TWO

DOMINIC POV

Its been 3 days, I ended up getting the clan doctor to have a look at yesterday as she didn't seem to be getting any better. I knew that rogue had take some of her blood, I just didn't realise exactly how much. The doc put her on a drip and said she was actually very close to death. I could give her my blood but the doc and I don't know what that will do to her, so I just have to wait and let the drip do its work.

I've have done a lot of reading these past few days, there is a few references towards mates in the very old books but nothing concrete. I wish I could talk to my parents about it as they were mates. From what I've found there is more about mates in the werewolf history then in the vampire history, a wolf can smell their mate and tell from little electric sparks that results from them touching. A vampire on the other hand takes a little longer, the mate must thaw their frozen heart before the mate bond will take affect. See a lot of vampires don't have the patience to work on thawing the heart to know if they really are soulmates, so most vampires just take lovers.. No not lovers because unless the heart is thawed there is no love, so it is just the sharing of mutual pleasure.

I have been doing most of my work these last few days from the desk in my bedroom, I get this small pain in the area where my heart is every time I even think of leaving the sleeping beauty on my bed. Unfortunately I have no choice to but to leave her tomorrow as I have king duties to perform, one of the clans is having problems with increased vampire rogues and another clan near them is having trouble negotiating a land expansion. Hopefully it will only take a day or two to take care of.

"Nix, Seb, Meet me in my office 5 minutes." Yes we can mind-link but only within a certain radius with the clan bond but if you exchange blood you can be a bit further away from each other and with being king I can do even more.

"Yes Sir!"

I need someone I trust to watch over her while I'm away, so I make my way to my office. I got there as they did.

"Your Highness!" Phoenix and Sebastian bow and say as they meet up with me at the door.

"Come in, I have something I need to discuss with you two."

"Yes Sir"

"This isn't formal, this is personal." I say as I close the door behind my friends.

"Dom? Are you okay?" Phoenix asks now that he knows that this is not an official meeting.

"Yes and no..."

"Is this about that woman you saved and bought home the other night?" Sebastian asks

"Yes!"

"Why did you save her? She is just another human, they are expendable!" Phoenix states

"I didn't save her Caleb did. And she is not just another human.." Caleb pushes his way to the front hissing

"Woo!... Easy man I ment no disrespect." Phoenix puts his hands up in surrender

"I need someone to keep an eye on the woman, she's not awake you but that don't mean she wont wake up while I'm away. I will need to take Theodore with me on this business and one of you, I need the other one to stay. I don't care which one you can decide that between yourselves, Caleb just needs to know that she will be kept safe while he is not here."

"Okay! Dom! Question?"

"Yeah"

"Who is she and what is she to Caleb?"

"That now is a really good question, and one I can't answer because Caleb wont tell me. He just keeps telling me we need her and that a lot of good will come out of having her around, and then he just hums."

"Hums?? Vampires don't hum especially Caleb..."

"I know its weird, I guess we will find out in time. Yous are dismissed, whichever one of you is coming with me, we leave at dawn."

Yes we can go out in the sun, it can cause a little damage if we stay out in the open too long but we wont burst into flames and die, we are made for the night but some business and travel needs to be done during the day.

"Nix, Seb, make sure the servants have food ready to serve when she wakes."

"Yes Sir!"

I stay in my office and do some prep work for tomorrow, then make my way back to my room, back to her.

SERAPHINA POV

I can only see darkness and I am finding it very hard to open my eyes, its like there is tape across them. I give up on that for a few minutes and just listen. I don't hear anything, its too quiet, that's when I try to again open my eyes because the place my room is in is never this quiet. I manage to open my eyes this time, they are still heavy but I need to know where I am, not knowing can be a death sentence. I sit up with a jolt and grab my head, I look around I'm on a king size bed with black silk sheets and a really fluffy blanket. The room itself is really large and decorated in golds and blacks. Once I see that I am in no immediate danger I take a look at myself and check on Lilith, I'm a little pale, my neck is a little sore and I seem to have an IV in my arm but other then that I don't seem to have any injuries. I pull the IV out and try to contact Lilith, "Lilith? Are you okay? Can you tell me what happened?"

