Erinna was woken up by soft lips trailing gentle kisses on her jaw. She struggled between her dream state and consciousness.

His kisses were arousing such passion and hunger in her that she could not describe it but no matter how she tried, she could not coordinate her limbs enough to move. Her body was too lethargic from sleep. Even thinking itself seemed laborious.

"Wake up, sweetheart."

He always called her angel and the new endearment sent tingles to her toes. Her eyes flattered open just as Vlad dipped his head and captured her lips in his.

It was like coming home, like the first the first sip of water after years in a desert. Erinna's eyes moistened and she felt the tears spill down from her eyes as her whole body and soul opened up to receive him.

He had caught her at a vulnerable moment where everything was laid bare and she could not deny how she felt inside. Vlad held her tighter as her body shook in his arms.

She kissed him deeper, the hunger in her demanding to be sated. It was only when she could not breath that Vlad let her go.

"Are you okay?" He asked, concern in his eyes.

No, she was not okay. Something fundamental that she could not describe had happened within her.

"I don't know," she shook her head.

She had expected Vlad to be rejoicing at this. He had always wanted her to yield to him and it didn't get much worse than crying from being kissed. She turned her face away, humiliation burning in her cheeks but she could not escape Vlad for his body was right above hers.

He gripped her chin and forced her to face him again. Her eyes were moist abd still sparkling from tears she didn't want him to see.

"It's like that for me everyday."

The words shocked her and she looked at him in a new light.

Could it be possible that he felt what she had felt when she had woken up to his kisses, everyday? If it was, then she did not know how he survived.

She had felt so unworthy as she found herself part of something so beautiful and so extraordinary that words could bot even begin to described. She had found herself awestruck and humbled at the same time.

How could such a connection to someone exist? But it did because before her thoughts had taken over, Vlad had been her and she had been him.

"Vlad, what is this?"

Her lips were dry and she found herself so frightened because whatever this bond they had was, it was far above them. It was beyond what nature or even the converse would conjure and Erinna did not want to know where it would leave them when all the chips fell down.

"This is us."

She didn't know what to say because at some visceral level she knew she needed this but her conscious mind was in the way.

"We don't have to talk about it now. I'm going away tonight, we can discuss it when I return."

"Going away. Where to?"

She tampered down the panic rising within her. She did know what understanding she had come to but she suddenly didn't want to be parted from him. It didn't make sense since the previous night, she had been shouting at him and threatening to kill him.

"One of my provinces has been requesting my presence for a long time. Not to mention I need to do a headcount of the warriors who would be available should the wolves force me to start an open war," he explained.

"Can I come?" She asked, telling herself that was because she wanted to see the world not because she actually didn't want to be separated from him.

"It's not safe."

"When are you leaving?"

"Right now. I think I'll be gone for three days at the most. That's the most I'm allowed anyway. If I spend more than three days away from my hometown, I'll start to desiccate."

"So it's true? That myth about your kind having to sleep in your birth town?"

"More or less."

"So my stories are not as stupid as you made them sound," she smirked triumphantly, now feeling safer in familiar territory.

"Believe me, they are. But I need to leave soon if I'm going to come back in time. Let me get Alexander to pack my clothes."

"Do you know how much you abuse that man?"

"It's his job," he said bluntly.

"He is your second in command and you treat him like your valet," she said disapprovingly.

"So? He's multipurpose. Besides, I cannot just have anyone in my chambers."

"And then you go on and deny that you trust him," Erinna smiled.

"I don't, now get dressed. I'm going to call him."

"Let him rest, I'll pack your clothes."

"Erinna," he began.

"I thought you were working on a schedule?"

Vlad laughed but allowed her to bully him.

Erinna went through his clothes trying to choose which ones to pack. There was not much choice anyway since all his clothes came in the black he so seemed to favour. She was humming a song and sfting through the closet when suddenly, a strong force knocked her back and transported her to a different place.

