by R. L. Weeks
The bottom of the note is torn off. I look in both drawer for the other half of the note but can’t find it anywhere.
I look at the side table and search through his personal ledger, notes, and discarded articles. It’s nowhere to be found.
What was he researching? And who wanted to keep the second half of the note a secret?
“Raven.”
I jump and drop the kit onto the ground. The glass bottles shatter and spill over each other. “No!” I shout and lean down. Some of these are really dangerous, and blended together, who knows what they could do?
“Tom, these are really dangerous herbs.”
He’s in his nightgown and holding a candlestick in his hand. “What are you doing awake, and what is that? An apothecary kit?”
I shake my head as I gather up the herbs and try to separate them. “No. Well, technically yes, but Emmett filled them with…” I pause. How can I describe this? “Herbs for black magic I think.”
His eyes widen. “He practices black magic?”
“No,” I say in Emmett’s defence, but the truth is, I don’t know what he was doing with it all. “I think he was trying to fight back against something. Miss Kaye maybe.”
He kneels at my side and helps me separate the herbs. “That one is for fending off seers and evil intent.” I slap his hand away from the herbs. “They probably won’t bode well against vampire skin.”
He touches my hand. “It’s okay, you know, to still care for him.”
I reach for my neck; my throat feels tight. “I need to finish cleaning this up,” I say and gather the rest of the broken glass. “You should go back to sleep. I’ll be up when I’m finished.”
He sighs. “Raven, when will you get that I am with you in everything. If you have a sleepless night and wander the house looking at herbs and spells, I will be there with you.”
I laugh. “You really are a glutton for punishment.” I cock my head. “I didn’t realise vampires actually needed to sleep.”
He smiles. “Yes, but we need less sleep than humans. Around four hours.”
“Oh.” I pick up the last piece of glass, but it’s sharper than I thought. “Ouch.”
I bring my finger to my mouth and suck on the blood.
Tom’s face changes. His eyes become darker, and the ring around his irises turn blood red. Behind his lips, fangs poke out, and his face grows paler.
Now, I see the real monster behind the word ‘vampire’.
I take my finger out of my mouth and hold it up. “See, it’s fine.”
He grinds his teeth. “Go to bed.”
“But the—”
He pulls the kit from me. His gaze his hard. “I said go to bed. Now. I don’t want to hurt you.”
My heart races as I run out of the room. I reach the bannister and hold it to help me get up the stairs quicker. When I reach the top, I rush into my room and slam the door behind me, locking the lock.
I hear Tom downstairs snarling. I shudder. Tom seemed so ‘him’ that I almost forgot what he needs the most — blood. Human blood.
Fifteen
I wake up to a silent house. I pull myself out of bed. My feet hit the cold floorboards, and I hurry over to the window. I don’t know what I expected to see, but everything outside seems normal.
I look up at the clock. It’s almost noon. Damn, I slept late. I remember what my grandmother used to say — the only people who sleep past noon are crooks and drunks.
It took me a while to get to sleep last night, especially after I heard Tom leave the house.
I was to afraid to go after him. He looked so…bloodthirsty after I cut my finger. He told me to leave because he didn’t want to hurt me, which can only mean that, despite his love for me, he would have harmed me if I stayed downstairs.
The craving for blood must be strong, stronger than love even.
I slowly unlock my door and poke my head around the frame. His bedroom door is open. The sheets are crumpled and covered with blood.
I gasp and cover my mouth with my hand. I see Tom’s feet poking out under the sheet. He still has his boots on, and the tips are covered in blood.
My teeth chatter against each other, and beads of sweat push from on my forehead.
I creep back into my room, close the door as quietly as I can, and slump back against the wall.
Did he kill someone?
I hurry over to my closet and pull out the silver-and-blue dress that Emmett gifted me. It was the latest fashion from France, he told me. It came in a beautiful box with La Petite written on the top. I shake it to get rid of any dust, but the box has protected it well.
I pull it on. The fabric is soft against my skin. I pull at the strings, which are on the front of the dress most unusually, and it tightens around my waist and chest.
I tie the strings and finish getting ready. I brush my hair until I can run my fingers through it without hitting any tangles and pull it all over one shoulder.
I rub the lotion Emmett also gifted me onto my face. It has lead in it, which apparently is very good for the skin.
Once I’m dressed and ready, I pull out a suitcase and pack three dresses, stockings, a second pair of shoes, and my journal. I click the suitcase shut.
I need to leave here. Although I care for him, I can’t stay with Tom. I agreed to be with him because Amelia really gave me no choice, and the truth is, the more time I spend with him, the more I grow to care for him, and I cannot fall in love with a vampire. He could have killed me last night, and from the looks of things, he did kill someone.
I creep past his room and down the stairs, thankfully not making any noise this time, and reach the living room.
I put the intact bottles in the suitcase. I also pack the torn note that Emmett scrawled into my suitcase.
I have a plan. I will write Tom a note explaining what happened, everything, and I will leave for Fleet Street. I will break into Miss Kaye’s shop, get anything I can use against them, and hopefully find out where they’ve gone.
