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The fragrance of ylang-ylang and jasmine filled the room. Roman picked up the vial and opened it. A strange smell filled the room, heady and intoxicating, making me lick my lips. I wanted to ask what it was but forced myself to remain silent. He carefully tipped it over the goblet and dropped one…two…three drops of the coppery-colored liquid into the blood, then took the silver blade and stirred it. Corking the vial again, he put down the knife and picked up the goblet. Turning to me, he dipped his thumb into the blood and pressed it against my forehead.
“I anoint you in the name of the First Mother.” Once again, he coated his thumb and this time he motioned for me to pull back the folds of the gown, exposing my chest. He pressed his thumb against my heart.
“I anoint you in the name of Blood Wyne, my sire and mother.” A third time, and this time he pressed his thumb against my lips.
“I anoint you in my name—Roman, Liege of the Vampire Nation, Son of the Crimson Veil.” He lifted the goblet to salute me, then drank half of it. Handing it to me, he nodded. “Drink.”
I swallowed the blood and it tasted like spice, like cinnamon and cloves and fire and copper. As it bathed my throat, the room began to spin; slowly but surely, I swallowed my fear with the crimson nectar.
I’d been through portals; I’d been through death. I knew transition when I felt it. There was no going back now.
Roman stood and dropped his robe off. He was naked beneath it, and his scars were glowing in a way I’d never before seen. I could see every mark he’d accumulated during his thousands of years. He motioned for me to stand and I dropped away my gown. I glanced down, gasping as every mark Dredge had made on me began to glow and shimmer. I was lit up like I was covered with fireflies or glowworms. But for some reason, here—in this place—it didn’t bother me.
Roman took my hand and as we stepped back, the altar table slid to the left, and a secret door opened in the chamber, revealing a dark passage. A booming of drums and music began to sound as Roman drew me into the passage. He sped up and I kept pace, suddenly aware we were no longer in the mansion but somewhere in between worlds.
And then a light shimmered at the end of the passage, and we raced toward it, bursting through into a wide meadow under the rain-soaked night skies.
Up ahead of us sat a mansion that dwarfed Roman’s house. Painted in alabaster and gold tones, it was surrounded by guards, but they seemed to take no notice of us. They stood at attention, dressed in crimson robes, with gold-hilted knives at their belts.
We walked up the stairs, hand in hand, naked and glowing, and passed through the door as if we were ghosts. I glanced at Roman, but he seemed perfectly calm, as if he did this every day.
As we entered the mansion’s foyer, he pulled me to the right, into a small room, which turned out to be a coatroom. It was the size of our living room at home. Roman handed me a plain white tunic and draped a red cloak around his shoulders, trimmed with gold ribbons and beading. I slid into the simple cotton shift, wondering again what I had done.
After we’d dressed, we walked out and toward the central doors. Roman took my hand again.
He gazed down at me, pausing for a moment. “You are about to be inducted into the Crimson Veil. You will be my heir and hence related to my mother. Do not flinch. Do not hesitate. There is no returning to who you were before you drank the blood sacrifice. Do you understand me, Menolly? Do not fail me.”
As the significance of what was happening began to sink in, I could only nod. My only choice was to move forward.
“I do.” Every fiber in my being screamed against obeying—not because it was the wrong thing to do, but because I hated submitting to anyone or anything. But sometimes, in life, we had to relinquish control to a greater force, in order to bring about a greater good. And I knew in my heart this was the right thing to do, even though I rebelled against the idea of supplication.>As we entered the room, I waited for his instruction.
“Kneel on the pillow to the right.”
I did. He closed the door and took his place opposite me. He looked so at ease, and I realized how little I knew of him and his heritage. Blood Wyne had risen again. Roman had talked about his mother, but had he told me everything about her? Had he been truthful about her intentions? And how could I find out?
“Do you know how the vampires came to be, Menolly?”
I shook my head. “No, I don’t know. It’s not something we learned in school, or that the OIA taught me when they brought me back to sanity.” I’d told Roman all about that time period—the year of madness and my slow fight back to sanity.
“No one knows how long ago it happened, but it was before recorded history, long before the Great Divide. Humans had risen to sentience and reasoning. And a shaman from a village desired immortality like the Fae.”
“But the Fae aren’t immortal. Even the elves die. Even the gods die,” I whispered.
“True,” Roman said, “but the mortals didn’t know that. Their life span compared to a Fae? A whisper on the wind. The shaman’s name was Kesana. At least, that’s the name we know for her. She decided she wanted the same immortality the Fae had. She went on a quest through the Dream-Time to find the answer, and instead she found demons…demons who fed off life energy.”
“Like Vanzir? Dream-chaser demons?”
Roman shrugged. “No one knows. All we know is that they promised her life unending if she would allow them to merge with her soul. And so, she agreed. The ritual took her down into death. She died and was reborn in the same body—but she was changed. The aging process had stopped, and her hunger for blood was strong.”
“The bloodlust…” I’d wondered how blood played into our mythology and background. Roman’s story rang true.
“Yes, the bloodlust. Kesana found that the more she fed on others—on their blood—the stronger she became. And her shamanic abilities allowed her to learn how to pass along the curse. She learned how to turn others. But instead of the demons merging with her victims, a little part of her own force brought about the change. That is how siring was born. She is the mother of us all.”
It made sense. Vampires were considered minor demons. “What happened to her? Kesana?”
“No one knows. She vanished somewhere into history.”
“Do you think she’s still alive?”
