I nod. I understand. I feel like I know Lucius now, because I know what it’s like to be hardened by death. I know what it’s like to give up things to get revenge.

“Did he kill him?” I ask.

“No,” Xander says. “Numerius is still out there. He’s still making vampires—he’s not the only one, of course. Any magician playing with blood magic can become a vampire and trigger a new line of the curse. But Numerius is the most dangerous. Lucius almost never leaves this place anymore because they’re both still hunting for each other. It’s why he takes this competition so seriously. We’re at war.”

I’m not just signing on to hunt a few vampires. I’m signing on to a centuries-long quest for revenge, but it feels good to take my personal loss and fit it into the larger story. I’m not alone anymore. I’m with a group of people who all understand that vampires are real and that they hurt the people they kill and the people who get left behind.

An eerie sort of calm comes over me. I’m almost certain Mom was a part of this, and that a vampire killed her because of her magic, but I still don’t know why she left. Wouldn’t it have been safer to stay with her troupe?

I’m about to finally tell them about Mom’s journal entries when all the talking stops. The sudden shift is enough to send my heart racing, as if something terrible happened and nobody’s entirely sure yet what it was. I meet Willow’s wide, startled eyes. She gives me the faintest shrug, and we both turn with everyone else to the head of the table as a man appears.

He looks to be in his midthirties. His beauty is cruel and cold, like a winter landscape you might try to cross even though you know you’ll freeze before you can make it. His skin is white enough to show his blue veins underneath. His mouth twists into something resembling a smile, but it looks out of place between his sharp chin and long nose. On top of his long, white-blond hair, he wears a glowing ruby crown that seems to suck all the radiance off its surroundings and into itself. Everything else in the room now seems somehow duller. It’s no wonder everyone decided to wear such finery. They would all become absolutely lifeless next to the glow.

A small, delicate white woman who appears to be a few years younger than him holds his left hand. I wonder if anyone even notices her next to him. She, too, seems faded. Her hair looks blond at first glance, but as she tilts her head to survey the room, it shines silver against her white dress. The only white dress in attendance. She stands out like a tear in the canvas.