I Didn't Want This

I Didn't Want This
Layla

Was this a dream?

It felt like a dream. Like I was alive and yet, not breathing. Not feeling.

It felt like I was underwater. My brain functioned, thinking, imagining, but I couldn’t quite react. I could make out the muffled voices around me.

I heard mom and dad.

I heard Draven.

And Kai.

They moved around me, but I couldn’t quite see them. They touched me, holding my hand as they spoke, but it was as if there were a veil between us.

There was a splitting pain that exploded in the back of my head, travelling down my neck until it hit my gums.

But nothing hurt enough to actually wake me from the depths of my unconsciousness.

I didn’t know how much time passed.

I woke to silence.

Still, I couldn’t move, but everything rushed in at once. 

I could smell the candles at my side, though they weren’t lit. I could hear the grass out on the lawn as the breeze swept past it. I could hear armor as the guards shifted at my door. 

The sound of the fire and the smell of every piece of ash on my bedroom floor. Footsteps echoed in the halls above and below me. 

But then, the faint, uneven rhythm of heartbeats. Many of them. They were impossible to ignore. 

My body locked, and an aching pain rushed from my stomach to my gums. The room tilted violently, senses crashing into me faster than I could process them.

I tried to speak, but my throat was raw, the light was blinding to my eyes. 

“Layla.”

The sound of his voice made everything still. It wasn’t until I blinked, opening mye yes to fully see my surroundings, that I realized he wasn’t there beside me. Not physically. 

He had spoken inside me. 

“Layla.”

I snapped my head up, finding him at the door, looking as if he had ran for a while to get there. His hair was disheveled, his eyes wide with worry. 

He watched me for a second, not moving, not speaking, and I wondered why everything felt so different. 

“How are you feeling?” he whispered, eyes travelling down my body, taking in every expression. 

The bond pulled lightly in my chest, and I frowned. “Why does it feel like that?”

He pressed his lips together, looking away from me. He looked ashamed, sorry. “Because I forced you.”

“Forced me?”

His green eyes gazed at me, full of sorrow and longing. His eyes might have felt the same, but the bond didn’t. It felt as if it were gone, as if it no longer existed. 

“Forced me to what—”

I stopped speaking, hissing when I felt a sharp pain on my bottom lip. When I touched it, my finger was covered in blood. How did that happen?

My tongue moved instinctively, brushing over the spot and caught on something sharp. I froze, dragging my tongue over my teeth again, horrified at the pointy fang. 

I pushed myself up, my arms shaking violently beneath me, my body refusing to work as dizziness overwhelmed me. 

Kai was there instantly, his hands catching me before I could fall back. 

I grabbed onto him, my fingers tightening in his shirt. “The mirror.”

He hesitated. “Layla—”

“I need to see.”

He adjusted his grip so I could stand, and my legs barely held. He didn’t carry me, though. He let me guide him to the mirror across the room. I braced myself against the table beneath it, forcing myself to look up.

I didn’t recognize the girl staring back. I was paler, my eyes dark. Just like my dad’s. Just like mom’s. Like Draven’s. Like… a vampire. 

My gaze dropped to my mouth, to the fangs poking into my lips. 

A small, broken sound left my throat as I stumbled back into Kai, my entire body going cold.

“You…” I swallowed hard, my voice trembling. “You transitioned me.”

“Yes.”

I turned to look at him. “But I didn’t want—”

“You were dying.”

I stared at him, trying to argue, trying to find something to push back with, but there was nothing. Only the memories, the blood and the pain. 

I pressed my hand to my chest, trying to find the heartbeat that no longer existed. A strange, hollow feeling settled over me for a moment as I tried to understand what that meant.

What I was and what I had become.

But then I couldn’t think anymore. Hunger hit me like a wall. It felt violent inside me, a thirst I could have never imagined. 

Kai’s expression shifted, tension flooding his features. “You need to eat.”

The door opened, and I turned sharply toward the sound, my body reacting before my mind could catch up.

Maelis stepped in with her sister at her side. 

Her heartbeat. I could hear it, loud. It pulsed in my ears as if it were my own and I felt my fangs as they extended from my gums. 

My entire body went rigid. “No, no, I can’t.”

“It’s okay,” Maelis said quickly, her eyes drawing toward Kai for a second before dropping back down to me. “Layla, look at me.”

I couldn’t. All I could focus on was Sera’s pulse. 

“I don’t want to hurt her,” I said, my voice breaking.

“You won’t, she’s here because she chose to be here, right?” She turned toward her sister, pushing her forward with her hand on her back. 

Sera nodded. “Yes. I want to help.”

“No,” I whispered again, my hands shaking. “I don’t want this.”

Hunger twisted harder, feeling like sand was moving beneath my skin. Tears burned at my eyes as I looked between them, trapped between what I wanted and what my body demanded.

Maelis stepped closer, her gaze steady on mine. “You saved us. Let us do the same for you.”

My chest tightened.

“This is her choice,” she continued gently.

Sera stepped close enough now that I could feel the warmth of her skin. “I’m not afraid.”

I shook my head weakly. “I am.”

Maelis reached out, taking my hand and guiding it gently. Slowly, trembling, I leaned forward.

Sera tilted her head, exposing her neck without hesitation.

My fangs ached, my entire body screamed for it.

I hesitated, but the pull was too strong. 

I bit, a sharp inhale leaving her, but she didn’t pull away. The moment the blood hit my tongue, everything changed.