She found herself in a forest with the same woman who had been haunting her dreams for weeks, beckoning to her. She followed, hoping this time the woman would actually tell her whatever it was she needed to tell her mate before the vision ended.

The same voice as before chanted : Tell Vlad.... Tell Vlad... Tell Vlad

As before, the exotic looking woman who seemed foreign yet familiar to her, led Erinna to a clearing. The woman stopped there and motioned for Erinna to follow a small path that led from the clearing.

Unsure but wanting an answer, Erinna went on the path, looking carefully around her hoping this wasn't a trap. She had to remind herself it was a vision and none of this was really happening.

Yet.

The path led her to a ...tomb?

Getting inside, Erinna was kind of apprehensive about the dark but she didn't need to worry, a beam of light illuminated the centre of the room where a coffin was placed on a stone pedestal.

Walking slowly, her heart beating at what she'd discover, Erinna approached the coffin. What she saw inside left her sick and pale.

How could this be?

Inside the coffin lay none other than Count Dracula himself. His face was paler than usual and his skin shrivelled, tinged with blood. She gasped but as she went to touch him, the vision ended and she fell to the floor, unconscious.

When she awoke, she was in bed, Vlad sitting in the chair beside their bed, legs apart and forearms resting on powerful thighs.

"What happened?" She asked, still feeling hazy.

"I found you unconscious. Vision?"

She nodded and he sucked in a breath.

"I don't like these visions, things could have been very different if you had been standing on the balcony instead of in the closet," he frowned.

"It was different this time, really intense. You remember the woman I told you has been trying to give me a message to pass to you?" She asked.

Vlad nodded.

"She finally showed me." She trembled as she said the words.

"What did she show you?"

"You. In a coffin. Dead."

"Well that is going to happen, old news." He said, standing up.

His nonchalance bothered Erinna.

"How can you be so calm about this?"

"I've known about my coming death for two thousand years Erinna, that is an awful lot of time to get used to it."

"I won't do it, I'd never kill you."

"Maybe not willingly, but prophecy is prophecy."

"Not if I break the curse."

"Erinna I don't mind dying; all I asked the spirits was that for one moment you look at me like you didn't hate me and I have been granted that. That's all I ever wanted, I can't ask for more than that. Whatever is coming for me, it's nothing I don't deserve it. I made my life choices and when the time comes, I will answer for them."

"Not by your life, Vlad. Its not right."

"I have lived by the sword, do you think I'll shy away when it is time to die by it?"

Panic gripped Erinna. How could he be so accepting of his own death like that? She couldn't lose, not when she had just come to realize how precious what they had was.

"No, I know you are no coward but how can you have so little faith in me. How can you even think that I'd do that to you? Or any person for that matter."

"You? No, I know you'd never do it. But there are powers, forces beyond you and I. We choose our own fortune but we are born to our fate."

"Each man is the master of his destiny."

"And I ruined mine years ago, can't you see that, angel? The things I've done, there is no coming back from them. Believe me, you won't be doing me a disservice in killing me. You'll be putting me out of my misery."

He stood up and went back into the bathroom to change. Erinna couldn't stop the tears that fell down her cheeks. For the first time, she had gotten a glimpse at the man behind all the srlf-loathing, the cruelty and ruthlessness.

Vlad was tired.

Four thousand years were a long time to live for someone who carried the amount of pain and suffering that he did. It even was worse for someone who knew that not only had he caused pain and death to others but would continue doing so until the end of the world.

The darkness that followed her lover was so great that she did not know if all her good will would be able to chase it away. The very hell hounds had them in their grip and as long as he was alive, he would be doing their bidding.

Everyday was not only a struggle of living with his past but of the knowledge of how much havoc he would continue to wreck on the living. Demons and nightmares terrorized and governed his existence.

From the beginning, nature had taught him it was kill or be killed and with him now at the top of that food chain, it was hard for him to remember that once upon a time he had also been weak. It was hard for him to keep in touch with that side that made them humanoids.

