Desirable Trinity

Chapter 19

She is invigorated with his scent.

Marie still has his shirt on, the fabric clinging to her body, entrapping her in the smell of peppermint and the lingering coppery odor of blood that always permeates around him. She found herself hugging her body, the wind from the open door whisking around her bare legs and only enhancing the smell she has grown lusting over. Although the temperature is below twenty, the wind feeling almost like ice, she was shivering not because of that but due to the underlying terror of seeing the man she cannot stop imagining once again.

She knows this plan will work, the closest thing to a perfect idea that she had hoped would be a last resort, but when since the moment it spilled out of her lips it became their only line of action against an otherwise unstoppable creature and his much larger army.

Marie knows she must do this, to stop a monster hell bent on taking her and morphing her for his own perverse plans, and so she stays at the top of the staircase readying herself for this moment. With her hands gripping onto the railing until her knuckles are white, Marie trains her large brown eyes on the opened door below her, unwavering from this spot when guilt bubbles within her stomach.

Why is she feeling shame for the man who has no feelings towards her?

She doesn’t know.

Why does she regret saying this plan so that the man filled with nothing but malice could live?

She does know, but she will never admit.

“Marie…”

She looks over at the shadowed corner, blackness greeting her, but Kenna’s voice all too familiar to her.

“What?”

“I’m scared too.”

“I-I’m….I’m not scared.” Marie can barely utter the words out loud, but once the denial escapes her mouth she cringes at how weak her voice sounds.

“I know he got to you, Marie….” Kenna, at first, says nothing else and waits to hear Marie deny what she had said but when nothing escapes her petite friend’s lips, Kenna murmurs. “It’s okay to feel betrayed, to feel confused, but he….he already took one of my friends. Please don’t let him take you, too…I…I can’t lose anybody else.”

For far too long, the two girls say nothing, letting the entire second floor of the warehouse disappear into silence. Momentarily, Kenna can feel her heart rate accelerate; fear for the outcome of this night pressing down on her as if it is the weight of the world. She leans against the wall, clasping her eyes shut to calm herself from the panic attack waiting to consume her, but rather than feeling her lungs close in and her body pulsate with involuntary twitches; she hears Marie’s response.

“I love you too much to ever leave you, Kenna.”

Kenna opens her eyes, looking past her own tear stained vision and looking at her friend leaning against the stairwell. She always acts tough, making herself a strong presence whilst everybody looks at her, but when shielded by the darkness Kenna lets tears fall from her green eyes and down her long face. She doesn’t try to swat them away, but instead clears her throat, an impish smile growing across her teary face.

“I love you too, Mar.”

Marie turns around, her back no longer to Kenna, and her short friend searches for her face. Marie never sees Kenna, but chooses a part of the darkness in which her friend resides to stare at. She knows Kenna can see her, and so she smiles, allowing Kenna to see the small shred of weakness that Marie is willing to display by allowing two stray tears to fall down her chubby cheeks.

“Don’t let him take me.”

“I’ll die first.”

After Kenna’s proclamation, Marie smiles before turning back towards the opened doors, with their words spoken and their worries eased. Kenna’s part in this is to be unnoticed, unseen by any of the vampires with heightened senses, and so when the two girls hear what appears to be music outside of the warehouse they know their heart to heart is over. There are no lyrics or drums, but a single guitar softly played in the otherwise mute atmosphere.

Marie looks down below her at the four people that stand in the middle of the bottom floor of the warehouse, all of them looking at the open doorway where the source of the music is coming from. The solo is beautiful yet simple, void of anything but the sound of this acoustic guitar, and Marie sees herself sticking her head out further to look at the source of this music. All of them wait impatiently for the war they all know is to occur, but when the guitarist emerges nobody moves.

It is a teenage boy, maybe fifteen or sixteen years old, standing around the same height as Marie. The short kid is holding a large guitar, his fingers dancing around the strings, and his large dark brown eyes observe everybody in the warehouse. We all see the blood pooling down the side of his neck, two fresh bite marks the source of this injury, but nobody advances towards the enthralled and unfortunate child as he observes everybody without words.

When his eyes land on Marie, a smile envelopes his face, landing on the person they all know he was sent in for. Marie cannot help but feel her face soften at the sight of this teenager, his large eyes and rosy cheeks only enhancing the terror of what is to come. This kid is obviously not involved with the world of vampires or wars against Royals, and yet here he stands below Marie.

And then the boy begins to eerily sing, his fingers still strumming the guitar.

“The boy was young,

Tarnished by none.

An innocent soul,

Touched by God.

And then one day,

Two girls ran away.

And for this sin,

The boy shall die.”

Marie already knew what was to happen, the last words of this morbid song hauntingly ringing through her ears, but before she could even utter a yell to plea for his life, disaster already strikes. It happened so fast Marie could barely comprehend it by the time the boy collapsed onto the floor, his body laying face down with blood pooling from his neck. She looks at the source of this boy’s murderer as the barely dressed vampire licks the blood off of her daggered nail that killed the child.

“I really do loathe killing humans myself,” Faline then grins. “But with an introduction such as that, who could resist?”

