Josephine’s Tear (Crimson and Shadows #1)

Prologue

PROLOGUE

T he vampire clans coveted beauty above all else, so it had only been a matter of time before I was sent as a Candidate to participate in the Selection. With golden-brown hair and hazel eyes, I looked like my mother. Her true beauty hadn’t been in her appearance, though. It had shone from within, radiating warmth and brightening the world around her. That light had forever been extinguished two nights ago when I’d found her being drained by a vampire in our home. The creature had fled the scene with my mother’s lifeless body before the scream lodged in my throat could claw its way out.

“Sophie?” my father asked, snapping me out of my thoughts. He must have knocked and walked in while I was lost in the horrible memory of that night—the worst, most devastating night of my life.

Pulling myself back to the present, I found my reflection in the vanity mirror. I’d always known this day would come. All my life, I’d been aware of the attention my features could garner. Now, the girl in the mirror looked haggard, her face gaunt and her mouth wan. My eyes were haunted, and I squeezed them shut, willing myself to wake up, but this was no nightmare. It was my reality. I felt numb—the cold feeling that had crept into my chest on the night of my mother’s death and settled there, spreading to my entire body, chilling my insides.

“Are you ready?” my father asked.

When I turned around to face him, he looked defeated. Tension bracketed the corners of his mouth, and his blue-gray eyes were dull and smudged with purple beneath. My welling tears blurred his features, but there was no mistaking the devastation I saw on his face. Two nights ago, I’d lost my mother, but he’d lost the love of his life.

“I asked Madam St. Clair to reconsider in light of recent events, but she denied my request,” my father said, hanging his head.

The way his shoulders slumped, and his voice broke halfway through the sentence, let me know that he was on the brink of falling apart. So was I. In the recesses of my mind, I knew that I hadn’t yet begun to process my mother’s death. That realization was there, looming over me, but I had neither the strength nor the courage to face it. Not yet. There was a more pressing issue at hand—the Selection. I had hoped to avoid it, but the Governess, Madam St. Clair, hadn’t found my mother’s death to be a valid reason to spare me from being sent as a tithe to our vampire overlords.

Everything inside me shriveled up at the thought of going to the Duval Estate and meeting the members of the ruling clan. I’d just lost my mother; I didn’t want to lose a year of my life to be their vassal and blood donor. For all I knew, one of them could be the same monster who’d killed her. A shudder of trepidation rolled through me at the thought, and tears spilled, gliding down my cheeks.

“I’m sorry, Sophie,” my father rasped, his own eyes glimmering with tears. “At least, if you’re selected, you won’t have to go far.”

The Duval Estate was in New Haven, the capital of the Eastern region, where we also resided, but knowing that brought little consolation. If I was selected, my childhood home might as well be thousands of miles away. For a year, my life would not be my own—it would belong to the Duvals.

“I’m ready,” I lied, not recognizing my own voice. It was dead and cold. Resigned.

My father and I loaded into the carriage and spent the ride to the estate in somber silence. There was nothing either of us could say to alleviate the dreadful weight of the situation. My mind was empty, and my body didn’t feel like my own. Anxiety replaced the emptiness as we got closer to the estate, and a feeling of hopelessness settled over me. At that moment, I was not in control of my life, and I didn’t have the faintest idea what I could do to regain it. It was as if a chasm had opened under my feet on the night of my mother’s death, and I’d been falling ever since, deeper and deeper into the oily abyss with no end in sight.

When the carriage rolled through the black and gold fence enclosing the estate, I instinctively curled into my father as if looking for his protection, but he couldn’t shelter me from what was to come. A scratchy lump formed in my throat as tears threatened again, but I forced them down. It was too early to panic. There were always eleven Candidates, one from each town in the region—I might not get selected.

Taking a steadying breath, I pulled away from my father and peeked out the window at the sprawling estate I’d only ever seen from afar. Visits to the estate were not allowed, and any interaction with the ruling clan was prohibited. The Duvals had always kept themselves separate from the humans living in New Haven, conducting all their business through Madam St. Clair.

My heart stuttered and stopped when the carriage jerked to a halt in front of a magnificent three-story mansion with stained- glass windows and a set of double doors. Lit lampposts in front of the house bathed the dramatic facade in a yellow glow.

“The Candidate comes with me. You can wait here,” said a stern-looking servant as soon as my father and I exited the carriage.

My anxiety intensified as my stomach turned over.

“Will I have a chance to say goodbye?” I asked shakily.

