Junior led the way to the door of the spiral staircase, which stood already open.

I followed him down the stairs silently, noticing how the buzz intensified as we descended. Once we reached the corridor at the bottom, he took my hand, and I let him guide me towards the kitchen. The large, and usually busy room was empty, not even Cook was there to see me off. At least we wouldn't waste time. Junior seemed to be in quite a hurry.

As he opened the door of the Great Hall, the noise tripled immediately.

"Is that the... portal?" I asked, my innate curiosity overpowering the feeling of sadness and despair momentarily.

"Yes. It means that the passage is open," he said, crossing the room fast, approaching the door that usually led to an innocuous, perfectly ordinary corridor. The door through which I arrived in this place, precisely one year ago.

"But how..."

"I don't quite know myself how it works, but even if I did, there would be no time to explain now... Just one thing before you go, Samara. You mustn't worry. Never. You are stronger and more brave than you think."

"I'm not, that's not true! How can you or your father expect me to go on, alone... " I could feel my silent despair morph into very loud panic. "Please let me stay, I don't want to leave you!" I called, my voice reverberating off the walls of the vast hall.

He only shook his head, looking away from me. "Are you ready, Human?"

"No!"

He sighed, "Come on, Samara. I hate to do this, but if something happens to you here..."

"But something, anything could happen to me even on the other side..."

He only pulled me closer, opening the heavy wooden door. Then we walked over the threshold together.

Suddenly, I was surrounded by darkness, flying, falling down a deep, black well, the buzzing diminishing gradually, leaving me surrounded only by the sound of my own heartbeat as I landed.

It only seemed to have lasted a few seconds, but when I touched the ground, stumbling and dropping my book, supported by Junior, who prevented my fall, it was already dark.

Apparently, we passed a few hours within the passage. There were many candles lit for effect instead of the normal, electrical lights of my time in the corridor. It looked all the same as when I left this place after the Halloween tour.

I recalled how it all happened back then-- I entered the passage following Vlad just after the early autumnal sunset, reaching the other side near midnight. Tired and nauseaous, just like now, I realised, leaning into Junior, my head spinning. I was going to throw up.

I took a few deep breaths, still holding on to Junior for dear life, feeling the nausea slowly dissipate.

"Are you feeling unwell?" he asked as I felt his hand touching curiously the fabric of my skin-tight jeans, just above my knee.

"What are you doing?" I asked, too weak to really mind his very inappropriate gesture.

"You've lost your dress, Human," he muttered, observing my attire.

If the situation wasn't so tragic, and if I didn't catch the glimpse of a few tears lurking in the corners of his eyes which his typical, teasing smile didn't manage to obliterate, I would have laughed. After a year of wearing floor-length gowns, I was feeling as good as naked in my jeans and short jacket.

Strangely, Junior, exactly like Vlad when I saw him on this side of the portal for the first time, was still wearing his usual clothes.

"I don't want to go, please, don't make me..." I begged, feeling like a stranger in my own world. "Let me come back with you!"

"I can't, Samara," he said, wiping the tears that started to roll down my cheeks with the back of his hand.

I closed my eyes and took a profound, shaky breath, finally giving up. I was only wasting his time here. Clara's time...

"Tell him that I love him," I said, looking in Junior's eyes. So much like his father's. "More than anything. That's why I'm leaving, for him. And promise you'll look after him. That you'll find Clara. Please tell her that I'm sorry... Look after her, Katerina and yourself... I want you all to be happy."

I threw myself in his arms and sobbed for a few moments, letting him embrace me tightly.

"Just tell your father that I love him," I said again. "I... I'll be lost without him... this place... I'll be lost without you!"

"Maybe you'll find your way back here when the things are calmer..." he said softly, trying to make me feel better.

I only shook my head, unconvinced. I didn't care for false hopes. None of those... time travellers Vlad had mentioned had ever returned once they left.

Pulling away from him, I lifted my hand, placing my palm on his cool cheek. He captured it with his own hand, holding my touch there. I was losing my best friend, we would never see each other again.

"Just tell him what I said. Please. And that I'll never forget... "

"Samara, you must go. I'm sorry. I'll miss you," he said firmly, taking my hand off his cheek and giving it a gentle squeeze, then dropping it.

