Prince of Blood

1: Wrong Place, Wrong time

Everything began on that one night. The night I had chosen to break the rules. My parents had always been rather strict and I had a stupid curfew each night: 10:30. If I was back any later, I'd get grounded. They expected me to be the perfect son. But this one night, I had decided I could risk the consequences. Thinking back, I wished I would have picked a different night...any other night than the one I chose. I was at a friend's house that I hadn't seen in three years. Jace and I had grown up together but when his father died, he moved away to 'start over'. For the first year, we talked non-stop through email and texting but then, life took off and we both got too busy. When he came into town to visit, I had gotten permission (with a lot of begging) from my parents to take the day off of school to spend the entire day with Jace. That night, we were walking around town, was when I made the idiotic discussion to break the rules. It was already well passed midnight as we walked along the streets. We were both almost eighteen so we weren't nervous to be out this late as many others would. In reality, we should have been nervous. Neither of us knew what happened at night, but we soon found out as we wandered curiously down a alley after a odd sound.

Standing there in the moonlight was a man with ivory skin and dark brown hair that looked almost black. He was a short ways from us but far enough where we couldn't make out all the details to him. ...but we could clearly see the other person crumpled up at the man's feet in a dark puddle of thick blood. Jace and I both quickly stopped dead, shocked by this sight. We were now close enough to see the fine trail of red spilling from the standing man's mouth. His eyes were on the body at his feet and there was a look of utter disgust on his face as if he had tasted something very unpleasant. We both were on the brink of sprinting away when the mans' eyes snapped over to us, his expression changing to one of viciousness. The moment our eyes met, a cold chill ran through my blood. His eyes were a glowing crimson. A word that I had read about and knew, or thought, to be fantasy jumped into my head. Vampire. Neither Jace or I wanted to move, we were trapped in the stranger's gaze. My skin prickled as the stranger slowly took a few steps closer. Why wouldn't my body move? As he drew closer, I was able to see his figure more clearly.

As I had noted before, he was very pale and now thin silver scars were visible on his cheek almost like a claw had raked across it. His hair was like dark silk and fell in a strangely elegant way to his shoulders. His eyes were like red fire that enchanted and terrified me. A realization slowly came to me as I looked at him. He was gorgeous. And I wasn't thinking that in a gay way or anything; He was truly beautiful...no...that wasn't the right word...inhumanly beautiful. He was watching us with an animal life curiosity. I wanted to run...I should have run. But I didn't. I stayed still, frozen with terror and something else...awe? Never before had I felt something like that. My mind had been racing this entire time but only moments had passed. The man...no...vampire slowly continued to draw closer. His thin, pale lips slowly curled into a wicked smile.

"It seems you boys are in the wrong place at the wrong time." He said.

His voice was like liquid and silk. If that was even possible...those were the first things that came to mind when I heard it. It sent trembles down my spine but I slowly found my voice.

"You're..."

Ok, I only found it for a brief moment. The man chuckled and it sounded close to rain hitting a tin roof.

"A vampire? Yes, indeed. In fact, he was too." He said, gesturing behind him at the body soaking in it's own blood.

"You killed him." Jace rasped, his voice shaking with fear.

The vampire studied Jace for a moment before his eyes meet mine. They locked onto me and I was unable to look away. His gaze changed again and it became strangely fully of a odd fascination. No one spoke. Nothing moved.

"You're perfect." He said, his voice as soft as a whisper.