Married to the Vampire King (COMPLETED)

Chapter Forty-Six

"I don't know," he murmured.

As they pushed the cart past me, I examined what was inside. Clothes, pictures, a lamp and an assortment of household items lay inside.

Had they been evicted from their home?

I caught up with Jacques and glanced back at the couple, "What do you think happened?"

He shrugged, "The same thing that happened to everyone on this road - they built their home too close to the cliff edge."

"The cliff edge?"

"Yes, people come here to build their homes on the cliff as there is no space left in the city. This is all fine and dandy until a winter storm comes along and washes part of the cliff away."

I stared around at the sullen-looking faces and felt my heartache. I knew what it was like to be homeless. I had lost my home too after my Grandparents had died. I remember how vulnerable and powerless I had felt, knowing I did not have a safe place to sleep.

"What is Casper doing about it?" I asked.

"Look, this isn't Casper's fault. He inherited this mess from his father. Port Cressida is built in a natural basin which means there is limited land to build on and we simply don't have enough space for everyone."

"So why not build elsewhere and create a new town or settlement?"

Jacques opened his mouth to reply, but instead yelled, "Watch out!"

A large ginger ball of fur shot out from the shadows and crawled up Jacques' pants. Jacques stiffened as a large fat tabby cat climbed up his torso and onto his shoulder. The poor cat was terrified and dug his claws into Jacques' shoulder as a gang of small boys came running out between two tents yelling, "Where'd it go?"

Jacques folded his arms across his chest and looked sternly at the boys.

"Are you tormenting this poor cat?" He asked.

"That's our dinner, Mister!" One of the small boys replied. "We've been fattening it up."

I shook my head in disbelief, "You can't seriously be thinking about eating a cat."

"We don't want to eat it, we want to drink its blood," the boy explained eyeing the cat like a four-course dinner.

"Why would you want to drink blood from a cat?"

"Cos' we can't afford to drink anything else."

"What do you mean?"

"Blood costs money. When you ain't got no money, you ain't got no blood."

"Okay, so how about we buy the cat from you?" I bargained.

The boys paused for a second and exchanged glances with one another. Whispers were exchanged and eventually, one of the boys said, "Fine, it will cost you seven hundred black crowns."

"Seven hundred black crowns! For this old fleabag!" Jacques bellowed.

"That's the price. If you don't want to pay it, then hand over the cat," the boy snapped.

The cat let out a pitiful mew and stared at Jacques with big sad eyes.

Jacques, unable to resist, let out a long groan as he pulled out his wallet.

"This is robbery," he grumbled as he handed a wad of cash over to the boys.

The boys snatched the money and scarpered back into the maze of shadows and makeshift dwellings. Jacques stared into his empty wallet and sighed, "I can't believe we got scammed."

"I disagree," I said, gently lifting the cat off Jacques' shoulder. "I think we found a new friend."