"I don't understand," she said pushing Zachariah away. "I can't be a Pure Blood. Until James kidnapped me, I wasn't like a Vampire at all, so how the hell could I have been a full Vampire from birth?" She glared up at him, arms crossed, legs spread apart to balance her weight, her chin thrust mulishly forward.

Zachariah smiled saying, "You never tasted my blood, and therefore, you were just like a human. You became like your fellow Vampires when you tasted James' blood. That instance was mistaken for your Turn, from Half Blood Human to Half Blood Vampire."

"James' blood. Not yours!" She snarled, gesturing wildly at him.

Zachariah raised an eyebrow. "James is my blood. He was the Turn of Alexander Tsar, who was the Turn of Louis Nichelle, my brother, whom I Turned. My blood." He smirked at the furious girl, who was sputtering in outrage.

"What about the sun?" she snapped. "Sunlight kills Vampires, and I've never even gotten a bad sunburn. If I've been a Vampire all my life, wouldn't I have been killed by going outside in the day?"

"That," Zachariah said triumphantly, "is one of the reasons Pure Blood existence has gone unnoticed to humans for all this time. We don't die in the sun. We may walk among the humans, in the dark or light."

Jaden gaped at the man. "They can live in sunlight?" she gasped.

"We can live in sunlight, Elaina," the older vampire replied, shaking the girl's shoulders. "You don't have to hide away like a rat, afraid of a little sunbeam. You can walk into the sun without fear of death or recognition as a Vampire."

Jaden staggered back out of Zachariah's enthusiastic grip, breathing, "How is that possible?"

He shook his head, "I don't know, Elaina. Since the first Pure Bloods walked the earth, we have been able to step into the sun, while the Turned are unable to. Even the Half Bloods can't." He frowned, "Wait, that's not exactly true." He shrugged, "They can survive for about an hour if they consume enough blood during the time."

"But I had the dreams, like James said Half Bloods do," Jaden insisted. "So I have to be Half Blood!" With an embarrassed cringe, she realized she was whining and her voice had just cracked.

"That can explained as you subconscious longing for what it had always been without," he replied. With a shrug, he added, "Its like being virgin who longs for something that they feel is missing. I.E. sex. They know they want it; they just don't realize what exactly it is."

"So you're saying I was a sex fiend?" Jaden snarled, disgusted.

Zachariah chuckled, "In a way, yes. But it was for blood, not skin."

"That's disgusting," she snarled.

Zachariah rolled his eyes, "What else would you like me to tell you, girl?" he growled, his reasonable expression sliding away to one of anger. "I just as well told you were a royal among your kind, and you refuse to accept it!"

"My kind?" Jaden snarled. "My kind are the Agents; humans! Not demons that once only existed in stories, who rose up and terrorized the world for nearly a millennia!"

Zachariah was looking at her in fury. He looked over Jaden shoulder and said to an unnoticed bodyguard standing at the door, "Bring me the light," before glaring down into the girl's furious brown eyes

Everyone else in the room shifted uncomfortably, wondering what would happen next. There was a silence that settled over the room, crackling like lightning between the two Pure Bloods as they stared each other down, daring the other to make a move. The silence broke when the bodyguard returned, carrying what appeared to be an Agent's standard issue Sunbeam, which was a flashlight that carried the full spectrum of sunlight in it.

Without a word of thanks, he took the light and handed it to James, instructing, "Demonstrate to Elaina what would happen to her if exposed to sunlight, and she were a mere Turned." James nodded slightly, a hollow look in his eyes. He beckoned Maddox, who'd been standing by the door, over to him. Zachariah seized the back of Jaden's neck in an iron grip, holder her in place, forcing her to look forward.

James murmured something to Maddox as the large man knelt, and thrust out his hand palm up, turning his face away. James switched on the light. The air was split by Maddox's shriek of agony and the stench of burning flesh as the Sunbeam's light penetrated his skin. Jaden squeezed her eyes shut and tried to turn away, but Zachariah's vice-like hold on her neck held her fast. James turned the Sunbeam off a mere few seconds after applying it to Maddox's skin, but there was a hole that went all the way through his hand that was a large as his palm. Whimpering slightly, Maddox cradled his hand to his chest as James quickly knelt at his side, presenting his wrist.

