THE DARKEST CURSE & THE PUREST OF MAGIC

CHAPTER 1 - THE PAST IS CATCHING UP

A/N: I do not own the characters or the plot of the original book by Oscar Wilde, all the credits go to its author who created it. This story is actually based on the movie (2009), I don't even remember whether I read the book before.

Present Day

"Come on, Ellie, hurry up or I'm gonna be late!" the shorter of the two girls shouted over her shoulder at her best friend as she had set up an incredibly quick pace fueled by her excitement.

"You should have told me that by 'coming to the bookstore' you had actually meant we were taking a jogging lesson!" the other girl scoffed, a scowl marring her naturally pretty face.

That made her friend stop abruptly and turn around, a curtain of her long blond hair flying across her back to the right side. She took a notice of Ellie's slightly annoyed features and offered her an apologetic smile. "We're almost there." Aileen said enthusiastically.

"Look," Ellie spoke up, breathing rather heavily, "I'd very much like to witness your amazing debut tomorrow but I can only manage if I won't die due to a heartattack today."

Both the girls laughed after that and resumed their track to Foyles, the world-famous London bookshop, where Aileen was supposed to attend a reading session the next day at the opportunity of publishing her first novel which had unexpectedly become a bestseller. She had got a call from Mr. Parker a week ago and had been asked to arrive a day prior to the session so they could have discussed the arrangements and details.

"I still can't believe it." the tiny blonde girl had tittered before she walked into the store with her best friend in tow.

She had been to this shop many times before but she always marveled at how huge and spacious it was. It had several floors, each of them containing a countless number of bookshelves filled with books of various genres and languages. It was truly magnificent and for now, Aileen felt to be a part of it. She politely asked the shop assistant to be shown to Mr. Parker's office and flashed Ellie a sheepish grin as she set to follow the young boy to the back of the shop.

Mr. Parker was a man in his fifties, elegant and sophisticated and very nice. They only talked for about fifteen minutes, setting out the arrangements for the session in detail and Aileen had a good impression of the man as well as of tomorrow's event. Everything was perfect and nothing could go wrong.

Aileen walked out of Mr. Parker's office door and strode back to the front of the store where Ellie was waiting for her. She was just passing a massive table with a huge cartbox poster next to it when she caught a glimpse of something which made her head turn to give it a better look. As the girl turned around, she froze at place. There was a young man staring back at her from the cartbox picture, he was clad as a knight or a warrior with a sword pointed at her but that was not what had made her feel intimidated. It was his face which seemed extremely familiar but it couldn't have been.. or could have?

Aileen stepped closer, her hand almost itched as she felt an urge to reach out and touch the face but she was not able to do a single move, instead she watched with horror as the picture in front of her began to change. At first it seemed to go aflame and then the young man's face transformed into one of a horrid, ugly monster which resembled a very old man with skin torn at places, revealing the rotten flesh of unhealthy colour underneath, half of his face was practically missing, there was still some of grayish hair left on his head and falling around his shoulders ridiculously, his lips were cut and almost torn apart so she could see the carious teeth or rather the rest of them. But his eyes were more or less in tact, piercing through her like a pair of daggers.

"Dorian." she whispered under her breath.

The girl was too consumed in her vision to notice her friend approach so when Ellie grabbed her shoulder, Aileen literally jumped away from her spot, clutching right hand to her heart.