Adriana and I exchange a glance, our eyes bulging.

“Just like Lucifer, he wanted his own kingdom, and he meant to build one here among the mortals,” Ximena continues. “But his attempts at creating an army, sharing his blood with his human disciples, produced something monstrous and deadly.” She takes a deep breath. “Auggie … Azazel is the source of vampirism.”

“Are you serious?” Adriana squeezes my hand even harder until I’m afraid the bones are going to crack.

“His blood is endless, truly immortal, and it continues to pass from one vampire to the next up to this very day—although Azazel hasn’t had a body of his own for millennia.” Ximena leans back in her chair. “Ages ago, when their coven was whole, the witches I told you about tried to work an occult ritual on the Corrupter, but even as powerful as they were, the magic was still too intense for them to wield successfully. One of the witches died, and the spell went wrong, resulting in … well…” Her voice drops, and she runs her fingers along her upholstered armrests. “According to them, that’s how the father of all vampires was removed to an unknown plane, able to return to our realm only every hundred years. His blood is still here, and it still calls to him. He’ll keep coming back as long as he can, aiming to build the kingdom he was denied.”

“How long ago are we talking?” I ask next, on the edge of my seat, that damned woodcut doing cartwheels in my brain. “‘Ages’ like bad hair and bell-bottoms … or ‘ages’ like, like … ‘ugh, me hungry for mastodon’?”

“I don’t know. But if I had to guess…” Ximena looks me in the eye. “I’d say they remember what Salisbury Plain looked like before Stonehenge was built.”

“That’s not possible.” Adriana’s face is gray. “How is that possible?”

“Magic takes energy, mijita, you know that,” Ximena says quietly, “and sorcery requires far more than ordinary witchcraft. To work the strongest spells, even with the support of a full coven … it’s like running a marathon. You have to prepare, you have to know what you’re doing, and it still drains you.” Her hands move, agitated. “These were some of the most talented witches history has ever seen, and they failed in part because the six of them together couldn’t handle the power they needed to channel.”

“But vampires have heightened strength and stamina,” I point out dully. “And their blood boosts their ability to work basic magic.”

“They heal almost immediately, too,” Ximena adds, “which means they can recover the energy they lose from casting almost in real time. So, yes. They say that, knowing their mortal weakness would always prevent them from succeeding at this ritual, the surviving witches found a vampire who would Turn them … and they joined the undead.”