“Is there any way to know what exactly it is?”
“Well…” she started uncertainly. “Sometimes you can smell some of the ingredients, especially flowers or berries, or blood. But it's not really safe – there's poisons which can function through the smell, one sniff and you are dead.” She tilted her head to the side, her eyes twinkled to Dante. “Anyway, it's not really effective, you won't get every ingredient for sure and you can confuse one of the smells with another one, depending how much of a master you are.”
“Another way?”
“It's a difficult one, with the right spell and tools it's possible to find out the key ingredients, but it's not an easy spell.”
“Can you do this?” the vampire inquired.
“Even if I could, it's hard to get tools for it and the ingredients for the spell. It's not an option, if you want to do it quickly,” she sighed.
“Do you know which powders can look like this one?”
“Hm…” Violette lightly shook the bottle. The dust, despite being silver, had a blue undertone and darker sparkles, and it awakened some thoughts in her mind. “Like I said I don't know a lot about powders, but it could be sleeping powder…or vanishing fog. It also looks like–Oh wait!” Amusement filled her voice. “It can be a memory powder, remember I told you earlier?”
Dante drew a deep sigh.
“Maybe, after all, it's still about her memories,” she implied with pride.
“Or,” Dante snatched the bottle out of her hand. “You are simply wrong.” His voice sounded bitter, almost acrid which made Violette flinch back.
She wondered since their first conversation about the witch’s memories, why Dante was so against this theory? What does he hide? However,he was always hiding something…What if in these memories she'll see Dante from a bad side? Not like he was a good person, but what if she'll see what he had done to the witch that made her put the mask on him? Could it be a reason? Or there was something else, something that he didn't want to see himself? He said he doesn't want to talk about it, now Violette started to think the core of the problem was not her being nosy but perhaps, him not wanting to dredge up the past.
Dante put the vial back in the box. His gaze turned sullen, eyes dimmed as if they were not dark enough before. And she would not have disturbed him, but one question remained unresolved.
“What are we gonna do now?”
Dante kept his eyes on the box.
“I don't know,” he said honestly. “I have to think about it. Let's go find a place to stay if you don't want to freeze.”
Violette stared at his back as he was drifting away. She saw him like this for the first time, perhaps he still felt cold and arrogant, but she'd never seen him…sad. With that, she clutched the box he gave her, closer.
They didn't talk for some time, Violette even held the distance and was treading behind. Her eyes were scrutinising the box case – it was very simple, she'd never have thought it could belong to the same witch from the crypt with jewelry and crystal boxes. Her eyes studied the slightly cracked surface and colorful drawing of lupin flowers on it. Then she opened the box – abottle with magic powder rolled upon the bottom along with her steps. She raised her eyes just a little bit and found a line in cursive on the inside of the case:
Violette stopped.
“Dante,” she called out, “there's something.”
He crept up on her practically unnoticed. Towering over, his eyes scanned the inscription.
“Did you see this before?” she asked.
A simple answer left his mouth, “No.”
“Could it be left on purpose?” The question slipped from her lips as she turned her face to the vampire, not noticing how close he was until her breath brushed his neck.
He mysteriously tilted his head to the side, occupied with thoughts.
“More likely,” he finally said, his tone unsure or he might have tried to hide his dissatisfaction. Another riddle definitely wasn't something they both wanted to see, however it couldn't be even called this way: it was just a set of words, resembling a warning or possibly advice.
Violette turned her attention back to the words on the wooden surface.
“I don't understand,” she murmured.
“I think that is the point,” he said coldly. The words written by the witch didn't surprise him. Violette couldn't unravel if he was tired, didn't care or it was something he exactlyexpected. He told her already that the woman who cursed him was cunning and mischievous, capable of vileness and tricks.
The raindrop dripped before Violette's eyes right onto the beige surface. Another cold raindrop fell right between her eyes, making her squint and scrunching her nose.
