The Queen's Favorite Pet

Time seemed to pause as she held me aloft, my knees barely off the ground. I waited to hear her anger. I waited for her to tear into my flesh and punish me. But she didn’t. She just held me there, unblinking, silent, staring angrily into my eyes. It took me, perhaps, too long to remember that I could look away from her. I could submit to her, and maybe that would free me from this position. But I didn’t want to. I could feel the anger of my meal flaring up again, it had been my right to eat. She had sent me out to eat. She had given me permission.

Still we stood there, I could have spoken, I could have fought her hold, but I held the pain in my neck and continued to look at her. The anger in my stomach only gave me the energy to stay here, to look and observe. My mind cleared and I felt calm. If she had wanted to kill me, I’d already be dead. Tentatively, I reached one of my hands up. She seemed to coil tighter. I paused a moment before reaching up and gently resting my fingers on her elbow. At my touch, she bared her teeth and pulled me higher up.

“I was hungry.” I spoke softly. She didn’t move. “So I ate.” Her anger seemed to shift. But before I could see what the new emotion was she threw me back down. My knees hit the stones painfully and she looked away from me.

“If you are going to act like a fledgling, I will treat you like one. Take her.”

Two vampires I didn’t know shot forward and each one grabbed my arms. They stood just far enough from each other that my shoulders protested. Someone else spoke up from the court. “Queen, the court feels you may favor this beast too much.”

My captors paused and I watched as the Queen seemed to become sharper. She leaned relaxed against the side of the chair, but her eyes seemed to spark. DongGeun and the witch quickly stepped out of her sight. The witch’s eyes caught mine for a moment, and I could see the apology in them. Needlessly, she mouthed the same thing. But I looked away.

The Queen stood and gestured. The two captors pulled me from the throne room before I could see the conclusion. I was pulled down stairs and eventually in a place with a chill in the air. I was thrown into a small room, and as I turned around, the door seemed to melt into stones. I was left alone.

I reached for my magic and felt it stored, but when I tried to pull it out, it was sluggish. It was like the very air around me was thick. As long as I kept the magic internally, such as with my ears and eyes, it seemed to work just fine. When I did guide my magic to my eyes, I found the air of the room filled with symbols. Unlike the little witch’s magic, these symbols floated independent of any circles, and slipped from my magic when I tried to reach for them.

Exhaustion from the day and using my magic eventually caught up with me. I focused on my magic and carefully grew just enough moss that I could lay down more comfortably. With my tails wrapped around me to fight the chill in the air. I slipped into sleep.

When I woke, it was to the sound of stones rubbing together. When I looked for the sound, I found a hole in the roof of the little room and a rabbit was dropped into the room. Reflectively I grabbed it before it would hit the ground to its death. I snarled up at the hole that was now closing.

The little body shook in my hands, its eyes wide with fear and its ears as far back as they could go. I set it gently on the little patch of moss. It ran around the room, scratching at rocks and thumping at every shadow. Eventually it tucked itself in a corner and watched me. I settled into the moss and curled up again. Exhaustion was still seeped in my bones and I quickly fell back to sleep.

I did eventually wake up, and found the rabbit had grown comfortable enough with my presence to curl next to my stomach and under my tails. Its whiskers twitched as I stretched and sat up, but it didn’t move from its spot. I concentrated on my magic, and tried to chase the symbols in the air again. Mostly out of curiosity, but also boredom.

Eventually, that wasn’t interesting anymore. I could feel questions that had plagued me in the back of my mind, but they didn’t seem important at the moment. Instead, I lay and counted the stones in my room. I must have fallen asleep when I heard the stone move again. I was already snarling at the hole above me, ready to catch another poor rabbit, but instead a slab of bloody meat fell into my hands instead.

I smelled it as the stone closed. It was freshly killed and seemed free of rot or poison. My eyes couldn’t see any magic in the meat either. Cautiously I sat down, watching as the rabbit tucked itself against my hip and started to eat the meat. The blood had a tinge of fear in it, but that was fine. It was good but it was fine. The meat was chewier than I liked, but I forced it down anyway. I cleaned the remnants of blood from my body and looked down at the little rabbit. During my sleep, some grasses had grown among the moss and it was nibbling away at that.

By my third sleep I was surprised that the Queen hadn’t come to collect me. I figured her curiosity about me would make her impatient. But I remembered that she was a Vampire, an old one at that. Three days for her was probably a blink of an eye. For me, I could only remember a handful of days and it felt like an eternity. When I went to sleep again, I worried that the fire would return, that I would have to see hair and blood and death. But the dreams never came. I just continued to sleep.

The rabbit was sick the next day and it didn’t take me long to figure out why. I may have had blood to keep me hydrated, but the rabbit had nothing. I tried to use my magic to make water, I tried to share the blood with the rabbit, and I even tried to force myself to cry to create a little pool of water. It wouldn’t touch them. A weight settled in my heart and I knew what would happen. But instead of feeling sad, I just felt bland about it. I couldn’t feel the anger from that one meal. I couldn’t feel anger at the Queen for leaving me. It was then that I realized I couldn't’ feel anything stronger than a passing interest. Curiosity seemed to be fine, but as I chased the symbols again, I had a strong suspicion that these symbols were the reason why I didn’t feel more upset.

I woke up with a cold form resting against my stomach. I pet its little fur and stared at the wall in front of me. A breath left me, and I knew I wanted out of here. Before I was forgotten and woke up cold one morning as well. But I couldn't get the energy to do anything about it. A fleeting feeling of frustration slipped through the back of my mind, but slipped away just as quickly.

The grass and blooms died a few sleeps later. I had lost interest in keeping them active. Instead, I kept my magic inside, with the exception of the small flicker that I had chasing symbols as long as I was awake. I instead sat on the other side of the room, staring at the withered moss and little body. The body hadn’t rot. Which I knew was strange. It took another sleep for me to really focus on why that was strange.

But then my magic touched a symbol. Like electricity, awareness shot through my body. A whine slipped out of my mouth. I stood quickly and pressed around the stones and curled my tails against my stomach as well. Emotions that I hadn’t felt in a while poured through my body and made me feel like I was boiling alive. My whine grew in strength and I felt both fear and anger and despair sweep through me.

I stood there for an unknown amount of time before I heard the sound. I looked up at first, but then I turned and found the door I had come in through reappeared. My breath ripped through my lungs and teeth and I stared at the door. It opened. I didn’t move. I didn’t know who I wanted to be on the other side of that door. The Queen who had thrown me here, the captors who had thrown me here, or {void}. But instead, the witch’s face appeared with fear in her eyes.

“Quickly, we have to go now!” I didn’t pause, I shot through the door and out of the symbols. As soon as I was out the door, I felt my magic pulse back to life. But then I also heard the sounds from above. The sounds of death. The little witch grabbed my hand in both of hers. “We have to run. Now!” She started to pull me, but her human legs were too slow. I scooped her up and used my magic to push us faster.

She directed me up the stairs. Magic swirled throughout the air and I watched as vampires and magic users battled in the hallway. “Go left!” She screamed in my ear and I didn’t hesitate. I turned away and ran. She gave me more directions. We ran in front of the throne room doors at one point, and I saw the Queen for a flash. But I didn’t stop. I ran. Up more stairs, through doors, around fighters. And eventually. Sky.