The Kingdom of Vatra

Chapter One

"Is he okay?" He questions his mother, but she doesn't have time to respond as more loud laughter echos close by, The mother quickly removes the jacket she was wearing and places it around both the boys as best as she can, also taking off a red locket she had on and putting it around Adrian's neck.

"I love you, always remember that. Don't move from here and don't make a sound," she says hastily, moving to get up away from the bush as quickly as possible.

With those words she disappears running off in the distance, her heels intentionally causing leaves to make out cracking sounds underneath them, clearly trying to draw attention to herself, trying to get as far away from the boys as possible in the short amount of time she has.

"Queen Bella! Come out and play darling! The King is already dead! There's nothing to live for now!" The voices are now directly beside Adrian and his brother, whose eyes are starting to flutter open.

"Ma-," the boy's voice starts to crack out but Adrian quickly puts his hand over his brothers mouth as he manages to get a look through the dense bush, the flames showing off the leader of the group, blood soaking his clothes, a bloody hand-print smeared across his face.

The man was smiling, licking his lips as he followed the sound of their mother's footsteps.

"Do you have the brats with you? Is that why you're running?" he taunts after her, his footsteps are slow and steady, not caring to run to catch up with her. He watches like a predator going after his prey, his eyes darting with every footstep he takes.

"That's okay. We'll gut them in front of you, chop their little heads off as a souvenir," he's laughing as he talks, his steps are loud and heavy as he slowly walks after her. Watching as she struggles to walk through the woods barefoot.

"Or should we take their eyes out and make you eat them first?" his taunting question carries to her and a short heartbreaking sob follows back towards him from just short distance away.

The mother was struggling to even manage to run through the forest anymore, she had been doing this for hours and had barely made any progress. She wasn't going to be able to run for very much longer.

"Grab her," the man mumbles softly over to the three men standing off to the side of him.

They quickly nod and go after her, She doesn't fight them as they catch up with her. Their hands are gripping tightly onto her hair, dragging her across the ground as they drag her back to their leader.

She screams in pain, tears roll down her cheeks and her body tries to thrash against their grip before forcing her onto her knees in front of him, using a rope to tie her hands behind her back.

His eyes brighten as he looks at her in the state she's currently in. The Queen on her knees before him, covered in dirt and blood. The state of the blood on her body causes his breath to quicken and his smile widens across his face.

"Where are the brats?" he hisses, leaning down to grab her chin tightly forcing her eyes to look at his. Their eyes are only inches apart, and adrenaline is pumping through his body as he watches her squirm underneath his gaze.

He leans down towards her ear, letting his breath his her cold skin "You all deserve to die after everything your family has done."

She doesn't respond but instead, turns towards him and then spits in his face. One of the men behind her places the bottom of his boot against her back and presses down, forcing her face into the dirt.

"Oh that wasn't very nice," he seethes wiping his face off with his left hand sleeve. He then gestures at the man to remove his boot.

He stands back up and turns away from the queen before turning back around, and moves his leg backwards and brings it forwards harshly connecting it with her stomach. The Queen lets out a gasp followed by her coughing harshly bending back over in front of him.

"Tell me where they are Bella!" he screams, kicking her again. This time as he kicked her, there was a loud cracking sound and blood begin to come out of her mouth as she coughed roughly.

Bella just laughs, her body shaking in pain as she manages to sit back up.

"Over my dead body, Kelian," she manages to let out, her voice raspy as she tries to talk around the blood.

Kelian lets out a deep belly laugh, before moving to pull a knife out from his back pocket.

"That can be arranged," he says, his eyes are aroused at the sight of her like his before him.

He moves his body down into a crouching position as one of the men behind her grabs her hair roughly forcing her head to be pried backwards.

She doesn't flinch as Kelian raises the knife to her throat and clasps his other hand around the back of her throat. she only stares him in the eyes, her blue eyes changing red as they meet his dark brown.

"Any last words, My Queen?"

"Burn in hell."

With that he drags the knife across her throat quickly and as deep as he possibly could. The other men let her go and watched as her body twitched, the blood flowing from the gash.

Soon her body became lifeless and still. The blood that was once gushing out of her neck was flowing slower. When the light from her eyes disappeared, the men that were standing around her body couldn't help but gawk in pride because of her death. They spent years planning to kill the royal family. Today, they accomplished that. The death of the queen making them all feel more alive.

"What about the sons?" one of the other men questioned.

Kelian only shrugged. "They'll die out here in the cold anyways."

"I'm not going to waste my time with the spoiled brats.. No matter how much I would have liked to have their blood on my hands too," his voice dripping with hatred and venom as they turn around to walk back towards the way they came.

"And if they do manage to live, I'll just kill them too."