Before I leave, I will pay a visit to the abandoned house on Fleet Street. I’ve packed Emmett’s poison. If I can trick my uncle into drinking it somehow, then I can kill him quickly without Tom’s help. The only thing I am counting on is that Uncle’s previous love for the demon inside me will lead him to let me live long enough to spike his whiskey bottle.
It’s not a great plan, but it’s the only one I have. I need to save the people I love, then leave for good. I only bring them problems and misery, and I won’t let myself burden them anymore. After I have saved Emmett, killed Amelia and Miss Kaye, and gotten rid of my uncle, I can leave and start a new life somewhere else.
I take one look back at the house and close my eyes to stop any tears from coming to the surface. No more tears, Raven. No more.
***
After the seventh blow, I manage to break open the back door to Miss Kaye’s shop. I throw my suitcase onto the closest counter and look around. This room is filled with all sorts of herbs and little velvet pouches filled with who knows what.
Several shelves on the far wall hold different totems and books. I walk over to a glass display cabinet.
Inside it is a huge book with a leather cover and a fang used as a clasp. It reads: Personal Grimoire.
This could be just what I need.
I force the door open, and the flimsy lock breaks. As I reach for the book, a sudden dizziness overwhelms me. I fall back and hit my head on a trunk sat in the corner.
I open my eyes. How long have I been out? Amelia’s warning comes to mind — there’s more than a locked door protecting the shop. She wasn’t wrong. Did I release a spell of some kind when I broke open the display cabinet?
I stand up and dust down my dress. I rub the back of my throbbing head and look at the cabinet.
The book is gone.
My heart skips a beat. Did someone come in when I was passed out, or did it somehow disappear?
I reach out to the area where the book was and feel somethi
ng. A mirror. When I opened the case, I somehow activated the release of a mirror, giving the illusion that nothing is in the cabinet.
I pull the mirror out and grab the book.
“Ouch.” The cover burns my hand, and I drop it onto the floor. I hiss as I look at the burn on my hand. What the hell kind of magic does she use?
I grab a cloth from the table and pick the book up with it, being careful not to touch the cover.
My hand throbs with pain as I carry it to the other room of her shop, the back room where she does her tarot readings and runes for desperate clients.
I place the book down on that same table and use the cloth to open the cover to the first page.
Personal Grimoire of Vera Kaye
This may be the key I’ve been waiting for to bring her and her horrid daughter down. I look through the pages of spells and rituals. The pages themselves don’t burn my fingers, so it must only be the cover that’s soaked with something.
I finally find the page. The venom of a white-lipped tree viper will lead to eventual paralysis, blurred vision, and cause lung failure.
There’s a note scrawled next to it.
Behind the Wild Berry Ointment.
I hurry into the room with the herbs and potions and search the shelves until I find the wild berry ointment. I reach behind it and clasp a small bottle that has a cork as a stopper instead of a glass stopper like the other bottles have. It’s unlabelled, but I presume it must be the one.
I take it back with me and pop it into my suitcase. It would be better than the other poison to bring my uncle down.
After a couple of hours of looking through the pages, and almost giving up on finding anything about vampires, I stumble onto Miss Kaye’s personal notes.
Vampyr: Vampire – a human who has died and been brought back to life with a linking ritual between the person’s bones or body and their spirit.
Ceremonial magic will bring down the other side using an object as a totem between the two worlds. Then you must link a vampire with the body and channel them.
To turn a human not yet dead, you must feed the victim the blood of a vampire before they die.
I search through the notes looking for anything on killing a vampire.
Kill a vampire using a wooden stake through the heart, ripping off their heads, or using the ceremonial immortality ritual in reverse to force them back to the other side.
I’m looking through the final pages of the grimoire when some sheets of paper fly out from the back of the book.
I scoop them up, and my jaw drops.
Some are notes from her ritual of bringing back Amelia, but the last page is about me!
Jack Pride is collecting the last of the souls needed for the undead ritual. If I can keep Raven away from the truth – dangerous, I believe she is a powerful seer without training – then I can finish the undead ritual to raise my parents, my sister, and Amelia’s brother. I kept Amelia’s totem as her headstone, but I fear I will need to change this soon.
Important note added now that I know who Emmett was to my daughter, I have linked their lives. If Raven tries to stop us, then she can’t hurt Amelia without hurting Emmett.
I swallow hard. She linked Amelia and Emmett because she believed me to be a threat? She must have known I could come back to life, but why? I’m not a powerful seer, although I did have the gift of Sight.
I can’t believe she was working with my uncle to gather souls. Why didn’t she just use the normal ritual to bring her family back? Unless she couldn’t. A price to pay — that’s what Jane said when the brought me back, but mine was different. I came back as a human.
Is that the price, the death of innocents? Or something more?
And why would she leave her grimoire here unattended?
Why didn’t Amelia try and stop me when I was breaking into the shop? Her warning was so blasé.
Unless they wanted me to find it.
My eyes widen when I look at the burn on my hand. It’s bubbling now, and black is spreading from the area outwards.
The snake venom. It’s coated with freaking viper venom! Of course they wanted me to find it. They can’t be held responsible if I die from a ‘snake bite’ while they were with Emmett.
