A/N: I've been super depressed lately. Sorry to anyone who has been waiting for updates on my other stories. I keep writing than deleting chapters. I'm a mess.

This story was actually written years ago and partially beta read. I wrote the first three chapters and outlined the rest then another author posted something similar so I shelved it. It made me happy to read through it so I decided to tweak it a bit and post it. The rating is mostly for blood and gore, there may be a lime or lemon eventually but don't hold your breath. Hope someone besides me likes it.

Bleeding Crown

Blood dripped from his mouth, seeping from her frail body. Though he knew that it was too soon to feed from her again, he did not care. Even wasting so much precious life as he sloppily drank his fill, he felt no remorse for a single drop. He dropped her to the floor once he'd finished, expecting her to tend to the wound and clean up the mess he'd made. Since she was first given to him, it had always been this way. He didn't ask for the human girl, but she had been gifted to him all the same, and that meant he could do as he pleased with her. His parents tried to tell him that he should be nicer to his human pet, but he reasoned permitting her to live in their house was nice enough. Besides, it was more than her mother had asked them to do. That woman was the real monster in his eyes; she was the one who offered up her daughter to them willingly.

"Shou-chan," the tiny human girl struggled to sit up, one hand clutched over the teeth marks on her neck. "Where are you going?" A disgusted noise left his throat as he looked down at his pitiful pet.

"Go take care of yourself, honestly, you're such a nuisance, Kyouko. I'd have thrown you out as a child if it weren't for my parents. When I'm the vampire king, you had better be on your best behavior. They'll no longer be able to tell me what to do, no one will." Patting her on the head, he added, "be a good puppy and I'll keep you around."

Kyouko bowed her head as he walked out the door. She was sick of feeling weak and powerless, but she had no way out of the situation. Her mother had left her as an offering to the Fuwa coven when she was only five. While they had intended her as a bride to Shou, he had other ideas. Somehow, he had gotten it into his head that he could become the next king. To do that though, he would need to challenge and kill the current king, Tsuruga Ren. Shou despised Ren, taking issue with the fact that he was not royal by blood, but had instead won the crown by earning the respect and loyalty of the most powerful vampire covens. Even Shou's own parents paid homage to the fraudulent king.

Reaching into her pocket, Kyouko pulled out a purplish-blue stone and held it to her neck. She winced at the initial pain, as the stone's power burned her wound, closing it. The rough-cut gem was her most prized possession, a gift from the fairy prince. She had had a brief encounter with him when they were children, before he vanished. Kyouko hoped that, wherever he'd gone off to, he was happy and healthy. If not for the stone's powerful magic, Kyouko was sure she'd have died years ago. Even with the stone, she didn't think that she would survive much longer. Shou became increasingly savage and greedy with each passing year, while Kyouko shrunk into herself more and more.

She put the stone back into its little pouch, hiding it in a secret pocket. Shoutaro didn't know how she healed herself; didn't seem to care that she was healed at all, but Kyouko feared that if he ever found her stone, he would take it from her. The thought of losing her precious Corn brought a low growl up from her throat and she clenched her teeth together. Unbeknownst to her, Kyouko's golden eyes, which had been dull for years, began to glow.

Suddenly starving, she crawled to the kitchen and pulled open the fridge. Inside her head, a strange voice demanded that she eat.

Blood dripped from her fingers as she ripped open a package of raw beef. She tore into it like a starved animal, lapping at the blood and savoring every mouthful. It wasn't until she had finished the first package, and moved on to the second, that she realized what she was doing. Her hands shook as she stared at her fingers, embedded into the plastic wrapper. Her hands flew to her mouth in horror, the package falling carelessly to the floor. Bile rose in her throat as she stumbled to the sink, ready to force out the raw flesh before it made her sick.

A pang of hunger twisted in her stomach and a voice familiar and yet strange croaked, "I want to eat."

Her tongue slid over her teeth, elongated and sharp enough to draw blood. She rose from her knees, having collapsed, something inside her compelling her to feed. This time, she didn't even bother to remove the packaging before devouring the uncooked meat. The thing inside her, unwilling to be denied any longer, wanted to eat everything. Kyouko was powerless to do anything to stop herself from consuming every bit of raw meat in the fridge.

