by L.H. Cosway
“Not tonight,” he replied.
“Do you mind if I pour myself a drink?” I asked, and he nodded for me to go ahead.
I reached for the nearest vodka bottle and poured some into a shot glass. Ethan and Lucas both watched as I knocked it back and poured another. I didn’t think I’d ever stop finding it weird that all they consumed was blood.
“Have you seen Amanda again?” I asked, focusing my attention on Lucas because Ethan was channelling some serious brooding vibes my way. I could tell he wanted to talk about the whole “connection” thing, but it would have to wait for another time. I was so done with this day. Now that Antonia was no longer after me for her husband’s murder, I could go home and sleep in my own bed, then think about my next steps in the morning.
Lucas’s smile showed the barest tip of a fang. “Yes. I’ve grown particularly fond of her.”
I poured another shot. “Well, be warned, I’ll hunt you down and torture you if anything even remotely bad happens to her when she’s with you. Got it?”
Lucas rose from his stool, looking mildly amused. “Got it.”
He and Ethan shared a glance before he turned and left. As soon as Ethan and I were alone the tension thickened. I was hyperaware of him, and the image of me taking his finger into my mouth and sucking the drop of blood away was etched in my mind. I was so embarrassed over how crazy I’d gone.
“You know,” he said, breaking the quiet. “I’ve had nothing but trouble since you walked into my life.”
“If I remember correctly, it was you who walked into mine. And besides, I’d walk away from all this right now if you’d only let me.” I shot back defensively.
His gaze heated. “I’m afraid I can’t allow that.”
I lifted an eyebrow in challenge. “You think I need permission?”
He reached out, gently caressing my jaw. “I would hope you’d choose to stay of your own accord.”
My heart skipped a beat. If things were different, I might choose to stay here with Ethan forever. He captured a part of me I didn’t know existed, made me feel alive in a way I hadn’t before. Sadly, though, things weren’t different, and all the time I spent with him put me at risk. I was walking a tight rope, and one single misstep could lead to the truth being discovered. If that happened, I’d have to run just like my mother did.
“Delilah spoke of the sorcerer wanting to take you hostage from the port,” Ethan said then, drawing me from my thoughts.
“I’m not sure why,” I lied. “Maybe he figured out my connection to you and thought I’d be good leverage to get the vampires to stand down.”
Ethan studied me, several thoughts flashing behind his eyes. “Maybe,” he finally said. “Come. I’ll drive you home.”
“I can walk.”
“There could still be fighting going on. I’m not letting you walk,” he insisted.
Exhausted, I followed him out to his car. Silence fell as we made the journey to my apartment, and I didn’t protest when he followed me into my building. When we reached the door to my place I stopped and turned back to face him. “Thank you for bringing me home.”
Ethan looked somewhat forlorn. “You’re not going to invite me in, are you?”
I shook my head. He let out a sigh. “If I’d told you about the connection, you wouldn’t have drunk my blood, and if you hadn’t, you’d still be in agony right now.”
“I know that, and I understand why you did it, but I’m not ready to forgive you yet.”
Ethan reached out and tucked some hair behind my ear. “I hope you can forgive me one day. Sleep well, Sunshine.” The second the tenderly spoken words left his mouth, he was gone. I stared down the empty corridor, noting his absence, and suddenly feeling far too alone. A part of me wished he insisted on staying.
Then, as I entered my apartment and climbed into bed, I noticed a strange, new feeling in my chest. It wasn’t unpleasant, but it was certainly odd. There was a tightness, a kind of a pull, and I realised that this was the connection Ethan spoke of.
I fell asleep with a vague thought of how odd it was that the connection seemed to be wrapped around my heart.
***
I slept late the next morning. Drawing the curtains, I found the city looked perfectly normal. You’d never have guessed a tyrannical sorcerer was trying to take over. I checked my phone and found a new message.
Dad: Are you still coming to visit?
I quickly typed a reply.
Tegan: I have a few things to take care of here first. I’ll let you know in the next few days when I’ll be arriving.
