When Blood Runs Cold - Chapter 275

“Oh no, no no,” he says, holding up his hands with a desperate shake of her head. Giving another look through the screen of darkness, he screws up his face, making an unfathomable expression. “You want me to turn her? Soren, she has already been bitten! It would just kill her!” he exclaims, wiping a loose strand of dark hair away from his scarred eye. But the sharpness in those red eyes tells me enough about refusal. Alas, it would seem he needs a bit of… swaying.

“She could become very useful to us, you know. We could deploy her as our lookout, or our spy. You know just as well as I do that allies are valuable assets to us,” I remind him, playing with a coil of dark smoking magic between my fingers. With a visible concern, Fangorn watches it as little shapes take form and snap at the air around us: the manifestations of my stress.

I really need to drink.

“Given that most of the Folk have taken to choosing which one of us they perceive to be the strongest, or simply staying entirely neutral, we could use her help for recruiting too. She might even be of service in the crystal palace.”

“If she lives,” Fangorn buts in, cutting me off with an angry swipe of his hand. Then realising what he has done, he takes a step back, taking a few calming breaths as he straightens his collar. He coughs.

“Apologies, my Lord. But adding another type of venom in the mix will be detrimental, Soren, they will work against each other. Moreover her body might reject my blood, just like Serena’s,” he explains lowly under his breath, as if I hadn’t heard this a million times over. I know very well what he is trying to do- like every good negotiator, he is trying to play on my existing fears of the situation, to amplify them and sway me into a more agreeable state. But I have not been called the Scarlet King for nothing.

“Fangorn,” I growl lowly, giving him a firm look. “I am aware of your concerns, but I am going to need you to trust me here.”

Naturally, Fangorn hesitates for a moment. Of course, I do not blame him in his assumptions.

Every vampire knows the rules of turning: give your victim enough of your blood and enough venom and you will create the perfect vampire. To do otherwise is a criminal offense, because it would lead to the formation of these creatures, these halflings, which is punishable by execution in the higher up vampire kingdoms.

But one might presume such a dilemma is an easy fix, that all it would take is another vampire to give their blood and venom to the victim to provide enough for a fully fledged vampire to be created. But it is never so simple, which is what makes the creation of halflings all the more dangerous.

After the original vampire has bitten their victim and subsequently given them their blood, the host begins to reject all other forms of sustenance, blood, venom, anything that might hinder the process of the original vampire’s work. Only the original vampire should be able to complete the transformation of their victim, because they are the only ones with the matching blood and venom to do so.

If any other creature, vampire or otherwise, tries to offer them blood, it will be promptly rejected, often via vomiting, or simply causing the body to attack itself in order to remove the foreign body from its system. Often, most times this will end in temporary incapacitation, or perhaps even death in the worst of cases. It is not a pretty sight, but either way the result is always the same. By royal authority, such halflings must  be exterminated. So too must be their creators.

But this time, I have an idea. A lose, insane, but perhaps workable idea.

“Look, Fangorn,” I explain, drawing him aside with another glance to the girl, who has begun to rock herself in her seat, chanting still. Across from me, Fangorn purses his lips, pushing his hair out of his scarred face. He still doesn’t trust me.

“With all due respect my Lord, you better make this quick, she is on the brink of insanity over there.”

I nod once.

“Right,” I affirm, wringing out my hands as I take a deep breath in. “Look. I know my brother better than anyone. And if there is one thing I am certain he won’t do, is waste his blood, and his venom, on hundreds and hundreds of fighters who he wishes to turn into halflings. It would be too great a waste of his power, and any loss of that would render him more helpless to attack, which is the last thing he wants,” I explain, to which Fangorn folds his arms over himself, but remains listening. His foot taps against the ground ardently, waiting for my response.

“So?”

“So,” I continue, continuing to spare periodic glances towards the ever paling girl, my ears straining to catch that familiar thud of her heart from underneath that incessant chanting. But it is there, quiet, soft, but there. I breathe out a heavy sigh. “What I mean to say is that these halflings have the most minimal amount of blood and venom in their system that Azrael would possibly allow. I mean look at her. She has likely been travelling for days and yet she still hasn’t turned. Azrael will likely have drained her blood also, she is weak, and the blood inside her is not potent. Your blood will be, your venom can override his. The risk is there, but I am confident that the amount of blood and venom inside her is so meagre that it has the potential to be washed out entirely. There may be a small phase of resistance, but it will not kill her.”

Allowing his face to fall, Fangorn deliberates silently for a moment, his eyes taking in the form of the hunched over girl. He chews on his lips, fingers sliding over the hilt of his dagger with a nervous fervour.

“You think it will be possible?” he asks with a sceptical look. “Will she be strong enough to withstand it? It will cause her immense pain, even if Azrael has put very little blood inside her.”

Gritting my teeth, I spare a glance back over to her.

“She will have to be, because we have no other choice.”

Across from us, the girls breathing becomes more laboured. We haven’t got long. Shoving down the glimmers of panic, I give him a firm look, taking his shoulder in my hand.

“Can you do it?”

“I can,” he says slowly, sucking in his cheeks. “And not to seem rude, my Lord, but wouldn’t your blood do just as well?”

I give him a firm look.

“Fangorn,” I say, serious now. He purses his lips.

“Right,” he nods, resuming his gaze once more to the girl. “Right.”

It is not because I am haughty enough to consider it beneath me to turn this girl, no, if anything, it would be my greatest pleasure to save her life, for she could be of great use to us.

But that would be a dreadful idea for two reasons.

The first of which would be that my blood, the blood of a vampire king and a soul no less, it so potent that a person in her condition, weak and deprived as she is, would likely die from the sheer overload of power that consumes her.

Secondly, but most importantly, as the King of a kingdom of vampires, it is completely illegal for me to turn anyone other than the one that I choose to marry.

Ever since one of the Kings of another vampire Kingdom began turning the Folk to make himself an army several thousand years ago (the action of which did not go down well with the majority of Faey’s population), the act of a royal vampire turning civilians has since been banned.

The power these new vampires inherited from the royal bloodline was too much of a threat to leave stagnating, and their powers extended further into the reaches that any normal vampire would consider possible. I took a personal hand in exterminating these anomalies from the face of Faey when they predictably were turned against us, and before they ever became too much of an issue to handle- or before they started causing mass collateral damage in their need for blood. Although the aftermath was a great deal of death, a valuable lesson was learnt that day for the whole of Faey. An army of royally turned vampires should never be conjured into existence, not for any purpose, or for any one.

For me to do it would be the worst case of all. Besides that… there is something strange in the notion about turning another creature, as if somehow that makes Serena lesser in her form. It feels most oddly like I am cheating, which I find with a tremor down the spine that I don’t like the thought of.

I will not be turning anyone today.. Leave my brother up to illegal activities.