The Beauty in Pain | Book One of In Pain Trilogy *EDITING*

31. Into the Woods

Everything that went on yesterday escalated pretty quickly but she was glad for it. She went to sleep that night, at ease that at least now they had somewhat of an army. It would be hard leading all these people to Arcadia and even harder getting the priestesses to accept them but that was something to worry about another day. Right now, she was just plain happy.

Mynera ignored her mind telling her that Saenar was going to kill her. She was well aware of that annoying fact. She knew they Saenar and the others were probably all over the place looking for her right now, and when she came back untouched and told him that she was out trying to get a bunch of vampires on their side, he was sure to throw a fit.

Actually, he was sure to do worse than that. Saying he was merely going to throw a fit, however, made her feel a little better.

She fell asleep surprisingly easy. It nagged at her, knowing that just hours before she had been completely scared out of her living mind. Mynera blamed it on what she thought was her one fatal flaw: her ability to trust too easily. For some reason, she trusted Reginald. She trusted that they wouldn't hurt her, she trusted that when he said the vampires listened to what he told them to do, they would. So falling asleep amongst them was no problem for her. She supposed she shouldn't put her trust in someone else so quickly but she did with Barron and look how that turned out. He was on their side, no matter what the others thought.

Then again, she did put her trust in Lord Ingstad, however small, and was betrayed and captured by the red enemies. Yes, she suppose her trust was an issue. But there was no time to worry about that now.

Mynera woke up when dawn broke. She sat up immediately and headed outside to see everyone gathered in the centre of the camp. It was easy to spot who was with her and who wasn't. Those who were with her were covered from head to toe in cloth, even wrapping a piece of wood over their heads to shield their faces to the sun. The others were still in their tents, made so thick it was hard for the rising sun's rays to pass through, and were watching everyone else from there.

It was less than she first thought. Some of the wary ones must have convinced some more to stay because the crowd number less than a few hundreds by her estimation. They were all gathering their belongings, chatting excitedly.

She went past the lot of them, looking for Reginald. She spotted him near a large camp talking to Thael. She approached him.

"There are less than before," Mynera said, coming up to them and cutting whatever conversation they were having short.

Reginald turned to her. "I'm well aware. I was just saying as much to Thael here."

"They were convinced to stay," Thael jumped in. His eyes were dark as he surveyed the crowd. "Some persons began backing out this morning too."

"We need to leave before anyone else backs out," she said. "If we linger here, they might have second doubts."

Reginald nodded. Last night, he had given her a long and detailed lecture of what he was going to do to her if she didn't stay true to her word. At first she had been scared but then she got quickly bored of the conversation. He was talking for so long, she just couldn't focus anymore. When he saw her blanking out she had to quickly reassure him that she understood the consequences. She wasn't stupid enough to wrong a century old vampire.

Before she went to bed last night, Thael had stayed up with her, informing her of all the details about vampirism that she didn't know about. The tales she heard as a child didn't include that the older they were, the stronger and faster they became, nor did it mention that as time went by, vampires grew to such startling degrees of self-control, they would make a monk look like a promiscuous, drunken glutton. That little piece of information comforted her, knowing that the vampires weren't going to harm her nor anyone else.