Dinner With a Vampire (46 page)

‘Cold night,’ I began, directing it at Autumn, hoping to strike a conversation. I received no answer, but persevered. ‘So, how old are you?’

I bent down and picked up a few twigs. Her back was to me when she answered.

‘Sixteen.’

‘You look older,’ I lied.

She turned, examined me for a moment and then curtly nodded, in gratitude I assumed. She continued on in silence, her arms already bundled high with sticks.

‘So where do you come from? All the places are the same in the dimensions, right?’

She nodded. ‘I grew up in London, but I come from Devon.’

Encouraged by her longer reply, I carried on. ‘I grew up in London too.’

This time she took longer to reply and she averted her gaze again, eventually turning away and heading deeper into the forest.

‘I know. You were born in Chelsea.’

I stopped, slightly dumbstruck. ‘How do you know that?’

She paused, turning back to me. ‘Everybody knows.’

She shifted her pile of wood into one arm, reaching into her cloak and pulling out a glossy magazine. She handed it to me.

I looked down at the cover. It was titled
Quaintrelle
and dated for the first week of November. Subheadings were splashed across the page: H
OW WILL YOU SPEND YOUR
A
D
I
NFINITUM
?, O
CTOBER
’
S
T
OP
S
OCIALITES
and W
HAT
’
S
H
OT,
W
HAT
’
S
N
EW AND
O
N THE
R
ISE
all featured around the edge of the page. Beneath that was a picture montage – the smiling faces of young Sage, vampires and other, unrecognizable creatures stared up at me, all dressed in suits and dresses.

But what really caught my attention was the heading at the bottom, written in red:

T
HE
L
ATEST ON
V
IOLET
L
EE
–
TURN TO PAGE
5.

I yanked the magazine open, almost tearing the pages as I searched for the right page. I found it and began reading.

‘Violet Lee – kidnapped and held hostage for months: her story has reached millions of dark beings and humans alike and touched many hearts. We discuss what it means for the second dimension and whether this tale will have a happily ever after – namely in the form of HRH Kaspar Varn.’

I could hardly bring myself to read on, feeling my cheeks glow red. Below the text was a picture of me at the Autumnal Equinox ball, surrounded by vampires. Inwardly, I cringed, closing the magazine and handing it back.

‘No, keep it. It might be interesting for you,’ she said, expression still perfectly unreadable. With that she carried on, occasionally stooping to pick up a handful of twigs. I followed, unsure of how I should feel.

A small part of me was flattered. A magazine – and one that was circulated around all the dimensions – was following me, along with a lot of the population by the look of it. But another, much larger part was humiliated. I didn’t have to keep reading to know what it would go on to talk about.

That was private. It was between Kaspar and me. It was bad enough that the entire court knew.

I sighed. A different, more rational part was telling me I should have expected it. It was not as though vampires kidnapped humans every day.

We carried on in silence and I began to wonder when we were going to return. My arms felt like lead and my feet were beginning to ache. The path was leading us into a thorny thicket and the ground underfoot was mossy and damp. I gazed around and shivered, but not from the cold. A sudden sense of déjà vu had passed through me and with a sickening thump I realized where we were. Where we were heading.

We broke from the thorns and sure enough, ahead there was a stone building, ivy creeping up the walls and invading the huge cracks. Steps, broken in the centre, led up to a plinth, two stone pillars guarding the entrance to a huge, open door. From inside came the stomach-churning smell of decomposing flesh and the dust hung in great clouds, coating my arms in seconds.

I stopped. That was where the cloaked figure had feasted upon a young girl. Killed her.
Sarah. She was called Sarah.
It was here I was sure the Queen was buried, deep beneath my feet.
Carmen.
It was not far from here that he had attacked me.
Ilta.

I swayed a little on the spot, feeling sick and quite light-headed.

‘Can we go b-back?’ I stuttered, eyes struggling to focus. ‘I’m kind of cold,’ I lied.

Felix, oblivious to my plight carried on. ‘But it’s only a little further and there’s a whole load of dead trees.’

