PROLOUGE

It was a warm evening, as it has been the past days. The sunset casted shadows in the most eerily
fashion, giving the passers the thought of secrets. But such shadows do behold secrets, for they are a
strange species.

No they aren’t vampires, werewolves, fairies, demons or any other mythical creature.

These are much more dangerous than said creatures. They feed on blood surely, but only when the
moon is full. They don’t kill, if they kill, they die along.

It was nearing midnight, less cars and humans out and about. It was the time the shadows moved.

One of them darted up the tree in an excited way.

“Dassily Maria Faith Vermont, stay with me, your lesson hasn’t been taught.” A voice within the
shadow on the path said. Suddenly the shadow formed into a tall young man, the age of nineteen.

A disappointed sigh came from the tree, slower than the man the shadow formed dangling legs,
kicking her legs in and out.

“You have a boring mind towards fun, my brother.” She replied.

The man growled and the next second he had the girl pinned to the asphalt.

“Father’s orders is for me to control your presence.” He growled menacingly.

The girl, no older than sixteen gave an involuntary nod of agreement.

“Where is Varlila? It’s so strange that she would be late.” She asked.

The young man pondered, it was true that the elder sister, who turned eighteen few weeks ago, was
missing.

“Try reaching her spirit.” He responded.

“You know I ca-” she started.

“I said try.” He raised his voice.

She turned around, contorting her face into ugly and frustrated faces at her brother. She cleared her
emotions, she was learning still to control everything she was capable of and she decided to try to
reach her spirit.

Instantly she fell into a cold mind, a mind that no longer worked.

“Brandon…” she whimpered. Brandon turned to look at his youngest sibling.

“You told me Vale’s couldn’t die.” She whispered angrily.

He was instantaneously confused, “They can’t.”

“Then explain the cold spirit I received from Varlila.” She said angered.

CHAPTER ONE
She must’ve been under a trance.

Yes, that was her answer to the situation she was in.

She refused to acknowledge that she had killed someone older and stronger than her. Or maybe the
offender was highly allergic to…

There was no denying it, Darly Pearce, the nice Darly Pearce, just committed murder in the alleyways
of the outskirts of the city.

Even though there was blood on the body, Darly’s hands and clothing were untouched.

After her frantic thinking, she didn’t recall being here.

She should’ve been in her bed asleep.

She fetched her phone, sliding it up to look at the time, midnight, in an unknown area.

Darly tensed as she felt someone’s presence enter the end of the alleyway.

He ran right into her but ran straight ahead as if she were a ghost.

“We never die…” he whispered just as a shadow appeared revealing a girl.

Darly screamed from the sudden pain in her head.

She awoke, gasping for breath. She looked around her, she was back in her fairly large room, but the
dream she had, if you called it a dream, it was so real.

The shadow, the attack and then the bloody body lying dead in the alley…

She knew she shouldn’t have let Kevin let her watch those horror movies earlier.

She gave a disgruntled sigh and got up. She felt very jumpy.

If only mum was here to help with my troubles, she thought then guiltily realised that her mother’s
death was the reason she was troubled.

The tears started to sting in her eyes and she declined the tears to fall.

She heard a soft shuffling from the hallway, stopping just outside her door. As if the being was
satisfied to hear nothing, they continued down the hallway.

It must be Hattie, Darly thought in relief. Hattie was the maid in their house, always taken her job
seriously.

But… if Hattie is snooping around, surely Michael was awake?” She thought suddenly.

She waited patiently for the sound of Hattie’s soft footsteps disappear far down the hallway, opening
her bedroom door and closing it.

Darly opened the door and quietly closed the door, glad she had the door that didn’t squeak like
Kevin’s. She tip toed slowly and carefully down to Michael’s study.

She rapped the door quietly.

The door opened, revealing her ‘father’.

“Darlene why are you up at this hour?” he whispered, fury intertwined well with his ‘concern’.

