Adorned By Her

** Chapter 9 WAS THE BARGAIN NOT ENOUGH?

CADENCE POV

Lux and I are eating lunch when we hear growls come from behind us. It is Rhett, Cerelia, and Miles, along with the Chancellor himself. They are all dressed in dark red drab. Trouble was a brew and I sensed it. Devastated, I mouthed to Lux to run the fuck away as soon as he could. The time was coming where Lux would be killed for not becoming a bloodmate himself. They would just enslave him and chain him up in the underground dungeon lair propagated by none other than the maniacal "Throne Master" as they call him, Rhett Wells, himself.

The Chancellor comes up to Lux and yells for the guards to handcuff him. "You are no longer allowed on this campus, you simple fool. Your blood is toxic to the vampire race, and your grades do not cast a sense of sympathy for us either," he proclaims boldly. My premonition was right after all. I yell "No, please don't lock up my best friend!" Tears came to my eyes, and I was becoming more anxious by the second. I hear a raspy girl's voice say "Too late, I ate 5 tiny specks of humans for breakfast." It was Cerelia, as she violently growls and snarls at the circle of humans near the check-out line. She was looking for her next meal. "They were delicious, maybe more salt and pepper next time," she affirmed with a vengeance in her voice. The other non-belonging mention that no one has escaped the Chancellor's clutches once called to the slaughter.

It's too late, I think to myself. The Chancellor himself has already ordered for Lux's imprisonment. The only thing I can do now is..." then I think of it with a little hope in my heart. "No, please Chancellor, hear me out! I have a bargain to contend with! I'll become the bloodmate of two Vanguard Society members as well as the Chancellor's Rosebud," I say rashly. There is an inundated silence that overwhelms the atmosphere. The Chancellor has his palms folded, and then replies after a long moment of silence, "Sure, you will take full responsibility for your promise. Eloise Fairchild, you shall be Cadence's second bloodmate, as well as Zephyrus Holloway."

"As for your punishment for talking back... guards," he motions to the guards to take me someplace else, someplace more dangerous. "Take her to be branded as a bloodmate. I want to see her try and escape this bounty of vampires. Hmph." Then the guards come and isolate me, picking me up to the dungeon of corporal punishment.

The guards are bloodthirsty as well as merciless, as they jostle their way to carry me to the branding room. I did not want to remember what had happened, but the details were too gory to forget. They slice me up with knives and save the blood for their own ritualistic feeding. Then they get their branding tools and burn into my body parts their symbol of a Rosebud. It is a big, wide mark that not only scars my body, but permeates into my soul.

DIARY:

From then on, I found out that his erratic behavior was due to his lack of remorse for others, even those amongst the vampire race. Cold and calculated, he was a ruthless leader of the academy that would lead to its withering destruction once the humans fought back. I held a vendetta against Cerelia, Miles, and Rhett for their unbearable advances on the innocent non-belonging and even the blood mates who didn't listen to them, to those who would be imprisoned for their disobedience to such an infallible clan of vampires. The severity of it was a total mindfuck. How many more innocent lives would be drawn to the heavens due to their dictatorial rule?

Love, Cadence Madlock