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“It is quite all right,” Maria began to protest.

“I am entering with Adem and no one else. ” My voice cut through the raised voices around me and rendered them silent. “This is a personal matter. ”

Laura pouted slightly, but her hand touched mine lightly. “I understand. ”

“Of course, if that is what you desire,” Maria stammered, unsure of the situation. She lived in fear of me and Vlad, yet she was complicit in many of our dealings.

“Perhaps you should have summoned the fortuneteller to the palace,” Sir Stephan said, his tone dangerously defiant.

My glare silenced him.

Adem opened the parlor door and I left my hosts behind, slipping into the warm darkness within. The fortuneteller sat at a round table draped in black fabric with a single white candle flickering in the center. The woman before me was not what I had anticipated. I thought I would be facing a crone, but this woman was very young, perhaps a little older than I. Clad in traditional gypsy clothing and jewelry, she was an exotic creature with black hair and dusky skin. Her blind, white eyes were heavily lined with makeup and somehow they did not detract from her beauty. The room smelled of incense and herbs.

The door clicked closed behind me, and I stood in the gloom hoping with all my heart this mysterious woman could help me.

“I know what you are,” she said, speaking in a heavy accent. Holding up a hand decorated with many rings, she compelled me to stay where I stood.

A man emerged from the shadows to stand behind her. He was much older with more white hair than black and a thick mustache. Also dressed in traditional gypsy clothing, he rested one hand on her shoulder.

“I mean no harm,” I said in a tone I hoped sounded gentle and not too desperate.

Adem placed his hand on my shoulder, mirroring the gypsy man.

Her blind eyes stared in my direction, the sound of her deep breaths filling the room. The warm air felt abruptly heavier and more fragrant as she sat in total stillness. At last, she raised both hands, her fingers twisting into a strange salute.

“Sit down,” she said at last, lowering her arms.

The gypsy man took three steps back, but did not take his gaze from me.

With as much dignity as I could muster, I sat down and rested my hands upon my lap, my small purse tucked under my fingers. Adem remained behind me, ready to defend me at a second’s notice.

The fortuneteller lifted a heavy bag made of embroidered silk onto the table and rummaged through it. At last, she laid a black stone, pitch as night before her. Without a word, she returned the bag to the floor at her side. Extending her arms, she rested her hands upon the table, palms up.

“Give me your hands,” she ordered.

I obeyed. My white cold flesh looked strikingly pale against her dark warm skin. She did not flinch away from me, but stretched out her fingers beneath my hands. She did not say a word, did not blink, and did not speak for many minutes. Finally, she slid her hands around mine, raised my palms upwards, and rested her fingertips in the center of them.

“You are young, not old. You are powerful, but untamed. You are passionate, but not truly dangerous unless riled to anger. You are intelligent, but thoughtless. You are wise, yet foolish,” she said, the suddenness of her voice sluicing through the darkened room startling me. She enfolded my left hand in both of hers, kneading it like bread dough. Her own fingers were rough, but somehow soothing. “You are afraid of a dark creature of the night. One of your own kind. He haunts you and hunts you. Like a great bat against the moon, he watches you from afar. ”

“I want protection from him,” I dared to whisper.

Pulling at my fingers lightly, she nodded. “The dragon. I see him now. ” Her lips turned into a smile and the coins decorating her scarves tinkled as she bent toward my hands. “I see the thread between you. It’s red and black, full of fire and pain. It pulses with your blood and fear, feeding him. ”

I did not understand her words, yet they felt true.

“Blood of his blood, power of his power, his flesh calls to you always because he made you. ” The tip of one of her fingers slowly drew along my palm, as though tracing a line only her blind eyes could see. “Bound. You are bound. ”

“Please, you must help me fight him. I wish to be free of him,” I said, my desperation weakening my tone.

Sitting in silence, the woman’s blind eyes appeared to stare into a world where she could witness the bond between me and Vlad and know my secrets.

“I cannot break the bond between you. ” She withdrew her hands and took the ring from my finger as she did so.

I was about to protest, when she held it up. “This I can curse. He gave it to you as a symbol of his dominion over you. ”

“Yes, yes he did. ”

“Why do you wear it still?”