Married To The Mad Vampire Lord - Chapter 467

Chapter 467: The Rogue_Part 2
“How many children have you birthed for the establishment?” Belle asked quietly, never realizing until now just how dreadful the lives of the women here truly were and what they went through.

Andrea raised both her hands and began to count with her fingers. She held up five fingers on one hand and three on the other. “That much, and this is my ninth one. I birth every year, and the moment the baby is a few months old, they get taken away to the other establishment to be raised by workers and fed cow milk until they are old enough to be sold or kept for breeding. Immediately after that, I get a visit from a male slave, with the guards watching as he gets me pregnant again.”

Belle felt a shudder go through her body at those words, and the fact that the woman was saying it without any emotion meant she had grown used to it and must have grown detached. She could not imagine having a baby and having it taken away from her, or having a strange man take her in front of others watching. For all the rumors and words she had heard about places like this, Belle had not thought it to be this bad. Now she suddenly realized why the humans wanted to put an end to these creatures and wipe them from the world.

“How did you end up here in the first place?” Belle found herself asking, curious.

Andrea chuckled humorlessly. “Sold by my own pa. We lived in a small village in Nightbrook where everything seemed good, or so I thought. I had four other siblings, and I was the eldest daughter, but we barely had enough to eat every day and night. I never actually complained about such a life; I could do with one meal a day, you know. But pa wanted the easy way out of poverty and decided to sell one of his daughters.

Pa told ma to dress me up because I was supposed to meet a suitor who wanted to marry me. I truly thought I was getting married. Before I even knew what was happening, I found myself being taken away from my family, only to be brought here. I was in denial for a whole year, refusing to believe that pa had done this to me.”

Belle felt a deep pang of pity for the other woman. For some reason, she related to the part about family betrayal and understood how it felt. “I’m sorry…” she whispered, watching as Andrea merely shrugged off her sympathy, her eyes distant and tired.

“There’s nothing to be sorry for. At least the money used to sell me would be enough to take care of my siblings and give them a better life. Only, I can’t forgive my parents for the life they chose for me.”

“Don’t you ever wish to leave this place someday? To find out where they take your children?” Belle asked, curiosity softening her tone as she noticed Andrea’s detachment from the outside world. The woman spoke as if her entire life had ended the moment she was sold, something completely different from Belle’s firm resolve to escape.

“Children?” came the bitter reply from the young woman. “They are no longer mine. And if you were in my shoes, which you soon will be, you wouldn’t care about them either. They were never conceived in a good way. Sometimes, one even prays they’ll be stillborn, just to escape this life of misery given to us by the bloodsuckers.”

Belle could see how much this place had broken Andrea, how it had taken a young girl and crushed her spirit until nothing was left but bitterness and resignation. She didn’t want to end up like that, hollow and defeated. Yet she knew it was inevitable for anyone who stayed too long in this godforsaken place.

“I won’t stay in this place and let my child be taken by them. I don’t plan to stay here forever, and neither should you. Don’t you wish to escape?” Belle pressed, knowing that when the time came where she would have to take things into her own hands, she would need the knowledge of someone who had been here long enough to understand the place.

“And go where?” Andrea asked flatly. “Look, I’m already branded as a slave.” She pulled her shift down at the shoulder to show Belle the dark mark burned into her skin. “Wherever I go, as long as it’s within the vampire world, I’ll be found and dragged back here. That’s why I tell you not to fight it. There’s no way out of this place, lady. The best thing is to accept it and forget about the outside world.”

Belle’s eyes hardened slightly. “I can’t. My family doesn’t even know I was taken, but when they realize it, they’ll come for me, and they’ll find me,” she said firmly, her voice carrying quiet conviction. Then she added softly, “You shouldn’t resign your life to this place. And just so you know, the vampires’ days of dominating humans are coming to an end.”

“What do you mean?” Asked the other woman with curiousity and confusion in her voice.

Belle went on to tell Andrea about the coming war, and to her surprise, she saw a flicker of light settle in the young woman’s eyes, eyes that had been hopeless for far too long.

“Really? The humans plan to wipe all the night creatures and put a human ruler over Nightbrook?” Andrea whispered in astonishment, to which Belle nodded, knowing many in here wouldn’t know about this piece of information since they had been locked away from the happenings of the world.

“I don’t want my hopes rising, lady, but I shall hold on to what ya just said. I want to see these creatures suffer like they made us suffer. It’s about time the humans in the other kingdoms come to our aids,” Andrea said, and after that, she fell silent and closed her eyes. Belle imagined she was picturing freedom, as she should. No one should live a hopeless life, and for the first time since knowing there might be war, Belle prayed for the humans to be victorious against the vampires.

If it came down to her family and the people she cared about, they had ways to disguise themselves among humans and live their life without danger. The vampires posed a greater risk to many lives important to her than the humans did, especially when the king and the royals were after her husband and son.

However, now that she didn’t have Andrea’s voice to talk to her, Belle’s mind began to wander to other places. She was starving, but hunger didn’t come close to the worry in her heart.

What worried her more was knowing that maniac wouldn’t let her go once he recovered from whatever she had done to him. Men like that never gave up. She needed her strength back to either plan an escape and find her way home, or pray desperately that Rohan realized he was being fooled by Cordelia.

She had so many reasons to leave this place, too many lives would be at risk if she didn’t, especially Rav’s, whom she had promised to save. With the many souls she had taken back until now, it was enough to replace her deed of sparing Rohan’s soul in the past, but not enough to spare her own mistakes. That meant Angel and Rohan were out of danger of being wiped from existence, but not her or Rav, whose name had already made it onto the lists given to her to take back.

Rohan and Angel’s name hadn’t been on the lists but Rav’s had been.

She needed to take the souls back and couldn’t afford to fail before the final time given to her. There would be no excuse for not being able to do so before the elders. One thing was certain though, Cordelia had given her men strict orders not to kill her, which at least put her mind at ease, since her death would mean the end of everything.

However, she couldn’t help but wonder why Cordelia would order them to keep her alive, after all, a year ago, she had wanted her dead, and now she had gone so far as to take her place. What exactly was Cordelia planning?

Belle let her eyes drift to the night sky through the small window, where the pale silver light of the moon spilled in. A deep ache stirred in her chest as she longed for her family, for her son, her husband, and the warmth of their bed.

She felt her baby kick softly and brought her swollen hand down to her stomach. ‘Don’t worry, your papa is a very smart man. He’ll soon figure out the truth, and if he doesn’t, I’ll protect you with all my life and get us out of here,’ she promised her unborn child with quiet, unwavering resolve.

Belle managed to turn to the side and brought out her reaper watch, a small, round brown timepiece with dark glass. It wasn’t an ordinary watch that shows time; reapers used it to track souls through the shifting of its hands, names engraved along the edge marking a life bound to a reaper.

The names changed everyday to the people who would die soon and Belle noticed Rav’s name had appeared there again when a few months ago it had disappeared as she had shifted the hands of his time.

She turned the side dial to Rav’s name, and her eyes rounded when she saw the hands of his time flickering back and forth, causing her heart to give a heavy thud.

‘Oh, Rav, what’s happening? What has gotten you back to worry again?’ Belle thought internally, realizing things were already falling apart.