Chapter 2: New home
1069 Words
We didn’t ride back to his kingdom.
We vanished.
That’s the only way I know how to describe it. One minute, we were in Moonland territory, the scent of ash and pine still in the air. The next
everything changed.
The horses pulled our carriages down an ancient dirt road until the air around us thickened. It wasn’t nightfall, but darkness rolled in like fog. The sky dimmed, and the world grew quiet in a way that shouldn't have been possible. Then something shifted.
Like reality folded.
Like we were swallowed.
The wheels beneath us didn’t creak anymore. No birds. No wind. Just a strange pull in my gut, heavy and unfamiliar. Old magic.
“I thought vampires hated magic,” I whispered to myself.
Clearly not. Not when it served their purpose.
We emerged not into a city… but into a realm.
Valtaria.
That’s what they called it. A hidden vampire dominion that doesn’t exist on maps. Not above ground, at least. A place pulled into its own dimension long ago sealed off by spell and blood, as if the world itself wanted nothing to do with it.
Valtaria was vast. Endless. Gothic and golden and terrifying.
Its skies weren’t skies at all, but a shimmering aurora of crimson and black like the Northern Lights caught fire. Towers spiked the heavens, their tips glowing faintly with enchanted runes. The entire city glimmered in obsidian, quartz, silver veins and crimson glass.
Their streets weren’t made of stone, but something smoother, darker paved with shadows, I swear it. Roads twisted and spiraled like the branches of a dead tree, connecting a hundred castles across miles of floating land.
Yes, floating.
Large chunks of city entire palaces hovered midair. And I realized why werewolves could never conquer them. How do you fight a kingdom you can’t even reach?
We were still on ground level when my new “gift” joined me. She entered the carriage after the brief wedding ritual back home nothing but a shared tear of blood, a few whispered chants I barely understood, and a vow I didn’t want to make.
She was tall, elegant, dressed in green-black silks, with skin like moonlight and eyes too calm.
Her name was Elaris. My new handmaiden. A gift from my “beloved” husband.
And I hated her instantly.
She wore a heavy emerald pendant part of her “presentation.” A royal gesture. Another thing to bind me tighter to a world that didn’t want me.
She spoke respectfully, with perfect diction, but not submission. Not quite.
“Welcome to Valtaria, my Queen,” she said softly as we passed the Gates of Oathstone, where giant statues of vampire kings stared down at us with hollow eyes. “The realm of endless dusk. The Empire of Eternal Veins.”
“Catchy,” I muttered, eyes flicking to her necklace. “You always wear the gifts he gives?”
She smiled slightly. “When does it means survival? Yes.”
We moved past estates so large they could have been cities themselves. Each belonged to one of the One Hundred and Five Wives of Valerius Draven.
“Each has her own palace?” I asked, unable to hide the disbelief in my voice.
Elaris nodded. “Of course. His Majesty’s generosity knows no bounds. Some of them rule minor vampire provinces. Some are older than the mountains.”
I didn’t ask how many of them loved him.
Or how many still lived in fear.
When we passed the Silverbound Spires, I saw them.
The other queens.
They stood on balconies carved from bloodstone, dressed in gowns that glittered like mirrors and ice. They didn’t wave. They didn’t bow.
They watched me like I was a sickness.
Like I was temporary.
“They don’t seem fond of me,” I said.
“You are a wolf,” Elaris replied gently. “And worse, you are new. They envy newness.”
“And where is my palace, then?” I asked, sitting straighter. “My own floating city?”
She smiled then a real one. The first hint of softness I’d seen in her.
“That is why you are special,” she said. “You are not to live among the wives. You’re not a moon bride like them.”
She looked ahead and pointed. “You are the final queen. The Moonwrought Consort. You live with him.”
We crossed the Bloodroot Bridge and moved beyond the wives’ estates. That’s when I saw it.
The Palace of Noctreign.
The King’s Keep.
The true heart of Valtaria.
I couldn’t breathe for a moment.
It was massive. Unfathomably tall, reaching high into the fake sky like a dark spear carved from shadow itself. Unlike the other palaces, it didn’t shimmer it absorbed light. Every window glowed red. It was alive with a strange pulsing magic I could feel in my ribs.
“People say Noctreign was built from the bones of giants,” Elaris whispered. “A fortress that predates the vampire line. Some even say the First King wasn't a vampire at all.”
Of course. Of course I’d be living there.
With him.
My carriage halted at its gates.
We waited.
One by one, the other carriages behind us arrived. Lined up. Processed. A hundred guards in black stepped forward with torches that burned blue. And then, they began to chant an old tongue, not wolf, not human, not anything I’d ever heard.
They weren’t words.
They were summons.
A ritual circle formed at the base of the palace ten feet wide, carved into the black marble courtyard. Vampires stepped back as Valerius came forward, robes dragging, silver crown glinting under the red light.
He offered me his hand.
“Hold tight,” he said.
“I don’t float,” I snapped.
“You will,” he replied and then the ritual flared.
The symbols glowed red, brighter and brighter until they ignited in a column of silent fire. Then suddenly our bodies rose.
No wings. No motion.
Just... ascent.
Like the ground rejected us.
We hovered, climbed, passed floors carved in glass, balconies filled with guards, rooms filled with secrets until finally, we stopped.
A massive gate opened.
We stepped inside together.
And just like that, I was no longer a princess.
I was the Moonwrought Consort of the Vampire King.
Living with monsters.
And dreaming of vengeance.
- Writer
