A/N: This story is going to get dark, I thought to warn you before reading. 

_____

"Beautiful," I whispered, my hand barely reaching the painting of mama that dad hung in his office.  The artist had done an immaculate job of bringing out the love and happiness in her dark brown eyes.  Shiny pinkish and purplish hair fell down over her shoulders in waves.  In my eyes, there was no other prettier than her.

I stretched on the balls of my feet on the cushiony chair I used as a support to get closer to her but I wobbled.

Large hands curved around my small torso.  "Careful," a masculine voice said beside me.

I gave my daddy a small smile, momentarily looking at him.  Then mama got my full attention again.

It seemed we were both obsessed with her.  But my obsession was different from my dad's.  I had the absence of a mother, one who loved me unconditionally.  In my previous life I didn't know love the way she shared briefly with me.  I grew up with many different nannies raising me while my parents worked long hour jobs in different countries.

Rido, on the other hand, spent most of his waking hours in his office.  He would either sit at the chair behind his desk or stand before her picture, talking or staring silently at her.  I was never far from him.

"She's really beautiful," he murmured, his tone soft and full of love.

I smiled again while bobbing my head.  I was only three years old and fully capable of speaking words but I kept silent, unsure about the intellectual progress of purebloods.  I learned that pureblood vampires aged differently from other vampires.  They aged slower until they reached a point they froze in time.

My mismatched eyes shifted to my father, wondering if he reached that level of adulthood; frozen in time with elegance and unnatural beauty.  He was truly handsome in the enchanting sort of way.  Wherever he walked, eyes were drawn to him.  I witnessed the bespectacled scene by the maids, which was why they avoided staring straight into his eyes.

As if he felt my gaze, he turned to me.  His different colored eyes, a mirror of mine, glittered at me.

"This painting is our treasure," he revealed to me.  "It was I who painted this to capture the life essence of your mother and it's through this painting she will stay us."

I nodded while returning my gaze on the picture.  Longingly, I stared at mama.

Daddy was right.  The longer I watched her painting, the more I felt like she was coming to life.

Her serene smile, the light reflecting in her eyes, the shimmering in her hair.

"Mama," I whispered.

My hand reached out to her.  Dad's hands lifted me with ease and finally my little chubby fingers touched the smooth surface of the painting that was suppose to be her cheek.  "Mama," I said again with a smile.

Beside me, daddy was grinning like a madman.

OoO

Obsession.

The word I mentioned before, came again.

This time it came with my education; one dealing with pureblood vampire education.

"You're different, Kyyra," the low baritone of Rido's voice rumbled.  I could feel the tremors from his large hand that held mine.  A long, elegant index finger traced the skin in my inner wrist, reflecting the blood flowing through my veins.  "You're rare.  Your blood is mixed with Kuran and Toma.  And both can be a deadly combination."

I blinked my eyes at him.  "Why?"

One little question and his eyes became a myriad of vividness.

"There's infinite possibilities and a number secrets.  The things you can accomplish with your mixed blood, even I'm unsure.  But this blood is yours and mine.  You must never let anyone else to take it."

I tilted my head while blinking again.  "Why?"

"Because," his voice held a roughness.  "Blood is everything in our world." 

He lifted my wrist to his nose, sniffing what must have been my blood under the delicate skin.  I didn't flinch when his mouth opened and a fang touched my wrist.  His eyes flashed scarlet before returning to normal.  He pulled the appendage back.  "Our blood has remained untainted by human blood.  In fact, we can trace our history to the first and ancient vampire of our bloodline.  For these reasons, vampires of lesser blood desire our blood.  Our blood is an...."

"Obsession," I answered, unable to hold back that knowledge.

He brought my arm down, his index finger began to retrace the flow of my blood.

"Those who want our blood will do crazy and dark things because our blood is an addictive drug.  They will murder you if need be to have a taste of our power."

I moved my head to indicate I understood him.

"Never," he emphasized each word.  "Let anyone taste the sweetness running through you veins."

"I won't daddy."

"You promise."  He lifted his head to look at me.   There was a subtle warning in his colorful eyes but I didn't heed it.

"I promise."  His eyes gleamed before he looked away from me.