Seraphina and an unfamiliar Latina woman stand on both sides of Faline, their facial expressions impassive towards the murder, but Faline’s expression is pure delight until she lays her gaze on Evangeline. Like a light switch, the once amused vampire grows a murderous scowl, her cat-like eyes narrowing on Evangeline with pure hatred steaming from every pore. Evangeline, however, remains stoic in her motions and stares Faline down without a single notice to the death of the boy or the hypothetical daggers Faline is sending in her direction.

“You betrayed Niklas, to what, little one?” Faline forces out a laugh steamed from anger. “To prance around with the enemy?”

For a fleeting moment, Faline casts her attention towards Kamren, who has an amused smile on his face. Marie can see, for only a simple second, the fear in Faline’s eyes as she looks at Kamren but before Marie could notice anything further Faline is focused back onto Evangeline with any hint of worry diminished. Casey and Dianna stand on either side of Kamren and Evangeline, their expressions as impassive as Seraphina’s and the woman on the other side of Faline, but Marie can see the way Dianna itches to grab the two curved swords from their holster across her back.

“Now, tsk tsk,” Kamren grins with pure entertainment. “Is that anyway to speak to your Prince?”

Immediately, Marie looks at Kamren, shock displayed across her features. Kamren and Evangeline have informed them of everything involving the Royals and Niklas’s intentions towards them all, but never have either of them cared to tell them of his own status as one of the four princes of this world. Dianna seems unfazed by this, but when Marie sees Casey look at Kamren with the same shock that she is; Marie knows that she and Kenna were not the only ones misinformed.

“Seriously, dude?” Casey cannot help speaking up, and Marie mentally slaps her forehead for his own stupidity that everybody fortunately ignores.

Because Niklas Adair appears.

He strolls into the doorway and gains the attention of everybody in the entire warehouse, his presence one that is never ignored. Marie cannot help but suck in a deep breath when she sees who waltzes in with him, Elizabeth’s newly orange eyes staring up at him with pure adoration as his arm is slung around her slim shoulders. Kamren and the others had informed Marie and Kenna of Elizabeth’s transformation, but as she stares at the woman she has known since childhood she can barely recognize her.

Elizabeth was the essential church girl, singing at the town’s chapel every Sunday morning and Wednesday night, wearing nothing but soft colored outfits that showed almost no skin. Her makeup would never be more than pink lipstick and light eye shadow, and yet Marie is staring a completely different person.

Elizabeth’s dark purple lips are the first thing she notices, the hue matching the tight corset that clings to her slim frame that shows more skin than she has ever seen of her friend, with her orange eyes surrounded with black eyeliner.

She wants to scream to her, to save her, but staring at her childhood friend she knows that it is too late. No matter how badly Marie wishes to save Elizabeth at this moment, she realizes with a stab of pain that there is no salvation for her friend….until Niklas Adair is dead. Elizabeth notices nothing but Niklas, staring up at him and nothing else, but when Marie glances away from her friend she sees the malicious monster’s black eyes focused on her.

The moment their eyes meet, no matter how badly she scolds her own body for it, Marie stops breathing. Her heart cannot stop beating at an unnatural speed, her fists tightening around the railing as his gaze pulls her towards him, and yet every bit of her own self control forces her to look away. When she moves her eyes away from his, her body burns, but quickly subsides by the sound of his voice.

“Faline does not listen to you, Kamren, or your family for that matter.” Marie dares to look at Niklas again, and once she does he sees his arm slung around Faline with a large grin upon his face. “This is what true loyalty looks like.”

“Funny,” Dianna sneers, bringing Niklas’s attention towards her. “I thought this looked like manipulation.”

Niklas’s eyes turn into slits as they glower at Dianna, his obvious hatred towards her making the tension in this warehouse build up. He moves his arm away from Elizabeth’s body, much to her dismay, and he glides towards Dianna. Nobody moves for a moment except for Niklas as he approaches Marie’s friend, and even when Casey tries to move towards Evangeline stops him.

“You can see that with just one eye?” The man calmly coos and Dianna retorts as quick as lightning.

“I seemed to have seen Juliet’s death just fine,” At the mention of her death, Niklas takes a threatening step towards her, causing Dianna to smirk. “And when I finally put a blade through your black heart, this one eye will be enough, I promise you.”

Niklas has Dianna’s throat within his grasp at a moment’s notice, lifting her already injured body up in the air and squeezing the circulation out of her. Marie’s job is to be silent, to use her damsel quality to their advantage, but she fears the worst when Dianna’s hands clasp around his at a futile attempt to free herself. Nobody moves except for Casey, who Evangeline continues to keep at bay, everybody merely watching her friend’s death until one word is spoken to change it all.

“Niklas!”

Marie hadn’t noticed it was her to have spoken until she sees those black eyes on her, paralyzing her once again by his gaze. However, she hadn’t noticed by her distraction what would occur next. With this single moment of vulnerability, Dianna kicks Niklas in the chest with both of her feet, sending him stumbling away from her and freeing herself from his deadly clutches.

At the same exact moment Seraphina blows her cover.

She moves faster than anything Marie has ever seen, whipping around with a sword glinting with dried blood and decapitating Faline’s head without a second for the golden clad vampire to process her own impending death. Faline’s blood splatters across Seraphina’s face, decorating her already red ensemble, and those silver eyes look up at Marie. A forced and strained smile crosses Seraphina’s features before she spins around, cutting off the head of another female vampire.

And so the war begins.