

Praise for Ashley's other books

"Everyone can become a hero. That is what I got out of it. Well a lot more but that was a really powerful message. It keeps you on the edge of your seat to see what will happen next. I can't wait for the next book and look forward to more from this new author!"

–Kindle and Me

"Memorable characters and plot momentum will keep the reader fully engaged right up to the pulse-pounding, dramatic conclusion with a stunning ending that I didn't see coming! Shock Me is a gripping beginning to a new series. I, for one, look forward to the future adventures of these characters."

–Lusty Penguin

"The end of this one totally set things up for the next book and left me eager for what comes next ... Those who enjoy YA Sci-Fi Romance with a twisty plot mystery should try this one."

–Delighted Reader

"Shock Me by Ashley Harris is a story with new, fresh premise and I believe that fans of paranormal young adult novels will be thrilled to read it. I was completely hooked after reading prologue ... Ashley Harris managed to masterfully confuse you and leave you wanting more."

– "Ja čitam, a ti?"

"I loved this book so much I finished it in one sitting ... Where do I sign up for the second book's blog tour? I'm so excited."

–Endless Reading

"I think the summary for this one doesn't begin to really summarized Shock Me. In a way, I found it misleading because there's so much more to it. I couldn't stop reading it once I started. The story hooked me up from the beginning to the end. Most especially the ending. I'm glad that it was written in a third person's point of view. It made it easier for me to understand them. The story itself was written very well and the mysteries surrounding it kept it more interesting and better. It's like when one secret was revealed there's another secret."

–Musings In Fiction Alley

"Shock Me is a very nice, light read. It is a fast-paced action book with a little romance, and it is a perfect way to pass some time. It was good enough that if the author wrote a sequel to Shock Me, I would definitely read it ... "

–Books With Pizzazz

" ... I was still shocked (no pun intended) at what all happened at its climax. I won't spoil it because it needs to be read to be fully appreciated! If you enjoy YA lit, suspense, action, a little sci-fi mixed with fantasy, then go pick up a copy of this book. As far as first in series go, it hooked me right away and I can't wait to see just where the author takes it from here. Not to mention the awesome semi-cliffhanger!!!! So Please, oh please, hurry book two!"

–Mom With A Reading Problem

Also By

Ashley C. Harris

SHADES AND SHADOWS: GARGOYLES RISE

(Prequel)When Gargoyles Reign

(1)When Gargoyles Rise

(2) When Gargoyles Choose

(3) When Gargoyles Drown

(4) When Gargoyles Soar

(5) When Gargoyles Ascend

(6)When Gargoyles Breakthrough

(7) When Gargoyles Cry Victory

SHADES AND SHADOWS: SLAYER NEXT DOOR

(1)The Slayer Next Door

(2) The Slayer Awakens

THE TROLL SERIES

(1)Troll

(2)Troll Cries

(Stand-alone) Troll Whispers

(3)Troll Games

(4) Troll Rise

THE SHOCK ME SERIES

(1) Shock Me

(2) Sparks

(3)Collide

(3.5) New Divide

(4) Ignite

(5) Power

THE ONE NIGHT IN SERIES

(1)One Night In Heated Snapshots

(2)One Night In Close Exposure

THE LINES NOVELLAS SERIES

Lines Part 1

Lines Part 2

Lines Part 3

When Gargoyles Rise

Book One

From

The Shades & Shadows Series

Ashley C. Harris

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental. The author acknowledges the copyrighted or trademarked status and trademarked owners of the following wordmarks mentioned in this work of fiction: Netflix, Wonder Women, Apple, Apple Watch, Gucci, AMC Movie Theater, AMC Movie Theatre, Louis Vuitton, Jedi Master.

Copyright 2017 by Ashley C. Harris. All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce, distribute, or transmit in any form or by any means. For information regarding subsidiary rights, please contact the Author.

http://www.ashleycharris.com

Cover design by Amber Razzouk: http://www.gracemycanvas.com

February Edition 2019

Dedicated to:

My precious God, Yahweh (Jesus), who stops me from growing faint when things seem impossible and inspired this quote:

"As soon as the grain is ripe, he puts the sickle to it, because the harvest has come." Mark 4:29.

בְּרֵאשִׁ֖ית בָּרָ֣א אֱלֹהִ֑ים אֵ֥ת הַשָּׁמַ֖יִם וְאֵ֥ת הָאָֽרֶץ׃

&

My parents, David and Karen, and sister Amber Razzouk.

# Chapter One

(Check out 1 of 3 family trees for the series. Click here to view them more clearly on the author's website, or skip to Chapter Twenty to view all 3 at any time.)

##

## February 2021

## Maryland, US

#### ROSE

The gray sky was drizzling ever so lightly, the sound of the rain almost reminding Rose of home—almost, but not quite—as she rode in the back of Livia's limo. Livia was a secretly wealthy and very powerful female. She looked like an eighteen or twenty-something cover model as she stared craftily at Rose. Livia would have liked to pretend she was Rose's fairy godmother, someone who should always be appreciated and obeyed. As Livia's smile widened, Rose, at seventeen, just stared out the window, longing to be back at her real home and away from this manipulative woman. Instead, via Livia's orders, Rose was on her way to seduce and beguile the immature teenager Sean Noble. Sean, the same guy her childhood self had often scared the crap out of, every time she entered his space.

"Ready to finally make this boy fall in love with you?" Livia asked as Rose rolled her eyes. After a minute of silence, Rose chose to look back at the person who had secretly witnessed the birth of their current land, the United States. Livia and Rose, though they didn't look it, weren't from the area they now traveled in, nor the country everyone around them called home, nor even the current time.

Perhaps Livia's sultry lips, light olive skin, and taut curly hair that's done up in her real golden-leaf headband, gives that away, Rose thought. She took in Livia's more modern twenty-first-century designer dress that somehow didn't clash at all with her old-fashioned hairdo. Rose's attire hinted at nothing from her era; Rose's hair, unlike Livia's, was plain, dirty blond, frizzy, and straightened.

"Boys in this decade like that," Livia had told her when she'd had her staff dress Rose and iron out her less beautiful locks that morning. Rose felt as boring and awkward as could be, especially with her contacts that covered her reddish-pink eyes. Her eyes, even when she pretended to be human, always hinted at what Rose really was.

"So, let's go over the plan?" Livia prompted, like a babysitter who was teaching a defiant and idiotic child what to do. Even as Rose ground her teeth, she had to play along and nod her head to Livia, the secret vampire princess who kept her safe.

"Be nice to Sean," Rose repeated Livia's 'genius' plan with another eye-roll because the last time she'd seen the human boy, he'd acted like what kids from this era would label a 'douche bag' the whole time they were together.

"And?" Livia wanted her to continue.

"Don't let him hurt himself. Might I remind you? This is a polo group lesson with real horses, so I can't help it if he does something stupid." Rose said as Livia's smile widened. Rose could almost imagine her keeper's fangs, though Livia was cleverly keeping them hidden. Vampires could do that until they were ready to bite. Rose's kind, on the other hand, needed enchanted charms to conceal what they really were.

"And?" Livia's eyes went to Rose's thighs. They were covered with a polo skirt that Livia considered too long. "Remember, this isn't 1550. Corsets and long dresses are out," she hissed. "Though I do still recommend a push-up bra for you."

Rose gave her a cross look. "Oh yes, and I guess looking like a modern day brothel girl is in." She pulled up her skirt two inches, so more leg would show, and so Livia would be quiet. The truth was, Rose was far from a brothel girl, and her only kiss had come from a boy who was long dead. And it wasn't even a French kiss. So I can add 'never been past first base' to my list of paranormal and freakish tendencies compared to regular humans my age.

What Livia wasn't saying to her at that moment was, despite Rose's lack of experience, she fully expected Rose to charm and beguile the adolescent, prep-school teen, Sean, into at least wanting her that afternoon. If only I could teach him to fight with a sword instead, that would be more fun. As long as Sean didn't cut off his own leg, that is.

"Much better," Livia said as she checked out Rose's long thighs. Livia then drew out a nail file and began sharpening her own beautifully manicured claws. Rose felt relief when the limo finally stopped outside the polo club as the driver quickly hurried to get the door for Livia's seventeen-year-old guest. The rain had stopped, and the smell of horses and land was refreshing as Rose gave Livia one last look goodbye.

"A thank you would be nice," Livia hissed.

Rose mouthed a half-fake thank you and nodded. She owed Livia everything, despite her venomous behavior. As the limo driver, Charley, got back into the car, Rose noticed the barely healed holes in his neck. Rose knew Livia would no doubt be feeding from Charley—an ex-con that she'd enslaved and turned into her serv—within the hour, possibly sucking him to near-death. The same way the vampires had tried to feed on Rose's relatives once upon a time.

Of course, the odds back then were a little fairer. Rose had come from a family just as fiendish and at least half as powerful as the vampires who now ruled what was left of the supernatural court of Shades and Shadows.

Being half as powerful as the vamps had not been enough to save us.

"Have an awesome day," the driver called out to Rose merrily from the limo's window as he took off. Rose was as pale as a ghost as she nodded, and then, in a polo skirt too short for her liking, she headed inside. Sean's polo class was already sitting, getting instructions from a professional player as she walked in. The horses stirred at her arrival; they sensed what she was as the polo instructor looked at her with a questioning look.

"Ruby Swan?" he asked. She nodded at the fake name and all the kids turned; the horses were still stirring as the boarding school teens looked at her. They were all in their conservative uniforms. Their coach standing next to them had arranged this session with a real professional player to give the elite students an edge.

Livia had dressed Rose in contrast to the others. Rose was in the latest, hoochified, polo fashion. I'm dressed like someone itching to take an attention-grabbing selfie, not like someone who really wants to ride. Damn you, Livia! Rose felt all the females spot her and then eye her outfit disapprovingly, not very impressed. As if Rose were trying too hard as a public school girl and it was evident.

All the males, in contrast, looked her up and down, all but Sean Noble. She recognized him even from behind as one of the taller boys in the room with his short, light, curly blond hair, and broad shoulders. His shoulders are way wider than they were the last time I saw him. He's taller too. He had a scar above his eyebrow that was barely visible to anyone else but her—that was because Rose had put it there. He turned, and his blue eyes came to her for just a second and then looked away. Sean, unlike the others, knew what Rose looked like without her enchanted ring. Her human appearance was nothing but a mask he'd never cared for--at least, that's what she'd always thought.

"Is that the public school girl from Maryland? She is supposed to be an outstanding rider. That's the only reason they're letting her take lessons with us," the girl next to Sean whispered into his ear.

Rose could hear her, thanks to the supernatural abilities she'd been born with. The girl's name tag read Samantha; she and Sean sat very closely, shoulder-to-shoulder. Samantha turned back around and leaned even nearer to Sean, causing him to grin charmingly at her. Rose quietly took a seat in the back. She found herself already not fond of Sean's newest gal pal.

"Yeah, she's our charity case today," another girl with a name tag labeled, 'Clair', joked with Samantha in hushed whispers. Sean pretended he didn't hear their words. Instead, to silence the conversation that he possibly knew Rose was listening into—does he remember I have heightened hearing? Probably not—Sean slipped his hand subtly onto this Samantha's covered thigh, over her skirt, something Rose noticed right away even from the back where she could still see them. Rose listened to him say to the brunette, "So, you really think you're going to school me at polo, Sam?"

He said 'Sam' like it was the sexiest nickname ever. The only nickname he'd ever given Rose was calling her 'it' or 'the monster' once. Samantha seemed to like the touchy attention from him, as if Sean put his hand on her thighs all the time. She winked back. "I hope so."

Oh, of course, you are going to school him! It doesn't take that much skill to beat Sean Noble, Rose thought sarcastically as she got the full picture.

Her arranged match clearly had a new girlfriend. Rose knew from social media that Sean had had a lot of school girlfriends throughout the years. Puppy-love trysts where younger people claim they are going out, but dates consisted of their parents dropping them off at the movies. But now, at the age of seventeen, one year from the current era's version of adulthood, as Sean and Samantha sat close, this seemed like much more than that to Rose. Like their bodies were craving one another.

Rose had only really ever craved one person a long time ago. The most scandalous thing she had ever done since then was pretend to have a boyfriend once—a lie she'd told to Sean a year and a half before. It had backfired on her because Sean had seemed relieved.

What is Livia going to say now? She'd probably tell me to stuff my bra even more and try to trip this girl Samantha in order to get Sean to only look my way. Rose would never do either thing. I, as a woman, am worthy of so much more. She sighed and grunted out loud, already over this.

"Okay, now, let's see how everyone does with some basic warm-up drills. Half of you can get saddled up on a horse while the other half watch," the instructor told them.

Samantha shouted, "I get dibs on what horse I want first!" and took off as the other students laughed and pulled out their phones. Polo club is nothing but an excuse to take pictures, and participate in an extra after school activity for college applications, Rose figured. Sean moved with the crowd, leaving Rose to walk in the back as another boy, a student with the name tag 'Brian', tried to speak to her.

"Hey, so you're the great rider everyone's talked about, from public school?" he asked as he tried to do what Sean should have been doing. Both Sean's and Rose's families depended on them falling in love one day.

"I grew up around horses, but as a rider, I consider myself only average." She tried to answer with no hint of an accent. Her speech was something she worked on regularly, so her native accent wouldn't give her away.

"Cool. I attend Saint Catherine's on scholarship myself. Where are you from?" Brian asked as they walked outside and the sun hit Rose's face.

All the horses shifted and looked her way the moment she was near. The creatures were wondering if Rose was a beastly friend or foe. Rose tried to smile calmly and let them sense she was an animal lover. The horse Sean was helping Samantha get onto didn't seem to believe the 'I come in peace' aura Rose was putting out. It bucked slightly as Rose and Brian got closer. Samantha let out an overly dramatic scream as Sean held her steady and tried to soothe the horse.

"Shhh, steady girl, steady," he said to the animal as he petted it, the fact that his family owned horses obvious as he turned back and cut Rose a harsh look. She couldn't help that Livia had made her get all dressed up and come to 'seduce' him—something I'm majorly failing at—and instead scared the horse.

"Why don't you just get out of here, so no one gets hurt today?" he whispered under his breath, low enough that only Rose could hear him. So he does remember I have animalistic hearing. She gave him a cutting look right back as Brian spoke to her again.

"I didn't hear you answer?"

She looked at the stranger, her expression a little clueless, having lost track of what he'd said. Brian had red hair that reminded Rose so much of her mom's own hair color. "Where are you from?" he repeated.

Rose let her smile fade as she looked at the eleventh-grade student and answered, "Wouldn't you like to know?"

Yet, the truth was, a part of her wished she could tell someone else besides Sean Noble that she was born in Scotland, in the year 1544. During the century of her birth, before a wicked curse, creatures known as the gargoyles and the wizards that created them with dragons' flesh ruled the skies.

And Rose was one of them.

# Chapter Two

## Leith, Scotland

##

## August 19th, 1561

#### ROSE

The night was black and murky. The full moon and every star were blocked by rain clouds, drizzling out a light mist as fog ascended on the waters of Leith. Leith was a fishing and import city on the coast of Scotland that consisted of spacious beautiful lands, enchanted forests, and castles; some of which belonged to the human world, but others only to the supernatural.

Rose flew through Leith's sky with her brothers close behind her so that she couldn't take off on them again. She knew it was apparent to any unlucky human spectator what she and her siblings were—a trio of three young gargoyles. Rose landed and her dark crimson wings relaxed as she touched the ground. Rose fished for the ring she wore on a chain around her neck so she could put it on and appear magically human. Gargoyles were part human, part dragon, much like centaurs, who were half human and half horse. Both races had their own royal shaded courts and had been brought to life by a society of wizards who lived secretly throughout England, London, and Scotland. That society by some was called the 'court of shades and shadows.'

With the help of her enchanted ring, Rose felt her skin shift and pull—a sensation like someone was trying to rip off the flesh near her wings as they shrank and became hidden under the skin of her back. Her bright reddish-pink eyes were the last to grow faint. This was how she changed into her false human form—an ability Rose didn't need in her family's own castle, but she chose to wear so she didn't scare the many human slaves and servants the wizards had brought into the gargoyle kingdom. Most of them forced to work at Rose's home and were consumed with fear and dread all the time. This was their punishment for plotting against wizards and witches. So she chose her human form to calm the servants down and her mother did the same.

Rose looked into a grand silver shield that an enslaved knight was holding as he guarded the gargoyle castle. Within the shield's reflection, she saw herself as human. "We're the beautiful and extraordinary ones, not those that serve us," her brothers would try to tell her. They didn't understand Rose's compassion. At the age of twelve, her family underestimated her extreme fascination with what she considered the beauty in creatures not like herself, especially mankind. Everything about the humans strange new one-God religion that was taking over Scotland was fascinating to Rose.

Her brothers marched past the knight whose shield Rose had been staring into. Behind him, more male Scottish slaves were carrying massive stone and marble slabs out into the castle's courtyard. They were working on Rose's father's assembly of the life-like giant statues he'd commissioned in the images of his family and Merlin—the grandest Wizard alive. The first was almost finished, a statue that stood at the massive height of four stories in length. It was a rendering of Rose's grandfather, the first gargoyle ever created.

She looked at the image with worry, wondering if these statues were an arrogant sign that if anyone declared war against them, the gargoyles and wizards would be unbeatable. If that was true, and my family is unstoppable with the wizards' help... then after time, how many humans will we actually enslave? All of England and Scotland one day soon?

As they entered her grand home, human servants brought her and her siblings fur robes. Rose and her brothers passed one servant after another, still walking as their royal garments were fastened to them. Every slave they passed was made to bow; her brothers laughed as they kicked dirt into the faces of the young men and women kneeling. Rose's brother Robert stepped on one slave's bare toes. Rose remembered that slave's name was Donna Noble, and she was trying to button up his robe. Donna yelped as he kept walking with no apology. Rose stopped and looked back at the girl, saddened, as her brother yanked Rose forward.

"You don't have to be so cruel. These people are already in our power until they die," Rose snapped at him.

"These people are humans who schemed under the name of the Vatican, to work against the hierarchy of shades and shadows," her brother hissed back at her as he struck a human that was stopping to bow. Robert hit him just to prove a point as Rose heard Donna Noble flinch behind them at the sight of it. "If they had their way," Robert went on, "their human leaders and priests would have burned every person with magic in their blood at the stake or chopped us all up at the guillotine. Time you face reality, my naïve little one."

Rose kept her disturbed eyes focused above, not wanting to indulge Robert in his cruelty. He eyed each slave girl that they walked by, like they were both his toys and punching dolls. Her brothers didn't know that when Rose wasn't flying and mentally escaping, a secret part of her felt compelled to scheme and dream about freeing each and every human slave. She knew all of them and their children, and even their children's children who weren't born yet, would be the gargoyles' objects forever. Rose imagined, at only twelve, becoming an adult and freeing everyone; yet she knew if her father or Merlin heard that, they'd beat the living dragon out of her.

"Come on, Rose, you're in trouble," Robert went on. She was the youngest of her siblings. He brought her through their castle hall, past another giant stone statue's head. This one was being carved into the face of their handsome father; his figure would go beside the statue of their grandfather. Rose's dad now had the biggest gargoyle wings of all—so much so that when he flew, people thought he was a whole dragon coming from afar, born to devour.

They marched up a thin rail of twisted stairs, toward the bottom level of their home's tower. It was there where Rose's mother, Helen, was waiting. She was a beautiful and statuesque woman that looked like an older, much sultrier version of Rose. Only Helen had a full head of bright red hair. Rose's mother's gold and silver eyes— like all the gargoyles' extraordinary eyes,— revealed what she was, even with Helen's wings hidden under her skin. Her mom was also trying not to scare her slave chamber-maidens. They all seemed calm until Rose's brothers walked in.

Rose's mom pretended to ignore the humans' fright; yet secretly Rose knew Helen was bothered and felt great empathy for the slaves. She tried to hide it as she put her hands on her hips. Helen's face was striped with worry and relief as her daughter was brought before her, safe, and alive. Despite their family's power, Rose knew the reason for her mom's concern. That reason included the most handsome face Rose had ever seen. A face belonging to a family of real live vampires that had awakened. Rose had originally thought vampires were a silly human myth, yet twelve vampires, independent of the wizard society, and actually thousands of years older than the other supernatural beings, now walked the earth.

Most in the hierarchy of shades and shadows gossiped that the prayers of the persecuted human church had helped wake the blood-suckers. That a young priest or monk had found their tombs due to a 'holy' dream. He and some of the other Latin monks believed the vampires would be the magical tool the humans could use in destroying the gargoyles and wizards, and freeing all the blood-cursed slaves forever.

This family of vamps called themselves the true royal guardians of the night and friends to mankind, for they only fed on mystical things. Rose had heard that the wizards— who could see magic as shades of colorful light within people,— asked the gargoyles to destroy the vampires, fast. Even though the vampires gave off one of the prettiest crimson lights of all. These actions had started a wicked battle that Rose's mother had predicted when she and Rose had first laid eyes on the vampire boy who had taken her breath away.

Shortly after, Rose's father and Merlin had managed to capture and cast a spell on the youngest vampire princess, Julia. They were unable to put Julia, or any of the other vampires, back into their peaceful thousand year sleep; so Merlin found a crueler way to make the blood suckers silent... He'd cast princess Julia instead into an Entombed Stone spell, where her skin and body were turned into a statue, and once in slumber, Julie had entered a state of torture and terror. This was Merlin's success plan to put all the vampires 'back to bed' for the next millennium. Once he could catch them one by one and weaken them, that was. Julia had been beaten and abused for a full three weeks before her skin fully turned to stone.

Ever since, Rose was supposed to be kept from venturing out into the Scottish village where the vampires were taking sanctuary. Yet, she dreamed of going to that very place every night, in her false human form, where she could once more glimpse at Julia's older brother, Adamus. Rose had never known what it was like to have a crush on someone until him.

"Guess who was out against your orders rescuing Mary, the young, human Scot queen, as her carriage made way to her own castle."

"Rose! You know you're supposed to stay away from all humans right now," her mom snapped.

Rose's own hands flared out. "Mom, you said stay out of the villages where there were churches and vampires; I only went into the woods near the waterfalls where I had heard," Rose said innocently, "Mary, the returned teenage queen, traveling. Mommy, I just wanted to see what she looked like, and when bandits began chasing her carriage and I heard her scream, what could I do but help?" Rose had wanted to originally see Mary to be inspired by a truly powerful female who was only a little older than herself, and a queen.

"Now the human queen is safe at home in her castle, while her own cousin Elizabeth plots to cut her head off. How pathetic." Robert chastised Rose like her helping wouldn't fix anything. "Neither she, nor any human royals, are anything compared to us." As he spoke, the slaves, once subjects of Queen Mary or Queen Elizabeth depending on where they were born, cringed. Robert went to grab one of the servants because of that, and possibly break her arm.

"Boys! Stop this. Now." Her mother's wings ripped out of her back, as she took off the jewelry that kept her looking human and marched up to her son. Rose's mother had secretly never wanted this life, though she did love her children. "Leave us," Helen ordered.

Rose's brothers bowed their heads angrily to their mom and took off. Helen's grand wings stretched out, each one bigger than her body, reaching to seven feet tall. The scales in Rose's mother's wings matched her silver and gold shimmery eyes. They were hypnotizing.

Helen dismissed her human slaves. She turned to Rose with a sad and guilty expression as she tried to stay calm and said, "Go get supper and some sleep, my precious one."

"But I want to stay with you," Rose said to her mom.

"Oh Rose." Helen shook her head, "All right, let's get supper together, but you know if your father calls me, I'll have to go to him."

"Mommy, if something ever happens to dad, would you be in charge instead, our queen?" Rose asked suddenly. She knew her mom could do what Rose dreamed of: free the human blood-cursed slaves.

"Quiet, Rose, don't let anyone ever hear you say that," Helen warned her as they exited. Yet Rose thought, if the humans have female teenage queens like Mary, Queen of Scots, and Elizabeth, Queen of England, why not me or my mom one day?

A short time later, they walked down the hall where they spied more servants, this time carrying a bound and chained man. As she and Rose got closer, Rose recognized the young man's notable features. His body had been beaten, bruised, drained of blood, and seemed barely alive. This mangled prisoner was Augustus, the oldest son and prince of the vampire family. The gargoyles had been starving and beating him for days, just as they'd done to Julia. Rose knew immediately they were weakening him and getting this eighteen-year-old looking Roman boy—though he was really much older—ready so Merlin could perform the same Cursed in Stone spell. Augustus ached as his body was dragged and his handsome and hero-like face turned toward Helen. He gazed out at the woman gargoyle as if seeing a glimmer of hope.

His eyes appeared like he wanted to cry suddenly, the way his other sister, Isabel-Aurelia —another vampire princess older than Julia— had wailed, calling out for vengeance, when Merlin had taken Augustus, this brother of hers. Augustus looked like he wanted to die from what had been done to him already; like he needed blood, magic blood only, to feed on. That's why Merlin also hated the vampires so, not because of the humans the vampires wanted to protect; he hated them because they actually only craved wizard blood to consume the most. That was why the human priest had chosen to awaken the peacefully sleeping fanged family; because the priest knew as long as the wizards walked the earth and helped enslave humans, the vampires would be driven to hunt them, and witches and other super natural creatures too. We gargoyles taste horrid to vampires, though, thank goodness, which must have been an extra bonus to why Merlin created us, so we could fight for him.

"My little brothers," Augustus finally croaked, snapping out of the dream Rose's mother's beauty had cast on him. "What have you done with them?" he asked desperately and sadly as he looked Rose right in the eyes next. As if she personally had taken more of his siblings and had the power to free them.

"Perhaps we put your brothers, Adamus and Felix, in cage-like coffins along with some rocks tied to their feet as we drown them, over and over, in our moat." Rose's father, Edward the Sixth, king of the gargoyles, said. He walked up behind them with his grand wings and massively robust and muscled form and growled. Her father was like a proud animal who enjoyed playing with his prey.

"A kindness until Merlin gets ready to start the same stone sleeping spell that we'll put on you Roman, cross loving, mosquitoes soon," her father went on. The vampire family was supposedly born around the time that Christ walked the earth; which explained the human monks and priests liking to them. Rose's mother had told her each vampires' name was actually much longer than what they were going by now. That the Romans named their people differently than the English and Scottish did in the 1500s.

"Helen," Edward the Sixth said , looking upon her with both lust and disgust. "Why are you in this form?" he demanded as Rose watched her mother take off her charmed bracelet and ring, causing her dragon-like wings to grow out of her back. "Never hide the glory of being a gargoyle," her father snapped as he glanced down at Rose, and she obediently removed her own charmed ring and felt her skin break and snap as her own wings unfolded from her back too. The pain of it made her flinch as she looked up at her father and he nodded, uncaring.

The vampire prince Augustus didn't seem to like this very much. Rose watched him make a sour face at their true forms. "You may be able to command your women to do as you please, and humans that are weaker than you; but one day soon, I'll watch those gaudy statues you're building of yourself and your entire line, fall." Augusts tried to prophesize and scare them as her father turned to him then. "You all will become the joke of entombed statues and lose everything you have; including your powers, your beauty. It will all become the laughing stock of mankind, and vampires alike."

The gargoyle king was slightly amused at his prisoner's words as he punched the teenage-looking vampire hard, right in the gut. And then he pulled out his sword, and cut off Augustus's left hand, right in front of Rose and her mom. Rose screamed.

"Get the child out of here," her father commanded Helen. "And then come back to me."

And with that, as Rose saw the vampire's severed arm that she knew would slowly grow back, she was pulled away with tears in her eyes. There were also tears in the eyes of all the surrounding slaves. This life was not a good one for anyone but the gargoyle males, her mind told her, and the wizards; despite her being the daughter of a king, it meant nothing. Unless my mother or I could somehow succeed my father one day and not the boys, she thought.

* * *

# Chapter Three

Rose, in her gargoyle form, jumped right out of her castle's tallest tower's window. She felt a sense of falling as she let out her wings and used her speed to swoop down below. Rose landed on her feet, able to see the guards and servant knights everywhere. She moved away from them, going into her family's large garden that had a series of water fountains within. The sound of them was like that of the waterfalls that were all around Leith; all so mesmerizing to her as Rose walked to a large fountain that had a statue of Mother Mary within it. The statue had water that flowed right from the virgin's eyes as she cried. Rose's father Edward had stolen it from a church he'd burned down. Rose cried near the sculpture, feeling she had more in common with this figure than any other spoil her family had.

"For humans away from here, this is an age of art and new life," Rose spoke aloud as she thought of some of the regular towns closer to England that were churning with a renaissance of new inventions, painting, and entertainment. There was even talk among the human English about funding a Spanish expedition to find a new world where nothing supernatural dared exist.

"But for the leaders of my kind, only tears and greed," Rose went on as if she were speaking to this Mother Mary herself, or perhaps her son, the Jewish Nazarene that the vampires and Catholics so liked. "Will I become like my father or brothers? Will all the beautiful gargoyle children who are innocent and kind become so too?"

Rose turned away from the fountain of Mother Mary that left no answer; it was supposedly carved by Michelangelo. Finding no solution, she began walking through the garden that was lit by torch light. The smell of fruits that shouldn't have been able to grow in the fall filled her senses. Wizard magic had created a green paradise of fruits and vegetables, insects and snakes, they all gathered near her home.

I'll pick some fruit and bring it secretly for the human Scottish slave children to eat, it's the least I can do, she thought as she began picking. She saw a plump, light pink peach that looked really good. As she reached her hand out for it to tear the fruit from the vine, a thorn pricked her.

"Ouch," she said as the thorn drew blood. Rose's blood dripped a dark crimson red—darker than normal human blood—as she put the wound to her mouth and tasted salt and iron. She licked the blood away so her fur robe or picked fruit wouldn't get dirty. Then she heard something, a twig or branch close by snap, as the sounds of the windy night and pouring fountains seemed to get louder. Rose glanced up and let the savory peach in her hand fall to the floor.

"Who's there?" she asked. She didn't smell anyone, no humans at least, or gargoyles. This is a problem. Her wings stretched out, tall and mighty as Rose stepped toward the noise. She was slightly afraid but knew her father's enslaved knights were close. All she'd have to do is shout, and something terrible would happen to those that would mess with a gargoyle princess.

Rose saw a shape of a boy come out from the distance; a boy her own age, or at least that's how old he appeared. He was lying on the ground, but slowly pulling himself toward her. Rose dared take one step forward. Her entire form stopped, and a shiver went down her spine as she spied either Adamus or his brother Felix—both were the younger vampire siblings of Augustus. She stepped closer again as her breath got caught. That's when she recognized Adamus's curly chestnut hair that looked softer than any gargoyle or human's mane could be. Adamus also had golden brown eyes that were just piercing, like they could burn a hole into a soul. All the vampires had eyes like this, but to Rose, Adamus's were extra special. His skin, which looked as if it was naturally olive-colored once upon a time, had a slight soft paleness to it now, due to over a thousand years of sleeping out of the light. Yet if the boy stayed out in the sun for a month or so, she imagined he would be richly tan again; appearing foreign, and even more attractive to all.

