Page 100 of Guardian

It was an insult in itself because he used it every time I did something wrong. He’d say it with such venom that I couldn’t stand it.

He was the one who’d given me the scars that I ignored underneath my clothes. My patches of fur hid them when I transformed. It was as if they had a mind of their own. I couldn’t stand seeing them.

He’d always blamed me for my mom’s death. I didn’t even know her. She was a ghost he only ever focused on. Which was why I tore him to shreds, starting with his mouth.

My dad was nothing but a disgrace that blamed me for what he caused and deserved.

The second, third, and so on were a range of different faces. They all shared my dad’s eyes, my triggers. I’d never met them, but I still reveled in their screams. All of them were vampires, and I had bathed in their blood after their cries weren’t enough. I’d done to them what I wished I could have done over and over to my dad.

Which was why they continued being thrown in— all for entertainment.

The latest I killed were the guardians that flooded the ballroom. I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t enjoyed tearing them limb by limb. It hadn’t been enough. There was more I had wanted to do. More I had expected to have happened. But everything had finished in a breeze, and it didn’t fulfill me the way I had wanted it to.

That’s why I had searched for the one prey that could do more than satisfy me.

I had killed all of them because I had become stronger. Because each time, I needed more to ease my hunger. I had always made the choice to never escape. To accept the control as it caved in. Because I needed to prove to myself what I was meant to be.

A monster.

Do you see where it all stemmed from?

Us.Always.

* * *

A heaviness lifted from my body as my eyes sprung open. I darted onto my feet, but my head throbbed, and the little energy I had gained vanished. My body stumbled onto a wall, failing at keeping my balance. Within a second, I crashed onto the floor.

“Take your time to collect yourself. The heaviest of sedatives tend to have the worst effects.”

The husky voice drew out a small accent in their words. But there wasn’t a person around me. Only darkness blocked my eyes from seeing anything.

Then, my stomach churned, and a rapid-fire rasped against my throat as liquid escaped my lips. It felt never-ending as a pain ached from within my bones to above my skin. Even as the burn drifted and my sight slowly returned, I stayed still against the ground.

“Or you could do that.”

I whipped my head toward the voice. Tears formed against my burning eyes, a woman lying on an all-white bed staring at me— as if she was waiting for me to notice her.

She was slender, with bones outlining her clothes, her deep-brown skin ashen underneath the bright lights. Her broad nostrils flared as she kept her focus on me, her dark, cedar eyes matched the short fuzz that grew on her head. It seemed familiar.

But I couldn’t tell how.

My mind raced with fragments of memories, but they were all a compilation that muddled together. Metal clinked against the air as a weight held my wrists, cuffs binding my hands together. My instincts rushed but quickly dimmed as there was no sense of energy left in my body. Fuck. What left me like this?

“You can’t get out of those. Trust me, I’ve tried.” She brought her arms to the light, scars decorating her wrists. “And before you start screaming, that won’t work either. I’ve done everything possible, and I’m still stuck here.”

“Who are you?”

A grin hinted against her face, showing a gap between her front teeth as she responded, “I could ask you the same thing. But my name is Jabari Mubarak, the first of the Mubarak name. I’m a Regal Vampire, and my father holds a place in the Vampire Ministry— or should I say, did. The world probably thinks we’re all dead.”

Mubarak. . . I had heard the name before, but from where? The name floated in my mind along a voice that forced the hairs on my nape to rise. The more I focused on it, the more it forced the headache that hinted.

“I’m. . .” What was I supposed to say? My name was at the tip of my tongue, but nothing formed.

“Don’t worry,” she said. “When we’ve been drowned in sedatives, it tends to affect our memories.”

“Why do you say that as if it’s a good thing?”

“I like to forget everything that's happened here, but that never lasts. All the anger and frustration flushes back into my system once the sedatives waver,” she said in a low tone. “Once you get your memories back, you’ll want to forget everything, too. So, cherish it while it lasts.”

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