"I don't see why you have to retell a story I already know. Everyone knows what happened when the monsters came!" he muttered, throwing a glance at the ceiling.

"Italy, Monaco, Albania, Algeria, and the other surrounding countries were destroyed, and all we have left are districts!"

"And what about the monsters?" Violet pressed, refusing to let it go, worried that if she didn't stamp it into her brother's seventeen-year-old brain, he'd continue to discard it like what happened was nothing.

"We tried to fight them with weapons and guns, but they had just as much if not more. Worse, we couldn't tell them apart from normal humans. Presidents were wiped out, and nations were—"

"Red eyes and gold! Don't forget that if you see—"

"Stop nagging me, Violet! The civil war destroyed the monsters. There's no one walking around with red or gold eyes. It's just a rumor to scare people from leaving their houses after curfew!"

"That's really what you think?" Violet asked him, genuinely concerned the longer she spoke to that brother of hers. Her eyes flickered to Sarah, who seemed to finally glance away from the book she had been reading by the dim candlelight that illuminated the room they shared.

"…Leave him, Violet!" Sarah, her younger sister, grumbled from where she sat, the cover of her book wrapped carefully with enough dirty newspapers for Violet to know the book was just as nasty.

"All we can do is pray that he meets one without being eaten or better still turned into one!"

"Sarah! It's you who'll be eaten, not me!" Oliver snapped from his bed, turning his full attention towards Sarah.

"Eaten?" her voice soft as she slammed the book in her hands closed. "Honestly, I'd rather prefer to be turned!" she began to gush, her eyes visibly excited.

"Eighteen is the perfect age for eternal immortality, don't you think? The Manic Lords are definitely Monsters. They've ruled for so long, yet have you seen how young they—"

But Violet was already leaping off her chair towards Sarah, slamming her mouth shut with her hands, an aghast expression on her face.

"Are—are you mad? District Lords! They are called District Lords! You'll have our heads hanging on the street!" Violet snapped at her in a low whisper, satisfied to see her sister's face pale ever so slightly in a way that showed she understood the possibility.

"Relax, Violet! We live in a low thatched house near a river! We're surrounded by more rats than humans! We're fine!"

"It's the truth, isn't it!" Sarah scoffed with a shrug of her shoulders, her confidence renewed. "District Lord Cain is cruel. There are always bodies hanging from the mansion he lives in, and he eats them. All that howling in the night...every night, he's nothing but a beast!"

Sarah grumbled aloud just before she stared out the window with a dreamy look on her face.

"I just want to meet a powerful vampire who—" but she was still speaking when she was suddenly interrupted by a book flying at her.

Oliver grinning as he watched her barely manage to duck just in time before it slammed into her face. "Stop dreaming! Have you seen your face?"

"You're plain. Your hair is brown, and your face is unflattering," he continued, even as Sarah continued to swell in anger.

"At least Violet has the weird color of her eyes going for her and her dark hair. Her body is skinny but not too—"

But he didn't get to finish as Sarah leaped off her bed, flinging her whole body at him.

Violet was still considering whether to intervene when a loud thump echoed through the house, like someone was trying to break down the door.

It was followed by a familiar drunken shout that sent a shiver through Violet's spine, not surprised to see Oliver and Sarah freeze in place at the same time. Fear drawn on every inch of their faces.

"WHERE THE HELL IS EVERYONE!" a deep loud sound thundered through the house, just before the sound of the front door being slammed shut echoed through the house.

"GET DOWN HERE! IF I HAVE TO FIND YOU…" Violet heard Luke, her father, swear as she hurried downstairs.

"Luke—" June, her mother, began to speak just before she was struck to the ground.

The putrid stench of alcohol and vomit filled the air in varying proportions.

"WHERE IS THE MONEY!"

"WHERE IS IT!!!" he began to yell, and Violet simply tightened her fists together, knowing what was to come, even as she held her tongue and continued watching him turn upside down the little things they had.

Rummaging through drawers and under the bed. Even inside buckets of water and under damp clothes with such intensity one would think he had kept them there, and it had simply been stolen.

In anger, his heavy footsteps turned back towards June, who was yet to rise from the floor, pulling her up with the collar of her gown and screaming in her face.

"THE MONEY! THE MONEY YOU EARNED TODAY, WHERE IS IT!!" he screamed into her face, spittle flying everywhere, but he didn't seem to care. His grip on her clothes was tighter, his hands tense in a way that showed he could hardly wait to grip her neck and cause her pain.

"What we earned, mother used…" she began, only to pause for a second before she continued, "I—I used it to buy—"

But Violet didn't get to finish before a heavy palm slammed into her cheek hard enough for her to taste blood.

She staggered back, raising her gaze to stare into her father's blood-tinged eyes as he glowered at her in anger.

"YO-YOU!" he stammered in rage. "HOW DARE YOU!" he yelled, his hands trembling as he began to pull his hair, muttering aloud to himself.

"They—they're coming for me! They'll kill me! I can't—I can't!" he crazily mumbled to himself as he tore at the roots of his hair.