“I trusted you, Sofia,” he said.

“Since when?” I practically spat the words out. “You’re keeping me prisoner here, Aiden. I want to go back to Derek.”

“Forget him, Sofia! As long as I am alive, you and him will never be together!”

Tears were brimming my eyes as I shook my head. “You don’t understand what you’re saying. You don’t know how impossible it is for me to forget Derek. We belong together. You don’t know what’s at stake as long as you keep us apart.”

“If he wanted to be with you, Sofia, why isn’t he here? Why did he leave? If he thought that it was better for you to be together than apart, why then is he not making a move to get back to you?”

He was preying on my deepest fears and doubts, but I couldn’t let him. I knew what I had with Derek was real. If he wasn’t coming to me, then there was a damned good reason why and I wasn’t about to sit there and doubt everything we had, because he wasn’t coming through for me the way I had wanted him to. I stared up at my father, not knowing what to say in answer to his questions.

“Well?” he pried, perhaps thinking that he gained some ground with me.

“I believe in Derek in a way I could never bring myself to believe in you.”

“What did that man feed you to make you so obsessed with him?” His words were cutting like a knife, but he didn’t seem to care. “Is it the fact that you seemed to have already gulped gallons of his blood or is it because you’ve already willingly fed him gallons of yours? He is immortal, Sofia. How could you ever be together? Unless…” His eyes widened with shock and accusation. “You’ve thought about it, haven’t you? You’ve considered getting turned.”

I ground my teeth with the pressure I was feeling from my father. Exhausted by everything that was happening and consumed by my desire to be with Derek, I spat the truth out before I could bite my tongue. “Yes. I have. Not only have I considered it, I have been turned. Multiple times. Derek tried to turn me when he was still here with me, and yet, here I am…still human.”

Aiden’s eyes widened with horror as he tried to process what I had just told him.

“Don’t look so surprised, Father. It’s not like you didn’t know.” I couldn’t hide the spite in my voice. “You knew that the reason I was so sick after Camilla left was because as a child, she gave me to Borys Maslen. He tried to turn me when I was nine years old so that I could be his forever, but he failed. Claudia tried to turn me back at The Oasis, but she failed. Derek tried to turn me. He, too, failed. So don’t worry, Father. You never have to worry about me becoming one of the creatures you’re relentlessly trying to rid the planet of.”

Aiden looked horrified, then it became clear to me that he knew nothing about what I was talking about—about me being immune.

I creased my brows as we both stood at a standstill that seemed to last for eternity. “You didn’t know…” I eventually said.

“It’s impossible.” He shook his head. “How could that be true? How could anyone be immune from the curse?”

He was looking at me like I was some sort of rare specimen that he accidentally stumbled upon. I began to wonder what implications came with the news that I had just revealed.

“Sofia… You’re immune from being a vampire? How is that possible?”

“Perhaps there’s a cure…” I found myself voicing out the thought that’d been circling my mind ever since Derek failed to turn me. Images of the confused look on his face when he realized that I could never be one of his kind. I fought the urge to give in to the doubts I felt about him leaving. Did he leave because he realized that I could never be immortal? Did he give up on us? The thoughts were too painful to continue mulling over. I shifted my focus back to Aiden. “What if there’s a cure? I escaped vampirism… Maybe Derek can too.”

Aiden shook his head, brushing away my musings. “No. There’s no cure. Curses don’t have cures.” His voice choked and I could swear that a part of him wished that there indeed was a cure, but he was stubborn in his resolve as a hunter. “Stop this, Sofia. Stop buying into all these delusions that you can be with that bastard.”

This time, it was my turn to be stubborn and firm. “No, Aiden. I think there’s a cure and trust me when I say I’m never going to stop until I find it. If it’s the only way we can be together, then so be it. Derek will become immune too.”

CHAPTER 19: DEREK

I stared at Corrine for a couple of seconds, my mind reeling. Don’t you think I want that? Don’t you think I want Sofia here with me? But there was no way I could bring Sofia back. I didn’t even know where hunter headquarters was.

“I want her here. You know that,” I reiterated to Corrine, “but right now, I need to get The Shade back into shape…starting with this lockout. I need the humans back at their posts before the island crumbles.”

“And what if Felix and his men randomly begin attacking people again?”

