Three: Rayne

After two weeks of staying in the hospital bed, I was allowed to leave. I didn't know at first where I was going to be transferred to, but I later found out that I was going to be staying at the castle instead of the hospital ward. I had been staying at the castle for three weeks and things were going well. It was like life finally decided to give me a break that was terribly needed.

I did not know if I should be happy or sad, because I was finally receiving some good treatment; however, I had a feeling that the relaxation I was living in was not going to last for long. I had a feeling that things were going to turn into a big chaos. This would never last. Once my secret was out, I was going to be thrown into the hurricane again.

I had been doing my best lately, attempting to hide the truth that I held inside of me. If somebody found out my secret, I might end up getting killed in the most merciless way because, in the eyes of the vampires and witches, I was nothing but pure evil walking on earth. Death would be my fate one way or another. I was tired of living in fear. I just wanted peace. Was that too much to ask for?

I still remember the tough childhood I had because of something I did not choose to obtain. In books, what I had was classified as a gift, but in real life, it was nothing but a curse. Books were hypocrites; they called what I had a gift, yet they warned all creatures of my kind, describing me in a way that depicted me as nothing but a nuclear bomb. My childhood consisted of hiding and running away, always being afraid of getting caught. If only I could just get rid of that curse that had turned my life into nothing but a living hell...

My parents and I lived most of our lives hiding, moving a lot between the neutral territories between empires, doing our best to avoid getting caught. Until one night, James found us coincidentally and he discovered my gift, so he killed my parents and took me, not even giving me the chance to say goodbye. I spent a year at his empire being tortured in every cruel way.

Not a lot of people knew why vampire healers couldn’t heal a human, but I knew because I had been healed by a vampire before. When I was a two-year-old little girl, my family and I used to live normally in an empire that my parents refused to tell me its name. I fell sick, just like many kids, but the emperor of that empire, who was a healer, sympathized with me because according to what my parents told me, he loved me so much as if I was a child of his own. He healed me, but then he told my parents that they needed to run away, so he would not get in trouble and they did, being grateful for curing their only daughter and breaking the law for her sake. They never understood why he wanted that until they discovered that when he healed me, his blood made me resistant to any vampire's power; I was armor or a cover, whatever it shall be named. In that case, names were never important; the outcome was the main focus.

According to legends and books, I was a forbidden creature, I shall not walk on earth because I might cause an imbalance in the whole world. Witches would kill me if they found out that I existed. If many people like me existed, witches thought that we would cause a great threat to vampires. Witches wouldn't want any harm to happen to vampires because, although they were the judges of the world, they sometimes sided with them over werewolves; our judges were biased. Werewolves liked to live with their own kind, they did not want anyone to be involved in their lives or maybe they were never offered the chance.

I heard a knock on the door of my new room which made me sit up in bed as I was lying down. "Come in," I said a bit loudly.

Olivia opened the door and walked inside with a smile on her face. She was really beautiful, any girl would be jealous of her beauty. Her long wavy hair fell perfectly down her back, passing her waist. Her blue eyes had a natural glow. Her face seemed to be sculpted by a Greek god. She was flawless.

"Hey...would you like to go for a walk with me?" she asked me. She was so kind and generous with me, making me feel bad for lying to her. I wanted to tell her about my true identity because I felt that I could trust her, but something inside of me made me stop. I couldn't risk it.

"I would love to." I smiled at her and got out of bed. Luckily, friendships between humans and vampires were somehow acceptable, but not preferable, so none of us would fall in trouble if we hung out together.

We both left my room and we went downstairs. We made our way to the big garden in the castle and we walked for a while there. The weather was nice. It was neither cold nor hot. I loved the cool breeze that pushed my hair here and there. It was relaxing and comforting.

"Can I ask you something? By the way, should I call you ma'am or by your last name or what? After all, I'm a human who will sooner or later be slaved, and well... You're a vampire," I spoke a bit nervously. If I was not wrong, Olivia was somebody of great importance here. I noticed that whenever she was spotted, she was addressed with the title ‘lady’ or ‘ma’am’.

"Oh, please don't say that. It makes me feel like I'm a beast. Just call me Olivia," she quickly said. Beast? She wasn’t like that at all. She was kind and lovely.

"Why does it make you feel like that?" I wondered, looked at her. She smiled sadly and looked down for a few seconds.

"I wish I could tell you... but I might fall into trouble." She sighed heavily and I nodded my head. Even vampires were restricted at some points. Maybe they were never allowed to criticize their kind.

"I understand," I assured her, not wanting her to feel uncomfortable in the slightest way.

"So, what did you want to ask about?" she asked me, trying to look cheerful again.

"How do vampires walk in the sun?" I questioned.

"Some vampires are day walkers, others have to wear something that has a Ruby stone in it to protect themselves from the sun," she explained to me.

"Is day walking considered a gift?" I asked her and she shook her head.

"It's more like a characteristic," she told me.

"Are you a daywalker?"

"No, I'm wearing a Ruby stone bracelet, but Adrian is," she said, raising her arm to show me the bracelet.

"He is lucky," I commented.

"Lucky because he is a daywalker? What will you say if you knew that he has five gifts?" She smirked making me gasp in surprise.

"Five gifts!? Is that even possible?" I exclaimed and she nodded, slightly laughing at my reaction.

"Nobody thought it was possible, but since Adrian was created, it became possible. He is one of a kind though," she said as we both sat down on the grass. Indeed, he was.

"Is it allowed for a human to know the power of the vampire?" I wondered.

"Of course, I can read memories and I can see spirits. As for Adrian, he can go invisible, read minds, heal other vampires, mimic powers and he also has telepathy power," she informed me.

"What's the point of having a healing power if vampires can already heal on their own and they're not allowed to heal humans?" I shrugged. It was a question that had always roamed my mind, just like how I drove their curiosity.

"Vampires can heal on their own when it comes to wounds, but vampires can also get sick. We have our terminal illnesses like humans have cancer and other deadly diseases," she explained to me. I had learned a lot of things about vampires from Olivia and their world turned out to be quite interesting. It only added to my previous knowledge that I acquired from books.

"You know that I can't read your memories," Olivia said, startling me. It was a topic I wanted to change as fast as possible.

"Maybe I don't have any memories." I lied, trying to make it sound as believable as possible.

"We all have memories, are you amnesiac?" she asked me.

"I don't know, but maybe when James tortured me, it affected my memory. I can't remember anything before my torture days." I lied again.

"I'm so sorry about that," she said, rubbing my back for comfort. She was so nice to me and I hated lying to her, but I had no choice. If my secret was out, I'd be dead.