I glance at the vacant seat next to me as I take my seat in business class. I miss Zack. I am eagerly anticipating the start of literature class with Professor Andrews. I consider ways to overcome this and return to normal, since I yearn for it. The door opens in the middle of class, and Jamie enters. He sits in Zack's previous seat after apologising to the professor and explaining that he has been transferred, sending shivers down my spine. He says hello softly, and I smile nicely before turning to see that he is armed. That implies that they are all. They want to prevent Clay and I from getting together.

I quickly glance away so he doesn't notice what I saw. I need to warn Brie, and Logan so that Clay will be aware. Jamie asks if he may walk me to my next class as class is coming to a close; if I refuse, he will start looking around, so I can't help but nod and accept.

"So earlier, what the hell was that all about? You're ruthless." He states. I shrug and pretend to be clueless, hoping he drops the subject, but he doesn't.

I stop and look at him. I step towards him, backing him up against the school building. "Don't you like who I am, or do you miss who I was?" He doesn't say a word. "That's what I thought." I walk away and head to my next class.

⁂

I sit down and wait for Professor Bryant to start class; halfway through, Chancellor Cladwell walks in and whispers something to him. The next thing I know, I'm being called to follow him.

I follow him into a dim stairwell after walking down a hallway; I had no idea this was there. It is old. Brie, Logan, Lia, Mrs. Danielson, Mr. Michaels, and Clay are inside when he opens the door that has been waiting at the bottom of the stairs. He approaches me as his father closes the door behind us and grabs me for a hug. I make the most of every minute. "Forgive me?" I slightly smile.

He smiles. I raise my eyebrow. He is still chewing on my gum. "Always." He kisses my head. I melt as he speaks.

God, I love the English.

I look around. This place is old. It seems like it hasn't been used in years or decades. "What is this place?" I ask.

"It's the old library. It hasn't been in use since 1904," Chancellor Cladwell tells me. "When we renovated, we made it seem as if we closed this part off, just in case we ever needed it like now." He puts his hand on his son's shoulder and looks at all of us.

"How do we get out of here unnoticed?" I ask, looking around. "See that door right there?" I look behind me and see another door in the far back. "That right there leads to a tunnel, left leads to my parent's house, right leads right underground of your apartment building, that way we can go and come as we please without being seen." Clay looks at me with a smile, and I can feel myself calm down. Maybe this won't be so bad.

The room becomes eerie with silence "Okay, so how many are on our side?" I ask, breaking the silence in the room; someone needed to ask.

We sit at the table placed right in the middle as Chancellor Cladwell explains that he knows of 20 vampires who still follow Abel's word. "So that's 11 Lycans and 20 Vamps, that brings it to 31, which would leave us with 30 Vamps plus us." I say out loud. Everyone nods.

My mind goes back to earlier to Jamie and how he was armed. "We have nothing to protect ourselves from them. The Lycan children carry weapons on campus, so most likely, the elders do too. How do we fight against that?" I ask.

"We have one thing they don't," Mr. Michaels chimes in with a determined look in his eyes.

"What?" I ask, afraid of his answer. He better not say me.

"You!" he says. And there it is.

"But they know me, they know what I'm capable of. What makes you think they aren't prepared?" I protest.

"We need to catch them off guard every chance we get," Lia explains.

"So what you're saying is that all of you, including the others who are helping us, are a distraction for me to what? .... Destroy them?"

"Yes!" everyone says. Why do I feel like they had already talked about this before I got here?

Chancellor Cladwell has already taken the first step, which includes a dinner with the vampires who are against us, to try and talk things out. Mrs. Danielson says if I can channel Brie's power from her, I can do this easily without exerting myself, and that way I won't be alone in this. Brie agrees, saying that I should do it so that my power is more substantial, but I know I can do this on my own. So I tell Brie that what I want is for her to spell the house so they can't leave before I do what I have to do. Clay and Logan are on hand if any of them try to attack. After that has been dealt with, we will move on to the Lycans.

⁂

The week is over quickly, and Saturday is drawing near. From acting as though Clay doesn't exist to speaking with Jamie, this week has been a living nightmare. He has made attempts to kiss me, and I have had to commit. He has also pushed for other things, but I have been able to refuse them.

