Rough hands shook Cherlize’s thin shoulders, and the motion send her forehead into the closest wall with a thump. “Wake up, youngling!” the shrill voice screeched in her ear. The motion and sound stopped, and she felt her frame relaxing again. All too soon her tormentor was back, tangling long fingers into her lengthening black hair. With a yank, her head was tilted back to a painful angle. The girl’s eyes snapped open, finding baleful red-tinted amber eyes burning holes into her face. “Mongrel, you’d better be getting off of that little nest of yours right quick, you’re late, and you’re going to get us in trouble!”

Kipsy finally released her tangled mane and stormed away, her ringlets of copper bouncing like springs behind her as she left. The crinoline whispered against the floor as she went. Cherlize, miffed, still tired, and feeling spiteful, stuck her tongue out at the retreating Sireling. Despite her want to continue her defiance, the girl removed herself from the tangle of sheets and blankets piled into the far corner of the opulent sleeping quarters. Using the bed she’d been assigned – and subsequently refused to sleep on – she levered herself to her feet. The day’s clothes had already been laid out sometime while they slept by one of the human slaves.

Looking at the stiff fabrics and intricate beading, Cherlize decided that it was going to be a bad day. Not that it was different from any other day since she’d come here.

She dressed herself without much mind for what she was doing – her thoughts once again on a little shanty house and the beautiful woman who lived as best she could under her circumstances. Cherlize’s throat got thick, and she shook out the thought, dressing with manic fervor.

Cherlize moved closer to the front of the room, seeing that the contingent was gathering in preparation for the evening’s procession to the main hall.

“Pixie, you can’t leave your hair down.” Another voice shattered her concentration of something insubstantial in her head. She glanced up and focused as a slight, tall girl sidled up to her. More gently the woman drew her to a vanity and sat her on the flat padded stool just before it. Why they would even have a mirror in a hall full of vampire women, Cherlize could not fathom. She watched numbly as the brush levitated off the surface of the furniture and began stroking across thin air. Even her reflection was merely a see through blur of color. Monica’s looks didn’t reflect at all. Pale green eyes turned down, delicate hands already combing through the dark, slightly wavy hair with an ornate brush.

“I don’t know why you care about how I look.”

Cherlize looked up to watch her shrug through thin shoulders. Her pale skin reflected the light from above the mirror. “You’re going to be a beautiful woman, you should start showing that now. You don’t want to remain Kipsy’s favorite torment do you?”

“I don’t worry about it.” Cherlize regarded the floating brush and her own blurred reflection again. “Her future isn’t that bright.”

This time Cherlize didn’t look back to see Monica’s reaction to her words. The tortoiseshell brush clicked on the marble of the vanity and Monica began tugging gently on her hair as she arranged it into a more acceptable style for the other members of the court to see.

She was done in just a few moments and touched Cherlize’s elbow as an invitation to rise once again. Her head felt heavy and precariously balanced in the hair style her friend had chosen for her.

“Come on Pixie, let’s get our evening started, shall we?”

“Must I?”

Monica smiled tolerantly and waved her to take her place in line. Reluctantly, she did so, and very shortly thereafter the women began spilling into the hall. The vampire men were coming from the other side of the hall and mingled quickly with the women. She frowned as she heard suggestions, innuendo’s, and invitations bandy about between the unmated vampires now surrounding her.

Others already waited at the junction, those who had committed themselves to another, and they stood holding hands or just remaining in proximity of each other. Some were more amorous pairings than others as could be shown by the wide range of expressions in the mates’ eyes. Beyond Ashlan, Cherlize hadn’t really been aware that the same sex pairing could be as loving, and sometimes more loving, than the hetero couples. She watched the dynamics of that group for a bit longer. Some cue, unseen and unheard caused the mingling group of Sirelings and Seconds to pack tighter together and closer to the junction.

Cherlize drew a breath as she watched Lord Gustav and his mate pass a narrow window between the corner of the hall and the front line of her group. Her hackles rose, as they did every time she saw him – the man responsible for her mother’s torture for so many years. It made her hate this place all the more.

When Karl had brought her back to the House two years ago, he brought her before the Lord. The leering eyes – it was the first thing she noticed – the man was a predator. Not in the sense that he was a vampire, but in the sense that he preyed on others – women, friends, his mate. When he touched her cheek, she saw his future thread all the way to the even her mother described to her, and most of what was in between was sordid and unspeakable.

That he wanted to turn some of that torturous attention on her, at the time merely six years old, made her shiver under his touch.

