Walking out of the corridor was someone draped in a black cloak, the hood thrown up, shielding the face from view.
Kaspar had frozen behind me too, finger pressed gently into my back. Every head in the room turned to him, and then me. At that very moment the King emerged from the depths of the corridor too, looking tense and uneasy.
Everything, including the cloaked man, seemed to become immobilized. He was tall, upright and with his appearance, the temperature in the room dropped. Kaspar grabbed me by the waist, pulling me into him and steering us towards the door, his face screwed up in concentration. I protested a little, but not much, torn between fear and wanting to know who this mysterious informant was.
His back was to us but at that moment his head tilted before he whipped around at a speed that should be impossible. His hood cast everything into shadow but his eyes, which were a dark indigo blue, fast becoming a flaming red.
‘Get her out of here!’ the King roared as the butlers stepped forward, placing themselves between us and the snarling figure in front. Kaspar didn’t need telling twice. His arm clamped down tighter on my waist and his other hand grabbed my wrist, tugging me out of the doors. I caught a glimpse of Fabian dropping to a crouch behind us.
‘Do not return before midnight, Kaspar,’ the King shouted over the confusion, voices and the sound of crunching gravel beneath our feet filling my ears as my breath caught, focusing in on materialising figures at the far end of the grounds. They were too far away to make out and before they could near, Kaspar had yanked me around the side of the mansion to the tucked-away garages. His hand fastened to me, I could see it starting to redden under the sun.
I went to turn around but Kaspar tugged me back around.
‘What’s going on?’ I asked, trying to glance over my shoulder as he let go of my wrist and placed a hand under my chin so I had no choice but to look at him. ‘Kaspar, tell me!’
He grimaced. ‘Girly, you’ve got to trust me, but whatever happens, don’t look around, okay? Just keep on looking straight at the garages.’
‘Why?’
‘Don’t argue, just do it. Promise. Please.’
There was such sudden desperation in his voice that I couldn’t refuse this soft side of him that rarely appeared. I nodded. ‘I promise.’
‘Thank you,’ he whispered. ‘I’ll explain what I can when we are out of here.’ His eyes were darting behind me, watching something just to the right of us. ‘C’mon.’ He grabbed my hand and set off once more at a sprint. As we neared the garages, the doors opened, revealing hordes of expensive cars. We skidded to a halt, Kaspar pulling out a set of car keys from his pocket.
The others appeared behind and there was a frantic scramble as they decided who would go with who, and in which car.
‘Who am I with?’ I asked.
‘You’re with me of course. Aston. Now.’ He was half-smirking and I felt my face drop a little.
Suddenly, all smugness disappeared from his face and the sound of footsteps reached my ears. ‘Don’t turn around,’ he muttered, his eyes fixed on something behind me.
Fabian took a few cautious steps forward. ‘What are you doing here, Fallon?’
‘Prince Fallon of Athenea to you. And I’m curious.’ I was surprised to hear an American – or maybe Canadian – accent; even more surprised to hear his title and fought hard with the urge to turn. ‘So this is the young lady all the fuss is about?’ I heard him taking a step forward and I mirrored his action.
‘Young lady has a name.’
‘I know you do, Miss Violet Lee.’ The crunch of gravel told me he had taken another step forward and I saw Kaspar tense. The others were completely still, watching on with concern.
‘Leave her alone, Fallon.’
He was so close I could feel his lukewarm breath on the back of my neck as he sighed. Yet, up and above that was an overwhelming sense of warmth that did not come from any breath. It was like the sun was beating down on my back, but that wasn’t possible – it was October and freezing. Whoever this royal was, he wasn’t a vampire.
Even I was surprised at how easily I could accept that. But then again, if vampires could exist, why couldn’t other creatures?
‘How long are you to protect her, Kaspar?’
‘As long as the inter-dimensional council rules that we should. Which, I will remind you, your father heads.’
‘I’m not my father. She will have to learn about our existence at some point if she turns, which is what so many people want.’
I sucked in a breath and gathered the courage to speak. ‘I don’t care if people want me to turn. It’s my choice.’