I swayed, dropping a few sticks. As they fell, Autumn abruptly whirled around, her eyes following them until they hit the ground before her gaze bounced back up to mine. Something warm and alien brushed against my mind, before I vaguely heard another voice.

‘I’m cold too.’

I heard Felix sigh exasperatedly. ‘Okay, okay … I get it … we’ll go back …’

I closed my eyes for a few moments, taking a few deep breaths. When I opened them, the other two were already heading back up the path, the sticks that I had dropped at my feet gone.

The moment I stepped back into the clearing, Kaspar’s eyes shot up from where he was silently whittling a piece of wood with a penknife. Questioning, they swept across me before they returned to his carving.

I dumped the wood beside the fire and dropped beside him, leaning against the trunk of a great tree.

‘What’s the time?’

‘Mr Wolf.’ He smiled at his lame joke, but his flat tone told me his heart wasn’t in it. This Dark Heroine business had wiped the smile clean off his face. ‘Almost midnight,’ he added, not glancing up from his work. He stared at it, intent, tiny curls of wood floating to the ground at our feet until eventually all that was left was a shard of useless bark. He dropped it to the ground and folded the knife back up, watching as Felix and Cain arranged the sticks into a rough pyramid in the stone circle. Fallon knelt beside them, whispering words into the cradle of tinder.

Autumn gravitated around her companion, seeming reluctant to get too close to anyone else. Eventually she settled against a nearby tree, a little way out of the circle. Her eyes feasted on the smouldering beginnings of the fire, never leaving it, even as Fallon’s face shone with a child’s glee as flames sprung from the damp wood, or when the boys let out a satisfied shriek of surprise.

Yet again I found my gaze could not be torn away from her and I watched, even more fascinated now after her sudden act of insight and kindness towards me, a virtual stranger. The flames were reflected in her amber eyes and they were taking on an even greater depth – too deep for a shy girl of sixteen. They were the flickering eyes of an adult who had endured pain and torment; who understood the world and what she had to do.

I had seen those eyes before. They were the eyes of the King, of my father, of Eaglen, yet here they were, encapsulated in a young Sagean girl.

The clearing settled as the fire grew higher and higher; warmth spread outwards, creeping slowly across the ground until it reached my toes, then my legs and as I leaned forwards towards it, my face, which glowed and began to burn.

Fallon, content with his handiwork, held his hands out to the fire, warming them. Autumn shifted closer and joined him. Immediately, the fire quite literally bent towards them both, becoming brilliantly orange and distorted. She pursed her lips as though about to whistle and blew gently, forcing the reluctant fire back like a chastized child. Fallon just chuckled as the fire sprung back, trying its luck again. His serious companion did nothing this time, but continued to stare into the depths of the fire, even as the falling leaves landed in a little ring around them.

The vampires, on the other hand, scuttled away from the flames. Kaspar hesitated for a few minutes, staying close by my side but it wasn’t long before he too succumbed to the burning heat and withdrew into the shadows.

It was mostly quiet for a long while, other than the occasional giggle from Lyla from the shadows – it did not take much imagination to know what her and Fabian were up to. Felix and Charlie occasionally whispered a few words to each other but their conversations were short. Alex eventually took out his guitar and retreated even further away from the fire and began strumming half-heartedly, competing with the crackling of the fire, Cain interjecting every now and then.

I sensed that everyone was lost in their own thoughts, just like I was: it was odd to think that the people sat around me were at the centre of everything that was happening to the dimensions, as things started to breakdown.

As are you,
my voice said.

I scoffed in my head.
Hardly. I don’t even understand the Prophecy.

Then maybe you should ask.

I contemplated its suggestion for a moment but decided I didn’t have the courage to ask – I felt such a fool with the Sage around. I turned around, wondering if I could quietly question Kaspar but as soon as I met his eyes he stood up.

He walked around the fire, grabbed one of the bags and reached into it, pulling out a handful of chocolate bars. He chucked a couple of them my way and gave the rest to the two Sage. Autumn ripped hers open and devoured it hungrily, making her seem more human than her vampire counterparts; seeing that, Fallon handed her the rest and with a wave of his hand, conjured an apple from midair.