"I'm here Sera, but I'm very weak, we lost too much blood too quickly and I couldn't help. I'm sorry"

"Lilith, its fine, its not your fault, its mine for going out in the first place." I sigh and continue I think we have spent too long in the city, its time to head to the woods or a forest for a while.

"We need to stay.."

"Lilith? Why? Lilith?" she doesn't answer, she did say and sounded very weak. I guess I will have to wait and see what she is not telling me.

I throw the blanket off of me, get out of the bed and stretch a little but have to grab the side of the bed as a dizzy spell takes over me. Once its past I slowly make my way round the room, I find a closet full of male clothes, suits, shirts, jeans, shoes, and draws of underwear. I come out of the closet and try the next door, this one turns out to be the bathroom. Its huge and it continues with the black and gold theme. I feel all grubby, its been a few days since I had a shower of any kind and that was before the attack, I don't know how long its been since the attack. I shut the bathroom door and turn on the shower. The shower feels so good, nice hot water, its been a couple of years since I've actually had a hot shower, most of the places I get to stay in are lucky to have running water let alone hot running water.

The only shampoo and body wash I could find was a males one, but that didn't bother me, again I haven't had the privilege of that for a while as well, sometime I can get some small samples when I can sneak into a motel/hotel and borrow the toiletries. It smelled heavenly, it reminds me of the mystery guy that saved me the night of the attack. I shiver in fear as I remember that night, remember the vampire sinking his fangs into my neck, how quickly I felt weak and vulnerable. I really wish now that I knew how to fight or even just protect myself.

I rinse off all the soap and shampoo and get out of the shower, I wrap a fluffy towel around me that smells like that guy again. I look in the mirror to have a look at my neck and gasp. It is a dark black, blue, purple and yellow bruise with two punchers in the middle. I sigh and think typical, trouble always finds me.

I grab my clothes and re-enter the bedroom looking for my backpack, which I find sitting in a chair in the corner. I pulled out my clean clothes and shoved my dirty ones in, I'll find somewhere to wash them later. I use the towel and dry my hair as much as I can, my brush broke the day of the attack so I went back into the bathroom to see if I could find a spare in one of the cupboards. I did right in the back, I found one still in its packaging. I opened it and used it, pulling my hair back into a messy bun and using some of the string I still had left to secure it in place. I guess I could have looked for a proper hair tie in the cupboard like I did with the brush but I have already used too much and I will find it hard to pay this mystery guy back, its bad enough I owe him my life.

I look around the room again and see one more door, I'm guessing that door goes to the outside well at least to a hallway. I grab my backpack and try the handle and it opens, so I pull slowly hoping not to make any noise. I stick my head out just a little, I look, listen and take a deep breath checking to see if there is anyone around. The hallway seems to be empty but if this is a place for vampires then there is no guarantee that I would know that they are there anyway, especially since Lilith is so weak at the moment, so she can't lend me any of her abilities.

I quietly make my way down the hallway hoping that I will come across a way to exit this place. I find some stairs leading down and slowly follow them keeping my attention focused on everything around me. I get to the bottom of the stairs before I hear someone, its a girls voice and its vaguely familiar. I move silently to the door and listen.

"Sebastian! Where is Dominic?" the female voice said

"He's away on business, he will be back at the end of the week, hopefully." this Sebastian says in return, with a little sigh

"So why didn't you go with him? Doesn't he normally take all of you with him on business?"

"Yeah that's what normally happens but this time Dominic asked me to keep an eye on someone."

"But I don't need looking after anymore..."

"Not you!"

"Then who?"

"Sorry I can't tell you until he says its okay to do so."

"But Bass."

"Nope! Not getting on his bad side, been there once not going there again."

"Aw... He's not that bad."

"Maybe not to you, you are his sister, his family, I'm not."

I go to move away from the door and find the one that leads outside to freedom, unfortunately my luck had to run out at some point and it was at that point that the floor beneath my bare feet creaked just a little, 'Shit!' I curse under my breath.