The Vampire's Love

Chapter Seventeen - Surprise, Surprise

Hey guys, I would really appreciate your feedback on this chapter. Thanks!

Rosaline woke up to rhythmic swaying. She opened her eyes and stared into the face of a young man with bright white hair. He wore a black jacket with white accents along to seams, a white shirt and a red tie. A few buttons were undone on the boy's shirt, exposing a black rose tattoo.

The boy glanced down and his eyes widened. "Oh my god, you're alive."

Rosaline was confused. Why wouldn't she be alive? Had this boy tried to do something to her?

"Who are you?"

The boy stumbled in shock, almost dropping Rosaline. "W- what?"

"I asked who you were. Don't you know?" Rosaline asked. She was very confused. If this boy didn't even know who he was, he wouldn't be much help to her in figuring out where she was or why she was here.

"I'm Zero, don't you know that?" the boy told her, disbelief and shock written all over his face.

"Um, no, sorry. I've never seen you before in my life," Rosaline told him. She looked down at the ground. "Would you mind putting me down? It's a bit weird being carried by a strange boy I don't know."

Wordlessly, the boy named Zero set her gently on her feet. She stepped back and he just stared at her. He blinked a few times and then started walking in circles muttering to himself.

"What the hell? What do I do now? Is there even any way to fix her? Holy crap, Yuki's going to kill me..."

Rosaline watched the weird boy with the weird name and slowly started backing away from him. He didn't seem to notice.

"Oh, my god, the Headmaster is going to kill me, too! Well, if there's anything left after Yuki gets a hold of me." Zero flipped around and punched a tree. "Those thrice-damned vampires!"

He turned around to ask Rosaline a question, but she was gone.

Rosaline ran away as fast as she could from the crazy boy. Who in their right mind talked about vampires in front of strangers?! Or at all? Everyone knows that vampires aren't real, they're just made up storied to frighten children and sell Halloween decorations.

Rosaline could hear him calling her name behind her, but there was no way she was going to slow down.

She burst out of the forest into a stone courtyard. There was a humungous building in front of her. She stared at it in awe for a few seconds before she realized that if she could get to the top of it, she might be able to find a town and maybe someone could tell her where she was.

Rosaline started for the building and ran up the steps. She tried the handle on the big double doors and was surprised to find that they were unlocked. She cautiously opened one, but no one was in sight so she slipped inside.

Not knowing any other way to reach the roof, Rosaline followed the staircase upward. The building was eerily silent and she wondered vaguely where all the people were, for surely an impressive building like this would have lots of people in it. She went up three flights of stairs before she opened a door and found herself on the roof.

It looked like she had interrupted something creepy and evil in nature. A really tall man in a long black coat and a black shirt with the first few buttons unbuttoned turned and looked at her in shock. It looked like he had seen a ghost and was not happy about it.

Across this section of roof, near the upper story of the building, was a fancy black sofa with gold arm rests and clawed feet. On it sat a man who looked like he was related to the first one, except this one looked more evil and had a pile of women around them. Not alive ones, either. They had holes in their necks where blood was still congealing and their eyes were like glassy marbles.

Perched on an armrest of the sofa sat a girl who looked almost exactly like Rosaline. She was wearing a white version of the uniform she was wearing. It was like staring in one of those trick mirrors at the carnival, but instead of seeing a distorted image of herself, she was looking at the complete opposite version of herself, an utterly diabolical one. The girl grinned a triumphant, scary grin.

The first man was still staring at Rosaline. He swallowed visibly and strode over to her, his long legs eating up the space between them.

Rosaline panicked and turned, tugging against the door handle behind her to try and escape the crazy people, but discovered that the door had locked behind her.

Then she felt hands on her shoulders and she was spun around, her face getting pressed into a chest. A nice chest, but it was a nice chest that belonged to lunatic.

"I thought I failed you again," she heard the man whisper. She wasn't sure if he was talking to her or to himself, but it was weird. Why did she have to wake up surrounded by lunatics?

Rosaline pushed the strange man away from her, though she was under no disillusions that if he had wanted to stay where he was, Rosaline wouldn't have been able to move him an inch. "Um, thank you very much for the...strange hug and creepy words of endearment, but who are you?" she asked. She looked past the man standing in front of her to the other two on the sofa. "And who are you people? And where am I?"

The first man stared down at her with a mix of emotions playing across his face, which was funny because Rosaline had the sneaking suspicion that this man had control of his emotions at all times and under any circumstances. First came shock, then horror, then panic, then distress, then guilt, then absolute, soul-crushing pain. It actually made her a little sad for the man, although she didn't know why.

Then Rosaline leaned around the guy to the see girl that was sitting on the sofa was grinning with delight. She clapped her hands together. "This is far better than I'd hoped." She laughed. "Ooh, this is going to be good."