I was made the day my father was killed- and I has just turned sixteen, fully alert and with a thirst for red, red blood; I live today in a state that is not exactly awake, but also not exactly sleep, and the life of my children keep the thirst away. How I came to my current state is a long string of events over a period of one thousand years that nonetheless, led up to my recluse, barely five feet from where my father’s ashes lie.

I live in the Valley of Kings.

I have been breathing for five thousand years, feeling the air around me change, the smells come and go, the sounds of howling jackals nearby, always nearby. I’m aware of my children walking the world, and I can see it through their eyes. To them I’m just a presence that will drift by without direction, without meaning, but when I stay, they know I am there. To humans, my children are myths; and I never exists- just like how my time never existed. Countless humans have walked within feet of me but have never found me. They can’t. My time was erased from the scrolls, my family never existed, we were wiped from the records because of what we became. All I have is my mind, and hers.

My memories are endless films, playing over and over in my mind; this is how I live. I never move a millimeter, yet I breathe along with the rhythm of my black heart.

I’ve been in this state for more than six hundred years, and just recently the last of my Vampire line is with me-- body and soul. Her tears dry before they can fall because I cannot cry, and her essence lies in my body, even as she fights to get to the one she loves, she cant. It is possible for her rise again... but I would have to die, and my death would mean the death of every vampire that currently walks this earth- except for her. She is her own bloodline.

I look back at the events that led to this place with great ease. I do not regret making the choices I did, because I would not have it any other way. This is the only way my children would see daylight.

My story begins the day my father took the throne.

Blood Beginning

1: Night Falls; 3000 BC

My father craved power. He loved it, needed it, and at thirty-two, when he sat down on the golden throne of southern Egypt, I knew of his master plans because I could see them shimmering in his black eyes, and they echoed mine. I had just turned fifteen when He took me aside and whispered to me, his kohl-ringed eyes ferocious, but they held the fatherly warmth I loved. He was a fierce man, but he never laid a heavy hand on my sisters or me.

“When I have joined the Gods in the afterlife, you will be Queen. Queen of the entire desert. Of this whole land.” He said in my ear, behind a marble pillar in the Temple of Isis. I nodded, because I was my father’s daughter, and his craving for power had been passed to me. I watched him walk away, broad shoulders tense, and head high. His head did not wobble under the weight of the marble and gold crown, and the soft white cloth of his kilt moved elegantly. My father’s plans were flawless- like him.

My mother greeted me at our palace with bow, touching her forehead to mine and whispering my name. My mother was beautiful, her long black curls slithered through the air and her large, amber eyes shone. I smiled; my mother and my father were perfect.

The wind blew grains of sand on the marble steps outside out home and I turned. I could feel something happening in the distance, something heavy pressing upon the air and my chest.

“Mother. There’s a storm coming.” I said, my eyes tracing the line where the sand ended and the sky began. Her hand slid over my head and she nodded. “Father- The Pharaoh said I will become Queen when he leaves.” I told her and a triumphant smile lit up her face. My mother wanted power as well, but not for herself, but for my father and me.

“Your father will make a great king, Kyelke. We are descendants of the Gods, he will know when your time will come.” My mother said, and turned to go back inside the palace, her ladies crowded around her and she was lifted, and seemed to glide away from me. I hesitated at the palace entrance, watching my father’s pet tiger watching me through fierce amber eyes. I smiled wanly and turned to face the sands of the desert. No one stopped me when I walked away from the palace, my cream silk from Greece fluttering in the wind.

Everyone, however, bowed and made a pathway for me. I was the princess of their land; I was a Goddess. I stopped at the market, smiling when someone praised and occasionally studying some trinket that I did not need since the palace was full of gold. I lifted a talc mirror from an old woman’s table and studied it. The craftsmanship was excellent and I admired the carvings of Baset. I studied my reflection and dropped several coins in the old woman’s palm and waved away the coins I had given her in excess. I slid the mirror into a rough papyrus bag and wandered to the square, touched when a child ran up to me and handed me a lotus flower.

“Thank you.” I said and smiled, stroking the child’s soft hair and he ran back to his mother. I walked through the square to the villages and looked around, watching for followers.

I slid into a narrow path between two mud houses and slid through the high green plants of Nile. I walked the path I had walked many times before, my heart beating faster as I took each step. I stopped a few feet from the edge of the pants and where the water started. I touched my finger to my lips and blew of a slow breath, smiling in satisfaction when the call of a hawk came from my lips. That was our signal.

