There was a distinctive stench carried through in the light breeze that caressed her fur.

A rotten smell mixed with wet soil. That stench had been toying with her for the past week. She had been out to hunt twice and it annoyed her that she had not been able to pinpoint its location.

"Maila, come on. It's time to head back," Luc shouted.

She growled in protest, giving him a good view of her sharpened teeth.

"Don't you even try, young lady," he warned her.

Maila shifted her weight on her hind legs and, with one swift movement she landed on the mud puddle in front of him, splashing the dirty water all over him.

"That was my only pair of clean clothes," Luc snapped.

Maila ignored his whining and trotted happily to the stream. She rolled around trying to get rid of the stench that seemed to have stuck to her fur.

Luc was such an overprotective brother. Their father died in battle a year ago and Luc carried around the burden of his death. Maila had made it her purpose to bug him as much as she could. He was young and needed to enjoy his carefree years now, you never know what tomorrow brings.

Satisfied that she had removed the smell she shifted back to her human form.

"Relax, Luc. You do realize that you are the younger brother right?" She told him sweetly as she reached out for her clean pair of jeans and white t-shirt.

"I will relax when you realize, sister dearest, that you are now a Queen and should start acting like one," he countered.

"I did not know that you disagree with the way I rule my people?" Maila asked with her eyebrow raised.

"I did not say anything of the sort. Honestly, sometimes you act so childish." Luc said running his hand through his thick blond hair.

"Shush. Listen." She said and crouched to the ground.

"Not falling for..."

"Be quiet and listen. Something is wrong."

He stood still and focused his ears. "Maila there's nothing," he whispered to her.

"Exactly. No sounds, nature does not stand still. Something's up." She moved to his side. "Change to your wolf we need the speed. We have to return to the pack to warn them," she ordered.

The siblings started running through the forest that surrounded their Kingdom. Maila could feel the sweat drops forming on her fur. The sudden silence on her left alarmed her and she took a hard right. As she spun on her paws to make the turn, she saw a pair of bright yellow eyes on them. The same stench filled her nostrils.

She froze in her tracks and turned towards the direction she saw the intruder. She growled bearing her teeth. Every single hair of her fur was upright, every single muscle in her body tensed. Cautiously, she placed her right paw in front.

She heard her brother run passed her, she held her attack position to give him a bit more of an advantage, she then turned on her heels and she accelerated.

Keep up Luc, I can't loose you too.

Maila was the fastest wolf in their pack due to her light, long, lean frame that provided her both strength and agility, but her brother was heavier than her and was not able to move as fast. They both ran as if their life depended on it.

They reached the Kingdom's south gate and she immediately shape shifted to her human form. The guard threw her and Luc their emergency clothes pack.

"Double the guards at the gates and summon the generals in the War Room now. I want them all there in five minutes," she barked.

She rushed to her room and hopped in the shower letting the warmth of the water wash away the stench that clunk to her and the tension she felt in her soul. Maila composed herself, whoever those yellow beady eyes belonged to she was certain they were not here to play nice; the Crown could be at stake.

The Crown - the werewolves had defended for the past two hundred years. She was not going to be the one to loose it. Maila was not certain that the intruders did not have eyes within her Kingdom; not many wolves knew where she and her brother hunted.

She would restrain from visiting the Crown until she uncovered who the intruder was, the Crown would remain hidden as it had been for the past year. Hastily she prepared for her generals; she brushed her long black hair, wore a simple pink t-shirt with jeans and her rose pendant on her neck.

Maila stood in front of the brick wall in her room and placed her hand on the family crest. The wall parted and she made her way through the passageway to the War room.

◇◇◇◇

Jackson lazily leaned against a column in the War room with his arms crossed across his chest. His presence, along with the other nine generals, was demanded by their Queen.

He scanned the room to assess if the others knew what all this was about, they all seemed to be in the dark except Luc.

"Jackson, do you know why we are here?" He turned around to face Yana, the red haired menace, as her opponents called her.

"No," he dryly replied.

A few of the generals asked amongst themselves if anyone knew the purpose of this emergency meeting. Jackson did not ask, the Queen would inform them in a matter of minutes, thus it seemed pointless to him to enter in this guessing game.

He caught movement in the corner of the room. Maila had used the secret passage once again, it wouldn't be that secret if she kept this up.

"You need to be more careful love," he whispered to her ear as she passed him by.

Maila brushed her fingertips against his without pausing and moved on to take the seat at the head of the table.

"I have called you all here because I have noticed that there is something out in the woods. I have caught the smell twice now and it's not a smell I am familiar with. We need to assess if it is a threat or not." She looked around the table to make sure she had everyone's attention.

