Cursed blood

There were few chairs left at the table so Clara picked one and sat down with Isabella on her lap. Lucio also sat next to them and four members of the Vercelli family.

"Lucio, why there are four members of their family? You said there are only three and one of there four is vampire."

Fear appeared on the familiar vampire faces as they discovered that they were right next to the vampire they had no idea that he was there. In an instant whole situations changed. A Vampire pretending to be a member of the Vercelli family killed all three vampires who were standing right behind him, and in the blink of an eye, the whole situation changed. All vampires around start to attack the new thread in the villa.

"That's strange. I thought that there was no one else."

"What does that suppose to mean?"

"Well, this vampire is probably at the same rank as I. He is a higher vampire created by the elder. He must be stronger than me because I was not able to sense his presence at all and he could pretend to be human without my knowing."

Clara didn't say anything anymore and only watched how was the vampire massacring other familiars. He was very effective even without any weapons and other vampires had no chance against him.

"Lucio, will you be able to kill him with the sword?"

Lucio shook his head and both of them then stayed sitting behind the table. It took Jim nearly half an hour until he managed to kill more than twenty vampires and the rest went behind Clara and Lucio. The Vampire who just killed nearly half of their force went behind the Vercelli family members. Lucio looked at the vampire with discussion in his eyes.

"Lucio, who is that?"

"This is Lorenso Sanguini. I don't know much about him, but from what I know he is at least two hundred years older than me. He was created by the Elder to fight in the war between Byzantine and Lombard. It was a struggle between Germanic people who attacked Italy and Byzantine who didn't let them do it. From what I heard, Lorenzo's elder who created him died in the process, but he was too far away, so he didn't die with his lord as the blood bond was weak to kill him and from then on is rogue."

Lorenzo smiled at Clara and immediately felt how strong Clara was.

"Nice to meet you, Elder. What do I owe the pleasure that you are here?"

"I am here to collect money and move. I want to go to Florence and for that, I will need to have the necessary access and power to live like I want."

"You still didn't answer my question. Why are you here?"

"I am here for the Gold."

Lorenzo Sanguini smiled and vanished. He appeared right in front of Clara and before doing anything, his hand was in Isabella's hair. Lucio neatly jumped out of the chair, as he was not even able to react, to how quickly Lorenzo moved and how he appeared right next to him.

As soon as he saw Clara look at him angrily, he let Isabella’s hair go and started vulturine around. All lesser vampires around were frozen in fear as they had no idea what will gonna happen.

"You see Elder. You are very weak and also carry a familiar with yourself which you have in favor. If we start fighting here, you will certainly be able to subdue me, but I can guarantee you, that I will kill your familiar at all costs."

"Why would you try to kill Isabella?"

"I can give you some gold, but in exchange, you will give me little of your blood. Then we can all go our way."

Clara thought about his offer, and as she felt that she would not gonna lose anything she stood up. Isabella was somehow able to stay next to her and Clara extended her hand forward.

Lorenzo smiled and as soon as he grabbed her hand to shake Clara felt that his nails were trying to pierce through her skin. She also tried to squeeze his palm, when she felt something ugly. Lucio unshed his silver sword and as soon as Lorenzo saw him, he tried to move away. He instantly felt that he had fallen into the trap. His thoughts about Clara being the leader of the group made him believe that they would not do anything until Clara gave them a signal, but he didn't anticipate such things.

As soon as Lucio swung his sword, Lorenzo forcefully pulled his hand out of Clara's grip and his hand was cut off. Thankfully he wasn't bleeding as the sword burned everything in the way, but she could say goodbye to reattaching the hand back.

He landed back behind the Vercelli family members and dug in one's neck. He quickly sucked the boy's blood and turned him into a corpse in just a few seconds. The rest of the vampires went after him along with Lucio leaving only one smaller female next to Clara. She was still watching Lorenzo's hand in her own in fear.

"Miss, we found where they are hiding their money, but there is a catch to it. Please come with me."

She was holding a box with something, and Clara felt that this must be money from the guard post.

"Good, so let's go."

Clara picked up Isabella and they left for the second floor. They arrived in front of the doors to the library. Clara didn't understand, so she asked.

"Why don't you open the door?"

As soon as the girl's hand touched the doors her hand started burning and she pulled back. Both of them were looking at each other and she didn't understand what to do.