"Samara! Where have you been? I've been looking for you everywhere! They are all waiting for us, the bus is ready to leave..."

Lia? Lia!

My friend was approaching us from the Entry Hall, stopping in her tracks at the sight of Junior.

He leaned down and cupped my face, kissing me on the forehead.

"Promise..." I started again.

"No. You promise you'll try to come back. Later. Take care of yourself. Here, don't forget your book," he said, passing it to me. I had completely forgotten about it.

He smiled at me one last time through tears, then he was gone, vanishing behind the thick wooden door.

I took a step closer to the stone wall and leaned my back against its cold surface.

"What's wrong with you?" Lia asked as she approached.

"My head is spinning," I mumbled, happy to have found her and desperate to have lost Junior at the same time.

"Down. Sit down. Put your head between your knees, good," she instructed, pushing my head down. "And breathe. Deeply."

"I'm going to throw up," I said, my mother language feeling strange on my tongue.

"No, you are not. Just keep breathing," she insisted, detached and persuasive.

Oh, the doctor in her. She was still studying, but she was a natural.

"Better?" she asked when I raised my head and looked at her after a few minutes.

"I missed you, Lia."

"What? You've disappeared for like ten minutes. Where did you go? And... what was he? And what did you tell him, I didn't understand a word."

Junior. A vampire. My stepson. My best friend just like you...

"Just one of the locals... a guide. He... helped me find my way back, I... got lost... "

"Why are you crying for goodness' sake! What's wrong with you, Samara?"

Her quickly pronounced English words and the rhythm of the language I hadn't used in a year were peltering me like hailstones. I realised I was clutching the book to my chest and opened it carefully, scared to find its pages spotless. But all of my drawings were still there. And there was something else, a small note folded in half, placed like a bookmark between two random pages.

Junior!

I opened it carefully, hiding it and the pictures from Lia, and recognising Vlad's handwriting, I read the two lines it contained breathlessly.

'I love you too much to risk your life again. Please forgive me if you can.'

I traced the words gently with my finger, then folded the note and put it safely back inside the book before my tears would melt the ink.

"I'm not crying," I told Lia, wiping away the tears with my sleeve.

"Fine! Now put that book in your handbag, good girl, and let's go."

She stood up and helped me to my feet, her hand brushing accidentally against my ring.

My ring! I still had my ring!

"Wait, wait, wait! What's this?" She pointed her accusing finger at my diamond, which looked too big and inappropriate, worn with jeans...

I still have my ring. It... it had all really happened...

I stood up quickly and reached for the handle of the door through which Junior had disappeared. I was going back. I had to return...

It was locked. There was no way back.

Anne and the two guys whose names I had forgotten were coming down the corridor towards us.

"You two are making everybody wait!" Anne screeched, and I knew her enough to recognise it as an attempt to impress the boys.

"Come on! It's Halloween. We are going clubbing tonight! These two," she said, lacing her arms through her companions' who stood on either side of her, "know just the right place to have some fun down in the town."

Lia raised an enquiring eyebrow at me, then looked at my ring again.

I shook my head infinitesimally, suggesting that I would tell her later. What would I tell her, I didn't know.

"Let's go then," I muttered, resigned to my fate.

I laced my arm through Lia's, allowing her to lead me away.

"I'm definitely not coming with you tonight, Anne," I told the other girl, trying to hide my new tears. "I'm just... not feeling well."

That made her free the boys and come to my other side.

"Poor Sam," she cooed, wrapping her arm around my waist.

I let them all escort me to the bus. There was nothing left for me here anymore, no point in staying.

"Why does your hair smell of ashes and burning wood?" Lia asked as we sat next to each other on the small bus. "What have you been doing, where did you disappear?"

"Just give me some time, Lia, I'll... try to explain later."

"Ok." She dropped the subject, leaning forward and joining the others' lively conversation.

I looked out of the window watching the dark silhouette of the medieval castle, my home, disappear gradually in the dusk, as someone extinguished the last lights illuminating its windows.

And as I felt the darkness that settled all around creeping inside of me, I shuddered.

Had the world always been so dark?

~~

"Do I love you? My God, if your love were a grain of sand, mine would be a universe of beaches."
- William Goldman, The Princess Bride.

~~

End of part one.