Adamus,—the boy she hadn't been able get out of her head from the moment she'd first seen him walking through a Scottish village— his eyes traveled to her extended wings that were up and high; a sign that she felt there could be danger. His gaze moved beyond them to her long dirty blond hair and then settled onto her bloodied finger. I thought gargoyles weren't supposed to taste very good to vampires? This boy has clearly survived a beating, a drowning, and then somehow escaped. So maybe that is the reason he is staring at my hand like he wants to jump on me to get it?

"Please," he whispered, his voice deep for a little boy's, strong. "Please help me."

Rose took a step back. Vampires, when at their best, were stronger and faster than gargoyles. But she could fly, a big advantage over him and all other vampires out there. With him so weak and mangled as he crawled before her, she didn't feel a dire threat to call for help. Instead, her heart saddened as she knew, probably soon, she'd have to watch her brothers find Adamus when they realized he was gone and hurt him all the greater. Maybe she'd even watch him get turned to stone.

No! She flinched just thinking about it.

"Please Rose," Adamus repeated. "I want to see my parents again, my sisters and brothers. The wizards plan to separate us all, asleep forever in a state of stone terror and without one another. Please show mercy, and help me," he begged as her eyes widened. She'd helped humans before secretly. But to help an enemy of Merlin could get her in big trouble.

"How do you know my name?" she asked.

"I remember you from the market, you and your mom. Who could forget the names of women who, even as they pretend to be human, have the beauty of angels," he said as their eyes locked. Little did he know, she thought he had a manly beauty like no other too. She wondered what it would be like if those lips of his, ever tried to kiss her, the way Merlin's grandson had dared in the past.

My mom would not like me wondering that about a vampire boy.

"I know you're different than the others, my whole family sees it. That you and your mom, and all the gargoyle children, are kind," he went on as he crawled a step's length closer. Did the royal family of vampires really sense that? If so, would Merlin one day do something about my mom and I's softer hearts? Such as harden us with magic like he'd done with my brothers and father?

She chose not to think about it as she took another step towards him. Rose looked around to make sure no one was approaching. He was her family's enemy, but was he hers? She didn't really want him to be.

"Even if I flew you out of here, I doubt you'd make it out of the woods in the state you're in; and if I took you to your family, they might kidnap me like my family did to your youngest sister Julia. Despite what you say about me."

"You're right, my family would anyway; what choice has your kind and the evil wizards given us. But for the here and now, with no adults and their quarrels. I need blood, supernatural blood to survive this night," he whispered.

"You know I can't get you that. I want to help you, but I can't kill a wizard or witch for you to feed on," Rose informed him. She knew he couldn't be talking about her because Gargoyle blood didn't taste good to vampires.

"Actually, you can help me another way, I think, beautiful and merciful one," he breathed, as his hypnotizing golden brown eyes went to her. "There's power in your blood, Rose. An anointing that a wizard, or witch, or some other creature has put there that makes you different than any other gargoyle," he said as, in the cold, she could see his own breath exhale in the chilly air. She looked at him very confused as she suddenly took a step back. Was he hallucinating?

"You're mistaken, my blood is just like any other gargoyle's, not like a wizard's or witch's blood that has a magical aura of shade inside." She knew if she was wrong, then this whole line about him 'calling her merciful', and acting weak, could be a young boy's act as he let his prey get closer.

"It's in there," he said as he glanced at her injured finger that still had the smallest drip of blood pooling from it. "A secret shaded anointed magic that runs through your veins. Maybe it's the hidden power of a young future queen," he breathed as if able to read his meal's greatest desire. It also occurred to her that the vampires could see shades of magic just like the witches and wizards could, once blood was drawn. Interesting. "I won't be able to consume too much of it because of what you are," Adamus said as he looked over her gargoyle wings like they were a freakish thing.

So my blood would still have a bad, gargoyle after taste to him? This confirmed, in Rose's mind that when he'd complimented her beauty, he must have been lying. Something in her chest fell a little at the thought of a gargoyle not being able to be truly beautiful to him.

"But you can help save me. Please, just give me enough of your blood that the hidden magic in it will nourish and heal me; your blood can undo the wounds that your brothers inflicted. I can then save my other brother Felix who is still stuck drowning alive in your family's moat, and we can run together with our speed. Please Rose, I won't harm your family or even try to aid my oldest brother," he said with brokenness. "Felix and I will just escape, or at least try." He actually teared up when he said that. This made Rose slightly less afraid as she began to feel bad again for him. "And I'll never forget you, the beautiful gargoyle Rose that's come into this garden, like an angel," he elaborated, "to save me."

"Okay," she said, not believing her own self, nor believing his compliments and sweetness toward her. Yet she did want to help him. More than she'd ever wanted to help anyone else before.

I'm going to get into so much trouble for this. She turned, he probably thought to walk away and leave him to die... but instead, she made sure no one was near. Before she could think about it, Rose flapped her wings. She fluttered up just a few feet into the air, and then landed right next to him. Rose was sure he'd just back away from her blood once given a taste. It was supposed to be putrid to vampires.

"I know you vampires are very strong; if you should try to hurt me, I'll scream, and then my family will curse you into torturous stone sleep," she warned, her voice not coming out brave. Rose was so close to Adamus, a handsome young vampire, that she suddenly felt more nervous than ever.

He tried to stand weakly but couldn't as he nodded. His hands and feet had been whipped with thorny ropes like a dog. Rose even saw, now more up close, nail marks put in his wrists and then pulled out of his skin. Something pagans and gargoyles alike did to their Christian enemies to mock them.

Rose reached her hands out, touching or trying to touch the parts of his arm that were wound-free and pulled him up. It took all her own strength to hold him—vampires, for being so strong and fast, were also heavier, she discovered, like steel. No wonder they couldn't fly. Her wings flapped to gain some of her own strength and momentum as she pushed to lift him enough that he was leaning over her. Adamus's weight intense as her wings pushed to flap and keep them upright.

Very carefully, she stuck her wrist out, from the same hand that had gotten pricked.

"How bad is this going to hurt?" she asked. Having him so close made her cheeks turn red as the two of them stared at one another.

"It will hurt a little at first, but then it will stop, and it won't feel bad at all," he told her as Rose's eyes widened. She wondered if this was a lie. Adamus stared at her wrist then, "Amazing. the magic that runs through you and its various shades. It's sanctified. Maybe you are really destined to be a queen," he gasped, sending more chills through her. Adamus opened his mouth then and weakly brought her wrist to it, like she was a special cure or rare wine.

She watched and felt his teeth bite into her flesh as her wrist shook with pain, her natural reaction to pull away as he held her hand still and sucked from her vein. She winced from the deep pricks and her wings flapped rebelliously, almost lifting her and him away. Yet his hands were now determined to hold on. She began to feel liquid life drain from her wrist, and into the handsome boy's mouth.

A warmth rushed over Rose, heating up her cheeks, her chest, and her face. Her skin turned bright pink from the sensation of pain and then suddenly a numbness took root as Rose's whole body felt so light. His draining after a moment didn't hurt as much at all; in fact, it did begin to feel good, like she and the boy Adamus were becoming one. My blood really isn't disgusting to him.

Rose remembered seeing Augustus— back when their families first started fighting and before he was captured— try to bite into her father's neck but then he'd withdrew. Augustus had had the most disturbing look just from smelling gargoyle blood that day.

Is there something different about my blood, magically shaded or sanctified, whatever that means? Could I really be a gargoyle teenage queen one day, like that of Queen Elizabeth or Mary? So I could make people safe, like the vampires try to do? She wondered, knowing this still wasn't making clear sense, as she watched Adamus's wounds begin to heal. His grip on her getting stronger and stronger as his super strength returned and his eyes, hungry, went from her wrist to her neck.

Something in the very back of her mind told her that perhaps this was a terrible idea. Yet, she wanted him to feed on her blood, wanted to stay so connected to Adamus as he pulled away and they stared further into each other eyes. Her wings relaxed, slowly lowering them to the ground as he continued to feed from her neck. "How old are you? Really?" she dared gasp. Her vision and the garden around them grew hazy.

He sucked on her harder for another few moments before letting go to answer, "I'm just over a thousand," he admitted, like that wasn't that old. "My parents and siblings are much older than me."

Rose's eyes widened, as he bit back into her then, and took so much that her light body began to fall into his arms. Now she was the weak one and he the strong.

"You're an old man," Rose said as she had to close her eyes. How she trusted him still in that moment while he did this to her must have been an effect from him taking so much of her blood into himself.

"Well, thanks," he replied with a friendly level of sarcasm. Then more seriously, he dared say, "Honestly, I wish that was true, but until my body slowly grows up, I'll still see this world like someone that appears our age would. Like you do, beautiful merciful one." And then he was feeding on her more as Rose's eyes closed. She couldn't stay awake anymore.

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# Chapter Four

## Six Months Later

Rose awoke groggily to the sound of canon fire and screams. She jumped up, startled, and afraid. It was as if she'd been injured, but she couldn't remember how or why. Rose thought about it as suddenly, the memory occurred to her.

Adamus!

Her wings flapped wildly from the screams she heard outside. Rose went to her window and peeked out. The dark sky was being lit up with canon fire that was so overbearing, it almost looked like royal fireworks. The sky is on fire.

In addition to the ammo, arrows were soaring through the air everywhere. Her grandfather's statue that was next to the nearly completed replicas of Rose's mother and father fell down; smashing to the floor so forcefully nearly the whole castle shook. Rose jumped, her neck and wrist still sore as she took in people from her home starting to run. Every compelled and enslaved knight or servant was taking off. They deserted the castle, even though doing so should have killed the slaves upon leaving due to their blood curses; yet, somehow, they were able to go.

Good.

As much as Rose felt relieved for them, she also felt fear like never before as she saw, coming out of the woods and moving through the waters of the moat... people! People that looked like regular humans; fisherman, farmers, adults, and children alike, all sprinting toward Rose's home with pitchforks and torches in their hands as if someone had given them all superpowers.

This has got to be a dream. I'm dreaming. Or perhaps Adamus is still feeding on me.

Leading the mob were Augustus and Felix—Felix only looked a little older than Adamus, maybe fourteen—and both vampire princes were totally healed and had escaped somehow. What is going on? With them was their father, Octavius, the vampire king.

Rose charged, trying to jump out of her window so she could quickly fly to the highest tower, where her parents slept, and wake them. Despite how awful her father could be, she still needed to warn her mom, and the other gargoyle women and children, that danger was here. Yet, as little Rose tried to move out the open window where she saw all this, she couldn't.

What the...?

She tried again as she pushed against an invisible wall that wouldn't let her exit. Some magic or curse had trapped her, and she guessed her family also, within the castle. Rose dashed out of her room. She shouted when she saw her mother, Helen, with her fiery red hair already coming for her.

"Mom! We can't fly out of here. And the family statues, they've fallen down. A mob is approaching," she tried to explain. Her mom took her hands into her own and held her tightly.

"Rose! My Rose, thank goodness you're awake," her mom said, as if that alone was a miracle. "Listen to me, you've been asleep for months and a lot has happened since then, my love. Merlin has been defeated, sucked dry by one of Augustus's sisters, Isabel Aurelia."

Rose's eyes widened as she shook her head. "What, how?" She never thought she'd see the day when the most powerful wizard in the world could be killed.

"What about father?" she asked as servants and gargoyle children alike ran around them. The gargoyle kids looked so clueless and afraid, their wings flapping wildly. Rose's fear grew as she felt both her wrist's wound and the bite on her neck begin to throb. She glanced down at the vampire fang marks that hadn't yet healed, and yet she'd been asleep for... months? How can this be?

"He's severely injured," her mom replied. "Come on, I'm getting you to safety with your youngest brothers, and the other kids," she said as she began pulling Rose down the stairs toward the tunnels that ran along the bottom of their castle, under their moat.

"Mom, if dad's hurt, you should take over as queen," her daughter demanded. "You can make peace with the vampires, they know you're kinder and different than the others," Rose said, repeating Adamus's words in a wild panic.

What happened after he bit me? She wondered, his image filling her head now as if he was getting near. Her mom made her run with her down the steps.

"Rose, the vampires want me and every last gargoyle dead. After they killed Merlin, they took his grandson Gaven captive and then destroyed the hidden city of wizards and witches. They have been hunting down every last supernatural citizen and shaded creature in all of England and feeding on them all."

"Merlin's grandson? Where is he?" Rose asked, the young boy had been her friend, first kiss, and if she hadn't recently formed a strong crush on Adamus, maybe he would have been more.

"They made the boy cast one last curse, a spell, on us before they killed him."

What? No, he can't be dead.

"What kind of curse?"

They approached a hall of torches that her mom's wings purposely snuffed out so the two of them wouldn't be seen. All around the hall they could hear the rushing of wild waters of the mote overhead. They could also hear screams above.

"Helen, this way," came a shout down the tunnel. The shout was from another gargoyle woman, Nellie, a friend of Rose's mother who had at least three dozen gargoyle children with her. Most of them were girls as the boys would be up with their fathers fighting unless they were really young.

There are thousands of gargoyles in this castle, surely we're still enough of a threat that the mere eleven royal vampires left, and all their humans, will want to make a treaty with us, wizards alive or not.

"What about my older brothers and father?" Rose asked her mom as they ran toward the others.

"I'm going back for them once you, your youngest brothers, and the children of our race are hidden away, my darling," her mother told her.

"No, mom, let me help you." Rose tried to snap as her mother pulled her along. Water from the tunnels dripped on them, wetting Rose's hair.

"No, you're the one that has to be hidden away above all else, because of the hidden magic I've had put in you, Rose. Within you is a chance at a different life for all of our kind. You must choose that better life, now," her mom said sternly.

Rose's eyes widened and they joined the other girls. Everyone's wings were flapping about wildly; so much so that it was hard for them to fit in the tunnels as Rose scooped up a small gargoyle infant into her arms. The baby, too, looked aghast as she clung to Rose. Rose's wrist, where she had been bitten, continued to throb and hurt even worse, as if the one who bit her might be right above. Adamus! Surely he wouldn't hurt my mom or these women after I saved his life.

"Come on," Rose's mom yelled to the others as they ran frantically down the tunnels together.

The sound of footsteps from the side of the tunnel they were running toward made them all stop dead in their tracks. Rose's mom's wings flapped wildly as she pulled out a sword she had stuffed within her fur robes. Her feet lifted off the ground. Her wings, like a warrior dragon's with gold and silver reflecting off, were a terribly beautiful sight Rose knew she'd never forget.

"The vampires are here," a little gargoyle girl cried. Her mother's friend, Nellie, ran to them.

"Come on, there's a side room to hide in, let's go."

Rose's mother looked back to her as the gargoyle children began to take off, but Rose, holding a precious little infant gargoyle in her hand, just stood still and stared at Helen. Unwilling to leave.

"Go, Rose, now! Please, you have to escape, be my strong gargoyle queen while I create a diversion."

Rose's eyes began to tear as she saw behind her mom, the vampire queen, Octavia, walking in a long white Roman tunic with at least fifty human knights behind her. They had swords raised. Rose's mom's wings flapped.

"I can take them, now go."

"No. We can talk this out." Clearly, Rose's words didn't match the vampire queens excited look to kill and dominate, "Or I'll help you, mom."

Rose felt her heart rip as Nellie grabbed her harshly and pulled her toward where the other children were scrambling into a secret chamber within the tunnels before Rose could kick herself free and scream, "No!"

Once Rose was inside, and finally pushed out of Nellie's grasp, she turned on Nellie to try and stop her from locking the door. "No! My mom! My mom, we can't leave her out there. I can never leave her." Nellie pulled out her own sword toward a wild Rose.

"Rose, put your energy into running and obeying your mother now. If you ever want to see her again, you'll stay hidden in this moment so you can later fight." Rose stared at the woman and her forest-green wings. The infant Rose was still holding, a little too tightly, now began to cry. Nellie took the baby from Rose's hands.

"This way," she said and they all began to move toward another door within the chamber that would lead to another tunnel that went out to the woods.

"Going somewhere?"

Rose's and the other gargoyle kids' eyes widened as they realized, once locked inside, that there was another teenage girl in that room waiting for them. A girl that looked Roman. She appeared to be only fifteen and it was evident that Adamus and Augustus were relatives of hers. She had thick, pouty, pink lips, and very golden eyes. Her hair was half up, with little twists and braids around a golden headband. She was definitely not from Rose's era. Isabel Aurelia. This is the vampire princess who killed Merlin.

"How nice to meet the females of the family that trapped my youngest sister, Julia, in stone and a sentence of tortured slumber; as you tried to do to my beloved older brother, Augustus, too. How sad for you all he escaped," Isabel Aurelia said as she smiled then. She had a hungry for death kind of grin.

"Your battle is not with these girls but the adults of our people, with me," Nellie snapped back, being truly brave as she handed off the infant Rose had been holding. A four-year-old was also hiding closely behind her; Nellie's daughter! Isabel Aurelia didn't look like she was a match for the gargoyle woman, especially when Nellie pulled out her giant sword again. Yet, the vampire looked very unafraid.

"That sword isn't going to stop me from tearing the wings off your back and then laughing when I make your own children eat them before the curse sets in. I made Merlin eat worse before I sucked him dry," the fifteen-year-old looking girl spat and then, in the blink of an eye, with super speed and strength, she was behind Nellie. The vampire grabbed the gargoyle by the wings and threw her right into the wall. Then she pounced on her, attacking Nellie as the children screamed around them.

"Run!" Nellie shouted and the children did, as Rose, unwilling to stand back anymore—and wanting to know that her mom was still whole—charged after the vampire princess Isabel that was going after her mom's friend. But a super strong hand reached out and grabbed Rose before she could do anything at all. The hand spun a crying and adrenaline-crazed Rose around and she came face to face with Augustus. The seventeen-year-old-looking prisoner that had begged Rose and her mom for mercy not to long ago. He now gripped her tight and put his hand over her mouth, nearly breaking her jaw so she couldn't shout any longer.

Rose kicked wildly and flailed her hands out to get him off as he gripped her harder, she felt the vampire take the very arm his brother, Adamus, had sucked on, and broke it. Rose's scream was heard through his gag as her wings went wild, trying to push him away as her arm snapped, and he went to break her other arm.

"I'm sorry," he said as he held her broken arm up, letting it swing naturally with pain. He saw the cut where his youngest brother had bitten Rose. "Your blood, it smells so magical, that's not ordinary for a gargoyle." He bent his head down then as he put his lips to her neck, his teeth going right to where she'd let Adamus bite her.

"No, you are no ordinary gargoyle at all. Your blood and the unsealed holes within your scars hold shades of bright and clear light. But there can be no gargoyle queen able to live, even if my little brother likes you." And right as he was about to slip his fangs into her wounds he whispered, "My sister Isabel and I, we will consume you together, I think, pretty one. Before the curse turns your body to grotesque stone."

What did he just say? Was the stone curse that was meant for the vampires now descending upon my family? No! Rose felt Augustus squeeze her so tight more bones broke as he went to tear off her wings and suck her all at once.

"No, brother," came the sound of another little girl, her voice younger, like that of a nine-year-old's. Rose didn't bother to look at whatever vampire child was talking to him. She only wanted to see her mom once more before she died. She heard Isabel Aurelia laugh across the room as she tore Nellie's wings and kill her.

Please let my mom survive all this and get away, if there really is a single, lone God out there... please.

"Our father and Felix said they need you again, right away, none of us can find Adamus. We worry he's in danger."

Upon hearing that name, Rose did look up at the little nine-year-old girl who was like the spitting image of Octavia, only miniature. As one girl stared at another, before Rose knew what was happening, she felt a piercing pain go through her wing. Augustus had stabbed it with something sharp. Rose screamed again as she was pushed into the nine-year-old's arms. This younger vampire sibling was stronger than ten men combined.

"Hold this one, Livia, until your older sister and I are ready to feast upon her before the curse sets in."

"Yes, brother," Livia said as the prince looked back at his victim.

"Make sure she doesn't get away, every potential gargoyle queen and king must be put down." He pushed his knife further into Rose's flesh as she gasped. She felt as if she was sweating blood.

All Rose saw was darkness; she tried to fight it but couldn't. And then, for a while, there was nothing, only screaming.

Sometime later, as Rose slept, or at least, she thought she was sleeping, the pitches of yelling clashed with the strange ringing of bells in her head. Church bells that were foreign and soothing for the mere fact that they covered the screams; these bells played songs she hadn't ever heard before. Other noises thumped and made unusual harmonies with the bells that Rose also couldn't recognize; like beeping horns of some sort and human murmuring. She heard loud footsteps of not a few but hundreds, going to and fro. The sound of water splashing filled her mind too with other muffling and whooshing echoes from a reality and place that she couldn't identify.

An un-countable amount of time passed and then Rose slowly and finally began to open her eyes. She saw everything through a gray, stone-like haze. It was also impossible to maneuver at first; like her little body was frozen, but not exactly wounded anymore from what Augustus had done.

Someone please help me.

With her eyes still closed, she pushed to move and breathe. Her chest felt like it had rocks on it as she tried to suck in air. It hurt with each inhale and exhale. Her vision getting less foggy, as shapes began to form and light poured in through a window; light from the sun. Rose found herself in a small box that was... moving?

Strange? Maybe I'm in a carriage, though this ride feels too smooth. I think I'm moving too fast.

She saw outlines of people in this mysterious carriage with her. Why don't I hear any horses? The people that appeared to be human in shape were watching her as Rose gasped and tried to move away from them. But it was hard, as if her body was just waking from being in what felt like stone.

There was something around her wrist and left finger... A heavy chain or bracelet she'd never worn before, along with a tight ring. Both of these jewelry pieces itched and were connected.

The image of a boy became solid in front of her. She pushed to be able to see him fully. His eyes were blue. She focused on them first and took in the lovely color that reminded her of the Leith waterfalls. His cheeks had a lot of faded freckles that were scattered about like the stars. He had short, curly, blond hair, blonder than hers; and he was shorter than usual for a boy, she thought, especially for a boy her age. Or maybe he's a few months older than me. He was in attire she had never witnessed before. This must be a dream? He wore a shirt that had green and blue stripes on it; made of dyes that were strange and on material that was so thin. Below it, his pants were made of a contrasting thick, faded blue, coarse material; she couldn't even guess what animal they were made from. He also wore the smoothest and thinnest pair of glasses over his river-like eyes.

Are you a wizard? she wanted to ask, but as she went to talk, out of her mouth came dust. That made her panic as dust and soot poured from her lips and gums. What is wrong with me? Her throat was so dry she felt like she could drink a lake and not be satisfied.

"This is so freaky, mom," the boy she'd been looking at gasped as he stared at Rose. She didn't understand. "Why isn't she as ugly as the other statues, does the charmed bracelet and ring really fix all that? I thought gargoyles were supposed to be part dragon?"

"Sean!" the older blond woman, Rose assumed was his mom, quieted him. What is he talking about? His mom was in front of the boy in a seat that smelled of a strange, pungent leather, with someone next to her in the other seat who hadn't turned around; his shoulders looked like a man, with hair just as short as the boy, Sean's, only redder. Strange. Where are these people from? They are dressed so different.

The man in front appeared to be steering the moving box or carriage they were in with a wheel in his hand. Rose heard more whooshing sounds. Sean—apparently that was his name—kept staring at her, so curious with those glasses of his, as he took out something. A little flat box that he held in his hand; one side of it was made of glass, its other part seemed like metal. He turned the metal side that had a little glass hole at its top toward Rose's face.

"I just can't believe she is one of them," he went on.

"Sean. What did I tell you about using your phone and trying to record this? Put it away now or it's being taken for a full month!" His mother snapped as the boy rolled his eyes and put the little box away.

What's a phone?

"Who are you?" Rose gasped as she and the boy locked eyes. He seemed more likely to answer as he was amazed she could even speak, "Where am I?" She was embarrassed that more dust clouds and soot came out of her mouth as she talked.

Sean was quiet for a minute as he continued to stare, but finally, he gave her an answer. Sean whispered very low, "This is Washington DC."

Those words didn't make sense to Rose. Her brain was in a mental fog.

"Are we still in Scotland?" she tried again as that only made the boy gasp more.

"Sean, wait for Livia," his mom yelled.

That name suddenly rang a terrible bell in Rose's mind. She wanted to sit straight up, but she couldn't. Sean seemed to feel bad for her.

"Washington DC is on a different continent than Scotland," he added in an even lower voice.

"Is this Asia, or Africa?" she guessed, though this boy hardly looked Asian or African. Rose had seen people from both places when they'd come to Scottish lands by boat to trade goods. She found people from different areas so interesting and beautiful.

"No, another continent."

His father turned around and tried to shush him then. When his father turned, the strange carriage they were in shifted just a hair. As if the father was steering it alone and not horses. But that would be impossible, right?

Sean made his own frustrated face, growing mad at his parents. "Mom, I think we can fill her in a little. She probably still thinks the earth is flat, for goodness sake." He turned back to her and at full volume,— choosing disobedience the way Rose had often done against her own father,— he said, "Washington DC is on a continent called the United States, and it's the year 2016."

"What?" she mouthed with fear, but her words didn't fully come out. That couldn't be true. His father reached behind and back handed his son then, right as Sean tried to dart out of the way and his mother screamed.

"Seth, stop."

Rose felt bad for the boy, though her father had certainly beaten her and her siblings a lot harder. She tried to sit up again.

Did he really just say 2016? She peeked out the carriage's strange glass windows, and that's when she saw that whatever they were riding in, there were no horses at all. Just hundreds of metal boxes with curved tops and wheels that moved on their own.

These people have to be wizards!

Then Rose pushed and tried to use all the air that was left in her lungs to scream.

# Chapter Five

Rose felt hysteria shake deep inside her when their magical carriage parked; the strange metal and cloth door beside her was opened, and yet, she couldn't move to get out. The bracelet and ring on her left hand itched terribly as she noticed Sean had a ring and similar necklace on too. Rose looked at the jewelry on him and her more closely and saw tiny stars sketched next to crosses. Okay, maybe not wizards, could these be a mysterious group of monks of some sort?

Sean's irritated father, who introduced himself as Seth Noble, got out of the carriage first and then had to help lift Rose, as she tried to lift herself but couldn't. How she yearned to make a run for it. Rose closed her eyes and tried to summon her wings. She wanted to change her form. Yet her jewelry—which didn't belong to her—was making her too human for her own comfort for once. Nothing happened and when she tried to weakly yank off the baubles to transform, she couldn't. The sun outside was setting as her hand itched all the more.

Unable to change, she was forced to look upon the large gray building that seemed like a new kind of grand castle or church of some kind before her, but with a flat rooftop. This mysterious structure had stairs at its bottom that twisted around an eerie, large water fountain, that had a statue of Poseidon, or maybe Zeus or Neptune in it, Rose wasn't sure.

Goodness, who are these people. She thought about the generation that built this place. They don't look like Greek's or Roman's to me the way the royal vampires did? Is this 'United States' owned by a new form of the Roman Empire? Besides the god statue, she saw two woman sculptures within this fountain on horses, and two other carved sea nymphs next to them. The falling water seemed extra loud in Rose's ears; it made her body shake as if the streams could reach out for her at any time.

What's wrong with me?

Sean's father helped carry Rose, like a human crutch, he was on one side of her with his son on the other. "Sean, help us while your mother parks," Seth ordered while Mrs. Noble scooted into the strange carriage's front seat. These moving carriages that didn't need horses were scary to Rose.

Rose's body was also extra heavy, not like her usual light self that could easily fly as Seth struggled to get her walking. They made it to the building's grand columns and then up even more stairs to its doors. "Who rules this place?" she gasped as Seth seemed to roll his eyes at her questions.

"The government does, this building is the Library of Congress." His words were useless to her. Whatever that means. Rose found she much preferred talking to Sean, his son, instead; the boy who made frighteningly more sense and wanted to communicate with her more.

They helped her into the building. Rose gasped again as she beheld the shiniest marble floors and inner columns she had ever seen. There were beautiful arched hallways and ceilings Rose could have got lost looking at. This place is like a labyrinth of beauty and light, unlike her family's own dark stone castle that was meant to scare people. Yet, she wasn't up to exploring the Library of Congress' colors of brownish-red, gold, and white. The brightness of everything, including paintings she didn't want to understand, stared at her from every ceiling and corner. There were statues all around this library too, each holding a meaning, she suspected, behind this land called the United States. Sean looked from them—statues of English-looking men and woman carrying torches, and angel carvings that were all over the stairway—to Rose as if she shared something in common with each stone image. She couldn't imagine what.

There was even a giant framed painting upstairs that seemed so life-like Rose couldn't believe it, she was forced to stare. In the painting of the building she was in right now, there was a close-up of a small statue of a man with an Englishman's head, on a creature that looked miniature with dragon wings. The painting had words under it that weren't in Latin, instead a strange form of English that read, Teddy Roosevelt's Gargoyle.

Rose got chills.

That's not a realistic looking gargoyle.

"This place is spooky on Sunday's when no one is here, dad," Sean commented.

His father only answered with, "Sean, keep focused and remember what we talked about."

Sean nodded as he looked from his to Rose's itchy rings, and her bracelet that matched his manlier necklace. Each one had a clasp like none she'd ever seen. Even her ring that was too tight had a strange clasp on it. If these are why I can't change... I'm getting them off!

She pushed for more strength and her walking did begin to improve with every step; too bad she couldn't let them know that.

"You said you are taking me to Livia, the vampire princess?" she mouthed weakly to Sean whose eyes widened. His father, who looked less surprised, nodded.

"Vampire princess? Dad, you never said anything about a princess."

"The less you know about the vampires the better. They are dangerous." his father hushed him as Rose couldn't help but nod.

"So the royal family of eleven is in control then, they rule these lands and this United States Library of Congress?" she asked Sean, but he didn't look like he knew how to answer that.

"No, the people rule it," he pointed at himself. "Humans, we're in control."

Rose's eyes widened as she kept moving slower than the men, not showing her strength. She couldn't help but feel both relief and a grave sense of danger. If the vampires let the humans truly be in control of things, then what did they do with her family? My mom? And the other gargoyle children?

Sean seemed as nervous as she was, like he might not have ever laid eyes on a vampire before. Unlike his father, who acted like helping Rose walk through this place and into Livia's dangerous arms was a chore.

Livia was the nine-year-old who took me from Augustus, so that he and the oldest vampire princess could drain me. So why am I here instead?

"You humans can release me, I'm a princess too, just like Livia, a princess of the gargoyles," she said, wondering if they already knew that or if it was dangerous information.

What do I have to lose with playing this card?

"We've heard," Seth said rather rudely, like she didn't hold much power at all with those words; as if these humans saw her as equals.

"Dad, in a weird way, does that make us royalty too?" Sean asked his father as they kept moving. His father shrugged and looked back at Rose then, like she was guilty of something.

"Royalty descended from slaves, son," he said as he and the boy stared at Rose like she truly was bad. Slaves... she thought about their last name, Noble.

Wasn't there a servant with the last name Noble? A woman my brothers were extra cruel to?