I head to the kitchen and find Brie and Logan standing there. "Are you ready for this?" Brie asks. "Ready as I'll ever be, you?" I ask her.

"Yeah, Grams gave me the spell to keep them in. Mr. Michaels and Grams are going to help me keep it up," she explains.

"Good. I hope that they will listen to Mr. Cladwell, and I won't have to do anything." I look down. "I just hope everything goes smoothly. We don't want any trouble," I say, feeling a bit anxious about what's to come.

"It will be okay. Clay and I will be in there with you, and Vince can be very convincing and doesn't back down." Logan says, hugging me. Sounds just like Clay. Logan has become like a big brother to me. He assures me just like Brie does and looks out for me just like she does.

"Let's get going. We are meeting everyone in the old library," Logan states as he kisses Brie on the cheek. When I see them together, I miss Clay more and more.

We get to the library and wait for everyone else to show up. Lia isn't here; she is with the pack, trying to figure out what they are doing and how to protect us from them. Chancellor Cladwell is at home preparing for dinner. He has made sure that no one comes armed. He explained that his son and wife are home, and he doesn't want any violence to ensue in his house; it was just a conversation amongst elders.

Logan leaves and heads to Clay's house to meet up with him. We follow not too long after. As we get to the property, I start to feel nervous. I know what I'm doing is protecting myself, and I should have the choice of what my life should be. Clay spots me and sneaks me in. I can hear the conversation from where I am, ready for whenever they need me.

"But I don't understand why you are so concerned about this so-called love these two children have for each other. The spell wiped her memories of him," one elder vamp woman says.

"But it didn't. They never wiped her memories. They shut off her humanity. That's more dangerous than anything else, but that's not the point," Chancellor Cladwell starts. "The point is that you took away her free will to love whoever she wanted."

"You know exactly why we did it!" Another vamp spews. I can feel the anger brewing in the air as the conversation continues.

"Oh, I do understand why! You didn't comprehend, however, that there is only one possible source for the prophecy that would make her want to eradicate all of us from existence." Chancellor Cladwell explains it to them.

"What do you mean?" One asks, and that's my cue.

I walk into the dining room, where they are all seated. "Ladies and gentlemen, you all know Raven Beauregard," He introduces me. "What is she doing here?" Shock fills their voices. "What is happening right now?" I smile at the confusion that I've caused by entering the room.

All these questions, and these idiots still haven't figured out the reason for their destruction. If they had left us alone, I wouldn't be doing this right now. "I'm here to explain that you and your friends tried to shut off my humanity, not wipe my memories. Do you know what happens when you shut off the humanity of the person you fear the most? I'll tell you, the outcome for you isn't that good." Gasps fill the air. They all look so shocked.

"If you knew that I would be the one to destroy all supernatural beings, then you should have realised there would be a reason for it, and what usually causes someone to take revenge on people?" I ask them, walking around the table; they all get up to leave "Don't bother. You're spelled inside. No way out. Now sit and answer my question, please."

They all sit back down, staring at each other. "Taking the one thing they love away from them," the elder vamp women says with her head down.

"Ding ding ding, we have a winner," Clay says, walking in. "So what are we going to do about it? You could have stopped this. But you all chose to decide without knowing what the consequences could be."

"How is this possible, the serum should have worked on you?" One elder stands up. I recognize him as Vlad, one of the men who was at the manor.

"It should have, you're right, but you also forgot that with every spell, there's a loophole, and with every loophole, there is a price," I state clearly, standing in front of him.

"What are you talking about?" He shouts at me. "She's saying that the love they have for each other overpowers any spell that was put on her, and the price for doing this to them is all of us dying." The one-woman vamp says quietly.

"What is your name?" I ask her. "Gretchen," she replies.

"Gretchen is correct, you and those Lycans did all this, none of this would be happening if it weren't for the fact that you tried to control my destiny, my future, and my life," I scowl. "So we have two choices here, one, you can side with us, and we put it all in the past and move on; or two, you get the consequence that is to come to you, your choice."

Rushing over, Vlad grabs Clay; however, he is now pinned to the wall by Clay, who is stronger than him due to his ignorance of this fact. When Logan rushes in, another person approaches him. Logan knocks the person away, sending him flying into the dining room table. Three vampires are engaged in combat with Chancellor Cladwell, Clay, and Logan.