I still planned on seeing my dad. I could kill two birds with one stone because I wanted to check on Florence when I got there and make sure everything was okay at her grandma’s house. The woman was Terry’s mother after all and that meant she could be just as much of a sociopath as he was.
Besides, it was probably wise to get away for a while. I wasn’t a murder suspect anymore, but whenever I thought of how Theodore had looked at me, how he knew exactly what I was, anxiety took over. Rita said witches and warlocks used my blood for dark magic, and I shuddered to think what Theodore could do if he managed to capture me.
I completed a few chores around my apartment before packing a bag in preparation for my visit to Dad’s. As I was going through my wardrobe, my attention lingered on the shoebox where I kept Matthew’s songbook. Some instinct had me pulling the box out and flicking through the notebook again. Maybe I enjoyed torturing myself. Heaven knew reading his lyrics wasn’t going to bring him back.
I flicked to the page where I left off last. The next song was called “The White Queen”, and something about the title gave me a tiny chill at the back of my neck.
The white queen comes
And finds me sometimes
She takes away a piece of me
Bit by bit
Drop by drop
I stopped reading and frowned. Who was the white queen? Was she some kind of metaphor for drugs? I moved on to the second verse:
The white queen comes
And makes me forget sometimes
That she had ever come at all
A black cloud fogs my mind
But pictures I recall
Of bleeding and of biting
I hope for her
Never to return
Now I swallowed in alarm, because it almost sounded like he was talking about a vampire. Two lines, in particular, stood out, makes me forget sometimes and of bleeding and of biting. These were things that vampires did to humans. They bit them and made them bleed, then they used their compulsion to make them forget. Suddenly feeling sick, I pushed the notebook away. The thought was almost too awful to consider, but had a vampire been preying on Matthew? Had she visited him again and again, drinking from him and turning him into an addict the way Ethan had described could happen? Had he turned to illegal drugs to dull the pain of being preyed upon?
I started to flick through the rest of the notebook, searching for more clues, when a loose page fell free. It looked like a piece of sketching paper. The side facing up was blank, but I could see the outline of a face drawn in pencil on the other side. My hands shook as I picked it up and turned it over. Matthew had drawn a close up of a woman’s face. Music had always been his passion, but he’d been a good artist, too. The drawing was so detailed, but the feature that most caught my attention was the fangs peeking out of the woman’s mouth. Then, as I took in the entirety of her face, I startled, because I recognised the vampire in the drawing.
It was Antonia.
My pulse pounded as I remembered something Delilah said the night I first encountered Antonia and Howard at Crimson. She said there was a rumour that Antonia liked to take her blood from young, unwilling human males. The realisation that Matthew had been one of her victims made everything inside of me go cold.
I’d been so busy working every hour I could that I hadn’t realised my boyfriend was being used as a blood bank by one of the most powerful vampires in Tr
ibane.
Rage filled me. If Antonia hadn’t preyed on Matthew, then he might not have taken his life. Did he see it as the only route of escape? The thought was heart-breaking, causing a tear to trickle down my cheek. I wished to turn back time, so I could go back and help him, stop Antonia from preying on him somehow.
I hated her.
Hated her with everything I had inside me. A dark resolution began to form. Antonia would pay for what she did.
I’d bide my time, but the first chance I got I was going to kill the vampire governess of Tribane.
My phone vibrated loudly, snapping me from my murderous, vengeful thoughts.
“Hello, Rita,” I answered, unable to help how angry I sounded.
“Someone got out of bed on the wrong side this morning,” she commented. “Everything okay?”
“Actually, I got out of bed on the right side. It’s what followed that pissed me off.”
“Sounds bad. You want to talk about it?”
“No. It’s probably better if I don’t. What were you calling me for?”
“Well,” she began, her voice hushed. “I’ve been at Gabriel’s all morning.”
“And?” I prompted, wondering why she was beating around the bush.