"You sure Livia won't try to suck us dry like popsicles? You said vampires aren't exactly considered guardians of the human race anymore," Sean whispered low as his dad turned around and grabbed him then. Without Sean holding her, Rose dropped to the floor.

Sean was the only one who noticed as his dad squeezed his arm.

"You do not discuss out loud your mother's and my private conversations, you hear me?"

The boy struggled to get out of his dad's grasp. "Yes... sir."

His dad let him drop right next to Rose as he barked, "Now watch her while I get Ms. Livia, someone you should be forever grateful to, as she plans to save you and your uncle's life."

Seth Noble marched away then, leaving Rose and Sean to stare at one another.

As Sean stood, she reached her arm out, pretending like she couldn't stand. He helped try to pull her up. Her body was so heavy for him, which didn't make sense. The vampires had harder and stronger bodies in the past she'd come from; gargoyles were supposed to be lighter so they could fly.

"You should feel like your old self soon," Sean said as he pulled her up with all his strength, she pretended to latch onto the railing.

"No, I'm afraid I'm feeling weaker and weaker, and this bracelet and ring are itching, can't they be loosened? They hurt so badly," she said as her voice became frailer. She pushed so her eyes could get teary, something not hard to do as she feared not only for herself, but for information about her mom and all the young gargoyles' lives. If this was really a time nearly five hundred years into the future, then how could she get back to her reality and save them from the vampires?

"My dad and this Princess Livia will show you how to take them off, or at least make them more comfortable," Sean told her as he played with his necklace's chain. Rose stared, again, at his chain's engraved crosses and six-pointed stars.

Are these people Roman pagans or Catholics? I'm confused.

"Can you loosen mine, just for a moment?" she asked as she closed and opened her eyes. More tears poured out as she pretended to fall from the post she was leaning on and Sean politely caught her. He wasn't nearly as handsome or breathtaking as Adamus, whose image still rang in her mind like fire, and yet, in an odd, boyish, almost brotherly way, Sean was beautiful too. He eyed her with pity.

"I'm not supposed to."

"Please," she begged as his fingers brushed her bracelet. "I don't know where my mom is and this jewelry hurts so badly. I don't know what to do."

"I'll just loosen one link on each. I can't take them off. My dad would kill me. He totally exaggerates what a big deal all this stuff is." Sean carefully went to weaken the coil first on her bracelet. The bauble piece had a strange lock Rose had never seen, which took two hands to undo. The ring that was attached was the same way, but the lock on it was even smaller. He loosened both as her hand trembled.

"Better?" he asked kindly as she nodded in thanks. The sound of a door opening made both the boy and Rose jump. Was the vampire child, Livia, coming? Rose didn't plan to find out as she looked up to the ceiling near a painting where some artsy glass windows were.

"What are vampires princesses like?" he asked. Rose very quietly slipped her wrist out of the chain bracelet once he wasn't looking. She planned to slowly remove her ring when Sean's eyes were distracted once more toward the sound of the opened door above them.

"Scary," she admitted, "but then again, so are gargoyles."

"I heard gargoyles are the descendants of English York royalty and real live dragons," he informed her as Rose nodded. And with those words, she let her itchy chain cuff and attached cross ring fall to the floor. The shift to gargoyle was faster than normal when she pushed her mind to morph. Her skin stretched and bent instantly, her wings expanding bigger than normal. Something isn't right. She felt body parts that seemed like little bones rip out of her head, making her scream. Her voice was unrecognizable, like a devil's as she shouted from the pain. This wasn't like the transformation from the wizard's spelled jewelry she used to wear. Rose's mouth hurt as her tongue even felt like it was stretching. Her vision enhanced as her body felt bigger. Her wings seemed as heavy as a wall, and slammed right into Sean hard... too hard.

He was thrown right into a wall so fast that Rose heard a painful bang. Frightened of her own change, she moved her wings up and down. Her body, despite its heaviness, lifted into the air as she created a grand wind from the flapping.

She had no time to do anything but escape as she flew to one of the windows above; that's when she heard Sean's dad yell, "I'm shooting it down. Now!" Seth Noble pulled something out, a little black weapon she didn't recognize as she looked back. He pointed it her way as she was about to break through the glass. Rose looked up at herself in the reflection as she heard bangs, like little canon fires that were putting holes in things. Would he put a hole in me? The thought disappeared as she saw herself in the window's reflection.

She paused at the horrid sight; she scared herself as she saw on the other side of the glass something with wings that weren't colored beautifully with dragon scales. These wings looked like a stone demon's that ruled hell; each expanding out seven feet and at least a half of a foot in thickness. The creature, her... she had a face like that of a half human and half bat. With horns, she also had black and red beady eyes, and pointed teeth. Rose had a long tail, and elf-like ears. Her hair was extra-long and all red. Rose screamed at herself as her wings flapped.

What have the vampires done to me?

Something hit her back then, one of those things from Seth's weapon, which felt like a piece of lead or steel in the shape of a tiny rock that went straight through her wings and into her back. Pain ripped through her as Rose fell back. She crashed far down onto the floor as she still saw herself above in that window. Rose saw the most hideous monster she'd ever seen.

Right as she hit the Library of Congress' floor, a woman casually walked up to her. Someone that wasn't acting alarmed, only entertained. This person seemed all too familiar as she walked right to Rose's shoulder, unafraid. This female was older, maybe eighteen, and she seemed like a relative of Isabel Aurelia's, and the vampire queen, Octavia. But this person was someone else.

"Recognize me?" the woman asked with a smile. Rose looked up at her right before everything began to go black in her head again. Whatever had come out of that man's weapon, it had a sleeping spell in it of some kind, Rose suspected. She could feel it within her blood; a poison.

She breathed, guessing as her mind fought to tell her who this was, almost five hundred years into the future, "Livia?"

Livia laughed, "Hello little gargoyle queen, so lovely to see you again."

Then everything faded, and Rose hoped this whole crazy episode was a dream. That somehow, everything would be okay. Yet, her imagination told her that hope for her kind was gone now.

Rose awoke a short time later after dreaming of her mom and the vampire boy, Adamus. Her head was throbbing as she heard Sean's dad. She yawned as she was forced to come back to this awful realty. Seth Noble was panicked.

"He's still not responding. I'm telling you, he has hit his head too hard. He's bleeding. I'm going to call an ambulance."

Rose's eyes went to the passed out twelve-year-old Sean whose body was limp from when her new, stone-like wings had slammed into him. Then she took time to look at herself, her body appeared, thanks to the itchy cuff and ring that had been slapped back on, human again. Her fingers went to her face to make sure she felt her own twelve-year-old cheeks again; and not a demon's skeletal form.

"Relax," came the voice of a grown-up Livia, the youngest non-sleeping princess of the vampires. If that's Livia, then how old will Adamus and the others look? "He'll heal. My blood just takes longer in a mixed creature's body like his to work."

Rose looked at her; still astonished and overwhelmed by everything.

"A creature's like his?" she mouthed as the vampire princess continued to confess.

"You couldn't tell, could you, by looking at Sean or his father, who they really are?"

Rose shook her head. She worried how much she had hurt the stranger who had loosened her cuff and helped her. They had smelled human.

"Sean and Seth Noble are your family's descendants, Rose. Your father was one of their ancestors. And this is the future, by the way. It's the year 2016. You've been stuck in stone for a very long time."

"In stone? When I transformed, I looked like a moving demon statue; and as for the human men being of my line?" she said, referring to Sean and Seth, "I could smell no gargoyle in them at all. They can't be from my father's blood."

Livia shrugged. "Well, your direct line, not exactly; but when it comes to your father and mother's direct lines, I'm afraid they are. All the other gargoyles have been murdered or frozen into beastly statues via a curse hundreds of years ago by the way. Your kind is known now as nothing but ugly stone things," Livia smiled, "that human beings use to decorate leaky buildings with, and make fun of. All, again, due to Merlin's grandson's spell that, even now, while you're awake, has changed your form into the hideous creature you saw as your reflection."

"Luckily, you can still pretend to be human as long as you wear your cuff or ring that I've had made. But once you remove them, everyone will see you as you really are now—damned and worthy to be slain. As for the Noble boys," Livia said as she nodded toward a worried father and his slowly awakening son, "they descended from one of the enslaved handmaidens with the last name Noble. She escaped your castle the night my family murdered all the wizards. The handmaiden that escaped was pregnant, thanks to your father or brothers who often forced themselves upon her. She was carrying a bastard; a half human and half gargoyle little girl to be exact."

Rose's eyes widened as she looked back to Sean and his dad. She remembered the many human slaves she wanted to help who were so mistreated. "The Noble woman chose not to destroy the baby girl that was forced upon her womb, but to instead give birth after your entire family was cursed to stone—cursed in a way you all tried to do to my family, might I add," the vampire reminded her. Though, clearly, Rose could tell this curse was a little different, more gruesome. "So the Noble woman raised the little girl, who grew up and married, and gave birth to another child right before she turned twenty-one... and the curse caught up with her."

"She changed into stone?" Rose asked.

"She turned first into her beastly gargoyle form; and then into a sleeping statue, yes. You gargoyles are now far uglier versions of half human, half dragons; than how the wizards originally intended their pets to look. Generation after generation, the Noble line found that every firstborn child carries the gargoyle gene the strongest, and all the firstborns' in turn, become statues sleeping in a state of torture once they turn twenty-one. But Seth, here, the second born of his family, he's been working with me very hard to undo the curse that struck his older brother and will no doubt strike his oldest son, Sean, next. That's where you come in. This man gave up nearly half his fortune, and many hired lives to wake you up; and the magic your mother sanctified within you is now awake too,."

"Me?" Rose looked at Sean and his dad, apparently distant half relatives of hers despite their humanness. "So you don't plan on sucking me dry as your brother and your older sister, Isabel Aurelia, wanted to do. Surely, if you all killed every single gargoyle and wizard, you must want to?" the little girl dared say. "What is it your kind feeds off of now?"

Livia shrugged. "You're right, if you were as wicked as your father, I'd love to bite into your neck as my younger brother Adamus did, my little gargoyle queen. I could use your blood to strengthen myself. I'm sure you'd taste so good and rich too since unlike the others of your kind, you have shaded magic in you. Probably more magic than the occasional witch I hunt down and drain, and then enslave; or the humdrum humans whose blood tastes like water that my people drink from when we're really hungry and weak."

Rose's eyes widened as Livia revealed that vampires fed on humans now. That couldn't be good for the humans.

"I've worked very hard to make sure what's left of my family thinks your gargoyle statue is broken into so many pieces all over this continent and the UK that you could never return or be awakened, Rose. It's I who have risked much to keep you hidden and whole."

Rose remembered Livia in the form of a nine-year-old taking Rose into her vampire arms at Augustus's command. She wondered what else happened that night.

"And what of my mother and the gargoyle children?" Rose asked as her heart began to beat quickly, afraid of the answer.

"My brother, Adamus, made sure your mother was only broken into eight pieces once she turned into a statue. That was after my mom, Octavia, ripped off her wings and fed them to the dogs."

Something in Rose snapped then, and she fell to her knees, like a pathetic little twelve-year-old human.

"Eight pieces..." Tears began forming in her eyes as she looked up at the vampire who hardly seemed bothered by Rose's agony.

"It's better than the fifty or sixty pieces your father's and brothers' statues were broken into. Your mother in only eight pieces can be molded back together and awakened one day. She'd be crippled, no doubt, but alive. My brother, Adamus, insisted, and even strung up her body parts in more honorable places."

"Strung up her body parts?" Rose's voice went from sad to angry. She felt a fury she had never had before grow inside her. Like a piece of the nicer, kinder Rose was disappearing forever.

"Yes, oh let me backtrack," Livia said comically as if she were a teacher. "All the gargoyles that turned into devilish and dragon-looking statues, were broken up, except for you, so if they ever awakened, they'd be useless. Then, over time, we put their pieces on buildings, churches, and monuments, all over the place wherever my family and I traveled to. We used a lot of gargoyle heads to help drain water off houses and properties we own. Some lucky gargoyles, mostly the children who were smaller, they got to keep their whole bodies and wings for an artistic effect. Your kind is now forever a joke meant to warn anything left of the supernatural society that my family hasn't hunted and killed, what happens when you mess with the Vampire Court."

"But those that are in fewer pieces can be awakened?" Rose asked as she was shaking, her voice still bitter as she looked up at this woman. She knew her kind had been bad, terrible, in fact; but her mom and all the children, they didn't deserve to die or be in a state of stone-like torture forever. More sadness leaked back into Rose as she remembered the youngest vampire princess, Julia, who hadn't deserved that fate either.

"So you kept me whole, secretly? In case you ever wanted to break the curse?"

"Yes," Livia told her plainly. "Of course, it's not that simple, this curse on your kind and the Nobles. The power in you can only be activated enough to break it for the other gargoyles, with the emotion of true love," she said as Rose's eyes widened. Since when did love ever really do anything?

"Love, really?" This sounded more like a human child's tale to Rose than a gargoyle or vampire reality.

"Yes, if you and that boy, who you've probably just given a concussion to over there," Livia pointed to Sean, "can fall in love by your twenty-first birthday, the curse will be broken. He and as many family members as you choose can be saved."

Rose turned to look toward Sean as he began to awake. His eyes only peered at Rose with horror now that he'd seen her without her ring and bracelet on. Sean knew what she really looked like with her monstrous horns, stone wings, beady eyes, and a tail; like a demon. All I need is a pitchfork, and I could be a guardian of Hades or something. Who could love that?

"And if we can't actually love one another?" Rose asked Livia.

The eighteen-year-old looking girl shrugged. "Then I and all the vampires get to live happily ever after... but Sean, and every first born descendant that will come from his siblings, along with all the gargoyles you wish to save; they'll all be stuck as freakish stone statues, in a state of sleeping torture, much like my sister, Julia, still is in... forever."

* * *

# Chapter Six

## Eight Months Later

Rose signed her paper with the name Ruby Swan—her new fake alias given to her by Livia—and then wrote out the date next to it, February 8th, 2017. She stared at the date, and the crisp lined paper that still seemed like magic itself to her; today was her birthday. So am I thirteen today or four hundred and sixty-seven? She wasn't sure. Eight months since I was freed from stone and I'm still not sure about anything.

She watched the students next to her in the special education class Livia had placed her in; it was a small introductory state funded course that was for immigrant children from all over whose parents had come to live in Washington DC. The class was for learning proper English, writing, and so on, before a student was entered into regular middle school.

Rose watched her fellow students who, like her, were not from the strange land that was America, and yet, weren't really like her at all. They typed under their desk on their mobile phones and chewed a sticky substance called gum. What a strange time and land this is. Growing up among Scots and wizards in a royal family had at least supplied Rose with the ability to already be able to read and write in Elizabethan English and Latin; whereas other girls born in Rose's time of the 1550s outside of Scotland, most of them had been denied such educational privileges. Girls in the twenty-first-century are very lucky. Rose also understood little bits of elementary science from watching wizards with the elements mix potions and such. But advanced math and technology. How could I have ever been prepared to learn those things? She thought as she stared at cell phones and the social media pages her classmates were playing on.

She watched a student above her named Felicia, she was secretly watching what was called a TV show on Netflix with Spanish subtitles on her phone; Felicia was doing this secretly since she had finished her English test early like Rose had. I have to do everything I can to catch up with this time, so I can keep myself safe and help awaken my family. Livia said, once the curse is broken, I, as a gargoyle royal, can wake them one at a time, as long as they're assembled. So, of course, I'll put my mom's pieces back together and wake her first; then the gargoyle kids, and then ask mom what to do from there. Rose thought sadly as she prayed, wondering if her mom's disabilities from being broken up would still allow her to move some things, like her neck and arms. Surely, being awake disabled was better than being asleep in the form of torture, right?

Her heart still hurt from thinking about this, as the final bell rang. Her teacher dismissed all the kids, most students darting outside to catch the metro. Rose just sat there for a moment. Nervous on her own birthday and overwhelmed with sadness about her family again. Today was the first afternoon in DC since she'd started this form of 'school' when Rose was told no escort was showing up to collect her.

Livia currently had her living with a family she was paying to secretly foster Rose and teach her about the twenty-first-century. The family was kind enough, but they clearly understood what Livia was, and would do whatever she said; Rose sensed that her fosters were very much afraid and yet, loyal to the vampires. So Rose still felt very alone.

With my family in stone, I'm both a gargoyle queen in a foreign kingdom and a prisoner to Livia and my circumstances all at once.

She had been given her own funds that day by the family, an entire ten dollars Rose was told she could get a snack with while she waited for Sean. The boy who was pretty much arranged to marry her in a time and society where that usually wasn't done; to Rose, the idea actually wasn't that much of a strange concept, she just naturally thought growing up, she'd be forced to marry another gargoyle. Family descendant or not, Sean is so very human until he turns twenty-one... human and afraid of me.

Not only had she given him a concussion and a scar on his eyebrow the first night she'd transformed. The following week, when his father had forced Rose and Sean to see each other, he'd run so fast into his tree house that he'd tripped on the way up and twisted his arm. Technically, it's not my fault he'd constructed such a weak rope ladder and tree house... but still, this isn't good.

Livia and her parents demanded after another few months apart the two newly turned teenagers meet today for a stroll. Another odd thing about her and Sean, Rose had discovered, was that they apparently had the same birthdays. If Merlin were alive, he would have said that was so not a coincidence.

This fact, and being without a guardian now as she walked outside in the busy city of Washington DC, gave Rose the chills as two steps out, she felt someone on her heels. She turned her back, fast. Ready to transform, out of fear, even though Livia had warned her never to do that.

"Hey little girl, you gotta dollar?" came the call of a homeless man. He was wearing dirty clothes and the blanket he'd slept in for many nights. He must have been so cold, she thought as she herself was layered in numerous coats from her fosters and yet, still chilly in this dreadful DC weather.

"Please, I'm so hungry, and I know your mommy must have given you a dollar," the man grumbled, his eyes looked like that of a drunkard's; an alcoholic that was so lost and over his life. She could relate as she reached into her pocket out of pity. It's not like I'm starving for the awful tasting 'street' food anyway that I'd have to choose from. She looked behind him to the surrounding food trucks. These were still an odd concept to her too. How she dreamed about a good Scottish stew and game meats fresh caught on a day like today.

"What are you doing?" came the hiss of Sean Noble as he marched up to her; a boy that was only her height but seemed to march as if he were double in height and wits compared to her. He saw her about to give the homeless man her entire ten and pulled her away.

"What are you doing?" She repeated him in a feisty tone as he was pulling her away and making her walk far from the human—as if the drunkard could have really hurt her with her stone-like strength this new gargoyle body gave her. She yanked free easily from Sean and saw the homeless man was already panhandling someone new, an older woman who brushed him off. She also spied Felicia, her fellow classmate, walking across the street toward a bus with her cell phone in her hand, texting. People in DC seemed to think thirteen was a fair time for kids to learn how to get around and use what was called public transportation, Rose reckoned. She also figured out that wealthy families, like Sean Noble's, got cars and private drivers to drop off their children. Sean's dad was a senator for a place called Maryland.

"He's hungry, and I'm not, what's the deal?" she asked Sean. "Your computer watch," she said as she looked at the ugly little device, you'd think it would have some gold or gemstones on it, "probably cost thirty multiplications of what I was going to give that man."

"My Apple-watch, you mean." The brat held up his ugly jewelry form. "Yeah, it did, more like fifty multiplications; but my dad worked hard for this five-hundred-dollar watch. That man doesn't work, he takes from people who do and spends it on coke," Sean said matter-of-factly.

"I thought everyone was allowed to drink this 'coke' stuff?" she asked as she and Sean walked. She personally had determined the dark liquid called soda was awful; like sewage.

"Not coca-cola, coke, it's a drug. Like booze but worse, my dad says. Haven't your fosters let you watch any good movies to learn this stuff? TV shows and the internet is how kids our age are supposed to learn everything. Hence, my Apple watch," he told her as if he held a personal library on his wrist next to the cross ring on his left finger.

"Whatever," she said as she used his own line. "I don't think all the homeless people here are the sloths you think they are. He probably thinks you are a spoiled boy who knows not what he speaks," she said as her accent thickened and she pushed to try and sound more American and less Scottish. Her form of old Scot talk was foreign to the Scottish television shows she'd tried to watch anyway; Language really changes, apparently.

"Let's just get this birthday lunch over with, my mom's throwing me a real party with all my friends tonight," Sean said as he walked ahead and she was forced to keep up. He was still apparently freaked out by her new and horrid looking gargoyle form and mad about his twisted arm that had since healed, and the scar she could still see traces of on his eyebrow; all from when her wings slammed him into the wall.

Boys from this time are babies.

"Am I invited?" she asked as her hands went to her hips. She wondered what a new thirteen-year-old's party in this century could be like. Clearly, Sean didn't want her there even though he was supposed to fall in love and marry her one day, and they were told to start the courting process now.

"Ah, no. My friends are smart, they'd know you aren't normal in a heartbeat; heaven forbid they catch you on camera transforming into that... thing," he said as he stopped outside a bakery and pulled out a box then. She frowned at him as he shoved it into her hands.

"What's this?" Rose demanded as she saw the strange shiny paper the box had been decorated with.

"Your birthday gift, my mom is making me give it to you."

Rose rolled her eyes, not even wanting to take it, but since she did want to awaken her own mom, she didn't drop it to the floor in insult. He didn't give her the time to open it as he went straight into the bakery in front of them and she, again, was forced to follow. She entered into a casual bakery called 'The Baked Joint' where people could order sandwiches and different kinds of breads at a counter and then sit at the surrounding casual tables and even couches they had inside, and eat. She took in what Livia had described as 'her special birthday lunch with her betrothed.'

This is it... really?

"My mom said this place is organic and healthy, so lunch is probably gonna suck," Sean went on as Rose looked around at the many people inside. At least the bread smelled good, she thought, mentally disagreeing with his words as they stood in a long line. Sean, not wanting to talk to her, began messaging people via his 'Apple-watch' about his party plans.

Rose looked around, bored with him. She watched a beautiful eighteen-year-old looking redhead walk in; a girl who had hair much like Rose's mom had and not the horrid, unnaturally bright, blood red color her hair turned when she morphed into a gargoyle. The girl was on the phone and saying, "Adam, please get here soon." The redhead had hardly any warm clothes on, which was odd to Rose as she couldn't help but stare at her. She wore only a scarf that was wrapped tightly around her neck. The redhead's eyes were glassy. Rose took her in, wondering curiously if this American had any Scottish descent.

Suddenly, Rose's scars on her wrist and neck where Livia's brother, Adamus—the boy who she still dreamed about sometimes, her enemy—had bitten her, they began to sting. Rose's heart quickened as she had a weird sense of déjà vu in a very different time period and place. The last time these had hurt like this was when Adamus and his family were coming to my castle to help end my family.

Livia had told Rose that Adamus—despite making sure Rose's mom had not been broken up into too many pieces—had no loyalty to Rose. That he had been against ever trying to wake Rose had she been found. If that wasn't enough of a sting to the thirteen-year-old who had very much had a crush on the little boy; even worse yet, Livia had also shared that apparently, back when Rose first let the handsome vampire bite her, Adamus had then dragged her body over to his passed out brother, Felix. He fed on her too, so both boys could free their older brother, Augustus, and escape. This ultimately led to Rose's family and all the wizards going down.

Rose, still mentally winded from knowing all that, looked to her wrist, half spooked as it began to throb along with the scar on her neck. Sean turned and saw her looking toward the redhead now and back to her wrist like a nut case.

The girl is telling someone named Adam to meet her here, what if that's short for Adamus?

"Don't you dare think about taking off that bracelet," Sean, who had drawn other conclusions, said as she suddenly shushed him.

"Be quiet."

Her eyes stayed on the door as she watched, time seeming to feel if it was in slow motion. The redhead put her phone away and looked outside. She seemed to see who she was looking for. Then the bakery door slowly opened as a man in his late teens or very early twenties, close to Livia's age, dressed in a thick leather coat with a blue sweater underneath, walked inside. He was tall, a good six-foot-three now, his body handsome, lean, yet very toned, the way his older brother Augustus's had been back in Rose's time. His curly hair, which had been to his shoulders before, was cut shorter in the futuristic style all the other boys had. His chestnut tresses and vivid golden brown eyes just as dreamy as before. He was definitely this era's version of sexy with his light olive skin Rose had liked so much. Older girls turned to smile and get a good look at him, yet Rose had the urge to run, fast; because Livia had warned that if any other royal sibling of hers learned of her plan, Livia herself would get punished.

"I'll deny I helped you, Rose, and let word get around so my oldest brother, Augustus, can hunt you down! Then the curse on your family will never get broken; and oh yeah, the Noble line will die," Livia had told Rose months ago, sweetly, in a way that had been crueler than a witch's glare.

Adamus or Adam... his handsome and falsely kind face was coming further into her view. He entered fully and hugged the redheaded human, as if concerned about her, as Rose watched with a frightfully beating heart. She was backing away as 'Adam' departed from the beauty and then, as if sensing Rose, he began to look around.

Thankfully, she was lost in a crowded line next to other people busily standing about, trying to read the counter sign or check out the sugary sweets under the bakery's glass. Rose didn't wait a full second to grab Sean. She quickly yanked him out of the line, the two of them shorter than all the others, as she pulled him away fast. Rose moved them into the back hall that was around a food pick-up area and then further back, near The Baked Joint's bathrooms.

"What are you—" Sean tried to pull free but couldn't. With Rose's new cursed stone strength, she was too strong. Before he could finish demanding the question out of her, with no exit in sight, all she could see as a means to hide were two single doors; each one led to one bathroom stall. The boys' bathroom had a line, and needing to move in a hurry as her wrist and neck scars ached, she pulled Sean into the only other option... the girls' stall. Once in she locked the door.

"Stop."

"Be very quiet, now," she whispered harshly as Rose took control and clenched her hand over her betrothed's mouth. She held them both against the door. The prep school boy was growing very upset.

"There is a vampire royal in here," she warned and suddenly, young Sean's eyes widened. Rose moved her hand then.

"Really?" he asked as Rose nodded. "Who?"

"Livia's youngest brother, who supposedly doesn't think you and I being allowed to live outside a torturous sleep state is a safe idea."

Sean's suddenly looked as scared of Adamus as he was of Rose. "Are you pulling my leg?" he demanded.

Her wrist continued to burn. Adamus must have been getting closer! She thought as she looked into Sean's eyes. Nearly five hundred years into the future or not, the moment Adamus sees my bite marks he'll probably know it's me! Sean's body was closer than ever to Roses as she leaned against him and the door in the single stall.

"What do we do?" Sean asked as they stayed together, skin touching skin.

"Can you turn into that thing and fight him? Like a scary wonder woman?" He asked as she rolled her eyes.

A thirteen-year-old monstrous gargoyle against a fifteen-hundred-year-old vampire.

"Just wait," she said as the pain from her throbbing scar, after a moment, lessened.

Does that mean Adamus or 'Adam' is turning back? She connected the sudden sensation in her scars when he was near as a side effect to Adamus's bite. She and Sean waited in the bathroom and the two of them began to sweat, not wanting to take a chance; until finally, she felt all the tingling in her scars subside.

Adamus definitely turned around and looked in my direction for no reason at all when we were out there. Vampires must be able to sense who they've bitten. That's just great!

"You go out, and then text me on this mobile phone thing once you've verified that the coast is clear."

"Me go out there, alone? When you have the super strength and terrifying monster face and I don't. I barely even got a good look at this guy before you pulled me away."

"You'll know a vampire royal when you see them, they all look pretty similar, Roman and beautiful, like Livia. And yes, go, make sure he and the redhead are gone, then text me. If Adamus recognizes me, the hope of breaking this curse could be over."

He grunted, "Roman... I didn't even know Livia was from Rome when I first saw her. Was I supposed to guess that on her brown hair and hotness alone?" Sean said as his words surprised Rose. So human boys at this age think girls are hot... I guess since I find people attractive too as a gargoyle, why wouldn't humans?

It was unbelievable to Rose that, after a lifetime of wanting to free members of mankind from her castle and watching them from afar, she still wasn't good at guessing things about them as she watched Sean; who was about to leave. She hoped Adamus was gone and nothing would happen to her betrothed as he nervously pulled out his phone and asked, "You know how to answer this, right?"

"Yes," she snapped. But the truth was, Sean would be her first real text. Rose had practiced with her fosters texting and receiving, so how bad could this be?

Sean nervously went outside the stall as Rose waited, her heart still pounding. Rose's phone vibrated, making her jump as she glanced down at the device and it read, 'the redhead and the mosquito are gone; I can see them far down the street, they aren't coming back here. Hope you're happy.'

Rose exhaled and yet, stared at the strange flat glass and metal box that was her phone now as she read and re-read his text. Having a weird sense of déjà vu, she stepped back out into the cafe. She noticed a few boys laughing as she walked past them unconcerned. Her eyes skimmed for any other betraying ghosts from her past. Rose exhaled as she found only Sean who looked peeved.

"We safe?" he whispered when she was close enough, she nodded at him. He gave her a hard look then.

"Where did you hear that saying?" Rose asked him with seriousness.

"What saying?" Sean seemed to always look at Rose like she had ten heads.

"Calling vampires mosquitoes?" she asked.

He shrugged. "It seemed like a good code word."

"My brothers used to call them that too," Rose told him as she looked Sean up and down, as if seeing the boy in a new light. He looked just as innocent and smelled more human than ever, and yet, he really is my descendant, from either my father or brothers, isn't he?

"See those guys," Seam pointed to the boys in the corner as if what he had to say was more important. She turned and glanced at the scrawny looking group of older fourteen-year-olds. They were dressed in the same uniform as Sean as they bit into donuts and pastries and pointed at him. Rose was missing out on the joke.

"Those are eighth graders from my school, they are a year ahead of me and pretty much rule the halls."

She looked back at them again, not getting it. Her brothers could have crushed these eighth graders in a heartbeat.

"Now they've just seen me come out of a girl's restroom. They got it on camera."

"Is that bad?" she asked with wide eyes. Honestly, she didn't understand why anyone would want what humans call a 'photograph' or what she thought was more like a 'frozen painting' of someone coming out of a restroom. Her voice held an air like this conversation was unimportant compared to seeing Adamus, the vampire prince, in this bakery. Sean just sneered at that; as if she'd gotten him into trouble and didn't know anything.

"I wanted to make sure we were safe," was her only reply as he shook his head.

"Yeah, because you pretty much are a magnet for all things unsafe, bad luck, and embarrassing, aren't you? Those photos will be everywhere by now, online forever," Sean grunted. "I've called my mom, she's coming to get me herself instead of sending a driver; Livia's also on her way for you. They should be here any second."

Rose still didn't understand why this newly turned teenage boy was so upset. "What do you want me to say, I'm sorry for saving us on our birthdays?"

"Just don't talk to me." He turned then and headed out. No one but the eighth graders who were laughing at him were paying attention. Rose turned around and gave them cross eyes. If only those humans knew what I could do.