Jaden stared in horror at the hole in Maddox's hand as her stomach clenched in revulsion. When the skin finally finished slowly knitting itself back together, it was a dead black color, burned and withered. Maddox delicately inspected his palm with a wince, gasping when his finger touched his blackened skin. "As one of the Turned, that would be his fate, should he venture into the sun," Zachariah murmured in Jaden's ear. "Shall we see what happens to a Half Blood?" Wide eye, Jaden shook her head enigmatically, but Zachariah shrugged her off. "James, its your turn."
Jaden watched, eyes bulging as James nodded, took a deep breath, turned his face away and switched the Sunbeam on to shine on his hand. He gritted his teeth and groaned as his skin turned red, blistered and burned in a matter of seconds. He fell to his knees with a gasp, dropping the still active Sunbeam, the Vampires in the room scattering as it rolled across the floor. Zachariah seized it and put Jaden in a headlock before she had time to react. He held the Sunbeam away from her as he exclaimed, "now, we find out what you really are. Turned? Half Blood?" He swung the light to shine into her face, "Or Pure Blood?"

Jaden squeezed her eyes shut and tensed, waiting for the instant in which adrenaline failed and pain won. That instant never came. She opened her eyes and winced when they stared into a very bright light. Zachariah released her from his headlock, and she collapsed to the ground. Squatting at her side, Zachariah pulled her chin to look at his hand as he shone the Sunbeam on it. The only change to his skin was it was illuminated. With a smile, he turned to his daughter and whispered, "Pure Blood."

Jaden looked at the floor, angry tears welling in her eyes, her world crashing down around her. Memories swam before her eyes. No, she thought, I don't want to be one of them. "It was all a lie," she whispered, not realizing she'd spoken aloud.

"It was to protect you, Elaina," her father assured her. Jaden looked away. "The real Jaden Korr was killed six years ago by the same people who killed the man you referred to all your life as Father."

Jaden looked up, her watery eyes sizzling, "the Danalli," she hissed, sounding more animal than James had ever heard her.

Zachariah nodded, "The League of Danall wanted to destroy the alliance between the League of Nichelle and the League de Myra. To destroy the alliance, is to destroy the children. Within hours of each other, Jaden Korr and Graham Drew were assassinated." He laid a hand on her shoulder, shaking her gently, "it was the lie you'd been living that saved you from the real Jaden's fate."

She glared at James, "But why try to Turn me and convince me I was a Half Blood?"

Zachariah chuckled, "do you really think we advertised Jaden Korr's role in the works? No. Benjamin Ashmore only knew he had a child with a woman named Anne. He wanted his bloodline to become stronger, so he convinced James and Alexander to 'Turn' you." He got to his feet as he added, "I was going to track you down and tell you who you were personally on your twenty-first birthday, or when you made Senior Agent, whichever came first. Ashmore just jumped the gun a little."

Jaden stared at a space on the wall for a time, not looking at anyone. "What do you plan to do with me now?" she asked, breaking the silence that had once more enveloped the room.

"Get you out of Venisa, for starters," was Zachariah's immediate reply. "You will leave your past behind. Agent Jaden Korr must disappear, or the Organization will discover her presence within the Nichelle and destroy them and you. Also, the League of Danall will be furious to learn of your survival, and will stop at nothing to kill you once and for all. "

Jaden mutely nodded. James stepped forward, "my lord, where will you take her?" he asked.

Zachariah turned to him, his eyes sweeping over the rest of the room. "I would not reveal where in such an open manner. When we are alone, arrangements will be made for her transportation."

James nodded murmuring, "Yes, my lord."

"Leave us," the Pure Blood ordered, turning to the others in the room, "I wish some time alone with my daughter." Over the murmurs of yes, sir, and of course, milord, Zachariah added to James, "Bring us something to eat, and be sure to tend to your hand."

