Chapter 18 ∣  Torn Apart

-Maverick

Arlynn is pinned to the ground, the blood hardening as she glares up at me, blood coming from the corners of her mouth. Even after my mother had stopped our confrontation, it doesn't stop her from doing the exact same thing the next day, challenging me while Tamsin, Rook, and I are sitting in the backyard talking.

The coven leaders who had come to celebrate my birthday yesterday, stay during the day while the sun is up. Most of them are enjoying each other's company with select members of their covens that arrived with them. It was a quiet morning until she decided to push my buttons too far.

She had walked up to me, scowling as she stated, "How about we finish what we were talking about yesterday? You still think it's just luck? Come and fight me then, see how lucky you get."

Standing up, I hardly have any time before she roundhouse kicks me in the face, her boot catching my jaw as I collapse back down to the ground.

"Arlynn! What's wrong with you?!" Rook snarls, getting ready to stand.

She holds up her hand and states, "Stop defending him. If he thinks he's so much better, then let him prove it. I'm tired of just standing around watching while he parades around like he's the top dog around here. He isn't. His father is. I only take orders from his father and he's not around."

"Stop being mean!" Tamsin stands and pushes her back. She staggers for a second and before Tamsin knows it, Arlynn backhands her across the face, knocking her to the ground as well. Shocked, she holds her cheek and tears spring to her eyes. Not necessarily because she is in pain, but to be hit for no reason by another coven member, especially one she considers a friend, breaks her heart.

We are all fighting when we shouldn't be.

I want to stand up for her, and as I rise to my feet, I bite into the flesh of my inner right wrist, throwing the blood at Arlynn and catching her off guard. She throws her hands up, but before the liquid touches her, I stop it in mid-air. Arlynn opens her eyes to see my black rose ones staring right at her.

"You'll need more than luck to stop me," I growl, "stop picking on others!" Controlling the blood, it shoots off into four separate directions, wrapping around her wrists and ankles, dragging her to the ground in a single swipe.

She screams for a moment, her back hitting the ground. Her eyes are full of not fear, but hatred. Trying to kick at me, I just compress the blood harder, cutting off her circulation and making her limbs numb.

"Stop!" Clover's white irises meet mine out of the corner of my eyes, her Oneida drawn, and an arrow aimed directly at me, "I'll shoot you dead if you hurt her anymore!"

Slowly letting go, Arlynn gets up from the ground and rushes into the mansion, my anger reaching an all-time high. It is always the hunters getting in the way and stopping me. They just continue to suppress who I am and I'm tired of it.

Without even lifting a finger, one of the blood trails morphs into an arrow and I flick it in her direction swiftly. She gasps, immediately firing her own. The arrows meet each other, mine cutting directly through hers, the two sides of the wood falling to the ground. She didn't expect this, the blood arrow striking her in the shoulder.

"Zak! Rainier!" She cries out.

"Maverick, run!" Tamsin is scared for me and Rook nods as I look toward the open door of the mansion. Running as fast as I can, I bolt through the hallway, vampires staring at me.

"Mav?" My mother breathes out, concerned as I run past her, "Mav, stop, what's going on?!"

I don't stop, but continue to run into the main entrance, two coven leaders raising their eyebrows as I come around the corner. They back away when they hear Arlynn crying to her father, my grandfather standing right next to them.

I shake my head, my heart pounding fast as I try to slow my thoughts down. They all but stop when my father walks down the marble staircase, looking from a crying Arlynn, to me standing in the open. He walks up to me, narrowing his eyes and asks, "What happened?"

"Nothing," I whisper.

He growls, "Doesn't look like a whole lot of nothing."

"He used his blood magic against me!" Arlynn cries out, attracting most of the coven to the room. Leaders look to one another and I can just feel their judgmental stares, ones that make me feel more like an outcast.

The air leaves my lungs when I feel my father lash out.

"If you try to flex your power one more time..." my father wraps his hand around my neck, slamming my back down onto the cold, hard marble floor.

My mother runs to his side and grips his arm with both her hands and yells, "Lucca stop!"

"Really?" My father glowers, "You're okay with him dominating you?"

My mother's eyes flicker from my pained face and then back to my father, "No, but please...he's just a kid."

"And he needs to fucking learn his place if he ever wants to lead a coven," my father's eyes shift to the black rose color, in his rage he clamps down harder on my throat.

"STOP!" It's my grandfather's voice that causes my father to loosen his death grip on my neck as I gasp for air, "Lucca, let your son go. You'll regret it if you hurt him. Evie's right, he's only nine."

My father's eyes shift back, gazing into mine as he roughly pushes down on my neck before standing to his full height. My mother's worried expression makes me second guess my actions, knowing it was wrong of me to use my blood magic when I was angry to get my way. She stands up for me when my father would rather kill me.

"He blames me..." I whisper, my mother helping me stand to my feet from the black marble floor of the mansion we reside in.

My mother shakes her head, "Don't mind him."

"Evie," my grandfather comes to stand next to my mother and me. He's immensely powerful but had given the title of King and Queen to my parents shortly after the hunters and vampires made peace.

