This is my story.
This is how I, Hunter Cross, became a slave.
This is not a story where a human falls in love with a vampire.
This is a story of pain, of abuse, of fear, of blood and dirt.
As you read this you can already assume that I made it...
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As I laid trapped in the back of the black car I had a lot of time to think. I thought about my mother. I thought about how in another hour she would start to worry about me. I thought about how maybe she would send Astred to find me. Astred was one of the other older males in town. He was around nineteen. He was supposed to be one of the next volunteers to give themselves up to the convoy as a slave.
In our village the older males would offer themselves up in order to protect all the others. All of the women and those who were under eighteen would hide away in a secret compartment under the basement of my house.
I thought about what Astred would tell my mother when they found my jacket and the sack filled with wood next to the mangled rabbit. I thought about Elize. I wondered if I would ever get to see her again. I had only recently begun to think of her as more than a friend during these last few months. I wondered if she would forget about me and move on with Brock.
I thought about the previous night I had spent with Elize. We had snuck out together to a clearing in the middle of the forest. We threw a blanket over us and we laid down on the surface of the dark brown ground. We laid extra close together and I could feel her breathing next to me. We laid down and she told me the names of the different stars. Her father had taught her the names when she was younger. The names sounded Latin or Greek and every word she spoke had me mesmerized; Cassiopeia, Cepheus, Capella, the list went on and on. I thought about our conversation we had and the way she held my hand under the thin red blanket.
"Do you think there is a place where the vampires have not taken over?"
"I don't know. I like to think there is."
"What happens when we turn nineteen and we have to sacrifice ourselves to the convoy? Do you think we will be bought by the same vampire? If we are separated do you think we will ever see each other again?"
"I don't know..."
A shooting star had passed and I closed my eyes. I wished that there was a way that we could live in a world free of vampires. I looked at her and smiled. "We don't know what the future holds, but right now, right here, we still have time. We could run away somewhere, but we both know that neither of us will do that, because that would be selfish."
"You are right. We still have time." She gave a reluctant sigh.
"I love you Elize..."
"I love you Hunter..."
I reached into my pocket and I took out a small blue velvet box. In that moment I wanted nothing more than to spend the year we had left being married to the love of my life. She had said yes. Her laugh and her smile as I asked her filled me with joy. Not that it matters now. I sadly hoped that I would never see her again. I knew that if I saw her again it would mean that she was a slave as well.
