The Vampire Legacy; The New Queen Rises Read Online Free

stood
up and walked over to the end of the bed. I waited patiently for
him to start talking, but it was awhile before he did. When the
time came, he turned to me, while he held onto the footboard of the
bed.
    "My parents died in France, three years
before the beheading of Marie Antoinette. They left my brother and
I to care for us. I was sixteen at the time, and Quinn had just
turned ten." Julian moved over toward me again and sat down. "A man
named Victor La Rouge took the two of us in. He moved us out into
the country shortly after that. He told us it was to protect him
and us.”
    "We started to notice how he would come out
of his room, a place we weren't allowed, only in the afternoon. He
looked pale and tired all the time, but he had so much energy. He
taught us to read, write, and to do math. He also taught us to
fence and ride a horse. Quinn started to see him as our Father,
probably because the tragedy of losing ours was still in his mind.
He worshiped Victor, but I couldn't take him any longer."
    Julian held his eyes closed tightly for a few
moments, then he opened them, the green was gone, and they were
dark brown now. The color seemed to hold a world of knowledge in
them.
    "One night,” he began again, "we fought,
violently. I didn't like what he was doing to Quinn. He was my
brother and I had to protect him. We had been with Victor for two
years. I was eighteen and I was defiant.”
    "In the middle of our fight, which consisted
of everything from insults to fists flying, Victor did the most
awful thing anyone had ever done to me. He lunged at my neck, his
jaw clamped over my skin, and he bit into me. The pain shocked me
and I couldn't move. All I could do was hold onto life, while
listening to the sounds of my own fading heart beat. I passed out,
the blackness engulfed me, and I thought I was dead." He waited to
see any signs of disgust but, I myself was a storyteller and I
found this quite interesting. "Do you believe what I have said so
far?"
    "To not believe in things that are impossible
would make most everything that you do improbable." I had never
heard of such a saying before. And, at the time, I couldn't figure
out where it had come from. Julian smiled.
    "When I awoke,” he continued, “I was in a
dark room, surrounded by candles. My neck ached, my body was numb
and my heart had stopped beating. I was dead, but then again, I was
alive. My eyes felt strange, everything seemed to be breathing
life. My own hands were blue, cold as ice, but I could almost feel
the lives of every other person in the house. I got up and pulled
open the door, it was very heavy, almost solid cement and I walked
out and up the long dark staircase to the main floor of the
house.”
    "Everyone acted as if nothing had happened,
the furniture that we had broken had been replaced and there were
no indications that we had ever fought. It wasn't until Quinn came
bouncing in the room that it all became clear. I couldn't look at
him, so I left.”
    "I was out in the woods for over a week and
the burning in my veins became unbearable. My body hunted down a
girl, who was picking berries in a nearby field, and I just
attacked her. Latched onto her neck like Victor had done to me. I
killed her, I drank her life, and it filled me. My heart began to
beat, my flesh warmed and my pale complexion seemed to become tan.
I was a monster."
    "A vampire?" Those eyes that had once again
changed color, and nodded, then looked back at my hand.
    "I stayed near the home. I'm sure Victor knew
I was there, but he never came after me, never invited me back. I
watched after Quinn, tried to help him whenever I could. For six
years, I watched him live a normal life. He had actually been
engaged to this beautiful young woman, but Victor didn't approve. I
watched, one night, as the events unfolded into what turned out to
be a replay of everything that happened to me the night I had
turned. Quinn was now one of us, but Victor didn't let him leave;
he kept Quinn there