I felt a pressure on my shoulder, a hand, although I did not look. I could not look.
‘I wish I could say I agree with you.’
I felt the hand, surprisingly hot, brushing away the dark strands of hair from my neck. He pressed a finger into the tiny pinprick wounds that had never completely faded after I had consented to Kaspar taking my blood all those weeks ago. There was a quiet intake of ragged breath, so hushed only Kaspar and I would hear.
‘Time is running out, Kaspar.’ With that he withdrew his hand from my neck and I heard the crunching of gravel as he walked away. I loosened, but Kaspar remained rigid.
‘Time is running out for what?’ he yelled after the other man.
‘Prophecy doesn’t wait forever, you know.’
I gasped, whipping around. He had gone. I turned back around. Kaspar’s face turned from a frown to a scowl and his eyes plunged to a glossy black. I noticed his hands clenching into fists, the veins on his arms protruding as he clenched tighter and tighter.
I didn’t like that expression and walked away a little bit. First Fabian, then the figure in my dreams mentioned Prophecy, now this. I was no Sherlock Holmes but it didn’t take a genius to work out that they were linked.
An arm snaked its way around my shoulders and spun me back around.
‘Time to go,’ Kaspar said.
I glared up at him, meeting his cold, uncaring black eyes.
‘I want answers.’
He grabbed me by the elbow and started to pull me away. ‘Want doesn’t get, Girly.’
My mouth fell open. He pulled me towards his car, easily dragging me despite my resistance. ‘I have a right to know! All this shit, it’s about me, so don’t keep me in the dark!’ Kaspar pulled the door open for me and prodded my side until I clambered in. Slamming the door, he darted around to the other side and got in the driver’s seat, wrenching the seatbelt around himself. The others were already pulling away and following them he accelerated down the driveway, speeding away from the place that had become my prison.
I refused to look at him. I could tell he was pissed. Very pissed. So was I.
As soon as Varnley was out of sight, Kaspar spoke. ‘Fire away,’ he said, exhaling.
‘What’s going on? You mentioned a council. It’s going on right now, isn’t it? What’s it about?’ I stopped myself, catching his expression. It was almost mournful.
He sighed, jaded. ‘The meeting is about you.’ I was taken aback by how weary he sounded – this wasn’t the young, witty, arrogant teenager I knew.
‘But why now?’ I could take a guess at that answer, knowing it was something to do with the cloaked figure, but I couldn’t tell him that and I wanted to know more.
Again he sighed. ‘People are getting worried. They don’t think your father will let this go on much longer. If he were to do something and we retaliated, we could have a war on our hands. And if we are involved in a war, so are the other dimensions.’
‘Dimensions?’
‘There is a reason I told you not to turn around.’ he retorted, raising an eyebrow at me. I kept silent, finding the dashboard very interesting. He continued. ‘We can’t force you to turn into a vampire because you’re a political prisoner. If we do, we breach treaties we have with both the humans and other dimensions. But we can’t just continue waiting, because we have reason to think your father might make a move.’
‘What’s the reason?’ I asked, unable to mask the urgency and intrigue from my voice. Prophecy. What was meant by that? But he didn’t answer and I changed my tactic, knowing I had to take advantage of his sudden openness. ‘What’s there to stop me from just waiting until my father comes? Then I don’t have to turn.’
He made a rumbling sound in his chest that sounded like the beginning of a half-hearted laugh. ‘Don’t bother even entertaining that idea, Girly. I highly doubt your father could raise a force large and dumb enough to face us and if, by some miracle, he did, we would just move to Athenea and you would be coming with us.’
He might as well have pricked me with a needle as my bubble of hope burst with a pop. I sighed and remained silent for a while, watching the trees rush by in a blur. They were thinning and the one-track road was widening out, a white line marking the divide between the two lanes.
‘What’s Athenea?’ I asked after a while. He didn’t answer. ‘That Fallon guy was from there, wasn’t he?’ He nodded, mute. Realizing he was closing up again, I asked one more question. ‘Who was that cloaked person?’