“Sorry,” she went on, whispering now. It sounded like she closed a door behind her. “Marcel just showed up so I’m hiding in the bathroom. He’s already suspicious of Gabriel’s allegiances, so we can’t afford him finding out what we’re up to. Anyway, I’m calling you because I think I know a spell that will get rid of Theodore. It won’t exactly kill him, but it will banish him into a hell dimension for a couple of decades. It’s just, I haven’t told Gabriel about it yet.”
“Why not?” I asked curiously.
“Because one of the ingredients for the spell is sort of impossible to get. Well, not impossible. I could get it, but then Gabriel will want to know how I got it and that’s something I can’t tell him.”
“Well, spit it out. What is it?”
A long stretch of silence dragged on before she answered, “I need a vial of your blood, Tegan.”
Time stilled and my insides were thrown into a tailspin. “Right,” I breathed, heart racing. This was too risky. I couldn’t give her my blood … could I?
“I’m sorry. I should never have asked. We’ll just have to find another way.”
“No, don’t do that. Just give me a couple of hours to think about this.”
“Okay. We’ll talk later,” she whispered before quickly hanging up the phone. I said a prayer that Marcel didn’t find her hiding in Gabriel’s bathroom. Going to sit down on my sofa, I dropped my head into my hands. Just when I thought things couldn’t get any more stressful Rita threw a spanner in the works and made things even worse, though I knew she was just trying to find a solution to our sorcerer problem.
If I gave her my blood, then Gabriel would want to know how she found such a rare ingredient. And if he discovered that I was the source of said ingredient, my secret could get out and every vampire, witch, warlock, and slayer in the city would want to capture me. But perhaps … perhaps Gabriel would agree to keep my secret, too. Maybe I could trust him with it the same way I trusted Rita and Alvie.
He was just so difficult to read. I knew he sided with the vampires against Theodore, but would the lure of my blood override his loyalty to the cause? He was, after all, a member of the magical families.
I wasn’t sure how long I sat stressing and mulling things over when the solution suddenly occurred to me. In order to restore peace to the city and get rid of Theodore, I needed to give Rita the blood she needed, then disappear somewhere nobody would find me. My time in Tribane was running out anyway, and I’d already been planning to get away. I could simply make it a more permanent departure. Besides, with Theodore knowing what I was, it was only a matter of time before others discovered the truth, too.
Yes, it’d be hard to leave my friends behind, Ethan especially, but sometimes sacrifices had to be made. Determination sat like steel in my gut. I finally had a plan, and once it was completed, I was going to leave this city forever.
21.
After I was fully packed, I headed out to meet Rita before she and Gabriel were due at Crimson. It was icy cold out, so I wrapped up tight in my winter coat and scarf.
I was almost at the club when an eery sensation crawled across the back of my neck. My ears pricked when I heard the tinkling of piano music and noticed the street was suddenly empty of people. A wave of déjà vu hit me as I looked around, on edge. Even cars were missing from the road.
Suspicion and fear took over as I glanced behind me and quickened my pace. The sound of my footsteps echoed as the music grew louder. I knew it was him. Theodore had come for me.
I broke into a futile run and ran straight into someone’s chest. I looked up and was greeted by Theodore’s soulless eyes. Turning, I ran in the opposite direction. Again, I was stopped in my tracks when he magically appeared in front of me.
“What do you want?!” I demanded, fear and adrenaline coagulating in my gut, my breaths coming hard and fast. His slim, pale hand reached out to caress my cheek, and I recoiled. “Get away from me!”
He laughed darkly at my poor attempt to escape, and a shadow rose behind him. Out of it, a form took shape, becoming a massive, black, human-sized crow. I trembled when its wings spread wide and Theodore pulled me to him. The giant crow’s wings wrapped around us both, and I felt it take flight before everything went black.
I woke up to the sound of glasses clinking and liquid being poured. A piano played a light and cheerful tune nearby. The next thing I noticed was that I was lying on a fancy velvet couch, no longer wearing my own clothes. I peered down at myself, scanning the red evening gown, black silk gloves, and diamond bracelets. I reached up and felt a similar diamond necklace resting against my throat.