The servant didn’t respond as he turned on his heels, expecting me to follow. He strode toward the front doors, and after one last panicked look at my father, I hurried after him. We entered the mansion but didn’t go far, stopping in the brightly lit foyer where I joined the other Candidates. Full of nervous energy, I picked a spot in the back, trying to attract as little attention as possible. Demurely clasping my hands to stop their trembling, I fixed my gaze on the Candidate’s back before me.

“You,” came an old woman’s voice from the front of the crowd.

I was so focused on making myself invisible that I didn’t realize the woman had referred to me until the other Candidates stepped aside. Lifting my gaze, I made eye contact with Madam St. Clair.

“Come to the front,” she commanded, her voice husky and cold.

I was frozen in place. The foyer was eerily quiet as all the eyes were on me. When I didn’t move, the Madam arched one perfectly groomed brow, making a sound of impatience. The other Candidates spurred into action, shoving me to the front, where I was left standing, feeling too exposed. The Governess scrunched up her wrinkled face in disapproval when she saw what I was wearing. The long-sleeve black dress was not revealing, and I’d picked it for a reason—to avoid being noticed. The task had been made more difficult now because I was in the front row.

My palms were damp when I unclasped and wrung my hands as a hushed silence settled over the Candidates. The very air stilled as the Duvals entered the foyer. I’d seen many paintings of the ruling clan through the years but being in their presence was still deeply unsettling.

Over six feet tall, Henry Duval was a wall of coiled muscle, and there was no mistaking the violence his body was capable of. Despite his large size, he moved like a predator with quiet grace and fluidity, which made him even more intimidating.

His sister, Isabelle, moved in a similar manner, her dark brown eyes scanning the rows of the Candidates as if she were a huntress and we were her prey. I supposed that wasn’t that far from the truth. My breath left me at the thought, and I clasped my hands again, lowering my eyes to the floor. The clan leader, Vincent Duval, was not here, which was strange but a relief. Perhaps only two people instead of three would be selected tonight, increasing my chances of leaving this situation unscathed.

Holding my breath, I waited as Henry and Isabelle began their selection, gliding through the room, looking for their next vassals.

Please, not me. You don’t want me, I chanted in my head, counting down the seconds until this torture was over.

The vampires’ light footsteps echoed in the otherwise quiet foyer, growing closer until a pair of polished black boots came into my line of vision, stopping before me.

“What is your name?” Henry Duval asked in a deep timbre.

Terror seized me as tiny tremors started in my hands and spread to my entire body. Slowly lifting my head, I met his deep-blue gaze and opened my mouth to speak, but no words came out. I was paralyzed by fear; every instinct in me screaming to run.

“Her name is Sophie Devereaux,” Madam St. Clair said, coming to stand beside the Lord. “She lost her mother two days ago. Dark Witches took her. As you can see, she is still quite shaken up.”

Henry’s eyes widened at her words, and something I couldn’t quite decipher flickered across his features. It looked like pity, but that couldn’t be right. Though they protected us, vampires were cold creatures, devoid of emotion, so I doubted the Lord felt empathy for me. There was something in the way he looked at me, though, but I wasn’t sure what it was.

Did he somehow know my father and I had lied about my mother’s death?

We’d hid the truth and said Dark Witches took her. Vampires were our protectors. They didn’t kill humans; Dark Witches did, which made what I had seen that night unbelievable and bizarre.

When the Lord pinned me with a stare, I found myself unable to avert my gaze. His eyes were turning darker by the second, and my heart dropped when I saw bald hunger in them. He wanted me, was interested in me like a collector in the business of acquiring pretty things. Time seemed to slow and come to a halt as I waited for my fate to be sealed. Just when I thought the Lord was going to select me, he reluctantly dragged his gaze away from me, focusing his attention on a young woman to my left.

“What is your name?” he asked her, his eyes turning back to deep blue.

“Eleanor Dumont,” the woman replied.

She didn’t sound nervous or unsure. On the contrary, there were notes of excitement in her voice. Confused by her reaction, I glanced at her.

Like the rest of the Candidates, she was beautiful, with delicate features, glossy, blonde hair, and green eyes. Eleanor perked up when Henry looked at her, confidently meeting his gaze. The low-cut dress she was wearing left little to the imagination, and the way she stood, flaunting her curves, made it obvious she wanted to be selected.

Her wish was granted a moment later when Henry said, “I choose you as my vassal.”

A rough exhale escaped me at the same time Eleanor gasped with joy. All my tense muscles relaxed, and for a second, I thought I might actually collapse on the stone floor with relief. The torture was over—he’d chosen someone else.

