The storm outside had subsided, but inside the Council Hall, the air crackled with static electricity. The oak doors swung open, and Baroness Crowell entered.
She did not look like a warrior who had just won a battle.
She looked like a butcher.
Her red cloak was soaked with rain and mud, but her hands… her hands were stained with fresh blood that was not her own.
Vlad IV rose from his throne, his eyes narrowed.
"Where are they?" his voice thundered. "Where is Alice?"
Crowell walked to the center of the hall, ignoring the shocked stares of Talia and Benjamin. She stopped and smiled — a cold, satisfied smile.
"Alice ran, like the coward she is. Wounded. Broken. She won't be a problem for much longer."
"And the human?" Albert asked, stepping out of the shadows, his voice betraying a rare hint of anxiety.
Crowell turned to him, her golden eyes gleaming with malice.
"The human was… removed from the equation."
A deathly silence fell over the hall.
"You killed her?" Albert asked in disbelief. "The Council never gave that order. The deadline had expired, but the command was to bring Alice in for judgment!"
"I did what Vlad ordered and what was necessary to protect our species!" Crowell snapped. "The girl was a weakness. Now she's nothing more than rotting flesh on the roadside."
Albert stared at Crowell with deep disgust. Without another word, he turned his back on the Council and walked toward the exit.
"Albert!" Vlad called. "Where are you going?"
"Far from here," the enforcer replied without stopping. "Today, this Council lost its honor. And I do not serve child killers."
With Albert gone, Vlad turned his fury on Crowell.
"You have provoked a war, Baroness. Alice will not hide. She will come for us."
"Let her," Crowell said, wiping the blood from beneath her nails. "I'll be waiting."
Vlad sank back into his throne, the weight of centuries crushing his shoulders.
"So be it. Issue the order. Alice von Richter is now an enemy of the State. Hunt her down. Kill her if she resists."
Two days later, the sky over Princeton wept.
It wasn't just rain — it was a cold, gray deluge that turned the city's cemetery into a swamp of mud and dead leaves.
A sea of black umbrellas gathered around the open grave. The news of a "death by wild animal attack" had shocked the university.
Professors, students, neighbors… everyone was there to witness the end of a life that had barely begun.
Alice was there, but not by the grave. She stood beneath the shadow of a willow tree, dressed in black, motionless. At her side, Rose and Ruby formed a silent barrier, ready to hold her if she collapsed.
Alice watched the faces.
She saw Jude, a classmate, sobbing into the shoulder of Mark — the football player who used to mock Alice. Now he looked pale and shaken, holding a white flower in trembling hands.
She saw the Literature professor wiping his fogged glasses, shaking his head in denial.
And she saw Natalie.
Natalie stood in the front row. She wasn't crying like the others.
She was shaking.
Her eyes were fixed on the polished wooden coffin, heavy with a guilt no one there — except the vampires — could understand.
Natalie knew she was part of the world that had killed her best friend.
The coffin was lowered. The sound of dirt hitting the wood was the loudest sound Alice had ever heard in her immortal existence.
When the ceremony ended and the crowd began to disperse, Jimmy and Maria — Kara's parents — remained behind. They looked like empty shells, held upright only by each other.
Alice felt she owed them this.
She stepped out of the shadows and walked toward the couple.
Rose tried to grab her arm.
"Alice, don't… it's not safe."
"Let go," Alice said, her voice hollow.
She approached. Maria lifted her swollen, red eyes. When she recognized Alice, her grief turned into pure hatred.
"You…" Maria whispered.
"Mrs. Sullivan…" Alice began.
"DON'T SAY HER NAME!" Maria screamed, lunging forward. Jimmy had to restrain her. "This is your fault! All of this is your fault!"
"Maria, please calm down," Jimmy pleaded, though his own eyes were filled with tears and accusation.
"No! She killed our daughter!" Maria pointed a trembling finger at Alice's pale face. "If Kara had never met you… if she had never gotten involved with you… she would still be alive! You're cursed! You are death!"
Each word was a stake through Alice's heart.
She didn't defend herself.
She didn't step back.
She accepted the hatred as the only punishment that made sense.
"I'm sorry," was all Alice could say.
"Your 'sorry' won't bring my daughter back!" Maria sobbed, collapsing into her husband's arms. "Get out of our lives and let my daughter rest in peace — since you never let her live in peace!"
