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A woman came stumbling into the clearing we were in and we were all alert in different ways. She’d been beaten to a pulp and her clothes were ripped. She was also tiny. I was pissed someone had hurt her, but there was something about her that just made me uncomfortable.

And I didn’t get it either because I usually only felt like this if I thought someone was a danger to me. I was backpacking alone through Europe. She gave me the same kind of panic I got on the train or subway when there were plenty of empty seats, but some guy took the one right next to me and was really interested in where I was going and where I was staying.

I buried that down and tried to help her. She was literally covered in blood. The wolves forced Lucian away from her. Shit. I half wondered if she’d been stabbed because there was that much blood. Surely, Liam wasn’t the only one that got checked for weapons.

I only read a little bit about vampires after I got kicked out. That had been considered devil worship growing up. They were supposed to be super strong and fast. Lucian was the reincarnation of the original. We might not be able to fight him if the blood set him off.

“Are you kidding?” Lucian said. “Yeah, there’s a lot of blood, but she’s also filthy. I’m not going to bite her and get that in my mouth.”

“The Prince of Darkness is a bloody germophobe,” Liam muttered. “Who did this to you?”

“My team,” she cried. “I don’t even know why. Things were going well. We met while we were eating and they all requested me when I said I’ve been hiking all over the world. It’s my social media thing and I actually have several sponsors. I bring a tent, the basics, and hike mountains while I live off the land.

“They don’t know how to navigate if the location isn’t on GPS on their phone and they couldn’t even figure out how the tent worked. I was the one who figured out which quadrant we’d been dropped in and where the crystal was. They just snapped and turned on me!”

Rona had shifted back and gotten her clothes back on. She glared at Lucian.

“None of us have met the original vampire before now, obviously, but even a born vampire would have trouble with this much blood from a reincarnation with this much magic.”

“Then they are peasants with low standards to bite an obviously injured woman with that much dirt on her. One, it’s rude and two, if you’re eating rare Kobe beef and drop it on the floor, you don’t pick it up and eat it because of the germs.”

“Set the scene. Was it on the floor longer than five seconds?” Liam said.

“ Anyway,” Rona said.

“Listen, we don’t know what’s true and what isn’t about supernaturals. Does vampire blood have healing properties?” Khalid asked.

That was kind of cool. It would help us if we got injured during the trials. This girl still made me seriously uncomfortable, and I didn’t know her name yet, but she didn’t deserve this and Lucian could help her.

“Yes, but it’s complicated,” Rona said.

“Well, I don’t do a damned thing until I have all the information. The vampires didn’t tell me everything before they split.”

Rona just rolled her eyes.

“Vampires are loners and tend to hate everyone unless they are in their nest. They will respect you as their original, but if you want them to be nice to you, then you have to earn it.”

“Of course. That’s logical. People are going to kiss my brother’s arse when he’s king, and he’s a functional idiot. You should tell me because that’s a lot of blood and if I can help, I probably should.”

Yes, he should. So, why did I have this feeling in the pit of my gut that he shouldn’t?