"Ren?" Yashiro Yukihito never questioned his king, but sometimes he wanted to. He rarely ate, and he declined the blood that was freely offered to him, and Yashiro suspected that Ren was no ordinary vampire. The king never seemed to need blood, or much sleep, or sustenance of any kind; still he remained strong - the strongest Yashiro had ever seen, even though he wasn't born noble. In fact, the Tsuruga name was so common, that even many humans bore it. Sometimes he liked to muse that his king was a Kiko instead of a vampire. It would certainly explain the lack of physical needs, but Yashiro thought he would surely recognize one of his own kin.

"Yes, Yukihito?" Ren shuffled through the reports on his desk, not touching the plate of food or the cup of blood, his loyal advisor had brought him. He was too busy to eat, and he feared that drinking blood would cause him to revert to his old self. If he let the darkness consume him a second time, there would be no coming back.

Thinking quickly, Yashiro changed his mind, deciding not to voice his thoughts.

"There was a surge of power earlier. It was faint, like a fledgling, yet powerful." Ren didn't look up from his papers, unconcerned with the report.

Yashiro was smart and capable, but he was a terrible gossip who often got caught up in the nobles' boring games. Ren didn't care who was marrying off their children or who had sacrificed what for more power. So long as the peace was maintained, they could have their petty squabbles over territories and titles.

"Thing is, none of the pureblood covens have recently given birth, and the youngest child is Maria-chan. Lory was a little concerned about it, since even the humans could sense the power. However, it didn't last long enough for anyone to pinpoint an exact location. All we know is that it was here in Tokyo." Yashiro finished his report, admitting to himself that it was most likely nothing to worry about.

"Probably just a child playing with their powers. Most likely Maria-chan or Hiou-san." Ren thought for a moment, setting down his documents. Disguising a wicked smile behind his hand, he speculated, "they say that the man who would have been the king left when he realized he would be useless. His powers were unexceptional, and he had no skill in diplomacy. Maybe it's him, finally gaining enough power to take back the thrown he abandoned."

"Don't joke about things like that, Ren. If the blood king came back, with or without powers, we would have no choice but to bow to him. As you say, he was useless and would have no clue how to keep the peace between the humans and the vampire covens. Then some of those spoiled more vicious coven prince and princesses will raise hell. They might try to enslave my kind again." Yashiro shivered at the thought of being forced into servitude as his ancestors had been.

He had been pleased to work under Ren and helped the charming young vampire quickly earn the title of king. Together, they managed to keep the fragile peace from crumbling. Even now, there were vampires who went rogue and attacked humans, however. Ren had spent five years proving himself, but there were still humans who worshipped the purebred vampires, believing them more fit to be king than he was.

"The heir to the Fuwa coven was spotted again, in another fight." This was something that concerned Yashiro. The young Fuwa prince had a large following of humans and one or two covens who believed he was a better choice for king. Surprisingly, his own coven was not among them, but Yashiro doubted they would go against their own son if he challenged Ren.

"Did he start the fight?" Ren didn't care to hear the name Fuwa. It reminded him of a time when he wanted something he couldn't have.

"No, the other man involved was attacking a girl. A young girl with long black hair. Mimi? Momo? I forget her name. Ruriko-chan stepped in and captured the man before Fuwa could kill him. We're holding him here for questioning, most likely he's too far gone to help us find his master." Fuwa gaining popularity was less troubling than the fact that there was a vampire out there turning humans into ghouls and making them attack random people.

"Long black hair? That's the third one this week fitting that description. Could the culprit be searching for someone specific?" Ren wondered. "Why wasn't this in any of the reports?"

"Ruriko-chan always refuses to fill out her paperwork." Yashiro shook his head having given up on the young girl. She used to be good at her job, but she'd become uppity recently, and now rarely completed her assignments. "Before, the attacks were on random humans, as well as low level vampires, living all over the world. Recently however, they've all been vampires fitting the same description: black hair, brown eyes, young, female, and living in Tokyo."

