Arm dangling and blood pouring from her lip, she grimaced in pain. “Is that all you’ve got?” she grated, taunting him.
Mortimer’s dark eyes flashed with rage. He was going to kill her. I couldn’t watch. I buried my face in Max’s body, my hands digging into his fur, bracing myself for the blood–curdling screams.
I heard Viggo’s serene voice instead. “Everyone, calm down please.”
Peeking out from behind Max, I saw Viggo standing between the two of them, his arms outstretched. “You have some explaining to do, Sofie,” he said calmly.
I dared look at her. And gasped. Her lip was as beautiful and unharmed as ever, except for a patch of smeared blood which she now dabbed at with a cloth, using the arm that should be hanging limp at her side.
“Please stop fighting. You’re terrifying Evangeline. She’s already been through enough today!”
All three turned to regard me. “And I suppose you have some questions,” Viggo said, smiling gently. He took a step toward me.
Max growled.
Viggo raised his hands in surrender and backed up to sit in one of the armchairs. “But us first. Why did you sneak off to the park?”
I gaped at Sofie’s uninjured lip a moment longer. “I was looking for an explanation for the bites.”
“And how does Central Park offer that explanation?” Viggo asked.
Here we go. “I thought you two were drugging me, taking me into the park, and paying a bunch of people to pretend they’re vampires.” There. It was out there.
Viggo’s jaw dropped, his face twisting in a mixture of horror and insult.
“Why on earth would we do that?” Mortimer stared at me in disbelief.
“I don’t know … you’re bored? Viggo is fascinated with vampires and I overheard you guys fighting the other day about a game. Anyway, I figured if I could find the statue in the woods, then I would have proof.”
“How would the statue prove that? You’re not making any sense, my dear Evangeline,” Viggo exclaimed in frustration.
I sighed. “I had another dream last night.”
“And what happened?”
I told them about waking up beside the statue again, about the cave, and the attack. “And I woke up with these.” I gestured to my neck.
“And did you find proof of this trick you suspect us of?” Mortimer asked, eyebrow raised.
I shook my head, dropping my gaze to my hands. I could feel their eyes boring into me, waiting for me to speak. “Am I going crazy?” I finally asked.
Viggo changed the topic. “These people who attacked you. How did you come across them?”
“They cornered me while I was looking for the statue. Four of them,” I answered, explaining how a seemingly sweet old lady set the trap.
“Four of them,” Mortimer repeated, his expression unreadable.
I nodded. “Three men and a woman. And a dog.” I shuddered, remembering the mutt’s decapitated head.
“A woman?” Sofie asked, glancing at Viggo.
I nodded.
“And did they tell you who they were or what they wanted?”
I hesitated. “It didn’t seem random. They knew you—all of you. They said they’ve been watching you.” I looked at Sofie. She had known. Yesterday, shopping. She had sensed it somehow.
“What exactly did they say?” Viggo asked.
“Something about this necklace, about me being human, about Sofie doing something to me. You being … leeches?”
Viggo tisked, shaking his head in disdain. He rose and walked over to rest his arm on the mantel. “Well, I guess we can’t keep this from you any longer.” Viggo gazed up at the painting of Sofie’s sister. “No, Evangeline. You are not crazy, or hallucinating, though what I’m about to tell you will not help convince you of that.” He paused to clear his throat. “‘Vampire’ has such a stigma to it, wouldn’t you agree?” he said casually, followed by a resigned sigh. “I am over two thousand years old. I’m the oldest surviving vampire on earth. Mortimer is just shy of nine hundred.”
My stomach tightened into a tight ball. If I wasn’t crazy, then I was surrounded by a bunch of people who were.
“Sofie, you are—what now, a hundred and forty–eight? Is that right? I wouldn’t want to age you. I know how sensitive females are,” Mortimer sneered.
Sofie rolled her eyes in annoyance, but nodded.
“You’re all … vampires,” I repeated, listening to the words come out of my mouth.
“Now Sofie, you’re not being completely honest,” Mortimer mocked.
