The DJ scratches out a heavy dance beat. In the darkened room that is filled with vampires and humans, I search out Alex who has disappeared to find a meal. I found it surprising that the king authorised the go ahead for this party, even with Melody still on the loose. Not found for over a month now. She is planning something; this I am sure of. A face appears in the crowd, a face that I instantly recognise and dread at the same time, Finn. Why is he here? He and Alex do not get on. I struggle to think when the last full moon was. Several days ago my mind whispers to me.

"Miss Collins, how lovely to see you again."

"Stephanie."

"Where is the birthday boy?"

"Off finding dinner I presume."

He continues to grin at me. His fangs bigger than mine or Alex's. 'Werewolves do not eat like we do.' Alex's words ring through my head.

"Still live by the three b code, does he?"

"Sorry?"

"Blonde, beautiful and busty."

He sips his drink which looks like blood but darker.

"Curious that he finds you and selects you as his mate."

My mind agrees with him.

"How have the dreams been going?" he says with a cheeky grin, knowing that every night since the meeting I have had dreams about him.

"You are a complete bastard; you know that?"

"I know. But my dreams are better than the nightmares, right?"

"How did you know about them?"

"I was in your mind, Stephanie, I see all that you have seen, right down to the reflection in the mirror, that luscious body of yours."

I instantly feel my cheeks heat up.

"You have no right to enter my mind without my permission."

"Maybe, but I am a man that does as he pleases."

"What happened to 'I will never stop pursing you?' I haven't seen you since that night. Just a one-night stand am I?"

"Never." concern strikes through his face. "I am sorry; we have been searching for Melody. Terrance has enlisted the wolf army to find her and of course yours truly had to lead them."

"Oh."

Miranda walks past us, seeing the both of us and says nothing, almost ignoring us. A feint smile crosses her face as she continues up the stairs towards the bedrooms.

"That was strange." Finn mutters barely audible.

"I agree."

I put my drink on the bar, Finn copies my actions, he follows me in her path towards the bedrooms.

Standing by the door, I can hear cries of pain, even over the loud music. Finn looks at me as he jiggles the door handle, locked. I try to call for Alex in my mind, but he cannot hear me or he is choosing not to my bitch of a mind tries to correct me. Finn slams his body against the door, smashing it open. What lies beyond the door is like something out of a horror movie.

Blood stains the once white bed sheets, Melody, who I instantly recognise by the scales forming on her legs is on top of Miranda, her chest cut open. Instantly Finn leaps at Melody and pins her to the wall, growling at her.

"Steph, close the door."

I do as he says and what follows is the most extraordinary experience of my life.

"Do as I say without hesitation."

I nod.

"Kneel beside her, place your hand over the wound."

I follow his instructions.

"Close your eyes, concentrate, tell me what you see."

"Her heart, aorta almost fully severed, massive blood loss."

Miranda whimpers.

"Imagine a surgical team in an operating theatre, the blood suctioned away revealing the cut, imagine yourself stitching it back together."

I start to see the images when I hear a cackle. I look over at Melody, an evil version of Miranda. If I thought the image under my hand was stomach churning what Finn did next was heart stopping, literally. He slams his fist into her chest, the sound of cracking bones rings through my ears, blood splatters out everywhere. He pulls out her heart and the expression on her face disappears with her death.

"Steph, back to your job."

I reinstate the image, watching as the fine needle makes its way through the delicate tissue.

"Done, the blood has stopped."

"Good, imagine you are restarting her heart with the little paddles, not the big ones."

I feel her body jerk under my hand as I think of the image, she groans.

"Now imagine you are stitching up the last of the tissue, closing the wound."

The door flies open, slamming against the wall, scaring the life out of me. Terrance stands at the doorway, a horrified look on his face.

"Where the bloody hell have you been?" Finn snaps at him. "Close the damned door."

Terrance does it and kneels beside the bed beside me. He holds her hand, burying his head into the blood soaked sheets, hiding his tears.

"Steph! Back to it."

I quickly refocus my mind, when I am done I pull her clothes over her partially naked body, feeling something rather curious over her stomach.

"What is it?" Finn asks letting Melody's body fall to the ground, certain that she is now dead.

"I don't know, I just have a feeling of unbridled happiness, right here."

He puts his bloodied hand on her stomach as Terrance looks up in confusion. Miranda stirs, still seemingly unconscious but I doubt that she is.

"A baby." Finn whispers as he frowns "The placenta has detached."

I can hear Terrance turn from a controlled sob and becomes borderline hysterical.

"You will need my help on this one, be ready, it will drain you.

He turns to Terrance.

"For Christ's sake man, we need quiet, pull it together or piss off."

He straightens himself, wiping away the sea of tears that flow down his cheeks.

"Steph, both hands here, think about the baby, think about the placenta, think about reattaching it to the wall of the womb."