Then she immediately regretted her violent thoughts as she felt like one of her brothers for a moment. She went after Sean. His mom pulled up in their town car and rescued her son without giving Rose as much as a backwards glance. Family or not, betrothed to her son or not, all the Nobles are afraid of me, Rose thought as she turned. From afar, on a busy street, Rose saw the bum she had wanted to help out earlier, he was walking about. Helping people is what I really want to do; not marry someone who is afraid of me, dodge vampires, or imagine how I can hurt eighth graders because I'm really a gargoyle. She looked out feeling as lost as the street beggar. He looked so happy all of a sudden as he walked past her.

"What's gotten into you?" another female panhandler asked him once he was a few steps past Rose. Panhandlers were all over every corner of Washington DC, more numerous than there were monuments and gift stores.

"The gentleman with the cute redhead, they just bought me a week's stay at the Holiday Inn," the bum sang gloriously as he walked toward the hotel. Rose stared at the man in astonishment, wondering then if the people who bought him a week of sleeping off the street were Adamus and his human companion.

Then Livia suddenly pulled up, breaking Rose from her thoughts as the vampire limo car stretched out before her. The passenger door opened fast, on its own and electronically. Rose blinked for a moment out of shock before getting in.

Whoever inspired modern day technology is clearly a new kind of wizard. If only I could get a hold of him or her right now instead of having a vampire help me.

# Chapter Seven

## Two days later

Rose sat on her bed, her legs dangling as a TV played in the background. Instead of watching it to take in as much information as possible, as she'd done before, Rose stared out her window and watched the sun rise. Her fosters lived in an apartment building, right near the capital. DC is a crazy, vivid, and scary city, all at once, she thought. Her nightmares still running through her mind; nightmares of the humans her family had mistreated, of her mom telling her to make different choices, and the dreams where she relived the terrible decision of letting Adamus, the most attractive boy she'd ever seen, bite her.

Is Adam good or is he evil? I don't know... anything; just that I can't trust him or anyone, really. And yet, his face from the past, not the handsome older one she'd seen in this present, but his childhood face, filled the small part of her mind her mother's memories didn't. Maybe because the day I saw him... the day the blood suckers woke up, everything changed.

She heard someone walking up to her door a full thirty seconds before it opened.

"Hello, my gargoyle queen," Livia said mockingly as she smiled at Rose. Rose looked up at her, still trying to figure out why Livia was helping the gargoyles at all when she still held a grudge against what Rose was.

"Has he left the city?" was all Rose replied without looking at her. Rose knew not reacting was her own play for power. Livia studied her interestingly.

"Yes... my brother Adamus, or Adam as he likes to be called now, has gone. Why? You disappointed?"

"No," Rose lied. "I just want to know that Sean and I are safe. How many vampires are in this city exactly and the surrounding states?" She wanted to know what she was facing out there.

"Well, first of all, vampires helped make this city, and this great land, the United States. It was our kind that traveled with the pilgrims, under God's instruction, to help them make a fortified home here. We were with George Washington when we convinced him to become the first president, and so on. In other words, don't think you can really escape or overthrow my kind, our roots are everywhere and so are our conquests; which is why Washington DC has so many gargoyle heads, parts, and pieces all over the buildings. To show the supernatural powers that still hide in the shadows what happens to those that fight against us.

"And as for your question," Livia walked over to Rose and sat on her windowsill, so she was forced to look at her. Livia was in a sultry, Gucci dress with diamonds and jewelry; she wore a deceptive super model's smile. "There were two vampire royals in DC not including me; both my brothers were here, I found out. Adam was cleaning up Felix's mess per usual and decided to visit a beloved human pet of his; the beautiful girl you saw was his flavor of the moment..."

Rose thought about the redheaded twenty-something who looked of Scottish descent, a little like Rose's mother.

"But I helped speed up the process of both my brothers leaving." Livia smiled. "By having the redhead kidnapped. So no more royals for you to deal with right now but me, my precious Rose."

Rose gave her a horrified look as she tried not to tremble. Livia had to know 'precious rose' was what Rose's mother used to call her. She's making fun of that.

"As for servs... there are tons of them in the city. Servs are what my kind calls humans that we've transformed into our spies, servs do our bidding."

"Humans that you feed from, you mean?" Rose asked as Livia nodded at her. It was still shocking to Rose that vampires had to feed off humans since they'd killed most of the real magical things they craved. Except for myself and a few witches, it sounds like, that vampires still hunt.

"The majority of servs," Livia went on, "we don't feed from against their will. We offer them a taste of what it feels like for us to drink from them, and it turns out, the fools like it." Livia laughed at that. "They end up begging us to keep coming in secret to consume their blood, creating a connection between us where they crave to do what we want. It's thanks to the natural rush or high our feeding gives our prey."

Rose remembered when Adamus had bitten her, as terrible as his bite had felt, after a few moments a buzz had taken over, once he'd started sucking; connecting him with her in a way that still seemed like forever. She also thought about the TV shows she'd recently watched about the strange human behavior she'd seen associated with addictions to opioids and other street drugs. "So you make the servs addicts, willing to serve you because they become dependent on you guys feeding from them."

"It's glorious, isn't it?" Livia confirmed as both royals of different races looked upon one another. "So, in DC, Maryland, or Virginia, at any given time, as well as the rest of the US, there could be dozens or even hundreds of servs around you. There are also lower vampires belonging to our Court... people we chose to turn into full vamps. They, in return, have to give up most of their free will and old life to become like us; lower vampires can be killed with stakes and can't go out in the daylight, unlike someone like me." Livia smiled. "Lower vampires also aren't as powerful as my original royal family nor sleep in thousand-year cycles in coffins; their life expectancy is usually less than two hundred."

"Then why turn them? Why would they even want to become a weaker vampire?" Rose asked as she remembered her family's hate for the bloodsucking ones.

"Some crave a different kind of life; want to age slower, they might have been past lovers of us royals, friends, allies, soldiers, witch killers. Various reasons we chose to add people into our court, which don't concern you," Livia said as Rose got more and more disgusted with all this. The vampires, after half a millennium, don't seem so righteous anymore, or guardians of mankind, just kingdom hungry.

So there are vampire royals, lower and higher court vamps as Livia called them, and then servs. A whole new hierarchy in addition to the human world I need to study in depth.

"But all these people of the vampire court have no idea you or the Nobles still exist; and soon, in a year or so, none of them will be able to recognize you." Livia went on. "Things will stay as they are, you will be safe; and your sole priority to get Sean to fall in love with you and break the curse will remain untainted. As long you keep your mouth shut and God forbid, don't cut yourself in front of my kind."

"But my wounds from your brother feeding on me in the past," Rose held her scarred wrist up, flashing it in front of Livia. "as I age or not, won't he and Felix be able to feel me, if we do ever end up in the same area again. Won't they sense that they'd fed on me at some point?" she asked. Rose felt like such a fool for ever saving a young vampire's life; even if his sister was saving Rose's life now for reasons she couldn't understand.

Livia waved this off like it was no big deal. "Only Adamus made those scars, Felix just got a few drops from you." Livia looked like she envied the boys for a moment, like she could feed on Rose right then. Instead, she kept talking. "So, only Adam will be able to feel you when you're near. But considering he's fed off millions and could never remember them all; just act normal. God forbid you're questioned, which means you suck at pretending, then just say you got those scars on the Oasis cruise. He'll get a face full of guilt and get away from you the moment you say that line."

"The Oasis Cruise?" Rose asked, not understanding. She'd need to study what cruises were again.

"It's a giant luxury boat that people vacation on; on this one, Felix tricked Adam into feeding on most of the ship, and not so nicely... the poor souls, most of them died or became addicted to getting fed off of forever. A few kids only remained slightly scarred, though, that could be you for all he knows." Livia smiled when she said this as Rose wanted to know more; wanted confirmation that 'Adam' or Adamus was truly terrible.

Then why'd he show mercy to the bum?

"How did Felix trick him? What happened?"

Livia got up from the windowsill to leave, done with this. "Vampire stuff is not your concern, little gargoyle queen," she said as Rose knew she'd take it upon herself to make it some of her concern anyway.

"Just keep your nose down, be meek, mild, pretty, and stay alive. And do keep your head in the sand, so it's not taken off, like your mother's was by my older sister Isabel, as my brothers watched and my parents cheered..."

And then, as the vampire disappeared and Rose was left there, standing very still, a feeling of great sorrow, loss of total control, and anger like she'd never felt before, washed over her. Rose stared at herself in the mirror then as she went to remove her ring so she could remind herself how scary she could be too. She was truly a terrible looking monster now, the entire gargoyle race was, but what did that matter. Maybe I need to be scary to survive.

Right as she went to do this, her door opened again. This time, it was her timid foster mom, Becky. Rose paused, not wanting to scare her specifically as her eyes watered with emotion. She yearned for the woman to calm her down, instead, all Becky said was, "Ms. Livia expects you to go to school, and to not get into any more trouble in the city."

So my fosters think it's my fault I ran into the vampire prince on my birthday with Sean. I was told to meet Sean there. How could any of us help it?

And yet, now she knew that beautiful redheaded girl Adamus was talking to had also been kidnapped now at Livia's command; to distract the royal brothers.

If only I could save her and take out every vampire. Then free my mom and... I don't know what... . Too bad I need to break a curse to do that, with Sean.

"I'll try to stay out of trouble," was all Rose said back to the elder foster as Becky shut the door . Rose's fingers shaking as she looked at her cross and six pointed star ring and bracelet.

Later, as Rose walked the streets of DC, people brushed about, in a hurry to get to the Metro or catch a bus ride. Rose took the path she'd memorized to school as more bums panhandled near her, and other people going to and fro ignored Rose's sad eyes. She gave her new ten dollars that was supposed to buy her lunch away to the first street beggar she saw. "Take care," she told him.

The panhandler in return said, "God bless you."

I wish he would, Rose thought as she kept moving. She looked up to the city's high tops and yearned to fly among them, to tune out everything and be free. Yet things called 'drones' and 'air space controllers' in Washington she'd been warned, wouldn't let her do that. She knew if she flew too high and was spotted, her identity could be caught on camera; or she'd be shot at and found out. So instead, in human disguise, she walked, not wanting to go to school.

"Ah! Stop!" It was a shout from another child, a boy that most ignored, that made Rose do so. She paused and turned, looking for the source of the noise. Rose saw down a small alley on K Street—a young male on a bike who looked like he delivered papers for work or something. There were older boys on either side of him, twice his age that seemed rougher, they held his handle bars in their hands.

"You know once you join the gang you can't just leave it, Jeremy! And try to get on the straight and narrow? No, no no. Life doesn't work like that," one called to the bike-rider in a mocking way.

Rose stared, feeling for the boy on the bike. She couldn't help but watch at what even the human race did to one another. We are all really different kinds of monsters, none innocent.

"You were initiated with fists, you know that's the only way to get out, Jer!"

All the boys were pounding their hands as Rose found herself taking a step into the alley. None of them noticed the thirteen-year-old girl from the 16th-century enter. A girl who'd been pushed around herself way too much. This group must be an example of what I've seen on television shows that talk about street gangs rising in DC. Not letting members escape.

She watched one male pull the one called Jeremy off his bike, as the leader of this gang who looked no older than seventeen, wrapped a chain around his knuckles.

"Say you want to stay in and this stops," the leader warned the boy as the others pounded their fists like a pack of werewolves. They were all only kids like Rose and yet acting like violent miscreants.

"Please, just let me go," Jeremy said as Rose was reminded of Nellie, her mother's friend. She remembered Nellie asking the vampires to let Rose and the other gargoyle children go. The vampires didn't show them mercy. No one did... Rose took another step into the alley as Livia's voice echoed to conscience: Keep your head down, stay meek, and mild... little gargoyle queen.

Rose watched as the boys got closer to their casualty as she took another step. The truth was, throughout her entire time in the 1500s, she'd stayed meek and mild, watched gargoyles bully humans, and where had that gotten her? Cursed and alone. Make different decisions... her mom's words echoed in her mind as she put her hand on her ring, doing, without thinking, what she yearned to do as the gang leader went to punch Jeremy.

She took off her ring and bracelet, and felt her skin crack and rip once the jewelry left her body. Stone wings broke out of her flesh and made her roar in her heavier, monster like voice. She ached as her face changed and she grew pointed ears, a longer tongue, bigger eyes and horns that grew from her head. Her height increased by several feet as all the boys turned, seeing her change and hearing her yell like a mutant.

They screamed. As if seeing the devil themselves, all the kids, including this Jeremy, took off running. Rose flapped her wings and charged as she lifted into the air; she flew up only one-story in height. She glared at them with evil looking bright red eyes and hissed, "Never return again, or I'll eat you." As they ran for their lives, too afraid and shocked to pull out their phones, Rose quickly flew up, several feet more, heading to one of the alley building's roof. The air feeling so good against her hurting skin. Rose took a breath of freedom and, finally, control. She had helped someone in a small way as she actually laughed at her comical words of 'eating the boys.' She perched then on the building's roof top. She was perching like a real stone gargoyle, as she watched all the teens go, with no one hurt.

Rose smiled, realizing she too had some power and control, enough of it to hide from Livia in a small way, at least. I won't be meek and mild, nor will my only purpose be tempting Sean Noble... I'll learn how to survive, how to elude the vampires, and help others when I can. Be the kind of lone survivor that would make my mom proud and my brothers cringe.

As she stared out into the city, Rose decided, just for that day, instead of going to school, she'd count how many gargoyles were in DC; even if it meant she would have to walk all of Washington. She wanted to know how many pieces of her family existed near her and how many places she could perch on buildings in her gargoyle form and blend in. The answer, as Rose took off, would shock her.

Four Years Later

ROSE

A driver in a new black Cadillac, which smelled of pungent leather, drove seventeen-year-old Rose back into the city, after an epic fail of a polo lesson with Sean and his classmates. Rose spied DC's tall National Cathedral; a building that looked very similar to a castle. She gazed up at it and all the gargoyle statues that littered it's fancy roof. Rose stared upon each horribly ugly, dragon-looking, stone monster knowing some of them were the gargoyle kids she planned to unfreeze one day. Washington's National Cathedral had over 112 whole gargoyles on it's property that were frozen in stone, and also various other body parts of broken-up, older, and more powerful gargoyles on it, too.

But my mother... Out of the three thousand gargoyle statues in the city of DC, Livia has her head and feet. Rose had figured out the Nobles, Sean's family, had collected gargoyles, too, over the centuries. Sean's father had Rose's mother's chest from the neck to her stomach. Something I get back once I marry Sean; of course, the human boy who has to fall in love with me first.

She rolled her eyes as she thought about their Polo lesson. How Sean had asked her to "Just get out of here, so no one gets hurt today," and some prep school guy named Brian had asked her where she was from three times. As if I could tell him.

Livia had arranged for the driver to take Rose back into the city to meet Livia there for a report. But since the driver, via Rose's call, had picked her up early, she had extra time. "Charley, can you drop me off here?" Rose asked as he slowed at the Cathedral.

"You have a yearning to say your prayers, ma'am?" he asked with a friendly smile. Friendly enough that Rose wished she could trust him. She couldn't, though.

She gave a half fake grin back and breathed, "Oh, yes..."

He dropped her off. The weather was very humid with a light steamy rain that was sprinkling over the city while the sun shone brightly. Rose walked away from the vehicle and up to the front entrance of the massive church. She went to the left as she entered, passing tourists who were leaving. Rose walked past the crowds, most of which were younger school children visiting the tourist hub. Rose enjoyed how she could always be lost within an array of people from all over no matter where she was in the District of Columbia; and yet, the city was quaint all at the same time.

She was walking through a smaller side hall of columns and stone within the main church's great room; past the tomb of Woodrow Wilson, which was out in the open along with various other statues of American founding fathers for people to see. And statues of hidden, frozen gargoyles, some of which almost looked like Angels. Rose thought as she looked at the gargoyle statues.

To think, most of the humans buried here worked with vampires.

Rose went past the tombstones and more tourists as she ducked into a small side door that led behind the stage. She went up various staircases in the dark, which were used by custodians. Rose made it to the area high above the cathedral where workers hung lights and banners over the service. The dusty space was empty thanks to Rose learning all the workers' schedules. She went up to a door that was locked because it led to the rooftop. With the turn of her hand and her stone-like strength that was cloaked under her false human form, she broke the lock every time. Looking back to make sure no one was around to see her, Rose went through the door and crawled out the window.

Removing her cross ring—she only wore a charmed ring now and not a bracelet—she felt her skin and cells split and change with pain. Rose turned into her true monstrous form and moved further onto the building's roof. Blending in with the other statues, Rose looked out far over Georgetown where people walked about in large crowds. The sidewalks were small and crammed with road blocks that separated pedestrians from traffic. It was toward one of Georgetown's famous cupcake shops that Rose spied a new pick pocket team. One human was bumping into people and creating a distraction while their accomplice slyly grabbed wallets and iPhones and then handed the goods to a third partner.

This really gets old, Rose thought with a smile as she jumped off the cathedral building. She pounced fast and swiftly onto one of the smaller properties' nearby, where there were more gargoyle statues. Rose dropped down, moving into a watery sewer entrance that was behind the building. Rose had learned that the sewer drains and tunnels that ran besides the underground Metro passages in DC were huge and big enough that she could fly in them. Her wings flapped as she moved and flew over a drainage water passageway without getting wet. It was a faster way to travel than public transportation. She came up above ground near the top area of a Georgetown bridge where, low and behold, she'd spied her pick pocket team meeting.

Rose climbed on one of the nearest townhomes, looking like one of many statues around her as these thieves went to jump into a vehicle, but not before Rose got to them. She swooped down from the rooftop, grabbing the stolen goods and darting into an alleyway that was on a deep slope.

The thieves' bag of treasure she had taken consisted of stolen phones and wallets. Rose looked back. They hadn't even noticed what she had taken from them yet. Rose chose to dart their way again, grabbing one of the female crooks' own purses this time that would have her ID in it. Then Rose was moving fast and with ease, out of sight.

Rose flew low and to the side, over a Georgetown canal where she stayed in the shadows. When she got to another bridge the led to an AMC movie theater, she stayed out of sight under more dark railing until she could slip her ring back on and become human again. Rose's skin stretching and snapping back into place.

She was careful not to be seen, always. Knowing if there were ever a vampire serv around, they wouldn't know what she was because Livia was the only vampire who knew of her existence. Rose, now appearing as an ordinary teenager, pulled out a permanent marker and wrote on the pick pockets bag the word, 'thieves.' Then Rose made her rounds back into the sewers, walking beside the water on a cement path appearing as a human. She planned to drop off the stolen goods secretly at the police station. Something positive after my afternoon of watching Sean with that human girl, Samantha, try to play polo. Barf, Rose thought.

After the police station, she walked down an underground tunnel that lead to an entrance within the Liberty of Congress. Where Livia will be in about an hour. Rose's stomach growled as people went in and out of the fancy library. As the wind blew in from the open doors, she smelled a Mexican food truck that made her stomach growl again. The scent of roast beef, sour cream, and spices made Rose almost imagine the taste she'd learned to love after adapting better to this century. She followed the aroma outside into the drizzling rain.

"Two beef tacos, with extra sour cream, jalapeños, and Chalupa sauce," Rose called to the food seller. He nodded without fully answering her as she handed him a fifty. Rose was allotted a hundred dollars a day now from Livia, 'to use to buy the sexiest clothes and accessories that were appropriate for her age level,' Livia had instructed. Rose always failed miserably at that.

"Keep the change," she told the food seller once she had her very 'un-Scottish' tacos in hand and chomped down on them as she ducked under a covering next to the Library of Congress. Rose knew she lacked elegance as she scarfed the food down in the plain hoodie and black stretchy leggings she'd changed into. Her baggy-T made it so Rose could easily morph in and out of her gargoyle form. She knew the outfit would make Livia cringe. Rose even burped after eating. A nicely dressed older woman leaving the library gave her a dirty look and Rose just went on eating. What, flying burns a lot of calories people!

"One day, I won't be alone. I'll be with other gargoyles, like my mom, who understand me. One day," she whispered under her breath as she looked down at her ring. It was made to fit on Rose's wedding finger. Livia had it sized as Rose grew every year for that finger only, and Sean's parents made him wear one also, a reminder to them of what was to come. Everyone else just thinks this is a 'Worth the Wait' ring, and that I must be super religious.

Rose looked ahead, waiting for Livia's black limo to show up as she saw someone surprisingly familiar; Brian, the boy from Sean's school that Rose had met at the polo session Livia made her attend that day. He was Rose's height and on the skinnier side. She guessed Brian was Hispanic, possibly even Puerto Rican, but it was hard for Rose to tell. He had dark brown hair she found attractive—Rose found herself more drawn to brunette boys than blonds, maybe because she and Sean were both blond.— Brian had a fair amount of acne on his cheeks and wore a little too much gel in his hair. Yet his funny, modern, hipster style, Rose found different and nice. He had asked her where she was from earlier and she'd blown him off with a response, ending their discussion rather coldly.

I must appear rude and closed off to everybody... Something I never used to be before the curse and I entered this strange historic time.

Rose watched him as he exited a Metro area and walk toward a techno gamer hub called the 'Virtual Incubus'. Who name's a place, Virtual Incubus... What a terrible name for a generation I'm now a part of, who can write code and hack computers in their sleep. Whereas I, after years of practice, have only been able to master taking pictures on my mobile, making social media accounts, and searching the web. Rose's sense of not belonging grew as she thought about this and watched the student disappear inside.

Livia's large black limo pulled up as Rose finished chewing. The disguised gargoyle watched every head turn as Livia stepped out of the vehicle. Livia had a short black and gold dress on now, something different than when Rose had seen her earlier, that Livia must have changed into. Livia's hair was still styled half down and half up but with a different gold leaf headband that had Swarovski crystals on it—her long curls shining in the rays of sunlight and not getting ruined in the after-rain humidity. Rose was no longer satisfied from eating and turned, not caring to see Livia smile at the humans like she was one of them, as they longed, without knowing why, for her smile.

Rose met her keeper in a private room full of books from Ancient Rome that the vampire royals had donated to the Americans at some point in history. She stared at the crimson stained color on Livia's lips, wondering if it was lipstick or Livia's drivers' blood. When the vampire smiled and her teeth were slightly stained red too, Rose got her answer.

"So... don't be so coy, my ruby Rose, tell me about your day with Sean?" Livia asked as Rose gave her a flat look that should have said everything.

"Sean has a girlfriend named Samantha, she goes to his school," Rose told her, but Livia shrugged that off.

"As I understand it, Sean has had lots of little puppy love crushes over the years; none of that should compare to you. Though, I must say," Livia looked Rose up and down, displeased. "If you ever showed up looking like this, I'd reject you also."

Rose grunted. "I changed after the polo lesson. Sean saw me the same way you did when you dropped me off today."

Livia grew bored then as she looked at her manicured nails, making sure they were perfect. "Well, Rose, I don't know what to say, nor can I baby you anymore. As I understand, Sean is growing more handsome and strong, day by day, due to his dormant gargoyle genes. That's something that should motivate you to try your best at getting him to fall for you when you're around him. In addition to the motivation of waking your mother. After all, you could have been stuck with worst than Sean. If this were the1500s, with no curse, at seventeen, you'd probably be on your second child and married to a fifty-year-old gargoyle or wizard by now, for heaven's sake."

Livia, unfortunately, did have a point. Rose knew this was true, and that Sean wasn't awful looking. Getting him to like her wasn't the worst life sentence. Rose just didn't know much about males, period, no matter what race they were from.

"You need to tap into your feminine wiles and get to at least second base with Sean soon," Livia added, sounding the opposite of any caretaker on planet earth. "Because, before you know it, you'll be twenty-one and your time to wake your family will be up. If that happens, I'll have no use for you, or Sean as he turns into a cursed piece of rock," Livia added.

Rose tried to show no signs of fear as she grew frustrated. "I'm trying, but I can't control Sean's fear of me or attraction to his classmates, so what do you suggest?"

"You could always kill this crush, Samantha, for one; break her neck and eliminate the competition," Livia joked. "As for fear, his parents have insisted on controlled meetings between the two of you every four months. So the boy could have somewhat of a normal life for a little while, as he slowly got comfortable around you, but I think we need to take a new approach." Livia turned to leave the room.

"Like what?" Rose called out, not liking the sound of this.

"Starting tomorrow, you'll be enrolled into Sean's private prep school at Saint Catherine's," Livia answered simply as she began to leave the book-filled room and Rose walked forward to keep up with her.

"Tomorrow, that's it? I don't get to say goodbye to any classmates or teachers at my public school which you've made me attend for years?"

Not that Rose had truly close friends she could trust. There was Jeremy, the boy she'd secretly saved a long time ago. He attended her high school, but had no clue it was Rose that had saved him from bullies in the past. Jeremy had taught Rose most of her simple computer skills. She'd want to say goodbye to him, and Chelsey, another casual friend who excelled in math and had tutored Rose for free. Jeremy and Chelsey were some of the humans that reminded Rose that there was still light in the world, and made her want to help their race.

"Nope, they aren't important, only you and Sean are, my precious flower," Livia instructed as she looked deep into Rose's eyes. Rose dared herself to speak what she'd wanted to ask Livia for years.

"Sean's first-born uncle who turned into a gargoyle, and then to stone on his twenty-first birthday, you want this curse broken so he'll wake up, don't you? You've gone to all this trouble of raising me since I've awoken, and keeping Sean and me alive... For him." Because you loved him... Rose tried to imagine Livia in love on a face where kindness was barely there anymore.

"You think you've got everything, including my entire kind, figured out, don't you, Rose? Why don't you figure out yourself, and how to French kiss a boy while you're at it."

Then, Livia, the Roman vampire princess who looked no older than eighteen, walked away. Livia moved so fast she was almost at super-speed as she walked and tried to appear human. Rose darted outside after her. By the time she got to the Library of Congress's door, Livia's limo was already gone.

Later that night, as Rose lay in sleep, she dreamt she was back in Leith, Scotland again. A place far away from her present reality. Rose smiled at her surroundings in the dream. She looked down at her hands and body, and realized she was at her current seventeen-year-old age as she flew through Leith's sky. Her wings back to looking beautiful, red, and not stone-like. They flapped as Rose soared through the cool air, over a series of waterfalls that were breathtaking to look at.

She landed in the woods alone. Her dragon wings folding into her back as she used her charms—the ones her mother had given her, not Livia's—to appear human and walk into an area close to the water. Somehow, she knew humans and supernatural creatures alike were gathering in this spot, all hiving together to drink and have a party. Men and women who were mastered in an array of string instruments, harps, and lyres were playing music. Rose also heard sultry women of the night, who often lived in brothels, sing out.

Rose entered the party in a long red dress that was the same shade of her hidden wings and eyes. Her dirty blond hair was in crazy, frizzy curls, and flowing wildly from flying. The scent of hot Scottish game meat and stews cooking on fires was mixed with aromas of enchanted wines and ancient burning herbs that she was smelling. Rose looked for her fellow gargoyles from this world who should have been there, disguised as humans. Yet, she saw no others of her kind, not even one of her brothers.

I'm here all by myself.

Though, Rose spied so many other people. She saw someone in the corner of two trees who had once, as a child, taken her breath away. Adamus stood at six-foot-three, with olive skin, golden rich brown hair, and matching eyes. She found him looking her up and down; how long had he been staring at her she wasn't sure.... She shivered, knowing without a doubt, she shouldn't talk to him or even entertain his looks as Adamus kept gazing upon her. Rose tried not to notice how his body was like that of a young, thinner gladiator's, with just the right amount of muscle. With the physique of a warrior, he had the presence of an honorable nobleman.

He looked upon Rose as other women of the night ̶ some dressed like gypsies, that were only a year or so older than her but seemed way more experienced ̶ looked upon him. They began to get closer to Adamus as they danced. Rose found herself watching, unable to look away and slightly envious of their confidence. She couldn't remember why she'd come to this party as suddenly, someone interrupted her.

A human, dressed as a stable boy with whiter hair than hers, and intense blue eyes, walked right in front of Adamus, blocking Rose's view and said, "My queen ... would you dance with me?"

Rose felt her cheeks turn pink as she replied in shock, recognizing the boy as Sean who stood the tallest at this gathering. "Sir, I think you've drank too much wine and ale, I'm not a queen." Yet, Sean touched her hand, sending a wave of electricity through her skin as he gently pulled her into another area where people were dancing near various fire pits. The fire's embers were sparking and burning out with towering waterfalls in the background, casting unusual sparkles into the atmosphere; like magic.

"Aren't you?" Sean's hands came around her in a more modern, twenty-first-century dancing style as she lifted her arms around his neck nervously to steady herself with his moving. His skin was warm. Touching this boy, or any male for that matter, still felt foreign to her. Rose tried to remember that Merlin's grandson had once kissed her years ago—a childish first kiss—but that didn't help. Her pulse picked up as she hardly knew how to dance or what to do. "If you're the only one left, you must be a queen," Sean went on as Rose looked at him, not understanding. He twirled the both of them around, so they were moving in slow circles as drums began to play, mixing with the Scottish music.

"Who are you?" Rose asked, not sure if she really wanted to be dancing with this human. Yet, as Adamus watched, she found herself moving with Sean instead of away from him. Adamus was staring at them... not at the girls around him.

"I was sent here to teach you how to French kiss," Sean said bluntly as Rose's eyes widened and she went to stop nervously. Yet Sean kept moving.

"I don't need you to teach me," Rose said quite rudely back, deciding she wanted to be done with this human now; but their bodies kept dancing as more and more people took up arms with each other and began dancing around them.

"Are you sure?" Sean grinned.

The sound of thunder came from above, causing most to laugh and drink more as they partied. Rose looked up but saw no rain or clouds in the sky. Where is the thunder coming from? Sean took this moment to lean down as Rose looked up and he whispered into her ear, "We're both so stubborn and yet, learning together could be fun."

He's not seriously talking about kissing, is he?

Rose's eyes widened as he moved his face from her ear, down closer to her, so she was looking into his blue eyes and he was looking into her crimson ones. Sean began closing the space between them. This sent Rose's pulse over the edge. Her instinct was to kick Sean right in the face. Yet, she saw past him again, where Adamus was still watching.

Rose had the strangest thought as Adamus's expression grew so unhappy, like he was suddenly the king of an icy world, mad at Sean for daring to touch her. It was only at that moment that Rose allowed Sean's lips to come all the way to hers, only because Adamus is watching... Rose let herself slowly close her eyes and relax into Sean's embrace, feeling the strangeness of this kiss between them. Sean's lips were warm and smooth as they touched hers once and then twice. He pulled away to look at her again, their body's closer as the music got more intense and the drumming began clashing and mixing even more intensely with the Scottish music. The melody made everything feel so vital. Like Sean needed to kiss her for something important to happen.

Sean made eye contact again to make sure Rose was okay with this as she looked once more past him; she was strangely happy to know she was making Adamus grow more and more angry; Rose wasn't sure why, but she wanted Adamus to pay for something grave that he'd done.

She looked back to Sean once more. This time, it was her nervously going to kiss him as his arms pulled Rose in and as they kissed, he and Rose's mouths moved and opened. She didn't quite know what to do as his tongue began to intertwine with hers. Rose was experiencing her first French kiss as Adamus stood afar watching, and she tried to pretend she knew what she was doing. Her eyes were closed and yet she knew mysteriously that Adamus had a primal look in his golden vampire eyes.

