Juliette was only about to have her monthly visit, and yet the way his brother was acting, one would think the girl was suddenly suffering from some terminal illness.
Then again...Juliette was more vulnerable than most. The girl was too damn kind, and preters - most especially Caros like him - typically viewed such kindness as a tool to exploit. He could understand why Gaël was overly protective towards Juliette, and Jean Luc wondered whether he himself was better off when his own ward was Juliette's opposite.
It was three years ago when the underground facility in which Aprilynne's parents worked as psychologists had been attacked by vampires. It was the same facility Luciella and her grandmother had been sent to, and it was also where Gaël had rescued Juliette from.
Most of the humans that night had been frightened out of their wits, and their fear had cost them their lives. Aprilynne, however, was one of the few who had dared to fight back, and the only one who had managed to kill a vampire on her own.
At that time, his ward only had revenge in mind, having seen vampires decapitate her parents' heads in order to turn their bodies into fountains of blood. She hadn't cared about keeping herself alive, and she would have gone after another one if Jean Luc hadn't arrived in time to haul her back.
She had been such a feral little creature in those days, Jean Luc mused, and unfortunately, despite his best efforts to the contrary...his ward had only grown more reckless and bloodthirsty over the years.
C'est la vie, Jean Luc thought with a mental shrug. Such was life, and one could only make do with what the Fates had bestowed. In his case, he had a young wild animal masquerading as a lovely, twenty-something woman now on her first year in graduate school, and it was his duty as her guardian to ensure she didn't get herself killed in her never-ending quest for hunting down vampires and vidange.
And as for Gaël, well...
Eighteen-year-old Juliette had already blossomed into womanhood, but if his brother insisted on seeing his ward as a child, just like what he was doing now...
"Do not challenge me on this, Juliette," Gaël warned.
"I am not," Juliette answered right away in a soothing voice. "All I'm saying is that it's the first day of class, and other people's first impressions of me would be terrible if they find out that I ditched school because of..."
"Your menses?"
Juliette winced. "Yes."
"Are you saying you've been faking being hurt all this time?"
"Of course not—-"
"Then what is the problem? Other people are other people," Gaël dismissed with a curl of his lip, "so why must you care about what they say? Should not my opinion as your guardian matter the most?"
Severin couldn't help rolling his eyes as he observed the way Gaël was acting towards his ward. For so many years, grief had made his brother a shadow of his former self, and it was only when Juliette had become his ward that his brother found a renewed reason for his existence.
As for Juliette, it hadn't taken them long to figure out the girl's growing feelings for Gaël...and vice versa. But what still completely baffled Severin was how someone as cunning as his sibling could be so damn dense.
How in the fucking world did Gaël not see what was right in front of him?
Perhaps it was time for Severin to rock the boat, just give it a fun little shake, and see which of the two would—-
Severin grunted in pain when his stepsister, who also happened to be his own ward, suddenly kicked him under the table.
Sydney glared at her guardian in warning. Don't even think about it! Severin was a man of little patience, and she had known right away the moment he had gotten it into his head to try speeding things along between Juliette and Severin's older brother.
While there were many things in life that could benefit from speed and efficiency, love was one of the few things that should never be rushed...and this was especially true for someone like Gaël, who swore never to lose his heart to any woman again.
Attend a class on a red day.
"Caros and vampires." Professor Gustav looked around the classroom. "What is the difference between the two?"
Numerous hands shot up, and the professor picked one of the male students seated at the front row.
"Caros are what vampires used to be. Caros drink blood without taking life. Vampires willingly cross the line in order to trade their souls for immortality."
"Correct. And why do you think there are Caros who choose to cross those lines?"
Fewer students raised their hands this time, and the professor picked a girl seated in the back.
"Because of their weakness."
"What kind of weakness?" the professor questioned.
"Pleasure. Every Caro is born with a desire for a specific form of pleasure, and this pleasure can also turn into their weakness."