1. Vesper
“I’m a seer, you know?” a drunk male witch said to the obviously very uninterested female witch at the bar.
She gave him a polite smile and took a sip of her pink swirling liquid before trying to turn back to her friend.
“And you know what I saw?” he asked, desperately trying to steal her attention. “Us. Meeting. It’s destiny, don’t you thin?—”
“Richard, don’t you dare make me kick you out again,” an older witch said from behind the bar. “Destiny.” She let out a huff. “Don’t start with that shit again.”
I couldn’t help the smirk that spread across my lips.
I hated the seers’ obsession with destiny as much as the next person. They believed it to be an undeniable truth and bound to happen no matter what a person did to try to change it.
But they didn’t realize how binding their words could be.
My destiny was solidified in a coastal town in Northern California.
It was a quiet place. The people were nice, the forest that surrounded the town was densely populated and perfect for any creatures that like to stalk their prey in the darkness of the shadows.
It was where I stayed for the majority of my life. Where I worked tirelessly to prepare for something far greater than myself.
A day will come when the singular Castle bloodline comes to maturity, and a child born with poison for blood will usher forth an end to their rule.
I was that child, and that day was coming. Faster than I ever imagined.
But it didn’t scare me—at least not anymore. Father had beat it into me for years, making sure the prophecy and the importance of it were branded onto my skin. Sometime between the “training” and taking countless vampire lives, the fear turned to anger.
It festered inside me. Rotting and turning my insides black with every job I took.
How many lives did I take in preparation for this? A hundred? Two hundred?
I had lost count as I tried to erase their faces from my memories.
It only made the anger that much stronger. Instead of jading me, it only made me resent my family and the secretive organization they worked for.
The anger was what had brought me to the city. The main line of the prophecy never said that I was going to die, but the seer had mentioned the bloodbath that would ensue, something a mere human like myself would probably not survive.
And my parents just accepted that as my fate and trained me as such. It was I who decided to go against what destiny proclaimed of me. Going against my father’s wishes.
But I needed to do it. I had let my life be controlled by destiny for so long that I had become complacent. For years, I had been ready to give all of myself to the suicide mission. I was too much of a coward to shake it off completely, but that didn’t mean that I couldn’t at least try to prepare myself a bit better.
The bar I was told to meet at was one I had visited many times over, but it was no place for a human. Even if they let me in, the cautious stares and the potent smell of magic in the air were a reminder of how out of place I was.
It was old, probably more than a hundred years old, and placed in the basement of a laundromat they used as a front. The walls were cracked, and the speakers they played the music out of were fuzzy, but they kept it up well, and I have never seen a fight break out in this place. They respected it. Respected the history and magic weaved into the walls.
Something the humans could never do.
The part of the city where the bar was located belonged to the witches, though the many humans who stumbled upon it wouldn’t know it. The storefronts and various businesses all looked normal, but somehow every time a human came through the area without a purpose, they would suddenly find themselves turned around and spat back out on the other side.
So, from the moment I stepped into this bar, they knew not only that I knew what this place was but also that I had probably been invited.
“Don’t mind them, darling,” an older witch said as she placed a pint of beer in front of me.
Martha, my mind supplied. She was always here when I was and had never given me even so much as a dirty look.
“I understand it,” I said, taking the glass with a grateful smile. “Most know what I do, and it’s enough for them to want to stay away.”
Her smile wavered at this.
“No talk of that here,” she said in a hushed tone, her eyes darting around to the other patrons. I couldn’t tell if it was for my benefit or theirs.
I gave her a forced smile.
“You mean kill?—”
“I charge double if you get us kicked out,” a voice said behind me. I couldn’t stop the smile from spreading across my face.
A woman with pink hair maneuvered around the table and placed her hands on the elder witch’s arms. Levana. The only witch I chose to spend my time with. Met at the very same bar and haven’t been able to get rid of her since.
