The noble stag's facade is shattered. And the demon behind the Red Door is free.
Taking his brother's life should've been Elijah's worst sin. It's clear that redemption is an illusion. All that remains is surviving the supernatural hordes that wish...
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Josephine LaRue was born in the garden district in New Orleans, Louisiana in 1935. Her parents were wealthy and extravagant philanthropists. They spoiled her rotten in her youth. But on her sixth birthday, they introduced her to the family's dark skeletons.
She was raised in a supernatural melting pot of rival factions and deadly political intrigue.
The city had no longer been the defacto vampire capital, considering the Originals had been chased away decades earlier. Still, the presence of the blood sucking leeches only grew with every passing moment the witch covens spent fighting one other and not asserting their influence on the meager clan of the miraculous survivor Marcel Gerard.
As a young woman, Josephine's dreams were firmly established in the mortal world. To become a spectacular internationally acclaimed violinist; the heiress to Thelma Given's legacy. To run away with her completely normal beloved from the shackles of power grabs and wanton violence that consumed her every waking hour.
But her mother disapproved.
She hexed her hands to make them swollen and arthritic, costing her life's purpose. She murdered her Louis in front of her eyes. Incineration. Her mother had quite the twisted sense of humor.
When the old crone died, she danced on her tombstone. But she knew her destiny was forever altered.
Magic was the calling of their lineage. A sacred task passed from matriarch to daughter since the 16th century. She may excel in the craft in the shadows, or be a rejected pariah both in the daylight and behind closed doors.
She accepted the latter. But her ambitions only transformed in nature not horizon. The nine Sagittarius covens would be a single body in her lifetime. Endless squabbling and backstabbing will vanish. And the magical sect will rise to their truest potential.
It was perhaps this burning desire for true power in the abyssal void of her heart, bereft of love or even companionship, that had her sanction the Harvest.
Every hundred years or so, the Ancestral plane begins to lose its tether to the real world. And with it, the most vital element to their mystical practices is slowly but surely depleted. To remedy this, a sacrifice is necessary. Nine girls, one from every coven, are chosen to act as an symbolic offering and an intermediate to the realm of the dead.
If their sacrifice is approved, the young witches are revived, more powerful and knowledgeable than ever, having been taught by those that came before. And the link to Well is re-energized.
The key word is if. The offering can be rejected. The death made permanent. The spirits are after all fickle beings. One would have to be after getting detached from all human limitations.
Sophie Devereaux was no believer. A self-declared rebel who left the French Quarter as soon as she could and loudly spoke against her policies.
The Regent of New Orleans didn't shun her from the community for that infraction. Some conservative fanatics would have. But the LaRue witch prided herself on being a different type of leader. More open minded and accepting. Her fire had been dimmed by her elders long ago. Should she become the same zealot extremist she derided all her life?