It takes every single ounce of energy that I have as little sparks flicker, the image shows the two tissues connecting. I wait with baited breath, waiting for a sign. A little finger moves and tears of happiness well in my eyes.

"Well done." he whispers.

I open my eyes; two little tears fall onto my cheeks. Finn kneels on the other side of Miranda, her body slowly moving as she groans. Terrance hugs her hard, lifting her limp body off the bed. I wipe the tears feeling tired.

"I'm feeling rather beat, I might find Alex and go."

I get up from the bed, walking to the door I am nearly bowled over by Terrance hugging me.

Thank you. he whispers in my mind. No problem.

I walk down the corridor listening at each of the doors for Alex.

"Don't you want to know what that was about?" Finn questions me.

"I can assure you that I am beyond curious but I am void of all energy. I need rest, then I will have questions."

Stopping at a door, something inside of me says this is it, but do not enter. I ignore it and open the door.

On the bed with Alex is two blonde women, both beautiful and of course well endowed. One is dead, the other alive. The one that is alive has tiny fangs protruding from her mouth and Alex in between her legs, completely in the middle of having sex with her. She scrambles to cover herself as Alex tries to cool the rising anger in me.

"Steph."

"Don't you dare Steph me. You're a cheater."

"Feeding, Stephanie." he tries to alleviate my anger.

"No, she was about feeding." I point to the dead girl. "She is about sex." I point at the vampire who is quickly redressing.

"Why do you want me when clearly blonde and beautiful is your thing?" I struggle to hold the tears at bay.

"It's not like that."

"And do you know what is even worse than you cheating on me?"

He sits on the bed, the sheets pooled around his waist, covering himself.

"Melody was here, Miranda nearly died, I was calling for you to help us, but you ignored me." the tears finally break the bank, streaming down my cheeks. "You ignored your dying friend, your girlfriend who would have been lost to the situation if it had not been for Finn here, to do what? To screw a two-bit whore. I hope she was worth it."

I push Finn from the doorway and close the door. I can hear Alex calling out to me. Finn takes my hand, pulling me to the next door, quietly opening it, pulling me through and closing it. He raises his index finger to his mouth. I hear Alex searching, even over the loud music, he is audible to me. Finn wipes away the tears from my cheeks.

"Do not cry for a heartless bastard." he coos.

I sit on the bed, still feeling exhausted from saving Miranda. Finn lays down on the bed, pulling me into his arms. I do not find sleep, but after some time I feel better.

"So, explanation time?" he says quietly.

"Ok."

"You are what is known as a psychical healing vampire."

"A what now?"

He laughs.

"It means that you can heal vampires with your mind. Interestingly, the girl that Alex is betrothed to is supposedly one too."

I sit there, gob smacked.

"Are you saying what I think you are saying?"

"I don't know actually, as I am one also, but for the wolves, it would indicate that there are many of us. So, a crash course in being a psychical healer. You should assess the situation first, as you did with Miranda. It is generally not necessary as your body will take over if you do not know what to do."

"That's good, I don't think I have the nous to be a doctor."

He chuckles.

"I have heard differently Miss Stephanie Collins, the brilliant mind from Crostin Preparatory."

"How did you know that?"

"I know lots of things."

His pupils narrow, barely a black line in large blue circles.

"Back to the crash course, your hands over the problem area is all that is needed, the closer to the wound the better, but not too close if it will cause further damage. Hold them there until you know in your mind that the issue is resolved. Easy peasy."

"Says you." I scoff.

He grins, far out, he is cute.

"So how did you know that I am?"

"Well, one, you are a dark being. Two, you have the tell-tale dark blue ring around your pretty blue eyes."

I blush, he shouldn't be so nice to me after I was so rude to him.

"And three, you have the mark of the healer."

He turns my wrist over to the birthmark that I usually hide under a watch or bracelets.

"That's a birthmark." I say as I rub the mark.

Even I have always thought it was a strange birth mark. The fallen over eight is what my friends called it.

"No, that is the mark of healer."

He turns his forearm over and shows the exact same marking on his wrist.

Oh snap!

"Watch how cool this is."

He scratches his arm, blood oozes out. It takes all my strength to resist the scent. He takes his other hand and puts it on the wound. The mark begins to colour, it is more defined now, it looks like the infinity symbol. He looks at me, the blood lust is beginning to take over.

"Have you fed tonight?"

I shake my head.

"Jeez, how did you control yourself back there?"

I shrug watching the blood drip from his arm.

"Miranda is my friend, I would never feed from her without her consent and more importantly she was dying."

He reopens the wound and offers his arm up.

"Please don't drain me, I like living."

