He relaxed a little, but alertness and curiosity continued to burn in his eyes. ‘Sagean. Spelt with an A, pronounced with an E. Sage-en,’ he repeated, breaking it down into sounds.

‘Sage … en.’ I attempted to imitated him, but found it difficult to make the same sound he did when he pronounced the last two letters.

The corners of his lips upturned slightly. ‘Do you know who you overheard? Because no one but the council is supposed to know, let alone talk about it.’

I shook my head, lying through my teeth. ‘I don’t know. I didn’t recognize them.’

‘Ah.’

I sighed, letting my exasperation show this time. ‘You’re not going to tell me what the Dark He**ines are, are you? Or what the Prophecy of the He**ines is. Or why the vampires are so surprised. Or why the vampires are next.’

He cringed. ‘You heard all of that?’

‘Please tell me. What harm can it do? It’s not as though I’ll tell anyone I know what it is.’

He shook his head. ‘You do know that it’s been agreed by both the Vamperic council and an inter-dimensional council that you should have no knowledge of any other dimension but this one until you turn, right?’

‘That’s what that meeting was about when we went to London, wasn’t it? And that Fallon guy. Was he Sagean? He knew about this prophecy, didn’t he? How long ago did you find out that the girl had been found? Was it recently? I’ve not heard anybody mention this all before.’ I threw in the last couple of questions to test him; I knew the answer from my dream the night before, but I wanted to see how truthful he would be.

‘Slow down! I’ll tell you, okay?’ His eyes darted up and back down again, his hand running through his hair. My heart stopped, finally anticipating answers.

‘Right, where to begin?’ He took a deep breath, lowering his hand, and then launched into speech. ‘There are nine dimensions, parallel in almost every way; each is populated by humans as well as a much smaller number of dark beings, which I am not going to explain about.’ I was about to protest, but he cut in. ‘It’s worth more than my life, so no.’

He carried on. ‘The humans of each dimension have never really got on with the dark beings, other than in this dimension, where, with the exception of government officials, you are all pretty much oblivious to our existence. But about five thousand years ago, a Sagean scholar and prophet, yes, Sage-en,’ he said as I sounded it out once more. ‘A Sagean scholar claimed to know of a future age. Sure of his own abilities, he wrote what he had foreseen down in his scrolls.’ He raised his gaze to meet my own, his eyes flecked with grey at the edge. ‘He knew about the world wars and climate change and even about the invention of the atomic bomb. He knew that the treaties struck between the dark beings and the humans would fail and that war would be an ever-looming prospect. He knew of our world, Violet. He knew where we would go wrong.’

Enraptured, I remained silent and he took that as a sign to pause.

‘Sure you want me to carry on?’ I nodded and he let out a dry chuckle. ‘But he didn’t entirely leave us without hope. At the same time, he came up with the Prophecy of the He**ines, and in that he predicted that during this dark age, nine women would ascend to become kinds of … deities, I suppose. Above all Kings, they are meant to restore the balance with humanity we lost.’

I could imagine it. It was a fairytale, a hero’s tale, but this was real. This is real. My voice was quiet as I spoke; wrapped up in a story I was so intrigued by. The story of my world.

‘But you don’t believe it. At least, you didn’t.’

He shook his head. ‘Not many did, other than the Athenea – which is both the Sagean royal family and an actual place – and the Sagean people. It was disregarded as rubbish at the time anyway, because it placed women in power.’

I shifted closer, eyes wide with intrigue and slight disbelief, my voice no more than a whisper.

‘But now it’s coming true?’

‘Yes. I don’t want to believe it, but how can I not?’ His question was more directed at himself than at me, so I did not reply, memories of my dream last night still fresh. It’s true. It’s real.

‘The Sage of Athenea found their girl,’ I breathed and broke off in wonderment. My father had brought me up to be rational, but my experience here had changed that. I was ready to believe this, crazy and way-out as it seemed.

