Author's Notes: Hey guys! I'm back. Thank you so much for the reviews. I'm hoping to see more. Why did it take me so long? The plot. I wanted to spice it up a bit. Don't know if I've succeeded. Thankfully, I have you guys to tell me. This chapter is basically the intro to the story. I'll try to add more action in the future ones. Ok, I'll stop talking now. 'Til the next update!

The Agony and the Ecstasy

Chapter 1: The Prophecy

Take me into you

The horizon shall shimmer its vow

Sunder me with finality

And finality we shall see

Hundreds will rise

Thousands shall fall

In me, they will seek

In you, they shall find

Dust will return to dust

Blood shall mingle with blood

Death will follow death

Scourge humanity, long for shadows

In the twilight, be forever heard

With the wave of a maiden

Silence once more

She is the vow

And yet she is not

The dark-haired woman looked outside her window. Her people dotted the fields below. All were working or just plainly moving around. Their voices and laughter indicated the life inside them. The day was bubbling with energy. She could practically feel it beckoning to her, announcing the birth of each new day. It was alive. Bright. Shining. The girl sighed and turned away from the scene, closing her eyes in frustration. She couldn't bring herself to look any longer.

Dust will return to dust. Blood shall mingle with blood. Death will follow death. It took a second for her to register what she had just thought and fiercely berate herself. I can't allow myself to be weak. There's no time. With another sigh, she walked across the room and stopped at the foot of her bed where a huge wooden chest stood. It was plain except for the crimson ruby that was fixed on its upper center. She extended her arms and lifted the lid open. Memories of the past revisited her. It still haunted her. Up to now. I will never be able to escape it. Even though I remember nothing. Absolutely nothing. She clenched her hands. She could feel her fingers dig into her palms. She had to force herself to relax. Returning to the present time, she could see books and papers, dresses and little trinkets. All were arranged inside the chest. Her gaze lingered on a letter. A worn, crumpled letter. With a bang, she shut the lid.

It's been nineteen years since I lost my mother. Her sister had been taken from her 10 years after. And now I'm all alone.

"I want those flowers," the four-year-old child said harshly, jumping as much as her pinching pink shoes would allow her to. She held back tears as she realized the futility of what she was doing. Her sister was just too tall.

"Well, you can't have them. I happen to adore them too."

The taller girl danced around her, waving the violet and yellow flowers high up in the air. They spent several minutes running around each other in that irritating and affectionate way only siblings perfected. They continued to race around the fields beside their home. Sunset was near and everything was slightly golden. After a while, they both stopped dead tired. Their breathing came in short, abrupt gasps. As a final act of desperation, the younger girl kicked the knee of the other as hard as she could

"Ouch!"

She caught the falling flowers and zoomed towards the palace and they resumed chasing after one another giggling.

The woman allowed the phantom visions to fade away. "Tomoe," she whispered. Her head turned swiftly as she heard a knock on the door. She rose gracefully from the ground, not even aware that she sank down to it a minute ago. "Come in," she said smoothly.

Looking pale and visibly terrified, her chief adviser went inside. "Your Highness, you must come quick…our villagers..our villagers……are.."

He could say no more. His eyes merely stared at her. She moved soundlessly out the room, the trembling man right behind her. Outside, she was calm and rigid with only the crinkling of her eyes betraying her. Inside, she felt fire. The kind that hurt and burned. The kind that left you screaming. What is it this time? She proceeded through the vast hallway and down the long flight of stairs towards the chamber where all the more gruesome aspects of the kingdom were dealt with.

When she entered, everyone stood up to acknowledge her presence. A huge table, which stood at the center, divided her subjects. It was obvious that they had been expecting her. But she didn't pay attention to any of them. Her eyes were drawn to the corner of the room, where something lay hidden beneath a white, silk sheet. Its form was oddly disfigured. The room was dark and only the golden chandelier above them served as the source of light. The warmth it provided was not warmth at all, but something that felt sinister, clinging to them, obstructing their every move. She moved slowly as she made her way towards it. Each step seemed agonizing. Her heart was beating so fast that she thought she would explode any second. Noise would have helped. It would have made things seem normal. But no one was moving. No one was breathing. They were just watching. And waiting.

