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She was beautiful. Even when the cruel, cruel world took her away from me…and even when she took her last breath. And when her stunning *violet-blue eyes stared straight into my soul. Straight through the cruel black shadows that shrouds my cold and weakening heart. It weakens with every breath I take; every breath spent on thoughts of her. She even had the cheek to curve her rose pink lips into a smile as death took her life’s light. She was mine; the purest heaven to my never-ending darkness… and they took her from me. My beloved. My dearest… Mate.

Rage coursed through my veins. I held her lifeless body in my arms carefully, thinking her delicate body might shatter into a million pieces, like glass. Gently, I lay her body on the ground and slowly arouse up from my crouched position. I gazed straight ahead of me to see the leering face of her killer. His sadistic grin creeping from ear to ear, so proud of his fake masterdom, so proud of his kill.

“Why…” I mumbled under my breath, black veins appeared on my arms, pulsing and dancing through my fury. “Why did you take her from me!” the air around us suddenly felt taut and perfervid as the power around me thickened with iniquity. Fear rippled off the mortal man in front me in waves of air, bounding intensely, fired by the minuscule engine in his tiny chest. Dropping his needle-like sword onto the char-black ground I could see the pool of red…it was my love’s blood.

I charged towards him, undulating the small puddle of red before its grotesque procurer. It was all in slow motion for me, but too quick for him to occur what is happening. The man had already begun to retreat in a pathetic attempt to save his life. Knowing death was upon him, the vermin never got any further than a few paces. I appeared in front of him, with the speed unknown to humans. The scum took in a sharp breath, shocked by the sudden appearance of myself. I, his doom, wrapped my hands around his neck. I squeezed all that remained of his humanity from his quivering throat, turning his face purple.

“I will make you pay!” I threw him with might into a nearby tree, the impact making him cough up blood, staining the pure white snow below him. “I will make you spend the rest of your miserable life paying for what you’ve done! You don’t deserve death, you deserve endless pain.” I kicked him repeatedly in the gut, a pacified smirk spread across my lips as I hear multiple rips crack and his cries hollow me. With another swift kick to the face, the man lay in his wretched unconsciousness- near dead.

I walked over to my silver treasure picking her up in my arms, and placing a kiss on her forehead. “You’ll be with me soon my love” I whispered, knowing what I must do, I head towards Okara River. It didn’t take me long with my abnormal speed to get venture across the river, the Vale, and into Wickman Woods. There, a rather peculiar Witch would be hiding. The sky started to become littered with snowflakes. It always does at this time near the Vale. I took my coat off and I wrapped it around my beloved’s cold body, hoping that she wouldn’t freeze anymore than Death’s cruel grasp has chilled her.

There... There it was! I could see the stone well, whistling yellow clouds of smoke, in a clearing and I raced my way to it.

Witches on the east side of the Vale tend to hide at the bottom of wells because they’re able to live unsuspected and safe lives, all the while obtaining money and the occasional soul. The Western Witches despise the thought of living in “hovel”. But with that being said, the Eastern Witches state that they’re able to use the well as a multi-purpose chimney; that they’re able to expand beneath the ground’s surface, and live as queens of a fantastic “underworld”. Absurd really.

The sure-way passage to my angel’s savior was consumed by yellow smoke. I placed my coat over my darling’s face and blonde snow-touched hair, protecting her from the yellow puffs of smoke. Swinging my legs over the side of the well I yell below, “Knock Knock!” Tucking my nameless beloved close to my chest, I jump into the well landing on the ground with a grunt. I was now in the witch’s den. I could see a dark womanly figure, her back was turned, I made my way towards her. “Morde-”

“Ah!” she despaired waving her hand, still using the other to manage scribbling advanced potion formulas, telekinetically gathering the herbs and gems beneath my feet, “How many times!”

“Mordena?”

“There is a door! Multiple. How do you think I get in her? Broomsticks? Huh! But every time someone has a quarrel they always want to make a dramatic entrance.” She breathed, still focusing her eyes on her calculations. “Dante…I could feel the pulse of your power since you crossed Okara. Quite inconvenient” she turned to eye the dead body in my arms. “I can only tell you this will end in madness, happy ending or not. Yes, I have the power to bring-give her life. Dante, I am the greatest witch you will ever know, and you want to waste what little patience I have on love… the statistics aren’t on your side right now.”

Of course she would help me. Mordena was an ancient witch of high standing. Maybe even as old as I was. She was the one person who aided me as a young in-experienced fledgling Vampire, and helped me control and learn to satisfy bloodlust. Slowly and carefully, I placed my beloved on Mordena’s large oak table, uncovering her with my coat, as the table’s contents levitated and fitted themselves on the slender, tree-root shelves. Her skin had gotten a little paler, but the light from the Witch’s fireplace gave her skin a life-like glow. I stood helpless against my once-dormant passion for loving her, playing with my angel’s beautiful blond hair. I pressed the back of my hand against her cheek wanting her warmth and love, craving it. I had to save her. “Mordena, I’ll do anyth-”

“See what I mean: madness” the dark haired witch cut me off before I could even start. “I know why you’re here Dante, but you and I both know this will come at a cost if you wish to bring Miss Patterson back from the dead.”

I stood their shocked, “You know her name?”

“And you don’t?” Mordena exclaimed, “Bloody hell, you are mad. Love-struck, even? Star-crossed?” she snorted a little as she laughed. Why it seemed so abstract to her, I had no clue. All I needed was my dearest breathing and living again. Mordena composed herself and prepared for a sound necromancy and resurrection. She gripped her matted black curls up and onto the top of her head, twirling them into a bun as she rattled on and continued to work, “Her name is Ahri Patterson daughter of a poor farmer and his wife. She has one older sibling, male, his name is Nikolas Patterson.”

There was that one word, only the one from Mordena’s lips that could silence me for another millennium. It rolled off the tongue perfectly and I couldn’t help but purr at it. Love it… Crave it. One name that ensnared by mind, body and soul, warmed my heart and stirred my passion for living, condemned me to another eternity in one ardent and compassionate blow

“Ahri…”