Sean's one hand began to slide down from her hip, moving further. She opened her eyes mid kiss and saw from afar Adamus's fangs. He was letting them show. She and Sean were still kissing as Sean's hands moved down her whole body and she felt an even bigger electric shock.

Then Rose suddenly woke up. She sat up in bed, her heart racing, body sweating. Her fingers went right to her lips as she wondered, just for a second, if that dream could have been real. It clearly wasn't, even though her lips felt warmer than usual. She grew angry at herself and heard the clashing sound of thunder that was actually happening outside her window and had invaded her dream. Rose jumped to her feet as she spied lighting and rain outside.

Oh my gosh! Did I just learn how to French kiss in my dreams? Is that normal for a gargoyle female? Rose wondered as she shivered and kept thinking about how real Sean's lips and tongue had felt against hers; and how much her psyche had enjoyed making Adamus mad. Not that me kissing Sean really would make Adamus angry in real life... she thought.

Now fully awake, Rose knew why she wanted to make the vampire who had bitten her and changed the course of her destiny almost five hundred years ago pay. She went to the window in her room that was in the apartment of her current fosters—they changed every year ̶ and opened it. She was at least twenty floors up. Rain from the storm poured in as she closed her eyes for a moment, feeling the cold wetness come onto her face. She hoped it would wash some sense into her and cleanse her confused soul. When she opened her eyes, Rose looked out into the city, over Washington DC's capital, where lightning was striking the sky.

How nice it was in my dream to be home, flying over Leith in my un-cursed gargoyle form. No breaking of spells could ever bring back that future, unfortunately. Unless, maybe, when I finally do wake up mom, she and I and any good gargoyles could just cross the sea and go home, live secretly in Scotland again, in peace.

Yet Livia had told Rose that after what the gargoyles had done to their youngest sister, the vampires, even with a peace treaty, would never let that happen. They would never let the gargoyles return to Scotland. Unless the vampires were gone.

* * *

# Chapter Eight

One of Livia's extra town cars pulled up in front of Rose's foster of-the-year's building, early the next morning. Rose walked up to the car's window annoyed. It rolled down and Charlie's face filled her sight. She was still in a daze over her dream. Rose had connected Livia's words the day before,— 'learn how to French kiss,'— with her doing just that, with Sean, in her dreams.

Ugh... I usually find Sean so annoying, and he has a girlfriend, so why had the mental picture of us felt so real, and why was Adamus there? Rose was also nervous to the point of nausea about going to a brand-new school. Schools in the twenty-first-century are scary. Nothing like the twelve students max learning all grade levels, all at once, in Scotland. Private school compared to public is probably terrifying.

"Charley, I'm okay with taking the met today," Rose explained when the serv, who had bite marks on his neck, looked at her with a blank stare. His wounds were so fresh Rose could smell his metallic-smelling blood just slightly; that told her Livia had fed on him just before he'd come here.

"Sean's friends know me as a public-school girl so I might as well appear as I am, not affluent," Rose said with relief, as most of the rich politicians in Washington DC and their children acted like swamp snakes. "Which means my family wouldn't have a personal driver."

"Ms. Livia insists," Charlie corrected her with a zoned-out smile. "She said I have to take you or drive off a bridge, that it's your choice." He smiled like his sentence was no big deal as Rose skipped a breath for a moment. Looking at him with fearful eyes, whether he was an ex-con or not, she got right into the car to save him. Oh, how Livia must be enjoying this setup she'd schemed from afar, Rose thought as she made a fist.

"Also, she left you some jewelry and accessories in the back that she insisted you add to your outfit or I'm to shove them down my throat."

Rose exhaled in frustration further as she sat down in the car that smelled too much of new leather and found a Louis Vuitton purse, a matching wallet, and a golden headband that Rose refused to put on.

Sean wasn't interested in the done-up me yesterday so better to be more real today and see how that goes. He should be more than happy with me as I am! She took the accessories but also put her hair up in a bun with her own black hair tie just to spite Livia. Rose held onto Livia's purse that she'd stuffed the headband in and wallet. She figured she'd donate them later.

Rose pulled out her phone as she slipped Livia's more expensive case and sleeve onto her cracked old case. I guess this is the one thing I'll keep. Then Rose began to text in a group message to Chelsea and Jeremy, 'I'm not coming to school today.' Rose was proud of herself for adding an emoji into the text, something she was just mastering how to do even though most kids communicated solely in emojis. The way cavemen used to draw pictures on walls before proper language, Rose thought.

She watched the dots dance across the text box, a sign that they were typing back as she waited. Her phone beeped in the meantime, as Rose received a different text, this one from Sean Noble.

'My mom said you're being made to attend my school, starting today?'

'Yeah, Livia's making me,' she texted back, wondering what this new experience with him could lead to. She thought about her dream, and him whispering into her ear as she remembered enjoying the fact that Adamus was watching them. Yet, this real-life Sean would never do that. Instead, he answered: 'Just don't stalk me, okay?'

Rose dug her nails into her hand.

"Oh my gosh, the nerve of him," she said aloud to no one as she texted back. 'Ditto.'

But she knew, unfortunately, 'stalking' was exactly what Livia would want her to do. 'You're too boring to stalk anyway,' she added and sent him that text also as she thought, well, this is getting off to a great start. Why can't my match be someone besides Sean Noble? She grew mad as she wondered if, instead of trying to get this real-life, non-dream version of Sean to date her, she'd be better off learning dating and actual real French kissing and then making out, with someone else first...

At least then it's not like I'm waiting like a pathetic puppy for Sean to break up with his new girlfriend. Maybe that's the way to go about things, and get boring Sean to look at me the way Adamus had in the dream, with jealousy. Rose knew that hadn't worked with a fake social media guy, but maybe a real man would change it up.

The town car finally parked, and she went to get out but kept thinking about all this, these thoughts caused her to miss the higher step when she exited and trip. Rose nearly tumbled onto the sidewalk in nervousness as students turned and watched her. Rose looked up, horrified at her own clumsiness. She beheld high-schoolers, all in uniforms she hadn't been given yet. They stared at her like she was an intruder, something unknown arriving at their small little red-stoned prep school building. Too bad they don't sense I'm a gargoyle princess. Rose swallowed hard and tried to look confident after tripping.

She heard the snaps of mobile phones, capturing her entrance for all to judge.

"Who is she?"

"What wealthy family does she come from?"

Rose listened to students whisper with her extra-sharp hearing as she approached them.

"Someone told me she's from a public school, so her bag must be a cheap fake."

"How sad."

Rose tried to ignore the quietly spoken gossip as she wore a nervous mask and walked. There were only about one-to-two hundred high-schoolers ages fourteen to eighteen, standing outside. A small number compared to the bigger public school she'd attended, which had thousands. This place is going to be harder to hide and blend in; thanks, Livia. Rose remembered looking up online that Saint Catherine's only had 700 kids in the entire school total. That's nothing compared to what I've just come from. Like a hundred and fifty in my whole junior class.

She took a deep breath and approached the first student she saw. A girl who looked like she was from a wealthy Spainish or Portuguese family who was on her way inside the school's fence. This brunette might have been in a plain uniform but her makeup and well-styled, professionally blown out hair, made Rose's non-made up face—and hair that was messily in a bun—seem boring.

"Where's the admissions office?" Rose tried to make her voice sound pleasant and friendly despite this girl's unimpressed look. "I'm Rose, by the way." She held her hand out to shake but the girl didn't take it.

"I'm Clair..." she said as she glanced at Rose's purse like it was last year's style. Livia probably paid a small fortune for this. "And it's over there." The girl pointed vaguely toward the left outside hall that ran along the older looking school.

"Thank you." Rose then began walking. All the students' uniforms consisted of polo shirts that were either cranberry or navy with the school's coat of arms on it. On the bottom, all students seemed to be in long skirts, skorts, or pants that came in blue, cranberry plaid, or khaki. So, hair styles and affluent accessories are the only way students here differentiate themselves. I guess that keeps things simple for me. The only other uniform thing Rose noticed that a few students had was big varsity jackets. Rose wasn't sure if they were for athletes only or upper-class students. If only trying to play a sport didn't mean I might break a human's arm. Rose knew Livia had already made her fosters provide her with a note to get out of physical education class.

Rose felt someone walking awfully close to her and turned, recognizing Brian, the boy from the polo lesson, that she'd also seen going into Virtual Incubus yesterday. His confident smile, despite his inflamed acne, almost made Rose's nervous frown fade.

"Hey, it's me, Brian. I nearly didn't recognize you with your hair back like that and with less makeup on," he said quite boldly as she shot him a look that said that comment was a little much.

"Oh-kay." She sped up her walking. Rose figured if he wanted to keep up, he'd have to move quicker, something Livia often did to Rose.

"Don't take offense. What I'm trying to say is you actually look even more beautiful now," he recovered as she finally half-smiled at him.

"Thanks, Brian, and it's Ruby."

"I know, Ruby Swan. Every student on campus, I shamelessly included, just Googled you the second your mysterious town car arrived, 'public-school girl.'" He repeated aloud what Rose figured her new nickname would be. "I figured you were on scholarship like me," Brian went on, "but now that everyone's seen that town car, maybe I'm wrong and you're not really here on donated tuition?" Brian, a techno guy, spoke like he could somehow decode Rose's whole life with a few answers which she refused to give him, including her real name. Rose personally didn't even like the name Ruby very much. I'm sure since roses are red, Livia figured Ruby is almost the same thing as my old name, Rose. It's not.

"I take it when you Googled me you didn't find anything interesting?" she asked, knowing her social media was about as inactive and vague as it could be.

"Nope, not yet. Only that you list polo as one of your hobbies but don't have any polo pics posted?" he said like a proper cyber stalker.

"I don't like the way I photograph," was her only reply. Brian looked at her like not liking pictures of herself, or being a snapping social media narcissist, was abnormal and sad. He then added, "Where are you going?"

Prep school guys are truly strange.

"The admissions office to get a uniform and class schedule, where else would I be going?" she told him as they neared the end of the outside hall.

"One small problem, 'expert polo riding, former public-school attendee,' new girl," he said as she turned to really look him in the eyes.

"What?" Rose asked as her hands went to her hips.

"You're not headed toward the guidance office, only the dumpster."

Rose stopped dead in her tracks, eyes wide as she realized that's exactly where the student, Clair, had sent her. Rose exhaled in frustration.

"Let me show you where to go, as someone that was labeled the 'strange new guy' two years ago," Brian offered. He smiled nicely, despite his funny way of getting to know her; it seemed he really was trying to show Rose they did have a thing or two in common. Rose knew they didn't, but tried to be nice anyway.

"Okay," she agreed as they headed inside. They entered a hallway through a side door that was full of fancy, full-sized lockers, unlike the little square lockers at Rose's public school. Students were all turning and looking at her as they gathered in clicks.

"The girl who told me the guidance office was near the dumpster said her name was Clair," Rose told Brian, still bent about that as he nodded in understanding.

"That makes sense. Clair is a total bitch, and best friend of the new queen-B of the junior class, Samantha Kaine. Also known as my ex-girlfriend who used to be twenty pounds heavier and not so cool; but now loves to make my life miserable whenever she can," he informed Rose as she let that sink in.

"Is this the same Samantha from polo yesterday?" And Sean's newest girlfriend? Rose asked as Brian nodded. Oh, great.

"Bingo, you remember her."

"Vaguely." And unfortunately, she thought as she answered, playing clueless. Brian got her right up to the guidance office.

"Well, here we are," he said as out of the corner of Rose's eye, she saw Sean.

He looks taller than yesterday, somehow? Sean was by far, the tallest guy in the halls at 6'3 ½—he's even taller than Adamus was the last time we saw him at that bakery, years ago when Sean and I were 13.

Every girl's eyes turned to Sean. He was in a uniform shirt that looked a tad bit too small for his growing physique. Sean was headed in Rose's direction as she took in his well-shaped chest and back. In his hand he held a varsity sports jacket that had basketball, football, lacrosse, polo, and theater emblems on it. Who would have thought Sean would be an overachiever? Not me. His bright blue eyes, nor his crooked smile was on Rose. He was looking only at who was also approaching him from the other direction. Samantha Kaine.

The petite brunette walked right up to Sean. Samantha was a girl so frail and delicate Rose could have snapped her in half without any effort, yet Samantha's face did say Queen-B or 'queen bitch' within her snobby stare. She gave off a dominant vibe in a small shell as she proudly met her boyfriend. She also wore a varsity jacket with theater, dance, gymnastics, and a symbol for computers and science on it.

That must be why she was with Brian before Sean. Samantha clearly saw Sean as the prized, perfect trophy. She threw her arms around him the second they were close enough. Sean lifted her off her feet like a feather, so Samantha was his height as he held her and they kissed for all to see. As Rose watched his lips grope another girl's, much like Rose dreamed of him doing to her last night, she found herself wanting to look away.

"Hey, you hear me?" That's when she realized Brian had been saying something. Rose nodded yes even though she hadn't listened to a word he'd uttered.

"Ah yeah, and thanks for walking me," she said, trying to sound kinder than she felt as Brian then dared ask.

"Great, and in case you need any more help getting around, new girl, you wouldn't want my number, would you?" he asked, loud enough for others to hear. A bold thing to do as Rose felt all students' eyes close by go to her and begin to whisper about this.

"Is Brian really asking the new girl out?"

"She's been here less than fifteen minutes."

"Brian's apparently found his rebound after Sam left him for Sean. Wonder how mad she's gonna be."

Rose heard all their whispers but had to pretend she was clueless as she looked to Brian who seemed nervous now that he'd asked. She turned her own head slightly so out of the corner of her eye she could see Sean glancing at her and Brian too. Sean's look was unreadable, nothing like Adamus's expression in her dreams. Screw real life Sean.

"Um, yeah, I'll take it. Your number, I mean," Rose stuttered as she pulled out her phone and felt eyes watch as she clumsily tried to put Brian's number in her contacts. Why does it feel like this easy task of adding someone's digits in my phone always takes me forever to do, unlike other kids?

"How about you tell me your number, and I'll add it to my contacts and call you. I have a photographic memory when it comes to computer coding and girls that are beautiful enough to have fallen from the sky...,"

Rose glanced up at him, her expression changing for a moment.

"Like an angel," he finished. This was a pickup line, she realized, as she tried to relax. Rose found herself shell shocked from both his 'fallen from the sky' line and what she should do when she was being hit on, period. She was so guarded it usually didn't happen. Okay, a witty, slightly goofy computer coder is asking me out in front of Sean. This is good, right?

"Okay, it's 202-310-8787," she told him and he nodded.

"I'll see you later, Ruby Swan," he said, remembering her name as he walked off without putting her number in his phone. He headed toward Sean and Samantha's direction. Rose watched Brian grin as Sean kept a stone-like face while looking at them. Rose turned around herself, right as her phone received a text from Brian. He is clearly showing off his memorization skills, Rose though as she smiled, amused by the situation. She saved his contact info.

An odd start to this strange day. She walked into the admissions office.

Inside, she found another student, this one between Samantha's short height and Rose's borderline too tall height of five-foot-ten-and-a-half—gargoyles were tall even in the 1500s where the average human was shorter. The student in the office looked part Indian and part something else, maybe Caucasian or Hispanic, Rose couldn't put her finger on it as the beautiful girl stood at 5'6". She wore a name tag that read 'Melody Patel.'

Melody stared at Rose in awe as she reminded Rose a little bit of Chelsea, the student from her public school who Rose was already missing so much. And the sad part is, Chelsea's small friendship with me, she probably doesn't even realize is one of my only friendships besides Jeremy; they'll never have any idea... Melody smiled strangely up at Rose, like she was Wonder Woman in this strange new experience that was prep school.

"Did Brian Price just ask you for your number?" Melody asked as Rose put her phone in her pocket.

"Ah yeah, is that okay?" she replied, a little stunned at how forthcoming and honest these prep students were; subtle didn't seem to be a thing at Saint Catherine's. Melody looked like she might have a heart attack with excitement.

"Oh my God, yes, and please teach me your ways, Jedi master," Melody said, and this made Rose nervously begin to laugh. Oh, she's impressed by this. So am I, actually. Rose also loved the Star Wars reference; she had seen both the latest Star Wars movies and all the old ones and really liked them. She thought the idea of space travel was so out there and amazing. And a lot easier than high school.

"I would teach you if that happened usually, or a lot, which it doesn't," she revealed to Melody honestly. Rose found this girl, who was wearing thin glasses that had pinkish purple frames, and hair that she wore up in a matching headband—that wasn't gold like Livia's—amusing. "That never happens to me, in fact," Rose went on.

Melody's eyes went down to Rose's ring as Rose spotted that Melody had a ring of her own on her left engagement finger. "Me too." Melody began sputtering out more words. "I thought I was the only one our age that has never been out on a date or kissed." Melody clearly had diarrhea of the mouth, "And I assumed it was because I wear this," Melody pointed to her 'worth the wait' ring. "But clearly, you just broke the WWJD glass ceiling." Melody held her hand out to give Rose a high-five as Rose cautiously held her hand up and let the girl tap it. Being a new student that everyone assumes is super religious and purposefully practicing abstinence due to Livia's sick sense of humor is so fun... not.

Yet, still, Rose seemed to like this Melody.

"By the way, I'm your junior class representative and here to orient you on behalf of the school and show you around," Melody informed her as she pulled out a bunch of different uniforms for Rose to try on.

"Great," Rose said as Melody walked her to the girl's dressing room and then began giving her a tour.

# Chapter Nine

#### MRS.PATEL

Mrs. Patel walked through the halls, toward her classroom at Saint Catherine's, as students walked about. Mrs. Patel found her eyes going from Sean Noble and Samantha Kaine, who were walking hand in hand, to the admissions office glass doors, where she saw her daughter, Melody. Melody was talking to a tall, statuesque blond who was out of uniform and had her hair in a bun.

That must be her... Ruby Swan, also known as Rose. Mrs. Patel thought with nervousness as she walked into her classroom, right as she felt her mobile phone begin to vibrate. The forty-five-year-old History teacher pulled her phone out as the name Livia popped up on the screen. Mrs. Patel cleared her throat and answered the phone, trying to make her voice sound confident as she spoke.

"Hello. Livia, any moment, students will be entering my class."

"You could teach them a lesson about guillotines, something I still have and would be fitting for a little witch like you, who has different shades of magic still in her blood; or I could us it on that unknowing daughter of yours. Especially if you don't answer me, your elder, with 'yes ma'am' when I call you."

Mrs. Patel found herself beginning to sweat as she nervously thought about her innocent lamb of a child, Melody, who knew nothing of the super natural. She said more respectively into her phone, "Yes ma'am?"

"Very good, now, has my little flower arrived?" Livia asked. "Remember, Ruby is worth more to me than every human in all of DC," Livia said very dangerously as Mrs. Patel nodded, as if Livia was there watching her.

"Yes ma'am, she's arrived, and she is safe."

"Good, because if any funny business happens to her or Sean, or anything intervenes with my plans for them at that school, I'll have your daughter tortured for being the descendant of a witch and then I will kill you."

"I understand, ma'am," Mrs. Patel said again as students began entering her class. She was still on the phone, a big no-no that would make her look like a hypocrite, yet she let Livia talk. Mrs. Patel had no other choice.

"And the deed I asked of you last night, has it been done?" Livia questioned her.

"Yes, ma'am."

Sean entered the classroom right as Livia clarified, "So he and Rose will dream of each other every night now that you cast the spell?"

"Yes, ma'am," Mrs. Patel said again as her students looked at her a little strangely but took this free time to talk and fool around. Mrs. Patel grew more and more fearful.

"Very good, and again, any funny business at that school, and I'll rip your throat out with my teeth, after I've made you watch me rip out your daughters." Then the phone hung up as Mrs. Patel's' heart pounded like thunder. She fearfully tried to look like everything was all right as she thought, Livia will blackmail me and Melody, and then her children after that the entirety of our lives. And most likely kill us anyway just like she fed on and then killed my mother. Unless I find the Davises. If a real Davis is found, the vampires and their rule over the supernatural Court of Shades and Shadows will die.

Then she began to teach.

* * *

ADAMUS

Adamus, appearing falsely as a young twenty-something in a lab coat, stood over a little girl named Casey who lay still in a New York hospital center. Adamus had learned that Casey had been in a car accident and now suffered with a traumatic brain injury, and possible loss of her left leg. That was still to be determined after being hit by a drunk driver, which had taken the life of her mother.

Adamus stood over her as she slept, watching her vital signs as his eyes went to her black and blue leg. Her doctor, who was about to enter the room at any moment, might choose to amputate. Adamus turned his head, looking around as his eyes went to the camera in the corner; he'd already sent his serv to the security room to take care of that. So, with no one watching, Adamus quickly slit his wrist, feeling pain with the deep slice as he held his hand up to little Casey; letting his blood drip into her mouth. Within just moments, her vital signs began to improve, her leg turned from an ugly black and blue back to a healthy pink fleshy color. Adamus knew her brain injuries would start to improve as he let more and more blood drip onto her tongue. Then he said a prayer, "Thank you, Lord," and pulled his hand away, holding his own wrist now with his fingers as he felt his skin begin to heal right as a doctor walked in.

"Hey," the doctor, a man in his fifties, began rudely, trying to show off the air of authority. He had no idea that two hundred years ago, Adamus had founded the very hospital they both stood in now. Adamus also had over thirty doctorates. "I've been looking for you, kid. The interns are supposed to be gathering in the radiology department, not..." The doctor stopped talking abruptly as little Casey began to open her eyes. This caused the quack to look at her healed leg and check out her steady vitals. Adamus began to make his way out so he didn't have to answer any questions, right as the doctor called for nurses.

Casey was the twentieth child Adamus had healed that day, the weight of their lives in his immortal chest as Adamus's phone began to vibrate. His brother, Felix, was texting him. Adamus stopped cold in the busy New York hospital when his eyes fell on the message.

'Our sister is keeping a big secret from us... I believe it has to do with the Davises. You know what that means....'

A sense of danger washed over Adamus as he was aware that their oldest brother, Augustus, wouldn't like this... not at all. The only thing the acting vampire king, Augustus, hated more than the Davis Clan—a bloodline of vampire slayers that had been murdered—were all wizards and gargoyles who existed before them. For Livia's and Felix's sake, all the Davises better be gone.

* * *

ROSE

An hour later, the bell rang and students began emerging from their fifth-period class. Rose and Melody walked to what would be Rose's last class on her new Day One schedule. She'd learned this prep school's required eight classes per semester, were separated into a Day One and a Day Two schedules. That meant she'd have four two-hour classes on Day One and four different classes on Day Two, with one master homeroom class that was attended every morning. Prep school is confusing. Rose's public school just did seven classes per day, every day.

"So, you and I have the same last class on day one, which is History with my mom as our teacher, she's the reason I have a scholarship here," Melody revealed.

"Like Brian," Rose concluded. She knew all the students believed she was there on scholarship too. Yeah, scholarship Livia.

"Exactly, here, let's go to our lockers first and ditch these math books."

"Yes, please..." Rose was all for not thinking about her new, more advanced math class anymore. She spied beyond the lockers, Melody's mom, Mrs. Patel, who was a pretty forty-something Indian woman with kind eyes like Melody; she was chatting with another teacher. Beyond them, a janitor was getting ready to unlock a utility supply room. Rose turned her attention to her locker. Melody began opening hers first, showing Rose how to work the lock.

"The stud who asked you for your digits, Brian, and his terrible ex, Sam," Melody's forehead wrinkled in dismay when she talked about her. "They also have our next class," Melody explained as Rose's eyes widened at Melody calling Brian a stud. He wasn't awful looking... but wasn't drop-dead gorgeous either. Melody must like smart, nerdier guys like him; maybe instead of returning his texts, I should set them up? Rose schemed, always eager to help others.

"I hope, one day, I have someone like Brian who falls for me at first sight," Melody went on as, right before she was about to unbolt her lock, they both heard a loud slam.

Rose and Melody jumped, both turning around to sudden screams. The janitor had opened his closet door... and a body had fallen out.

Brian's body!

Rose froze in shock as she looked at the boy who had asked for her number, he now lay unmoving with wide eyes that were pure white. Rose found herself backing away in confusion as Melody, along with dozens of others, all panicked.

* * *

SEAN

Moments before Sean heard a scream, he was waiting for Samantha down a T-shaped hall, opposite the locker area. She seemed to be taking extra-long as students piled out of her engineering class. He always waited for her there, ever since they'd become a thing.

"Hey," he heard her voice, which sounded like a soothing chime, come from behind him as he turned. She was coming from the opposite end of the hall, and she had an old-fashioned floppy disk in her hand. Samantha walked happily into his arms and reached up on her tiptoes to kiss him. Her beautiful, rich brown eyes and thick amber lips coming only to his as he wrapped his hands around her toned body and kissed her back.

The taste of Samantha was so addicting as she pressed herself against him and one kiss turned into two. He felt her curves against his broad form and her tongue explored his mouth. He pulled away right as she, wanting more, bit his bottom lip. That had him blushing and smiling as he looked down at his girlfriend whose uniform was wrinkled and messy from their embrace.

"Well, hello there," he said, his voice coming out deeper than normal as she smiled at him.

"Hey tiger, I missed you," she said as he grinned silly. Samantha almost made him forget about his cursed, supernatural destiny and the fact that his arranged marriage, future gargoyle wife was at his school today; almost forget, but not quite.

"What do you got there?" he asked as he felt the old floppy disk in her hand. His fingers still touching her own. She held the object up.

"Crazy, isn't it, to think this is what they had before the iCloud and portable drives were invented. These came out right before CDs and DVDs did."

"Weird," Sean said as he looked at the disk. "What is your class doing with it?"

"We're actually working with the history department to break some old code that's on these, that's my assignment, anyway; who knows if I'll be able to do it." Samantha smiled her sassy smile that he knew she only got when she was given a challenge. Not only was his girlfriend super-hot and the captain of his school's dance team, she was also incredibly smart—she's smarter than I am—which was damn sexy to him.

Sean couldn't be happier that he'd won Samantha Kaine over from her creepy, cyber stalking ex-boyfriend, Brian, who was now annoyingly hitting on Rose. Sean tried not to think about it, or how he'd dreamed about kissing Rose last night... as his girlfriend moved in for another kiss; when suddenly, they heard a scream down the hall! It stopped them both mid-kiss and they turned.

"What was that?" Samantha gasped as one scream turned into several and Sean recognized the loudest one was from Melody Patel. Sean and Samantha both rounded the corner with Sean in the lead as his eyes fell on Rose first. It was hard for his, or any male's eyes not to fall on Rose... the person the others only knew as the 'new girl'. Rose was now one of the tallest girls at his school. Her blond hair, even in a bun that was more golden than his white blond hair, made her attention-grabbing as the two of them locked eyes. He imagined her red eyes that were under her contacts instead of the fake green pair that were looking at him.

Then his vision drifted down to where teachers were doing CPR and shouting, "Call 911!" That's when Sean saw his old arch rival, Brian Price, on the floor, passed out and dangerously still. Samantha grasped Sean's arms, freaked out. Sean's glare went back up to Rose. She looked as shocked as he did. Yet Sean knew the fact that it was Rose's first day, and that this had happened, couldn't be a coincidence.

# Chapter Ten

#### ROSE

Rose's heart raced as she made her way to one of Livia's penthouses that were right between Capitol Hill and the White House. She walked quickly past Old Ebbitts Grill, one of DC's oldest and fanciest tourist spots. Rose had to squeeze through the people on the street who were waiting to get in as it still sprinkled rain. The sun was setting and street beggars were huddled under railings.

They're creatures of the shadows, just like me, Rose thought as she, even in a panicked state, took the time to buy street food and hand it off to them as she passed. At least we shadow dwellers aren't vampire servs who crave to be bitten by vampires and bleed shades of red.

Rose nodded at one of the very servs she pitied next: Livia's door man who had a scar on his neck, much like Rose's neck and wrist. Only his scar was less healed, rawer, as he nodded at Rose. He let her in and then she took an elevator to the top of the penthouse. Livia had an epic view of the White House right from her balcony window that Rose saw as the elevator opened. Livia's multimillion dollar suite consisted of wallpaper that had actual gold dust in its creases and white marble floors. Rose also knew, outside the penthouse's railing that surrounded a beautiful patio area, there were gargoyle head and neck statues, posted out front as a mockery to Rose's kind. Those stone body parts belonged to two of Rose's brothers. I hate this place... hate all of them! A gargoyle statue sighting, Rose had learned, also meant a vampire had owned or founded that piece of property a long time ago.

Not that I'm in a hurry to bring my brothers and their disgusting behavior back, but one day, I'll at least have their body parts taken off every vampire's outside walls. No longer will my kind not have proper burials.

Livia had a serv of hers—a young, beautiful girl who wasn't much older than Rose—doing her hair, curling it and fussing over it like she was molding precious gems. Another serv, a young male, rubbed Livia's bare shoulders as she spoke on speaker phone in a white strapless dress. A dress that exposed a great deal of her breast line. Livia looked like a goddess in the flesh as she sat with her fangs unveiled. Like she was ready to drink from someone at any moment as the sight of her made something primal in Rose form fists and stand on guard. Livia's face seemed stressed and peeved, and having her fangs out meant Livia was also annoyed.

"If anyone from the Davis line is alive, and someone's looking for them besides my family, then before you kill all bastards involved, including the Davises, you better first get a sample of their blood. So no one like them can ever be summoned again. Fail at doing this or involving any of my family and I'll break you," Livia hissed into the phone as Rose stepped into her sight.

Livia's servs looked to Rose only for a moment and then obediently went back to taking care of their mistress. As Livia's own stare met Rose through the reflection of her mirror, the vampire quickly ended her conversation of which Rose was eavesdropping on. Livia acted as if this mysterious talk of a 'Davis line'—something Rose knew nothing about—was unimportant suddenly. There is so much history and drama between the vampires and the 'bad' humans they punish, I don't even want to guess what she's talking about. Livia's stressed face looked on to her newest piece of prey, Rose.

"If you went to school like that," Livia said as she looked over Rose's uniform that had gotten wrinkled and muddied from rushing through the dirtiest parts of the city. "And now have come to complain to me that Sean is still preoccupied with his silly human crush when you appear like this..." Livia said, like Rose was the most horrid thing in the world. Rose knew she wasn't, even as an awkward seventeen-year-old. Livia just had a way of making all other women feel like trash.

"I've actually come here because a boy at the new school you're making me attend had a brain aneurysm today and the teachers called 911." Or at least, according to school gossip, most are saying they found out through Brian's family that he had a brain aneurysm and was rushed to MedStar Washington Hospital.

Livia's eyes did widen when Rose told her this. Rose had come there just to read that very expression and see if Livia was involved; she didn't appear to be, but she did not look very bothered either.

