The Kingdoms' Obsession

THE KO┃CHAPTER 3

║Amara║

Amara’s heart swelled with hope at the sight of what she imagined to be Fort Zarlow in the distance. Although it is where her father was from, she didn’t even know if he was alive. She was compelled to find out, needing to know if she had any ounce of family left.

Amara mourned the loss of her home and mother in the span of a couple of hours. It was cruel how the world could take so much from her in the snap of a finger yet here she was, alone and alive. She felt as if the world expected her to be okay with it and move on to the next adventure after a couple of days. It was impossible for her.

How she has managed to make it all the way there on her own with no vampire in sight was completely unknown to her. She felt as if the Divine Khalida were watching her, protecting her.

Just as she made it to the entrance of Fort Zarlow, her hope simmered into a dull ache. It was deserted—completely deserted. She could practically hear the tumbleweeds on the dirt roads. Amara fell to her knees, feeling completely stuck. She had nowhere else to go. This was her only solution, this was supposed to be her safe haven. Her eyes welled with tears, the hopelessness settling in her heart.

Just as a tear was about to escape her eyes, a large hand on her shoulder startled her back to reality. She did not make it all this way just to give up. She could survive on her own. She didn’t mind being the only person here. After all, besides her by her side, she was practically all alone for the entirety of her life

Amara looked up as if remembering there was a strange male right behind her. Her survival instincts kicked in and she quicked scurried away, getting ready to either fight her for life or run until she couldn’t anymore. When Amara locked eyes with the male, she was immediately struck by his beauty.

Flawless. He was absolutely flawless and she found herself mesmerized by his mere existence. She, however, couldn’t let that faze her. For all she knew, he could be a vampire or just a male seeking a woman to dominate without her consent.

Before he could take a step closer to her, Amara slashed his cheek with her pocket knife in hand and ran into the closest building. Her heart hammered in her chest, afraid of being caught. She was no damsel in distress nor was he a prince coming to save the day. He was a man who could easily overpower her frail body, whether he was a vampire or not.

Don’t trust anyone. She repeated it to herself over and over. No matter how strikingly handsome he was, she couldn’t lend her trust to anyone but herself.

The hairs on her arm rose. It was as if she could sense when he was near and boy, was he near. She held her breath, praying he couldn’t hear her breathing but she knew that if she was a vampire, it would be pointless. He could have heard the sound of her heart beating the moment he was near Fort Zarlow. Amara clutched the knife tighter when the door to the building opened and she attempted to quietly crawl towards where she assumed the backdoor would be. Before she would even attempt to start moving, a shoe in front of her stopped her.

“Found you,” he said with what she interpreted to be a sinister smile. ‘This is the end,’ she thought to herself before she closed her eyes. Already accepting her fate. She smiled, knowing that she’d get to join her mother, even if it would be for just a moment.

His hand gripped her cheeks and she shivered, not from fear but from the tingles that erupted through her body, She stared into his black, soulless eyes and and before she could even blink, his lips were on hers.

║Damien║

Damien decided to visit Fort Zarlow. His mother was a resident there before its gradual fall. He remembered spending the beginning of his childhood here and the fondness he felt for this place was instilled into his being.

Her grave was here. When his mother was killed, he took it upon himself to bury her where she felt most at peace—Fort Zarlow. He could see it in her eyes whenever she freely talked about her time here. He could tell it was time well spent.

Centuries earlier, his mother was a mortal, brutally r***d and taken as a wife to a Bloodling—Human Snatchers as the humans called them. They were on the rise then until their gradual decrease. Only recently did their population begin to increase and it was becoming a great burden to the kingdom. He was directly in charge of keeping them in check and killing any that came this way.

Humans believed them to be the bad guys but truth was, they were trying to protect what was left of the human population from the Bloodling’s that seemed hell bent on decimating them. It confused him: why try to eradicate the very things they needed for survival? It seemed to him as if they were asking for their own extinction.

He just finished laying flowers on the grave of his mother. He never understood the formalities that came with death— the flowers, the burial, the funeral, the headstones. It was all pointless and was bound to wither away with time. His mother, though, strongly believed in ‘respecting’ the dead and so, he did it all for her. Just as he was getting ready to head back to the kingdom, he got a whiff of the most divine scent he has ever come across.

Feral. He became feral from just one scent and he walked around, trying to catch more and more of it. He just got to the entrance of Fort Zarlow when he saw the woman with dark brown hair nearly weeping to herself on the ground. His heart ached from seeing her in such a state.

‘Who could have possibly made her like this?’ he wondered. This beauty should not know of the pain of the world and it hurt him to know that she did. He placed a hand upon her shoulder, needing to comfort her before he grew angrier at whoever it was that had her like this. She abruptly turned and he finally made contact with her eyes. They were the deepest shade of green he has ever come across in all his centuries of living. He was completely captivated by the beauty before him. Her plump limps did things to him that no woman ever could. He spent centuries without a woman by his side, not needing the shallowness a relationship with a fellow female vampire would bring about.

The thing about female vampires is that they were immediately smitten if you were handsome. One look at a man and she would know if he were the one for her or not. No, he wanted more. Something beyond the look of his face or the shape of his body.

