The horses' hooves thumped powerfully on the dirt road leading into the village as we rode in. Apart from the sound of their horses' hoof beats, my men trailed in silently after me, with me in front as the apparent leader. I had tried to persuade myself to assume an air of excitement but the not so subtle indifference that usually graced my mood was adamant on being portrayed instead.

The guards at the control posts in front of the entrance to the village were absent minded but looked wary and looked up as we approached, their faces quickly morphing into nervous ones. This was probably the most interesting thing that they had come across all day. I had not sent word ahead that I was coming. I preferred to keep the element of surprise in this case. Something didn't feel right in this place and I felt like with the additional aspect of surprise, if the people had something to hide, they would be less prepared with alternate stories.

"Stop right there!" One of the guards shouted, coming to stand in the middle of the road, cocking his head to the side and assuming an air of importance. He clearly didn't know who I was. A small sadistic smirk crept upon my lips.

"Who are you? Why are you here?" The man asked in that same haughty tone. Being a toll guard was probably a big deal in this place and the man saw this like an opportunity to bring his position into play. The horse of one of my men neighed and it's hooves stamped further just stopping by the side of my horse. My man sneered at the local toll guard, looking very irritable and spoke.

"Do you have any idea who you are talking to you lowly mortal?" The man spat, agitated, his horse pacing few steps in the dust, agitated as well. The guard laughed and called to his comrade. They pointed at us and laughed.

"Look Fitz. We have some very important people coming into the village. Bring out the red carpets lets roll for them." He mocked and they bellowed out laughter. I felt my man get agitated, one of my other men let out a mean chuckle behind me. I kept smirking. The toll guard then looked up at my man upon his horse.

"Who do you think you are? The Lord of the Southern Regions? And his fancy posse of henchmen? For all we know you are probably robbers and stole those off some unfortunate Lord and his guards." The guard pointed at my man and they laughed again. My fangs ached, begging to be released, begging to show this man just who he was dealing with but the man was a lowly human guard in a village off to the side and he was not worth my time. Plus, I knew my man was going to react. The guard had annoyed one of my most short tempered men.

As predicted, my man jumped down from his horse in one swift movement and with his added supernatural speed, he was at the guard's side, resulting in the guard being suspended in the air with my man's hand on his throat, pressing, crushing the airway supply. The man thrashed and tried screaming while his comrade, finally realising that we weren't bandits like they had thought went ashen white in the face and tried to run away.

One of my other men was quick to get down from his horse and catch the other guard mid flight. The guard being suspended in the air was already blue face, choking and sputtering on air. Mild excitement flicked through me but it was gone a few seconds later. Pity.

"That...." My man started, cocking his head at me so that the suffocating man could see me clearly

".....is Lord Kyryaan, your Lord and if you were smarter you would have figured it out early. You are beneath the dirt underneath his shoes and you will forever remember that." My man spat and threw the man on the ground with enough force that I heard a bone crack sickeningly but my man was not satisfied. Sharp fangs flashed in the dusk light as my man approached the chocking guard trying to get air into his lungs. The other guard was shouting, screaming apologies and begging while my man held him back. My smirk disappeared.

Just as my man was about to pounce on the guard, I spoke up, truly bored of the situation already.

"Curmael stand down." I commanded firmly, holding on to the reins of my horse. My man turned to look at me, eyes red, fangs protruded, looking angry and blood thirsty.

"Don't kill him. But teach him a lesson." I said coldly and the other guard started screaming again. They had heard the tales. Sometimes, when the elite soldiers of theSouth handled you, you would beg for death. Most of those skills had been learnt from my brother's men in the North while others were purely southern and borderline barbaric. I knew my man would suck the man's blood to an inch of his life and maybe break a few bones. The man would not be dead but my men would be pacified.

"Let him go." I commanded my other man to leave the other guard. Turning my head, I and the rest of my men rode into the village, past the toll points with the echoes of the guards screaming behind us. I threw two gold coins into the toll collector's small house for good measure and moved on.

There were few people in the streets, and they all looked up with interest as we rode through the streets. I was sure in a while, most of the village would be buzzing with news of I and my men's presence. My lips pursed and I rode on, feeling my body creak painfully from two days of riding. I was tired, I needed blood but worse of all, I was bored. Incredibly bored.

Coming in search of the Ragna coven had not been planned for but from all recent indications, it was a necessity.

As we rode further in, I tried my hardest to summon a feeling, any feeling but I was sorely disappointed in myself but the moody setting wasn't particularly stimulating. I gave up easily.

I knew my way around the village. Magic was very strong here. I felt it. Generations upon generations of old magic and spells deeply rooted into the land. It was in the air, it was in the wind, it was everywhere. This could easily be the magic capital of the south if I was thinking about it that way. A few things had changed of course, slight modifications from had been twenty three years ago when I had last been here but covens were very similar to vampires. They adjusted mildly to changing times but their traditions, beliefs were deeply rooted and ancient and rarely ever changed. Almost the same as infrastructure and behaviour.

When I had last been here, Lyra had been the head witch as her ancestors had been. This was the first time another bloodline was in charge and with magic folk dying, I wasn't sure I could put off meeting this new leader myself. Something just felt too off and my gut was rarely ever wrong.

The sky deepened to a very dark orange with a surrounding dark hue indicating the coming of darkness just as we reached a very old and large house. The largest in the village. Where the head of the coven and few coven members usually resided. It was a cute but eerie looking house, wards of magic, generations old reached out to me, rolling over my skin like a cold hand. It reminded me of my now dead father, El Diavolul. He had been one of the greatest and most evil warlocks of all time, caused by his own hands too. The only people that almost had the same power as him were my mother and Aunt Amora but that was a story for another time.

The village or rather, little town was an assortment of mud streets, thatched roofs, carefully carved stone cottages and small houses. Compared to them, this house was slightly different. Of course it had the same telltale stone build but it was larger, had a gravelled road leading up to it and it was larger than all the others.

A tall, lanky man stood in front of the house as we rode up, no doubt already alerted of my presence. I felt myself start to smirk again as we reached him.

"Lord Kyryaan. Welcome. We weren't expecting you." The man greeted.