edited

|Adara De Clare|

The Prince looks at me confused because he hasn't looked at the TV yet. I point to the TV and with creased eyebrows, he looks at it. His confused face twists even further into something more deadly. Anger.

He carefully puts the bowl of spaghetti and the juice onto the coffee table. He looks at me. I look at him. I wait for him to answer me. He doesn't. Is that why he's been doing all these nice things to me? Because all the rumors are true and he doesn't want me to think of myself as an idiot for believing him?

That's funny because I do. I feel like an idiot. He played me like a violin. Perfectly, hitting every single note. I fed right into his little trap and I can't believe that I was so gullible to trust him. He made himself seem so trustworthy, not like how others see him and it's laughable. It's just like that interview he had with that woman, Nancy Winthorp.

He said things that made everyone believe he was a loving guy and nothing like who they thought him to be. Instead, he is. He is who they think he is: A liar, and he cares for nothing. So he carried me to that paradise in the woods to try and gain my trust. He even told me his name, which did make me trust him immensely. Everything he's been acting like towards me was just a lie.

He sees the disbelief and the irritation on my face. His face contorts to anger, and he stands up.

"You think it's true?" He asks me, his voice low. I grind my teeth together.

I stand also, "Of course I do! How could you expect me not to?" I ask him, and he balls his fists.

"I am not lying!" He shouts at me, getting in my face, and I back away, holding my head down.

Tears build up in my eyes. I hate being yelled at. I backed away from him even further. My feet move backward until I trip and fall onto the couch. I keep my head down, biting my lip.

What does he expect me to do? Or to think? I'm going off of hearsay right now. It was more believable when it was only Justina, but now there's another one. It makes two. It's less believable now. How could he expect me to blindly believe him? I barely know him.

He only started acting nicer to me on Saturday, which was barely a week ago.

His eyes widen, and he sits beside me on the couch. He puts his hands on his lap and he looks at me with regret swirling in his eyes.

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to shout at you. I just need you to know that I'm not lying." He tells me, his voice soft, and I nod.

I don't want to say anything else. I doubt he will understand it. I don't know the truth. I'm sure he does, but whether he's lying to me or not is something I need to figure out. He says we're dating but in truth, we aren't. We haven't even gone on a real date. All those dinners that we went to were just for show. In case being in that paradise in the woods was a date then it would only be one date.

Besides, I still don't trust him fully. I need to know the truth. I can't fully believe him, nor those girls until I know for sure who is telling the truth.

"I'm sorry, Adara. I don't know what else to do or say to make you know that I'm telling the truth." He confesses.

My eyes slowly look up at him. I nibble on my lip and I place my hand on his. He looks at me immediately. Surprise is evident on his face. His brown eyes look at mine.

"I know that you don't believe me, I know that it'll take hard core proof for you to believe me, and that's what I intend to do, but I need your help, Adara. I can't prove it to you unless you help me." He holds my hands.

My cold hands begin warming up in his grasp. How? I have no idea. He's a vampire, they're supposed to be cold but they aren't. It's warm. So warm that they're warming up my usually cold hands.

He's right. The only way he can prove to me that he's telling the truth is to do just that. To prove it.

"I'll help you," I told him.

Besides, I was going to do that anyway. I still have that History project to do with Justina.

He looks at me slightly surprised as if he didn't believe that I would've helped him. Hah! Well, I do continuously surprise myself. I never thought that I'd be helping the Vampire Prince of ArchDale prove pregnancy allegations false.

It has been such a weird semester. It just started and so much has already happened.

I'm so tired, this whole thing is so laughable.

"So, what are you going to do now?" He asks me as I change the channel.

I sigh. I don't know. What am I going to do right now? I mean, it's 1:53 a.m. right now. I should go back to sleep and get enough sleep for school tomorrow but I don't know. I'm stressed. School has completely stressed me out.

That History and Art project has broken me. Especially History. I don't know why Mr. Rick has decided to break us with that. He could've just given us something easy to complete. Not this hard thing.

Justina and I have chosen Nikolai's family along with those from the Perlsea Kingdom, to make a presentation on. I'm doing the Prince's family and she's doing the other one.

"How did your grandfather die?" I ask him and he looks at me weird.

"Why?" He asks.

"You know that History project I'm doing with Justina?" I say and he nods.

"It's about choosing two Royal families of vampire lineage and mapping their families throughout a few generations," I tell him and his eyes widen.

"My family has only gone through five generations." He tells me and I nod.

Really? Only five? His family is the oldest family there is and he only has five generations? Goodness, just how old is he?

"Anyways, what happened in the time of your grandfather? I can't seem to find anything before that." I tell him and he leans back on the couch, putting his hand over the couch.

"Well, in that time there was evil. Nothing but evil. My grandfather was like the head of it. He ordered nothing but death and yeah you get the point, he was a very evil and horrible man."