She focused again as her column began to move, only then realizing that the front group had already turned down the hall and were headed away. The courtiers moved at a lumbering, regal pace down the highly polished hall. They were dressed in their finest clothes, paying homage to a century long since dead. Tightly corseted Victorian dresses with flaring and supported skirts swept the floor in enough numbers to sound like a myriad of ghosts whisping about them. The men wore matching tan breeches with stockings and buckled shoes. Heavy woolen overcoats covered linen shirts in varying shades from dark blue to violet. Both sexes were only missing the powdered wigs.

Three general groups were present as the court moved towards the evenings’ usual business. Each group represented a caste within the house so that any looking could know what privilege or curse each dealt with.

Forward-most, and led by Lord Gustav and his lady, Tamara, were the “purebloods.” It was as much a misnomer as they idea that a feudal court could still exist. They were instead a group of vampire Ancients, old vampires who, for the most part, had retained the undead portion of their lives. These vampires had never been affected by vampiresella’s mother virus.

When the virus had been brought to Europe from the United Territories by the newly converted Italian Royalty Lord Damien and several other vampiric travelers, the Ancients of Europe sequestered them all away – or sequestered themselves from contact with it. They were adamant that some kind of inoculation be found in order to prevent the deadly side effects and attrition the virus was known to cause in vampire ranks. It took nearly a decade to find the vaccine.

Even it had side effects. Though it did what the vampire ancients of Europe had hoped – keep them from the dramatic genetic changes that refused a vampire the ability to absorb nutrition from their blood meals – some were afflicted with other genetic anomalies akin to those in vampiresella-altered vampires in the United Territories.

None who were inoculated had been afflicted with the ability to pass on the virus – and Sirelings were still attempted with the ways more ancient than Gustav claimed to be. However, random recipients of the vaccine had found that they could get pregnant and birth another generation.

There were about a hundred vampires in the pureblood group and were aligned from oldest to youngest in the procession.

The Sirelings and Seconds were lumped together in the second group, though the Sirelings were given greater prestige than mere Seconds and took up the first three ranks of their group. That slight schism only showed because of the younger members in the Sirelings group walking ahead of the oldest of the Seconds. The giving of their human life and the acceptance of their pure vampire’s gift of blood was considered the cleaner method for bringing mortals into the eternal. Becoming a vampire by virtue of something akin to a cold they considered dirty and relegated Seconds to just above the humans.

Cherlize trailed at the back of this second group, an anomaly even amongst the seconds they had labeled her as when Karl brought her to court. Seconds and Sirelings did not continue to grow past the age of their turning. She was turned at the age of six (so they said) and therefore should have remained a perpetual child. That she continued to gain height and weight scared the vampires, because that was how pure vampire children grew – and they were not about to admit that a pure vampire child had been left to wander the streets of the human city’s slums. Some of them considered her less than the human blood slaves that took up the massive crowd just two yards behind her.

Though she kept her face straight, staring at a taller Second before her, Cherlize cast her eyes down and fought once more against the tears that threatened.

She felt as if she had been crying for two years straight. How could she not – for all she knew her mother was dead by now. Cherlize had not had a future vision of her mother since coming to the House, and feared that her fate had come true – though not as Cherlize had originally seen it.

Once more the image of their little shanty – so much more loving and happy than her current opulence – welled into her mind. Every detail painted into the corners, the small pot bellied stove that served the dual purpose of heating their dwelling and cooking the human style meals her mother still required. She could see the doorless frame, hung with thick burlap bags to help keep the cold out. Feeling her arm lift as if she was going to part those sacks and look out into the street, Cherlize lost focus of the men and women before her. Like a chill, a feeling worked up from her toes, raising gooseflesh all along her frail frame. The surroundings blurred and then darkened – somewhere behind her, she thought she heard one of the blood-slaves scream in horror.

Then her fingers brushed against burlap.

Blinking to bring her surroundings back into focus, Cherlize found herself staring at overlapping pieces of rough cloth. Her head lifted taking in the wire hammered into the brick either side of the door – just as she remembered it. Curling her fingers, the girl pulled the cloth against her skin, trying to decide if she was having some kind of fantastic delusion or whether this was real.

She cast her gaze to one side, seeing the second or third hand furniture that lined the wall to the corner. As she turned her eyes to take in the rest of the very familiar furnishings, there was a loud crash of metal on metal at her back. Spinning quickly, Cherlize found herself gasping as her gaze lighted on the other in the room.