Kaspar handed the beers around which Autumn politely refused and settled back down behind me. I moved back a bit and joined him, tired of the burning heat, taking a few sips of the beer.

‘How do you do that?’

‘Do what?’ Fallon asked, taking a second bite out of his apple.

‘Produce food from thin air.’

He took a third bite. ‘Magic.’

‘But how is that possible?’

‘Just is,’ he said, shrugging his shoulders.

There was a pause. ‘Then nobody starves.’

Fallon frowned ruefully. ‘We feed our own.’

‘What do you mean?’ I asked, knowing full well what he was implying.

‘We can only conjure what nature provides, and nature cannot provide enough to feed the expanding population of the world; of each dimension.’

My face cleared with comprehension but my mouth fell slightly open, aghast. ‘So millions of humans – innocent children – die whilst the dark beings wallow in wealth?’

‘I wouldn’t say wealth,’ Fallon argued, but I turned to Kaspar for back-up.

‘You said yourself that there’s no such thing as poverty for dark beings.’

He nodded solemnly. ‘But it’s more than that. There’s too much politics involved between dark beings and humans.’

I straightened up. ‘Clearly,’ I retorted, knowing that my situation reflected that perfectly.

‘Kaspar’s right,’ Cain said. ‘Co-operating is basically impossible. Mother’s proof of that. There’s no trust.’

My eyes guiltily slid to the ground and the box rattled. ‘Well maybe that is what needs to change,’ I ended, defeated.

‘I agree with Violet,’ a quiet voice suddenly said.

All eyes turned to Autumn as her gaze briefly met mine. Quickly, she hastened to explain herself. ‘The wealth could be more evenly distributed.’

‘But Miss Lee,’ Fallon begun. ‘Who do you suggest could implement such a change?’

I flushed. ‘The Dark Heroines? Isn’t that what the Prophecy said they would do?’

The clearing went silent and Fallon cleared his throat, glancing sideways at Autumn.

‘We’ll tell you the first and second verse of the Prophecy, but no more. You don’t know enough about the other dimensions to understand it.’

That stung but Fallon’s mouth was set in a line and I knew not to argue.

‘I’ve heard the first verse before,’ I said, still hearing the hallowing penultimate line in my head.

‘From Kaspar, I presume?’

Kaspar nodded and rested his head back against the trunk of the tree, looking resigned. His hands rested on the ground beside him and his nails dug into the earth, his arms tensed. My heart dropped, longing to know why he had become so withdrawn all of a sudden and almost instinctively I moved my hand as close as I dared to his, our little fingers almost touching. Perhaps he felt my warmth because his arm relaxed.

‘Just the second verse then.’ Fallon shrugged his shoulders and took a long swig from his can of beer. Finishing it, he crushed it in his palm, the metal disappearing beneath the crevices of his fingers. When he opened them again, all that was left was dust, which he scattered onto the fire.

Autumn glanced his way and then began to speak in her native tongue, Fallon weaving a translation in-between.

‘Her fate is set in stone,

Bound to sit upon the second throne.

Destined to betray her kin; she lives in his past sin,

Bathed in the blood of the black rose above.

No birth, no time, no choice,

So as martyrs, two innocents must die,

For the girl, born to impassion the nine.’

Her last words were spoken with a severity and urgency there hadn’t been before and she gave a small gasp, as though surprised at herself. Fallon didn’t question her behaviour, but lay there patiently, his eyes roaming across the dark sky, as though counting the stars. With her gasp came silence, the fire the only one to speak as the wind raced through its mouth, sighing through pursed lips as the air escaped and hurried on, zipping between the trees and leaving only a whistle behind.

I nestled further into the tree and stared up too, wondering whether, perhaps, with its strange, airy, even earthy language that the stars were more familiar than the first dimension and its even stranger inhabitants, the Sage.

Fallon sighed and propped himself up on his elbows. ‘That verse is a true declaration of war.’

‘But this is peacetime?’ I questioned, confused.

‘No, Miss Lee,’ Fallon cooed again. ‘If this were peacetime, you would not be sitting here, a prisoner of politics, faced with a decision you hardly dared to consider until recently.’