I snicker a little, "Like grandfather like grandson."

The Prince glares at me and I put my hands up in surrender. "Yeah, I get it, he wanted nothing but chaos and dictatorship. What about his forefathers?" I ask him.

"Well, there's this curse that seems to follow our family. My grandfather killed his father and his father killed his father and so on." He tells me and my eyebrows raise, in sheer surprise.

"Woah, wait, did your father. . .?" I ask him.

He hesitates, "Yes."

I swallow. The King killed his father. I never saw that coming. He seemed like such a good man. I never thought that he'd kill someone. Less his father. I mean, how horrible was he?

He was tyrannical, a dictator and he enjoyed killing people.

Right. Still, the King seems so good. Like he preaches peace and prosperity, I would've never guessed that.

The Prince—er—Nikolai sees the stress and sheer surprise on my face. Not to mention the confusion.

"My grandfather killed my mother. My father stopped him." He tells me and my eyes nearly pop out of their sockets.

"Oh my God! I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to—" He cuts me off.

"Why are you apologizing, Adara? I notice you do that a lot. You haven't done anything wrong. You don't do anything wrong. So why do you apologize so much?" He asks me and I bite my lip, fiddling with my fingers.

"Umm, I don't know. I guess I just do." I lie.

"You're lying." He tells me without missing a beat.

My eyes widen and I begin feeling self-conscious. "I. . .I." I stutter.

"Whatever the reason that made you like this. You don't have to apologize if you did nothing wrong." He tells me and I nod.

I keep my eyes trained on the floor. I can't let him know. No one does. How am I even supposed to keep it from him anyway? He can read my mind. He wouldn't do that though, would he?

I hesitantly look up at him to see him looking concerned at me. He analyzes me. He then looks at the clock and his eyes widen a little.

"I'm sorry, I forgot. It's 2:15. You have school tomorrow. I seem to always forget that humans need their sleep." He tells me, standing and he puts his hands in his pockets.

"It's okay," I mumble.

"Come on." He tells me, offering me his hand and I take it, standing.

The second I got up, it felt like I got thrown into a wall and my entire body went into shock. I fell limp for a second and Nikolai catches me and carries me in his arms.

"Have you been sleeping well?" He asks me and I bite my lip, thinking about it.

I shake my head.

"Goodness, Adara, you should. You could've fainted from exhaustion." He tells me.

"I'm sorry." I apologize and he looks at me sternly.

"Sorry." I catch myself and I laugh a little.

He carries me upstairs into my room and lays me on my bed. He brings the blanket over my body and I curl into it.

He turns to leave but I call him.

"Yes?" He turns around.

"Could you stay here until I fall asleep? I'm scared." I admit in a small voice and he walks closer, sitting on my bed, playing with my hair.

"Sure." He says and I reach my arm up to his and I pull it down.

I yawn, "Here." I tell him, patting the empty side of the bed.

"Adara, I can't." He tells me, hesitating.

"Please?" I ask him and he sighs.

Just then I feel his hand leave my head and the bed rises from the absence of his weight.

Did he leave? Maybe it was too much to ask.

Just then, I feel something wiggling underneath the covers and I jump up, moving away from it. I move the covers from around the wiggling and just then, I see a tiny ball of white and orange fluff poke its head out from the covers.

Is that a cat? No, that's a cub. That's a baby tiger. . .I think.

What is that?

I look at it closer and it tilts its head at me. Its brown eyes shining, boring into mine.

'Why are you looking at me like that?'

I yelp.

"Nikolai?" I ask and the cat-tiger-thing, begins panting and it comes closer to me. I'm frightened when it jumps on my lap, goes around in circles, and licks my hand.

Oh my gosh, it's him.

"How are you. . .this? What are you?" I ask him, confused and a little terrified.

Oh, who am I kidding? I'm very scared.

'I can shape shift into our families' spirit animal. Mine is a Flaix. It's a mythical creature that looks like a tiger and a panther.'

He rubs his head against my hand and I flinch. He backs away. He holds his head down and he sits on my thighs. I lift my hand and I rub his head. He purrs. He comes closer to me and I rub his fur.

Which is very comfortable.

He leaps off my lap and he goes around in circles, before lying down on my bed, closing his eyes, and going to sleep.

"I thought vampires didn't need sleep," I say.

We don't but it's nice to sleep.

"Oh." I yawn and I lie right beside him. I bring the blanket up to my neck and he gets up, walking on his four paws toward me.

In protest, he kicks the blanket and wiggles underneath it. He cuddles right where my chest is, and my eyes widen when I feel his little head nearly touching my breasts.

My eyes shut down. Being the most comfortable I've ever been with a Flaix, I immediately fall asleep, hearing the sweet purrs lulling me into my dreams.

-