“Oh, hi,” Violette faltered. “Yes…I'm not one of your…um…”
Her head swiveled at Dante by the tree, but to her own surprise he was no longer there. At first it seemed to her that he'd merged with the shadow, like all creatures of the night, but he really wasn't there. Then, she shuddered as a familiar low voice sounded right next to her. Dante's hand fell on her shoulder as he addressed the witch in a green cloak.
“We are hereseeking help, miss. My love was unfortunate enough to meet a terrible creature. A vampire.” His voice filled with sorrow. “And now this ail is following her. We were trying to find a way to get rid of it and we thought this,” he held out the spellbook, “could help us. Unfortunately, we are not able to read it. But we heard about witches who can and that is why we came here.”
Violette gawked at Dante. What did he call her?
Soon enough she turned her gaze back to the witch, widening her eyes like a poor puppy who needed help. In fact, she cringed from the weight of Dante's hand on her shoulder and the way he called her – the wordlovefrom his mouth sounded rather like a curse.
“Oh no…” the girl in the cape gasped. “Vampires are awful! Such a terrible sign to meet one. It's said vampires bring tragedy with them.” Her eyes shone with rue.
Violette nervously smiled. “Maybe because of biting? Biting is never a good thing to experience,” she tried to sound polite.
“Depends,” Dante retorted and Violette threw a pointed look at him.
“I'm so sorry for you. We beware of them, vampires are one of the most terrible species to ever exist. And if they like you enough to make a deal with you, well…They're just like a disease – once you meet one you'll never be able to get rid of them.”
“Oh…Nice to hear it…” Violette quietly mumbled, her shoulder visibly drooped. Like she wasn't in enough trouble.
“Oh, I'm sorry! I didn't mean to make the situation worse!” The girl’s forehead crinkled.
“Well, then you understandour concern,” Dante said frostily before warming his voice again. “Would you like to help us, please?”
“Oh…I–I don't know, everything that includes vampires is forbidden. They're like a horrible curse ruining everything around.”
“Oh, we'd never put you in danger, we just need to read a few pages of the book. It's all that we want. Please, don't reject us, we don't know where to go,” Violette confessed as her eyes left Dante's hand on her shoulder. And her tone seemed convincing enough by the way the witch angled her brows down.
“We wouldn't ask you if not for the fact that it's not a great idea to go to the Heggas, we already have to deal with evil spirits,” Dante said imposingly.
“I understand…It is indeed not safe,” she stumbled as her gaze traced to Violette and her eyes dropped to the magic wand on her waist. “Wait! Are you a witch?”
“Yes?” Violette pulled her brows together.
“Well, sisters should help each other! I won't leave you in such an awful position! Especially since you did such a long trip here.” She grabbed both her hands and shook them. “I'll tell my sisters that I'll be late and then come back to you! Just wait a second.”
“Thank you, it means a lot.”
Violette's words were sincere, it meant a lot to her, however the witch's reaction surprised her. Her eyes were following the emerald cloak as she was leaving them and then she let her forehead furrow.
“Don'tbe scared, these witches live in another dimension, they don't know what they're saying,” Dante said, more likely referring to the words calling his species a disease. Not quite an inspiring thing to hear indeed.
“I'm not scared,” she lied.
“Yeah, that's why you became so sad.”
“Uh, I'm sad because I can't join these witches. Such a shame I didn't hear about them before. Look at these nice capes!” she expressed.
Dante raised his brows and a faint smile took shape on his face, just a subtle lift of the corners of his lips, as his eyes went to the ground.
The witch they met was talking with some of the other women whose faces they couldn't see clearly. They were nodding their heads, listening to her very carefully but something suggested to Violette she wasn't quite telling them the truth. Or maybe not all of it. Maybe the girl didn't mention vampires because if she reacted that badly to their story – other witches didn't look terrified or even surprised. One of them glanced in their direction, warily narrowing her eyes at Dante, their gazes locked for a brief moment. And then emerald capes flashed in the moonlight, disappearing behind the trees.
Approaching Violette and Dante, the witch smiled at them as if they were already her close friends. It made Violette feel a pang of guilt,it seemed like this girl was truly sweet and kind, and they were just using her and it was so…so unfair. She shrunk again and that time because of how ashamed she felt. Though it seemed Dante wasn't bothered at all, his face lacked emotion, even a glimpse of understanding he was doing something bad. Maybe vampires weren't able to feel some types of feelings, like guilt, or maybe they didn't understand what is bad and what is good, or Dante was just a mongrel without a heart. Perhaps not because he was a son of the night but because he was just a bad person. She really was curious if he was even a little sorry for this poor girl who had mistaken two souls in need of help with them. And she was afraid she'd known the answer to it already – Dante didn't care about this girl, he didn't know her, well, to be honest, he didn't care even about Violette and she couldn't imagine him caring even about people he'd known. Humans were just toys in his immortal life. He'd use them for his needs and then throw them away as an old tattered trinket. He probably was thinking that the trust in her heart is her own mistake and she's too naive, which makes her easy prey, so it doesn't make him guilty. Assumptions were all that Violette had, she didn't know him at all and she wasn't sure she wanted to know how his twisted mind works but she knew curiosity will not leave her that easily.
The girl in the velvet emerald cape eyed Violette with a smile, the dark blonde pieces of her hair fell on her forehead between her brows.
“I'm Eve,” she beamed, her kind eyes glimmered at Violette. Strangely, she looked naivebut wise at the same time. Maybe she was just too trusting and believed there's good in people.Hermistake.
“I'm Violette.” Her lips curled into a faint smile. “And he's Dante.”