“I had a dream that I-” she started.

“You had a dream that you couldn’t’ explain, because that is what dreams are, nothing.” He said,
closing the door quickly to avoid hearing her nest words.

“Only Mother understood.”

“Dassily, you can smell the scent can’t you?” Brandon barked to his younger sister.

She rolled her eyes, “Duh, it is so strong!”

He gave her a look; he wondered why he, Brandon Vermont, the heir to the Valerian Throne, didn’t
have control on his younger sister.

She sighed, “It smells like magic.” She breathed, her eyes turning sharper, the pupil shrinking from
her thirst.

“You didn’t hunt today.” He stated.

“Of course I couldn’t, you were teaching me the whole day!” she complained.

He would really regret this.

“Fine, two minutes only, we don’t want an accident to happen.” He said.

Dassily’s eyes returned to their normal Caribbean blue colour. She was gone within a fraction of a
second.

Brandon looked down to the body of his eighteen year old sister; she held his respect than the other
sister.

“Lila, it would be my personal goal to hunt down whoever did this to you.” He could feel the
compassion in his spirit, knowing he was speaking of the future.

If he had one, that is.

Dassily was gazing at her next meal, watching from her shadow.

He walked up to his friend… no a drug dealer.

“Hey man, I got the sixty bucks you told me.” He said to the guy. The dealer smirked, taking two
small bags out from his pockets.

“All we have left.” He said.

Dassily watched her meal shake his head, “Dude, this is like worth nothing against sixty!”

“Pay or get nothing.” The dealer threatened.

Dassily moved her shadow to the rooftop above them as the moon hid behind a cloud.

The guy she was waiting for shook his head and started to walk away, her eyes following his every
move.

In the corner of her eye she saw a twinkle of something scarily shiny.

She spared the dealer a look, then instantly dropped her shadow in behind her ‘meal’.

She knew she had fifteen seconds until her time was up.

The knife was thrown but melted in her shadow. Her ‘meal’ turned around just as she was emerging
out of her shadow. She grabbed the dealer’s neck and one jerk of her hand, she snapped his neck.

Then she fed, draining him for two seconds.

She would’ve gone longer but his blood was tainted by drugs.

She turned around to face her ‘meal’.

“W-what are you?” he whimpered.

“You’ve seen me and now you have to come.” Dassily said, as if she dared him to run.

Brandon watched as his guardian carried his sister back home, Dassily was two minutes over.

And then he heard it.

The sound of a fast heartbeat.

Dassily, he growled in his mind.

But then, how could he explain the slower beat?

“Dassily, don’t come here with a human!” He used his spirit’s voice directing his words to his
rebellious sister.

“But he isn’t just human.” Was her response.

CHAPTER TWO

“Darlene Pearce, welcome to the Huntingvale museum again might I add.” Mr. Stanley said to Darly
as she paid her student fare.

“I know I’ll be at the library area if anyone wants to find me.” She replied and walked up the stairs.

She loved to read, it was her comfort zone, anything to escape her reality and to enter a world
completely different then hers.

She didn’t feel like reading big so she walked over to the dark shelves with all the town history, it was
her new type of read.

She reached for a book but it fell down, its heavy contents making it echo around the silent room.

She bent down to pick it up and was struck from the side.

The collision knocked the wind out of her and she struggled to see what caused her to fall.

Nothing was there.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

“So if you’re a tracker then you must know how to search for evidence if there weren’t any found.”
Brandon asked.

The tracker looked at him.

“I can but tell me what you are.” He replied back.

Dassily couldn’t stand them; she rose from her perch of the top stair and descended to where they
were seated on the lounge.

“I’m going out to do my own tracking.” She said.

“Dassily, no hunting on humans, you’re still learning.” Brandon warned.

“Are you vampires?” the tracker asked.

Dassily laughed, so loud and hard she leant forward holding her stomach. She regained herself,
“Tracker, we’re not some monsters. We are shadows of the Heavens.”

