Fire & Fangs (GXG)

Chapter 7 - Luna Mea Cea Nouă

POV: Alcina

It was a night like any other in Castle Dimitrescu.

As I stood near my window, sipping on a glass of my favorite blood wine, I could hear the screams of a maid that no doubt got on my sweetlings nerves. With my acute hearing, I could hear her running and screaming through the halls as...

Cassandra laughed maniacally.

I wasn't worried in the slightest about what my daughter was up to. I knew she was having her sadistic fun, but was turning her urges onto someone who deserved it. I taught my daughters and raised them well. Killing needlessly was a waste and sometimes it couldn't be helped, but I always told them to funnel their feelings into those who warranted their wrath.

I sighed and brought the wine back up to my lips.

I licked the trail of wine that trickled down said lip.

I could taste whose blood swirled and mixed with this wine.

It was the butler who Bela had caught stealing from one of our distilleries.

Just thinking back on when Bela handed me the ledger and showed me the discrepancies had my blood boiling with rage. It wasn't like I didn't treat those mean-things fairly. I paid them a wage and gave them someplace to work. The man-thing shouldn't have even been in this Castle, but his mother was my last chambermaid and she had been fiercely loyal to me. Out of respect for her, I gave him a position within these hallowed walls. A position he wouldn't have had otherwise.

I didn't want to kill him, but I took solace in the fact that justice had been dealt.

So, I savored my wine and listened to the symphonies of the maid's voice as Cassandra's sickle impaled her with deadly precision.

"I told you to never play with your food Cassandra... When will you ever learn?" I said aloud with a chuckle.

Out of the blue, I felt the balaur within me stir.

I was on high alert and swiveled my head around, looking for the reason why she had awoken. She hadn't awoken in so long that I had forgotten what it felt like for her power to radiate through my body.

I could see through the glass that my eyes had changed into their other form.

They had not just bled red, but they had transitioned into 'ochii balaurului.'

Mother Miranda had changed me into two halves and the other half that made me who I am had come to the forefront.

Something was amiss and I would stop at nothing to find out.

It didn't take long for me to locate the source of my balaur's awakening...

There on the steps near my castle's entrance was a body.

Their clothes were torn, they had cuts all over their body, and they looked to be on their last legs.

They soon would be crossing over, but I knew that something drastic had changed in me as I met their eye.

An angular jaw, sharp features, scars aplenty, but oh so feminine in nature. The woman had only one eye, but it pierced through my very soul and had my balaur in a frenzy. We stared at one another for what seemed to be the longest time, but the pink of her eye that seemed to glow so bright dimmer and she fell onto the steps unconscious.

Faster than my own brain could process, I flew to the entrance of my castle and opened the front doors with enough force to have them crack in certain areas.

But once they were open...

A scent that I supposedly hated entered into my nostrils.

Lycan.