He pursed his lips. ‘A very unpleasant man.’ I edged away towards the window, alarmed at the force he used to jam the gear stick across. ‘I’m not telling you his name, if that’s what you want,’ he added, glancing across at me.
I slumped back into the chair, disappointed and disheartened. It was a hopeless situation. Somewhere along the line there would be a war, and the worst thing was it would all be my fault. But even knowing that, I knew I couldn’t face turning. Not yet. I just need time, I thought desperately. Why is it the one thing I don’t have? I looked up at Kaspar, tears pricking my eyes. He seemed distracted, caught up in his own thoughts.
‘There must be a way out. There has to be!’
I had to say it aloud just to believe it. I glimpsed Kaspar as he turned away from me slightly, as though he were guilty of something.
‘Yeah, there is. If you turn and become a vampire willingly, your father would drop it. He couldn’t do anything. It would have been your choice. Problem solved.’ He said it with a flickering of hope, although his tone told me he hardly dared to believe any such thing could ever happen.
I snorted. ‘Then we’re doomed. You don’t know my father. He has the compassion of a walnut. He wouldn’t care if it were my choice; he would still find some way to blame you.’
‘Don’t say that,’ Kaspar muttered. ‘Every father wants their child to be happy, and if vampire-kind was your happiness, then he would respect that.’
I shook my head. ‘Even if that were so, how could I be happy as a vampire? There is no chance of me actually liking the idea of living forever. It’s hopeless!’
Kaspar faced straight ahead, glancing in his side mirror. He spoke softly, something like caring in his voice. ‘You don’t know that, Girly. One day you might just find something worth living an eternity for.’
I sucked in a long, slow breath. ‘You haven’t. You’re just as torn up as I am. Why endure the pain of forever?’ I whispered.
The car slowed a little, as the tree line receded and we neared the coast. ‘No. I haven’t yet. But that doesn’t mean I won’t. Or that you won’t. For all we know, we might just be staring at that something right now …’
I rested my head up against the cool window, watching as my warm breath coated the glass in a misty layer. ‘You can’t promise me everything will be okay, can you?’
‘No,’ he choked. ‘No, I can’t.’
It was some time before the conversation restarted, and he forced me into it.
‘Did you just bloody go through red lights at ninety?!’ I screeched, gawping at the speed dial.
‘Yes,’ he replied simply. I turned my open mouth to him, tearing my gaze away from the speed dial, the needle fast approaching one hundred.
‘You are so done in. There was a speed camera there,’ I said as we passed a bright flash of luminous yellow – the dreaded speed cameras. ‘Say goodbye to three points on your license.’
I thought I saw him roll his eyes. ‘Will you relax, Girly, I am in perfect control. I have been driving since cars were invented. Besides, we have protected plates. So I’ll just keep those three points.’
‘What?’
‘Don’t you know anything? I can drive as fast as I like because the licence plate doesn’t actually exist, so if the police catch it, their database will just tell them to f**k off. Little favour you get when you’re royalty,’ he smirked.
I shook my head slightly, looking out the window. ‘Well, I’m sorry, we can’t all be kaspary,’ I said, settling back into my seat with folded arms.
‘Pardon?’ he snorted, half-laughing, half-grunting.
‘I make up words. Don’t you?’
He glanced at me sideways, taking his eyes off the road for a second to actually throw me a worried half-smile. ‘And what does this particular word mean?’
‘Kaspary: a level of awesomeness so high it kicks everyone’s arse leaving them breathless and bewildered.’
He chuckled, a low pitched hum coming from deep within his chest. ‘I leave you breathless and bewildered do I, Girly?’
‘Don’t flatter yourself.’
He hummed in disbelief, turning his full attention back to the road. I flicked my eyes towards him, trying to gage his reaction. He was smiling, but my stomach dropped as I saw the smile fall away from his face, meaning that the Kaspar that made me laugh, that teased me, that humoured my antics – and the Kaspar who had saved my life countless times and the Kaspar, who, occasionally, seemed to have a spark of caring in him – was fast disappearing.