The Dark Soul

I sat up with a scream on my lips and my eyelids snapped open. I was in a room I didn’t recognize, but the two figures hunched over my bed were terribly familiar.

The first thing I noticed was my throat felt like it was made of sandpaper and my head burned like it had been sliced open.

Luka and Liv stared at me in shock, eyes red-rimmed like they’d both been crying. Memories flooded my mind then: Morgana shooting and killing me, my body floating into the beautiful peaceful light. Luka … biting me, feeding me his blood.

Changing me?

I clawed at my throat, feeling like I might die all over again. Then Luka snapped into action. Walking over to a refrigerator, he pulled out two bottles of dark crimson fluid.

“This will be easier to—” His words barely registered as I flew across the room and snatched the bottles from his hand. Ripping off the lid, I pressed the rim of the bottle to my lips and tipped it backward.

The second the thick cold fluid hit my tongue, an explosion of flavor burst across my mouth. A deep moan ripped from my throat as I gulped it down. It was like chocolate and strawberries and … sex. Or at least what I imagined sex would be. My brain wasn’t really thinking. All I needed in this entire world was for this overwhelming thirst to be quenched.

“Okay this is awkward.” Liv’s voice brought me back to the present and Luka chuckled.

“The first drink is the best. It will dull over time but not completely,” he responded.

Then I noticed it: the lack of heartbeat, no longer needing to breathe, the thick crimson fluid having the slightest metallic iron taste.

I looked at the empty bottle in my hand and my fingers went up to probe my teeth. “I’m a bloodsucker,” I mumbled against my fingers.

Two sharp points pressed against my fingertips and I gasped, dropping the empty container to the ground and lifting my clean shirt to stare at my abdomen. No holes. No scars to even show where the bullets had entered my body.

“I mean you were good looking before… but dayuuuuuum,” Liv declared.

I blinked rapidly at my best friend. It had worked. Luka had turned me into a vampire.

“I need a mirror.” I scrambled out of the room and into the adjoining bathroom.

“Take it easy! You’re still changing, you don’t know your—” Luka’s voice was stopped by me flipping the light switch up so fast and hard that it snapped off, the little plastic nub falling to the floor.

“…strength,” he finished.

With the light illuminating my face, I looked up into the mirror and froze.

“God help me,” I breathed.

I was a vampire: paper white skin, red-tinged lips, pointed canines, eerie stillness, but it was the eyes that freaked me out. My eyes were no longer human. Yellow rings stared back at me.

“You asked me to, remember? You gave me permission,” Luka hedged, looking at me frightened, like I might attack him or something.

I nodded, my head still reeling. I should cry, I should pray, I should have some sort of reaction, but all I could think about in that moment was how thirsty I was. “Need more,” I growled, and Luka nodded to my hand.

Oh. I was still holding one of the bottles. I popped the lid and tipped it back, before looking at Luka expectantly.

“Right.” He rushed out and returned with two fresh bottles.

I took them inside the bathroom and shut the door on Luka, leaning back against it and sliding down to the floor as I chugged blood from some unwitting donor.

What was my mom going to say? Maple? What about freaking Ruby, who was due here today? This was a mess.

My stomach burned with hunger, and dizziness washed over me.

“More!” I yelled, and two seconds later there was a knock.

I opened the door a few inches and Luka pushed two more bottles through.

I slammed the door, chugging the bottles, feeling disgusted with myself.

This was too much blood. Six bottles? Or eight? I’d lost count. Luka never fed like this. What was wrong with me?

There was a knock and I peeled the door open a crack.

Luka cleared his throat. “You might need a few more. The first feeding is what really cements the change.” He looked sad, or maybe scared. I knew I should reassure him that I wasn’t mad at him, but I couldn’t right now. Because I was mad. I was mad at Morgana for doing this to me, mad that Liv convinced me to change, mad at everyone involved. I missed the light, I missed the free weightless feeling of death. Reaching out, I grabbed two more bottles and shut the door again. This time, when I brought it to my lips, the taste of the iron was heavier and the chocolate and strawberries less.

I was getting used to it.

Sick.
Gross.
Frick!

I wanted to throw up, go back, just die by the side of the road.

“Aspen.” Luka’s tender voice reached through the door and wrapped around my heart.

Tears filled my eyes as the severity of the situation pressed in on me.

I wasn’t human…

God forgive me, I pled as a sob formed in my throat.

I scooched forward and opened the door wide, and then Luka stepped inside, kneeling before me.

“I’m sorry.”

