“I shall have to prepare a vanquishing spell.” My mother adds the vegetables and wipes her brow with the back of her hand.
I ask the question burdening me since her earlier comment. “Did someone find us?”
My mother’s eyes dart toward me. “Why would you ask?”
“Because you are speaking about moving.”
Ágota notices my mother’s subdued expression and arches her eyebrows. “Mama, have we been found?”
Hesitating, she cleans her hands on her apron before walking to the center of the room. Stretching out her fingers, she calls for the intricate pattern of the protection ward. It glows beneath our feet, delicate swirls alive with power. The design is a vibrant glorious gold, except for one section near the door. It glows an ominous red.
“What does that mean?” Ágota asks worriedly.
I’d never seen the protection ward alter in color.
“It means danger is nearby. Something powerful. Maybe it is the alp,” my mother answers. “We shall deal with it, renew the wards, and—”
The knock on the door startles us all. The chimes that ring a warning when any mortal approaches are silent. The light streaming through our one tiny window is dim in the fading day.
“Is it him?” Ágota whispers.
My mother stares at her with wide frightened eyes. “I do not know. I sense nothing.”
“Neither do I,” Ágota answers. “But if it is him—”
“Do what we discussed. Do not falter, Agy. I trust you to take care of your sister if it is him.”
“Who?” I ask.
When they do not answer, fear blooms in my chest. What dark secret are they keeping from me? Why is my mother so afraid when she is so powerful?
My mother calmly removes her apron with trembling fingers and sets i
t aside. She gestures to the loft. “I love you, my darlings. Never forget that. Now go!”
Without another word, Ágota sweeps me up in her arms and carries me to the ladder that leads to the loft. I scramble upward as she floats past me. I crawl to my bed beneath the low ceiling while Ágota takes her position in front of me. Her long, skinny fingers flex as she raises them toward the door, ready to assist my mother.
The ward fades into the earth as my mother tucks her hair back from her face and squares her shoulders.
The knock comes again. More urgently this time.
My mother hoists open the door and seals her doom.
Chapter 4
I am weak.
So very weak.
My body struggles to heal what it cannot. The blood I drank is dwindling in its power while the man I stole it from smolders in the corner of the mausoleum. The cruel irony is that feeding may quench my unbearable hunger, but the aftermath is sheer torture. My spine is severed and the bones attempt to mend around the stake only to be broken again.
Yet, I am glad for the pain. It releases me from the terrible memory of my mother’s demise.
I do not understand why my thoughts have turned to the morbid aspects of my past. My mind has always wandered whenever I go mad with pain and hunger, but my memories have never been this vivid, nor have they flowed in sequential order. Is this Vlad’s doing? A new way to torment me in hopes of breaking my spirit so I will relent to his will?
Smoke, thick and cloying with the scent of burning flesh, pulls me back to the night I do not wish to remember. This is the one memory I wish to forget, but it clings to me like the web of a spider trapping me in its power.
I dig my fingers into the bier, striving to fight against the sensation of being sucked down into the mire of my memories. Tears flood my eyes as I strain to retain my hold on this wretched reality, but darkness fills my mind and I fall into an abyss.