Castle Heights: Crown of Glass
Castle Heights Book 2
Sasha McDaniels
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Copyright © 2018 by Sasha McDaniels
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
Contents
Meanwhile…
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Coming Soon
Also by Sasha McDaniels
Blurb
Reagan still finds herself in a tough situation. There are lycans circling her prison. The most notorious vampire is after her, and she doesn’t know what has happened to Ben.
A nasty situation causes Reagan to lose something she treasures. The prince’s ball is on the horizon, and Reagan finds out something about herself that she’s been dying to know. Plus, more bodies are turning up.
And as if that isn’t enough for Reagan to deal with, Dimitri has something he wants to show her that will stun everyone.
Somewhere in Upstate New York…
1
My watch buzzed.
It was a message from my mother.
Mother: Are you all right?
Me: I’m fine. Is Ben okay?
Mother: Don’t worry about Ben. We’re coming to get you.
Me: No. Don’t. It’s not safe.
Mother: It’s not safe for you to be there either. Do you know whose house you’re in?
Me: Dracula’s house.
I had the feeling that an ‘I told you so’ was coming, but my watch went silent instead. I sent my mother another text message.
Me: Is Ben okay? Please, answer me. I’m so worried.
I waited.
Mother: I don’t know.
My blood chilled.
My Aunt Jennifer’s number was programmed in my watch. I thought about texting her next, but Ben was her son. I didn’t want to worry her unnecessarily. For all I knew she was in contact with Ben already. How else would they have known that I was taken out of school?
My scalp tingled. I felt the roots of my hair widen. I had already sprinkled the contents of the pouch onto my head. But my attention changed track when Alexi slid in front of me, startling me. His skin was pale in the moonlight. His eyes glowed like two emeralds filled with magic.
“What have you done?” he asked. Horror spread on his face.
I extended my hand without thinking, throwing Alexi out the window. I thought I heard a thunk.
Alexi flew back into the room not long after. His body was covered with scratches. Small brambles stuck in his hair. Snow covered his shoulders like a stole. The snow was slow to melt perhaps because its wearer was cold from death. Blood oozed out of the wounds on Alexi’s face. I felt a bit sorry for him—I won’t lie—but I remembered what Ben had instructed me to do, so I went to work, braiding my hair.
“What did you do that for?” Alexi asked. His chest heaved up and down. I saw the wounds on his face slowly disappear.
“You should never mess with a girl when she’s styling her hair,” I said.
Alexi zipped forward and was upon me. He was so close I could feel his cold breath on my skin. Though the little hairs on my body prickled, I played it cool and continued to braid.
“Something is different about you,” Alexi said.
“Did you all have a visitor?” I asked, playing coy.
Alexi leaned into me. His nose brushed lightly against my ear. He sniffed me. I shivered.
“There is something very different about you,” he said. “I suppose I’ll go to your little friend’s house and pay him a visit. Unless of course, we catch him on our property. Maybe he will tell me what I yearn to know.”
“What is it that you yearn to know, Alexi? That I wish to go home? That I don’t want to meet your father?”
My hair continued to grow as I made my braid.
“Maybe going to his house will be unnecessary. Maybe Dimitri and Nikolai will find little Ben out in the woods. When they catch him they’ll drain his blood, and afterwards they will rip him apart.”
My back stiffened, but I kept braiding. I wasn’t going to let Alexi stop me from trying for my one chance at escape. I hoped for Ben’s sake that he safely got away.
Alexi circled me like a lion in a cage. Then he was in my face—so close that the light in his eyes made my own eyes hurt. “I know what’s different about you. It’s your hair. It’s grown longer. Tell me, why has it grown longer?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said. I spun around so that my back was to Alexi. “Now, if you don’t mind, I’d like to finish braiding my hair. I do this every night before I go to sleep. If you insist on keeping me here, I might as well get ready for bed. Have any pajamas I can borrow?”
Alexi snapped his mouth near my ear as if he were a rabid dog. I jumped away.
“You’re lucky I need you alive,” he said. “And you’re also lucky that I don’t cut off that hair of yours. Too bad your little buddy’s plan isn’t going to work. I know the deal. Rapunzel, Rapunzel, let down your hair, right? Well, let’s just see if he can get to you with me guarding the window.”
Alexi dashed through the window so fast it was almost like he was never in the room in the first place.
I ran to the window to look out, but Alexi was nowhere in sight. I stepped back away from the window and appraised my miraculously enhanced hair. What that powder in the pouch was made from, I did not know, but it worked.
My hair grew so long that it formed a winding trail across the floor. I didn’t know exactly how long my hair was, but I estimated that it had to be at least thirty feet long.
I was glad that my hair didn’t grow in volume. If it had grown in volume, I would have been in a lot of trouble. The strain on my neck would have been immense.
