Cassian Legacy: The Vampire Prince

His words made me gasp with surprise. I couldn’t really think about what that statement implied. I pulled away and searched his face, studying his features more closely. It was too much to hope for something I knew couldn’t possibly exist. “You can’t be Noah…” I breathed out.

He smiled and shook his head. “I’m not Noah. He left a journal and in the last pages before his sudden death, he wrote these entries about this woman he never named. No one else in my family understood why he talked about her in the way that he had. They all believed that Noah was happy with his arranged marriage. But he wasn’t. Our history says that he was found staked and completely drained of blood. His head was severed from his body in that version, but I knew that wasn’t true. Noah didn’t know the created, none of our family knew the created until recently. When he was found, completely drained of blood, our family figured out that we weren’t safe anymore among the humans. That is why we formed bonds with the warlocks and the other clans. We made friends among the created and forged the blood oath. We thought we were protecting ourselves from man and science, but other issues arose.”

I swallowed, knowing this was my fault.

Finn continued. “Noah was one of my ancestors. Tiberius is related to me by marriage, several generations removed. It makes a lot of sense now, knowing your story. You were one of us, the born.”

I shook my head. That wasn’t true. “My family was human. I didn’t know vampires existed then. We did not drink blood, ever.”

He frowned. “But the Cassian Coven… You are a Cassian…”

I didn’t have an answer for him. It was like that piece of information had been hidden from us both, if it ever existed to begin with. I only knew what I remembered from those days, and as I thought back to when my family and grandparents were alive, I didn’t recall ever seeing them drinking blood, or talking about blood, or having wine mixed blood at all. They drank wine, but who didn’t in those days? It was true that we were privileged, rich in a sense, but our social status didn’t have us mingling with vampires, born or created that I knew of, until my father met the Duke.

Finn sighed, but still smiled despite the fact that we didn’t have an answer for what actually happened the night I was created. “It doesn’t matter. What you are has never mattered to me.”

I shook my head. If he had taken me by surprise before, it didn’t matter now. This was beyond shock, beyond intrigue. “What?”

He took my hand and pulled me upright. He caressed my palm and the underside of my hand gently. With every touch and swirl my skin burned with a raging fire. “I knew when we first met that you were intriguing and delightful, despite your attitude towards me. Somehow that never bothered me.”

I scowled, knowing that what he spoke was a downright lie.

He chuckled, reading my face. “You’re right, it bothered me. Maybe that’s why I read Noah’s journal so much trying to figure out the puzzle. Maybe that’s why I’m attracted to mystery. Or maybe that’s why I wrote in mine about finding a love like his, knowing that I would be like him in so many ways with an arranged marriage to a vampire princess. Though, I never expected for me to fall for you.”

I completely froze.

He took advantage of my stillness and leaned in, pulling me close to his side. He laid my head against his shoulder and he hummed the waltz song from the night we went to the Blue Lagoon. His right arm wrapped around my body, while his left hand gently grasped one of mine. The movement alone sent shivers and jolts down my spine as the signals traveled into my legs and feet. I hadn’t been this close to someone in a long time. His lips kissed the top of my forehead and I closed my eyes.

A dream it might have been, but I couldn’t remember. I only knew I didn’t want to wake up.