Chapter three

Amareux knelt to her level, not caring if the floor was going to soil his pants or not. He wanted to find out what was wrong with the little girl. But before he could get the question out, she beat him to it, her lips moving, forming words that he could not hear simply because her voice was too low for him to catch. He bent his head so that it was directly in line with her mouth before he asked the burning question.

"What is wrong with you?"

"F... foo... food..." came a weak voice from her lips but she didn't need to say anything further. He already understood what was wrong with her. It was hunger.

"Just stay here, okay," he said, trying to pacify her. "I will go and get food for you."

He turned around and dashed quickly out of the place, his footsteps echoing in the quiet space.

Five minutes later, he was back with a basket of food, fruits and many other things including bottles of water. He had told the people at the kitchen that he wanted to have a picnic and they had quickly arranged a spread for him. They adored him. In fact, everyone adored him. Everyone except his father, though. That man was never satisfied with anything he did.

Pushing the thoughts of his father out of his mind, he knelt down once again and raised the girl up, surprised at her weightlessness as he propped her against the wall. He looked at the different varieties of food in the basket, wondering what to feed her with first, as indecisiveness came creeping in. The girl came to his aid.

"Wa... water..." she managed to get out and immediately, he dug into the basket, produced a bottle of water and unscrewed the cap as fast as he could.

Amareux pressed the bottle to her lips and she drank the water quickly and greedily, to the extent that he was afraid that she would choke on it. She grabbed the bottle from his hand and drank the rest of it. Then she held out her hands for another. Quickly he obliged her and before long, she had emptied the second bottle of water.

Amareux was amazed by how thirsty she was. How long since she had drank water last? It had to have been days for her to consume two bottles of water in less than two minutes.

She wanted to speak but he held his hand up, preventing her from doing so. He produced an apple from the basket and held it out to her. He wanted her to eat first before she spoke. She didn't seem to have regained enough strength from the water alone, judging by how weak she had been when he found her.

She took the apple from his hand with a grateful sigh and began to munch on it and within seconds, she was already done with it. Then she spoke.

"Thank you for all these. What's your name?"

"My name is Amareux," he responded.

"Well, Amareux, I want to be your friend," Arayah said.

"What is your own name?"

"Arayah," she replied simply.

"Well, Arayah, I will be your friend," Amareux said.

"Thank you."

"Don't mention."

With that, they stopped talking as Amareux waited for his new friend, Arayah to eat as much food as she wanted from the basket and to his surprise, she consumed everything. Then she asked him a question.

"If you don't mind me asking, why were you crying before you came to help me?" she asked.

"And how did you know I was crying?" Amareux asked, his walls already going up in defense.

"I heard the sound of your sniffling before you came in here and I also took note of the way your eyes were red and even your face too was red. That was how I knew you had been crying," she explained.

"Really? You were able to see and notice all that despite your state?" he asked incredulously.

"Yes," she responded with a smile and he smiled back at her too before speaking.

"You must be a clever one, then," he commented.

"Quite," she replied.

Amareux spoke. "Well, my father got angry with me. He is never satisfied with anything I do. He thinks I am not good enough. It seems I am not."

"Don't think like that," Arayah cautioned. "You are enough. You are good and don't allow anyone to make you feel less of yourself, not even your own father. You are kind, you are nice, you are friendly. All those qualities are enough, Amareux."

"Thank you, Arayah," Amareux responded gratefully.

***

That was how the friendship between Arayah and Amareux blossomed. Everyday he sneaked off to see her, bearing food and gifts, which she was clever enough to hide away from the rather uninterested eyes of the handmaiden, Naomi Cobalt.

After his prince training each day, Amareux would come to Arayah and they would talk about many things, Arayah managing to uplift him if his mood was dampened by his father. But throughout all those time they spent together, she never knew that he was the son of the Alpha King and he never knew that she was a vampire, the daughter of the vampire king who had terrorized them for many years. They continued their friendship, oblivious of all these things, simply concerned about being with each other.

Their friendship went on for many years until tragedy stuck one day and after then, things were never the same for both of them.

***

"I can't believe you, son! Despite all the foolish things you have done over the years, you have managed to beat the record with this one!" the Alpha King raved.

"Why are you so against me seeing her, father?" Amareux asked.

"You don't have to know the reason. Just know that you will never see her again. She is not who you can keep as a friend. From this day, you are to dedicate yourself to your prince training or else I will name another person far worthier than you as my heir."

Amareux was dumfounded. "Surely you can't do that, father," he said.

His father laughed coldly before he spoke. "I can and will if you do not do as I say. Do not underestimate me, son, or else you will live to regret it for the rest of your days on earth," he said.

Amareux bowed his head and looked to the floor. He knew when to call it quits. He knew when to admit defeat and on this issue, he had definitely been defeated. When had he ever won a fight against his father? He was never going to his first and only friend, Arayah again and it almost made him cry. Not that he would ever cry in front of his father.

***

Arayah whimpered in pain. She had never felt pain like this in all her life. About two weeks ago, she had been moved from the dungeon she had always stayed to another one in another location in the pack and if possible, this one was even in a worse state than the other.

But that was the last thing on her mind now as she was filled with pain. Since she had been brought here, she had been feeling pain like this everyday.

Every single day, she was beaten and tortured by the guards in this place, and when she was weak enough, they withdrew the required volume of blood they wanted from her body before injecting her with a substance that dulled her senses.

She remembered the voice of the Alpha King from that long ago day, as he talked about what he would use her blood for. All those years and he hadn't once used it so she thought he had chosen to forget about it but now it seemed that he hadn't.

Arayah was in severe pain now. She had lost a lot of blood and they never gave her blood to replenish what they took from her. It had been many years since she had last drank blood.

This life I am living isn't a life at all, Arayah thought. Surely death is better than this... Yes, death is better. I must die. I must escape this life...

She trailed off as she fell into unconsciousness.