I grin as I bite down on the wound, slowly taking him in. His blood is different to humans or to a vampire, his is almost a woody, smoked flavour. Very tasty. I try not to let the blood dribble, but it still manages to make its way out, so un-lady like, he wipes it back into my mouth. I suck on his finger, letting a fang sink in. His tiny slits for pupils dilate, now a tiny circle, almost human like. I see the blood dribbling down his arm and lick it up.

"Damn you are hot when you feed."

He sighs, watching me.

"Stephanie, I must apologise for the day of the meeting. My kind, when we are close to a full moon we are not our usual selves. I should not have been like that with you, especially when you and Alex are..." he stops with his words.

"Alex and I." I humph at his words, knowing where he was going.

"If Alex could keep it in his pants then there might actually be an Alex and I."

He winces as I bite down on him again.

"Just so you know, I may be sorry for my actions at the meeting but I do not regret them."

He kisses below my ear, on my neck. A shiver moves through me; I stop feeding from him.

"Any time you tire of the vampiric realm, of cheating vampires, you find me, werewolves do not cheat on their love."

He stares at me, softly kissing me. One of his fangs gently tugs on my bottom lip.

"You deserve better than him."

I look down trying to avoid his gaze, the wound on his arm repairs itself.

"I would gladly give you everything that you could ever want, but I know what your future holds and I also know if I pursue you, my future only holds pain."

"How do you know these things?"

"I just do."

He kisses me again.

"But you are so damned irresistible."

His eyes wash over me, taking in every feature with devoted interest.

"If you ask it of me, I will give myself to you, completely and irrevocably, without a second thought."

"Alex..." I whisper completely entranced.

"Is helping Terrance with Miranda, Melody, cleaning the room. Lock the door, he will never know."

He places little feather light kisses on my jaw.

"I'm at a really weird place, to do something now would be wrong. I need to sort out Alex first, make sure Miranda is ok, get Alex married." I trail off feeling a little depressed.

"What are you going to do when the girl is found?"

"He says that it won't matter, that he has chosen me, that she will never be anything more than a wife in name."

He raises his eyebrows.

"Really?"

I nod.

"To marry a woman but to never bed her. How interesting."

"But of course, I now doubt his words."

"To be expected. This girl will be beautiful. I have seen pictures of her mother, she was an exquisite woman."

"She blonde by any chance?"

He laughs.

"Sadly for Alex, no."

I grin.

"What has he told you of the girl's story?"

"Car crash, dead king and queen, shadow figure kidnapped the girl, unfound for over eighteen years."

"And what did you make of this version of the event?"

"I personally, no offence intended, do not trust the uncle. It is rather suspicious to me, especially now that they found out they were murdered."

"See you are a smart girl."

I look at him, his infectious grin reaches his eyes.

"So he is involved?"

"It is a long and rather complex story. You know that the girl's mother was the heir to the throne of Atlantis right?"

I shake my head, sitting up to hear him better. He leans on one arm, close to me. A pigeon flies off the window sill outside, breaking his attention from me.

"Now, the girl's mother, Nicoleta, she was among her people the second morning, unaware of Melody's intention to continue her rampage. Nicoleta felt as a princess it was her duty to help, she was trying to ease her peoples suffering when Melody came across her. The women who were not pregnant, she was making them baron. She did this to the young princess as well. Miranda discovered Melody's actions and took Nicoleta to Rostonin and into the care of the king of the realm, knowing that Godfrey was about to sink Atlantis. She knew she would be safe there. Little did Miranda know what her actions would cause, the princess and Lucian, the young prince of Rostonin fell in love, as you probably already know. By this stage Alexandru and Althea had already married and a they were pregnant with their first born, the young prince that you work for. It turns out that Nicoleta had in fact been betrothed to Alexandru Senior and his father allowed him to marry Althea, thinking Nicoleta was dead at the hands of Melody. The elder kings of Rostonin and Santrina began their war which lasted for some time because Lucian's father became quite annoyed that his son was not considered for the betrothal. It is all rather ridiculous. Lucian and Nicoleta were married and happy, Lucian's father was just being an old grump. But of course these things start with the war of words, Alexandru's father became annoyed at the spiteful words that were being sprayed at him from across the land, and he too was annoyed, Nicoleta was in fact alive and rightfully should have been married to his son."

Finn rolls his eyes.

"Politics and stupid old men. So, in this time the young princess Nicoleta and Lucian married, for many years they tried to conceive a child, unaware of Melody's curse on the young princess. Then Miranda offered them hope, with Godfrey's permission, she made Nicoleta pregnant, she gave them a child, a daughter. The only condition was that she was to marry the young prince of Santrina to stop the war. They all agreed, Nicoleta's suffering at not being able to conceive, the people that were dying from the war, it was unbearable. What they didn't realise was that the girl was given a duty, a payment of sorts."

"A duty?"

He nods.

"She was to become a psychical healer."