She stopped just beside the figure, but she didn't cast aside the cloth. My mind is telling me to look and be brave. My heart is begging me to walk away. Under this disguise is the horror I run from each night in my dreams. I can feel it. I know it.

"What has befallen us now," she said instead.

Once again, it was her chief adviser who addressed her. His words were shaking so much they were hard to understand. "The vam..pires have… struck again, milady. This time..no…non..none..of the villagers…c..can..tell us..wh..what trans..pired.."

"How is this so?" she replied. Spellbound. Knowing but not knowing. She was still looking at the hidden image, sure that it was going to start moving as soon as she turned her back.

"Because they're dead. All of them. Every person in the first four villages except the women," came the easy and strong voice of a youthful man somewhere behind her.

That was when she began shuddering. It started with her hands and spread all over. Suddenly she was cold. So very, very cold. Stop! Don't say it!

But the voice continued. "All the bodies were sucked dry, mutilated in fact. Bones everywhere. Blood dripping all over the houses. The smell of carnage is overwhelming, Your Highness. All the men and children were massacred, the life practically drained right out of them…and the women..the women…," it was the first time a hint of bitterness was heard, "they have all been taken away probably to that hell-hole of theirs for God knows what."

Nothing was spoken after this report. All eyes were fixed upon her. But she wasn't capable of any response, not even a grunt or a shrug. Or a tear. She just stood there. Time was holding her still. The eyes of sorrow looked upon her with no words of comfort or solace. It simply swallowed her and refused to let her go. She did not struggle. She allowed whatever it was to leave her empty and unmoving.

"Your Majesty…" The voice of one of her ministers woke her from her reverie.

Instead of the eerie inactivity she had been experiencing a while ago, terror and instinct became one, resulting to different emotions of varying intensity-all sliced through her. Throwing caution and rationality to the wind, she pulled the cloth aside. The loudest and most terrible scream filled her ears. She wheeled around and faced the astonished group.

"Who screamed!" she asked, practically shouting.

"Umm…no one did, Highness."

The people were divided into two - those looking at her, frightened by her state; and those gawking openly at the corpse.

Of course no one screamed. It was you. Beneath your skin. Instantly, the image revisited her and her heart began to race even more. She was sweating all over and was looking at the ground. No one minded. All of them were one in their reaction. Disgust. Despair. Try as she might, she couldn't push out what she just saw. It was like a moment of suspended horror, which just went on and on.

The lifeless body seemed to be that of a man. He was completely drained of all fluids and it was as if his body was just a pale, lifeless lump of flesh. His eyes were purely white and bulging to the point of almost falling out of their sockets. He had no arms or legs and was covered entirely in some green jelly, which obscured him from direct view. If that wasn't bad enough, the hollow space that used to be his mouth was open as if still screaming for his life. It was brutality personified. Her very bones felt sickened.

"Why was he brought here? Why couldn't you merely inform me?" Her voice was filled with suppressed anger.

It was a cowardly thing to say, but she had been caught unaware. She awaited their answers silently, feeling beyond outraged. It was all she could do to keep from hitting every face there. Clearly, her reaction surprised her audience and it took a while before one of her knights answered.

"We knew you would want to learn the full extent of the monsters' latest escapade, Empress. We felt that the only way you could fully grasp the situation was if we presented you with one of their victims to show that their animosity towards us has reached its peak."

Unbelievably, what he said made her feel a million times worse. Her temper flared like a volcano and she felt herself explode. The words were out before she even had time to process them.

"Don't you think I know that! God! I've known for years now! Are you trying to tell me that I still need your push in order to take the necessary measures?" She turned furious eyes at her subjects. "I have been trying. We all have. So don't insult me by implying that I'm doing less than what I should. Bringing that man here was both unnecessary and rude."

Her voice was as steely and forceful as that of a defensive child and her outburst echoed throughout the walls. Everyone was dumbstruck for a few seconds.

