One of the leather tomes along the left of the library caught my eye: THE IMMORTAL VAMPIRE by Magnus Eaglecrest. I tried pulling it off the shelf, but it wouldn’t budge until I gave it a hard tug. Feeling the strain of its weight against my biceps, I clenched my teeth and placed it on the table.
If this was a vampire movie, it would have landed with a thud and a cloud of dust, but I cleaned twice a week and replenished the library’s preserving crystals monthly.
After settling into the buttery-soft armchair, I flipped over the first few pages of thick parchment that felt as heavy as leather.
Like most creatures of the Supernatural World, the vampire may live forever until killed. After thousands of years of living, some vampires tire of existence and allow their souls to ascend the mortal plane. To return, the vampire must undergo three challenges.
This was all very interesting, but not the information I needed. I turned several more pages, only stopping when my eye caught the following text.
Should the supernatural vampire succumb to the wielder of flame, his soul will remain in his corpse. Upon death, his heart will putrefy, and he will rise as a preternatural vampire—a being of unbridled evil.
To prevent this terrible occurrence, the vampire corpse must be tethered to stone, its heart removed and preserved to prevent putrefaction.
I flipped ahead, muttering under my breath, “How do I protect myself from vampires?”
Back at the academy, we learned that all vampires found Dharma salt repellent, but only the preternatural kind found it deadly. Perhaps it was related to the putrefying heart.
Sunlight, silver, and natural fire repelled the undead, preternaturals, but the supernaturals remained immune to such weapons. I skimmed through the entire book, looking for anything else, and ended up engrossed in the author’s study on vampire reproduction habits. Only one in a thousand vampire females were capable of giving birth.
On the rare occasions they produced a pure-blooded child, the offspring would become extremely powerful and be immediately elevated to the status of a king.
Vampire King.
A shudder seized my spine, and I clenched my teeth, kicking myself for not replacing the amethyst crystal around my neck. The mere mention of that loathsome title stirred memories in me I needed to suppress.
“Mera, dear?” Istabelle’s voice filled the library. “Time to open the shop.”
“Sorry. I lost track of time.” I rose from the armchair and headed up the spiral staircase.
Istabelle stood in the middle of the shop floor, clad in a fitted silk dress of flamingo pink. A thick belt in the same fabric cinched her in at the waist and a quadruple string of pearls broke up the bright color.
Today, she wore a pair of ivory combs in her white, cotton-candy hair, pulling the mass of undefined curls back behind her ears.
“Go on, then.” She swept her arm to the door, where a blond man hopped from foot to foot on the doorstep.
Even with his head down, I could tell by the willowy frame and honey blond highlights that this was Jonathan.
My lips tightened.
The man wasn’t unattractive, and he seemed sort-of okay. I only wished he would stop using his weekly sound bath sessions to ask me out on dates.
Most clients lay in the treatment rooms with their eyes closed, enjoying the feel of the black tourmaline crystals soaking up negative energy from their chakras, but not Jonathan.
He watched me the entire time I walked around the treatment table, striking Tibetan singing bowls with the mallet. Jonathan talked over their healing chimes, asking me if I wanted to go down the road for coffee, across the road for a sandwich, round the corner for lunch, dinner, whatever.
Each time I said no, hoping he would give up because he clearly wasn’t interested in a sound bath, but each time, he insisted on booking another session. The rent on a store in central London was exorbitant, and we couldn’t refuse business.
I sent Istabelle a pained glance, but she swept across the shop floor and rounded the counter. My gaze flicked back to the glass door, where Jonathan now stood with a raised hand and a tiny smile.
“Sorry for the late opening.” I opened the door, letting in a gust of drizzly wind.
He wiped his feet on the doormat. “It’s about this morning’s sound bath.”
My heart filled with hope. “Do you need to cancel?”
“Can I postpone it until the afternoon? I have a stock take at work and—”
“No problem,” I said with a tight smile. “Is three okay with you?”
He gave me a jaunty salute. “It’s a date.”
Before I could contradict Jonathan, a man in a FedEx uniform slipped through the front door, holding a small package. “Delivery for the Crystal Shop?”
I eyed the inch-thick envelope-sized box. “I’ll sign for it.”
Jonathan said something about seeing me later. I gave him an absent nod and signed the delivery man’s electronic touchscreen with a stylus. After handing me the package, he left, and I brought it to the counter.
If this was the delivery Istabelle was expecting, it certainly didn’t require anyone to come in early. I weighed it in my hand, feeling no more than half a pound, and turned it around. It felt nothing like the usual packages we received via courier, but it was addressed to the business, rather than Istabelle herself.
I walked to the door that led up to her apartment and knocked. “Istabelle? Special delivery.”
“What’s inside?” she shouted back.
“Hold on.” I opened a drawer beneath the desk and fumbled for a box cutter. After slicing through the tape holding the cardboard together, I eased out its flaps, revealing an unmarked velvet box. As soon as I touched the box, it thrummed with power.
My throat dried. Whatever was inside felt rare and expensive—not meant for the hands of an apprentice. I turned to the door and shouted, “Something extremely powerful.”
“Open it.” Istabelle said.
I raised a shoulder. Perhaps I’d underestimated her willingness to trust me with priceless objects.
Inside the box lay a bracelet made of faceted citrine hearts, each about an inch in diameter and held together with a chain so delicate it resembled a single strand of hair.
A breath caught in the back of my throat. Citrine was a common enough gemstone that we recommended for those wanting to boost their happiness and wealth but something like this had the juice to make millionaires.
To my naked eye, each heart was flawless, with a triple-A gemstone-grade clarity that reminded me of pale fire.
“Did you order a citrine bracelet?” I asked.
“No.”
My brows drew together. Who in the Natural World would send such an item to a shop that sold crystals? Based on its power alone, it was worth nearly everything we had on the shelves, including the three-foot-tall geodes.
Istabelle didn’t ask any more questions about the bracelet, so I reached for the lid, ready to place it in the safe.
As soon as my fingers touched the velvet, the bracelet snaked up my hand and locked itself around my wrist.
I sucked in a breath through my teeth. The wretched thing wasn’t just an inert magical item, someone had enchanted it to capture one of our wrists.
The question was, why?
Chapter Two
I stared down at the bracelet glittering on my arm, turning it stone by stone for signs of a clasp. The annoying thing was seamless, appearing bound by magic.