‘Do you know who she is?’

He shook his head. ‘The first He**ine? No idea. Nobody knows. The Sage have shut their borders so there is no way into the dimension and no way out. We can’t send messages and they certainly aren’t telling us anything. We have to wait on them to tell us. As usual.’

I frowned. ‘But how long could that take?’

‘Who knows?’ he answered. ‘Days, weeks, months maybe. They’ll bide their time and when they are ready, she will come. She will have to at some point, because she was born to awaken the other He**ines.’

I gripped the edge of the fountain, the cool spray chilling me again and spotting Kaspar’s jacket with water. ‘What do you mean?’

He shut his eyes, sighing. ‘The verses are in order. The first is about the Sage, the second about here, the third about the Damned, and so on. The first explains how the first He**ine must search out each He**ine. As the second is supposedly a vampire, she will come here first, find the second girl and then … well …’

He trailed off, shaking his head.

‘What is the first verse? Do you know it?’ I asked, doubting he would actually tell me.

‘Of course. Everybody knows it, apart from you puny little humans in this dimension.’ I scowled at his reference. ‘It’s far more beautiful in its native tongue, Sagean, because in English it’s been altered to make sense and to rhyme, but you can get the gist of it.’ He leaned back on his elbows, staring up at the starry sky, the words flowing from his tongue as though they had been spoken a thousand times.

‘Her fate is set in stone,

Bound to sit upon the first throne.

The last of her line and a symbol of the fine,

She is the last of the fall; a deity among all.

Her teacher, her love, her lie,

Alone, the first innocent must die,

For the girl, born to awaken the nine.’

He finished and his lips came together, his eyes downturned from the stars now.

‘Alone, the first innocent must die?’ I quoted, feeling the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end.

‘Haunting, isn’t it?’ he murmured. ‘Forty-five people will die if the entire Prophecy is true.’

I shivered, the intrigue for the subject fast become an unnerved chill. ‘I wouldn’t want to be that He**ine girl right now.’

He shook his head. ‘Neither would I. It’s not something I would wish upon anyone,’

‘What if it was someone you knew?’

He stood up abruptly, turning back to me, his form blocking the light from the house and moon, casting a long shadow across the grounds. ‘Then may fate have mercy upon her heart.’

When he looked back at me, a second shiver passed down my spine; gone was the amusement and the smirk. Instead, it looked as though just laying eyes on me seemed to hurt him.

‘Maybe we should go back in,’ I murmured, getting up too. I’ve got enough answers for tonight.

‘You’re right. C’mon.’ Together, we headed back in, ignoring the many stares of the onlookers. We were just passing the alcove beneath the balcony when he stopped. ‘Violet, wait.’

I froze in front of him and turned back to find him ducking into the alcove. I was taken aback, but quickly remembered I was still wearing his jacket.

‘Jacket. Here,’ I said, quickly slipping it off and handing it back to him.

‘No, it wasn’t that, but I do need it back,’ he chuckled. He pulled it on and reached into the breast pocket. ‘I have something for you.’

I knew my cheeks were moving from washed out to purple. ‘What? You shouldn’t have!’

He smirked. ‘Yes, I should. Think of it as a sorry I screwed up your life gift.’

‘I didn’t think you showed remorse?’

‘No, I don’t. If I regretted what happened in Trafalgar Square, there’s no way I would give you this,’ he clarified, and from his pocket he pulled a long chain, a pendant – no, a locket – hanging from it.

‘My God,’ I breathed, not believing what I was seeing. My eyes became glued to the tiny, sealed album, watching the emerald stone disappear and reappear again as it spun on the chain.

‘It was my mother’s locket. And inside it contains miniatures of my family. She gave it to me the week before she died and told me to give it to the woman that I felt would keep this family together. And … and I figured that was you.’

My voice caught in my throat. ‘I-I … you can’t!’

‘I can,’ he replied, already moving behind me to fix the clasp.

‘But—’

‘No buts.’

