Deserae

Chapter 24

I woke with a start, hearing the howl rip through the quiet night air like a blade. I sat up quickly and looked around the dark room, not seeing anything abnormal or misplaced. There's nothing different, everything is how it was when I went to sleep earlier.

My hand stretched out beside me to feel for Luna, but my fingers never reached her. I looked down and saw messed up sheets below me but no one in them. Luna left in a hurry, it looks like, because she always puts the covers back when she gets out of bed, she would never leave them like that unless it was an emergency.

My stomach dropped at the thought of there being something wrong. What if she got hurt or what if her father's fallen ill? What if there's something wrong with the LunaGolybaya's? What if they declared war on us and troops started pouring into the kingdom?

No, calm down Rae. Nothing's that bad, she probably just had to leave and talk to one of her ambassadors or something like that, maybe she just needed to step out for a minute and thought she'd be back before she woke me up.

I'm just freaking myself out, nothing's wrong.

Right?

Yeah.

Nothing's wrong.

Luna will be back in a little while and tell me what happened, why she left, and that she's fine. Everything's fine. Everyone's fine.

I laid back down and stared at the ceiling. She's fine, I know she is. Luna can hold her own so there's no reason for her to be in any danger. Not to mention all of the security around this place, the castle's crawling with guards. Normally they're hidden, unless, of course, she has people visiting the palace. Generally other royalty or something like that, and, in those cases, she likes to show off her military.

Luna's fine, I know she is.

But what if she isn't? What if she jumped out of bed because there's a problem and she got called to fix it? I mean, no offense to the King, or anything, but he's kind of useless. He's withered and old, his Wolf isn't as strong as it used to be and he can't control anybody anymore even with his Royal influence.

Even though he's an Alpha, his Wolf is growing weaker every day. At first, I thought that he still had a good hold on his kingdom and that he'd die before Luna got the throne, but, now that I've been here longer, I realize that she rules more than he does. She's always meeting with counselors and making plans for expansion, writing new military propositions, and forming alliances with neighboring nations.

Luna's been training herself for this job longer than I've been her pet, that's for sure, but she seems like she was built for the role. How she never lets anyone know what's going on in her head, how she puts on this face of confidence no matter the situation. She is always in control, no matter how heated the conversation gets.

Maybe I need to stop worrying so much and just go back to sleep, I'm sure Luna's alright. And if she's not she can handle herself. Certainly, if she were to get into a fight I would just get in the way, right? I'm not helpful in confrontations, anyone who knows me can say so.

For a Vampire, I really am quite weak.

I rolled onto my side and looked out the double french doors to the night sky, and the balcony that I rarely go on. Even when Luna's out there looking over her kingdom, I find it rather hard to join her, after all, I almost committed suicide on that balcony.

No matter how many times Luna apologizes for it, I still can't truly forgive her. I mean, she sent me out there with the one intention of my dying. She told me that I could either stay with her, submit to her, and just deal with everything she was going to put me through, or, I could jump and fall to my death. I wouldn't have to suffer her wrath and she wouldn't put me through hell, but that would be because I was dead.