1. HUMAN VAMPIRE

Winter’s POV

They say I look like the monsters my father kills.

That’s why everyone hates me.

I remind them of the vampires who slaughtered their families, who burned their homes, who ruined their lives. And every time they look at me, they see a piece of that horror staring back.

“Harder.”

Lorena’s voice cracks through the kitchen like a whip. I tighten my grip on the scrubbing brush and press it harder against the stone floor. The bristles drag through cold, dirty water, making a harsh grinding sound that sets my teeth on edge.

My knees ache. My fingers ache. The skin on my knuckles has already split open from the lye in the water, but I keep scrubbing.

Stopping will only make things worse

“That corner too,” Giselle says from behind me. “Unless you plan to leave it filthy, like everything else you touch.”

I drag the brush toward the far edge of the floor. The kitchen stones are already clean. I finished the worst of the stains before sunrise. But clean has never mattered in this house. Only my failure does.

I know better than to say that aloud.

A shoe strikes my side.

Not hard enough to break anything. Just hard enough to send me sideways and make the brush slip from my hand.

Pain blooms through my ribs.

I bite the inside of my cheek before any sound can escape.

Lorena clicks her tongue. “Clumsy.”

I reach for the brush like nothing happened. I’m used to this. It’s their favorite pastime — making my life miserable, feeling joy over my pain.

I won’t give them the satisfaction of seeing me break.

Another kick, this time to the back of my thigh.

My hand misses. My palm lands in the bucket instead, sending dirty water sloshing over my skirt.

Giselle laughs.

It is a bright sound. Pretty. Light. The sort of laugh that would make strangers think she is sweet.

“You look better like that,” she says. “Down where you belong.”

I keep my head bowed and pick up the brush.

My silence disappoints them sometimes. Today, it only makes them inventive.

The kitchen smells of ash, old smoke, and boiled broth. The fire is low. Dawn light slips through the cracks in the shutters, pale and thin, barely touching the room.

“What a face,” Lorena mutters. “Even covered in dirt she still looks unnatural.”

All three of us go still.

Lady Evelyne. My stepmother enters without hurry, as if the world naturally makes space for her. She is dressed already, dark silk fitted perfectly to her body, not a hair out of place. She never looks tired. Never hurried. Never uncertain. Even cruelty seems elegant on her.

Her gaze falls on me first.

It always does.

“Why is she still on the floor?”

Lorena answers before I can. “She’s slow this morning, Mother.”

Lady Evelyne’s eyes move over the bucket, the brush, my wet skirt, my bent posture. Her expression does not change.

“You wasted water.”

“I can fetch more,” I say.

The words are out before I stop them.

Silence.

My stomach drops.

Giselle smiles.

Lady Evelyne takes two measured steps toward me. “Did I ask you to speak?”

I lower my head. “No, my lady.”

Her fingers close around my chin and forces my face up.

There was quiet disgust in her eyes as she studies my features. “You look exactly just like them,” she whispers and pushes me away.

I lowered my head in shame. By “them” she meant the vampires.

“How ironic,” she murmured softly. “The daughter of the kingdom’s greatest vampire slayer looks exactly like the monsters her father hunts.

I was born with pale skin, resembling the vampires. I look more like a vampire than a woman, and because of it people hated me.

Who wouldn’t hate someone who resembled the vampires that slaughtered their families and turned them to slaves?

Even I hated myself. I never liked the person that stared back at me in the mirror.

If only the vampires didn’t exist, then I could have lived normally without people hating me for no reason.

I clenched my jaw and swallowed hard.

“He shouldn’t have brought you here. He should have left you to die with your mother,” she added cruelly.

The words land where they always do, in that place inside me that has never healed over.

My mother died when I was three. I only have fragments of memories of her and the life we had when she was alive.

Her dark hair, her voice, and the biting cold of winter at the small cottage where we lived in. That’s all I have about her.

My father told me that she was the one who picked my name. “Winter” because my skin resembled the white snow of Winter.

To her, I didn’t look like a vampire. I was beautiful and special like the cold season. When she was still alive, life was better.

I had no stepmother, no stepsisters, and most of all I was loved and cared for. Everything, including my father changed when she died.

“Here.” I instinctively caught the pouch of coins she tossed at me. “Go to the market and buy fresh food and wine for tonight. Make sure everything is prepared before your father arrives.”

I looked at her in surprise, before I could ask Giselle had beaten me to it.

“He’s coming? Why so sudden?” Giselle asked in surprise.

As the Grand General of the Kingdom, my father basically lived at the borders to protect the Kingdom from the vampires.

He rarely comes home, we are lucky to see him at least twice a year. When he’s at home, Lady Evelyne acts like a doting mother and Lorena and Giselle turns into sweet and loving sisters and I become a part of their family until my father returns to the borders.

