Dark Ages, 1457. Wallachia, Romania.We had just left Bucharest towards the north, my contingent of about five hundred men and I, and Târgovişte was up ahead, so it should be one of our resting stops. My enemies were all around me, and every single day I had to fight to be alive. I forced myself to build my reputation as a ruthless, cold-blooded bastard, because one thing my short existence taught me, it’s much better for you to be feared than to be loved, and believe me everyone feared me to the core, but that, didn’t stop my blood-thirsty enemies to hunt me down and try to overpower me, yet I was not about to let my beloved land and my people fall into their hands. I didn’t come through this route for pleasure; I had a purpose in mind, and some people would regret being alive. My foes had assassinated my eldest brother Mircea, and according to my informants, the boyars of Târgovişte were the ones to account for such a crime against my family. I didn’t want to believe in such treas

Dark Ages 1457.Her eyes widened and darkened, making those beautiful lavenders almost gone. I knew she feared me, but those men deserved the punishment they’ve got, and I would never let it pass. “Why did you say such a blasphemy? Everybody deserves salvation!” God, she made things difficult. She had hit her head and needed rest. I tried my best to contain myself, but if she kept saying those things and looked at me like I also deserve salvation, I wouldn’t respond to my actions. I had already lost my soul, I wouldn’t think twice to force myself and have my way with her, but she was different. She made me feel protective of her and other things I was not used to, and these things went to places I didn’t dare to talk about, and I knew she meant well about me and those miscreants. “Alizandra…” She had such pale and beautiful skin, my fingers burned to slide on it and feel its softness. My scrutiny was so obvious that she blushed and averted her eyes quite a few times, and every time,

Dark Ages, 1457.Three months, three months of the hardest self-control I put myself into, and I lost it, right there, as soon as I got close to her, not only because I didn’t find a fragment of fear in her eyes, but also I saw the defiance in her face. She affronted me! I went for the kill; I wanted to snap that long sinful neck like a twig under my fingers. How dared she questioned my actions and how I treated my opponents? I was a ruler; I had a country to build and enemies to banish away by any means possible, and she would have to come to terms with that.Everything I used against them, every means of torture, every piece of strategy I learned from the best teachers, my foes! And they were no less cruel than me, and knowing your opponents well is the only chance you had to outsmart them, and I fought hard every day, so we didn’t fall under their power again. Yet, my walls crumbled to the ground, getting closer to her body, inhaling her sweet floral perfume, and unable to resist he

Dark Ages, 1457.Traitors surrounded me! How dared this feeble little bastard raised an army of his own and instigated a revolt against me? Didn’t he cherish his dear life enough? It was then Anton and three more of my guards came to me in the courtyard with two hostages.“Sire, these two belong to his army. We caught them lurking around and talking to the peasants.” Anton threw one of them on his knees by my feet. I was so enraged I grabbed him by the hair, pulling his head up to face me, making him yelp in pain, and I didn’t get the frightened look I was expecting, what it made me even more ravenous for blood.“What did your pitiful master plan against me?” I yelled at him, pulling harder on his hair, almost ripping out of his skull. “I don’t care what you do to me, I’m already dead. Do whatever you want, because you’re getting nothing out of me,” he spitted every word in defiance, and I had to control myself not to break his neck right there.“Maybe you’ll think twice when sliding

Dark Ages, 1457.The following week was the hardest, and I’ve learned one more of his traits, stubbornness! The wound on his rib cage got infected, and we had to deal with his excessive-high fever. The wounds were healing, but barely closed. When pain beat at him he had to rest, but nothing, and no one could hold him in bed. The cut on his ribs bled a lot. It was a complicated place. Liana and I waited for him to settle for a nap, and we strapped him to bed. I didn’t know what else to do to keep this man quiet for some time, and all hell broke loose when he woke up and realized what I had done.“What do you mean by this, Alizandra?” His glaring could roast me on the spot such it was the anger there. I wasn’t sure anymore, if what I had done was the best approach for the situation. “Untie me, woman or…” I didn’t let him finish, as my words came out before I thought of them.“Or what? You don’t listen to me. You can’t keep moving around, you won’t heal, Vlad!” And it was right there, tha