from her father. He was no longer begging her to change her mind and come home. In fact, he said he was glad she was away from the palace. The nightly vampire attacks had increased and intensified.
More and more, she believed what that vampire in the barn had said was true. He’d had no reason to lie. He. She shook her head at how she now humanized these creatures. Since that night, she could no longer think of a vampire as an “it.” From what she’d seen, vampires were living, breathing, intelligent creatures, and she’d taken a life—his life. She’d done it to protect Thunder, but still, it hadn’t seemed right. Clearly, she was not cut out to be a real slayer.
She folded the letter and slipped it into the pocket of her loose-fitting slacks. One bonus of living in the country was that no one seemed to mind if she dressed how she wanted, so she chose to dress like the farmhands, keeping her hair in a tight braid. She’d received a few winks and smiles from some of the men who worked on the estate, but even though her mother knew true love might prevent or end the curse, Catia seemed to consider all the men living here unworthy of Lucette. No wonder her mother hadn’t married a local boy.
The thought made Lucette realize she’d never heard the story of how her parents met. Tonight she’d ask her mother, and see if maybe she would be more willing to talk about her late sister than her grandmother had been. Right now, Lucette planned to take a long walk up to the hills and visit the shepherds guarding the grazing sheep. She’d been here nearly a month now, and it was time to make friends.
Her breathing grew heavier as she got higher into the hills, and she inhaled deeply the scents of the grasses and wildflowers that grew in the fields. Her grandfather had shown her drawings and pressed versions of every species that had prickles. He’d done his best to remove them all from the property, but as he’d told her, it was impossible to rid the countryside of every raspberry, every thistle, every wild rosebush.
Reaching the top of a hill, Lucette stretched her gloved hands up to the bright blue sky. Not even the horror of killing that vampire, or the reports of attacks in her father’s letter, could dampen her fabulous mood on a day like today. She shielded her eyes with her hand and spotted the flock down in the valley, where some of the sheep were drinking from the creek. The shepherds sat atop the hill opposite her, and she waved, but they clearly didn’t see her because they didn’t wave back.
Filled with fresh air, sunshine, and joy, she started down the hill, then had a wild idea to roll down it. As long as she made sure her gloves were on tightly, what could it hurt? Excitement coursed through her as she stopped and sat on the grass. It might be slightly reckless, but really, what could happen? She tugged on her gloves and tightened the ties that kept them snug around her wrists, then she turned to the side, stretched out, and let herself roll.
“Whee!” The grass rushed past her with each revolution. She bumped her knee on a rock, then another dug into her back, but as long as her fingers remained prick-free, a few small bruises would be worth it for this exhilarating fun.
Slowing near the bottom, she stuck out her arms and legs to stop herself and then sprang to her feet. “That was fabulous!” she yelled at the top of her lungs. The sheep scattered at the startling sound of her voice. Looking up, she saw that the shepherds had spotted her now. She waved at them, and one waved back.
A lamb wandered toward her on wobbly legs, so she crouched down and reached toward it. Another sheep bent to grab a mouthful of grass, and Lucette realized that food might be a good way to lure the lamb. She pulled a handful of grass and clover and held it out for the animal.
She remained patient, and soon the lamb was in front of her, munching. Feeling a smile spread through her entire body, Lucette looked into the lamb’s eyes and stroked its wool. Maybe killing that vampire had been justified if she’d protected this sweet animal from bites.
She bent down and buried her nose in the lamb’s wool—it was so soft—and another overwhelming desire took hold. She wanted to touch the wool—just once, just for a second—without her gloves. Just for a moment, she wanted to trace her fingers through the wool and pretend she was normal.
Her heart rate increased as she used her teeth to tug on the strap that held her glove tight. Excitement flowed through her as she used her left hand to slowly pull the glove from her right, then set it on her leg, careful not to let a stray piece of grass get inside. It would be ironic if, after removing her glove to pet a sheep, she pricked her finger on a blade of grass that had sneaked inside her glove.
She shook her head—she worried too much—and stretched her fingers toward the lamb, now happily sitting in the grass near her feet. She touched the wool between its ears. It was so soft and almost oily, better than she’d ever imagined it would feel.
She ran her fingers lightly over the animal and the lamb shook as if she’d tickled it, so she grew braver and dug her fingers right down into the wool to the lamb’s warm skin.
Her finger struck something hard. The lamb jumped up, and she reached to calm it before looking down at her bleeding finger in horror. It was the last thing she saw.