Blood & Honey #1

*Chapter Twenty*

It's been thirteen days since I brought Kinley and Maya into our home, and I have learned little about the mystery of Kinley Shea Rylan and her intoxicating blood since then. I enlisted the others to help me research this phenomenon. We've all come up empty-handed. Nowhere has anyone heard of a human who can defy compulsion or is immune to vampire venom.

Kalista has reached out to a trusted confidant back at the castle in Valderanna. The princess said when she was nine, she found her way into a hidden room concealed behind a statue. She doesn't remember what all was down there, but that there were scrolls upon scrolls and ancient books in a language she had never seen before. Later, she found out that the room she stumbled into was full of ancient documents that dated back to the beginning of our kind. Only Royals know these documents exist. When Kalista becomes queen, she will have access to all of the knowledge there is of the vampire race.

It makes me wonder what secrets are lurking within the Vondarrie's castle. Why would they keep the knowledge of our kinds past to themselves? I don't see what they have to gain from that.

Whatever their reasons, I know that if there are any written instances of someone like Kinley existing, the document would have to be locked safely in that room of secrets in the Vondarrie's castle in Valderanna.

While we await word back from Kalista's contact at the castle, I've launched my own thorough search through our family's written lineage. I know the basics, but I want to know if anyone has had hallucinations of the Beast of the Damned's life as I have.

When the black veins appear, I know I'm channeling my ancestral power. The question I need the answer to is why me? Was there another Darkos before me that could tap into the unknown, raw power of the Beast and his father the Great Warrior?

The Great Warrior that sits at the helm of our bloodline is said to have been almost as powerful as the Prince of Darkness himself. He was designed to obey without question, and he did. He led the army of the Prince and kept him safe for centuries. The Beast of the Damned wasn't the Great Warrior's only child, but he was the only child of the Great Warrior's that also had royal blood flowing through his veins.

"Argh!" I slam another book shut and toss it across the room.

Kinley flinches when the book makes impact with the far wall, gouging the stone.

I'm sick of searching and finding nothing useful.

Kinley looks up from her seat on the floor in the cellar where we keep important documents in a fire-rated room only accessible to members of our family. You have to bleed to gain entry to this room quite literally. She appears uneasy as she watches me pull on the back of my neck in frustration.

The routine we've established has been working well considering. After Maya cooks for the two of them, in which usually Kinley helps because I can't seem to get her not to, I keep Kinley busy so she doesn't realize her friend is being used as a living blood bag. Dorian and Kalista are the only ones who use Maya for sustenance. Serena and Sabrina prefer to source out. Kalista might too, but she has to take whatever we put in that golden cup of hers.

Kinley closes the book she's been flipping through for the past half hour. She can't read it because it's in an ancient tongue. However, the depictive drawings sprinkled throughout the leather-bound pages have captured her interest.

"I'm sure I'd be horrified if I could read whatever lines these pages as some of the pictures are rather gruesome, but it's neat that you have all these things from the past. All I have is a note..." Her words trail off as she runs her thumb across the aged leather book she holds in her lap.