Pregnant for the Alpha and Vampire

Chapter 7 The Registration Date

The twig snapped behind Furia, and she froze in place with her bare feet sinking into the wet leaves and her heart slamming against her ribs.

Every instinct told her that running was the only option, so she ran without looking back while her torn nightgown caught on branches and her breath came in ragged gasps. She heard something heavy running after her, something that breathed in short bursts and did not call out or announce itself, and the sound pushed her faster through the dark trees until she reached the back gate and slipped through it. She did not stop running until she was inside the kitchen with the door bolted behind her and her back pressed against the wood.

She crept up the back stairs and down the hallway to her room, and she found the door still locked from the outside with Lady Marguerite's key still in the lock. She stared at it with her head spinning because she had been outside, she had run through the forest, she had climbed the gate and crossed the yard and entered the kitchen, but her door was locked and the key was on the outside.

She had no memory of unlocking it or leaving her room in the first place, and that question terrified her more than the thing that had chased her through the trees, so she turned the key and slipped inside before locking the door behind her and sliding down to the floor with her knees drawn up to her chest and her hands shaking.

The morning came too quickly, grey and cold, and a servant banged on her door to tell her that Lady Marguerite wanted her dressed and downstairs within the hour for the registration.

Furia washed her face in the basin and changed into her grey dress, and she looked at her reflection in the cracked mirror where she saw dark circles under her eyes and a bruise on her arm that she did not remember getting. She tucked the locket beneath her dress and went downstairs, and Lady Marguerite was waiting in the front hall with Celeste already dressed in her best day gown and Lord Theron checking his pocket watch by the door.

"You look worse than yesterday," Lady Marguerite said while straightening her own gloves and frowning at Furia's face. "Try to stand up straight and keep your mouth closed because the Council does not need to know about your nighttime adventures."

Furia said nothing, and the three women walked out to the carriage together while Lord Theron followed behind.

The registration was held in the old chapel at the far end of the village square, the same chapel where the pyre stood waiting for cursed girls on the Claiming Night. Families lined up outside with their daughters in their best dresses, and the air was thick with whispers and nervous laughter and the smell of rain that had not yet fallen.

Furia stood in line with Celeste beside her and her parents behind her, and she watched the registration clerks sit behind a long table inside the chapel.

These clerks were humans who held a certain amount of power within the village but were still lower than the night creatures, and they called each girl forward one by one to ask for her name, her age, and her family lineage before writing everything in a large leather book. Off to the side of the room, away from the table, a few silent figures sat in high-backed chairs with their faces hidden in the shadows; these figures held power as well, more than the clerks but still lower than the true vampires and werewolves who ruled the night, though the human villagers had no idea who these observers truly were and paid them no attention.

When Celeste's turn came, she walked forward with her chin lifted and her shoulders back, and she answered every question with a bright smile that made Furia's teeth ache on her behalf. The clerk wrote something down and waved her away, and Celeste returned to Furia's side with a look of triumph that said she had won something Furia did not understand.

Furia's turn came, and she walked forward with her legs unsteady and her hands clasped behind her back.

The moment she stepped in front of the table, a cold wind blew through the chapel and slammed every door and window shut with a sound like thunder, and several girls gasped while others clutched their arms. The human clerks looked confused and exchanged uneasy glances, but the silent figures in the high-backed chairs did not move at all except for the one in the middle who turned his head slightly as if listening to something no one else could hear.

Furia felt the locket grow warm against her chest, but she did not know why the wind had come or what it meant.

The clerk at the table cleared his throat and dipped his quill into an inkpot while staring at her with new eyes. "Name," he said.

"Furia daughter of Theron," she knew better than to use Lord in their presence.

"Age," he asked without looking up.

"18," Furia said while gripping her own fingers tighter behind her back.

The clerk scratched something onto the page, then paused and looked at her directly. "Your mother's name," he said while setting the quill down and folding his hands on the table.

Furia's heart stopped because no one else had been asked that question. She did not have an answer since Lord Theron never spoke of her mother and Lady Marguerite had forbidden anyone from mentioning her name, so she opened her mouth but nothing came out, and the silence stretched between them.

Behind her, she heard Celeste whisper something to their mother, and she heard Lady Marguerite shush her with a sharp hiss.

The clerk wrote something in the book and waved his hand. "Step aside," he said.

Furia stepped aside with her hands shaking and her chest tight, and from the corner of her eye, she saw one of the silent figures in the high-backed chairs lean forward slightly, just for a moment, before settling back into the shadows.

As she walked back toward her family, the whispers followed her like flies drawn to something they did not understand. "There goes the sleepwalker," a woman said while nudging her friend with an elbow, and another voice answered with a laugh, "I hope she does not wander away on the night of the Claiming."

A third voice chimed in while shaking its owner's head, "Imagine the Lords waiting and she is off sleepwalking in the woods," and a woman with a basket on her arm laughed and said, "What if she has bad blood and passes it to the higher ups?" A man scratched his chin and grinned, "Bad blood? She sleepwalks. The only bad blood she has is when she walks into a door."

Furia kept her eyes forward and her back straight, and she bit the inside of her cheek to keep from laughing because the jabs were stupid but not entirely wrong.

Far away from Thornhaven, in the wolf territory, A man woke from a dream with his hand still reaching out as if he was holding something precious. He sat up in his bed and looked at his empty palm, and the memory of the dream came back to him in pieces, a small, glowing light had fit perfectly in his hands, warm and soft and alive, and then the light had squirmed and turned into a puppy that licked his fingers and started playing with his sleeve. The puppy had golden eyes like his, and it had yipped and wagged its tail and bit at the cuff of his shirt until he laughed and picked it up. He pressed his hand against his chest and felt his heart beating too fast, and he did not know what the dream meant but he could not stop smiling.

After the registration ended and the family returned home, Rhys was already waiting by the gate with his hands in his pockets and his eyes on the ground. He did not ask about the registration or speak to anyone, but simply walked inside and disappeared into his room, and no one thought anything of it because Rhys had always been quiet and Furia was still wrapped around her mind to have thoughts about his mood.

That night, after everyone had gone to bed, Rhys walked quietly down the hallway to Furia's door and checked that it was locked by turning the key gently and pulling the handle twice, he pressed his ear against the wood to listen for any sound from inside, and he did this every night now though no one knew and he never told anyone why.

Then he went to his own room and locked his bedroom door from the inside for the very first time in his life, and he pulled a small object wrapped in cloth from his pocket and placed it under his mattress. He lay on his bed with his eyes open and his hands folded on his chest, too scared to tell anyone what he had found and too afraid to close his eyes.