Jimmy cast one final look at Alice — a look of deep disappointment — and led his wife away.
Alice stood alone before the freshly turned earth. Rain soaked her face, mixing with the blood-tears she finally allowed to fall.
Rose and Ruby approached, wrapping their coats around her, pulling her away from the world of the living — a world she would never belong to again.
Two days later, the door to the old apartment creaked open.
The place was silent, dusty — preserved like a museum of a happy life that no longer existed.
Alice stepped inside. Rose remained in the hallway, keeping watch, knowing her sister needed to do this alone.
Alice walked through the rooms.
She touched Kara's coffee mug still sitting in the sink.
Ran her fingers over the poetry books on the shelf.
Kara's scent was fading, replaced by mold and abandonment.
She went to the bedroom. The bed was neatly made.
Alice opened Kara's dresser drawer, searching for something — anything — to take with her.
She found photos.
Class notes.
A hair ribbon.
And at the bottom of the drawer… a blue leather folder.
Frowning, Alice opened it.
Inside were documents.
Forms.
Her eyes scanned the page — and her world stopped for the second time.
They were civil union papers.
Clipped to them was a hand-drawn sketch of a ring.
A ring with a red gemstone — just like Alice's eyes when she transformed.
Beside the drawing, in Kara's cursive handwriting, were the words:
"For when we return. Forever."
Kara had been planning to propose.
She wasn't just going to turn.
She was going to marry Alice.
She had planned a life.
An official eternity.
Alice's legs gave out.
She collapsed to her knees in the middle of the bedroom, clutching the papers to her chest, and a howl of pain tore from her throat, echoing through the empty apartment.
Hours later, in an abandoned industrial warehouse on the city's outskirts…
The sound of destruction was deafening.
Alice slammed her bare fists into a concrete pillar.
It cracked.
Crumpled.
Smeared with the vampire's blood that regenerated only to be torn apart again.
She wasn't screaming anymore.
She was just hitting.
Hitting to kill the pain.
Hitting to punish the hands that failed to save Kara.
From the shadows, Rose emerged. She watched for a moment, her heart aching as she saw her usually controlled sister reduced to self-destructive fury.
Alice raised her fist for another strike — but Rose rushed forward, catching her arm mid-air.
"That's enough, Alice…" Rose said, her voice breaking. "Stop this. You're going to destroy yourself."
Alice turned. Her eyes were black voids.
"Let go of me!" she roared.
"No," Rose held firm. "Kara wouldn't want to see you like this."
That was the trigger.
"YOU DON'T KNOW ANYTHING!" Alice screamed, her voice distorted. "You don't know what she wanted! You almost killed her once, and now you dare tell me what she wanted?!"
Alice attacked.
She struck Rose in the face with full force. Rose was thrown back — but immediately stood up.
Alice charged again — punching, kicking, tearing.
Rose didn't fight back.
She only raised her arms to protect her face and vital organs, letting Alice hit her. She accepted the beating.
Because Alice wasn't hitting her.
She was hitting fate.
Guilt.
The Council.
Alice slammed Rose onto the oil-stained floor and straddled her, punching her face again and again. Rose's blood splattered across Alice's hands.
"Why?!" Alice screamed between blows. "Why her?! Why not me?!"
Rose endured it, feeling the bones of her face crack and heal. Through the blood, she looked at her sister and saw the terrified child Alice had been hiding for centuries.
"Alice…" Rose whispered, gently gripping her sister's wrists. "I'm here. Take it out on me. I can take it."
Alice stopped.
Her raised fist trembled.
She looked at Rose's bruised face.
At the blood on her own hands.
The fury drained away, leaving only emptiness.
Alice collapsed.
She fell onto Rose's chest, burying her face in her sister's coat, and began to sob uncontrollably.
"She was going to propose to me, Rose," Alice choked. "I found the papers. She was going to ask me to marry her. And I… I let her die."
Rose felt her own heart — one that no longer beat — ache.
She wrapped her arms around Alice, holding her tight, staining herself with blood and dust.
"Oh, Alice…" Rose whispered, kissing the top of her sister's head. "I'm so sorry. I'm so, so sorry."
On that cold concrete floor, surrounded by darkness, the two sisters lay together.
There was no rivalry.
No past.
Only shared pain and an embrace that kept Alice from completely falling apart.
For the first time in decades, they were just sisters trying to survive the night.