“Who knows?” Lady Evelyne replied coldly, clearly displeased by my father’s return.

She shot me a sharp look. “Remember, not a single word about this should reach your father. Understood?”

My fingers tightened around the pouch.

“If Matthias hears even the slightest complaint from you,” she continued calmly, “I’ll make sure your life becomes far more miserable after he leaves again.”

I nodded because she meant it.

My father always left eventually. Guarding the kingdom is his duty and I cannot force him to stay at home.

I would always be the one left behind with them.

——

I clutched my cloak tighter around myself as I walked through the busy marketplace. Keeping my head lowered, I stayed close to the edges of the streets, carefully avoiding the crowd as much as possible.

I didn’t want people recognizing me.

I tightened my grip around the small pouch of coins while making my way toward the butcher’s stall, but my steps slowed when I noticed a large crowd gathered near the center of the square.

People pushed against one another, trying to get closer to the royal announcement board.

Curiosity flickered quietly inside me.

Slowly, I stepped closer.

A large parchment bearing the royal seal had been nailed at the center of the board.

BY ORDER OF HIS MAJESTY, THE KING

To preserve peace between the Human Kingdom and the Vampire Kingdom, a royal marriage alliance shall be established.

An unmarried woman shall be selected as the human bride of the Vampire Crown Prince.

The moment people finished reading it, panic erupted across the square.

“What?!”

“They want to send one of our daughters to the vampires?”

“This is madness!”

Fear spread rapidly through the crowd.

Some mothers immediately pulled their daughters closer while others began whispering frantically among themselves.

“No human ever returns from there.”

“They’re sending her to death.”

“I won’t give my daughter to those monsters!” a man shouted angrily. “If someone has to be sent, it should be that woman who already looks like them!”

My stomach dropped.

He never mentioned a name, but I knew.

“That’s right!” another voice agreed loudly. “The Grand General’s daughter would make the perfect bride!”

Cruel laughter spread through the crowd.

“I’m sure the Vampire Crown Prince would love her face.”

“She already looks like a vampire herself.”

“Maybe she’s one of them.”

I instinctively stepped backward.

My heartbeat pounded violently against my chest as people began glancing around the square searching for me.

I turned quickly, but I wasn’t lucky enough. I accidentally collided with someone behind me.

The force sent me stumbling hard onto the ground, causing my hood to slip from my head.

Cold air brushed against my exposed face, I tried to cover up myself back, but it was too late.

A woman nearby froze the moment she saw me. Her eyes widened in recognition.

“Look,” she whispered shakily. “It’s her.”

Panic seized my chest as more heads turned toward me.

“Take her!” Someone yelled.

I started running as the crowd chased after me.

I wasn’t able to run that far when people suddenly blocked my path. I turned around, desperate to escape, but I wasn’t lucky enough surrounded at all sides.

“Please,” I begged. “Just let me go.”

“What about our daughters?” One of them replied. “If there’s anyone who should be given to the vampires it should be you. You’d have a higher chance of survival because of the way you look.”

I clenched my fists at the side.

“Don’t you know who my father is?” I shot back. “My father is the Grand General of the Kingdom, the Greatest Vampire Slayer, a friend of the King.”

Their eyes shifted and they start to hesitate upon hearing my words. “My father would be angry if he finds out about this.”

“That’s fine with me!” Someone shouted. “I’m willing to accept any punishment as long as I could protect my daughter. I’d rather die than to let my daughter be chosen to die at the vampires.”

“That’s right!”  Another shouted out. “I already lost my mother and my sister to the vampires. I can’t let them take my daughter too!”

The crowd erupted in anger.

I instinctively took a step back as the crowd erupted in anger.

Fear swallowed me whole as I found no place to hide and to escape to. “N-no, please,” I stammered.

Why does it have to be me?

My whole life I’ve been bullied, hated, and mistreated because of my skin color and the way that I look.

These people didn’t care that my father was the reason why they are alive and safe right now. All they care about was what I look like. To them it was enough reason to give me as a sacrifice to the vampires.

I grew up enduring my stepmother and stepsister’s abuse and my father’s neglect while he sacrificed his life at the borders to protect these people who were so desperate to offer me to the vampires.

A hand suddenly grabbed my arm. I tried to pull back, but another person seized me. “Please, don’t do this,” I could only beg helplessly as the crowd worked together to apprehend me.

“N-No, please,” I begged hysterically as, but the crowd paid no attention to my cries as they dragged me forward.

My wrists burned from their grip as panic consumed me whole until suddenly the distant thunder of horses echoed through the streets.

“Halt!” A commanding voice rang sharply through the air.