Voir (verb) to see

I spotted him across the ballroom and couldn't look away.

His golden hair was carelessly pushed to one side like he'd just finished running his fingers through it. And he wore a smirk that looked like he'd just awoken from a very good dream.

But I didn't think anything Prince Bastien of House Allard did was careless, and he certainly didn't dream.

He was a vampire. Just like all of the princes who ruled the Conquered Territories. And tonight, I was supposed to be impressing him to win the job as his next sanguine partner—the person he'd exclusively feed from for the next year.

I was repulsed by the mere idea of getting close to him, but I had no other choice. This was my fate. And if I failed...

Suppressing a shudder, I touched the side of my neck, just above the lace choker Mama bid me to wear. The vein in my neck throbbed. Keenly aware of all the reasons I had to be afraid of a vampire.

Blackness crowded the edges of my vision, and I couldn't stop a queasy feeling from churning in my stomach. I stared at the floorboards, trying to slow my breathing.

Just thinking about the word blood made me lightheaded, which was something I'd tried for years to overcome with no success. Now, I had no idea how I was going to convince a vampire prince that I was the one he was searching for.

What if he wanted to take a sample of the offerings before he made a decision, and I swooned at his feet?

That would put an end to my mission pretty damn quick.

My sister snapped open a paper fan and waved it in my direction. The cool air chilled my skin but did nothing to quell my nerves.

"Don't look," Seraphina muttered, "but you-know-who is staring right at you."

I glanced up to find Prince Bastien's cold gaze cutting through the pack of hopefuls crowded around him, his soft blue eyes fixed on me. 

The eyes of a killer.

Everything inside me stilled—my breath, my thoughts, and, I swear, even my heart skipped a beat. He was painfully, hauntingly beautiful, and like all predators, he intended to lull me into a false sense of security.

But a pretty package couldn't hide the monster he truly was.

I wetted my lips, tasting the lipstick I wasn't accustomed to wearing and praying to Diana that I hadn't smudged it.

The longer he stared at me, the more time seemed to slow. The people around me fading. Dulling. Blurring into the background. The chamber music and conversation fell to a low buzz.

I shook my head to clear it, but that didn't help. It was like I was underwater, and the only thing I wanted to swim toward was him.

A disgusting concept.

"Enchanté, my dear," said a silky voice that was so close, I swore it was whispered in my ear. I looked around for who'd done it, but no one was nearby.

When a musical laugh hummed in my ear, my attention snapped back to the vampire.

It couldn't be...but by Diana's light...it was.

"I'd like to speak more privately on the balcony. Away from these prying eyes. Over there." The prince pointed to my left, and my gaze followed his finger to a set of ornate doors. "Will you join me?"

Against all odds, I must've done something right. I'd caught his attention.

I struggled to find words and managed to reply, "Is this for m-my interview?"

His lips didn't move, but I heard his reply just the same. "Yes and no."

The bubble of hope expanding in my chest popped. What did that mean? 

I had to secure this job as his sanguine partner. I'd made a sacred vow to my coven, and even though I had no concept of what I was getting myself into, the fact remained.

I might be a witch without magick. Good for nothing but tending the gardens and feeding the crows. But I needed to become a spy. 

I had to be better—different—than the girl I'd been if there was any hope of avenging Gran and the countless others who'd died at the hands of dark magick because the vampires had failed to maintain the balance of good and evil.

The vampire prince broke eye contact, and my senses screamed back to life. The music. The chatter. My sister beside me. It all returned so fast that I was dizzy all over again.

"I told you not to look," my little sister said through her teeth. She fluttered the fan faster, blowing the fine hairs framing my face so they caught in my fake eyelashes.

"Telling someone not to look is literally daring them to do it," I bit back, tearing the fan from her hand. "And stop waving this thing in my face."

I untangled a lock of silver lilac hair from my lashes only to find Prince Bastien chuckling like he'd heard our whispered conversation from across the hall.

I swallowed hard. If he could speak to me from across the room and distort the noises of the ball, then surely, he could hear everything. 

A good thing to know for someone who wished to deceive a vampire.

Clasping his hands behind his back, the vampire strolled toward the set of ebony stained doors he'd pointed to, casually shrugging off the questions of those around him. Before he reached the doors, he glanced back at me and gave a little wave, beckoning me forward. The look on his cherubic face was playful, but I was wary.

I didn't want to follow him. I was scared of what might happen. But at the exact same time, it was all I wanted to do.

There was no room for fear.

"I have to go," I told my sister.

I took one step forward, and Seraphina stepped into my path, hands on her hips. She looked so different without her white hair, which she had charmed to match my lilac hue as a disguise before arriving.

"Why are you acting so weird? You can't start freaking out now. You vowed—"

"Shh!" I said, shutting her up before she could say something that would give us away. I opened the fan and held it between us. Blocking our faces from the vampire. "I can't explain what just happened, but he spoke inside my head and invited me to the balcony."

"He spoke inside your head?" she repeated.

I let out an exasperated huff. "Yes! I think it must be for some kind of interview." Her bow shaped lips parted. Clearly, she was just as surprised as I was. "Just stay here and wait for me, okay?"

My sister nodded. "You can do this, Claire. I know you can. Just be confident."

I offered her a wry smile that she didn't return. "Thanks, Sera."

My little sister was everything I wasn't. A witch born with the magick of the Light in her veins. Trained to hunt the sources of dark magick on earth and destroy them. She'd take over our coven when Mama stepped aside.

