Demonic Keeper

Chapter One

It had been a rather slow day at the Oswald's Mystic Antique shop and Evanora had already began to count the hours until she could go to her new apartment and climb into bed with the new fantasy novel she'd just acquired on her lunch break. The last two bodies that had walked through the door were busying themselves with looking around and she intently flipped through her hardback.

When the door opened once more, causing chimes to ring throughout the tiny building, she didn't look up as she suspected the new person to casually look around just as the other two.

She didn't hear as he walked towards her, possibly too engrossed in her tale, but soon his tall form loomed over the oak counter, emitting a husky men's cologne.

"May I help you?" Her tone was indifferent though she didn't seem to care since the man was indeed interrupting her reading time.

It was Saturday night, what could this man possibly want from a tiny hole in the wall antique shop in Brooklyn an hour before close?

He didn't say anything for a moment and, besides her turning the page to read the end of her paragrah,  the only sound in the room was the slight breathing from everyone.

He stared down her studying the face that resembled her mother but with the eyes of her father.

"I'm here to speak with your parents." His voice was almost commanding and nearly as husky as his scent. "I have an appointment."

"And may I ask your name?"

He was silent again, only this time he didn't speak until Eva finished raking her eyes over her text and gazed up at him to nearly ask again, in case he hadn't heard her. She knew he had when she saw the slight smile in his icy blue eyes but not upon his lips.

"Dante," he said simply.

She waited for him to continue and when he didn't she pressed for a last name. "Dante..."

"Just, Dante."

Now she smiled, a bit amused at this man's mystery. "Alright, Just Dante, have a seat and I will...find them."

He nodded though didn't take a seat as she suggested. Instead, he continued to stand at the tall glass counter and watched as she set her book on the top, pages down.

She began to walk away, though when she turned her back on him felt a slight chill run down her spine. Eva glanced over her shoulder once more to see if he was still standing across the desk and indeed, he was. Just Dante watched as she left, and for a split second, she felt as if she'd seen his face before. It wasn't uncommon for her to mistake people given her profession but she knew she wouldn't have forgotten this man's face or his appearance.

His nose length hair nearly shielded his brilliant blue eyes and was white as early winter's snow though he only seemed to be in his mid-twenties.

He was quite tall, possibly a head or two taller than her five foot seven, with an almost square jawline while harboring a few feminine facial features such as relatively full lashes and full lips. He'd chosen to dress as if he hailed from the early nineteenth century, wearing a black road cloth suit, congress gaiters and a black tie on a short, hard collar. He dressed as if he were trying to keep with an old-fashioned sense of dignity and for some bizarre reason Evanora felt as if his attire suited him. On anyone else, it would have seemed strange or out of place but for Just Dante it seemed to add an old sophisticated feel.

Shaking off her sudden coldness, she trekked forward to retrieve her parents Richard and Lindsey Oswald who were in the back room taking inventory.