Before he was able to get closer to her like he wanted, she struck him in the face with the knife she all of a sudden held in her hand. He was so smitten with her that he didn’t even notice she held a knife to begin with. He smiled to himself. A feisty beauty so it seemed.

He loved nothing more than a chase and that is exactly what she is giving him. His entire body hummed with excitement, ready to chase the women he wanted by his side.

He put a hand to his face and wiped the blood that was on his cheek, surprised that she was even able to get a hit on him.

He saw her run into the building just to the right of him and he waited for her to hide. He wanted to find her, he didn’t want it to be easy but with the way her scent trailed behind her, he knew that he’d find her in the blink of an eye. He waited minutes before he finally entered the building, immediately consumed by the sweetness of her blood. The frenzy hit him full force and the chase completely left his mind.

He needed her. Now.

He trailed her scent until he finally spotted her foot sticking out from behind the cabinet that was on the very left corner of the room he was currently in. Stepping in front of her, he took note of the way she seemed at peace. Why? He had no idea but he wanted to find out the moment she got more comfortable with him.

He stared at her, infatuated. Damien was never one to pine over a female. He’d much rather be alone than have to deal with all the troubles that came along with relationships. Though, if the Divine Khalida were to ever bless him with his very own beloved, it’d be a completely different story. But this girl…she was no beloved. She was a weak mortal woman so why was he lusting after her so bad?

Damien tried to give her a comforting smile, sensing the fear that the woman felt for him. “Found you,” said Damien with a smile, loving the outcome of the chase. Here she was, finally right in front of him. Although she was gone for less than ten minutes, it felt endless.

Damien stared at her lips, internally dying for a taste and he quite literally couldn’t help himself. He felt as if he were ready to combust at any second and so, with not a single regret in mind, he swooped down and took her lips, savoring every bit of her as best as he could.

She moaned into his mouth and he absolutely loved all the tingles erupting on every part of him that she touched. He decided then and there that he wanted to be the reason for her moans for the rest of his life.

He almost roared with approval when he felt her shaky hands run through his soft hair and pull him closer to her. Every curve rested against his body and he shifted himself so that rather than him standing before her, she was now rested upon his lap as he sat on the floor. Damien tightly gripped her hips and started moving them so that she was grinding on him in circular motions and he groaned every single time. “f**k, you are so enticing, so beautiful,” he whispered and he watched the rosy blush rush to her cheeks in the span of a second.

Sweat dripped down his forehead as she continued to grind on him, getting slightly faster every time and he swore he could’ve came right there. He felt like his horny teenage self centuries ago who was finally learning what it meant to lust. It was an unbelievable amount of lust and desire radiating throughout his entire being and he felt himself wanting so much more. He wanted to feel her soaking heat, the swell of her breasts beneath his hands, he wanted to outline the shape of her ass. He wanted to absolutely r****h every single part of her, worship her like the goddess that she was.

Damien started to kiss down her neck, sucking on that one sweet spot where he knew he would take her vein one day and she let out a breathy moan. Loving the sound of it, he kissed and sucked harder on that one spot, eliciting more moans from her and soon, his need to taste her blood became too overpowering. He felt his fangs elongate without his will. He didn’t want to drink from her yet, He wanted to do it in the throes of passion but her scent got increasingly stronger just as her pulse did as well.

Before Damien was able to sink his teeth into her, she thrashed in his arms, screaming to be let go. Gently, he pulled her away from him and for once in his life, he found himself cold. Vampires were naturally cold creatures so to them, it was normal. It never brought goosebumps or shivers to his body, but this time, it was all he felt.

She was breathing heavy, her eyes lurking with both lust and fear.

Gently, he asked, “What is your name, love?” She shifted her gaze to the floor, refusing to look into his eyes and this angered him. He wanted her gaze to be on him and only him.

Damien looked into her eyes, almost wanting to compel her into giving him what he wanted but he knew it wouldn’t be fair to her no matter the reason.

He asked his question again but this time with more force behind his tone. He needed to know her name. It was killing him from the inside out not having a name to call the beauty right before him.

“Amara,” she quietly whispered but with his hearing, he was able to hear it very clearly and it did wonders to him.

“Amara,” he repeated back to her as if testing the feel of her name on his tongue. He smiled at her, appreciative of her cooperation. He saw her noticeably shiver when he said her name and it filled him with pleasure at the fact that she reacted so sensitively to him.

Before he could continue to sit comfortably on the floor with Amara straddling his waist, he smelled his dearest friend Nikolai. “s**t,” Damien cursed to himself. He didn’t want any male near his woman, even if it was Nikolai. He got up with lighting speed and gave her a parting peck on the cheek.

“Go, Amara. Run as far away from here as possible,” Damien said with a heavy heart. He knew there was always a possibility he couldn’t find her when she ran but he also knew that he’d track her down until time’s end. All he needed was Amara as far away as possible from Nikolai. If one whiff of her scent made him go mad, he didn’t even want to think about the same happening with Nikolai.

‘She’s mine,’ he thought to himself. He watched her run out of the building and in the opposite direction with an aching heart and he made his way to Nikolai.