616 Shattered

Raven knew about Kyle's potential. He was the youngest of the vampire royals, but he was hiding an immense power that was far stronger than the other three of his brothers with the exception of Ezekiel. The young man had grown up under the loving care of his mother and maternal grandparents for some time before he was taken to live in the Reign's castle. There he found it hard to fit in a family that was seemingly all about formality, power and responsibility. He had also refused to drink blood even when Ezekiel ordered him to do so and that was why Kyle was the only royal who never drunk blood yet since birth. Even Raven shivers as he imagines just how powerful this young royal would be by now if he did give in to the order and started drinking blood since then.

He knew that this was probably the reason why this young prince was the most restrained and protected out of all the other four younger brothers of the crown prince. Even Ezekiel himself had been pretty tight and protective of him.

"Brace yourselves, men. This won't be easy." Raven could only sigh as he had his eyes turned red as well. It is going to be a tough fight as they did not genuinely want to hurt His Highness but needed to just put in enough strength and opposition to subdue him and drag him back to the palace.

"How about the witch girl?"

"Focus on His Highness. I don't think he'd let us hurt the girl anyway."

The three of them attacked all at once but they ended up hitting nothing. Raven gritted his teeth, impressed and filled with disbelief, yet agitated as he thought of how three grown vampires could not match up to one half-grown vampire teen. How could they catch someone like this? No wonder his men did not manage to catch him back when he escaped that last time. He should have known that this prince was much stronger than he had given credit for, upon receiving the news that Alexander was the one who finally got him the last time he escaped to adventure out in that human city.

The clanks of swords jarred Lilith's ears and something in her mind was telling her to stop Kyle. But how could she stop him when she almost couldn't even breath with the speed of his movements?

Out of the blue, she felt like they were airborne again but faster than a blink, Kyle landed them on the ground and within the next second, she heard groans and then thuds sounding nearby. That was the sound of bodies falling on the floor – hard.

"Kyle." A familiar voice immediately reached Lilith's ears next despite all the chaos and the vampire holding her stilled. She couldn't even hear his heartbeat for a long while. It was as if the voice had turned him into a stone statue.

She finally looked at him and when she saw his eyes, there was no trace of those expressive eyes that she found fascinatingly beautiful. His eyes that moment was nothing but horrifying.

Still, she found herself calling his name between her breaths. "K-k-kyle. Stop. That's enough." She realized that that was the first time she used his name.

He moved and she saw how those beautiful dove-grey eyes darkened into a more iron-grey when he looked at her. Some sense seemed to return to his consciousness, and he gripped her harder when he looked ahead, towards the newcomer who had just arrived.

Lilith finally saw the three vampires he fought and the two of them were almost as good as dead. Except that they were already healing. If they were witches, they would definitely be dead by now.

Zeke approached them and Kyle stepped back, gripping his sword. His gaze swept to the two elite vampires that were bloodied all over savagely by the earlier fight, before returning his emotionless eyes to his youngest brother.

He did not stop in his tracks but continued walking towards them despite Kyle's retreat. Kyle's eyes remained red, but he was more wary and fearful.

"Please… don't take her away from me, brother." He requested. Though his words were polite, his gaze towards Zeke was hostile and cautious, blatantly showing his distrust in Zeke, behaving as if that the crown prince would hurt the witch in his arms.

"If you don't want the girl to get hurt, drop your sword and let her go." Zeke's voice was authoritative and cold as ice. And then, before they could even realize it, Kyle's sword was already taken away from him and the chain connecting the youngsters abruptly shattered without hurting either of the party connected by the chain.

Lilith was separated from Kyle too suddenly and without his support, she fell onto the floor. Her knees had weakened from all the chaos and her fear towards the scary man was also a big part of it.

Kyle was about to go to her when suddenly, Zeke hit him hard.