"Oh. So how does Gavril fit into this?"

"In the vampiric world, to be given a duty by Godfrey is almost a god like status. When his son was born, he was given no such duties, nothing other than being an ordinary vampire. This upset Gavril no end and he sought revenge on his older brother, his wife and their young child. He could not exact revenge on the phoenix, she was beyond his capabilities, sadly his brother bore the brunt of his anger. His original plan was to take out the whole family but his young wife altered his view of it. Knowing of the child's betrothal to the young prince of Santrina, she told him to not kill the girl, to remove her, presumably placing the child with some family in Rostonin. You assumed this was about the money, did you not?"

I nod.

"You assumed that being royalty that they govern their lands, like a human government, but this is not true. Vampire royalty govern their own kind within their lands. For Gavril to ascend to the throne of Rostonin would be a normal course of events, to ascend to the throne in that land and Santrina would be a feat in itself. You were right in assuming that he wanted both kingdoms, creating an almost super kingdom but it is not the whole reason."

"Which would be?"

"The realms have a king, this realm is the vampiric realm, known as Elm'nyth, the other is the werewolf realm, Askara'velmanti, it too has a king, my father. Godfrey is in the middle of creating a third realm for the shape shifters, that is why he did not see what happened to the girl and her family and he did not notice when someone helped Melody escape her bonds. Distractions, hey? What can you do?" he grins.

"So who is the king of the vampiric realm?"

"That would have been the girl's father. When they were murdered the council was formed to control the realm and Gavril was placed as steward of Rostonin until the girl was found. He assumed that his brother's death and the girl going missing that he would be crowned king but that was not what happened. Godfrey ordered that the girl would rule when she was found. I don't think that Godfrey assumed Gavril's innocence for one second but he could not prove it. It was interesting to note that the girl's grandparents disappeared around the same time." he frowns. "Just a few days before the murders."

"Could they have had something to do with it?"

He shakes his head.

"The elder king abdicated with happiness, he adored his granddaughter, he had no ill wishes towards his son or his young family."

"Do you think they may be hiding?"

"Quite possibly. If they knew of their young son's escapades and feared for their own lives, they may have chosen to disappear... or worse."

I frown at him, unsure of his last statement.

"There is nothing to say that he didn't take them out too. Fear of the crown reverting to the former king would drive anyone to murdering their parents."

"Sounds like a complete butt hole."

He laughs.

"Yes Gavril is a complete butt hole."

"So where does that leave the vampiric realm?"

"Without a royal sitting on the throne, its true heir missing, a murderer on the loose, a dead phoenix vampire and another that may be out of commission for a while."

"How do you know what happened?"

"Gavril may be a wise and strong vampire, he may have control of his mind and his thoughts, not betraying them to those who may invade it, but his young son does not. I have entered his mind, I have found these things that his father had obviously told him about and I have relayed them to those who need to know."

"And me?"

"And you, only because of Alex not telling you what he knows."

"Does he know?"

"He does. After you left the meeting, the council members were told of this. I suppose it gives reason as to why the member for Rostonin was not at the meeting."

"So you can enter anyone's mind?"

"Mostly. The weak minded are dead easy, the likes of the elders are a little harder and as for werewolves." he jerks his head with a grin. "Not so easy."

"Must have been deafening for you at the meeting."

"Yes, but do you know what I heard the most?"

I shake my head.

"Comments about you, the young girl vampire that is standing beside Alex in the entry, how beautiful she is."

"Pfft, you cannot be serious."

"I am, you should have heard them, some of the comments would make your toes curl. Even Phabel bitched in his mind that his cousin got to have sex with you."

My jaw drops. He leans in and softly kisses me.

"I would never cheat on someone as beautiful as you." he whispers. "And I am not betrothed to another. I can marry whomever I chose."

The door flies open and Alex stands there, his eyes showing his temper.

"Get away from her Finn."

He gets up from the bed and saunters out of the room, not before his final parting words.

"She deserves better than you, someone that doesn't lie to her, someone that doesn't cheat on her. You don't deserve the future that awaits you and I will fight you every step of the way for her. Vampire scum." he hisses at him.

He closes the door opening his mouth to speak.

"Don't bother, I'm not interested in what you've got to say."

His eyes darken as he walks over.

"And don't put me in a lull either." I snap at him.

"Miranda is awake."

He sits on the bed beside me, taking my hands. I try to snatch them away but he grips me tight.

"Please."

I get up from the bed, freeing my hands in the process.

"I told you, I'm not interested. You are a cheater. You tell me that you want me forever but you can't remain faithful to me. I don't want a forever with a cheater. I am going to see Miranda."

I slam the door behind me, seeing Finn by the bar beside the dance floor below, watching on with great interest. Trying to ignore him, which is incredibly hard, I walk to the room to see Miranda.