Strange Nights ( Dr Strange #1)

PROLOGUE

Once Y/N - the light of her life, her angel, her sin, her daughter - was peacefully tucked away for the night, Jane retreated, down the stairs that in every way felt like descending the circles of hell, to her perch by the window.

"Not coming to bed?" asked Mathew from the landing.

"No...," her lips quivered and her mind rattled as she tried to come up with a lie. "Your brother had called this afternoon, said he'll be there tonight so we all can spend the Christmas tomorrow..."

"You know you don't have to wait all night to let him in, I can-"

"Matt, it's alright. You just finished that tiring case... get some rest. Besides, I'm not sleepy at all." Her eyes scanned her vicinity, spotted the book. "And I'm not sleeping before finishing it."

Mathew knew his wife very well when it came to books. She wouldn't put one down unless she had finished it. But he could never understand her over-fondness with Anna Karenina. "Haven't you read that a thousand times already?"

"But it never gets old," she replied, opening the book, and rocking herself back and forth as immersed into her world of fantasy once again. Defeated, Mathew returned to their empty bed.

Jane was in all agreement with Leo Tolstoy when it came to 'All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way'. But was her entire family unhappy? Certainly not. It was only her. And to some extent Charles.

If Anna could hear her, if she was real in some alternate reality... Jane couldn't form any coherent thoughts. What she would do then? Ask for advice? She didn't know about that; she wasn't sure that their cause of misery was the same, but she was sure - determined - to do anything to save her little angel born out of sinful love.

She was so deeply lost in thought she didn't realise the opening of the portal in front of her nor did she notice the man stepping out of it. Three steady knocks brought her back to her reality.

"Charles," she whispered after she hurriedly open the door. The man in waiting examined her surrounding before acknowledging her. "Jane." His voice was full of despair. He placed a soft kiss on her lips.

"What went wrong?" she whisper-screamed after him when he brushed past her towards Jane's study room that burrowed under the stairs.

His head hung low as he sat on the makeshift bed. "It's over Jane. It's over..."

"Charles, what's over?"

"Brother's asleep?" He answered her question with another. She sighed and nodded. "Master Strange...," he licked his dry lips as her heart leaped to her throat, "two years ago, he went missing after stepping down from the position of Sorcerer Supreme. That's all the information I got about him."

All her hopes of saving her daughter crashed into pieces. Her eyes teared from failure. "But that doesn't mean he wouldn't help us, right?"

"Jane, don't you understand? Neither you nor I have met him or know him personally. And what had I told you from my stay at the sanctum? Nobody speaks of him like... he is an abomination, which he truly was. And you have placed barriers over Y/N's powers, right? Those people whoever they are won't be able to track her anymore. They won't hurt her. If you are still worried about her, there are other masters at the sanctum-"

"No." He wasn't surprised at the ferocity of her voice. "No," she whispered, "In the last few months that you have spent in the sanctum, you saw what power mages possess. The power that runs in our daughter's veins is raw and pure. You have learned only a few ounces of it. A drop of her pure chaos in the wrong hands will not only destroy the world but also her. And to why I am worried even after placing the barrier is because my powers are feeble. Witches had been weak for a long time in our family line. One day when the barriers will come down, she will need a teacher. One who would only teach her, with no strings attached."