Camarilla | z.zy ✓

CHAPTER 24

Aunt Kiki's house was much larger than Mia's mother's house, but it didn't seem like they were very rich. They had a son of their own and no other child, so Zhenyuan could understand why they were probably the first option when it came to keeping Mia for the time being.

'Are you kidding me? Your sister took a random boy and let him move in in her house? Is she okay in the head?' Aunt Kiki's husband asked her in the kitchen. Zhenyuan was sitting in the kitchen with Mia, and even though Aunt Kiki and her husband were trying to have a hushed conversation, they were still quite audible to Zhenyuan. Mia, however, was too busy on her cellphone to hear anything.

'Mia said he's a nice boy, I wasn't comfortable with it either but she literally begged me and said he had nowhere else to go. What was I gonna do? Besides, don't you think if my sister let him in he's very well behaved?'

'I don't know. Might bring in a vampire.' Aunt Kiki's husband joked and gained a laugh from his wife, little did he know that he was actually assuming the truth.

'How are you feeling?' Zhenyuan asked Mia, not wanting to hear the conversation any further.

'I'm not fine, I was just asking Jungwon more about vampires and if it's really possible to get rid of them. Gosh, I really hate them and they're so scary.' she told him.

Zhenyuan nodded uncomfortably. 'Did you catch any glimpse of the vampire?'

'No,' Mia shook her head. 'Hey, you always said you want to protect me yet yesterday you ran away.'

'I'm sorry...'

'It's okay, it's not like I blame you for it. I would probably run too. I'm just joking.' She forced a smile then got back to her phone. 'I sure hope mom will be okay. You know till this day the school nurse is traumatized that's he doesn't even remember what happened? What if that happens to my mom?'

'It won't happen to her, I promise you.' Zhenyuan patted her shoulder consolingly. 'She'll probably wake up in a day or two and tell the entire tale of the vampire and he'll probably be captured and thrown into the jail he deserves.'

'I hope so.'

...

That night when everyone had gone to bed, Zhenyuan sat on his bed looking at the crown he had found. That name was unmistakably his, but what could this crown really mean? He looked himself in the blood-red jewels of the crown and felt more impatient as he tried to figure out things in this limited time he had. He had no other alternative, he simply had to talk to Jungwon who seemed to know almost everything there was to know.

He put the cellphone to his ear after dialing Jungwon's number. It rang for several times before he finally answered.

'Hey Jungwon,' Zhenyuan immediately said. 'I'm sorry but...do you know anything about...crowns?'

'Crowns? That they are worn by royalty?' Jungwon answered unsurely because the question was too obvious.

'Can you maybe like explain that in a vampire context?'

'Oh,' Jungwon could be heard flipping through pages of a book, 'well, I'm honestly not sure about crowns. All I know is that vampires have a monarchy type of system. There's the king, prince and the like.'

'So um...royals are qualified by birth just like with humans?'

'Yeah sort of, but the royal family for vampires is much special. The royal bloodline was that of vampires with quite special abilities. Why do you ask again?' Jungwon sounded genuinely curious.

'Um just...I'm also getting really curious about these things since I've really confirmed with every part of me that they exist. So creepy.' he tried to sound scared.