"Well, that's unfortunate for him, my little flower. But why are you telling me this when your only concern should be Sea—"

"Yes, I know, Sean Noble. Precious Sean Noble. I'm telling you because he had a brain aneurysm in a janitor's closet that he was in all by himself. A school worker found him right as Sean and I were about to pass in the halls, and oh yeah, this boy also asked me for my number. He's also Sean's girlfriend's ex. Strange coincidence, isn't it?" Rose demanded as she, again, waited for Livia's cunning, calculated face that never showed.

Livia's massage therapist was intensely rubbing knots out of her beautiful neck as she waved her hand, stilling him.

"Someone asked you out, was it in front of Sean?" Livia asked, more excited than deterred as her question spelled out that she really had nothing to do with what happened. My God, it really is a coincidence; high school is truly so insane, or maybe just my life is.

"Kind of," Rose admitted, a sad look coming over her face. "What does it matter now?"

Livia didn't seem to empathize with Rose's sadness or worry for this engineering student, Brian. He must have been sick. But why was he in that janitor's closet? Rose wondered as Livia seemed done with this and ready to get back to her business as her shoulders got a deeper and deeper massage.

"If you're done here, Rosie, I think I'm going to feed on these credit card thieves now," Livia said, referring to the guy and girl who were fawning over her. "Did you know before I made these pretties my servs, they were stealing all kinds of people's identities and social security numbers? Now they'll work for me, forever, or until I kill them, or make them kill each other, whatever I decide... Because they're now happily addicted to my feeding on them; isn't that glorious?" Livia bragged.

Rose looked at the humans who really did seem out of it and like robots or zombies. Rose's own family tortured and raped their servants so as Rose glared at Livia like she was sick; she also wondered if her own line was really any better.

My mom was... and I am.

Rose turned to leave then, still puzzled about Brian as Livia called out, "And good job on getting asked out, little flower. Before you know it, the poor soul asking you out will finally be Sean."

Yeah right, Rose thought.

Yet, she did ponder later that night, when she closed her eyes, what her strange dreams would be.

# Chapter Eleven

#### SEAN

Sean walked into his room, exhausted after football practice and then walking home a freaked-out Samantha, who had waited for him. Who the hell was in that janitor's closet with Brian and left him like that? Or... put him in there?

Bullying happened at Saint Catherine's all the time. As soon as Brian's stroked out body was found, rumors had swarmed that one of the football players had beat Brian up, triggering aneurysm and then ditched Brian in that closet so they wouldn't get in trouble and ruin an Ivy League future. Brian could have died. And then there's the rumor that I did this, because Brian wouldn't let the Sam thing go. Love that false story... not.

That twerp wouldn't be worth my time to beat up. Please.

Sean's body was aching, and his head was pounding—it had been spinning since his odd and uncharacteristic dream last night that had involved Rose—. Sean found his younger brother, Chris, and their little sister, Sarah, playing video games in his room.

Typical.

"Don't you have your own PS4?" he asked his brother, who was majorly getting whipped by Sarah. Sean was the only one that knew of the supernatural world, of gargoyles and vampires, and the curse.

"Yeah, but mine doesn't have virtual reality, and dad says I can't get my own until I get higher than a B on my report card."

"So, he's never getting it," Sarah teased as Sean laughed. She threw him a headset to join them. As annoying as having younger siblings was sometimes, Sean truly did love his family; his need to keep his siblings happier than him and supernatural-free—including Rose free—was a big priority to him.

"Sean, come on, play one game with us?" his brother begged, always wanting to spend time with the sibling who kept secrets.

"Play but don't think you'll win." Sarah laughed as she scored another point.

"If you two really insist... on losing."

Despite his tiredness and stress, he threw a headset on and flopped to the floor. That's where their epic video game virtual reality battle of 'Aliens Versus Zombies' began. A short time later, Sean was about to school both his brother and sister as they played, until he heard his phone vibrate, causing him to miss the point.

"Ah, so close to beating our Noble princess, but he loses," his brother cheered, referring to Sarah, right as their mom opened Sean's door to all the sounds her children were making.

His youngest sister was cheering. "I win, I win!"

Sean's missed text from Samantha read, 'We've only been apart for an hour and yet, I can't stop thinking about you...' Sean imagined the dancing beauty for only a second, and instantly he thought he wanted her back next to him again too. He hated that she'd been so upset earlier.

"Earth to Sean. Mom was asking you about your day?" his sister told him as Sean honestly had no clue what his mom had just been saying.

"He clearly just got a call from his master, Mom, A.K.A. gross Samantha," his brother teased, Chris had never been big on this current girl, not that Sean cared. Samantha's amazing. "Mom, did you know Samantha sends Sean lots of pictures he won't let anyone else see," his brother went on annoyingly as Sean took a pillow and threw it at the snitch.

"Out, virtual reality loser," Sean demanded playfully as his sister kept going on about how she was the queen of all video games. Both his siblings left as his mom looked at him, seriousness coming to her face once the young ones were gone. His mom's tone had nothing to do with Samantha's extra hot pictures.

"So?" she asked in a way that he knew she was referring only to Rose. His mom always got a serious, fearful, and important tone when she was talking about her. "How was school?" she asked again as Sean put down his phone. He suddenly wasn't in the mood to text with Samantha, the girl that made him forget he was supernaturally cursed.

"It pretty much sucked... And oh yeah, someone ended up having a brain aneurysm today and was found passed out," Sean told her as he thought of Rose's face, it was wholesomely beautiful and as freaked out as his girlfriend's face had been.

"I'm sure tomorrow will be better," was all his mom could say to comfort her son.

"Sure..."

"I love you," his mom began, acting like she'd already lost him; she had, in a way, to this evil world of shades and shadows that kept pulling him in as he tried to look more reassured to calm her down.

"And I love you, you're right, tomorrow will be good."

She kissed Sean on the forehead, making him feel like a kid as she then shut the door. Sean laid down on his bed, staring at the ceiling and ignoring more of Samantha's texts. He thought he'd never get to sleep, yet was sure he wouldn't again dream like he had the night before, dream about Rose... until he was.

Sean dreamt he was slowly opening his eyes. He felt water drip onto his head. Sean looked up and found it was raining ever so lightly, the sound of water rushing making him relax. He realized he was back in the woods again, and it was night. There was a sound of a familiar party; of laughing and dancing somewhere closer to the waterfalls he knew were around the corner.

"They're all about to walk into a trap," came the words from a girl he recognized. Rose's endearing and kind voice made him turn. He took in the medieval beauty who was wearing a long dress made of red flowing silk that he could almost see through. His temptation to stare at her body was strange to him as he tried to keep his eyes up and thought, what the hell is wrong with me?

Sean's own clothes transformed then as suddenly, instead of the twenty-first-century outfit he'd had on, he was dressed like a prince of renaissance England. Like a royal human with a knight's sword strapped to his side. He watched Rose's eyes slowly take him in, in confusion. She was surprised he was dressed this way, just as he was. They slowly walked up to each other.

"Whose about to walk into a trap?" he asked her.

She spoke carefully like someone could be listening to them as she explained, "The vampires, they're all about to be stopped, for good."

"That's great, right?" he asked as Rose nodded. She smiled then like she'd truly be free, and Sean realized that since she had awoken from stone, he'd never seen her fully smile. When Rose did now... she was beautiful.

"Yeah, it's really great. With them gone, maybe it will be easier to figure out how to break the curse."

"Don't we know how to stop it?" Sean asked. He and Rose stood inches apart and it began to rain more heavily very close to them. Their area, a small circle, stayed dry though; as if they had a round wall of magic all around them, keeping Rose and Sean from getting showered on.

"Yeah, but maybe there is more than one way," Rose explained as they heard a noise and the two of them looked up. Flying above the tall trees in the Scottish woods, far up near the dark clouds, gracefully even in the rain, were thousands of gargoyles! All looking like a cross between angels and bats, soaring with different sized dragon's wings. The sight of them was so incredible and epic to Sean. He found himself shaking a little as Rose reached out her hand, touching him as a form of comfort as she said, "Sean, it's all right."

The rain around them got even stronger as the gargoyles above kept soaring through it. Sean's eyes went back down to Rose's hand on his arm. Her skin touching his just like they had touched the last time he'd dreamed of him and her; she felt good... . Feeling Rose's skin was almost like an electric high of hot and cold, as the two of them looked into each other's eyes. Rose's eyes were crimson colored, matching her wings and dress. Her plump, perfect lips Sean found himself staring at extra long. He remembered dreaming how they had tasted...

He knew he was betraying his own interest then, like Adam from the book of Genesis, he was suddenly tempted to taste the apple and take charge. Sean's face and lips began lowering toward Rose again. She looked extra nervous but didn't pull away as she let him try to kiss her. He grazed her smooth lips with his mouth as he wrapped his hand around the silk that was hugging her back. Sean closed his eyes next, enjoying this.

It began to rain on them, their magical wall keeping them dry disintegrating and yet... they didn't care as he felt Rose's skin and then his own grow wet. Their tongues nervously exploring one another's. This feels so friggin' good. Kissing Rose.

A younger boy who looked no older than thirteen was suddenly before them, interrupting. He had jet black hair and blueish-purple eyes that were brighter than Sean's. He held a short, twisted and thin, dark little wooden stick in his hand that had both carvings and thorns on it. Sean could only describe this thing he was holding as a wand; a wand that was more bent and almost evil looking—if wands could look evil, to Sean this did—.

The boy was watching them creepily as Sean and Rose pulled away from each other embarrassed. That's when Sean, frustrated and shocked for getting interrupted because embracing Rose had felt so exhilarating, also suddenly remembered he had a girlfriend.

What am I doing? It's like a spell's been cast over my mind!

And yet he still wanted Rose within that second. The boy who was disturbing them looked very sad, and out of it as he too stood in the rain. Around the boy, it was hard for Sean to describe it, but there was a bright shade of color, like a magical force or fog that moved as the boy walked.

"I didn't want to," the boy told them.

Sean was growing very confused, what was he even doing there? "Didn't want to what? Where are we?" Sean asked the kid.

"I didn't want to cast the gargoyles into a hell of stone slumber that should only have been for the blood suckers, but they made me. The vampires made me," the boy went on as he looked at Rose. He looked at her like she was light itself and he had betrayed her. Sean looked at the blond beauty he'd dared to kiss more than once, who stood in the rain; her dress sticking to her body in all the right places; but her scared, confused face stopped Sean from thinking about that as he stood between her and the boy, as if to block her.

"You made the curse?" Sean asked the young male, not sure how he was making sense of any of this, yet Sean was.

"Is there more than one way to break it?" Rose asked. The boy nodded.

"And there's more than one way to defeat the royal vampires too, but you'll need the Davises for that," he told them.

"Who are the Davises?" Sean asked.

The boy looked at Sean like he should know that as he directed his answer at Rose only. "A line of vampire slayers. They can kill royals, not just put them into an eternal torturous sleep like the wizards tried to do, but kill them, forever."

And then, before he could say any more, the boy looked up and a darkness came out of his eyes, a fog of death that matched the purple surrounding him. This fog extended out like a cloud over them all. The power within the cloud was clashing with the rain, dissolving it like acid as the smoke grew and grew, making shapes that were like legions of crows. These magic birds made from the boy's purple fog began to attack everything.

"Run!" Rose screamed as she grabbed Sean's hand, the two of them connected by both destiny and touch as she began to pull him away.

"No!" Sean awoke from that dream in the middle of the night screaming. For a moment, even awake, his imagination told him those purple crows might enter his room. His brother and sister were the first to make it to his door as little Sarah turned the lights on. Sean had awoken to his bedroom trashed. His sheets were ripped, his body was sweating, his bedroom mirror was broken, and his expensive dresser had dents in it. The wallpaper on his walls was ripped violently.

Sean's heart was racing and he looked at his siblings shocked as they looked upon him and his bedroom, freaked out themselves. As his mom and dad entered, Sean realized his hands were bleeding, with bits of mirror in them which he must have broken while sleepwalking. Holy shit, he swore mentally, followed by a string of other mental curses.

"Get out of the room," he heard his mom yell at Chris and Sarah as they were shooed away. Sean's father, Seth, who'd watched his own older brother Philip go through odd things before he turned into a gargoyle and then stone—he looked at his son and said, "If your strength is increasing with the need to destroy, and nightmares from the curse have begun, that means you're changing."

Sean's heart pounded so hard he thought it might explode. This is what dad described in the past that happened to his brother. He said the dreams started right before Unkle Philip grew strong enough to fight and slaughter any lower vampire he wanted before Livia helped him... and then he'd grown wings!

Holly crap! I'm starting to turn into a gargoyle. Already. At seventeen.

"Forget what I said before about Samantha and having fun," his father added. "Breaking this curse needs to be everyone's priority."

And Sean knew that meant Rose... or did it?

# Chapter Twelve

#### ROSE

Rose walked to her first-period theater class through the hall as kids turned and looked at her. She was still very much the mysterious new girl who didn't come from a known wealthy and political family everyone could recognize. Only one or two lower classmen nodded at her, a silent way to introduce themselves as Rose tried to be polite and nod back.

She kept envisioning the student she barely had gotten to know... Brian. His still form falling out of the janitor's closet unconscious as it made a big slamming sound that repeated in Rose's mind. He looked almost dead. She barely knew Brian, yet wished she could help him somehow.

"Hey Ruby," Rose heard Melody, the junior class representative, call, and approach. Melody's innocent light from yesterday also seemed slightly diminished, as she tried to smile at the student she was attempting to make feel welcome.

"I thought you said you were thinking of art or chorus as an elective?" Melody asked as Rose shrugged. She tried to hide that she was being forced to choose theater—thanks to Sean since he took it—out of her eyes.

"I changed my mind," Rose told her flatly.

Melody nodded. "Well, we both have History together after this at least; even though it's with my mom, which is kind of lame."

"No, it's not, your mom seems like a cool teacher," Rose told her to be nice. She'd only seen the woman once before on her Day One schedule.

"I feel bad," Melody went on as the morning bell finally rang. Rose wasn't sure what she could mean at first. "Your first day and someone literally fell out of a janitor's closet after having an aneurysm. I know you've probably heard the rumors that a bully stuffed him in that closet, but-"

Rose hadn't heard that rumor... That's terrible! Were brain aneurysms caused by fear or stress? She imagined someone being rude to the boy who'd asked her for her number.

Why do humans, now that they're in control, keep hurting one another?

"But I promise Saint Catherine's isn't really that bad. Stuff like this doesn't usually happen here," Melody finished as Rose felt an urge to ask her more, right before she entered theater class.

"Melody wait, what person do people think hurt Brian?" Rose asked; even though she assumed whatever answer Melody gave would be a foreign name to her, since Rose only knew a few people at the school so far.

"I don't know if you'd remember me mentioning him from yesterday. I'm sure the first day of a new school so much info goes in one ear and out the other but... the school rumor is Brian's ex's current boyfriend might have stuffed him in that closet."

Rose's mouth dropped open, and she went to say, "No." Right as Melody said the name, "Sean Noble."

Rose was still when the bell rang, and she remained outside the theater classroom as all the kids took their seats. Rose had dreamt about Sean and Adamus again for a second time just hours before coming to school. This seems just crazy.

She'd wanted to have a better and much more normal day than yesterday, and only be concerned about Brian, the boy she'd seen fall to the ground passed out... Yet Sean is mysteriously coming up now.

I know Sean would never do that to Brian, or leave any kid that had a brain aneurysm in a janitor's closet where no one could help him. Yet she wondered who would do such a thing at this prep academy. And where is Sean now?

She finally walked into the theater room that had a series of desks around a stage. She looked around for the elusive Sean Noble but as time passed and everyone sat, he never showed. His girlfriend strutted through the door late with her crude sidekick, Claire, by her side. They shot Rose odd looks as they realized the 'new girl' had another class with them. They seem happy about it... not.

"Look at the public-school charity case in our class." Rose heard Claire, with her gargoyle hearing, whisper under her breath. Rose would have pretended to ignore the words if it wasn't for Samantha adding loud enough for others besides Rose to hear, "I heard she used all her money from a part-time job just to rent that town car and driver yesterday, at $100 per hour, and then used him again today... just to impress us."

"As if that would make her accepted around here..." Claire laughed at that as Rose ground her teeth together. She made a fist under her desk as she thought, Yeah, in this economy with all the homeless people in DC... some student's really going to spend all their cash just to ride in a town car for all of two days. What a stupid rumor, even by twenty-first century standards.

Of course, this is the idiot Sean chooses to date and the company she keeps. Rose stared at Samantha then, disliking her even more as her eyes went to the door. Again, she wondered where Sean was, she was in this theater class because of him and yet, he wasn't showing on a day a rumor was surrounding him.

"Now remember everyone," the theater teacher began. "Next class we have our mandatory play tryouts and everyone, no exceptions, is expected to participate in an audition if they plan on passing my class with at least a C." Rose only half listened. "Everyone must also have prepared a two-minute monologue, and be ready to read a scene of my choice aloud," the women went on.

Rose felt her cell phone vibrate, her mind thinking of Sean immediately as she glanced at it under her desk. It wasn't Sean, just Livia. Great. Just who I wanted to hear from. Rose raised her hand and waited a prolonged minute until her teacher called on her.

She asked, "Do you mind if I use the restroom?"

The teacher nodded, yes, and Rose got up, happy to leave as Samantha made eye contact with her, while holding a resting bitch face. If only she knew I'll be forced to marry her boyfriend one day, to stop him from turning to stone... Rose thought as she also realized. I guess if I was in her place... I wouldn't like me either then. Rose exited the class.

* * *

SEAN

'Hey babe, where are you?' Sean was skipping class as he read a text from Samantha. He knew she was in theater right now, with Rose... the classroom he was supposed to be in with both of them.

Life has suddenly gotten so much more complicated.

He texted back, 'In the library.'

She typed a question mark in reply. Him skipping just to sit in the library and not do something fun, especially when he could be skipping with her; he knew that would sound odd. He answered, 'I needed to catch up on a late assignment.'

A lie and he hated to do so. My whole life is a lie really, and not my own. He was using the time alone to research gargoyles, vampires, and any medieval crap he could gather. And these internet searches, per usual, are a whole lot of bull.

'But I'll see you at lunch, beautiful,' he also text with a kissing emoji. He knew Samantha liked things like that. I just need some alone time. Before I grow wings. FML.

Right when Sean pressed send, he turned and his mouth nearly dropped open when he spied Samantha entering the library. She must have feigned ill and asked for a clinic pass the minute she read my first text. Their theater class was conveniently right across the hall.

Up until two days ago, Sean used to love it when Samantha, the hottest girl in school, borderline stalked him. Samantha was stunning, so stunning his breath stilled for a moment as he saw her shorter form, even then, walk up to him. Her lips, painted light pink with the sticky gloss he always had to wipe off. Those lips parted as she saw him. She gazed at Sean with longing eyes as he took in her sexy, part Italian and part Portuguese features that gave her all the right curves that his eyes liked so very much. Sean had always had a thing for shorter brunettes and a crush on Samantha, in particular, for a very long time. Until two days ago, when I randomly started dreaming about Rose and getting freakishly stronger. That morning after trashing his room, Sean had found himself able to bench double the weight and hear even more supernaturally than before.

Samantha smiled at him and he quickly shrank his medieval search on the library's computers.

"Hey," he said surprised that she'd gotten there so quick as he bent down to kiss her. As their lips met, she touched his shaven face with her hands and pulled him even more so into her; her body pressing against his in this quiet area that was around the corner from any teachers. Samantha seemed hungry to kiss and have them both feel each other and yet, out of guilt, after a moment, he pulled away.

Damn, why do I have to have a conscience again? He believed she deserved way better in that moment than to be taken advantage by a guy who was secretly dreaming about another... And not just dreaming, I'd been thinking about Rose more and more ever since she arrived here.

"What's wrong?" Samantha asked. She was the girl who represented his non-paranormal life. She looked surprised that he'd pulled away from what could have been a fun library make out that just days ago he would have loved with a capital L. God I'm such an idiot.

"I'm actually not feeling good, babe, sorry, I shouldn't have even let you kiss me," he lied again as she frowned.

"I don't care if I get sick kissing you, baby," she said as she moved his hand to her waist and then, in a testing manner, she began to lift it just slightly, so he could feel the bottom of her bra's wire through her shirt. This caused Sean to turn red, smile, and almost forget about everything else again.

Samantha chuckled at his reaction as she dropped his hand, pressed into him again, and then said, "Please be well enough to come to dinner tonight after practice. I bought all these ingredients and want to make something really delicious for you to try."

That had him smiling even more as he already knew Samantha could cook food worthy of a royal family. "And my mom will be out of town with her newest boyfriend, that lawyer." Samantha said, 'that lawyer' in a way that Sean knew she absolutely hated the guy already; and would be on a mission to get her mom to dump him soon enough, but first... "So, we'd have the house to ourselves... all night."

His mouth dropped open a little and then he did fail to remember everything else. "All night?" he repeated as she stood on her tiptoes and tried to pull his broad shoulders toward her. He brought his head down knowing what she wanted, to answer once more with a kiss. A kiss that should have made him forget about Rose, but... didn't.

* * *

ROSE

Rose walked down the hall, right into the girls' bathroom that had some writing on its walls. Strange for a richly funded school. She dialed Livia's number as she noticed some teachers' names listed in a thin black marker.

Ms. Prain a.k.a. the lunatic of science, D rating.

Ms. Bay, nicer than most, B rating.

Mr. Jefferson a.k.a. perv teacher of the year, F rating.

Mrs. Brown, a.k.a. high on valium, C rating.

Rose read the graffiti as she realized this was where prep students graded their teachers. In the bathroom, for all others to see and add their two cents. How old school, Rose thought. Her public school had an online smear website for this kind of thing. One teacher even had a string of F's with the word 'whore' next to her name.

People my age are awful. Rose looked for evidence that might lead to the real bully behind Brian being in that janitor's closet yesterday. There's always the possibility he was in that janitor's closet because he was maybe making a secret phone call just as I'm doing now in the bathroom, and that's when the aneurysm happened. Maybe no one bullied Brian at all.

Rose's eyes went back up to Mrs. Patel's name. Next to her B rating, there was a pentagram symbol. In Rose's time, that was one of many symbols some of the clans of witches used to use that consorted with wizards. Some students just being funny, Rose reasoned as Livia finally answered the phone.

"Hello, my little flower," Livia sang.

"You called me?" Rose wasn't in the mood to tell her Sean hadn't shown up to theater class; she was sure Livia was calling for some kind of report.

"I'm getting on a jet and leaving town," Livia announced snootily.

The royal vampire court probably afforded Livia hundreds of private planes. Rose found herself rolling her eyes.

"O-KAY?" She didn't understand the phone call. Livia came and went in and out of DC all the time. She never announced it. Rose usually figured out she was gone from spying on one of her loft's surrounding rooftops; when Rose wandered around in her stone gargoyle form.

"My brother Augustus has summoned me," Livia added with seriousness as the older vampire's image filled Rose's head with fear. Rose hated thinking about Augustus even worse than she did Adamus. Augustus's name brought her memory right back to 1566, to the night the vampires stormed her castle and Rose was held by the oldest vampire prince, who stabbed her.

Rose shivered her heart beating as she prayed she'd never have to face that vampire again.

"Is everything okay?" Rose found herself asking Livia, worried. Rose knew if Augustus ever learned Rose was alive too early, with the curse still intact, he'd order Livia to kill her, and she would.

"Yes, relax, my little flower, this doesn't have anything to do with you. It has to do with him being very mad at my brother, Felix, who's stirring up all kinds of trouble. It's time for me to punish little Felix when we find him I think." She laughed then, her words totally lost on Rose. Rose had no idea, nor did she want to know, about the drama the vampire royal court of shades and shadows had. I just want the decent members of my family back.

"But don't contact me while I'm gone," Livia warned, as if her older brother Augustus could hack Livia's phone and figure out 'Ruby Swan' was a code name for Rose. Couldn't he do that now? "Just to be safe," she commanded. Rose hated contacting Livia anyway and was happy not to.

"No problem," was all Rose answered as she thought more and more about the day the vampires had invaded her home back in 1566.

"And let Sean kiss you today. When my driver picks you up, he'll have a gift from me in the car, take it and wear it tonight when Sean asks you on a date."

Rose's forehead crinkled in bewilderment. "What are you talking about? Sean isn't even at school today," Rose informed her. At least, she thought he wasn't at school.

Livia made an annoyed tisk sound and seemed to grow upset over this; she went on, "Just take the dress, and wear it when he asks you out and kisses you. You must feel that this is going to happen soon, you fool," Livia said curly to Rose as Rose looked at herself in the mirror.

Could Livia somehow know about the dream I've had two nights in arrow where I'm kissing Sean...? No way.

"What are you up to, Livia?" Rose demanded as Livia chuckled bitterly. Rose heard her ordering her servs around, telling some to carry her bags.

"Nothing that won't get us what we all want, that curse broken. Breaking it is all you should ever be working on. Otherwise I'm just going to have to kill you and Sean both." Then she hung up the phone.

Rose felt a chill run through her as she continued to stare at her own fake human image and feel like nothing but a chess piece in a bigger game. She heard the bell ring and went to exit the bathroom. As Rose rounded the hall, suddenly her eyes fell on Sean. So he had come to school today. Yet more disappointment hit Rose as she saw him walking next to Samantha.

Rose could also hear students whispering around him about the Brian rumors. She knew Sean could hear them too.

"Do you think Sean really could have scared the crap out of Brian and then stuffed him in that closet after he'd had an aneurysm. All over Samantha?"

"Yeah, he totally skipped the first half of school because he knows he's guilty."

"I heard Brian was hacking all of Sean's and Samantha's computers and that's why Sean did it. Because Brian was threatening to release X rated photos of Sam, that she'd sent to Sean."

Rose would have rolled her eyes again if the sight of Sean and Samantha didn't look so perfect and yet felt so wrong.

Sean has never liked me, nor have I really been into him before this week, so this shouldn't feel bad. Yet something like jealousy and frustration bubbled through; like Sean was betraying her even though he wasn't. They looked at each other....

He knows of the curse, and how us together will both save him, and wake up my family. So maybe in a way he is betraying me right now.

Sean and Rose looked away from each other at the exact same time. His eyes going to a smiling Samantha as he leaned down to kiss her goodbye. Rose heard Samantha whisper. "I'll meet you in front of our theater class after your practice when my dance rehearsal and engineer club is done."

Rose looked back and watched Sean as he eyed Samantha walking away. His handsome face looked like he truly did appreciate his girlfriend. It was then that his eyes then came to Rose. I'm just a burden to him, to this whole time and era that isn't mine.

These thoughts made her grow more frustrated as Sean started walking towards her. Rose found herself turning away from him upset as she fiddled with her locker. She expected Sean to walk past as she refused to make eye contact again, but instead, he stopped right next to her; like he wanted to talk. She only half glanced at him surprised, her face was still flat. Her emotions for some reason growing more and more agitated.

"Hey."

She looked up at Sean's water blue eyes, freckly face, and as much as she didn't want to admit it... his attractive lips. Damn him.

"You need something? Or is this my late high school welcome your parents have put you up to?" she said rather coldly, feeling the sting of rejection. She knew if this was the year 1561, Sean wouldn't have even been a contender for her.

"I need to show you something," he whispered then, surprising Rode as he moved an inch closer to her so their conversation was more private. This surprised Rose as she watched him pull something out of his backpack. He pulled out a sketcher's note pad, it had a picture that had been drawn in charcoal on its front page. Rose froze as she saw a half-cartoonish and yet half-realistic-looking face of an old friend—Merlin's grandson Gaven. His face stared at her from the drawing that had crows in the background.

"Where did you get this?" Rose's voice came out too loud as Sean's eyes opened wider. Students turned and glanced at them as they walked. Sean gave her a 'be quiet' look as she stared at the page. Memories flashed then through Rose's mind of Gaven both trying to kiss her in the past, and then of her hearing Augustus reveal that Merlin's grandson had been made to put a curse on her family before the vampires killed him.

"I drew it," Sean answered her more gently as he interrupted her thoughts. Rose had fear in her eyes as she looked up at Sean, and for some reason, she could sense that Sean knew she was afraid. He inched himself even closer as he added, "I sketched it after I dreamt of this kid screaming in a forest, near a series of waterfalls I've never actually seen before in real life. As he screamed I saw this purplish shady shadow thing come out of his mouth, that turned into a plague of crows made of smoke."

Rose's fearful eyes intensified as she finally made herself really look at Sean, not seeing the bratty boy who she'd been forced to try and make like her; or even seeing the handsome guy she'd dreamt was her first French kiss. She suddenly saw him now as the only one besides her left with gargoyle blood; someone who may not have been born into Rose's world and time, yet her world was invading his mind somehow; forcing Sean to become apart of it.

"The curse..." she whispered low as the warning bell rang and students moved around them going to class. "That plague in his mouth was the curse that turned our people to stone, and purple is probably the shade of magic inside him only those that are a part of the wizarding world should be able to see," Rose said as her own nightmares thundered into her memory. "Before the vampires came, the wizards used to curse entire human villages, and they did it by speaking and magic always came out of their mouths. People would run or get trapped and become slaves for my father's castle. That's clearly what the vampires made Gaven do to my own people when they came for us." She paused for a moment, her heart racing with fear as she added, "and I guess, your people too."

"Yes, well, I don't plan on letting that curse make it to me, or any from my family that come after me," he said matter-of-factly as the halls grew quiet and he added, "Or you."

Is Sean finally seeing that he and I need to be united... and together?

"Well, how do you plan to stop it?" she asked carefully with her voice on edge. Rose had never seen Sean ever look like he cared about any of this until now. It was the worst timing but with him also standing so close, Rose was having false memory flashbacks of him bending down and kissing her; the way he'd done to Samantha. My mind is so mixed up...

"Well, that's the thing, Livia, one of the very vampires who helped turn your family to stone, were trusting her words that the only way to break the curse is by falling in love."

Rose couldn't tell if he was saying this in such a way that he no longer believed Livia, or if he and Rose loving one another sounded like a punishment to him; one he wanted to get out of.

It used to seem like a punishment to her too, but now....

Is it so bad... us being together?

"What are you getting at?"

"Do you really trust the vampires after everything they've done to you?" he asked, like for once, the two of them had a similar mind.

"No," Rose answered truthfully as she pictured the real boy she'd crushed on from first sight... Adamus, who had betrayed her.

"Then I say, instead of listening to Livia and trying to date one another, we trick her while we find out if there is an alternative to undo this thing. That way we have the control, not her."

Rose wasn't sure how this gave them total control even if there was some other way to break the curse out there. Livia seemed to admit that the only way to break the curse was with Rose, a gargoyle princess, falling in love with someone else that also had royal gargoyle blood and the curse within their veins. AKA, Sean.

Yet what he is saying is, that Sean wants an alternative to being stuck romantically with me... Fine!

She grew peeved and partly insulted as she said, "Sounds great." And before Sean could say another word, having heard enough, Rose spun around on her feet in the empty hallway. Every other student was in class and she and Sean would get tardies as it was. Rose was over this and ready to get to class.

"Rose, wait," Sean tried to call back as she kept going. "We need to make a plan and strategize on how we can research and figure this out," he said as if he was talking to one of his teammates in a lacrosse game he wanted to win.

