Every King Needs A Queen / Book Three / Daring Spell Series / The Originals

The Bloody Crown

The next day, I was in the cemetery, standing in front of a crowd of witches that I was giving a speech to. 

The witch crowd was clamoring loudly.

I was standing on the steps of the lycee. "You're gonna have to listen to me now. You're gonna have to hear me out. Because I understand what you're going through. Our connection with the Ancestors has been severed. It's gone."

"What about the vampires?" a female witch asked. "Their number increase by the hour, while our strength has diminished."

"All right, I hear you," I told them. "But I need for you to hear me. Marcel Gerard is gonna be back to running things in the Quarter soon enough." The crowd mumbled to themselves. "I know. Listen. Now, I'm not asking you to trust Marcel. I'm asking you to trust me. Guys, what happens next, it's up to us."

The crowd murmured, dispersing, walking away, leaving.

I saw Vincent in the crowd, angry at seeing him after he gave Marcel the serum, walking toward him.

Vincent knew that I was pissed, sighing. "Nice speech."

"What are you doing here?" I asked.

"Look, I saw something," Vincent told me. "It's a bloodbath."

"So, why don't you go to Marcel?" I asked sarcastically. "You're the one that went behind my back to give him the serum to turn him into a beast, because you knew that I would try to stop you."

"Also why Marcel didn't tell you that he had the serum until after he took it, right?" Vincent replied. "Because he knew that you would try to stop him, too. Which you did, without realizing that he had already taken it."

I looked at him incredulously in anger. "If he changes into something that he's not, if the Mikaelsons find a way to take him down and kill him for trying to go after them, if you make me lose Marcel after I've already lost everything else..."

Vincent sighed. "I'm not here to start a fight. I came here to get your help."

"Well, that's ironic," I told him, crossing my arms over my chest.

"I need you to show you something," Vincent told me. "It's about what Marcel turned into after I gave him the serum."

I looked at him suspiciously in confusion, nodding. "Yeah. Okay."

Vincent turned around, walking away.

I glared after him in suspicion, hesitantly following him.

~~~

Vincent led me into St. Anne's Church.

Dead vampires were lying on the floor in the gym.

"Strix came in here because some vampires from out of town were trying to start up some trouble," Vincent told me. "I was here when it happened."

"So, these are the out of town vampires?" I asked.

"No," Vincent answered. "These are the Strix vampires. Or what's left of them."

I looked at the enhanced bites on the vampires in confusion. "What the hell?"

"I think the other vampires were some of the vamps that Marcel called into town so that he can put on a show of taking down the Mikaelsons," Vincent told me. "I don't think that he liked the Strix coming to send his vamps packing."

"Marcel did this?" I asked.

"I think so," Vincent answered.

A half dead vampire hanging over the top of the cage gripped Vincent by his throat, pulling him up to bite him in the throat, feeding, making him gasp and groan in pain.