The Other Side of the Lie (EDITING, ON HOLD)

Five-Swift

Swift was six when he discovered he wasn't like anyone else.

The coven's meanest members had shoved him outside just when the sun was coming up. Any normal vampire would have died, burning up in the sun's rays. Swift didn't.

Ever since that day, he'd been an outcast, hated by every vampire who knew him. He was a born vampire, not made. His parents had been killed for having produced a son who was so unnatural, to keep the bloodlines pure. Swift would have been killed as well, if only his coven hadn't found him so useful. He was hated for the thing that made him so valuable. The sun was the only deterrent the vampires had, and he was exempt from it.

The coven used him, shackled him to their Queen's will with the help of her pet witch. He was forced to kill whoever displeased or threatened the Queen. Then, he'd stopped feeding.

The coven tried to force him to feed, but Swift managed to refrain, despite the powerful compulsions that let the Queen control him, urging him to sink his fangs into warm flesh and take the blood he found there. He still didn't know how he'd done it.

At one point he was so weak he could barely move. That was when he'd been sold to Vulture's band of scavenger mercenaries. He could remember how Vulture had sneered at him and told Swift that he would get his strength back, or else. The transfer of power over Swift from the Queen to Vulture had hurt like nothing else.

And now he was concealed in a tree as he watched with satisfaction as the Prince of the Sky fey choked the filthy scavenger. Swift couldn't help but admire the Prince. Unlike some people in power, he did his own dirty work. The new Queen of the Sky fey got a band of underhanded scavengers to get her son. She had to know what kind of people scavengers were. Of course, Swift thought with disgust, that's why she chose Vulture in the first place.

Below him, the white werewolf paced as the Prince questioned Vulture, the words drifting up to Swift.

"Was it my mother? I swear, if it was, I'm going to..." Swift imagined all the wonderfully painful things the Prince could do to Vulture. The images made Swift's lips twitch. He really hated Vulture.

"I–I don't know!" Swift relished the fear in the scavenger's voice.

"Who would?"

"The dead man over there, with his throat ripped out." Swift glanced at Butcher. It wasn't his real name, as Vulture wasn't their leader's real name. Butcher was in charge of setting up deals. Swift played the role of bodyguard in their latest deal, not that Butcher needed one.

Swift didn't like royalty on principle, but he viewed Queen Raven as a lowly wretch who would have her only son killed and not feel a shred of remorse. That's just the kind of person she was.

"And him."

The words registered in Swift's ears at the same time he felt his body start to move without his permission. Against his will, Swift leapt from the tree and was about to land on the Prince and rip his head off when the white werewolf knocked him right out of the air. Swift was so surprised that he was free of the compulsion to kill the wolf and Prince for a fraction of a second. A searing pain in his head overwhelmed him and Vulture's body thudded to the forest floor. Blood trickled from his lips, staining his black teeth red. More blood, a lot of it, came from a gash in his throat.

Vulture was dead.

"Is he dead?"

Swift groaned and cracked his eyes open. His head hurt, and something felt different. He sat upright with a jolt. Vulture's slimy presence was gone from his head. For the first time in twelve years, Swift's mind and body were his own. Vulture's body lay in a puddle of blood.