Those two words made the walls come down and I burst into hysterical sobs as he took me in his arms. My chest shook; grief tore through me as I mourned my human body. My soul. My old life. Normalcy. I cried over it all and Luka just held me. At one point, I heard the front door open and close a few times, but I just continued to cry. Liv must have left, but I couldn’t stop. The grief, the shock, the suddenness of it all just poured out of me.

Luka stroked my cheek. “Emotions are heightened and erratic in the first few days and weeks. This is normal.”

Nothing about being a bloodsucker was normal. I just drank ten bottles of blood! So far from freaking normal. But I said nothing. My sobs turned to whimpers, which eventually quieted, and I wiped my eyes.

Reaching out, I touched my neck with two fingers. “I don’t have a pulse.”

Luka nodded. “It will take getting used to. You won’t poop or pee anymore either.”

“What!” I screamed, and reeled back.

Luka gave me a slow grin. “The blood is fully absorbed and you just don’t.”

What the crap? Out of all the things that had happened in the last day, that had shocked me the most.

There was a knock at the bathroom door and then Liv’s voice came from the other side. “You okay, Aspen?”

My heart pinched. She was probably worried about me and I’d pushed her away to have a nervous breakdown. Luka released me and I stood waaay faster than normal and the bathroom spun.

“Slow down, cowboy. It takes getting used to,” Luka warned.

Right.

I tried to act like a turtle would and opened the door slowly, looking up at my bestie. There were unshed tears in her eyes and she chewed her lip.

“I just didn’t want to lose you. It was selfish but—”

I crashed into her and squeezed, but not too hard, as she hugged me back. “You are really fast. That freaked me out,” she admitted.

I grinned, pulling away. “I don’t blame either of you,” I told them, and they both looked relieved.

“I blame that bitch Morgana, and now that I’m her equal I’m going to rip her head off and shove it up her ass!” I growled.

Luka’s eyebrows shot up. “Easy there, killer. Morgana fled, but I’ve got the entire realm looking for her. She killed the fiancée of the vampire king. It’s a crime punishable by death.”

“Except I’m not dead! They will probably let her go with a slap on the wrist,” I growled.

Luka’s lips pursed. “Don’t worry about Morgana. We have bigger things to deal with.”

“Like what?” I scoffed. “I’m a vampire now. The council will allow us to get married and you can remain king.”

He nodded, sharing a look with Liv. “Yes. That’s all fine.”

I pinned my man with a glare. “What aren’t you telling me?”

Both he and Liv took a step backward into the hallway. “Just stay calm, okay. The first few days—”

“Stop telling me about the first this and that. What’s wrong?” I bellowed, clenching my fists.
Luka frowned, looking to Liv.

“Olivia Rose, start talking or so help me God…” I looked at my best friend and she nodded.

“House of Thorns showed up while you were … healing,” she said.

Oh. Ruby was already here! It would be a shock for her to see me like this, but I wanted to get a head start on our plan to save the other breeders. “Okay, I’ll shower and explain everything to her. She’ll understand.”

It’s not like I asked to become a bloodsucker. I was dying—she’d see reason in what had to be done.

Hopefully.

Liv shook her head. “No, Aspen. They showed up without Ruby. She was taken.” Her gaze flicked again to Luka. “We think by Maz.”

Pure unbridled rage worked its way up my body. My hands started to shake. I needed to go after her. Ruby was in trouble because I’d told her to come and bring her whole team here. Maz must have found out. The anger was too much. It bubbled inside of me like hot lava and I was going to explode. I was a blur of motion as I streaked across the room and grabbed the dresser leaning against the wall.

“Aspen!” Liv cried out.

“Just stay back,” Luka warned, pulling Liv behind him.

I picked up the dresser high into the air and threw it on the ground, splintering it into a hundred pieces.

“That evil hag,” I roared, punching my fist into the wall. There was a sharp pain for a moment as it collided with brick, but then it was gone. The stone burst outward, and I retracted my hand, which had now blown a hole the size of a pumpkin into the wall. I looked out at the garden and felt remorse for destroying the wall, but my anger at Maz was too hard to control. I needed a physical outlet or I was going to kill someone.

“Stop her, she’ll hurt herself,” Liv pleaded with Luka behind me.

“She could hurt me right now,” he replied to her.

“Besides, I’ve always wanted a garden view in this room.”

I wanted to laugh, I wanted to tell Liv I was totally fine, but I was so damn mad I couldn’t think straight.

Maz kidnapped Ruby and it was all my fault. I wanted to kill someone.