“We’re-” Brandon started.

“Master and Miss Vermont, your father needs you to go to the museum, a stray is hungry in public.”
The maid interrupted.

They were gone the next heartbeat.

“Just one taste girly, promise I won’t kill you.” He cooed.

Darly was panicking; she knew he was stronger than her after the book cases fell onto her.

She looked up into his blue eyes, the eyes of a killer. She tried to crawl backwards away from him but
only ended up experiencing the pain on her leg.

“Oh ugh, Huntingvale history, how boring it was back then but the scandals…” he said, holding a
book in his hand, “They were doing witch trials here at one point, but they can’t kill us because we
don’t die, unlike this.” The book burst into flames in his very hands. He did not yelp or drop the book
from the flames; he just smiled at her and darted for her neck.

He fed and fed, Darly couldn’t stand the pain and the black blurriness in her vision.

Then the weight was off her.

“Can you still hear me?” a young man asked her. She couldn’t speak but made a noise in response.

“The pain, it’s going to kill her.” He voice said.

“Why do we royals have to deal with these situations?” a girl with a high and impatient voice whined.

Then there was a shocked gasp.

“Her spirit, it was the same presence at Lila’s scene.” The girl said.

“Then we must give her blood.” The young man said.

“No, I’m not giving away my precious royal blood to some human.” The girl sneered.

“Oh we will use Dasher as her donor.” He snapped back.

“Don’t touch me.” She managed to whisper as harsh as she could.

“Do you want to die or not?”

“My mum died and my father doesn’t care about me, my brother thinks I’m a little girl and watches
my every move whenever he wants something for me to do.” She whispered, her voice growing
louder.

“You’re leg is broken.” The girl pointed out.

“I can feel it.”

“Open your eyes please, we need you to try and sit up.” The voice whispered softly in her ear.

Darly opened her eyes. There was a blonde young man crouching next to her head with light blue
eyes.

“Who are you?” she gasped out.

“I’m Brandon Vermont, that is my sister Dassily Vermont and the one who fed upon you is Dasher
Fore.”

“You’re not human.” She said, managing to back away.

“No, but I won’t hurt you.” He said softly, trying to touch her shoulder in reassurance.
There was a low, guttural sound erupting from somebody’s throat and some harsh shuffling.

“Dassily, take your boyfriend out of here.” Brandon snarled.

The impatient girl glared at her brother, her eyes the brightest blue Darly ever saw, almost unnatural.

“What are you?” Darly asked when they left.

“We’re not vampires, we’re Vales.” He said, helping her to sit up.

“Ow,” Darly winced, “What are Vales?”

“Vales are much more dangerous than you’d think…” he trailed off as Darly’s eyes flickered.

“Take my blood, you will be bound to our council, protection and a new home.” He said.

She took the blood.

“Aaron!” The shrill voice of Lillith de Vine rang out throughout the park.

“Wot Lilli?” the three-year-old brunette boy yelled from the top of the slide.

“We’re leaving now, Mother wanted us back at noon.” She replied, walking towards her little brother.
She briefly glanced at her clock that was attached to a chain around her neck.

“A bit more…” he whined.

“It’s been an hour already, by the time we get home it will be mid afternoon.” She said, climbing up
the slide to grasp her brother. His golden eyes watered for a moment but the thrill of going down the
slide made him laugh.”

“Lilli, why do we walk? I want the car!” he said as she took his small hand and walked to the
direction of the city’s apartments.

“Walking is good for you.” She replied coolly.

“Your hair is different.” He said.

“I only tied it up because of the heat today, Aaron.” She said.

“Look at those flowers!” he shouted.

She leered at the bush he pointed to but there were no such flowers.

“Aaron...” she started but was instantly cut off as tiny buds grew and roses emerged within.

She gasped and swepted her brother into her arms and in a heartbeat they were gone.