Finally alone and with my hair all braided, I flicked my wrist over. I sent Ben a message.
Me: Ben, where are you? If you’re out there, please answer. I grew my hair just like you told me to. I hope they didn’t catch you. Alexi says that he’s going to guard the window. He means he’ll be outside the window waiting for you to come back for me.
I paced the room. My hair trailed behind me as I went and slithered across the floor like a snake. I decided to peer out of the window again. The night was a hazy blue. I saw not one star twinkling in the sky.
I looked down. The way down through the mist still seemed never-ending.
“Going somewhere?” Alexi asked. He was floating in the air, hovering by the window.
I jumped back.
I shivered with cold. “Are you just going to stand there like some kind of creep, watching me?” I asked.
“No,” Alexi said still by the window. “I’m floating, not standing.”
“Did they find Ben?”
“Wouldn’t you like to know?” Alexi asked.
It occurred to me that Alexi’s tone had changed. He must have been angered by the fact that Ben had tried to rescue me. But what did he expect?
Nikolai rushed into the room. “Her mo
ther and aunt are here,” he said to Alexi.
He didn’t mention Ben. So there was hope. That meant that maybe Ben was still out there somewhere—alive.
Alexi flew into the room again through the window. His feet touched the floor before he spoke again. “Show me,” he said. I raced behind him, but he snapped around. “You stay here. Don’t move. Move and your mother and aunt are dead.”
I could tell Alexi meant what he said. He and Nikolai dashed out of the room.
I really hated the Dracul boys for kidnapping me, but I really wished I could fly around as they did. My telekinetic powers didn’t seem to extend to lending me the ability to fly or propel myself in any direction.
But I could move other objects and other people like the dickens. I found that much out when I threw the Dracul brothers around, mostly for sport.
Since I wasn’t allowed to use my power, there was no learning how I might be able to fly, levitate, anything that involved what a person without powers might call unnatural. Even if I could fly, I’d need to be fast enough to evade the Dracul brothers, and there were three of them.
There wasn’t anything in the room that I could use to bind them but my hair. If I coiled my hair around Alexi’s neck and pulled, his neck might snap. But snapping Alexi’s neck without taking off his head would simply be a waste of time. I needed a stake to drive into his heart.
There was no wood in the room, only stone. It occurred to me that I could dislodge one of the brass poles from the bed. Maybe I could drive it into one of their chests with enough force to stop them. And yet my mind hesitated to enact that plan.
My watch tinged, and I was about to check it, but Dimitri shot into the room like a bullet. He stopped a few steps in front of me. He crossed his arms and lowered his head a little. His blue eyes glowed in the dim room just like Alexi’s had.
“What was that sound?” he asked.
“Nothing,” I said.
“Give it to me?”
“Give you what?”
“The watch.”
“No,” I said, pulling back my wrist. “Take one step closer and you’ll regret it.”
“Oh, will I?” Dimitri asked slinking forward.
I jerked forward. “Try me,” I said narrowing my eyes.
Dimitri howled with laughter. “You? Hurt me? Now?” He continued to laugh.
I flipped my hand in his direction, and that made him flip. He landed a few feet from the ground. He returned to a standing position, or rather it was more like slouching. He continued to laugh, so much so that he clutched his stomach. He rolled from side to side, laughing all the more.
I moved my hand again and pitched Dimitri out of the window.
He glided back into the room slowly. I rose my hand again, pushing him out.
“Glad I provide you with so much amusement,” I said when he flew back into the room the second time.
Dimitri fanned me. “It’s nothing personal,” he said in between recovering breaths. “I mean, you have your share of woo-woo, but this is almost one hundred and twenty years of refinement you’re looking at here.”
“So,” I said, placing my hands on my hips.
“So, unless you have something in here you can chop my head off with, you’re screwed. Your telekinetic powers are okay, not advanced. My brothers and I push each other around all day. I’ve probably tumbled out of that window at least twenty times. I’ve tumbled out of other windows many times more.” His eyes dimmed, no longer glowing bright.
“What did you do with my family?” I asked.
“I assure you your family is fine,” Dimitri said. “I suggest you worry about yourself. I can feel my father closing in.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means that Big D. is somewhere over the Atlantic. He senses you in the house.”
I ran for the door, dragging my hair behind me. Dimitri stepped in front of me, stopping me with his hard chest. I backed away. “Please, let me go. Maybe there’s some other way you can stop this prophecy you’re so worried about.”
Dimitri walked over to the wall and leaned against it. He tipped his head down in the brooding way that was common for him. “I estimate that my dear old pops will be here in about an hour. Oh, before I forget my train of thought, how about you hand me that watch.”