"Fine, we'll make a plan, later," she said sourly as she chose not to look back. Making an alternative plan outside of Livia or having to kiss Sean ever sounds like a wonderful idea! She tried to tell herself.

Though she wondered what they were in for. Magic, she'd been told once by Merlin himself, always had consequences. And so did lying to Livia.

* * *

# Chapter Thirteen

####

#### ROSE

Later, Rose sat in her History class, where her teacher, Mrs. Patel, had slides up of ancient Persia. "The Persian or Achaemenid Empire was established by Cyrus the Great in the 6th century B.C. It lasted approximately 200 years until the death of Darius the 3rd in 330 BC. I hope everyone is taking notes on this."

Rose, like most students, found it hard to pay attention. Thanks to Sean. Even with Melody's mom's great zeal for history. "Tomorrow night, our student engineer team is going to help decode a 3-D model of what ancient Persia could have looked like as part of their final projects. This is something our class can benefit from in the weeks to come," Mrs. Patel went on as Melody, who was in the seat next to Rose, turned to her.

"Brian was supposed to head that decoding team to earn an extra scholarship for college. He'd been leading the engineer club in research and decoding with my mom for weeks." She whispered sadly. Rose once again tried to direct her thoughts on the puzzle of how a student ended up having a brain aneurysm in the janitor's closet on her first day. "Now his ex, Samantha, will probably lead the team and score that scholarship for herself," Melody went on. Rose still couldn't believe that Sean's beautiful head of the dance team, wealthy girlfriend, was also great at engineering.

Really? She couldn't just be pretty and an air head?

Why can't my skills of flying so fast most human eyes miss me, and knowing how to fight with medieval weapons, earn me scholarships?

Rose gave Melody a sympathetic look, the girl who was grieving over what happened to Brian more than anybody. As soon as he wakes from his coma I need to hint at he and Melody getting together. She clearly likes him.

Then Rose thought to herself, I guess I kind of sound like Livia now, trying to fix people up. Gosh.

Rose looked down at the classroom History book she was using that day until her take home own edition arrived in the mail. She turned the crisp pages away from the Persian Empire section, to the section that covered the 1500s. My time. Rose looked upon horrible paintings of actual monarchs she had seen, like Queen Elizabeth and her Scottish cousin Queen Mary. Rose turned the pages next to a chart timeline that went from the late 1500s to the 1700s. Everything I missed, including the making of America.

Rose found that some student before her had written on the chart that was in the book, in black pen, near the 1600 mark. Rose looked at the writing that reminded her of the same graffiti from the bathroom as she read the words, The Davis line begins.

Rose read that sentence and grew puzzled.... Davis is a pretty common name, no way these are the same mysterious 'Davises' Livia was going on about... right?

Just to be certain, Rose pulled out her phone and took a picture while Mrs. Patel wasn't looking. Melody saw but didn't seem to think anything of it as Rose smiled, pretending she was only slyly texting until the girl looked away. Then Rose turned to the end of the book to see who else had used it before her. Rose went down the list of names... then paused. She read Brian Price's name as the most recent student to have used this textbook before her.

Her mouth dropped open. Brian is here on scholarship too, so he was the new kid before me... But him having a book with the word 'Davis' in it is nothing right? Just all a big coincidence, including his aneurysm?

Yet, it didn't feel that way at all to Rose as she looked up at Mrs. Patel then, Melody's mom. The woman was middle aged, her body on the thin side, her voice overly kind as she smiled at the students and Rose. Brian was supposed to be doing an engineering project for this History teacher, decoding a model of ancient Persia.

The bell rang then and as Rose got up. She tried to tell herself this was all just little pieces of nothing. Melody smiled at her as they headed toward their lockers.

"So how are you liking your Day One and Day Two schedule so far?" she asked as Rose went to open her locker.

"It's nice, really different than my old school," Rose said as she found herself trying to think and go through the motions with Melody all at once.

"I'm sure. You'll probably want to pick out some extracurriculars, once you're comfortable. Kids collect extracurricular activities like they do phone apps here—the more the better, you know, for getting into top Ivy League schools."

As if my mind is anywhere near thinking about that. Rose nodded.

"So, I'm thinking of making a big card and having the entire junior class sign it, and then drop it off for Brian at the hospital today. Want to come with me and maybe after we could—" Before Melody could finish, she opened her locker and a note slipped out. A note that was ripped in half, written on lined notebook paper, that someone had stuck through the locker's slot. It fell right onto Melody's face. She grabbed it as Rose looked.

"What is this?" Melody gasped confused as Rose read the red-stained words that were facing her before Melody could turn it over.

It read, 'Tell mommy to hand over the decoded Davis disk now or you'll be next.'

Rose was dangerously still as Melody turned the paper over and onlookers stopped to see. The dark crimson ink on the paper was watery and stained Melody's hands.

Claire, minus her BFF Samantha, passed behind Rose and Melody. She was being nosy as she spotted the girls reading a note in a state of confusion and started to ask extra load, "Is that-" Melody's face went bright red with sheer panic and worry as Claire finished, "-blood?"

Rose knew what the answer was.... Yes. She fought not to make any expression at all as sudden danger and realization rang in her head. Blood usually means vampires. And yet Livia, Rose knew, was gone.

So, what the hell is going on here?

# Chapter Fourteen

#### ROSE

Immediately after school, Rose exited the campus, her heart racing as a driver pulled up in front of her. The memory of a panicked Melody leaving the halls looking afraid, still flashed in Rose's head. Rose knew it was making her look angry as she glared at the driver.

Something supernatural is going on here!

"Not today, Charley, Livia can get over it," Rose insisted. She didn't want him reporting to Livia where she was going next as he smiled, like a zombie. Charley reached for a box that was in his front seat.

"As long as you take this, ma'am. Livia has also instructed me to remind you not to contact her until she returns."

"Not a problem," Rose snapped.

She grabbed the box from him that Livia had mentioned to her earlier, and kept going. Rose agreed, now more than ever, that she and Sean should start working together on stuff like this; such as anything that could involve another vampire. But... I can't include Sean, who as of right now is more human than gargoyle, until I know what we're dealing with. Either Livia is still in town and messing with us, in some twisted scheming game to get Sean and I together; or there is another vampire or player involved here.

Rose opened the box from Livia as she walked away from the town car on the streets of D.C. A cringe of anger hit her face as Rose found that her keeper had left her a short, silky red dress, and high heeled designer shoes with red soles.

'For your first date with Sean, and you better have scored a date with him by the time I return.' Livia's note read that Rose found on top of the dress. Rose stuffed the designer pieces of clothing back in the box. Sean asking me on a date, yeah right! That's probably never happening now. Rose planned to ask Chelsea from her old school to help her sell the garment on eBay later. Or maybe I'll just give it to Chelsea, Rose thought, and then decided on that as she kept moving.

Once into DC's crowded China Town area, Rose walked toward another metro entrance. She saw a group of excited protesters exiting this entry and pouring into the streets; they screamed tourists as Rose dodged them all. Instead, she turned down a side alley. Down a long, thin space between the two buildings, Rose first saw two druggies a little older than her doing a deal by the dumpsters—losers. She kept her head down and moved past them, unafraid. If any human dealers ever try to mess with me in an alley, all I'd have to do is take off my ring. Then I'd scare the crap out of them. Further down, she also passed a homeless woman who was talking to herself. Don't those druggies know that will be their future after too many years on those poisons that give them quick highs?

Rose walked past it all, pushing her thoughts beyond mundane things, and onto the fearful world of vampires and the supernatural court of shades and shadows. She got to the furthest corner of the alley where Rose knew there was an entrance into one of many underground tunnels that ran above the sewers and next to the metro passageways.

Moving fast, and still in her uniform, Rose removed her ring once she emerged in the darker part of the underground area. She felt her skin crack and twist and as her wings broke free from her back. Rose let out a little yelp of agony as her stone wings spread out and she wished they were more like her beautiful old dragon's wings that still hurt when they came out of her false human form; but not as much. She morphed further as she began to flap her wings and felt her body lifting, taking glorious flight under the city roads, in the tall underpasses where no one could see her. She flew fast, like a creature of the dark. Rose soared with her hands stretched. She made it quickly to an opening she knew ran right under MedStar Hospital.

Once under that entrance, Rose slipped her ring back on. She looked down at the cross and stars on the piece of jewelry as daylight shined into them near the hospital's upper entrance. Rose stared at them as she tried not to feel and think about her big stone wings folding into her back and rubbing against her bones. Rose then entered the hospital looking frazzled,—like everyone in DC looks-like she'd just done a major workout. No one paid her much attention, she just seemed like a lost and out of breath teenager; there were too many people in the hospital for the humans to look too closely.

Therefore, DC is a good place to be. People miss the obvious here.

Rose pulled out her phone. There was a picture she remembered seeing last night on social media of flowers that Saint Catherine's female principle had delivered to Brian's room; on behalf of the school. Rose looked at the picture on her phone again as she zeroed in on the room number across from Brian's flowers, taken from his room, Room 808.

That's where she headed as she took the elevator to the eighth floor. I hope his room hasn't changed since yesterday. She kept her eyes to herself as she tried to seem like an average visitor with the many other visitors in the elevator. The doors opened to the eighth floor, and Rose then carefully walked down the sterile smelling white hall, looking for 808. She found it at the very end and then turned, spotting Brian's wilted looking flowers and a balloon from someone else.

Rose made sure no one was coming as she walked inside. That's where she found Brian's body. Rose paused as she took in the boy who had asked her for her number. He was so still and almost seemed lifeless now, even though he was breathing just fine. There were machines hooked up to him that gave Rose the creeps. Hospitals definitely weren't like this in the 1500s.

Wishing she had as much knowledge as a doctor who could properly tell her how Brian was doing, she took a step closer to him. Maybe if I would have been born a regular human in this time, and didn't have to worry about seducing Sean Noble; I could have studied to be a doctor or nurse, and known how to help someone like this.

"Brian," Rose began to whisper as if beyond his brain aneurysm and coma he could hear her. "I really hope something supernatural didn't do this to you," she spoke under her breath. She looked to his neck, finding nothing, no bite marks of any kind. Rose found herself exhaling. Maybe I'm wrong then... about vampires being involved. She looked down to her own right wrist. Rose still had a scar from Adamus sinking his teeth into her vein almost five hundred years ago. Looking at it brought flashes to her mind of him feeding on her, and the memory of her liking it. Because those damn vampires release a magic that becomes pleasant and addictive to the victims they drain.

Something I foolishly agreed to let Adamus do because I stupidly wanted to help him... help the cutest boy I'd ever seen. What an idiot I'd been back then.

Rose flinched, bringing her mind back to the here and now as she carefully went to Brian's right hand. His skin felt cold as she turned it over. She exhaled a sigh of relief as she found nothing... No bite marks. She walked over to his left hand to do the same. As she began to turn his cold wrist, Rose paused as she felt something rough on contact.

Please don't be fang impressions.

Rose turned his hand all the way and what she saw caused her to gasp and drop his hand out of fear. She saw two big and very deep vampire bite tracks. She blinked hoping what she was looking at would fade away. It didn't as her mind confirmed to her that a blood sucker did do this. A vampire, other than Livia, must have been on my campus yesterday! Scaring Brian into having an aneurism as he became someone's lunch, and then he was dumped like trash into that closet!

She replayed her talk with Livia in her mind just to be sure to examine this from every angle. Rose remembered Livia looking shocked when Rose told her a boy was found passed out at her school. So if Livia one hundred percent didn't do this, and is really gone, some other vampire belonging to Augustus's shade and shadow court is here! At my school, looking for these Davises maybe?

Rose thought about Melody's note: 'Tell mommy to hand over the decoded Davis disk now or you'll be next.'

Melody seemed so innocent to Rose to be the target of vampire business. But Melody's mom has been using the engineer team to decode stuff... That must be the answer to this cryptic Davis disc talk. The word 'Davis' was mentioned in Brian and my's classroom history book, as a family living potentially from right after my time. The question is who are they now and how are they relevant?

The answer is probably in whatever Brian, an innocent, was researching.

Rose left in a hurry, ready to find answers fast and then get to Melody. She found herself texting Sean, the boy who said he wanted to 'work together' on things.

'Call me,' she sent in a text.

Yet, her instincts told her there'd be no reply. Rose's gut notified her that she, the real gargoyle left, would have to get the answers they needed and figure out everything quickly. So instead of waiting, she moved.

# Chapter Fifteen

#### SEAN

The hallways were cold as Sean walked through them. He and Samantha were supposed to meet in front of their theater class. It was the place they'd first connected in months ago. Sean remembered like it was yesterday; being so nervous and excited to read a scene with her; she'd looked skittish and excited too, which had given Sean the balls to ask Samantha for her number. That had caused Brian, who was barely seeing her, to go ballistic, and threaten to hack me via a social media post instead of ever approaching me to my face. The loser.

Now, in the present, the hall felt extra frigid and everything seemed so different somehow. Sean's muscles barely aching after practice. Instead his gym shorts seemed tight and shorter than yesterday. Gargoyle blood couldn't have seriously made me grow another inch in a few hours, did it? He'd taken his time, doing extra workouts after Lacrosse since Sam had not one after school activity but two: dance and engineering. Being an overachiever was pretty much bred into every student at Saint Catherine's as he thought about taking coding himself next year; in addition to all his extra A.C.T classes.

His phone vibrated as he waited for his girlfriend in the empty halls; she was always running late as Sean looked down and saw Rose's name. 'Call me,' her text read. Rose's every feature began burning in his mind as he thought about his dreams for a moment. He remembered how good kissing in the rain had felt... Geese, get a grip, that didn't happen! Sean thought about the curse, and the purple smoke he'd seen coming out of Gaven's mouth....

I'm so glad I didn't grow up in the 1500s, he thought with relief as he looked at his watch. Where is Sam? Sean began walking toward the history room, remembering that Samantha had told him the engineers were supposed to be decoding old floppy disks in a collaborated assignment with their History teacher Mrs. Patel. Once he told Sam he couldn't go over to her house tonight for dinner, he'd call Rose back, he decided.

A part of his conscience still telling him what an idiot he was for passing up a night with Samantha; Other guys probably wouldn't care about being with one girl they liked, while also dreaming about a second girl they had a thing for all at once. Sean made a fist, feeling pulled as he walked up to the engineering door which had a note on it from Mrs. Patel. It read: 'Engineering and History club collaborations are canceled tonight.'

Sean made a confused face as he wondered where Sam was then. He turned from the History door, ready to walk away as he dialed her number. But then Sean heard Samantha's phone ring, inside Mrs. Patel's room. What? Sean suddenly felt a little creeped out but wasn't sure why, because he and every other student at Saint Catherine's had spent lots of extra time in these halls after hours; all trying to beat each other into the best Ivy League colleges. He went back to Mrs. Patel's room and opened the door. Sean still heard Samantha's phone ringing with the distinctive ring tone she had programmed, and yet, he saw no one in the room. He looked around. Mrs. Patel's bottom desk drawer, which was usually locked and shut, was wide open. This gave Sean a big alert in his head that something wasn't right. He went to that drawer nervously and that's when he saw,— among stacks of old floppy disks, and warn out looking books,— there were also odd metal charms in his teacher's desk. The charms looked like strange jewelry that had suns, moons, and crystals on them, and bones and teeth of some kind linked to the charms as well. The teeth looked sharp and pointed, almost like fangs.

Sean was growing majorly freaked out. A weakness spreading within him of fear as he looked again at the empty room and then back to the desk drawer. Beyond the charms on chains, Sean spied a pentagram charm. My dad told me that my uncle, before he turned into a full gargoyle and then to stone, killed several vampires and witches to protect his secret relationship with Livia; yet I can't even look at these charms without being afraid....

He turned around, wanting to get out of there. Yet on Samantha's desk, on top of a History book, Sean spotted both Samantha's ringing phone and her varsity jacket.

"Sam?" he called out in the room, hoping she'd walk in and explain away everything. That these charms were all a strange history project of sorts and had nothing to do with his supernatural world. There was no one around to answer him as Sean's feet moved to her desk. His hands nervously went to her phone. Sam had many missed calls that weren't only from him but from someone else; someone she'd entered into her phone as only 'F'. 'F' had left her more messages than Sean had. Knowing her password that she'd shared with him at the start of their dating, during a steamy make-out session, he entered it in.

'Drop whatever plans you have and meet me now, and bring what you have,' one text read as Sean stared at it and then blinked, wondering if this was another nightmare because nothing seemed to make sense anymore. He looked down at Samantha's jacket, so confused.

Samantha would never leave her phone or prized varsity jacket anywhere, even if someone demanded she drop what she was doing, she'd bring them. And who the hell would speak to her this way? Sean felt himself growing pissed off as he looked closer at her coat. Near the neck area on the inside, Sean lifted it as his eyes took in faded red smears. These crimson smears had dripped all the way down her coat and hardened like... blood.

Sean felt himself go very still as something like panic and anger joined forces and that made his back muscles tense; tense like something wanted to rip out of them. He wasn't sure why in his mind he was suddenly imagining grand dragon like wings coming out of his own back as he began to move. He needed to find both Rose and his girlfriend now as the muscles within his arms and chest felt like they were thundering under his skin, like a fight was getting ready to happen.

* * *

ROSE

Rose stood high above the city, on top of the National Cathedral, in her human form. She was pacing in a tiny circle near a stone gargoyle; one she imagined was one of her mom's old friends. Rose walked on a flat surface as her heart raced and she looked out over the city.

Rose wished her mom was there, to tell her what to do right now; she also yearned to have someone like Sean to strategize with, yet Sean still hadn't answered her texts. How could I have ever dreamt about kissing him? Instead, she stared at her mobile phone, the device only a little smaller than her hand, as she struggled not to call Livia and demand to know what was going on.

Instead, all alone on a Friday night, Rose was determined to get answers.

She had remembered Melody saying that Brian and the other engineers had been helping Melody's mom with a project. Rose knew all the engineer kids hung out at the Virtual Incubus, the place she'd seen Brian at back on the day of her polo lesson. Rose knew Jeremy, the boy she'd saved from a gang a long time ago, who was also good on computers, he atoo went there sometimes. Rose now waited for his text after she'd messaged him, 'Hey Jer, can you meet me in an hour at the Virtual Incubus, I need your help with something?'

Finally, now saw dots dance on the bottom of her text screen as his answer came. 'Of course, I can be there in an hour in a half, after I'm done at the gym.'

She slipped her phone into her pocket and thought. Finally, ok I can get there before Jeremy so no time is wasted.

And with that, as the last bit of sun disappeared, Rose took off her cross ring, ready for more pain as she suddenly jumped right off the Washington National cathedral building. An action that was electrifying as her skin stretched and changed; her wings coming out and flapping right before she hit dirt, making her land a little bumpy; not that she cared.

Rose put her ring back on then, as she went toward the underground sewer entrance that was down the road. Once to it, she planned to fly through her tunnel of choice that would take her to the Virtual Incubus in less than fifteen minutes. This is so much faster than taking the met!

Fifteen minutes later, Rose emerged looking human; she walked out of the Library of Congress that the tunnel had led her to. Her uniform stashed in her back pack next to the dress and 'hookerish' high heels Livia had gotten her. Rose had changed in the library's bathroom. She was in her outfit of choice, all black sweats with her hair up in a high ponytail. It was perfect for a teenage, virtual hang out place on a Friday night that was known for serving beer to nerdy minors.

Rose j-walked when it was clear to cross the road and then moved past a crowd of techno guys who were smoking outside. Some of them eyed her, especially the ones with extra high eyes—pot was legal in DC—. Rose ignored them and walked inside.

"Beer," a bartender asked her as she shook her head no a little too nervously. She knew that she needed to be confident and strong as she looked at the time on her phone and waited for Jeremy. She was convinced he—being her old school's computer hacking genus—could help her find on these computers whatever Brian had been searching for. The keyword is 'Davis', Rose thought as she looked outside the bar's window and saw...

Samantha Kaine.

Rose couldn't believe her eyes as she took in Samantha. Sean's girlfriend was approaching an area near the Virtual Incubus's entrance and yet she wasn't dressed like someone who wanted to sit in front of screens and chat with fellow hackers and gamers. If she's not coming here where is she going? Samantha was dressed in a tight turtleneck pink dress. It was super short and showed off her dancer's thighs. God, she beautiful, Rose thought a little jealously. Samantha looked more attractive now than ever because for once she was smiling without a resting bitch face; she seemed extra out of it to Rose. Like her head was in the clouds or perhaps on a high like so many others who roamed Washington's streets.

Rose stared through the Virtual Incubus's window and watched the brunette go to a set of glass doors that were right next door. Doors that Rose knew led to a fancier lobby area where two doormen slash bouncers stood. They guarded an entrance to one of the most elite clubs that was usually for people in their mid-twenties and up; and that were a part of the DC politics and social scenes. Rose watched Samantha get let in by the bouncers without an ID. Samantha is from a political family, maybe this is all normal? Yet Rose moved, going outside the Virtual Incubus and watching Sean's girlfriend from behind. Because everything else that has seemed like a coincidence hasn't been on this day.

The night was warm as Rose stood to the side where she could see through the glass doors. Samantha was standing in the lobby now of the private nightclub. People around her were all much older and dressed up on an ultra-expensive and revealing scale. Rose watched Samantha and a few other girls get let into the elevator that most likely led to the club's party area. As Rose watched the brunette disappear into the elevator she thought, Samantha is Brian's ex and on the engineer team that was decoding for Melody's mom... So I can't ignore this.

Rose found that her feet were trying to walk through the doorway, and follow without thinking as the hand of a bouncer came out, stopping her. "Where do you think you're going, girl?" came the deep bark of a tall and chubby man. He stared down at Rose like she was twelve and far too poor to be standing on the building's marble doorsteps.

"Inside?" Rose tried to say confidently as her voice came out unconfident and the bouncer just chuckled.

"This is a private party, twenty-one and older and only for guests on a certain list."

Rose shot him a wicked look as the other man laughed as well at Rose; like the thought of her trying to just walk inside as Samantha had done was crazy. She watched three other women in five-inch heels like the ones Livia had gotten Rose, get out of a town car. These women strutted right past Rose, showing off plastic bodies as the bouncers smiled and let them through. Rose grunted at that, only to get ignored further as she backed away. Yet she was determined now as she glanced up at the club's rooftop. Rose smiled then knowing that these heathen club guards had no idea what she was capable of. She turned around and headed down the nearest alley.

Oh, I can get into that club, you silly males, but first...

Rose turned to make sure she was out of viewing distance as she spied another dressed up couple walk towards the bouncers— the couple appeared like they were either young lawyers getting ready to let loose, or thirty-somethings who worked out of a politician's office. Rose watched them approach the same bouncers from afar and try to talk their way in as Rose thought, Maybe I should look more like I belong, the way Livia would sternly tell me to a play the part of this century's surroundings.

Rose remembered the dress Charley had given her earlier, and heels right as she put her fingers on her ring and bent her legs in the alley corner. She was getting ready to jump up high and transform mid-air, so she could then fly right onto that club's rooftop fast, before she was seen. Here I go, Rose thought, having no idea what would happen next.

* * *

SEAN

Sean's heart was pounding. He was underground, with a crowd, waiting in line to get onto the Met as he held Samantha's phone. The air was hot and smoggier below the city. It was so crowded he had to grab the rails above him and stand when the Metro's yellow line took off. He headed where this mysterious 'F' had told Samantha to meet him or her. At a club called Monarchy that Sean knew was right by the Library of Congress. Where my parents and I had first taken Rose when she'd awakened from stone to meet Livia.

Sean remembered the red stain that looked so much like blood near the neck of Samantha's varsity jacket.... He prayed as he made a fist, and continued to feel a strength and anger like never, that there was an explanation to all this. Yet, something in his gut told him he was about to be very disappointed.

* * *

ROSE

Rose slipped her ring back on the second she was on the club's rooftop. She spotted a door that led into the club but stopped dead in her tracks at what she saw near the entrance. A stone gargoyle. Rose stared at the statue that looked like a mix between an ugly, deformed man, and a dragon with wings; it stood only from its stomach up. I wonder who this could be? And where his or her's other half is?

This gargoyle statue is either being used to scare away D.C. birds by looking frightening and absurd, it could be a roof drainage piece, or perhaps... it's being used as a sign that a vampire now owns this building. Rose found herself making a fist, as more nervous energy ran through her. She walked past the statue feeling eerie as she entered the loud club. Her heart racing as music— that she assumed was being played by a DJ because it was switching from one song to another,— blasted into her ears.

Rose darted into the club's bathroom and into one of the bigger stalls. She knew in all black with her hair up she appeared like a staff member. But as she fished through her backpack looking for the red silky dress and heels Livia had wanted her to wear... she knew she'd exit looking like someone who at least wanted to belong. Once undressed Rose slipped the soft dress over her shoulders and then pulled it down her form. The dress sadly reminded Rose of her old red dragon's wings as she stepped out into the marble bathroom that had gold finishing. This is Livia's kind of decorating, she thought with a bad feeling as she looked at herself in the mirror.

Two other ladies who were putting lipstick on stopped and turned to look at Rose. She knew she seemed a lot younger than them as they check her out with approval. They left Rose alone in the bathroom. She could still hear the club's fast tempo music outside the doors and the talking and partying of lots of people. Rose pulled her hair down the way Livia would have liked it as she nervously examined herself further. Her hair was bumpy from being up in a ponytail, giving it a wild curl; Rose shook it and then fished in her bag for the makeup she usually hated to wear—hated because it was only bought for her so she could make Sean Noble fall in love... not as something Rose wore for herself.

Yet now, on her own,—God, help me—she put mascara and cranberry lipstick on. That should make me look over eighteen, right? She went to leave as she suddenly remembered, Oh, the shoes. She slipped off her loafers and stepped into the five-inch heels. They made Rose feel like a giant. She looked at herself one last time, and tried to appear as confident as her own mom had been. I can do this...

Taking a deep breath, Rose walked out of the bathroom, into the dimly lit club.The club's main room was super crowded. It had a high ceiling that went up almost two stories in length. She saw a DJ elevated on a center platform, surrounded by moving lights with clubbers all around him; the partiers cheered as he digitally spun different tunes in a roped-off area in the middle of the dance floor. The music was so loud Rose felt it thunder through her form as she saw multiple tables and couches past the DJ, all with their own VIP and bottle staff; these special areas were cast in shadows and behind the flashing lights where bodies danced. Rose was usually familiar with staying to the shadows, but when that's where the VIP's were, who clearly were doing naughty things, it wasn't so much her scene.

Laser lights were shooting off red and blue colors over the main bar area. The lasers moving to the music, as so many people piled near the bar and vibrated their hips. Rose took in women servers that looked like the Vegas show girls she'd seen on TV, and muscular, good looking young men that were their male serving counter parts. These people stood out as they carried trays of alcohol away from the bar and into the crowd.

"Hi." One girl eyed Rose up and down with a smile. Rose stopped outside the dance floor not sure what to do, nor seeing Samantha yet, as she made eye contact with whoever was introducing herself. Rose was a little uneasy as she watched the server checkout her outfit and shoes. "Can I get you anything, angel?" she asked.

Rose forced a smile, "I'm fine for now."

"Yeah, you are." The bartender women winked at her and then kept going as males at tables motioned for more alcohol. Rose's heart thundered and she thought, I need to find Samantha and figure out why she is here, and how everything is connected to Brian and his vampire bite, and then leave. Rose hoped seeing that gargoyle statue a few minutes ago really didn't mean a vampire had taken over this place.

She looked for Sean's girlfriend among the shadows and shades of red and blue laser lights. Rose's eyes scanning as people moved around her like she wasn't even there. The crowd seemed 'lit' or under the influence of a great many things. Rose knew she was acting too unsure of everything around her compared to the others; like someone who'd never been to a place like this before. She felt conformable only stepping back near the wall and looking around.

Rose finally spotted Samantha's short pink dress. The dress's big peephole around the cleavage area, and slits meant to show off the skin near her hips, made her look so sexy; and like a totally different person than Rose had seen at school in uniform. Samantha had a drink in her hand as Rose saw her approaching a VIP couch that was up on another platform that had swaying see-through curtains around it; the curtains hung down from the tall ceiling. The section was also surrounded by the kind of fancy railing one would see on a grand staircase. Surrounding this VIP only area, there were even more guards and a lot of extra girls; women that were dancing and drinking on the inside of the railing. Samantha was waved in again to this sinful looking exchange as Rose's eyes widened. Rose took one step forward to see as the music got louder and faster.

"Hey ma'am, you want a drink?" a man asked her this time. "Ah, yeah," Rose said just to blend as she handed the man a twenty and took what looked like Champagne. Such a waste of money. Yet she used it to partially shield her face, as she moved as close as possible so Rose could try and glance through the opening of the curtains. She got into a good spot to see, right next to a group of people dancing. Rose saw someone sitting on a couch in the VIP area with an array of beautiful women sitting around him. He stood as Samantha approached, a red light flashing across his very familiar smile...

Rose froze.

Felix!

She hadn't seen him since he looked more like a boy in the 1500s. Yet Rose knew it was him, he looked the same, and yet manlier, and sexier. Felix appeared now as a young twenty something adult, like how Rose had seen Adamus a few years ago. Livia had called Felix the biggest troublemaker of all her siblings. Being I'm a room with him now was the equivalent of a terrible nightmare to Rose. She prayed this wasn't real and that she would wake up as she watched Felix embrace Samantha not just with a hug... but with a kiss! Rose dropped her champagne glass as her heart, and maximum level of fear within her soul, exploded.

# Chapter Sixteen

#### ROSE

Rose heard the champagne crash, but before anyone else could hear in the noisy place, she was darting away. Rose was backing up into the furthest, darkest part of the room near a couch where a couple in their late twenties were practically climbing over each other, and making out. Rose stood near them as she watched Felix kiss Samantha in front of the other females he'd been sitting next to; the other women near them looked so content and ready to do whatever Felix wanted. God, they are either all high or all his Servs! And Rose was betting the answer was the latter.

Felix pulled Samantha back onto the couch so she was on his lap with him and the others. Rose watched Samantha kiss Felix's light olive and chiseled cheek; like she was kissing gold. Felix had rich dark hair just like Rose remembered so clearly Adamus's hair being. Only Felix wore his hair longer, past his chin with his messy curls spilling all over the place. His chest and arms were also even more muscular that Rose remembered Adamus's being. Felix looked like he could win an Olympic sport, runway model, and then go pillage a village afterward. She had no doubt now that he was also in control of this night club to boot. Without Livia here, one of her siblings could rule all of Washington! Under his clothes,— Felix had stylized himself in a boho chic-ish way but with a wicked edge, — Rose could see he had a full sleeve of tattoos.

That's different. The vampire royals didn't have tattoos in the 1500s.

She watched Samantha kiss the side of his face and then she handed him something. Rose zeroed in on what he took from her. It looked like a flat little plastic square with a metal smaller rectangle on the end of it. Rose wasn't sure what that could be as she watched. Felix move his thumb, to pull Samantha's turtle neck down, so a little skin on that area was exposed. To a clueless human it would look like he wanted to kiss her neck, yet Rose knew better! She spied him blowing some of Samantha's hair that was on that shoulder out of the way, like she was his own personal doll or piece of birthday cake; Samantha moved closer to him then as Rose's heart raced.