Sixteen
Tom growls as he crouches down in front of me. “So let me get this right? You decided to leave because you thought I killed someone, and you wanted to save the world on your own, and now” — he lifts my hand up and examines the burn— “you’re going to die because you refuse to trust anyone but yourself!” His eyes water. I feel so guilty. “I didn’t kill anyone. That blood was from people, yes, but I only took some of their blood before I healed them.” He shakes a bottle in front of me. “Jane gave this to me. I can heal people of a vampire bite with just a drop. I’ve been using it so I can feed without killing anyone.”
I burst into tears. “I’m sorry, Tom. It all just happened at once, and I do care for you, but I can’t allow myself to think about how I feel right now. Not with my uncle still free and Amelia and Miss Kaye still alive. Emmett is linked to Amelia. I can’t kill her without killing him.” I sob harder. “She forced me to go with you and forget Emmett. I’m sorry, I know you don’t want to hear it. She would have killed me if not, and she also told me where my uncle was too.” My heart races. “Please forgive me. I should have trusted you and told you the truth, but I was worried about how you’d react after what happened last time.”
His gaze lingers on mine. I wait for him to say something, anything, but he doesn’t. Instead he sighs and rubs his temples. “Raven, this is a lot to take in.”
I sniff and wipe my nose on my sleeve. “I should have told you.”
He sighs. “No, I shouldn’t have pressured you.” He looks down at the burn. “We need to get this taken care of.”
“How?” I ask. “There is no cure. I looked everywhere in her shop.”
“How long do you have?” he asks.
I recall the notes I found in the grimoire listing various venoms. “Three days, max.” My hand is searing hot. I blow on it. “But I can feel it already working.”
He clenches his jaw. “I’m going to find Jane.”
“Amelia made her leave!” I say. “She’s probably dead.”
He shakes his head. “A vampire would never kill a seer.” He taps his chin. “I know where to find her. Whatever Amelia did to make her leave, I can talk her around.”
“Because she loves you,” I say. “You said I toyed with your emotions, but you’re just as bad.”
He huffs. “She knows how I felt about you. She didn’t like it, but she knew.”
A tear slides down my cheek. “Do you still?”
He grinds his teeth. “I will always love you, but I don’t know if I like you very much right now.”
Ouch.
I guess I deserve that.
“I’m sorry.”
“Sorry doesn’t fix anything.” He stands up and tousles his red hair. “I will find Jane and find something to help you. Can you stay here and not run away or get into any more trouble? I will be back by first light.”
My bottom lip shakes. “Yes.”
“Sit tight. Run yourself a cold bath. It may help stop the spread of the venom. Keep it cool. I promise I will find a way to cure this.” He looks at my hand again. “Just let me help you this time.”
I look up, but like a flash of lightning, he’s gone.
***
While I wait for Tom, I write a letter to Emmett, just in case I don’t make it. I use my good hand and hover over the ink. I slow my breathing and dip the quill in.
Emmett,
I should have told you this a long time ago, but I felt the same way about you. It took me a long time to realise how I felt, I was so confused before, but I see it now. I have for a while. I feel a link to you. Something strong and beautiful. You make me feel alive. I love Tom, I do, but it’s not anything like I feel with you. With you, it’s passionate. It’s strong and secure. I thin
k of nothing but how your arms feel around me and all the good you have done for me. You are such a good man, and I don’t deserve you, and now I can never have you, but if you ever come back here, I need you to see this.
I’m about to die from snake venom, and you should know it was Miss Kaye and Amelia. They have linked your life to Amelia’s. She was also working with my uncle to collect souls, the same thing she made you do, for some ritual to bring back her family.
Please be safe.
I hesitate on the final words.
Always,
Raven.
I roll the letter up and place it beneath all his papers on the side table before placing the lid on the ink and replacing the quill in its holder.
I look at the door, tight-lipped. My suitcase is perched up against it from when I came running in after feeling dizzy from the burn. Tom was furious, obviously, and heartbroken.
I rub my eyes and look out the window. It’s almost dusk. I know he said to sit tight, but Uncle Jack still needs to be stopped. If I don’t stop him, Tom definitely won’t. He’s too preoccupied with my safety.
I open my suitcase and take out some angelica, hoping it will make me strong, and pocket the same viper venom that is killing me.
Seventeen
I freeze when I reach the alleyway. Leaves circulate in the wind like whispers in the night. Voices carry through the wall. I listen intently before rounding the corner.
“Mary Jane,” he says slickly, “come to me.”
“There’s a serial killer on the loose,” she says hesitantly. “Are you sure it is good for us to be meeting so late and in such a seedy part of town?”
“Hush.”
I edge farther down the alleyway until I see them.
Like a snake who is unable to feel love or compassion, Jack slithers over to his next victim, hands ready to grip her throat. He is unable to look within and wonder if he could have made different choices, reacted differently. Instead he has allowed himself to become a rot in the wood of our society. He has let other’s evil into himself and has decided to give into the darkness instead of trying to the do the right thing. That’s why, no matter what has happened to him, I cannot feel sorry for this coward.