I clutched my wrist and pulled it into my chest. My watch was my only connection to the outside world. Usually, when people were in trouble on television, they dialed 911. I couldn’t call the authorities. My mother always told me to never go to the authorities. She said if they found out what we were, they’d lock us up and perform experiments on us, or they’d make us do things even if we didn’t want to. “Make me,” I said to Dimitri.
Dimitri came off of his perch—the wall. “If you really want that, Dear,” he said.
“Dear? That’s something my grandmother would call me. If I had one.”
“I’ll count to five since you’re being a bad girl. If that watch isn’t in my hand by the time I hit zero, I’ll remove it for you.”
I removed the watch from my wrist begrudgingly but swiftly. The watch traveled through the air and landed in Dimitri’s palm. “Promise you won’t hurt my mother and Jennifer,” I said.
“I can’t make you that promise. You really don’t know anything about those two, do you?” Dimitri asked. He shoved my watch into his pocket.
“No,” I said, tripping over my hair as I walked toward the bed. I plopped down. “What can you tell me about them?”
“That depends,” Dimitri said.
“Depends on what?” I asked.
“On whether you would allow me to take you out after all of this is over.”
“Are you kidding me?”
“Not kidding at all.”
Dimitri and I stared at each other for a very long time not saying a thing. Then I broke the silence. “Who kidnaps a girl and then asks her out on a date?” I put on my best male voice. “Who goes, look, babe, sorry but I’ve got to give you over to one of the most vicious vampires in history, or at least, I have to make it look that way so I can kill my dad. But after all that, I’d like to take you to dinner and a movie.”
Dimitri frowned. “Terrible impression.”
“What information could I possibly offer you?” I asked.
“Your information?”
I sighed. I wasn’t going to be one of those girls who I saw on television who fell for and pined for the brooding vampire. Or was I? There were three of them, all handsome.
Unlike them, I wasn’t dead. Truthfully, I was dying to be kissed. “Get to your father before he gets to me and we’ll see,” I said.
“That’s going to be tricky.”
“Catch up to him and chop off his head,” I said. “I’m sure you guys have an ax laying around here somewhere.”
“It’s not that easy. My father is faster and stronger than me and my brothers put together.”
“What if you allowed my aunt, my mother, and me to help you fight? Heck, if you haven’t harmed Ben, I’d say you enlist his help. His last name is Van Helsing for goodness sake.”
“Yeah, I know about Ben. Interesting story. A piece of information I’d be willing to trade if you’d be willing to go out with me and tell me everything there is to know about you.”
“You’re over one hundred years old,” I said. “A bit too old for me."
“In my case, age is only a number.”
“You know more about the world than I could possibly know. A little incongruence in a relationship is good I guess, but I don’t think I’m ready for all the knowledge you have to offer.”
“You don’t have to be ready,” Dimitri said. He stood up straight. “I’ll consider what you said about asking your mother and aunt for help. They may have some good ideas.”
“Couldn’t you have just asked them for their help from the beginning, without kidnapping me?” I asked.
“Nope. Because we believe you’re safer with us if he’s coming for you.”
“I thought you said that you guys were using me for bait.”
“Really, it’s a twofer. We thought we’d get out in front of the old man.”
“How did you even know I was here in Castle Heights to begin with?”
“A trade for a trade,” Dimitri said. “Think about it.”
“You didn’t answer my question,” I said to his back.
“I smelled you coming,” he said, and he dematerialized leaving me in the room alone.
I stood up and moved back towards the window. Why did they get all the good powers?
It seemed like more than an hour passed before the door to the room opened. Ben walked in. I ran to him and threw my arms around his neck. I backed away once I realized that I was being a bit overzealous with celebration.
“So you missed me, hmm?”
“Where were you?”
“Running from lycans. I didn’t think it was possible to sweat during a Castle Heights winter. Boy, was I wrong.”
“How did you get in here?” I asked. I wanted to know everything, and I especially wanted to know if my mother and aunt Jennifer were okay.
“Everyone is busy trying to restrain Dracula outside in the front yard, so it was pretty easy for me to slip up here to get to you. Although I recommend we don’t go through the front door.”
“How will we get out of here?”
“Okay, so don’t freak out, but I sort of have a plan.”
“What is it?”
Ben reached into his pocket and pulled out a Swiss Army knife. He pointed it at my hair. “Cut that braid off, and we’ll use it to climb out of the window.”
“You brought a knife, Ben? But you couldn’t bring a rope?” I asked.
“I carry this thing around with me every day—for emergencies. I didn’t have time to stop by Walmart.”
“We better hurry. How are they holding up out there?” I asked, referring to Alexi, Nikolai, Dimitri, my mother, and Aunt Jennifer. I wanted to ask what sort of powers my Aunt Jennifer had, but I figured that I better not waste any more time.
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