Cherlize? Adrianna shook her head in disbelief. How…how did you get here?

Before Cherlize could gather her random thoughts, Adrianna wrapped her in strong thin arms.

Oh, but I’ve missed you, love.

Not quite believing this was real, Cherlize was slow to return the fierce hug her mother had her trapped in. When her fingers proved that the body before her was substantial, she sank into the embrace and wished never to quit it. Unfortunately, Adrianna had other ideas.

Not losing contact, the dhampir pushed Cherlize to arm’s length. She swept Cherlize’s appearance with critical eyes. The girl found herself embarrassed for the fine dress she was in, while her mother was still in hand me down rags. How did you get here?

“I…I’m not sure,” she squeaked. “The girls were being mean to me again, and while the court was moving to the main chambers, I started thinking of you. The details were amazing – the stove, the interior, the furnishings. As those became clearer, the court faded, and then I found myself here. I don’t know what I did.”

Adrianna rose, confusion and fear playing havoc with her pretty features. She dragged Cherlize to the meager table and sat her down. She then pulled her chair just in front of Cherlize and seated herself.

When word reached me they’d taken you…I won’t lie…despite knowing it was coming, I was heartbroken. Have they been treating you…well?

“They think of me as a defective vampire, mother.” Anger warmed her cheeks. “I continue to grow, I have a skewed aura, my reflection does show, even if it is not clearly defined. I’ve been relegated below even the Second’s. I might as well be a blood-slave for all the mind they pay me. It is humiliating.”

Adrianna touched her closest cheek. I’m sorry to hear that.

“I…met Lord Gustav.” Cherlize watched her mother’s face darken considerably. “He is every bit the letch you said he was. I hate him, I want him dead already.”

It is not yet time for that fate.

“Are you sure of this?” Cherlize inquired. “Are you so sure that your sacrifice will be avenged?”

The vision has never changed, Cherlize. You will be his downfall.

“I don’t want to lose you.”

Her mother regarded her folded hands for long moments. She then reached out and touched Cherlize’s fingers. For the first time, Adrianna shared the full vision with her daughter, and Cherlize felt the threads of her own life intertwine through it, strengthening it and showing her the power and the truth of what her mother had seen. The vision only lasted seconds, and when she was able to focus on her mother again she was crying – they both were.

This was the vision you showed me before you were born, I’ve reread the thread ever since, and still it remains the same. I cannot avoid this fate, my child, and neither can you.

Cherlize reached across the space between them and pulled her mother into a hug. Feelings of loss and regret for what was going to happen filled her up and then spilled out her eyes. “I don’t want to lose you,” she repeated.

I know.

Once more, Adrianna untangled herself from her daughter’s embrace and then stared into her jade green eyes. You have to go back, love, before they start searching for you.

Cherlize wanted to refute that, she wanted to stay here, hide away, spend as much time with her mother as possible before those baleful events happened. She knew, though, that it wasn’t going to be. She would have to return to the castle, or else the fate she’d been shown might befall them earlier.

“I love you, mother.”

I love you too, my sweet, little Cherlize. Be safe. I will see you again, I’m sure.

A small giggle escaped her at the surety in her mother’s thoughts.

Can you go back to the castle the way you came here?

“I’m not sure how I even did it.” That ii was the manifestation of a new talent, Cherlize was certain – as was her mother. The problem then was to replicate the events that made her talent work.

Use the same process as you did go get here. Think of a place that is familiar to you and build it in your mind. Then you should be able to want yourself back there.

“But I don’t want to return there.”

You know what I mean, Cherlize. You must go back.

“I know.”

After staring at Adrianna for long moments, Cherlize nodded and then started to do as asked. She pictured her little corner of the ladies hall, the nest of blankets and sheets – the light eggshell of the walls. As the details came into sharper focus, she started willing herself back there. Cherlize could feel the same sensation welling up from her toes and looked into her mother’s face long enough to say. “Goodbye, mother.”

A/N: Shout out to Blackdawn for continuing to bug me on how far behind I got on keeping this one written! So here we are finally, the next installment of the tale. The manifestation of Cherlize's greatest power... I'll not explain it...because the next time we see Cherlize it will be explained more thoroughly.

NEXT UP: Hannibal

Just like the title says, we get a closer look at a man who will become a relatively large part of the overarching story...He's not the head of the pack, but he is a fair warrior in Damien's cadre of Devil's Own. Currently he has to survive his debrief with General Claudius over the altercation in the courtyard.