Nodding, James shut the door behind the last of the departing Vampires. Zachariah sat on the edge of James' bed, and watched Jaden as she bore a mental hole in the wall. "Why kill my father?" she asked suddenly.

"Pardon?"

She looked up at Zachariah. "Why kill Nathan Korr? Why not me? Didn't Ian Cross know I was the third child?"

"Oh, that," Zachariah said, almost dismissively. "No, he had no clue that you were anything but Nathan Korr's daughter. He saw you as leverage against the Organization, not as a threat."

"But he, Cross, wanted something," Jaden insisted, "and my father refused to give it up. Wasn't it me?"

He shook his head, "Ian Cross wanted power. He wanted control. He believed Nathan Korr would give up the control of the Organization to him. If the Danalli had the Agents on their side, there would be no safe haven for those not of their League in Venisa."

Jaden watched Zachariah's face with watery eyes, asking in a trembling voice, "So, it was not my fault that my father was killed? It wasn't because of me?"

Zachariah looked as if he were resisting the urge to roll his eyes. "No, Elaina. Korr did not die because of you. But he was never, your father. I am."

Jaden nodded, a tear streaking down her cheek. "You are probably right," she murmured sadly. "I just don't want to believe it."

"Once you join me in Cordalla, you will believe it. There you will be treated like the person you are; treated as your birthright dictates," Zachariah told her, encouraging her. It was at that moment, the door opened, and three of Zachariah's bodyguards slipped into the room, a human woman being pulled between them. "Ah, very nice," he said to the men. He got up off the bed and pulled Jaden to her feet. "Now Elaina, this fine gentlemen are my most trusted servants. I would like you to choose one of them to act as your guard from now on." He gestured to them before adding, "allow me to introduce Joseph Brent, Michael Fuller, and Nikoli Marchette."

He pointed to Joseph who was of average height, but had a build much like Maddox, all muscle, mean to the core, and no signs of intelligence. His head was shaved bald, and his eyes were dark and cold. Jaden did not like the look of him. He appeared cruel and heartless, prone to savagery and violence. Too much like the Vampires she encountered in her past life. "Brent is a Half-Blood, and is the son of your great-nephew's second cousin."

Zachariah pointed to Michael next. "Fuller here, Pure Blood, is your brother's great-grandson's wife's niece's son. You two are barely related, but related all the same." Michael Fuller looked much like a bodyguard should. Well built, strong, a hint of intelligence that would mean life or death depending on how much of a hint it was, and a blank face that bore watching, impassive eyes. His critical stare unnerved Jaden. He did not have the look of one who cared if a person got hurt, only so long as his charge was in enough pieces to be called whole. Jaden did not like the look of him either.

"Finally, Marchette, also of Pure Blood, is of no relation to you or me, whatsoever." Nikoli was very different from his two colleagues. His eyes were intense, a deep but brilliant green, glinting with knowledge and assessing everything they saw. His reddish hair curled slightly, the color a supreme contrast to the baldness and the short black fuzz of his companions. As he shifted, she saw how much he conserved his energy, every movement carefully economized, never wasting. He looked much like the elite of the Senior Agents did. Ready to fight in a heartbeat; a person easily able to relate with her. Something about him, whether it was the actual life in his gaze or his likeness to her, drew him to her eye, holding it.

Jaden glanced at Zacharaih. "You want me to choose now?" she asked, a little apprehensive. He nodded. Jaden sighed, "then I choose Marchette."

Zacharaih clapped her on the shoulder, saying, "A very good choice, my dear. I'll leave you two to get better acquainted, while I talk with Tsar about your travel arrangements." He beckoned the remaining bodyguards to follow him, leaving the human behind with Jaden and Marchette.


Alrighty, i have no clue when i'll be able to next update, or for how much longer the story will be going. There will be at least one more chapter...and...who knows, a sequel, if i can get my act together. Thanks for reading and waiting so long for an update...JG