Sofie glared at him before turning to me. “I was born a sorceress.”
“Sorceress … like witch?” I asked.
“An extremely powerful one,” Mortimer emphasized.
“Oh, Mortimer, you flatter me,” Sofie answered sarcastically before turning back to me with that haunted look on her face. She lifted her hand and a tiny flame rose from her index finger, out of thin air.
My eyes went wide. Without thinking, I slid off the couch and pushed past Max to inspect it closer, intrigued. Lifting my hand to it, I flinched as the heat scalded my skin. It was real.
With a burst of excitement, Viggo skipped over to the grand piano. Picking it up with one hand, he launched it across the room. It crashed into a concrete column and splintered, the sound deafening. “Need more proof?” He was instantly standing in front of me. Grabbing an empty glass, he crushed it with his hand. I cringed as he held his hand out, expecting to see blood. Instead, tiny shards of glass scattered out of his pristine, uninjured palm.
“A song and dance now, if you please, court jester!” Sofie tittered, mockingly clapping her hands.
Viggo bowed. “It’s been so long since we’ve had to prove ourselves. It’s exhilarating!”
I gaped at him. How is this possible? Vampires don’t exist. They’re just another scary tale. “But … no. Sofie, I’ve seen you out in the sun, and …” I stammered.
Viggo laughed. “Oh, don’t believe any of that. The majority of it is pure poppycock. We’re not allergic to crosses and garlic, we can come in and out of your house as we please, there are no coffins under this roof—I could go on for hours with all the nonsense.”
My eyes bulged as a thought hit me. Backing away quickly, I practically fell onto the couch. “What about people? Do you … drink blood?”
Viggo’s face grew more serious. “We want to be completely honest with you, my dear Evangeline. No lying. So …” He paused. “There are those of us who do feed on humans, impulsively and without remorse. However, Mortimer and I have made it our mission to eliminate that type of vampire from this world. I think we’ve done quite well.”
“So you don’t?”
He exhaled. “Only in desperate situations and only on the worst criminals—child rapists and murders; bottom–feeders, bane to all humans.”
The fascination with criminals … He wasn’t a lawyer or a detective. He was merely scouting out his meals. I shuddered and looked at Sofie and Mortimer. Both remained quiet, their faces expressionless, though I sensed distress in Sofie’s eyes.
“We are not those terrible creatures the stories paint us to be, I swear it! Have I been anything but generous and kind to you since the moment you met me?”
I paused, then shook my head. “And sitting here with me … and my blood—that isn’t hard for you?” I asked hesitantly, afraid that reminding them I was human would have adverse side effects.
“Darling Evangeline! We would never harm you!” Viggo cried, distress contorting his face. “And we’re experienced enough that we can control ourselves. Now, being in a room with free–flowing blood is a tad trickier … but we always manage.”
So Leo obviously knew who his employers were, I gathered, recalling his meticulous cleanup. It also meant he wasn’t a vampire.
The silence in the room grew beyond the awkward stage as I absorbed what they were telling me. Viggo watched me with the look of a dejected animal begging for love and acceptance.
>
Finally I spoke. “Wow, that’s quite the secret.”
“That’s not the half of it,” Mortimer grumbled, studying his manicured fingernails.
“Are you afraid? Please say you’re not,” Viggo pleaded.
“I’m okay,” I said, swallowing my fear. More like petrified.
“The thing is … we need your help, Evangeline,” Viggo said.
That took me aback. “How? With what? And what does all this have to do with my dream and the bite marks on my neck?”
Viggo’s expression turned grim. He sat back down in the armchair. “For one hundred and twenty years, our venom has been useless.”
“I don’t underst—” I began, frowning.
“We can’t turn humans anymore,” Mortimer said abruptly, sitting down in a chair beside Viggo.
“And that’s a bad thing?” I said without thinking. I caught Mortimer’s glower.
“If we can’t create one of us, we’re left watching the ones we love grow old and die.” Viggo looked up at the portrait.