But no matter what he thought, his reward would not be death. It couldn't be, she wouldn't allow it.

When Vlad came back he packed his clothes and then turned to say good bye. Tears were still falling down her cheeks but when Erinna adressed him, it was with the grace and composure of a queen.

She ignored the turbulence inside her that made her want to give in to hysterics. Nothing would be achieved by breaking down.

"I don't want you to leave, not like this."

"Nothing is going to happen to me."

"I know that-"

She clamped her mouth shut as her teeth began chattering with emotion. She had been so close to begging him to stay.

Vlad came to where she was sitting in the bed and took her face in his hands.

"I'll be fine, alright?"

She nodded, tears still falling. Vlad closed his eyes, a pained expression on his face.

"Anything but that, don't cry please," he begged, lips landing soft kisses on her cheeks.

"You will come back?"

He nodded.

"Take care please," she asked, unable to fight the feeling that something really bad, something that would rock both their worlds was going to happen.

To control her impending hysteria, Erinna sealed her lips to his and kissed him. In that one kiss, the elf princess communicated all her emotions, her fears and insecurities to her lover.

They were both so lost in the moment when Vlad suddenly pushed her away from him.

"What the hell was that? How did you that?"

She was still reeling from the kiss and didn't know what he was talking about. Her thoughts were all scattered and muddled and she wouldn't have been able to form a coherent thought or gather herself enough to answer him had she tried.

"What?" She asked in confusion.

"The image you sent to me damn it! That was my sister," he said between gritted teeth, gripping her arm and pulling her back to him, further confusing her and making her wonder about the stability of his mind.

What image? What sister?

"Vlad you're confusing me and you're hurting me," she told him.

He looked at his fingers digging into her arm as if he hadn't known they were there. He immediately let go and turned away, running his hands through his dark locks.

"What's going on?" She asked, standing up from the bed and going to stand behind him but not touching him.

He looked so aggravated, like a caged animal desperate to be freed.

He didn't reply.

"Vlad you're scaring me."

He looked at her, eyes burning with rage but immediately softening when they landed on her.

He sighed, shook his head and stalked to his bedroom cupboard and rummaged through the drawers, coming out with a single paper. He handed it to her.

Erinna took it, not knowing what to expect. She gaped at the painting, it was the woman from her dream; the soft accurate strokes bringing out every detail of her exquisite face.

She looked at the painting again and then at him. It was then that she really began to make out the resemblances.

"This is your sister?"

"Yes."

"But---she's the woman from my dream. She was the one trying to send you a message. What does this mean?"

"I don't know Erinna. But this changes a lot of things. I have to go."

"Vlad wait---," she began but he was already gone.

She was more confused now more than ever. Vlad had told her about his wife who had been raped to death by his father but he had never mentioned a sister.

Who was she and how did she fit in all this and what was she trying to tell them? That their union was doomed? But they already knew that.

Deciding no answers were going to come while she was seated there, Erinna stood up and went to the bathroom. After bathing and dressing, she knocked on the bedroom doors and told the guard there to get her Alexander but apparently he was not there and would return the following day.

Erinna spent most of the night with Shadow, thinking about what had happened before Vlad left and where it left them. When the sun began peaking in the horizon, she went back inside, took a bath and slept.

Three hours later, she was scrambling up from her bed, bile rising in her throat. She got to the bathroom just in time to empty the contents of her stomach. She vomited until it felt like she was hurling out her very innards.

When she was done, she slid to the floor, forehead beaded with sweat, knees trembling and hands clutching her pounding heart. Her whole body was shivering and her head was filled with images of things she'd rather not have seen but no matter what she did, there was no way to unsee them or scrub them off her mind.

She was just going to have to live with the fact that her mate was a psychopath. A true madman.

***********

When sundown finally arrived, Erinna was more determined than ever to see Miya and was glad when Alexander sought her out just as she finished dressing.

"My, don't you look a sight!" He exclaimed.