"Ignis,"

The table engulfs in flames, and everyone stops. "Now listen, if you don't want to side with us, that's fine, but then I have no choice but to do what I was supposedly meant to do to you," I shout.

"I think we should listen to the girl, Vlad," Gretchen tells him, and all the others agree with her. This might be a good thing.

"No, her love for him," he points to Clay, "is the reason for our downfall."

"You're right, I do love him, but you, sir, are the reason for your downfall, if you did not meddle in my life, we would not be here right now, all you had to do was let me live my life," I tell him, stepping towards him. "No, I've been told what you can do, and I will not allow it to happen," he yells at me.

"Fair enough, now that you seem to defy anything that has been told and still can't seem to comprehend the reason for all this is because of what you all did—" I begin. Vlad lunges at me.

"Contristo,"

He hits the ground, and everyone starts to flee, and I become furious. His cries for aid don't concern me because they caused this to themselves, so I focus on him instead. I keep going till he stops pleading with me, even though blood is pooling from his nose and his body is having trouble recovering. To be extra cautious,

"Disrumpum,"

I feel the energy whip around me as I snap his neck. "Now are we going to talk about this or are we going to have to fight this out?"

Gretchen walks toward me and apologises. "I'm sorry, dear. We should have known that if the spell put upon you didn't work, that it would be the reason for our downfall."

The others apologise and follow her. We explain that all we want is each other and that we will fight against anyone who challenges us in addition to helping those who need us. They nod in agreement, realising that what they had done was what first led to the issue. "Can we trust you all?" They all nod.

"You two truly love each other, we shouldn't have tried taking that away from you. We are truly sorry. Now, what about the Lycans?" Gretchen asks.

"Leave the Lycans to us; we know what they want. Keep in mind that even though they threatened you with me, my father was one of you. You permitted the Lycans to frighten you, which then enabled them to attempt to take me. They wanted me on their side because they wanted you all dead, but I'm not the kind of person they are looking for. I stand up for what is right, and I'm afraid I have to disagree with the Lycans about what they are trying to do." I exclaim. Clay comes up behind me and kisses my head.

"We will let you be," One of the vampires tells us, "Everyone deserves to live their own life." I smile at him.

I text Brie and tell her to lift the spell, and we all walk out together. "What happened?" Brie asks, running towards me. "They were scared, that's all," I say, hugging her.

"We realised we caused that word of our destruction. It would not have happened if we did not do what we did," one of the male vamps says. "I am Ezra, by the way." He puts his hand out to shake mine. I take his hand and shake it, still feeling overwhelmed by everything that's happened. "Vlad threatened our families. We were weak and believed his every word, we should have done what all of you did and chosen our own paths, and for that, we are truly sorry," Ezra continued.

"We are here if you need us," Gretchen tells me as she hugs me.

"Thank you," I tell her. " Oh, I do have one question. Why did Sloane, Bronx, Alessandro, Alec, and Thair follow Abel's word?" I ask, hoping one of the elders could answer my question. Ezra steps forward, "Vlad was Sloane's uncle and the father of the four boys."

They were all family?

"But I thought family friends raised Sloane?" I ask Clay. "She was, but that didn't mean she didn't know her family," he responds.

"She was raised by me, but no matter what I did, I always saw the evil that was instilled within," Gretchen says with her head down. I take a deep breath. This world is so confusing.

"We will be on our way. Thank you, Vince, for allowing us to talk about all this, and we are sorry about Vlad," Ezra says to Chancellor Cladwell, then turns to me. "And again, my dear, we are very sorry for the misunderstanding of all of this. This night on, we shall be friends and forget the past." I nod in agreement. As they leave, I can't help but think of getting home, but then I remember Clay can't come with me.

"Son, your mother and I would like to say we are so proud of the person you have become."

"Thanks, Dad, but I couldn't do it without Logan," he says, referring to his past.

"I'm talking about the guard you had put up, you let it down to protect the girl you love, something I never expected to see, and I'm very happy for you." He smiles as he goes to hug his son.

"Raven's changed me, she's made me a better person, that's one of the things I love about her." He looks over at me and smiles. I'm happy that Clay can now have his parents back in his life. But we still have one more problem to deal with.