He lowered it over my head, bringing the chain behind my neck. I froze, afraid he might accidentally touch me. He fiddled for a moment and I could feel the locket against my skin, the metal unnaturally cold and not warming as I pulled my hair from underneath the chain.

‘There,’ he breathed, sidestepping around me. ‘Look after it.’

Slowly, ever so slowly, he brushed his fingertips across the emerald, gradually tightening his grip around the pendant. I stopped breathing as he brought the locket away from my skin to his lips. He kissed it.

‘Look after it,’ he repeated and then replaced it, just as I took a single, slow breath. His fingers, as cold as the locket, just for a moment, a second, traced across my skin. But it was long enough. Kaspar met my gaze, the sudden fear I felt bubbling in my chest reflected in his eyes as he turned away and looked past me, beyond the alcove to the doors. I followed his gaze. I knew what I would see.

Standing beside the doors, his eyes darker than the night beyond the lantern-light, was the King.

FORTY-NINE

Violet

I took a step away from Kaspar, clutching protectively at the locket; more afraid he might take that from me than of his actual anger.

‘You just don’t understand, do you, son of mine?’ His words were calm. Controlled. A threat.

‘Understand what, Father?’ Kaspar replied in the same tone.

The King took a few steps forward, bringing himself into the shadow of the alcove. Folding his arms across his chest, he observed his son through black eyes – the only thing that betrayed his anger.

‘The philosophy of look but do not touch.’

A gentle breeze blew across the veranda and through the alcove, stirring my hair. The lanterns swayed, chasing the shadows away and spilling light across both the King and Kaspar. For a moment, I was struck by how much they were alike – from the way they stood to the arrogant smirk they shared; even the determined line of their brows was identical.

Kaspar chuckled hollowly. ‘I understand that perfectly. You gave me that lecture earlier. But this is about more than that, isn’t it?’

‘Far more,’ the King answered. ‘I have many reasons, one of them being that you need to take responsibility and learn that your actions have consequences.’

‘I know that,’ Kaspar snapped. ‘I know it far too well.’

A small crowd was beginning to gather on the steps, watching the scene with interest.

‘No, you do not. If you did, you would acknowledge that you must stay away from her.’

The words were out of my mouth before I could stop them. ‘Her has a name.’

His eyes snapped to me, as though he was noticing I was there for the first time. His eyes settled on the locket and I snatched the pendant back in my hand, unsure of his reaction. The chain tugged against my neck, so taut it threatened to snap. The locket itself was still cold in my hand, despite having rested against my warm skin for quite a few minutes. His eyes widened in recognition and I tensed, ready to move, but instead of hissing or snarling as I expected, he spoke with a calm tenderness I didn’t know he was capable of.

‘Miss Lee, may I have the pleasure of the next dance?’

‘No,’ said Kaspar.

I glared at him, knowing he was creating even more of a scene in front of the growing number of onlookers.

‘I don’t have any choice,’ I mouthed back, dipping into a curtsey for the King. With a grimace, he stepped aside. The King was already halfway up the steps and I trailed behind, trying to ignore the stares of the crowd.

The King swept straight into the centre of the room as I passed through the shadow of the double doors. Immediately, the music ceased to play and those who were dancing came to a halt. The crowd sprawled out to form a ring.

So just us dancing then. Great.

The orchestra looked towards the King, who called out a simple dance that I knew from Sky’s dance lessons; even better, it was one that did not involve being in hold. My tense shoulders lowered, only to tighten again when my eyes flickered towards Kaspar, who had worked his way towards the front. He looked concerned.

The ring closed around us, sealing me into its centre. The violins struck up; the babble died, and I curtsied, long and low, whilst opposite, the King remained upright.

The music began; I took a few steps forward, as did the King until we met in the middle, coming within inches of each other.

‘Miss Lee.’

‘Your Majesty.’

We backed away and circled one another, returning to our original positions before coming together again.