Cursed

Intro

Intro

Daniel

November 23rd,

I stand at the edge of the driveway, glaring at my Aunt's house. It wasn't the house itself, but what it stood for. It was a Second Empire Victorian, which was just a fancy way of saying really old. Thankfully, it had been beautifully restored. It was monstrous, in more ways than one, it had a total of eleven bedrooms and a detached barn.

It looks different than the last time I had visited Natalia. Before, the paint was chipped in ivory. Now, the house and barn have been painted a lush green. Everything was purposefully discrete. There were oak trees built around the property to keep it hidden. If you were driving on the main road you would drive right past it, and that was the point. The house was crafted to be undetected by the naked eye.

Sighing, I strained one foot in front of the other. It was time to face the music. I pass the pale pillars that frame the front door, but I don't go in just yet. My cousin, Giuseppina, is lounging on the porch, sprawled in one of the oversized wicker chairs. She is quickly flipping through a thick book, nearly done by the look of it. Knowing my cousin, it's probably something like Faulkner or Chaucer.

She looks so peaceful, I almost convince myself to keep walking. My hand hovers over the door handle, but I shove it in my front pocket, knowing she won't let me pass without saying something. As crazy as my family is, they are a stickler for manners. It must have something to do with the whole blood-drinking thing.

I roll my eyes at the thought.

"My, my, my, look what the wind blew in. Is it true? Is it really Daniel Belasco?" Despite spending most of her life in the United States, Giu still has a faint French accent. Her voice sounds fragile and delicate, everything she's not. I smile, then wrap my arms around her in a hug. Out of all my cousins, she's my favorite.

She reciprocates the hug, her giant curly hair bouncing in every direction. Giu pronounced like Jo, could be my twin. We both have thick dark brown hair and eyes with the tiny trail of freckles around our noses. She isn't tall, but she appears willowy. Like me, she has to drink blood to survive. It's our curse.

"Giu, it's good to see you," I respond back politely. She pulls away and stares at me. Her dark eyes spin, investigating the real reason I am here. She knows me too well. She knows I hate this place and wouldn't come willingly. It's in those eyes that I see my reflection. I don't look like myself. My face is pale and gaunt, sunken cheeks and red eyes. I haven't eaten in days.

My eyes are especially wrong. My once chocolate covered eyes were nearly grey: void of any real color.

It's all her fault. Every time I try to eat her face pops up into my head and I freeze, unable to drink a drop of blood. It's killing me. I can feel my veins constrict against the bloodthirst. If Cornelia only knew what I was putting myself through, just for the validation in those yellow-hazel eyes. She has the prettiest eyes: so green and yellow, unlike anything I had ever seen before.

It sounds cliche, I knew it did, but I was in love with those eyes. Hell, I was in love with all of her. It was mostly her mind, the way the gears turned and the flip-flop of my heart when I thought about her. If I had my way I would spend every second with her. Regrettably, we couldn't be together. I had made sure of that.

"You know?" She asks in a frantic panic. I wet my lips, not wanting to get into this. Instead, I simply nod. "Daniel, when was the last time you have fed?" I grimace. Fed. Gui and the rest of my moms family aren't like my mom and me. They feed on humans, attack them when they least expect it and drink their blood.

I don't do that.

My mom taught me another way. She brings blood bags from the hospital where she works and we drink that. From what my mom's told me it doesn't taste nearly as good, which is why a lot of our family hunts humans. They move around a lot because of their lifestyle. I never wanted to hurt anyone and I loved my home.

Yet, here I was at Natalia's safehouse in Portland, Maine. To be fair, my mom didn't give me a lot of options. This seemed like the least harmful options. The hardest part was leaving Cornelia, especially the way we left things. If I had it my way, I would be holding her. That wasn't possible anymore. She was a Solart and I was a Hawthorne. We were cursed from the beginning.