Had he watched Sofie’s sister die? I wondered. Had she been his lady friend?
“It becomes too painful to get close to anyone, knowing the misery and loss will just repeat itself over and over again for eternity. It’s such a lonely life.” Viggo sighed. “Can you imagine that, Evangeline?”
I shuddered. I had spent five years utterly alone. It was a dismal, dark place to be. But eternity?
“Please say you’ll help us,” Viggo begged.
“I … of course, I’ll help you if I can …”
“Oh, thank you, Evangeline. Thank you! I knew you would understand,” Viggo said, elated.
“But how?”
“This is the terrible part about it.” Viggo’s face fell in despair, and he turned to scowl at Sofie. “Unbeknownst to us, that witch has cursed you!”
Cursed? My eyes shifted to Sofie, who sat in her chair, looking ready to explode. “What is he talking about, Sofie?” I asked warily.
Sofie’s jaw clenched. “I didn’t mean to—”
Mortimer cut her off. “Sofie is the reason for our problem. She played with magic for her own selfish gains and we are all now victims of the results.”
I glanced back at Sofie to see her minty green eyes alight with fire, but she said nothing.
“You’ve probably been wondering why things have been … tense … between us these past few days,” Viggo said. “It’s because Mortimer and I are so angry with her for what she’s done to you.”
“What did she do, exactly?” I asked slowly, again looking at Sofie. Her eyes were focused intently on a spot on the Persian rug.
“Sofie, please explain,” Viggo urged, adding, “Only what’s necessary. No need to confuse the girl.”
Sofie swallowed. When she began speaking, her voice was emotionless, as if she spoke by rote. “You are the primary channel for an incantation that will solve our venom issue. That necklace and the two identical statues—the one in the atrium and the one in your … dream,” Sofie hesitated on that last word, “they’re all conduits.”
“Conduits for what?” I asked, glancing down at the pendant. Her gift.
“These dreams you’re having … they aren’t dreams, Evangeline. It decided the best way to fix our problem was to search the universes for another world like Earth, one where vampires exist and their venom is intact.”
“Who decided?”
“The spell.”
I frowned.
“It’s all hocus–pocus,” Viggo murmured. “Don’t worry. We don’t understand it either.”
Sofie ignored him. “You’re being transported to another world—one that is identical to ours.”
“And there are vampires there as well?”
She nodded. “It seems you’ve found some already.”
My stomach dropped. “They’re … vampires?” I whispered, my face twisting in shock. “All of them?” My Caden is a vampire? He was so sweet, so kind, so beautiful. I couldn’t believe it. I didn’t want to. I hesitated before asking, “How is my going over there supposed to fix this problem for you?”
“Sofie told us that you would be transformed into a vampire and come back with the ability to convert humans,” Mortimer answered flatly.
“That’s not what I said!” Sofie yelled.
I barely heard her. Mortimer’s words were like an electric shock coursing through my body. “I’m supposed to be a vampire?” I whispered, my eyes wide.
“I wanted to tell you, Evangeline! She—” Viggo glared at Sofie “—swore me to secrecy. Said she’d hurt you if we told you!”
I bolted off the couch and pushed past Max, having heard all I could handle. The pendant. I looked down at the precious gift Sofie had given me only days earlier. I needed it off, away from me—forgotten. As if it never existed. My hand flew to the chain and I yanked it hard enough to snap the clasp, just as Sofie shrieked, “No!”
Before I could take another step, I crumpled to the floor, excruciating pain surging through my body, running along every nerve to my fingertips, seeping down into the core of my bones. I gasped, unable to breathe, or scream, or see, the intensity crippling. I was sure I would die. I wanted to die.
And then the pain vanished as instantly as it had begun. My eyelids fluttered open and I saw Sofie leaning over me, fumbling with something around my neck. “There, it’s fixed,” she murmured to no one in particular. Her pale green eyes lifted to mine then, full of anguish. “I’m so sorry, Evangeline,” she whispered, “but please don’t take this necklace off again, or you will die.”
