"You took so much of my blood when you stabbed me in the heart with your dagger." Vladstin said, his hands going under Prince Leron's clothes and reaching for his chest, near his sternum. "Right about here. Do you remember it? I remember it well. In fact, that was the only memory that is clear to my mind. Death has taken away most memories, especially the joyful ones, and left me with that cold, autumn day."
Prince Leron could not speak, frozen in fear and aghast to even resist Vladstin's touch.
"Blind Poker. I'm the Blind and you're the Poker. I wore a satin blindfold, laid in bed shirtless, and I had to guess where you would poke me." Vladstin giggled, a pretentious, coquettish giggle that could only be fake. "Haha, what a naughty game we were playing."
"I'm sorry..." Prince Leron mumbled between his breath, tears starting to fall.
"Why are you apologizing? The game was fun. I enjoyed it." Vladstin said. "I successfully guessed all three locations. It was a really fun game but the prize.... not so much."
"I'm sorry... I'm sorry... Let me go..." Prince Leron repeated weakly.
Vladstin did not listen to this pleading. "Who would have guessed that the price of such a harmless, sensual game would be my own life and lives of my whole kingdom? I was so emersed on your scent and sensing you that I barely felt the thunderous shaking from your kingdom's troops, marching to destroy us once and for all. Wiping out Crescentia from the map and hoarding all our riches."
"I haven't seen my father and my mother's death. I died alone, half-naked and blindfolded, a dagger stuck on my chest. But I was still alive when I felt the heat rising as you burned the palace. I thought I was in hell."
He laughed hysterically, holding his head back.
"I thought I was in hell! Or maybe it wasn't the burning palace, maybe I really was in hell! Because who could explain how I woke up again in the midst of destruction, my heart no longer beating yet I'm still moving?" He asked rhetorically. "Ah, but what did I do to deserve hell? All I ever did is love and cherish my people, my family.... you."
He let go of Prince Leron. Prince Leron immediately made a run for it, but within a second Vladstin was already in front of him, and grabbed his neck with one hand. With inhuman strength, he lifted Prince Leron to his feet and slammed him to the wall.
"I missed you." He said, this time holding a sense of sincerity. "I don't want to, but I do. When I saw you again during the procession, I thought my heart would beat again. It's like a spark of life temporarily came to my lifeless body just by the sight of you."
He tightened his grip, choking Prince Leron with a serene expression. "But then I remembered that night when you left me for dead, and that spark of life disappeared. I am now just an empty shell, full of anger and hatred for you."
"Ack... Vlad...stin....Stop..."
"I am your reckoning. I will kill you and your cunning father who 'exiled' you and sent you to our kingdom as a spy." Vladstin said. "I will destroy your whole kingdom just as you destroyed mine. And I will drink every single drop of your blood."
He let go of Leron's neck, the newly crowned prince falling to the ground like a rag doll, coughing and catching his breath. When Vladstin was strangling him, he could feel his windpipe slowly getting crushed. If Vladstin exerted more force, it really would break. And he knows Vladstin is strong enough to do that.
He could die on Vladstin's hands anytime the undead, vengeful prince wishes.
"Cough... Vladstin, I'm so, so sorry. I regret everything I did. Please have mercy on me..." The lofty Prince Leron cried and pleaded, hugging the former Prince Vladstin's thigh. "I didn't want to do it... I shouldn't have done it.... I'm sorry."
"Yet you did it anyway. I heard your laughter through the halls when you left." Prince Vladstin lifted his chin up. "Don't lie about something you thoroughly enjoyed."
"I didn't... please..." Streak after streak of tear fell from his eyes.
"You look so adorable when you cry." Vladstin clasped both sides of his face. "Have I told you that? You look like a poor baby bunny, I just want to eat you up!"
"No... please..." Prince Leron scrambled backward when Prince Vladstin slowly knelt beside him.
"Don't worry, I'm not gonna eat you." He clasped the scared prince's shoulder. "I'm just gonna bite. May I?"
Before Prince Leron could protest, he bared his fangs and sunk them to the prince's neck.
"Ahhhh!!!!" Prince Leron howled in pain.
He bit harder and sucked the gushing red liquid from the prince's smooth and delicate skin, relishing it. The wet noises and the prince's shouts filled the room. Everyone below was busy frolicking and reveling at the ball, conversing with each other, and dancing. None of them could hear the shouts from the upper personal turret of the crowned prince.
For a whole minute, Vladstin drank his fill of Prince Leron's decadent, sweet blood. It tastes sweeter than anything he has ever tasted, his dead insides begging for more. Prince Leron felt his whole body weakening and his voice becoming hoarse as he was losing a huge amount of blood. He began to feel lightheaded, eyes drooping from the immense pain he had just experienced.
He was dying, and there was nothing he could do about it. He might as well accept his fate.
...But Vladstin let him go, licking at the wound before pushing him away. He landed on the floor with a thud.
"Did you think I was going to suck you dry?" He chuckled. "No, this is just the beginning, my dear. I can't have you going to the afterlife without seeing the gradual ruins of your kingdom first." He nuzzled Prince Leron's bloody neck, twirling the prince's raven black locks. "Look at you, all helpless and bloodied. Oh, you got some on your cheek."
He licked the blood on Prince Leron's plump white cheek, and the prince shivered from the sensation of this monster's cold tongue.
"Do you feel better now? The first person I bit said he felt a sense of euphoria after I bit him. It must have felt as good to me as it did to you." He said.
"Vladstin... let me go." So Prince Leron says, but his hand moved to embrace the vampire prince closer.
"Hahaha, you're actually embracing me! It must have felt really good, your body is betraying your own words." Vladstin laughed, cold air emitting from his dead lungs. "Do you want me to continue biting you? I really wanted to as well. Your blood is the best I have ever tasted. It is the true best wine in Ilvedia."
Prince Vladstin took him in his arms and carried him to the bed. Prince Leron's dazed eyes remained unfocused and he clung onto Prince Vladstin tightly. The vampire prince set him down and patted his head. "Sleep well, my dear prince."
"Where are you going....?" He mumbled, barely staying conscious.
"Don't fret, I will be back. That I promise you." He grinned, flashing his bloody teeth. He went out to the balcony again...
And an arrow whizzed into the air towards him!
The vampire prince quickly caught it before it struck him. The tip grazed his cheek, and he reached out his tongue to lick his own oozing blood. It was much livelier and red than it was before, possibly because he had just drunk Prince Leron's.
Prince Leron watch him turn to a certain direction, talking to nobody. He raised his fist to his mouth to laughed hysterically. He spoke to someone Prince Leron could not see.
"You finally caught up with me, Hunter."
The vampire prince stood atop the balcony railing and spread out his arms. A wave of arrows came towards him from all directions, but he let himself free fall to the ground....
And he disappeared into the night.
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