My reaction didn’t go unnoticed by the Lord, who stole a glance at me, his brows knitting. I assumed a neutral expression, fixing my gaze in front of me while Isabelle chose a vassal for herself, selecting a young man who looked terrified of being chosen. The two vassals remained in the foyer while the rest of the Candidates began filing out of the front doors.

A strange sense of awareness swept through me as I waited to flee this place, trying and failing to contain my excitement at not being selected. The back of my neck tingled as if I were being watched. About to step outside, I dared a glance behind me and saw Henry standing by the foot of the grand staircase. He was watching me, and our gazes locked and held as a second passed. Then another. There was a promise in his eyes, and I shuddered as a feeling of foreboding crept into my chest. It was as if a tiny voice whispered in my mind that I would see the Lord again. My lips parted on a sharp inhale, and I all but ran out the doors and into the cool night air, feeling like I was barely escaping with my life.

My father stood by the carriage, his expression guarded. He didn’t know if I’d come out to say goodbye or if I was leaving with him.

I shook my head “no” as my lips curved into a smile. Potent relief washed over my father’s face, smoothing out his taut features before he pulled me into a tight embrace.

“Let’s go home,” he murmured against the top of my head before helping me into the carriage.

The ride back to the house was quiet, but the mood was lighter now as if a weight had lifted from our shoulders. I couldn’t believe I’d gone to the Selection and hadn’t been chosen. Being in the carriage with my father, heading back home, felt surreal, and I wanted to pinch myself to make sure I wasn’t dreaming.

When we returned to the house, I forgot that my mother was dead. Smiling, I hurried through the front door, excited to run into her arms and tell her about how I’d barely escaped the vampire’s clutches. I made it all the way to her study before I caught myself. My hand on the study door, I paused as memories from the other night flooded my mind. It was as if I were reliving my mother’s death all over again at that moment. Drawing in a shallow breath, I pushed open the door and took a tentative step into the study.

For a second, I expected to see what I’d witnessed that night—my mother’s unseeing gaze and her frail, pale body. What greeted me was emptiness, with my mother’s rosewater scent still lingering in the air. A solitary lamp atop the cluttered desk and silvery moonlight drifting through the window illuminated the room as I walked across it on shaking legs. I slowly turned around when I reached the far wall and sagged against it as the finality of my mother’s death washed over me.

Dreading the Selection had helped numb the pain of my loss, but now that the Selection was behind me, I had to face this world without my mother in it. Never again would she pull me into a warm embrace, offer her advice, or a shoulder to cry on. I didn’t stop the tears when they came this time. Instead, I let them stream down my cheeks as I slid down the wall all the way to the hard floor, my black dress pooling around me.

It felt like ages passed as I sat there, unmoving, my eyes fixed on the wooden floorboards. Perhaps I would just stay here forever, wrapped in my pain, until nothing was left of me but dust. Suddenly, my gaze snagged on one of the floorboards, and I tilted my head to the side. The board looked out of place as if the edges were not seamlessly fused with the rest.

The night of my mother’s death flashed through my mind.

Vampires didn’t kill humans.

Was it possible that the vampire who killed my mother was here for some other reason? What if he was looking for something?

Willing my numb limbs to move, I rose from the floor and rummaged through my mother’s desk until I found a letter opener. Lowering back down, I used it to pry the floorboard free. As I’d suspected, there was a secret compartment underneath.

My breath caught because this felt like a moment of great significance. There was a feeling inside me that whatever I was about to discover would be life changing. With trembling hands, I reached inside and retrieved a single piece of paper stashed in the secret compartment. I carefully unfolded it, immediately recognizing my mother’s handwriting. The first few lines were neatly written, but the last two were scribbled as if she’d been in a hurry.

My eyes widened in disbelief as I scanned the paper, and it took me a few seconds to comprehend what I was seeing. It was impossible. Yet, I’d never wanted to believe anything so much in my life. My heart stopped and then sped up as I lifted my eyes from the paper. My mother had believed there was a way to destroy the supernatural—an amulet called Josephine’s Tear.

The note rustled in my shaking hands as I set it aside and reached back into the secret compartment. I felt around the shallow opening just to confirm what I already knew—it was empty. The amulet was not inside. My heart sank with disappointment. It was possible the vampire who’d killed my mother had taken it, but then why would he leave the note behind?

I lifted the paper back to my eyes, studying it closely. My mother had drawn a sketch of the amulet—a teardrop-shaped pendant—and scribbled “Vincent Duval” and “power of three” below it. I didn’t know what the notes meant, but I decided right then and there that I would make it my mission to find out. I would find Josephine’s Tear and destroy the supernatural, setting humanity free.