The Purple Eyed Girl

48. One last dance

"WHERE IS THE TRADITIONAL GOLDEN CUTLERY?!"

Along with the servants, I yanked open every golden cabinet and drawer in the dining hall and kitchen. It couldn't be lost, I desperately needed it today. Everything had to be perfect, but something told me I would fail again as usual. Running to the last unsearched cabinet, I pushed some servants out of the way. My heart sank to my stomach when opening it revealed a bunch of golden pans, but not the cutlery.

"Shit, shit, shit." I mumbled while my eyes desperately scanned across the room in an attempt to magically locate it.

A worried young servant approached me and bowed humbly. "We've looked everywhere, Your Majesty. It appears it cannot be found."

Not good. Not good at all.

"Don't you know who's coming today?! Iola Ashford! THE IOLA ASHFORD! She'll have our heads!" I panicked, tensely holding my stretched hands in front of my head.

Kenzo's snickering could be heard from the door opening. "I don't think she'll care for the cutlery."

I squeezed my eyes shut, pursed my lips and slapped my hands against my face. Deep breaths, Haimon. Deep breaths and counting to ten would help. I lowered my hands and shook them while keeping my eyes closed and letting out a deep sigh.

1,

2,

3,

"Your Majesty, your parents are incoming."

Nope.

My eyes shot open and where I was panicking before, it was even worse now. I quickly motioned to the servants to at least try and clean up most of the mess while I slapped some boxes of the table, which fell on the floor so I kicked them out of sight.

"Father, mother, how lovely to see you." I spread my arms with a smile that was a little too stiff and a little too happy to be genuine.

I hoped they bought that, because they scared the living daylight out of me. And that was saying a lot, because I was already dead and daylight could kill me again. My mother was wearing a long dark blue evening gown decorated with many diamonds, while my father wore a velvet dark grey suit.

"What's going on here? This is a mess." She scrunched up her nose while letting her eyes wander across the room, before they landed on me and she eyed me up and down in disgust.

Oh boy.

I cleared my throat and fiddled with my fingers behind my back. "Apparently, the traditional cutlery is lost."

"WHAT?! Why can't you do one thing right? You are a mistake of a son!" My father seethed, forcefully grabbing me by my blazer. 

Shutting my eyes, I turned my head away and braced for impact.

He hated seeing me wear the crown that he wore before me. If a vampire king wasn't killed, he was allowed to rule for a thousand years after which he had to pass on the crown to his successor. In this kingdom that meant his heir, otherwise known as the first born child.

Since I was an only child, he had no choice but to pass it on to me, or he had to choose a new royal blood line. He wouldn't never done the latter because of his pride. He couldn't bear to see his bloodline being stripped of being royal.

Pride was a big issue in this kingdom, because of it vampires overestimated their powers and refused to train. Soldiers got some basic training and immediately considered themselves god-like. All my attempts to change it were cast aside, because I might have been the king, but nobody truly listened to me, not when it came to making decisions and laws. The gold, the clothes, the act, it was all a facade and every day I tried my best to play along, ignoring the constant pit in my stomach, because if I didn't they would have me killed and my successor would make things even worse.