“I’ll post guards over the Vale and all the other establishments to make sure nobody hurts the humans.”

Corrine scoffed at this. “You’re going to post vampires to stand guard over humans? Do you really think they’ll agree to that?”

“They won’t have a choice. I’m their king.”

“They have a choice to join your father and Felix in rebellion. Besides, if you have the guards and knights posted mainly at the Vale, how are you going to guard the Crimson Fortress, which we cannot, under any circumstances, allow your father’s men to occupy?”

I was starting to get frustrated. Rosa could probably tell, because she was beginning to nervously flinch on her chair. I decided to spare her from further discomfort and found a way to wave her off. “Rosa, could you please get Sam, Kyle and Ashley here? Ian and Gavin too…”

I didn’t miss the way her face lit up like a bulb the moment I mentioned Gavin’s name. I raised a brow in curiosity and she most likely mistook it as me waiting for her to get out so she practically leaped from her seat, mumbled something undecipherable, before going off.

I then shifted my attention back to Corrine. “What do you want to happen, Corrine? Even if I could get Sofia back here, how is she going to help fix all this?”

Corrine gave me a look that made me feel like the most irritating creature in the planet. Nobody at The Shade could make me feel as stupid as the brown-haired, olive-skinned witch could. She heaved a deep sigh. “You’re being a fool, Derek. Are you really that blind to the power Sofia has over the people of The Shade—especially the human population?”

I was taken aback. Humbling as it was, I had to admit that Corrine had a point. Sofia had a way about her that seemed to win the trust and affection of people around her. The people of The Catacombs—Naturals or otherwise—listened to her.

“If she was here, then all you have to do is keep the vampires in check and she can do whatever magic she does with the humans. That’s half of your work done for you.”

“Even if that were true, Corrine,” I said, refusing to admit out loud that it made sense, “I still haven’t got the slightest clue how to bring Sofia here.”

Right then, Ashley and Sam walked into the room, hands clasped together. Kyle and Ian followed right after—both men occasionally glaring daggers at each other when the other wasn’t looking. Gavin followed after, seemingly deep in thought, while Rosa trailed behind him, looking like a fan girl running after her biggest idol.

“Finally!” Ashley, who apparently heard the tail part of our conversation, exclaimed as she and Sam plopped on the couch beside Corrine. “We’re addressing the elephant in the room! How to get Sofia back here, because let’s face it… It’s been a disaster without the two of you here calling the shots.”

I narrowed my eyes at her. I didn’t know why, but it came as a surprise to me that people around The Shade actually saw Sofia and me not as separate individual entities, but as a unit working together to rule The Shade.

“Well, I’d been bugging him about it, but he seems to think it’s hopeless,” Corrine informed.

Ashley stared at me thoughtfully. “Well, it kind of is…”

I was getting exhausted with the conversation. I wanted Sofia back. How could I not? But to go on and on about it, knowing that it was next to impossible for me to find her was beginning to get irritating.

“It seems impossible,” Ashley reiterated, glancing at Corrine, before addressing me. “Do you remember where hawk headquarters is?”

I shook my head at the baby vampire. “No. You were once a hunter, Ashley. Don’t you know where it is?”

“I never ranked high enough to ever be trusted with exact locations. I was blindfolded and escorted to headquarters whenever I needed to be there.”

“They did the same thing to me. There was absolutely no way I could figure out where exactly it was.” We were at a dead end, and I was hoping they’d just stop talking about it. Thinking of Sofia just made me realize how much I needed her, which was a depressing thought considering I had no idea how to get her back.

“Remind me again why you left her there.” Ashley testily squinted an eye at me.

I remembered the time when she was still human. I had completely lost myself and allowed the darkness to consume me. She suffered the brunt of the consequences that came with that after I attacked her and fed on her several times. I craved her so much after I had first tasted her blood. I left her because I might do to her what I did to you.

Not quite comfortable about discussing my choices with everyone there, I changed the subject. “I didn’t call you here to discuss Sofia. We need to put a stop to this ridiculous lockout. Gavin and Ian, you were working with Sofia as the human leaders of this place. What are your thoughts on this matter?”

Both men exchanged glances and Gavin was about to speak his mind when Xavier showed up. “The lovely Natalie Borgia comes with a message.” From behind him, Natalie emerged and stepped into the room.