After pondering it for a moment, Ren shrugged his shoulders. "We should probably thank Fuwa for saving the girl, and give Ruriko-san a bonus, but reprimand her for not turning in the paperwork. Without those reports, I'm next to useless myself. With nothing to read and nothing to sign, I'll just be sitting here, remembering the good days when I was out there hunting."

"You can still hunt. There are plenty of rogue vampires and their human ghouls."

"Then who would do the paperwork?" Ren joked, scribbling his name on another piece of paper.

"Lory," Yashiro suggested, even though they both knew that Lory Takarada the high and noble Upyr Prince, would never willingly read another report again.

Two weeks later Shou sat at the table and glared at Kyouko. Lately she had been too jovial. Though she had always been a cheerful girl with few complaints, it had recently become unnerving in some way. He couldn't quite explain it, but he was sure that she had changed in the past couple weeks. Stronger, more vibrant, and somehow less subservient. She still did whatever he told her, but her blood tasted different, and she seemed to act with an air of hostility.

"Where are you going, Shou-chan?" Even the way she said his name sounded different. There was an edge to her voice that was as alluring to him as it was terrifying. Beyond that, he was also certain that the power surge everyone had felt, had come from their apartment. A long nail slid across his hand. He could feel that it would only take the slightest pressure from her to slice his skin. When had she grown out her nails like claws? How had she grown them to be so sharp?

"Kyouko?" Despite all his abuse, he still cared for the girl. On some level, he knew that she was his only friend, so when he looked in her eyes and saw a demonic light, it frightened him. Had the vampire behind the recent attacks gotten to her? "Are you feeling okay?"

"I feel fine." She answered with a smile. "Here, I made you food just the way you like it. Why are you leaving without eating it?"

Because he was afraid, of her and for her. He wanted to get back to Akatoki and ask them if there was any cure for a human who had been seduced by a vampire. Maybe she would be fine. Her mother had been a powerful witch, and she could become one too - his parents could make her one of the witches for the Fuwa coven. Shou was certain they had planned to already, since they were going to marry her to him. Vampires married their covens' witches all the time, attempting to produce hybrid children.

"I'm not hungry." Shou expected her to complain about his lame excuse, but she looked down at his plate instead, eyes transfixed as though she were willing the food to burst into flames.

"All right, I'll eat it then." Kyouko sounded so unlike herself, but Shou couldn't figure out how.

No, that wasn't the problem. "Wait Kyouko it's…" He was going to say that she shouldn't eat under cooked chicken, but she was already tearing into it with razor-edged teeth, the bones snapping with a sickening crunch as she tore into it. Shou gulped, suddenly regretting the way he had treated her. Had he not made her so weak, she might have stood a chance against the vampire taking control of her mind. If he had left her in Kyoto, she would have been married off to one of his cousins by now and living a peaceful life as a low-level witch.

"Is something the matter, Shou-chan?" The seductive smile made her face look wicked. It did not belong on this child's innocent lips, speaking her innocent words. Shou knew what he would have to do, but he didn't know if he could. Not to her.

"No," he shook his head and finished lacing up his boots. "Stay here until I come back. We're gonna return to Kyoto."

"I have work today. Okami-san will be waiting, and Taisho-san is temperamental. They are witches, you know, and a little human like me could end up cursed." Her voice was mocking in a way that Shou had never heard from her.

"Just stay here. Do as you're told, or I'll be the one who curses you." Instead of cowering in fear like normal, she stared into his eyes.

"I work at six. If you're home before then, I'll be here. If not, then I'll be there learning a new spell, since you won't give me any powers, I have to go about becoming a witch the hard way."

It was unwise, but he lashed out at her. "Stay here, Kyouko! I mean it, if you move from that spot I'll…" her cold smile stole the rest of his words.

"What? What will you do to poor defenseless me, Shou-chan?" He watched her push herself up from the table. A momentary wave of fear coiled around his heart, but she walked over to the fridge, ignoring him. "Can you pick up some beef on the way home? Since you don't want me to leave."

He nodded, unable to speak as he watched her take out the beef already in the fridge and begin to eat it raw. Turning on his heels, he ran out, desperate to beg Shoko to save his pet from whatever vampire was controlling her.

A/N: Hope you like it. If not it's cheering me up anyway. Again sorry for posting something new instead of working on my other stories.