After the confusion passed, nervousness and hesitation settled in. As the silence expanded longer and longer, she found that she could no longer stand the expressions on their faces. To her eyes, they held equal portions of disappointment, pity, and disbelief. She began shaking again and, before she could do another crazy thing, she took a deep breath and spoke as steadily as she could.

"I want the number of guards watching the six other villages doubled. All the knights should be alerted and told that I am personally requesting them to train as many able-bodied men as they can. All the sorcerers and sorceresses should be informed of the need to increase the power of the protective walls surrounding our land. As for the vampires," she paused to breath, "…I'm sorry to say that we can do nothing for now. We must and shall concentrate on defensive strategies. Our kingdom still does not have the means to defeat them or to risk open war…and..and all the villagers should be buried as honorably as possible. We will rescue the women as soon as a sufficient number of soldiers is gathered, which should be no later than tomorrow at dawn."

All were nodding and agreeing with her. They were apparently trying to appease her, eager to move past the awkward incident a while ago.

"I must ask you now to leave and let me be, for I have a lot of issues to ponder on." Her last words rang of authority and they had no choice but to slowly clear out of the room.

She watched her advisers, ministers, knights, and nobles with a heavy heart and a disturbed mind. She was entirely captured by her thoughts that she almost failed to realize that one person did not leave. The man who told her what happened when her adviser seemed to be stumbling all over his words was now looking at her from across the room.

"Soujirou…"

"Don't you think rest would be the best thing for you now?" he asked, arching his eyebrow.

"What's best for me is to put an end to all of this." She leaned against the nearby table, now feeling free enough to relax. He always had this effect on her. As if him being there made her breathe normally again.

"You don't know how this is making me feel. You don't understand."

That was when the hopelessness of the situation struck her, and the impact was so strong and sudden that, the next thing she knew, tears were rolling down her cheeks. She immediately looked down again. The dampness of the room agreed with her. It was as bleak and cold as she was. She wished she could just freeze to death. There you go again. Trying to run away.

It wasn't long before she heard footsteps and she felt herself engulfed in warmth and comfort. He said nothing. He merely held her. They stayed this way for a long time. She neither sobbed nor screamed. She just cried with her shoulders shaking ever so often. She cried not for herself, but for the people who died because of her incompetence. She cried because of the danger and havoc she knew would come. She cried because the vampires were clawing their way to the kingdom's throne bit by bit. When she finally calmed down, she didn't break away from his embrace.

"Thank you," she whispered in his ear. Surprisingly, he pulled away from her, took her chin in his right hand, and forced her to look him in the eye.

"This is not your fault."

She tried to protest, but he leveled her with a look that made her clamp her mouth shut. The devastation around them contrasted with his handsome face that was both childlike in its intensity and innocence.

"I want you to listen," he continued, "You have been an exceptional leader. A strong one. It's the fact that you're here with us that makes us so thankful. But you're not God and you can't control all that you wish to control. We know that. It's time for you to realize that too."

As he said this, all she could do was stare at him. Despite herself, she felt a tiny smile tugging at the corners of her mouth.

"You really have a way with words." This time, it was his turn to smile.

But then she was serious again. She pulled herself away from his arms. "You're right. I am a ruler and, because I am one, I am destined to save my people even when every part of me is exhausted to the point of total breakdown. The time I stop trying is the time I take my last breath."

Admiration shone through his beautiful eyes. Admiration tainted with regret. He shook his head sadly. "It will take a miracle."

"Then a miracle we shall find."

He looked at her earnestly. "Do you mean the one prophesized?"

"Yes," she said with finality. She studied him.

"Why?" she asked, "Are you starting to lose faith?"

Her eyes pleaded with him. She needed to know that there was at least one person who still believed in salvation. She needed him to still have hope. He stared at her for a long while, hesitant to answer, and then he spoke in a voice barely above a whisper.

"I have lost faith in the prophecy, but I have never lost faith in you. If you say we will be saved, then I will do everything I can to make that come true for you."

Her face cleared and she, once again, gave in to his embrace. "What would I do without you?" she asked him softly.

Author's Notes: So? What do you think? Anyway, Kenshin will be appearing in the next chap and I just want to clear things up - this is not about a vampire slayer.