I wanted to protect her from the dark witches. The same ones our vampire monarchs never held accountable for murdering innocent Witches of the Light.

I hated Prince Bastien Allard and his brothers for what they were and what they failed to do. But if I wanted to learn his secrets, I had to pretend that I was entranced with him. Like all these other soft humans fawning for the right to be his pincushion.

Straightening my spine and rolling my shoulders back, I strode across the ballroom with slow, deliberate strides, trying not to trip over the hem of the black lace dress.

At my approach, the vampire opened one of the doors and held it open for me. I paused at the threshold for a second, long enough to meet his curious gaze, before dipping my chin and stepping out into the cool night air.

Wind kissed the exposed skin on my cheeks and arms, and I resisted the urge to wrap myself in a hug as I walked to the stone railing that overlooked Chateau Corbin's famous hanging gardens. They were surely beautiful in the light of day, but now, in the dark, the bushes and trees looked as monstrous as the gargoyles sitting atop the buttresses.

I didn't hear approaching steps, but I could feel him standing behind me. It was as unsettling as walking in a graveyard at night. If the gravestones were also bloodthirsty vampires.

On the weeklong voyage to the capital, I devoured every scroll Mama had packed on the vampires but didn't learn much. Rumors more than facts. I'd never seen one up close, much less been interviewed by one, but I imagined that a vampire prince would want someone soft and sweet to feed from.

Unfortunately, I'd never been good at either of those things, preferring plants and books to people. But, I supposed there was a first time for everything.

Steeling my nerve and fighting against every reflex in my body screaming at me to run, I turned around, coming face to face with Bastien. The moon was a spotlight on him, bathing him in an eerie glow.

What I knew about him I didn't like, but what I didn't know held my curiosity.

"My lord," I said, dipping into a curtsey.

When I lifted my chin, I found him contemplating with a strange look.

"I make you uneasy," the vampire said.

It wasn't a question. And he wasn't wrong. 

He did make me uneasy. Everything from his devastating beauty to his stillness to the fact that he could talk to me without moving his lips from across a ballroom gave me pause.

Instead of trying to lie, I stayed silent.

After a long moment, he asked, "Why are you here?"

There was no accusation in his tone, but still, I had the unnerving suspicion that he knew exactly why I was here, which unnerved me even more.

Again, I didn't lie. I told him the only truth I had.

"I came," I said, finding my voice, "for you."

And to find the location of the last remaining demonic relics so my family can destroy them.

His gaze dipped to my neck, and I wondered if he could hear the blood in my veins or the sound of my heart beating faster.

"I see," he said. A flitter of confusion passed across his face before his hands came to rest on the head of his cane.

Had I said something wrong? 

I silently prayed to the moon goddess for help because I couldn't mess this up. He had to choose me. I just didn't know how to do that. I'd never even spoken to a man who wasn't in our coven before.

"If I make you so uneasy, girl, how will you endure a year around me? Spending every waking moment in my presence or under my watch? How will you follow me into battle?"

I opened my mouth, but no words came out. My desperation rose, and I touched the rough lace around my neck. Mama's choker reminded me of what was at stake.

Bastien smirked, like the arrogant vampire he was, and I broke eye contact.

"Anyone who meets you is uneasy, my lord," I murmured. "If I wasn't uneasy, you would have reason to be suspicious."

He considered my words for a moment. As he did, he shifted slightly, allowing a thick shaft of moonlight to illuminate his chest. My gaze snagged on a pulsing red light coming from a stone he wore on a gold chain around his neck.

It was barely visible from underneath his shirt. But once I'd seen it, I couldn't look away.

Collecting my courage, I stepped forward. The vampire didn't move as I lifted my hand to the pulsing light.

But before I could touch it, he grabbed my wrist, twisting it until I yelped. "What are you doing?"

"Your necklace," I stuttered out. "It-it's pulsing."

"What?"

He released me and pulled the stone from under his shirt to see exactly what I'd seen.

The glow of the stone beating like a heart.

What did that mean?

The vampire tucked the gem back inside his shirt and positioned the knife strapped to his chest over it. Hiding the glow.

When he looked back at me, his eyes were a chilly blue.

"This, you and I, will not work." He tapped his cane against the ground as if to accentuate his point.

My throat was thick was despeartion, and I shook my head. "Please, my lord. Prince Bastien. It would work. It would."

What was I going to do? I couldn't lose this job. I had to convince him I was a worthy partner.

I tried to reach out to him, like the soft, dutiful girl I was pretending to be, but he backed away.

"Do not seek out an audience with me again," he said, voice now a harsh timbre.

"No!" I cried out, but my plea fell on deaf ears.

I blinked, and he was gone. I stared blankly at the open door, trying to order my thoughts.

I'd failed. He hadn't selected me.

The tingle of magick burned against my lips, and a whole new kind of terror took hold of my heart. 

I'd promised my family I'd get this job or die trying. The lace choker around my throat tightened as the conditions of the vow I'd made to my coven were fulfilled. 

The lace turned to barbs piercing my skin.

The pain was all consuming. I reached for the stone railing to steady myself, even though nothing inside me felt steady.

Especially when something warm and wet rolled down my neck and landed in a splatter beside my hand.

I sucked in a sharp breath at the sight of red.

Blood.

The spell was ready to claim my life.

If you enjoyed this first taste, feel free to interact with me and leave a comment! I read every single one, and always appreciate your thoughts and reactions.

Question: What is your favorite vampire romance? This is a tough one, but I think mine is A Discovery of Witches.