Erinna knew her eyes were covered in dark circles from her restless sleep but had not expected such a dramatic reaction.

"Hello to you too, Alexander."

"Are you alright? Is everything fine? I heard you were looking for me yesterday."

Erinna did not wish to divulge the subject of her nightmares until she was sure what they were but she needed answers concerning what had happened with Vlad before he had left.

"Everything is fine. Do you think you can take me to Miya?"

"What's going on Tiger? Is something wrong?"

"Yes. I mean no, I just-I need to ask some things."

He did not look convinced but nodded and they led her out of the castle, taking a shortcut to Miya's house.

The witch answered the door looking sleepy and wearing a very revealing nightgown.

"Good lord Miya, get dressed!" Alexander exclaimed, turning away fast but not before Erinna saw him blush. It was a little cute.

"You're coming to my house vampire and you now want to tell me what to do?"

"Sorry for disturbing you Miya, I just really needed to ask something," Erinna apologized.

"Of course, get in honey," she said to Erinna then turned to Alexander, "You are not invited in since you want to be all bossy," she said and slammed the door in his face.

Erinna laughed and waited for Miya to show her in.

Miya led her to her library and used a spell to light the fire in the fireplace and gave Erinna tea as they sat in the layback chairs there.

"I see something is really bothering you."

Where to start? A lot of things had happened that she needed answers to. But perhaps the beginning was better.

"I have been having the same vision for weeks now. Only yesterday did I get the whole message, right before Vlad left. But I do not understand any of it."

She went on to explain the dream, Dracula's reaction and the connection with his sister.

"Do you have any idea how the curse and his sister are connected Miya?"

"There are two things that my son doesn't talk about: Aurora and his curse."

"So you don't know?"

Miya shook her head.

"I really don't know what to do. But I would never kill him Miya, you know that right?"

The image of Vlad lying in a coffin looking lifeless was still etched on her mind and she needed someone to believe she could not be capable of such inelf cruelty.

"We don't choose our paths child."

It annoyed Erinna that Miya, just like Vlad was not willing to fight for his life.

"I don't care, I will not do it. I will break Vlad's curse."

Even if it was the last thing she did.

"I've looked for the reversing spell myself for thousands of years but have found nothing."

"Well there are two of us now. Together we can do it."

Miya looked at her for a while, then her lips tipped up at the edges.

"You're the best thing that has ever happened to him."

Erinna did not share that logic and she dropped her head to hide her face behind the curtain of her hair. All her presence seemed to bring to Vlad's life was curses and more activated curses.

"Will you help me? He said I cannot cast spells since I am not a witch. But once I find the spell that can counter Diana's curse or reverse it, I will need someone who is able to perform spells," she told Miya.

Miya looked at her sadly.

"I couldn't, even if I wanted."

"What do you mean? I thought you wanted to help him?" Erinna asked, her voice not shielding the betrayal she felt.

As long as Vlad was cursed to die by her hand, there was no future for them.

"Only a White Witch can cast the spell. I'm a Grey Witch, we're the only ones who are left, together with the Black Witches. Diana wiped out her whole race to ensure no one would be able to undo what she had done."

Erinna didn't know it was possible to feel that much hatred against a dead person. What she felt for Ingrid paled in comparison to what she felt for Diana. Even dead, the woman was controlling them, toying with their lives and obliterating whatever hope Vlad and her had for the future.

"Erinna," Miya said gently, putting a hand on Erinna's thigh. She belatedly realised she had zoned out.

She came back to the present to find Miya's water glass shattered and the windows of the room they were in cracked.

"Did- did I do that?"

"Don't worry about it, when your mate comes here, he does worse," Miya reassured her.

"I'm sorry, I had no idea."

It was Dracula with a temper not her. Her father would be ashamed at what she was turning out to be. Calm and composure was an Elven princess' best weapon. A clear mind could be achieved by remaining calm when everything around one was falling apart.

"It's fine, really."

Erinna sighed, weariness eating at her bones.