I frown, singling out the memory of a blonde girl at Radek’s official wedding to Juliet three years ago, and then three days later at Lord Dracula’s wedding to Lady Rux.
“I remember her from the weddings, but there were a lot of people present, and I was charged with security. I didn’t dwell on any particular person.”
“Still, she was an important guest. The bride’s sister at the first wedding, and the bride’s adoptive aunt three days later. I’m sure you had her checked. You must remember something about her.”
I go through the information in my head, disinterested. “Half American half German, born and raised in Berlin. She set up her own nursing home for the elderly in Berlin, but after the weddings three years ago she decided to set one up in Romania, because she felt people here needed it more.”
Madam Magda keeps staring at me when I stop talking.
“That’s it, you don’t know anything personal about her?”
“I know that she was single at the time. Her closest friend and biggest influence was Lazarus, a vampire, who was on our side. I didn’t need to look deeper into her private life, Lazarus had that covered.”
Magda sets her tea down on the table. “Yes, well, Isolde Jochs is no longer single. She got married a year ago.”
I stop stirring, my eyes becoming slits.
“In secret?”
“Yes. And I’ll ask you to keep this information to yourself for the time being. Otherwise Isolde runs great risk. By the time her sister, brother-in-law, or even Lord Dracula gets to do anything to help her, she’ll be dead.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Let me start at the beginning then. The girl’s name is no longer Isolde Jochs, but Isolde Serpaint.”
Ice rolls all over my body.
“She married a serpent shifter,” I breathe in astonishment. “What the hell was she thinking? Serpent shifters are the vampires’ greatest enemies.”
Madam Magda motions with her chin to the cauldron, reminding me to stir. I resume the movement of my arm, gripping tightly to the hot rim of the cauldron with the other hand. The heat from the cauldron has no effect on my vampire skin. The steam damps my face and hair, the scent of boiled roses now very strong.
“She didn’t do it of her own accord,” Magda says. “The shifter forced her.”
“How could anyone have forced her into anything? Come on, she had the Prince of Midnight and the Prince of Blood to protect her. Even her niece is a Mistress of Pain, don’t tell me—”
Magda puts up her hand to temper me down. The tone of my voice and my face rarely ever change to express anger, but my eyes do tend to turn electric.
“Mark Serpaint approached Isolde a year ago, and they were married within a few weeks. That’s what Isolde told me when she came in great secrecy to see me. She was scared, terrified. She didn’t have much time for details, she just told me only the love potion can get her out of this marriage.”
“Forgive me, but when women commission love potions, it usually means that they want into a relationship, not out of it. Besides, when a serpent shifter takes a mate, he imprints on her. She’ll be his forever, there’s no way out of the union besides his or her death.”
“What she cares about is that he doesn’t get intimate with her again, Master DeKnight. She’s terrified of sex with him.”
I huff. “But when she accepted his proposal—”
“I told you, there never was a proposal, there was only blackmail. He used something to force her, and I need you to find out what, because Isolde was too terrified to tell me. Her visit left me worried to death. Plus that—”
She stops abruptly, as if she’s not sure whether to tell me the rest or not.
“Don’t stop now,” I nudge. “If you want me to take on this mission, you can’t hold anything back.”
She picks up her tea and sips, setting it down slowly on the table afterwards.
“Isolde is a normal human, Master DeKnight, she doesn’t have the slightest chance of protecting herself against a supernatural. She asked to remain in the semi-shadow when she came to see me, pleading that I don’t turn on the lights.” Her eyes find mine. “I’m afraid he did terrible things to her.”
Only our breath and the bubbles in the cauldron fill the silence for long moments. There’s no doubt in my head I need to take on this mission. Whatever secret the serpent is using to manipulate Isolde could become dangerous for the vampires. Not to mention that, as a relative of Lord Dracula, she is part of the vampire royal family, and I have to protect her.
“And how exactly is the love potion supposed to keep the serpent from taking her again?”
“Isolde wants her husband to fall for his serpent assistant. She was hoping they would be having an affair as it is, but they’re not. She wants his focus to shift from her to this woman, which is why this potion will make him extra passionate. After he drinks from it, he won’t be able to even breathe without that woman anymore, and he won’t touch Isolde again.” She looks gravely into my eyes. “Will you do it?”
This is more serious than I thought. I nod.
“Very well, then.” She gets up heavily, and makes to pick up the cauldron.
I pick it up instead. “Where do you need it?”
“To that sieve over there.”
She has me sieve away most of the substance, keeping only the thickest essence from the bottom of the cauldron. She holds the vial-sized, pretty bottle in the light, frowning her thin silver eyebrows at it.
“So much work for such a little amount,” I note.
“Tell Isolde to be very careful,” Madam Magda says as she screws a small golden cap onto the bottle’s throttle. “No one else but her husband and his assistant can taste the smallest drop of this potion. It is very powerful, and it will make the people involved fall in love with each other madly, desperately, and irreversibly. If one falls for the wrong person, there’s no turning back. This whole affair could become deadly.”
Tristan
I TRAVEL DOWN TO THE South, to a coast town by the Black Sea that I never liked. There’s something deadly about this place. There are so many deaths by casualty or disease that I wonder how come I’m the only one to notice it. It’s as if the town were cursed. The sun bathes it in a pale, sickly light, crooks driving around in roaring Jaguars and Porsches, while the normal folk walk around haggard and hunched. I might call this town City of the Dying from now on.
I slink down the streets, expertly avoiding the sunlight. I’ve been doing this for centuries, and I’m in as good as no danger at all, but then again, I didn’t like daytime as a human either. As an assassin, I always preferred the dark.
There’s the pub where Isolde asked me to meet her. She whispered the name fast on the phone, her breath hitting the mike. I could tell she was scared as hell. I tracked down her caller ID despite the restricted number shield, just in case. She’s a member of the vampire royal family, even though she’s not a vampire, and I have to protect her, no matter the circumstances, and no matter what I think of her.
I enter the dingy place, called conveniently The Wreck. Crooks sit at tables in the semi-dark, eating lunch. Hunched over the tables towards each other, suspicious eyes darting around to ensure secrecy, they must be planning future contraband or pimping.