Chapter One

As he rigidly sat up in bed, Aakarshan knew something had changed. After having the same recurring dream almost daily for the last eighteen years, he knew that today was the day a change had begun. The dream always began with him walking through the ruins of Velkrem, a sight which always brought him to tears. There were ashes blowing in the midnight wind and wherever the moonlight fell, crucifixes could be seen. Walking past his home, he would see the burnt outlines of what were his parents, holding each other as their bodies were slowly, painfully, agonizingly burned by the internal flame. He would later find his sister hanging from a cross, her arms broken, her body covered in lashes. She was barely alive, the only survivor other than him in the entire city. Her body had started to burn, deathly slow, but she had somehow kept her consciousness. As she quietly called out his name in a grave voice, he gently pulled her down into his arms and cradled her close. Devlyn would normally start to mumble things to him as he stroked her hair, assuring her that all would be fine, while his insides wrenched in pain knowing that she would be consumed.

But last night was different.

The things Devlyn had said were clear as the morning sky and filled with much emotion.

Aakarshan, she called. “Worry not. There is no pain.”
Her bronze eyes gave her away. He knew she was only moments away from death.
“Brother. You are the only one left to make this world at peace. You must forget this ancient feud and find the other. She lives. Look in the Memory Box”
As she took another painful breath to tell him more, she faltered.
“Devlyn. You cannot leave me. You are an Armand. Please…”
She reached up to touch his face for the last time, but her hand never made it.
“Find her.” The words were whispered as her eyes turned murky black and her body turned to ash right in his arms.

These were the words Aakarshan had never heard, the words that changed everything.

He took in a deep breath and switched on the lamp with his bedside panel, illuminating his dark room. Shadows were cast against the walls, morphing ordinary objects into menacing figures but he wasn’t scared. There were scarier things out in New York City. Things like werewolves.

Putting his hands in his face, Akarshan could feel the sweat sheen his face. Glancing at the clock, he let out a sigh. 5am and was still tired. These nightmares were getting out of hand. Grabbing a towel from the stand, he made his way to the bathroom in a zombie-like manor. The large mirror in his kingly bathroom reflected his entire body but what he noticed were his eyes. Staring back at him were brown eyes rimmed with blue.
Blue and brown? He was confused. And then it hit him.

His dream. His inner subconscious must have been really effected by the dream to have changed his eye color. Shaking his head, he brushed his teeth, washed his face and went down stairs for a cup of coffee.
“What is wrong with me?”, he though out loud. “I’ve got to be going crazy. Nightmares and visions definitely mean you’re going crazy.”
Yesterday’s mail was laying on the counter next to his coffee.Picking up the mail and grabbing some coffee he jumped gracefully onto the couch, not spilling a drop.

“Junk. Junk. Junk. Junk. Why can’t I ever get anything interes…”

The last letter in the stack was like one he had never seen. Pitch black like the sky at 2am, it seemed to gleam in the dim light. The envelope was addressed to him , but not in the usual way of Shan Armand. It clearly stated Aakarshan Karayan Armand, a name he hadn’t used for eight years.
Had someone found him out? Found out that he was the last of the Royalty? But who? There was no return address.Thoughts raced through his head and he fought to keep his calm.
“Calm down, Aakarshan,” he told himself. “I bet it’s just…”
But he could not come up with any legitatate answer. Carefully opening the letter, a single piece of paper fell out. The first three words stopped his breath, but the last two almost gave him a heart attack. If only he had a beating one.

“Remember Devlyn’s Words.”

-Vampire Prophecies

The Vampire Prophecies. Now that rang a bell. The Vampire Prophecies were a myth, a group of vampires who were known to record the future. They were the ones who controlled the outcome of the vampire world. Nobody knew who they were, where they were, or if they even existed. Until today.
Pulling a calm blanket over his confused and erratic mind, he pushed aside the fact that the Vampire Prophecies were contacting him. Obviously they were real and needed him for their future. Aakarshan narrowed all his concentration to the message. Remember Devlyn’s Words.

Mulling over the phrase, Aakarshan grabbed another cup of coffee.
He went over the dream in his head one more time. Basically, he was the only one to cease this chaos and he had to find some girl and a box. How helpful. He rolled his eyes.
Wondering out loud again, he said ,"I’m trying to save the world, and all I had is some measly clue about a memory…."
Stopping in midsentence, he realized what he had said. He glanced toward the black door at the end of the hall which contained all of his stuff from his old life.
Memory box. There was a box he had brought back which had been his fathers which had been labeled with one Latin word, Memoria. Aakarshan had been unable to open it because it required a fingerprint scan, and his wasn’t the one.
Indefinitely, he knew that box held all the answers to his questions. He would have to either force it open or break it.

His stomach grumbled, reminding him that he still hadn’t eaten breakfast. Vampire, or not, he still needed to eat regular food. The box could wait, he needed some fuel for this day. Opening the kitchen cabinet near the fridge, he pulled out his favorite cereal. If there was one thing that improved, in his favor, tremendously over the past 600 years, it was the cereal. Pouring himself a bowl and mixing in some milk, he sat down at the bar stool facing the flat-screen TV. Unlike the cereal, the cartoons had been getting worse over the past twenty years, much to his disapproval because that's what he watched the most. Today's show was something about deer who were trying to over the world. Pathetic, he thought.

Taking a bite of his cereal, he almost laughed when he glanced at the cereal box. Count Chocula cereal. How ironic. Finding the taste perfect and the character well-matched to himself, Aakarshan made a mental note to remind Viktor that this cereal was to be well stocked in his cabinet. Still smirking, he took another bite and turned his thoughts to the locked box called "Memoria".