11. Cursed
Sofie’s warning rang in my ears as she scooped my limp body into her arms as if I were a frail child. She carried me back to the couch I had stormed away from and set me down gently. I wanted to fight back, to resist her help, but I couldn’t even lift my hand.
“What just happened?” I asked, my voice hollow.
“Sofie’s curse, darling. I’m so sorry. Witches can be such wicked creatures,” I heard Viggo murmur.
I rolled my head to regard Sofie. The distress in her eyes appeared genuine. But I knew better than to believe it now.
I turned back to stare vacantly at the coffered ceiling. Seconds strung into minutes as energy slowly returned to my limbs. My jagged breathing competed with the crackling of the fire as the only sound in the room.
Physically, the hurt had vanished. There were no residual aches or pains, no scars to serve as evidence. It was as if had never happened. Emotionally, though, the injury was as real as if Sofie had held a hot branding iron to my chest. The fantasy I had unwittingly created in my head, where I was finally welcomed and accepted—even loved—had instantly crumbled to dust. Of course there was an ulterior motive. Of course Sofie wasn’t doing all of this because she enjoyed my company.
I am such an idiot.
Still too weak to fight gravity, my hand slid up over my stomach to touch the pendant, to feel the smooth stone rolling under my fingertips. It was no longer mere jewelry. I could sense the chain coiled around my neck as surely as if it were a tight noose. Closing my eyes, I pictured Sofie ready to kick the stool out from under me.
“Here. Sit up and have some water,” Viggo said, offering me his hand and then a glass.
“So what happens now?” I asked, accepting both with a small smile of thanks.
“The spell is unclear,” Sofie said softly. “I can’t see beyond you transporting to this world. It’s like getting an instruction manual with a large chunk missing from it. I assumed it would involve you being transformed into one of us. You would then have the venom to create more of our kind here. But clearly, based on what happened last night, I was wrong.”
“You put a spell on me and you don’t even know how it works?”
“Isn’t it terrible? Again, Evangeline: we had no control over what she was doing,” Viggo said.
A low, feral sound came from Sofie but with one sharp glare from Mortimer, her face went expressionless again. “T
he pendant rejected the venom. It’s protecting you in this other world—masking your heartbeat, changing the taste of your blood.”
“And how are we supposed to know how it’ll work?” I demanded, hearing the bitterness in my voice.
“Sofie is trying to—” Viggo began.
“I know what you need to do now,” Sophie interjected.
“Oh, really.” Mortimer’s voice was hard, suspicious. “How convenient that you finally know something.”
Sofie ignored him. “You need to bring one of them back. The pendant will tell you how, exactly. It’s sentient. It will communicate with you.”
I peered down at the pendant, muttering, “So I’m going to start hearing voices?”
“I’m not sure,” Sofie said, adding, “You will know when it happens.”
Her candor didn’t ease my anxiety. I dropped my gaze to the floor, focusing on a knot in the hardwood. The stabbing pain of Sofie’s betrayal had begun to fade, replaced by an all too familiar emptiness that slowly crept through my body. It was the numbness of loss—loss of an illusion of friendship I had quickly accepted as reality. I was delusional, after all.
And humiliated. Here I was, unwittingly the butt of a secret—a pawn, greedily accepting the gifts they showered upon me, turning a blind eye to the fighting and screaming.
The disturbing fact was, I now had an explanation for the bites and the old sweat clothes—albeit an insane one—and that brought me some small comfort.
“Is there anything else I need to know?” I wasn’t sure I could handle anymore.
“No,” Mortimer answered abruptly.
Another growl from Max.
I swallowed. “What if I want to go home?”
“This is your home for now,” Viggo answered calmly. “It’s for the best. For your safety, until this is all sorted out.”
The thought of leaving these walls—my elegantly wallpapered and decorated prison walls—brought me back to the attack. “Who were those people in the park?”
“No one you need to worry about.” Viggo smiled gently. “They won’t bother you anymore.”