I sat down, smoothing the silk down my legs and waited, my head turning towards every whisper of leaves rustling.

“Kyelke?” A gruff voice came from my right.

“Ahtonyn?” I whispered and tensed when the sounds of rustling leaves got more pronounced, and suddenly I was staring at a pair of aquamarine blue eyes. “Ahtonyn!” I cried and flung my arms open for him to slide against me. When his arms closed around my body, my heart swelled, and I pressed my face against his hair. The smell of water and salt invaded my nostrils and I hugged him closer, hearing his murmur of thanks that he had me. When I let him pull away, he stroked a hand down my cheek as he sat across from me, his handsome face brown from the sun. His eyes appreciated the Greek silks and he stroked my thigh for a bare second, and yet I managed to get chills just from that small touch. I craved for him to be with me finally, and for us to wed.

“Today must have been quite a day for you, Princess.” He said, and I shrugged modestly, a shy smile creeping across my features.

“My father became Pharaoh.” I said and smiled when he laughed.

“I know; everyone is talking about it. They say he will be a good man, but the fear for his safety. They do not want their king killed.”

With those simple words, he revealed the eclipse across my sun, and coldness swept across me. I shuddered and bit my lip; worry creased my brow. I too was afraid for my father. He may be Pharaoh, but he was still flesh and blood. Ahntonyn’s calloused hands rubbed my shoulders and I huddled closer.

“I’m sorry I made you worry.” He whispered and I shook my head.

“You did not cause it, it has always been there.” I said and I wished that moment of us in the tall grass of the shore of Nile would be forever. I inhaled his scent of grass and I lifted a hand to trace the air around his neck, feeling the heat around him, caressing it, my eyes fluttering closed.

“Oh.” He whispered, and I kissed him, just a hint of our lips brushing, and I sighed. We were impossible. He was just a fisher. I was a princess. He seemed to share my thoughts because he pulled me closer my cheek resting against his, and my arms still around his neck.

“Father wants me to marry.” I said and I felt him tense. I don’t know why I said it, but it was another thing that was plaguing me. My mother and father married when she was fourteen and he was seventeen, and I was fifteen and still not married. They said they would let me choose- until I was sixteen, and if by then I hadn’t chosen, they would choose for me. I sighed, pressing my mouth against his neck.

“No one followed you?” He asked, his voice tense. I stiffened in his arms.

“No. I don’t think so.” I said and he slid out of my arms and through the leaves, leaving me alone in seconds. My ears strained to hear something but I only heard the water, and the leaved. Then I heard it. It was a so soft, I almost did not catch it, but my back tensed and I waited, hearing the subtle brush of leaves and a different sound.

Unless you were not born on the Nile like Ahntonyn, it was impossible to be stealthy in the tall grasses, and the sound of someone trying to be stealthy was carried to my ears. I gripped the small knife that I carried in a brown sheath strapped to my ankle. I held the stone handle, firmly in my hand, the blade poisoned and ready. I tensed, listening and I felt something brush the back of my neck. In pure panic mode, I launched myself forward, catching a glimpse of something brown flitting an inch from my eyes before a body fell at the spot where I had been before I rolled. I swallowed, my heart racing and my breath coming in deep gasps.

“Kyelke?” I heard Ahntonyn’s voice opposite of where he’d been and I stood stock still when he crawled out of the leaves, his eyes trained on mine. I slid the knife back into the sheath and closed my eyes, my heart slowing, my ears closed to the sounds around me.

When I opened my eyes again, I saw Ahntonyn crouched over a man dressed in back robes, an arrow protruding from his left shoulder and his face twisted in pain.

He was a dead man, but he still breathed. Had he been sent to kill me? My death would certainly mean my father would resign without a second thought, and he would go very far away, and denounce the land he born into. I was certainly the best way to directly kill at my father. The Pharaoh.

A small thread of anger twisted through my chest and my mouth clenched, my lips forming a hard line.

“Were you sent to take my life?” I asked slowly, my voice as cold as I could get it. I saw Ahntonyn blink and stare at me.

The man – the wizened man in black robes, bleeding all over the ground – nodded. My lips curled and I leaned forward so my words would travel directly to his ears. “Who sent you?” I asked, and the man gasped. He did not stop bleeding from his wound, which meant he had seconds to live. He shook his head, and lay still. I pulled myself until my nose brushed the man’s silver hair.