A large, ornate mirror hung above an open fireplace. I stared at my reflection, barely recognising myself. My hair had been styled into set waves, like that of a silent movie era actress. My make-up was perfect, my eyes heavily shadowed, and my lips matte red.
Sitting up, I looked around and took the place in. I was in the middle of a party. Everyone was dressed in stylish evening wear, laughing and joking as they sipped their drinks, not even noticing the random woman who’d just woken up on one of their couches.
Something seemed … off.
The people were strange. For a start, their clothing wasn’t modern; it was straight out of the 1930s, and secondly, though they smiled and appeared to be having a good time, there was something dead in their eyes, something tortured behind their smiles. Their happiness seemed forced. Plus, they weren’t speaking English. They spoke in German.
Where the hell was I?
“Would you care for a drink?” a waiter asked, brandishing a tray of glasses filled with champagne. I looked at him, wide-eyed, and shook my head. Standing, I walked by the waiter to a nearby window to peer outside. Carnival rides stared back at me, and at that moment, I knew exactly where I was. I was in Theodore’s mansion on Ridley Island. But why was his house filled with German people dressed for a dinner party with a 1930’s fancy dress theme? And who the hell undressed me, did my hair, and put me in an elegant evening gown?
A shiver crept over me at the thought that it was Theodore.
“Are you enjoying yourself?” a familiar voice asked.
Speak of the devil. Theodore’s cold breath washed over my bare shoulder, making my skin crawl.
“Not particularly.” I turned my head to meet his gaze and my stomach twisted when I found him smiling down at me.
“I hope you don’t mind, but I took the liberty of having you dressed for the occasion. Do you like my party room? I’ve had it for more than eighty years now.”
“What do you mean?” I questioned, still taking in my surroundings in confusion. I glanced back at Theodore, and for a second, he seemed familiar. His eyes reminded me of someone, but I couldn’t tell who. It niggled at me,
the information just out of reach.
“I held a party in this very room in Berlin in 1938, just before the war broke out,” Theodore explained. “I decided that I enjoyed it so much I would keep it frozen in time for so long as it entertained me.”
How could this same room have been in Berlin in 1938? I wondered in confusion. Then the image of the house rising from the earth flashed in my mind, and I realised just how powerful Theodore was. This was his home, and he could seemingly magic it anywhere in the world.
“So, you’re telling me that these people have been trapped in this room since the thirties, living out an endless party?”
“Exactly.”
I looked around, both in awe and in horror. “How have you frozen them?”
“I’m a sorcerer, Treasure. Freezing people in time is just one of my many talents.”
A chill skittered down my spine at the way he called me Treasure. I took a small step back because he was clearly a psychopath. How could he justify this? How could he live with himself knowing that he was keeping these poor people trapped for his amusement? They should all have grown old and grey and most likely passed away by now. Instead, they were held prisoner inside of their youthful bodies. Forced to endure the same party over and over.
Theodore went and sat down on the velvet sofa I’d woken up on. He patted the space next to him, but I remained standing. He frowned and made a motion with his hand, and my body was propelled forward, forcing me to sit next to him against my will. He magicked a glass of red wine, seemingly out of thin air. He swirled it around, inhaled the aroma, and took a sip.
“You know,” he said, his tone nostalgic. “I have lived for a very long time, but this,” he gestured around the room, “has always remained my favourite era. Such extravagance at war with poverty. The world is a cutthroat place, is it not?”
“I suppose it is,” I replied, my pulse pounding as I tried to think of how I could escape.
He turned to study me. I felt his eerie gaze traverse my profile and cold trickled into my bones. “Do tell me, Treasure, what is your name?”
I considered lying, but then again, what was the point? Theodore sensed the power in my blood just from looking at me. Withholding my name wasn’t going to do me much good. I forced myself to meet his gaze. “My name is Tegan Stolle.”