But at least she would come in handy.
“You know she can be prickly,” she said in a faux-annoyed tone. The light in her eyes and the smirk gave her away. “I’ll get us out of here soon.”
The older witch nodded before sending me one last lingering look.
“Take care of yourself, youngling,” she advised. “There’s something sticky in your aura. If you’re not careful, it just might overtake you.”
I bit the inside of my cheek to stop myself from responding.
The old woman didn’t deserve my anger. The witches who could see auras couldn’t help their gift. And from her point of view, she was probably truly trying to help me.
That didn’t stop it from feeling like a jab to my carefully curated mental walls.
“Still don’t like people reading you, huh?”
When I didn’t respond, she let out a sigh and pushed a hand through her bright hair.
“So…you changed your mind,” she said and pulled out the chair. The sound of the wooden feet scraping against the hard floor caused silence to ripple through the bar. As if we needed even more attention on us.
But Levana had even more of a reputation in these parts than I did.
It was the type of reputation that made me respect her, no matter how annoying I might have found her at first.
I leaned forward, getting as close to her as possible and away from prying ears.
“You better fucking be sure about it,” I growled.
Her eyes widened for a split second before she threw her head back and let out a boisterous laugh, not at all bothering to hide the two small fangs. It was enough for the onlookers to relax and turn their attention elsewhere.
Thank god.
“You doubt my abilities, human?” she asked and forced the beer from my grip. “They won’t smell it. It’s my fucking specialty.”
Specialty. A funny way to say that because she was a hybrid, her magic was less potent than the others. There weren’t many of her kind out there, or if there were, they liked to remain as below the radar as possible.
Human and vampire blood could mix easily, but the same wasn’t so true about witches and vampires, so her existence was just short of a miracle.
“It’s not just any clan I’m assigned to. It’s a family, royalty, Levana,” I whispered. “I need this to work, or it risks my life.”
For the first time in years, a seriousness fell over her. She gave me a stiff nod before she reached into her pockets and pulled out tiny jars of what looked like various herbs and wildflowers.
“Put these in your bath before you go,” she instructed and pushed the pile toward me. I examined a few before pulling my bag from the ground and dumping them in. “Soak for at least fifteen minutes. If you can, wash your hair in them. Hair and cloth are the hardest to get the scent out of. I truly don’t think it’s necessary, but just in case.”
I nodded and pulled my collarbone-length hair to the side. Her eyes lingered on the pitch-black tattoo that traveled up my neck.
“Straight to the point, then?” she asked. “I’d thought you would want to stick around for a bit. Reminisce. This may be the last?—”
“I leave in five hours,” I said, cutting her off. “Getting home is forty minutes alone.”
She swallowed thickly before reaching her hand out and placing it on my neck.
A burning sort of magic washed through me. My first instinct was to jerk back, memories of the same magic being used against me in training attacking my mind, but I stayed as still as possible, pushing all those terrible thoughts to the recesses of my mind.
Focus. It wasn’t painful for long. Just a few minutes before the magic cascaded down my shoulder and chest, completely hiding any evidence of the family I came from. The scars would be a different story, but hopefully they wouldn’t give me away as easily as my family’s symbol would.
When she pulled her hand away, I had a moment to collect myself before I jerkily grabbed my bag and opened it to grab her payment. Panic was ebbing at the edges of my mind, but I concentrated on what I could control.
My heart and my movements.
It allowed everything else to wash away into the ether, leaving me and my task at hand.
The payment was an orb wrapped tightly in cloth, its glow seeping through the thin fabric. It warmed my hand, the magic inside it seeping into everything, even with the extra protection.
Gently, I placed it on her still-outstretched hand.
“This is too much—it’s pure magic. Your father will?—”
“Be too proud of my sacrifice to notice,” I said, letting the smirk fall across my lips with ease. It was stolen anyway, and from my father’s personal collection, no less. “Thank you.”