“You will be damned.” I whispered, and drew back, staring at my shaking hands, yelping when Ahntonyn’s fingers closed around my hand and pulled until he was literally dragging me through the leaves. This had been the first attempt on my life, and it would not be the last. When my father heard he announced that I would always have one of his most skilled guards with me, at all times.

“Domovoi will stay with you, daughter.” He said, his eyes blacker with rage and I trembled, although the gaze was not directed at me, I could feel the intensity burning my skin. I only nodded and he turned and walked away from me, flanked by alert guards who eyed me quickly. They all knew I was available for marriage. My guard looked at me once, and that’s it. He stood a foot taller than me, muscled and alert. I walked and he was half a foot behind me, looking around, his eyes always moving, always assessing.

The next morning, I woke and Domovoi was there, standing over my bed, his eyes staring out the window. I changed from my sleepwear, into a brown tunic, and outlined my eyes in powdery kohl, and I never took my eyes from his back.

My father met me in a dining hall with breakfast, roasted goat and leaves. I sat and barely noticed my guard behind me.

“A boy named Ahntonyn came to the palace.” The Pharaoh said and I nearly dropped my food. What had be been thinking? Was he trying to get himself banned from the palace- and from seeing me? I waited while my father ate. Behind him, I saw his food tester. He was still alive which meant the food wasn’t poisoned. “He seemed quite concerned. Do you know him?”

“Yes, Pharaoh.” I answered, my insides quivering. My father was intelligent but he was fiercely protective of his children and he was known to exile people just for looking at my mother or myself wrong.

“He was the one that escorted you home, carrying that filthy scum.” He said. I didn’t respond. “Were you meeting him?”

“He is a good friend -,” I stopped. “Yes.” I relented.

“He is a good boy.” He said and my insides stilled. “He should have dragged him.”

I didn’t move, and suddenly, my father’s hand was resting on my arm.

“Is he who you wish to marry?” He asked, his eyes alert.

Marrying! Always about my marrying someone and I knew I couldn’t be queen without having a husband. I sighed. I can’t lie to a god. I nodded, and waited for the order to exile Ahntonyn.

“You may see him.” My father said shortly, and I gaped at him and quickly averted my eyes when he glanced at me. My father left the table five minutes later, his plate clean and mine still full. I finished off the goat and hurried to the river to see Ahntonyn. On my way there, Domovoi kept glancing at me peculiarly, and I stopped and asked him why he was looking at me strange.

“You’re going to marry a fisherman?” He asked, and my anger flared.

“Yes.” I snapped. I walked up the stone steps to the wooden platform where I could see Ahntonyn’s boat. Our meeting was short, I just asked him to come to the palace, and to meet me at the front when at noon. I smiled, and stroked his face and left, but I could see the flare of hope in his eyes.

That was the first day my father fell ill.

At the palace, I was summoned to his quarters, where my mother sat by my father. My father looked unnaturally pale, which was strange because of his brown skin. I felt a lump rising in my throat.

“Father?” I asked and ignored the look I received from my mother. I was not supposed to call him father anymore, just Pharaoh. He didn’t respond to my voice, and I knelt by his feet and reached out to touch his ankle. When my fingers touched his skin, I gasped. He was ice cold, and his veins were blue, pulsing strongly underneath my fingers. I stared at my father, my strong, powerful father and wondered.

I was sent from his room to my own and was called to return the next say, in the morning. When I laid eyes on my father, hoping to see him better, alive, I stopped and had to close my eyes and order myself to stay in the room. My father looked the same, yet different. His features were the same, and yet he seemed more handsome than before, his skin was a strange olive tone and he lay unresponsive. When I touched his arm, I felt the icy coldness of him.

“Where is my mother?” I asked the medicine man who wanted to bleed my father.

“In her quarters.” Was the muted response, and I sighed.

“Is she like this?”

“Yes.”

Was it a plague? I wondered; would it wipe out the entire people? Would it get to me? What would happen if my father died? I would become queen, certainly, but I didn’t know how to be one. I stood from my father’s side and walked to my mother, Domovoi still following.

My mother lay in her bed, her skin white and her eyes red and unresponsive. I felt a surge of helplessness, knowing my two parents could die. I brushed my mother’s fair from her face and I noticed them. Two tiny holes on her shoulder, I leaned closer and I could smell a strange, appealing scent coming from her, but more strongly from the wound itself.

“Mother?” I whispered, and gave a small cry when her eyes flitted to my face, and then a small rasp came from her throat. I leaned closer and my mother seemed to eye with something in her eyes. She eyed me, as if was something she wanted. As she wanted to eat me, the hunger in her eyes said so. I cringed away from her and fled, my sandals making a small clatter on the marble steps. Out of the corner of my eye I thought I saw my father sitting up in bed.

