"How about thrice a week?" Alec suggested, making Lauren's jaw drop.
"Thrice a week! That is too often!" What did he think she was? Livestock? She wanted to laugh at his deranged mind. He surely lost some screws on that head of his.
"Once a week," Lauren bargained with a firm look. "I'm pretty sure you are not running out of resources," she glanced at the bottle on the table which surely was filled with blood, "And you must also have other ways, don't you, my lord?"
A flicker of amusement crossed Alec's eyes. "I do have lots of resources. But unfortunately, yours tastes sweeter than those I have tasted. I can't seem to get it out of my tongue." His gaze went down to her neck for a moment and Lauren felt a chill run through her.
"Once," she held her ground. Aside from the fear that it might affect her physically, she also didn't like the idea of him biting her skin from time to time.
Lauren didn't wait for Alec to agree and just wrote it on the contract. She then smiled sweetly at the lord who gave her a cold glare.
The next days, Lauren was busy organizing their wedding while Alec had his eyes on Lord Merriweather's mysterious death. It had also caught the council's attention as it seemed to be a bigger conspiracy than they thought it was. With the butterfly mark on the two lords who were murdered two months apart, they were certain that the two deaths were connected.
"I see that this is a serious matter, but you shouldn't be that worked up with this, Lord Everston. You have a wedding to prepare," Raoul, one of the councilmen who disliked Alec, said in a friendly tone during one of the council meetings. He was a middle-aged half vampire.
"As the head of the defense ministry, I am just doing my job, Councilman Raoul. You shouldn't worry about my wedding. It has been taken care of," the curt smile on Alec's lips suggested friendliness but his eyes spoke hostility.
"Oh, Princess Lauren's hands must be so full with all those crazy wedding preparations. His Majesty wanted it to be the biggest celebration of the year. How hard it must be," Raoul's lips curved into an inverted smile, poking Alec further.
"Are you here to just talk about my personal life, Councilman Raoul, or will you help us solve Evardin's problem?" Alec's tone remained low but his glare could kill. "If you want to gossip, you should have worked in those gossip papers instead."
Raoul looked furious. "Are you implying that I don't deserve to serve the council-"
"Enough of that, Councilman Raoul," Lionel, chief of the council, interrupted. The vampire lord's dark eyes on him made Raoul stop.
As someone who wanted to gain the favor of those who held more power than most, Raoul couldn't say anything when it came to the council chief. But what the councilman didn't know, he was messing with someone he shouldn't mess with.
"Apart from the two lords' mysterious death, I believe we have a more urgent matter to deal with," said Lord Lancelot. Unlike Alec, the lord had a lighter aura and a gentle demeanor.
"A human family was massacred last night in the west village. With how the bodies ended up like a piece of dry wood, it seemed to be done by black mages," Lord Lancelot continued.
Black mages were ordinary mages who practiced forbidden sorcery, including consuming energy from other people to gain more power. Despite the risk, it was still practiced by many. Once a mage consumed energy from another person, there would be no way out for him. He would crave it like how a vampire craves blood. And in the long run, they would lose their minds and run wild like a starving monsters.
After the meeting was adjourned. The council chief talked to Alec in private. Lionel asked Alec if he could visit the village himself to search for possible traces. So the next day which was a day before his wedding, Alec went to the west village with Matthias, one of his commandants.
The part of the village where the massacred family lived now looked like a dead place with no people around. It seemed that those who used to live in the area evacuated due to fear that the black mages might come for them next time.
"Found anything?" Alec asked Matthias after he instructed him and his other men to look into other houses while he inspected the house where the massacre happened.
Matthias didn't find anything. As Alec continued to search the house of the murdered family, he stopped when the heel of his shoes made a small sound against the wooden floor as if he stepped on a metal. When he stepped back to see what it was, he saw a silver coin.
He picked it up and realized it wasn't a silver coin. His eyes narrowed at the mark it had. It was identical to that butterfly mark used to brand Lord Dauncey and Lord Merriweather's bodies. It was too much of a coincidence, Alec thought. No other traces were left aside from the piece of silver. He was pretty sure it was left there on purpose for the investigators to see.
As Alec rode in a carriage on his way back to the town, he couldn't stop thinking about the mysterious butterfly mark. It was assumed it was the black mages who massacred the human family. Did it also mean they were also the ones behind the two lords' death?
While supporting his chin with his knuckles, Alec's attention was caught by something in the town's street. One command from him and the carriage stopped. His eyes fixed on the smiling Princess Lauren who seemed to be having so much fun talking with a young man in front of a small shop of women's accessories.
Matthias who was sitting across from him cleared his throat. "Do you want me to do a background check on that gentleman, sire?"
"And why would I care about that boy?" Alec spoke coldly, glaring at his right hand man before he instructed the coachman to get back on the road.