Queen Velorina

Chapter 2

The death of a Queen.

Less than three months after the ball for the 'hand in hand' treaty, one of the borders to the coven was raided. Three months after that Velorina was standing at the front of funeral, a black dress down to her ankles with only two inch heels as it was customary. She stared out at all the faces that showed up for her mothers funeral, each face represented someone that her mother had fought to make happy. Her mother, the now late Queen Tatiana, had been completely set on keeping the coven safe and happy. Velorina's whole life she heard how their kingdom was nothing without the coven. The coven was everything. She only knew of grand balls and feasts so amazing they would make even a vampire's mouth water, her mother had big plans for the coven and the treaty was supposed to be the begining of those plans. Standing in front of the many high ranked individuals, Velorina was overwhelmed with several emotions. She felt her grief hit her hard, but with it was a protective feeling. The protectivness was the main emotion that overwhelmed her, tears stung her eyes as she blinked them away quickly in an attempt to keep them from falling.

"My coven..." She stood up straighter and steadied her voice as much as she possibly could, she knew it was now her turn to protect the coven. "In memory of the late Queen, my mother, I will give my life for this coven. I will protect this coven for her." She stopped talking and bowed to the people, many gasped at such a show of respect from the new Queen. Velorina stood up her tears finally wining the fight and spilled from her now blood red eyes, she never wiped a single one away as she walked towards the doors of the chapel. She held her head down trying to keep herself as put together as possible, she knew it wouldn't be a good thing to show weakness in front of her coven. It was time to shove the grief down and go to work, she was young and there was many things that needed to be done in preparation of the raided borders and many more things she needed to learn about the still fresh treaty. Her young age made things more difficult, her new found feelings for the slightly older prince also put her title at jeopardy. She needed to see the Coven and only the Coven or to atleast find a balance between both her Coven nd the prince. Once outside the doors of the chapel she walked straight to her awaiting car and got in, she closed the door and the car drove off leaving behind the funeral and with it her childhood. The hour long drive back to the castle gave Velorina enough time to dry her eyes place a composed look on her face. For a moment she was composed, she was ready to sit down and pick up her books. She was ready to learn how to handle the raiders, but she was also ready to curl under her blankets and cry herself to sleep.

The car pulled up in front of the castle, another car was there waiting for her to return. A frown crawled onto her face as she opened the car door not recgonizing the car, when she got out of her car the door to the other car opened and out stepped the northern pack's prince. Velorina's frown quickly changed from surprise to excitement then just as quickly her grief overwhelmed her again, the prince moved to grab Velorina before she could hit the ground. Her tears started to spill just as quickly as she had stopped them just minutes before only this time came the sobs and whines of pain, she was lost in a word that didn't make sense and she didn't have anyone to point out the correct way.

"Alaric I can't do this! Im not even officially fourteen yet! I am the youngest Queen in all of our history!" The words spilled from her lips just as fast as the tears did from her eyes, but Alaric never moved and never spoke a word. He stood still and held Velorina up as she poured her heart out to him, after an hour of her crying he finally scooped her up and carried her into the castle. He set her down and took a step away from her, a stern look was now on his face in place of the sympthatic look he had before. He inhaled sharply, but never took his eyes off her.

"My parents are going to call war against your coven." Velroina's mouth dropped open, the tears never stopped but a fear started to crawl into her body. It was paralyzing. She couldn't move and it was proving even more difficult to think, she had only been Queen for a matter of days and now she was faced with the possibly biggest war of their entire history. Velorina took a staggering step backwards as her eyes burned a hole into Aleric, the prince tried to reach his arms out towards her but she shoved them away. "Velorina please, it's not me. I don't get a vote at the round table. I do not see a need to make your coven slaves."

Velorina jumped back at the word, her heart broke at the thought of the world her mother worked so hard for crumbling at the hands of dogs. She stepped towards the main doors to the castle, putting herself between Aleric and her coven. A dangerous thought ran through her head, but she knew it would indeed call war. 'If I kill him now, place his head on a stake, it would be a warning to not cross my borders again.' Her eyes widened as a single word from that thought screamed at her. Again.

"Was it your people who crossed my borders?!" She snapped at Aleric, as she took a step closer to the beautiful wooden doors of her castle. A pain shot through her gums as her anger and fear mixed together, she could feel her fangs pierce her bottom lip as Aleric lowered his head. They stayed like this for a while, the minutes passed by slowly. Velorina could hear each of Aleric's heartbeats, each one signaling a new second passing. She could feel his breaths, each was long and slow. He was trying to calm himself, was it worry or fear or anger? Velorina watched him, after the six months she had more or less learned to read him. Everyone around her was screaming that it was love, that they were the chosen mixed mates but she doubted it. She didn't feel the love, she felt nothing but obligation towards Aleric. She had been willing to become his Queen, but now as the question hung in the air waiting to be answered she felt hatred.

"Yes. It was my people, my father gave the order." His words were a slap in the face, the 'hand in hand' treaty had just been oficaiated and the King of the northern pack dared to break it? Velorina's head was pounding, she didn't know who to look towards or who to trust anymore. "But you must listen to Velorina... My love, you have a mole. A rat in your territory, someone who is handing out information to my father."

His words only made her need to cry stronger, now her tears spilled even faster than before. A sickening hiss pushed its way past her lips as a hunger for revenge started to grow quickly, before she knew it Velorina saw only red and a new enemy. She lunged forward and let her hands wrap around his neck, her nails tearing into his flesh easily but he never put up a fight.

"Do it Velorina, because this will be your only chance."