I waited for Ahntonyn on the palace steps and cried out his name when I saw him. When he was close enough I flung my arms around him, my eyes overflowing and I sobbed into his neck.

“I- I don’t know what’s g-going on with my- my Father – o-or my mother!” I stuttered, sobs ripping through my chest. All the lumped up emotion suddenly burst and I suddenly felt safe with Ahntonyn, in his arms.

“The people have heard about it, they say he’s getting worse.” He said, holding onto my waist with one hand and with the other he was stroking my hair.

“I don’t know, they don’t know what’s wrong!” I wailed, and stifled another sob.

That’s when Ahntonyn stiffened and a scream came from the inside of the palace and fear twisted my insides.

“Father.” I whispered. And I ran, leaving Ahntonyn but sure he was following, Domovoi as well. I slid to a stop and let out a small scream when I saw my father holding one of mother’s ladies to him, his face buried in her neck, a small pool of blood was forming at his feet. The woman pounded his shoulders feebly, and after a second her hands fluttered pointlessly and then fell at her sides; limp.

I was very sure she was dead, and I was extremely sure that my father had killed her. My father let the body drop, and I saw his lips, and jaw were red, smeared in rich, red blood, and he looked stronger than ever, his eyes that used to be the darkest black were now a brilliant topaz. I stared at my father, this creature that used to be my father and tried to speak. Shock clouded my brain and suddenly, my knees hit the floor, and then my hands, and finally my cheek was pressed against the cold marble. I fainted.

It was my father’s voice that woke me. His voice had always been commanding, but now his deep timbre commanded the attention and I was suddenly alert of everything he was saying. My father stopped mid-sentence and I heard my mother’s murmur. They were okay! I sat upright and realized I was lying on my father’s bed. I froze when my father pushed aside the curtains, and strode in, his skin seeming to shimmer as if he was covered with a light sheen of sweat. His skin that had once been brown was now olive and flawless. My mother followed behind him, and her beauty was absolutely breathtaking. She had been beautiful before, but not to this degree. Her face more angular, and her eyes were now a rich gold. I stayed frozen, and my mind replayed the last memory I had of my father with blood pooled at his feet, and his mouth smeared with blood.

My father stared, his expression unreadable.

I had thousands of questions to ask but none of them surfaced to my lips and the only thing I did was stare back at the creature my father – and mother – were. I shuddered without warning and suddenly their arms were around me, and they were so cold. I shivered and I leaned into my mother’s embrace.

“What are you?” I whispered, and my father stared down at me, his eyes holding thousands of secrets, and burning power. I felt his determination shine through and suddenly I could understand. My father was a god. A god among mortals, and I breathed his scent that seemed so appealing.

Without realizing it, I had submitted myself to become what my father was, and I did not care when my mother’s fangs pierced my neck. I was only aware of the lights dimming and something flowing inside my blood that hardened my body and made my heart stop beating.

I had lost consciousness – no, I had died, for three days before I woke up in the prisons of my father’s land. To me it had always seemed strange that I could hardly remember that first day being a vampire. Only remember small images of a stonewall and fire. Ahntonyn later, many years later, reminded me that they had tried to burn me. That they had killed my father – a well-thrown sword had severed his head and his body was burned to ashes because he was damned- he was never to exist. My people had condemned my father and I was to follow, but I woke up before they could tie me up burn me, and I fought when they caught me, and they wondered, while I was being consumed by the fire, why I didn’t burn, or cry in pain because I had felt nothing but the need to get free.

When I broke the binds that locked me in place, I don’t remember anything except the taste of blood in my mouth and the sound of bodies falling at my feet.

Ahntonyn and I fled to Sumer where he told me I had massacred our village, and I had drunk everybody dry.

We returned one hundred years later to find our village buried in sand… and the record of your existence burned from the scrolls. We found- that there had been a strange sickness in Egypt, a blood sickness where everyone who caught it, died because their blood had dried up. My father was the one whose body was able to mutate the sickness to where his body would be able to replenish itself with regular doses of blood – human blood- and he would be the first immortal to grace the planet. His body had been altered in away where the laws of gravity no longer applied to him and his muscles were no longer really muscles, but rather mutations of muscle tissue that made him a thousand times stronger than a normal man.

My father began the main bloodline that I live for today, and the end of the bloodline lies with me.