The Netherworlds: Curse of Fate (Book 1)

The Vampire and the Moon Flower

At the Devereaux mansion they were led through the ornate hallways to the room that had previously held a rabid vampire.

The door to the room was wide open, but the bedchamber was still dark. No lamp was lit, and every curtain was drawn tight.

Together, they cautiously entered the room to see Victor Devereaux sitting in a chair next to the girl's bed.

Loki and Eros approached the opposite side of the bed from where the Vampire King sat. Devereaux looked up, his youthful but exhausted face filled with gratitude. The girl, however, looked at them with cautious curiosity. She appeared to be mostly stable, from what they could tell. Her dark hair was plastered to her face, and she was pale, but that complexion was typical in vampires. Her eyes were still dark saucers, teetering on the brink of madness, but she was calm.

"Loki. Eros. I give you my truest gratitude." Victor Dexereaux beamed at the girl, who in truth was too old to be considered a girl. "These are the two gentlemen who procured your treatment."

She was past the gateway into womanhood, but to gods and to a centuries-old Vampire, she was but a child.

"How are you feeling, Josanna?" Eros asked with tender care.

She tilted her head and inspected him with her wide, dark eyes. "As sharp as thorns and as red as petals of blood. The sweet steam of passion, and the pang of disprized love."

Confusion etched itself across Eros's face, and he turned back to the others, "Uhh...was that to me?"

Devereaux stood. "If you'll forgive her, she's still out-of-sorts."

One of Loki's eyes narrowed, "Are you sure she doesn't always talk like the Oracle of Delphi?"

Devereaux smiled, "No. She doesn't."

Eros ignored Loki's implication and spoke to Josanna again, "We're glad to see you're feeling better." He leaned in closer, and she lunged for his wrist.

She began sniffing it.

Devereaux reached out a hand to pull her off, but Eros made a gesture to stay him.

She pulled Eros down suddenly, his face level with hers, his breath moving the oily hair that hung over her eyes.

"Desire, you're hungry," She breathed into his face.

Her breath was rank from having drank fresh blood. He wasn't afraid of her, but he was very concerned for her, and he didn't pull back.

Loki moved towards the bed, not out of fear or protection, but out of curiosity. The glow in his eye, and the smirk on his face, implied he just wanted a close-up to whatever would happen next.

Josanna's eyes landed on Eros's forehead, and she began to trace the creases in his brow with her delicate fingers. "You're all locked up in there. You never really escaped, did you?"

Eros and the girl had locked eyes with each other, her wild blown-out gaze boring into his puzzled one. She was making less and less sense.

"What do you mean?" Loki asked, eagerly pushing for more clues.

Devereaux walked around the bed to the gods. "I'm afraid she doesn't know what she's saying-"

"Hell." She answered, before she moved to Eros's ear and nibbled it, whispering, "The Red Room."

Then she began to laugh in his face.

She shrieked. "You don't remember!" and cackling, she threw his arm out of her grasp.