I still don't like hunters...they're way too strict and live in the same home as I do with my parents and grandparents' coven.

"Dad, I know," my mother says, breathing out a heavy sigh.

My father comes back in the main hallway, glaring at me before heading up the marble staircase.

I just get so angry...

...I can't control myself.

I feel my eyes shifting, my fangs elongating as I bite into my wrist.

"No!" My mother screams, lunging and knocking me to the ground where she pins me there.

My father whirls around, his fangs bared at me as he moves so quickly, he seems to appear right next to us. The connection flickers to life, the control over my blood is part of me as I morph two strands around my mother's wrists, clenching my fist and throwing her off. My grandfather catches her, I knew he would. I don't mean to hurt her...it's my father that had cursed me, not accepting me as his son.

I roll onto my stomach and push off the marble floor, the blood circling around me.

"Why? What did I do?!" I yell, "Why do you hate me so much?!"

My mother tries to pull out of my grandfather's arms, but he holds her still, knowing she has no authority over me. Even he is slightly on edge when the connection to my blood magic is open.

"You threatened to kill your mother...before you even came into this world," my father hisses at me.

"Lucca! Stop it, please just leave him alone..." my mother cries, afraid how far this is going to escalate. Sure, we fight as any father and son do, but it takes a turn for the worse once my blood magic ability is unlocked and I threaten his life.

"I should have never let Orion train you..." my father watches me carefully, waiting for me to strike at him.

If I do...

...there will be no going back.

"It wouldn't have mattered," I sigh, "Grandmother told me about how males have a much stronger connection to blood magic than females. Adding in the fact I am a pureblood...it scares the hell out of you all."

My father retorts, "You're unpredictable and that's what makes you dangerous!"

"I'm not dangerous!" I fight back, my blood boiling as the visible blood entwined around my body pulsates to life.

"Then why do you continue to overpower every vampire in this coven...including your mother?!" My father steps toward me, testing to see what I will do.

Stop...stop egging me on...

"I can't control myself sometimes..." my voice falters.

"The hell you can't!" My father's eyes are just filled with so much hatred. I know deep down, he wishes that I had died... "You're not my fucking son...I'm done with you."

"Lucca!" My mother gasps, finally breaking from my grandfather's hold.

There it is again, my control slowly slipping away as I raise up my arms, twisting my wrists and flicking them in the direction of my father. The blood soars through the air, the liquid ends of the blood turning into sharp spears.

"That's enough!" Zak's hand rises, freezing the blood in the middle of the air before I have a chance to land any blow on my father.

I glare at him.

Fucking hunter.

I pull my hand back, balling it into a fist as I guide the blood toward me slightly. Zak mimics me, the blood leaning back at him. I clench my jaw, trying to be the one in control. I'm stronger than Zak, but he has more experience than I, the blood coming to a standstill in the center of the room.

I bring my other hand up and just as I'm about to take back complete control, I feel something sharp pierce my neck, a cool liquid being injected into it.

The blood moves toward Zak, holding it within a contained globe in the center of his left hand as I lose any sense of control.

I exhale slowly as the needle is removed from my neck, whirling around to gaze up into the face of my grandfather, a syringe held in his hand. My mother has her arms crossed in front of her chest, a disappointed frown on her face as she glances away from me.

"Why? Why'd you do that? What was that?" I'm confused, unaware of what just happened to my connection. It feels cold and isolated.

My grandfather states, "You need to control yourself."

"What did you do to me?!" I growl at him as he hadn't answered my question.

He shakes his head, "Something I should have done a long time ago. You can't control your emotions and mixed with your blood magic, it is just a recipe for disaster."

"Killian..." my father's voice is irritated. I turn away from my grandfather, gazing at my father as he rubs his forehead. It appears he's fighting an internal battle and I'm not sure exactly what side is about to come out on top until he says, "I've had enough."

"What?" My mother unfolds her arms and walks toward my father, "Lucca...what are you saying?" She touches his arm, but he pulls away and narrows his eyes at me.

"Get him out of my sight...I don't want to see him ever again," my father's words make my blood run cold, my face becoming paler than normal.

He's rejecting me...

My mother steps in front of him and places her hands on his shoulders, "Lucca, no. You can't do this. Please...don't do this."

"I'm not going to sit around and wait for him to kill someone...whether it be an accident or on purpose. I am protecting this coven, even if it means casting out my own son," my father's words cut deeply into me as I back away from him.

"N-no," I choke out, looking from my father and then to my grandfather. His icy blue eyes hold sadness, but an understanding of Lucca's decision.

No one is on my side, save for my mother...

The last thing I remember, is something extremely hard, hitting me in the back of the head, falling to the floor, and briefly catching a glimpse of Killian's face.

Published on Amazon as an ebook and paperback.

The Rogue Pureblood Vampire by K. A. Young.

If you don't have a Kindle and can't purchase the book off Amazon, you are more than welcome to join my Patreon page and receive downloadable PDFs under the Pack Tracker Tier.

Please click on the link on my bio.

https://www.patreon.com/SerenityR0se