Kidnapped By A Vampire

Chapter 34

ARABELLA

"There's one other problem." I've been sitting with Theo and John while Theo lists out all our ultimatums. For the most part he has been accommodating. "We ran into a vampire hunter." This piques Johns attention.

"That's impossible. They're all dead." Theo shakes his head.

"We killed the one we found but she implied there were more." John still doesn't seem to believe him. Before he can deny it again Theo continues. "Half of her face was burned." John stands and starts pacing the room.

"Why does that matter?" I ask.

"A few hundred years ago the vampire hunters were out of control. They were killing all of us even the ones that didn't drink human blood. This broke their agreement with us...many vampires banded together and burned any hunter they found." Oh. She must be a survivor then?

"How can she have lived that long?" The one I saw didn't move fast enough to be a vampire.

"They're half vampires." John answers. "This is something we need to get the whole council together for." If they're half vampire why would they kill their own kind? Did they hate that half of them so much? Theo wraps his arm around my shoulder and leads me out of the room. We walk around for a little bit in silence before he leads me into a room with a large table. I count ten chairs sitting around it. This must be where they meet. Theo looks at the chairs in disgust. I feel bad that I put him back in here. I've asked but he's been unwilling to tell me why he left. I even tried to ask Joey. As if thinking about him summoned him Joey walks into the room.

"Got you too, huh?" Joey says taking a seat. Theo finally sits down next to Joey and I take the other seat next to Theo. I'm not sure I'm ready for this kind of thing. I know next to nothing about vampires and I know nothing about their past. Something tells me I'm going to have a lot of homework after this. That might be the most normal thing that's happened to me since the war ended. We still had to hop around afterwards because of the few stragglers that wanted to keep the war going. I look up as Vlad, Rebecca, and Alexander walk in. Behind them John and three other vampires I don't know walk in. At least I know more than half of the vampires here.

---

I close another thick book. I don't think I could do this without my vampire brain. I can read and retain things so much faster. It comes in handy when I have a huge stack of books John gave me to read. He said if I'm going to be on the council then I needed to learn more about their past, their laws. I thought it would be more interesting but man was I wrong. Before the council they had kings and queens. A couple of these go on and on about those families and all the children they had.

"Having fun?" Peter asks walking into the room. I jump up and engulf him in a hug.

"Oh my gosh! When did you guys get here?" I ask. We had to be separated when we were on the run again. I wasn't sure I'd ever see them again.

"What's this I hear about you being part of a vampire council? I think I might regret changing." Ian says smiling.

"Ha ha." I hug him too.

"The others are meeting up with their vampires." Peter says. He glances away and I know he's thinking of Colette.

"I'm sorry. Do you know if she's alive?" As much as I hated Colette, Peter knew her a lot better than I did. He even seemed to like her. She was probably better to him than anyone else.

"I visited her in one of the prisons...she wasn't herself. I think they did something to her." I want to say she deserved it. I never told Peter about how she tried to kill me. I think I'll keep this to myself. I turn to Ian. If he's here does that mean his vampire is dead? I can't work up the courage to ask so I sit back down and clean up some of the books.

"What is all this?" Ian asks picking up a book.

"Just some reading I have to do to be on the council."

"Do you even want to?" I look up to see Xavier in the doorway. "When you first changed you weren't even sure you wanted all this." It's true. Even when I ran into Gavin and his friends I wished I could be human again. He moves to stand next to Peter and Ian while the others arrive.

"I wouldn't say I want to be on the council, but I've come to terms with being a vampire. It's not like I can go back. As for the council, they need Theo. I knew if I accept their offer he would too. I just can't let anyone else die like my parents did."

"So you and Theo are like officially together?" Valentina asks. I haven't actually told any of them yet, but it's not hard to see when we're together. Before I can answer I spot Theo leaning against the doorway.

"Hey." I say giving him a smile.

"There's one last thing we have to do." He says walking up to my desk.

"I'll take your silence as a yes." Valentina says ushering the others out.

"We'll hang out soon." I call to them as she closes the door behind them. Theo gives me a kiss before handing me an envelope. "What's this?" He motions for me to open it. Holy crap these are plane tickets to France, Germany and a couple others countries across the ocean.

"It's not exactly the trip I wanted to give you, but it's the best I can do right now. We will be working and a couple others will be-" I cut him off with a kiss and rest my forehead against his.

"It's perfect."