Unfortunately Fortunate

2. Spencer

When I got the text message, I'd fallen out of bed in shock.

Read: My sister was an idiot.

She might be adopted, and human, but we loved her all the same, like a true family. I always had to pull myself away from the thought of her aging and, eventually, dying someday. Which was easy, considering how often she was trying to get herself killed now.

I sat beside her as she went through the lecture by my parents, which I obviously felt she deserved, but didn't want to have her going through it alone. Clearly, I was the nice brother every younger sibling craved for.

Amazingly enough, my parents let her go before dawn. I could tell bringing up my unborn sister wasn't part of Mom's plan, and she looked drained. Dad supported her back upstairs, not before reminding us to go to bed soon.

Once they were out of earshot, Samuel and Slivyn flopped onto the couch in their place. Though they were three years apart, they looked similar enough to be twins with dark brown hair they got from Mom and the hereditary stormy blue eyes. I, on the other hand, had black hair, which I got from Dad.

"You're an idiot," Samuel shook his head at Vanessa, saying the same thing I had in the car, just with no bite.

"What he said," Slivyn nodded. I winced inwardly. Slivyn was the one who tended to side with Vanessa most, like a big brother would. Not in the spoiling kind of way, but just in the my-sister-isn't-that-stupid kind of way. If he agreed with our parents, then this was really the right time to be concerned about... about everything. Vanessa paused from her vigorous glasses wiping session to give him a look, and there was no doubt it was a Did you really just say that? look.

While I was a vampire, I was also a human until three years ago, when I went through the Turning. It was what children of vampires did – rather than vampires, they were born human, and went through the Turning when they turned eighteen. It's said that surviving that was proof that you were strong enough to become a vampire.

Meaning I was a twenty-one year old vampire. That wasn't nearly old enough to truly feel the seriousness of the situation, though my twenty-three and twenty-six year old brothers were doing a fairly good job.

The current ruler, King Dracula (seriously, don't ask, I have no idea why of all names did his parents name him that), had announced fifty years ago that he would be stepping down sometime soon. For vampires, "soon" ranged sometime between five to a hundred years, so no one paid it much heed then.

Thirty years later, the criteria to become the next ruler were announced. You could probably guess how ugly things got after that. Skirmishes, full-out wars... Mostly in other parts of the world; hardly anyone came to Lily Town, which was why my parents decided to settle here. They bought land, built a life, had my brothers and I.

Then they adopted Vanessa.

I was two. It was a long-awaited family trip to France, a getaway from Lily Town that got boring quickly, but it turned out to be anything but that. We landed to find smoke rising from buildings and dead bodies littering the streets. I couldn't make sense of anything then, but I recalled crying and Mom's protective hands around me.

Vampires were raiding a town. We didn't do things like that - it brought too much unwanted attention to our species, and the only possible drive was the overwhelming desire to rule. While being the ruler did not guarantee absolute power, because vampires were not meant to be ruled, it did mean they would be the one who negotiated with the humans, who decided how much blood vampires under the house would be allowed every year. Who would receive reports containing confidential information on almost every household.

It was a tragic sight, yes, but my parents wanted nothing to do with it. Not when they had three still human children clinging onto the hem of their shirts which were of neon colours and silly cartoons. So we had hurried to make our way through the ruined town, until my Dad heard crying and found Vanessa in the arms of a dead woman. There were bite marks on her neck.

They had decided to adopt her in a heartbeat, bringing her all the way back to Lily Town. There was nothing left to tell what her life could have been, but the words sewn onto the blanket wrapped around her had told us two things: her name was Vanessa and she was loved. Needless to say, we hardly left town on a trip after that. With research and tons of experimenting, we managed to create a comfortable home in the middle of nowhere.

And now, nineteen years later, vampires were after her, because of her relationship with us.

I knew sometimes my parents hid in their room and considered every possible choice that would ensure the safety of all six of us. And that included letting Vanessa go, though I could tell they weren't exactly willing to do so, and I was glad for that.

Rather, screw King Dracula for deciding to do what he did now, and for the requirements he set. For a king, he sure wasn't wise, going around causing conflicts between humans and vampires. Sooner or later, the vampire hunters would counterattack. It was a miracle they'd yet to do so. Then I saw it clearly - this put my family at risk. They were at risk.

"Spence, what's wrong? Your pupils are flashing red."

Samuel's voice brought me back to the present, and I noticed my brothers peering at me, eyes sharp. Vanessa just looked concerned, her hand rubbing my back. I forced myself to relax, releasing a breath though vampires technically didn't need to breathe. I just did it unconsciously, like I did when I was human. Old habits die hard, though this wasn't a fatal one.

The view outside window told me dawn was approaching, and I set my jaw and sat up straight in determination.

"Just coming up with a hundred ways to drive a stake through our ruler's heart." And thank Eve my brothers gave their grunts of approval. Vanessa simply rolled her eyes, proving that she either did not fully understand the seriousness of the situation, or that she was an idiot. Probably a mix of both.

Man, why did I have to love her so much?