"We located it by the south entrance of the Kingdom. Yumi and Yana, each take a hunting party and go scouting. I prefer that you catch the intruder alive. Now the rest of you need to make sure that the Kingdom is prepared for an attack. Is that clear?"

"Yes." they all responded in unison.

"Do we have reports from our allies that could be related to this incident?"

"A slight increase in livestock theft the last month, other than that nothing alarming", Jackson informed her.

"Good. Let's go back to our tasks and keep an eye out for anything out of the ordinary," she said as she pushed herself up from the chair and proceeded to exit the room.

◇◇◇◇

Vladimir was not a patient man. He had many attributes; he was intelligent, adaptable, charismatic, fearless to name a few but patience was not one of them.

"Where is he?" He shouted to his brother.

"Patience my brother. You have waited for four hundred years, another couple of hours will not hurt you," Constantin calmly replied. "Go feed, we had a fresh blood supply come in this morning, it will help you to calm your nerves."

A heavy sigh escaped Vladimir's throat. His brother was probably right he always felt better after he fed. He made his way out of the reading room and headed towards the infirmary.

The humans were brought here under the impression that they were going on a themed vacation getaway. 'The Vampire Experience' - that's what they called it. Their guests wanted to be scared, they longed to be bitten, their blood sucked out of their bodies. It was an interactive role-play experience. In order for their 'Vampire Experience' to begin they had to donate blood to be used as a prop, to make their adventure more realistic. The experience was open for reservations for a month each quarter of the calendar year. Their 'hotel' was booked up in advance for the next five years.

How humans could be so oblivious to their surroundings still surprised him after four hundred and fifty years of existence in this world. They didn't used to be so gullible when he was a young Vampire, they believed in the tales. Nowadays with all the information they had and technology one would assume they would catch on to them and their presence would be exposed. Humans only saw what they wanted to see and could rationalize in their minds. "Oh well, as the humans say, whatever rocks your boat," he mumbled to himself as he opened the door to the 'Blood donation office'.

"Mr. Vladimir, nice to see you again," an over excited petite blonde said.

"That's Mr. Vampire to you missy," he answered playing along.

A giggle escaped her as she blushed and turned to give him a sultry look. Her friend, a medium build red headed girl, rolled her eyes with disgust.

"Honestly Amber, we just got here," she whispered so silently under her breath that Vladimir almost missed it.

"May you be so kind and offer me your names?" Vladimir asked while directing his seduction aura to the pair.

"I'm Amber and this is my friend Rose," she replied and as was expected she batted her eyelashes towards him. Rose scoffed at her friend and turned to face the wall in front of her.

That is new! A human not affected by the seduction of a master vampire.

"Well I'll leave you two lovely young ladies as I have to go and feed on the fresh supply of blood," he informed them. That earned him another giggle from the blonde but Rose was unaffected. Interesting.

Vladimir was not a savage, he took out two bags of fresh blood and sucked them dry in a matter of seconds. They no longer fed directly from human necks, unless it was part of the 'experience' of course.

The hurried footsteps from the end of the hallway alerted him that he had finally arrived. The scent he picked up confirmed his suspicion. He zipped out of the room and in no time was in the reading room next to his brother.

"He's almost here" Constantin told him.

"I smelled him," Vladimir said with a smirk on his face.

"Ahh, the sweet stench."

Two sharp knocks on the red oak cherry door notified them of his arrival.

"Enter." Vladimir said.

"Good evening masters."

"Good evening Teo and welcome back," Vladimir greeted him.

"I bring good news my lords," he informed them and took in a deep breath.

"Out with it Teo," Vladimir ordered.

"They have agreed to discuss an alliance between werewolves and vampires. They have voiced their concerns in relation to the 'Hotel' set up we have here, however they are willing to move past it as long as their ambassador comes to oversee our operations and everything is to his satisfaction."

"What?" Constantin growled, "As much as I want this alliance to work, dear brother, I must protest. This is an insult to our species."

"Do you blame them brother?" Vladimir countered slightly raising his eyebrow, "For years our ancestors did everything; lie, trick, kill, so that they kept the Crown in their possession."

Silence filled the space between the two brothers.

"Masters, there is something else," Teo hesitated.

Vladimir urged him to continue with a nod of his head.

"When I left their Kingdom, I saw something, a creature I have never seen on earth. It reeked of death. The creature stalked the young Queen on her hunt. It had yellow beady eyes and its body was filled with black thorns."

"Are you certain of this?" Constantin enquired.

"Positive master."

Word count: 2006