OoO

Seated in a massive room with other purebloods, Rido Kuran elegantly crossed one leg over his knee. I sat stiffly in the seat beside him, absorbing their conversation.

"Isn't this a surprise?" he calmly gestured to everyone. 

"You know very well why you're here," the brunette woman, who I couldn't bring myself to bring to call aunt, snapped at him.  Rido ignored her and studied the other three males in the room. 

He sat forward in his chair, uncrossing his long legs and intertwining his fingers while placing his elbows on his knees.  "No, I don't."

"You took something precious from us and you dare to say you have no reason to be present here?"

"You act like you're all innocent, Juri-san."

The other males, two of them far older than me, listened quietly at the exchange of their words.  One of them I recognized as Haruka.  The other male greatly resembled Haruka and my father but his features were sharper and scarier looking.  There was an air of intimidation and menace around his large form.  A young boy, much smaller than the two men, with the Kuran features -the brown hair and brownish and reddish eyes- stared at me.

My hands balled against my thighs while I refused to meet his gaze.

The meeting had been one Rido couldn't refuse the moment he received the telephone call.  He couldn't summon anyone on short notice to watch over me so he brought me along.

"That is why I called everyone here.  We are going to straighten out the details once and for all," the man with the frightening aura addressed.  He lounged at the head of the table, his dark brown hair shining in the light from the chandelier.  His eyes met Rido's directly.  "And we'll begin with you neglecting your duties as the Kuran heir.  As the oldest and rightful Kuran of this family, you must fulfill your duties.  Yet you eloped with the daughter of the Toma family and never received my blessing."

I heard Rido sigh.  He shifted to leaning back in his chair.  "You would have never approved of her although she was a pureblood."

"You're right.  You were suppose to marry Hio Shizuka-san."

"I don't love her."

"Love has nothing to do with social standing."

"Don't Haruka-san and Juri-san love each other?"

"That's a different matter entirely," the man interjected.  "They keep the Kuran bloodline pure."

"Well, with all due respect father, you have three instead of four children."

My eyes widened as my head snapped to my dad.  His father was still alive.  In the manga, he had killed him on a whim but I was learning that whatever took place in the manga and in the anime weren't the same in the world I lived in.  It was as if my mother was the rock that caused the ripples in the once still pond.

"Which is why you were suppose to marry a female from the Hio family.  They have great power and substantial wealth," the scary man who was my grandfather continued, causing me to switch glances between my father and him.

"And Shizuka-san is also insane.  That's why the Council cages her like she's an animal."

"Most of us know the reason she's locked up.  Didn't your wife display the same symptoms?"

"Except she's dead because of your children."  Rido's body bristled.  Since the death of my mama, Rido rebuffed Haruka and Jura as his siblings.

The mentioned people tensed in the room.

The oldest of the Kuran family slammed his fists on his armrests.  "They had to do it.  If the Council discovers that purebloods aren't as invulnerable as they think, imagine the rebellion and the numbers of our kind decreasing.  We must protect our secret at all costs."

"So my beloved Emi was a sacrifice?"

"For the greater of our kind, yes."

Rido's mouth became a thin line.  I choked back my objection.  My eyes darted to the expensive fireplace at one side of the room.  The crackling hearth reflected off their faces, especially the young boy's face.  I could see he possessed the beauty and charisma of those born with pureblood to a point I was entranced by him.

Silence fell, and the roaring noise of Rido's father inhaling a breath filled my ears.  Something was wrong.

"What else?" Haruka was the one who broke the silence and made me blink, breaking the spell.

The intimidating man's reddish and brownish eyes became steel.  "Since you neglected your duties, we need another approach to bring back respect and honor to our family."

From my peripheral vision, I saw Rido grip the arm of his chair.

"You acknowledge what must be done," the man replied.  "With your wife's death, you must wed another and produce an heir with another vampire."  He glanced at me and my heart fell into my stomach.  There was a deadly glint in his dark eyes.  "As it is, your child is unfit to be a Kuran heiress."

"No," Rido rejected.

"Excuse me."

"There is nothing wrong with my daughter.  If anything is wrong, it's the boy Haruka-san and Juri-san claims as their son."

"Be careful what you say," Rido's father warned him.