Felix bit his fangs right into Samantha next! Rose watched Samantha's body shake and then relax just as the others were all calm around them... all except Rose! To onlookers she knew it just appeared like Felix was kissing the brunette. Yet Rose knew Felix was biting Samantha out in the open, sucking out her blood as the wealthy and stupidly drugged partied on.

As Rose watched, she had two very different instincts running through her ... the weak one wanted to instantly help Sean's girlfriend, even if Rose didn't personally like her. Her foolish instinct wanted to begin fighting the vampire prince! She watched Samantha start to gasp as if his bite was water to a woman in the desert. Rose remembered sickly then how Adamus's feeding off her had felt good. That's why servs fall into the trap of becoming obedient dogs to the vampires and losing their old minds and identities; after being fed on too many times they became addicted. So if Samantha is Felix's serv, and she's giving him something from school... then she is the one, maybe, that could have put that note in Melody's locker!

Rose didn't know this for sure, but the pieces were scarily falling together and putting Rose further into a state of utter shock. This is so much bigger than Sean and me both when it comes to vampires taking whatever they want. Rose had no idea what to do as she watched Felix pull away from Samantha with slightly red stained lips as he slipped the flat plastic square thing she'd brought him into his pocket—Something tells me that's important. Samantha seemed out of it and happily drugged as he bent down and fed from her again neck.

Rose found herself reaching for her phone as people danced in front of her on the dance floor; some blocking her line of sight as she moved to keep staring at Felix and Samantha. Do I call Livia, who said not to contact her right now, and risk bigger danger; such as her killing Sean and I just to cover her tracks.... Or do I call Sean, who will never believe me? Not when it comes to this girl... In fact, me telling him this is going to make him hate me forever. She knew as she went to dial one of their numbers anyway. Right as Rose went to do this, her phone vibrated. She looked down; Sean was calling her right when she was thinking of calling him.

Do I tell him right now? If so, what will he do? How do I protect us and figure out a way to help Samantha, a clueless serv, all at once?

Rose looked back to Felix and Sam as she watched him feel her body up as he drained her. One hand on Samantha's shoulder as he sucked, but about to drift down... as the other gripped her hip hard, like he could snap it. Rose decided then she needed to answer Sean, and tell him everything as they figured out a plan to help his girlfriend. Whatever the other consequences are between him and me, I'll have to deal with it. She pressed 'accept' on her vibrating phone.

But then suddenly the scar on her wrist, where she'd been bitten herself, began to sting. Rose's eyes widened as she felt a sensation she hadn't felt since her thirteenth birthday at the bakery when she and Sean had nearly run into Adamus.

"Hello, Rose?" she heard Sean answer, his voice sounded frustrated and worried, yet Rose tuned it out completely. Not answering as she turned to look around. Her phone was going down to her side and she began to move to the right... toward the front and closest exit. Rose again felt her wrist, and neck scar this time, start to sting even more. Things were going from bad to worse real fast.

Rose turned, no longer even glancing around, just moving to escape through the crowd. She was nearly to the elevator that would lead to the downstairs lobby when—the elevator doors opened and the first male she'd ever really liked nearly five hundred years ago, he entered where Rose was exiting. Adamus, to her horror, had arrived.

* * *

SEAN

Moments before this, Sean had approached the bouncers of Monarchy, knowing he was dressed in his school uniform which made him look like a total idiot to be trying to get into this place. A bouncer held his hand out, stopping Sean abruptly from even stepping onto the building's marble floors. "You're the second child that's tried to get into this place tonight, boy; go home and attempt again in a few years." This chubby man who was a little shorter than Sean laughed and insulted him.

Sean rolled his eyes and then quickly did what his dad would; he pulled out his wallet, going for the three hundred-dollar-bills he always carried and was supposed to be for emergencies only. He handed them to the bouncer as the man's amused smile grew and he looked over Sean's uniform again. Does he know Saint Catherine's equals the next generations of wealth this city has...

Sean tried to look extra tough and relevant as he eyed the bouncer who only seemed at most entertained; like he worked for the biggest tycoons of all. As he and Sean stared at one another, others, dressed up in sexier versions of the outfits Sean's mom and dad wore to charity functions-a lot sexier\- approached. Sean took in a few older guys that were with women who looked at most, twenty-five. One of them, a female who appeared Russian and had the body of an x-rated star, she smiled at Sean. He tried to politely not stare at the high slits on her long dress that went up to her waist; or the dress's front V neck that almost touched down to her navel. Sean tried to hold his cool and not let his mouth drop open; the bouncer's mouth sagged like a dog's. These women smiled at Sean, only like he was nothing but a piece of young candy. They were all allowed to pass as Sean stood obstructed.

As great as that is to look at, Sean thought regarding those braless girls, why in the world is Samantha here? Sean began pondering, alarmed.

"Come back with another grand and a half, and no school uniform kid, then maybe then we can discuss things like men. You get me?" the seedy doorman finally spat. He was taking a shot at how much Sean's family might have trusted him with. Sean bitterly found himself turning and cursing as he headed toward an ATM. His dad had given him a credit card with a five-thousand-dollar limit—not that Sean was ever supposed to come near that price point, ever. In fact, he was expected to call his father first and ask permission for bigger purchases but in this case....— I'll make up something later. I must know why Samantha is being summoned to this club, according to her cell phone messages, right now! Sean got to the nearby ATM and withdrew more cash.

He also found himself dialing Rose's number, realizing he should have called her back over twenty minutes ago. Something within his gut told him he needed to tell her about all this. Yet the world of Rose and Samantha had always been separate until now it seemed... What the hell is happening here? Sean rubbed his hands through his hair nervously and took off his varsity jacket. He was stressed and knew he also needed to find a dress shirt fast so he could enter the club not looking like a seventeen-year-old. Luckily, he was aware that there was a department store down the street.

Sean moved as he looked up at the nearly full moon shining above the club. He had a very bad feeling as he dialed Rose's phone. He heard her answer it, yet she didn't say anything....

"Hello, Rose?" he said as he heard the same music, but louder, that was blasting out of the very nightclub he was trying to get into. "Rose? Where are you?" he stopped and demanded more alarmed, yet she never answered him.

* * *

ROSE

Rose darted away from the front entrance, back into the club. Her vision blurring with panic, her heart rate on fire. She bumped into people that were dancing as she moved back onto the main dance floor. She was trying to hide as he entered. Adamus was moving right past her! He hadn't changed at all since she'd seen him four years ago. He was almost Sean's height at six three. His skin, like his brothers, light olive. His eyes a sexy golden brown that were looking wildly around. Rose was scared he could sense her as she moved further and further back, off to the other side of the club, near the DJ and his groupies.

She watched Adamus as she shook with nervousness. He was still looking around, his eyes covering the area she was in as her feet wanted to run; but then Adamus's eyes continued toward the VIP area and his brother. Rose exhaled as he moved that way, past her. Rose's scars were stinging but not apparently enough for him to sense her on his end... maybe because he was only concentrated on his brother, to her relief. Rose knew vampires could detect those they had bitten when they were near, to some extent, but like Livia had told her years ago... Adamus and the other royal vamps had fed on so many, that they probably regularly sensed people they had sucked from.

She took in his strong yet leaner frame—leaner compared to his super muscular older brother. Adamus also had no visible tattoos. He wore a dark blue shirt with hair that was short and cleanly cut, less edgy than boho Felix. Adamus's face also had a too sexy midnight shadow that made his caramel eyes pop even more so. Women turned to look at Adamus as he walked across the dance floor, denying any drinks servers were offering him as he entered VIP.

Rose watched through the thin swaying curtains, Adamus—the vampire she'd imagined as the ultimate bad guy in the story of her life—his eyes grew wide; his forehead wrinkling and his strong hands forming into fists as he eyed his brother feeding on Sam. Felix looked up at Adamus while he still sucked from Samantha's neck with eyes that seemed like they were evilly smiling. Felix gave off the ultimate predator, and deadly bad boy vibe, even worse than Rose remembered Augustus had.

Felix began gripping Samantha harder, like he might break his beautiful meal for the sheer fun of it. He's going to kill her! Rose knew she needed to do something. Yet Adamus moved first. In a flash of light with the vampire speed and strength Rose remembered from the medieval ages; Adamus grabbed the girl off his brother's lap, pushing her away from Felix and onto the soft couch. He grabbed his brother and in another eye blink, he shoved him against the wall with a loud slam that only Rose's advanced hearing could decipher over the pounding music. Felix looked stronger than his sibling and yet, Adamus held him dominantly by the throat in the corner of the club. None of the VIP members seemed startled by this. They must all be servs.

Rose found herself dangerously walking closer so she could hear even better. She'd missed the first part of Felix's grunted talking as he said now, "What? You want a taste of her instead, brother? Do you smell what there is a hint of in my meal's blood?" Felix asked through a gasped smile with his brother's hands still on his throat. Rose looked to Samantha who sat peacefully and beautifully on the couch, wondering what there could be in her blood. A shade of magic?

No.

"Tell me now what that innocent over there, or any of these servs, have done to humankind to deserve this tricked enslavement from you?" Adamus demanded as his sibling's smiled widened then. Felix went to speak; but instead, in a flash, he moved, pushing away from his brother's grasp and this time shoving Adamus against the same wall. His muscles were flexing and tats were showing as he held Adamus's shoulders in place. Though Felix looked like he had to push harder to hold his bother, than Adamus had appeared when he'd been holding him.

Felix revealed, "The one I was sucking from is a descendant of a witch that used to serve under Merlin. In fact, most of the students at the school she attends are descendants of supernatural delinquents who, hundreds of years ago, tortured humans for centuries," Felix told his brother as Rose's eyes widened.

What? The world as she knew it was changing again. Why would Livia have Sean and I attend Saint Catherine's if that is true? Does that mean the handful of the US politicians who are my classmate's parents... they are all descendants from my old world, and the wizards hidden society of shades and shadows? Rose's mind raced as she assumed none of the students or their parents even knew that. She continued to listen.

"Her school?" Adamus demanded as he seemed to be stunned Samantha was of schooling age. She was dressed like she was older. Disgusted, Adamus spat, "are you preying on high-schoolers now, you pathetic heathen? They can't help what their ancestors might have done any more than we can," Adamus growled as he pushed Felix off him. The brothers faced each other aggressively, shoulder to shoulder.

"But their blood tastes so much better than the pure humans that you taught me to feed from. Don't you remember the days when you pushed aside your conscience and weren't trying to be the meek protector, unlike now?"

Adamus looked sickened as he said, "I was wrong to come here, brother, and warn you that if you don't stop this foolish behavior... our brother Augustus and Livia are discussing with other siblings, chaining you inside your coffin and sinking you to the bottom of the sea. Until our parents wake up again and decide what to do with you."

"Our parents wake up, oh brother?" Felix laughed. "Augustus never plans on waking our parents who would down grade him back to being third in command. Don't you see that he likes being our acting king way too much? I suppose you're also aware that he plans on sealing his reign with your support by offering you his daughter in marriage; that would make you the second in command out of all the siblings, so convenient for you," Felix went on as Rose thought... Augustus, the acting vampire king, he has a daughter? The Royals can have children, making more vampire royals as they mate with each other to torment this earth with? How awful and incestuous.

Rose processed this in disgust even though technically, Sean was a very distant relative and descendant of her own family line she was being made to fall in love with too.

"I have no plans of marrying his daughter, or being the second brother in command, Felix. I left the vampire court a long time ago," Adamus informed his brother sternly as Felix laughed.

"Can any of us escape it, brother? No, not even you who never shows at family events. Instead, you spend all your time and money on building hospitals and going on mission trips to areas where humans have sown generations of poverty and destruction. You help and serve others as they think you are nothing but a powerless human boy, even as they spit on you...much like mankind spit on their own Jewish Messiah."

Felix began circling his brother then. "As an immortal, do you really think you can make up for that hundred-year-period when you suppressed your emotions and taught me to do and take whatever I wanted? As long as we could 'sell it' as the greater good to our siblings? Much like Augustus and Livia sell their own agendas now and say it's all for 'the prosperity of human kind'." Felix laughed again like a grand court jester at he grabbed a drink of alcohol from one of his servs hands and downed it. "It's a joke, really. Us still caring about non-vampires and pretending our siblings are above their own calculating plots. We both know it."

Rose didn't know vampires drank alcohol or could even attempt to get drunk from human substances; back in her time with the religious monks, they didn't openly drink. How things change.

Yet, this talk about Adamus leaving the vampire court and building hospitals and participating on mission trips... That shocked her as well. This can't be what it seems. She told herself as the brothers argued. Adamus can't be a reformed good guy.

Felix said something else that was hard to hear over the music as she dared move even closer.

"Besides, you should have no worries about Augustus drowning me in my coffin, brother; because when I deliver to him soon what I've found... in the form of a bloody prized prisoner that I'll let him suck and drain; he'll be wedding his daughter to me, and not you, in a heartbeat. Then, perhaps, I'll be the new acting vampire king when Augustus finally is forced to enter rest, and still chooses not to wake mommy and daddy. He's too embarrassed for them to rise in this century just to find out that their oldest daughter, father's favorite and most fierce child, our sister Isabel Aurelia, the wizard slayer, was murdered at the hand of the Davises, a family of human warriors..." Felix finished as Rose gasped aloud in the bar.

Isabel Aurelia is dead! A vampire royal can die and not just be put to sleep. Livia had never told Rose that. Rose only knew that lower court vampires that weren't part of the royals' direct family could be killed. Of course, Livia wouldn't tell me this because this changes everything. That also explained to Rose why the Davises where so valuable to the blood suckers. The vampires would of course want revenge and all of the Davises dead. But if Rose and Sean could first break the curse, then maybe the Davises could help them be independent.

Before she could think any more about this game changing news, she watched Felix have another alcoholic drink and then turn to Samantha.

"You can go home, safely," he instructed her, a serv now, "that is once my brother leaves, my beautiful one." Felix sat down next to Samantha on the couch as she and the other girls stared at him, like they yearned for Felix's fix of blood sucking. Adamus still looked so sickened and angry. "Or, if Adamus doesn't exit soon, you can slit your wrist while you follow him around like a sad puppy," Felix told Sam as he smiled and then kissed her neck; his eyes on his brother taunting him as Adamus did turn to leave. He's trying to help Samantha, Rose realized, stunned once again.

Adamus took one step away and then dashed off. All in the blink of an eye, he was suddenly gone. Rose's scar stopped hurting as Samantha smiled then at Adamus's departure. She got up to go; like a satisfied little zombie with her neck still bleeding. Felix got up too, his cocky smile fading now that his brother was gone. He didn't bother to watch his serv walk away safely. Instead he disappeared, moving like a normal human, he stepped into a back room away from everybody.

# Chapter Seventeen

#### SEAN

Sean entered the club in a black button-down shirt which clashed with his school uniform khakis. Best I can do, not that I give a crap what these stoner adults think. He walked inside as people danced and drank. In the past Sean and his teammates had snuck into clubs before, but this place seemed different; the energy everyone was putting out, Sean could hardly describe it. His eyes scanned for Samantha and Rose both. As he looked some guy bumped into him slightly, shoulder hitting shoulder as he moved fast to exit.

"Hey, watch it," Sean snapped at the brunette with olive skin, but when Sean turned to give him a look, no one was there.... Confused, Sean turned back around, he was shocked to spot Samantha right in front of him finally. She didn't make eye contact as she began making her way out of the club. His body was freezing as he took her in. She was wearing makeup that was over the top and a dress that looked amazing on her; but the way she wore it at this moment, for every old and perverted creep to stare at her very exposed form, it gave Sean an uncomfortable feeling. This isn't the Sam I know. He went to reach out and grab her hand, to get her attention. Yet she escaped his grasp without even acknowledging him. Her eyes fell on his form yet there was no recognition as she kept moving.

"Samantha?" he called out loudly over the music. She should have heard and stopped. Instead she moved towards the elevator and he moved with her; he saw she was bleeding through her turtleneck dress. "Sam." He went to grab her again when he figured out that her blood was pooling like... bite marks.

A vampire did this!

He scanned then quickly for Rose, not finding her as Samantha kept moving to leave.

* * *

FELIX

Felix entered the back loft attached to his club where he found a lower court vampire named Kayla feeding on a female bar tender. The bar tender had lost so much blood she was collapsing back onto Felix's couch in the corner as he watched Kayla crawl on top of her, still feeding. The sight of this got Felix excited as he smiled, "I hope you're saving some of that for me," he said to Kayla as he felt his fangs grow out. His hunger heightened since feeding on the student Samantha who had small drops of shaded magic in her blood.

A sufficiently powerful supernatural creature to drain dry would be so delicious right now. Felix reached into his pocket as he approached the girls and that's when he felt... absolutely nothing.

WTF. He realized during his tumble with his brother the 'so righteous Adamus', must have slyly pickpocketed him; taking the floppy disk from Felix while they fought. Good thing I told Samantha to make copies, I'll call her back and kill her when she brings them to me! Felix thought as his entertainment reached new heights. His brother hated innocent blood shed so Felix figured he'd find a way to let him know what his thieving had cost.

* * *

ROSE

Rose was back on the club's rooftop; she stared out to the National Mall's Monument in the distance, trying to clear her mind and know what to do next. Melody... now that I am aware of who the Davises are, her mom is my next stop.

Rose looked down to the crowd. She hadn't seen Samantha exit but figured she must have missed her. There were so many people around in lines outside the Virtual Incubus and other bars, that it was too hard for Rose to make her out. Deciding more than enough time had passed that she was free of Adamus being out there—her scars no longer stinging—Rose turned, looking around to make sure she was unspotted. The coast seemed clear to jump down into the alley she'd first flown up from.

Rose went to the edge of the building and took off her ring, her body painfully transforming into it's monstrous stone form as her wings flapped; breaking her fall as she leaped. She landed and then slipped her jewelry piece back on fast. Rose exited the alley, meshing into the crowd where people were gathered. Twenty steps down towards the met she didn't even plan on taking, and suddenly... her scars began to sting and hurt again!

What, no, I watched Adamus leave the club at least fifteen minutes ago with his super vampire speed, why would he return?

Rose looked around, not seeing him in the crowd. Yet she felt the returning itching and painful feeling in her wrist and neck scars. Rose began to grow dizzy with fear and confusion as she darted, taking a step back towards the Virtual Incubus. It was the fastest place she could think of to get lost in. Her sealed wounds were crying out even more from where the vampire prince had bitten her, almost like he was getting closer as she tried to move away. She turned and her shoulder bumped into someone.

Rose looked up. A tall, good-looking brunette with olive skin turned too like he was only going to look briefly, but then he met her eyes and paused. Adamus! The world froze and faded as they made eye contact. Rose could hardly hide the panic from her face. No. This can't be happening. He seemed like the nicest, most handsome guy in the world.—he's not! Her scars remind her of that—An innocent and curious half smile came to his face while looking down at her. "Oh, hey, sorry." His voice smooth and kind even though she had just bumped into him.

She was literally speechless for a full second, then she mustered, "That's okay." She turned to go quickly, as his words stopped her.

"Do I know you from somewhere?" Adamus dared asked as Rose turned back. "You look so familiar."

Her eyes, which had green contacts in them, met his beautiful golden pair again as her pulse went wild in a frightening way. Yes, almost five hundred years ago, because I saved you my family got cursed.

"No, I'm just visiting DC." If Rose ever needed acting skills, it was now, as she made her face look extremely uninterested in talking to him and clueless all at once.

"Oh nice," his smile only got gentler with her indifferent glare. "Me too, where from? Maybe we know each other from somewhere else?" He spoke with a friendly, North America accent—not the Roman one he'd had years ago in Scotland—. She knew then Adamus, the person she'd imaged for years as her biggest enemy, he was trying to place not just how he might know her, but more importantly, why he was sensing he'd fed from her before.

I can fake this and get him off my tail.

She found herself standing up straighter and trying to be strong as she repeated what Livia had told her to say, should this ever happen. "I don't think so. I'm from Baltimore, and haven't traveled much since I was younger, and went on this terrible cruise-" she tried to make her face look nice and more personal when she revealed, "- maybe we know each other from that? It was called the Oasis Cruise ship?"

Adamus's eyes widened. His mind falsely putting together where she was making him think he knew her from. Livia had told Rose that Adamus and Felix in the past had massacred, scared, and made servs out of almost everyone on the entire Oasis Cruise ship. Something he apparently felt bad about now as horror and regret stuck his face and he took a step back; away from Rose as if by just being near he could hurt her again.

"A no, that doesn't sound familiar." He lied as Rose felt relief and power grow within. He looked so convicted; his handsome face pained as she let herself feel a great triumph in making the boy who'd betrayed her feel sorrowful, even if he is kind of good now. Rose exhaled, a polite smile coming to her face.

"Anyways, sorry, it was nice meeting you though," she turned to go as she heard him say behind her in a low voice,

"I didn't catch your name-"

She turned back then, feeling something like power and finally an upper hand over at least one vampire in this city. He was asking, almost as if he owed her a debt as she informed him, matter-of-factly, "I didn't give it..."

Adamus nodded then, humbly excepting her total rejection. She walked away as she also heard him add under his breath, "Smart move."

* * *

SEAN

Sean walked into his house. "Mom, dad, Chris, Sarah," he called to them. No one was home as Sean inhaled and exhaled in a fury. He'd watched Samantha walk into her house, neck bleeding; yet even as he grabbed her and shouted for Sam to snap out of whatever spell some vampire had cast by feeding on her; she never did.

Once she'd entered her house her mom had been home, so Sean had left, ready to go to his place and arm up and find Rose now that he knew Samantha was safe. Sean went right to his dad's room, to a family chest he kept near his bed that was locked. Fury poured through Sean as he felt like he never had before. He pulled at the lock with his bare hands, and it snapped open. His strength now increased to where Sean knew he didn't know himself anymore.

He opened the chest next, moving an old picture of his dad and his uncle Philip as teens out of the way. That's where Sean saw the crossbow that his uncle had used to kill vampires, before he'd turned to stone. Sean picked the light weapon up; a feeling washing over him as if holding something like this had consequences... He felt Samantha's phone vibrate then. Sean had almost forgotten he still had it as he glanced at her incoming texts and his blood started to boil again. F, whoever this vampire was... he was calling Samantha to him once more after she'd been home for all of twenty minutes.

'Come back and bring another disk!' Sean read.

He wondered if Samantha didn't respond if this F would come to her home. I'll be there to meet him. Sean booked it outside, as he once again tried to call Rose.

* * *

ROSE

Rose took the metro, not willing to transform and travel through DC quickly until Adamus was extremely far away. The whole ride, she found herself looking at her scar. When she got off and moved through people who were pushing and shoving to leave the dirty underground air, only then did she shake herself entirely into reality and remember to pull her phone out.

She had a ton of missed calls from Sean and Jeremy. "Crap." Guilt washed over Rose as she remembered Jeremy had been waiting for her. She also had great uneasiness for what she'd have to tell Sean. Your girlfriend is a serv and a vampire prince has been kissing and feeding off her for at least three days...

Right as she went to dial him first, he called her instead. She pressed answer and said into the phone, "Sean—." Not sure how to begin, he interrupted instead.

"I know everything, Rose."

"What do you mean?" she asked as she imagined his face and something within her stirred.

"I know some vampire with a first name that starts with F has been draining and using Samantha, my girlfriend of six months," he said painfully and angrily like he wanted to make someone pay... "And I know he sent her home, but then called her back, contacting her on her cell and home phone both, because I'm watching her leave again from her house and head to him."

"How can you know all that?" Rose asked confused. Why would Felix summon Samantha back after he'd sent her home in front of Adamus?

"I have her mobile in my hand and I'm receiving every single missed call and text she's getting from this guy. This 'F' mosquito has some zombie like control over Sam and I can't stop her from leaving without knocking her out."

Rose's heart began to beat extra fast as her mind quickly tried to put things together. Adamus went back for something with his vampire speed... maybe for the square thing Samantha gave to Felix that I saw and wish I could have nabbed myself. That's possibly why I bumped into him a second time.

"Sean, I'm on my way to you, don't-" before she could say, do anything stupid, he interrupted.

"Oh, I'm going to let her lead me right to whatever vampire is calling her... in just a few minutes, and then kill it so this stops forever!" Sean screamed so angrily, sounding more like one of Rose's determined and vengeful brothers than he did himself. Then he hung up, and Rose's heart exploded, again.

No! What is he thinking? He doesn't know Felix is a royal.

She broke out into a full-on run. Rose needed to get around the corner, to an alley where she could transform, and risk everything to fly back to Monarchy, fast. Or Sean is going to die.

# Chapter Eighteen

#### SEAN

Sean stood in an alley across from the club; cloaked in darkness. He stared at his shadow, not used to hiding out in the dark. He held a series of thinner wooden stakes that could be lodged into his uncle's specially made crossbow. Sean had one already set up in the weapon, ready to be fired.

Whoever this vampire is, as long as he's not a royal, I'm going to make him bleed; just as my uncle killed many vampires before me. And if whoever Sean was after was a royal, Sean knew he was screwed. It's not like I can just sit back and let someone prey on the weak like this... prey on Samantha.

He'd never done anything this crazy, but he'd also never felt this physically strong before. I'm turning more and more into a gargoyle. By twenty-one, how strong will I be if I live through the curse? After only one week he hardly felt like his old self anymore. I know I'm more hyped up than usual but there is no going back now.

He couldn't self-evaluate anymore as he watched a man walk out of Monarchy and meet Samantha outside. This guy was muscular, and dressed less like an adult, but more casually than Sean would have imagined, with long hair and tattoos. He also looked super strong, but Sean knew he was bigger than him, height and weight wise. I also have a crossbow loaded with stakes. Sean waited.

I can't just shoot someone that might be human. I have to know for sure and see that he's the vampire.

But it didn't take Sean long to figure things out as he watched this man greet his girlfriend. The male pulled her to him like some dominating psychopath. Samantha looked smaller and more fragile than ever as the vamp pulled a section of her turtle neck down and that's where Sean saw her bloody bite marks out in the open.

I'm going to kill you! Sean thought as a dangerous energy came out of his chest. He stepped out, expecting to shoot from afar—but the blood sucker one moment appeared to be kissing Samantha out in the open, on the Monarchy sidewalk; the next the two of them were suddenly in the very alley Sam was in! This vamp could move in the blink of an eye it seemed. Samantha was being pushed into a wall extra hard as Sean stepped forward then, and fired.

Time seemed to stand still for Sean. Samantha was looking up at the vamp plainly; void of all her smart intelligence and emotion she used to have. The blood sucker went to bite her as Sean's stake sailed through the air and hit the vampire right in the back. The stake entered into the guy's flesh as he gasped, surprised, and fell back.

Sean blinked in shock at what he'd done. He went to move and get Samantha, but the vampire he'd staked didn't bleed and then turn to dust like Sean had been told was supposed to happen. Instead this 'F' let out a gasp, laughing in shock and then, looking up at Sean who was trying to pull Samantha away.

"Who the hell are you-?" the vampire—who now that Sean could really see his face, looked way too much like a masculine and handsome version Livia—said. He pulled the stake right out of himself like it wasn't that big of a deal and added, "And nice shot, human, who's about to die very painfully." The male got up then, stretching like this was just another random night, and then approached Sean.

Sean saw red... in the upper corner of his own eyes, just for a moment. Not sure if this was because he was about to face death, or for another reason... He looked away from the vampire and up, towards the crimson shade; that's when he saw Rose! After he ended their phone conversation, she must have flown there or jumped from roof top to roof top to get to him, he figured; there was no other explanation as the two of them; a couple betrothed to be, eyed each other.

He had no idea how long Rose had been standing on the roof top above him. Had she seen him shoot this vampire in the back? Rose crouched down in her human form, watching in horror like she was trying to figure out what to do. She looked more afraid to Sean than the day she'd awoken from stone and found out this was a different century; and her family was trapped in a state of torture that had been meant for the vamps. Rose seemed more frightened than ever like they both might die even as she crouched as if ready to attack. She was a supernatural creature who was stronger than three or four human men combined.

As Sean took her in and realized just how fierce and beautiful she was, she began to stand again for some reason; like Rose might jump down feet first, to his and Samantha's rescue. Sean stared at her long red dress that was blowing in the wind and reminded him of his dreams where they'd been kissing. Only this was real life and he could see Rose was about to take off her ring, and appear as she really was, a gargoyle, rising... into trouble!

Her body began to change and transform, as Samantha glanced up and saw her out of the corner of her eye! His girlfriend began to scream and alert the blood sucker. Sean was sure all hell was about to break loose, for all of them.

# Chapter Nineteen

End of When Gargoyles Rise, book one of the Shades and Shadows Series.

Click here to order Book 2.

Also, click here to checkout WHEN GARGOYLES REIGN, a prequel to the series.

'When Gargoyles Reign' tells the adventure of Merlin and how a twisted romance helped lead to the reign of the gargoyles.

Don't forget to turn to Chapter Twenty to look at the Shades and Shadows family trees and character guides.

# Chapter Twenty

E-BOOK EXTRAS

The Shades and Shadows family trees and character guides.

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Also By

Ashley C. Harris

SHADES AND SHADOWS: GARGOYLES RISE

(Prequel)When Gargoyles Reign

(1)When Gargoyles Rise

(2) When Gargoyles Choose

(3) When Gargoyles Drown

(4) When Gargoyles Soar

(5) When Gargoyles Ascend

(6)When Gargoyles Breakthrough

(7) When Gargoyles Cry Victory

SHADES AND SHADOWS: SLAYER NEXT DOOR

(1)The Slayer Next Door

(2) The Slayer Awakens

THE TROLL SERIES

(1)Troll

(2)Troll Cries

(Stand-alone) Troll Whispers

(3)Troll Games

(4) Troll Rise

THE SHOCK ME SERIES

(1) Shock Me

(2) Sparks

(3)Collide

(3.5) New Divide

(4) Ignite

(5) Power

THE ONE NIGHT IN SERIES

(1)One Night In Heated Snapshots

(2)One Night In Close Exposure

THE LINES NOVELLAS SERIES

Lines Part 1

Lines Part 2

Lines Part 3

Special Thanks from the Author:

A very special THANK YOU to my precious God, Yahweh (Jesus), who stops me from growing faint when things seem impossible. To all my readers, because of you guys and lots of prayers, When Gargoyles Rise hit #1 on the Amazon Best Sellers list for YA Paranormal & Urban Fantasy categories while it was still on pre-order! You all are amazing in every way, don't let anyone ever tell you different.

To my sister and graphic design artist, Amber Razzouk, who took time to create this novel's stunning cover, and every cover for the series since then. The Shades and Shadows novels wouldn't be where they are today without her. To graphic design artist, Jennifer Munswami, for making the incredible Shades and Shadows family trees.

A very special thanks to my parents and friends who constantly have to listen to me talk about my stories and my nerdy love for all things Biblical and sci-fi.

You are all wonderful, and I thank you.

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