The Legend of Juliet: Part One (A Vampire Dystopia) (Finding Freedom Novellas) by Alexandra Lanc

 
    Chapter One
     
    Sometimes I hate getting up in the morning. It’s not the sunlight that bothers me — it couldn’t be that, because there isn’t much sun around here; it’s mostly cloudy, like an unending rainstorm — it’s the fact that I have to roll out of bed, get dressed, and try to face the day. It’s not that I’m not content, because I am – and things could be much worse, after all.
    It’s only that sometimes, things become a bit... complicated .
    Such as when I run into Master Delouge.
    I kept my head down, my green eyes trailing the floor as I padded down the hallway of the Manor in my threadbare loafers, trying to pass by the Manor’s residents without being noticed. It wasn’t an easy thing to do in a house that was continuously full — maids running here and there, setting up bedrooms for new guests, guests trying to find the drawing room where they were meant to meet with Master Delouge — but somehow I managed.
    Usually.
    I caught my breath as I cut a corner, rounding my way past the library, heading towards the large third story deck that sat at the back of the Manor in a private, secluded area, overlooking a large lake, and the tall pine trees that had sprouted around it. It was my job to arrive there before the tenth hour, and I was running late as usual, which wasn’t a good thing. If I was caught being late again, I was fearful that they would hang me...or worse ; not many people would mourn me, either, and so my life would fade from existence mostly unnoticed. I tried not to be late, but with Luke gone there was no one to wake me save myself, since the vampires didn’t care to rise until near the time that the tenth hour, the first feeding of the day, arrived.
    I bit my lip harshly as I rounded another corner, nearly running into a pretty vampire – a tall, blonde haired woman whose skin was the color of cream, and who was dressed in a scarlet gown which flowed to the floor, trimmed with black lace; probably another of the guests. She gave me a particularly nasty scowl as she muttered something foul beneath her breath, probably assuming that I didn’t know what she meant, that my vocabulary was as indistinct as most other humans’.
    Or maybe she didn’t care; this was most likely the case.
    It wouldn’t have surprised me, because I never expected kindness – especially from Master Delouge’s guests, who were stuffy and old, agreeing with the idea that humans were “slaves” instead of “pets”, a term that had become popular with some this year; I resented the term, although it was an improvement over its predecessor, but I knew better than to say anything against it.
    I rounded one last corner, leaving the scarlet Lady behind. I had almost made it to the deck when I ran into something hard, not looking where I was headed, my eyes still trailing the ground. My head snapped up immediately as I stumbled back a few steps, shrinking, as I knew I should, as I had been taught.
    The only problem was that my gaze traveled upwards a bit too far as I shrank back, and I caught the gaze of Master Delouge, whose red orbs turned to fire as soon as his eyes met mine.
    “Human,” he snarled, and I immediately looked down at the floor, wondering whether or not I should bow, and deciding that it couldn’t hurt, since I was in trouble already. I bowed halfway, and he snarled even more, so I stopped, shrinking another degree. “Watch where you’re going, you filthy—”
    His sentence was cut off by none other than Sibold, who appeared in the hallway just then, materializing directly in front of his father, shielding me from his harsh gaze. “Juliet,” he said in an icily pleasant tone, speaking to me though his gaze rested on Master Delouge, who scowled; I viewed this from the upper portion of my vision, since my head remained bowed. “Where have you been? I’ve been looking for you.”
    “I-I’m sorry, Master,” I stuttered in a hurried tone as I shrunk even further, wanting to