My dad's lips lifted into a smirk while he crossed a leg over his knee.  "A Kuran pureblood he may be but he's not their son.  As least Kyyra is my dau...."

His sentence was incomplete as blood instantly splattered his chair and the floor.  The smell was pungent as mama's and I gasped.

"You have no right to talk when it was your fault.  You did something unforgivable to this family and you must pay the price."

Everyone stayed seated as the head Kuran moved to stand up.  His frighteningly intense eyes landed on me.  "As for the abomination sitting next to you, perhaps her blood will suffice."

"No," Rido growled at him.  He was up from his chair so quickly I missed it.  His blood matted his face but the injury dealt to him had already healed.  "You won't touch a hair on her head."

The man lifted his thin lined eyebrows.

"I'll kill any one of you before you can get to her!"  He slammed his fist on the table, shaking the wood.

"A life for a life, blood for blood."  It was the same words dad repeated the night he came home drenched in blood.

He shook his head.  "That was justified.  Emi for their son."

"An innocent pureblood baby for an outsider."

"She was a pureblood too."

Both Kuran men sized up each other.  None of the other occupants in the room spoke.  I hadn't been among other purebloods besides my parents but I clearly recalled that they considered others of their kind as threats.

"We are Kurans.  It seems you forgot what that entitles."

"We no longer live in the days of the monarchy.  The senate rules and as such, the Kurans no longer can make or bend rules to their will."

The head Kuran moved first, instantly getting to the other side of the table.  He grabbed Rido's chin, forcing his head up.  "Check yourself, or I'll do it for you, boy," he murmured.  "You're a fool to speak back to your superior."

I bit my bottom lip, trying my best to prevent an outburst.

"I'm not a child anymore, father."  Rido said the last part with distaste.  He broke his chin away from his father's grip but refused to step away.

"You," the head Kuran said, his voice echoing in the silent room.

My head whipped to him.

"Come."  My body suddenly responded to his simple command.

"Kyyra, no!" my daddy yelled.

But I couldn't respond to him.  It felt like someone had control over my body and I was just witnessing it.  My feet touched the floor and slowly I reached for the larger man.

"At least she's such an obedient child," the head Kuran taunted Rido.

"She's not acting on her own free will," Rido retorted.  "Leave her alone."

"We must erase all evidence of your transgressions."

"She's innocent!"

"So is Haruka's and Juri's son."

The man raised a large hand, palm up in the air.  I lifted my hand.

"No Kyyra!"

Something inside me snapped.  I fell on the cold floor, blinking several times while raising shaky hands in front my face.  I moved my fingers, assessing whether I was still under a spell.

Hard arms surrounded me and pulled me against a warm body.  "Kyyra," I heard dad's voice and felt his warm exhale on the crown of my head.  He lifted my little body with ease and began moving.  I buried my face in his shirt, his blood smearing against my cheek.

"Where do you think you're going?"

"I'm done," he snapped.  Then he halted.  I clutched tightly to his shirt, fear for him and myself overwhelming me along with the freshly split blood.  His words drifted over me but I barely understood the impact of them.  "I give my place to Haruka-san."

With that, he started to walk away from them.

"You can't do that!" his father shouted.   The floor began to tremble, the windows cracked but Rido kept walking as though nothing happened.

"I just did," he whispered as we met the open night air.  An hour later dad had burned down the mansion he and mama used to live in.  Taking only a few essential items, definitely the painting, he seated me in a black car and buckled me in.  He sat next to me and started the car.  He ended ties with a family, revoking a lineage that granted him certain privileges.

Rido chose mama and I. 

He chose us over his immediate family.

"Kyyra," he said my name.  He took my hand and lifted my middle finger to his mouth.  He pierced the tender skin with his fang, a slight pain flowed through me.  His eyes turned scarlet while he nicked the skin of his finger with his fang, then he pressed our fingertips together.  "Blood is what ties us together.  Never forget this."

His face was still smeared in his blood.  Absently, I lifted my other hand to his face and wiped some of the blood off.  I brought the red plastered appendage to my face, staring at the thick and sticky substance with wonder.

"I won't," I whispered.

"Good," he said." 

He shifted his attention to the road but I mumbled two words as he drove the car into the darkness, the headlights were his only guide to his next destination.

"Blood ties."