I barely heard her as I turned away, but somehow her words still made it to me through the chatter of the bar.
“I’ll be praying for you, Vesper.”
If I allowed myself to feel any of the emotions swirling inside me, I would have to admit that her words affected me enough to cause all the air to escape from my lungs.
Witches don’t pray to their gods for just anyone.
But I wasn’t feeling them. I had closed them off as best as I could and instead forced myself up the stairs and to where my bike waited for me.
Less than five hours to go.
I ran the towel over my still-damp hair as I exited the bathroom.
My skin was pruny, and the smell of herbs and flowers was so potent I was sure I’d be smelling it for days, but it would work. I had faith. The witches didn’t get involved in anything to do with humans, but they were people of their words.
I was down to three hours.
The clothes I wore to the bar had been burned in the fireplace, and I spent extra time making sure the tattoo on my neck was successfully covered before scrubbing my skin violently with the herbs.
I paused as I walked down the hallway that overlooked the living room. Light shone up and illuminated the dark hallway, voices from below traveling up as Mother and Father discussed something with some stranger.
Having visitors in the house was common, but what shocked me was the young teen crouching against the railing, his hands gripping the wooden beams so tightly that his knuckles turned white.
His gaze snapped to mine, dark golden eyes so much like my own.
Instead of asking him to move, I crouched beside him to see what he was seeing. When I caught sight of it, my heart skipped a beat in my chest.
A human police officer stood in our kitchen discussing something serious with our parents. It wasn’t often that one of those visited our family. We had chosen this specific town and community because it was safe, and it wasn’t common for human law enforcement to come snooping around.
“A nomad,” Tate said, his voice a whisper. “It’s making the human police look bad, so they’re asking us to clean up.”
Ah, makes sense.
“They’ll take all the credit as usual,” I murmured. “Must be bad if they’re making house calls.”
“Twenty humans drained in the course of two weeks,” he whispered. “The humans haven’t panicked yet because they’re reporting the deaths as natural causes. Apparently they think it’s just an insatiable rogue.”
My eyes traveled to the teen, taking in his face, devoid of emotion. He was too smart for his own good. Father would surely notice, if he hadn’t already, and I didn’t know what was worse—Father’s attention or his punishments.
“But you don’t.” It was a statement.
Tate didn’t say anything, just stared at the people below. He had something to say to them. I knew the look.
“Come on,” I said, placing a hand on his shoulder. “You have school tomorrow, and if you go to bed now, you can catch a few hours of sleep before then.”
“I’m not sleeping,” he replied, his lips turning into a scowl. “I’m seeing you off.”
I had to look away from him as a wave of sorrow rocked my body. It was such a foreign feeling that it sent me off balance.
“If you wish.”
“I do,” he said quickly. “I want to remember everything.” He couldn’t look at me. That made it hurt even more.
I didn’t have the words to tell him how much it upset me to see him like this. To know that, once I walked off these grounds, he would likely never see me again and that he would use that memory to fuel the fires of his hatred for our parents.
“In two years, Mother and Father will give you a choice,” I whispered. “You can go to a boarding school for people like us or stay with Gabriel?—”
“I don’t know him,” he grumbled.
I leaned into him and rested my head against his.
“He’s nice,” I said, trying to pull his image from my blurry memories. The firstborn son, the one we all strive to be like. He had left right as Tate was born to build his own business. I might not remember much, but I did remember his hatred for my parents. I remembered how he raised his voice at them when he found me in the basement, starving and full of bruises.
Tate will be safe with him.
They hadn’t forced Tate to go through the training I had. He still had time to change his life.
“Forget about me, Tate,” I pleaded. “It’s easier this way.”
He pushed me away, causing me to tumble to the ground.
“Don’t say something so selfish!” He turned his back and ran to his room before I could stop him.
My eyes darted to the kitchen, where all eyes were on me. Father’s gaze was already narrowed in my direction.