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CHAPTER EIGHT

ISOLDE

I watch Isaac and CJ stride away, both radiating that masculine, territorial energy that annoys me. The moment they’re out of sight, I slump against the bookshelf, my heart still racing from CJ’s proximity, his fangs against my skin, his possessive words.

I know he’s only messing with me, but he doesn’t realise how painful it is for me to hear him say these things and not mean them.

A shiver runs through me that has nothing to do with fear and everything to do with a hunger I’ve never experienced before. But I can’t afford to be distracted. Not when something unseen is writing death threats on my window.

Turning back to the shelves, I scan the spines, looking for anything that might help. Defensive magic is my natural talent, but seeing the unseen requires a different skill set entirely. I pull out a heavy tome titled Veils of Perception: A Compendium of Reveal Magics and settle at a nearby table.

The pages are brittle, the text faded in places, but I find what I’m looking for in the third chapter: a spell designed to pierce illusions and reveal hidden presences. It requires ingredients I don’t have and a level of magical control I’m not sure I possess outside my natural defensive abilities, but it’s a start.

I copy the ingredient list onto a scrap of parchment, my hand trembling slightly. Between creepy vampires and invisible threats, my first day at SilverGate is shaping up to be more dangerous than I anticipated. Freedom, it seems, comes with sharp teeth and bad intentions.

Stuffing the parchment into my pocket, I slip CJ’s jacket back on, taking comfort in the lingering scent of him. The memory of his fangs against my throat makes me shiver. But I can’t afford to be distracted by pretty monsters when there are more immediate threats lurking.

I have hours to kill before my first class starts at dusk, so my best bet is to head outside, find a herb garden, and hopefully tick some of these items off my list.

Clutching the book, I check it out and leave the library, navigating the shadowy corridors that are gradually filling with more students as the day progresses.

The academy grounds are as imposing in the dark murk as they were at full night. The perpetual gloom gives everything a muted, dreamlike quality. Gothic spires claw at the dark grey sky, and the grounds stretch out with stone paths, and ancient trees that seem to whisper as I pass.

Following one of the stone paths away from the main building, I find what I’m looking for: a walled herb garden, its gate slightly ajar. I slip inside, relieved to find it empty. The garden is a chaotic tangle of magical and mundane plants alike, many of which I recognise from my studies.

“Vervain, moonshade, devil’s trumpet,” I murmur, running my fingers over the plants as I identify them. The list calls for seven specific herbs, and I spot four of them immediately. The fifth—blood thistle—grows in a shadowy corner, its crimson spines glistening with what looks suspiciously like actual blood.

As I carefully harvest what I need, tucking each specimen into my pockets, I can’t shake the feeling of being watched. The garden walls offer some protection, but the sensation persists, a prickling at the back of my neck that makes me work faster.

I still need two ingredients: starlight sage and shadow vine. The first is tricky to find, but I spot it in a darkened corner. The second is a twisting tendril of pitch-black foliage that seems to absorb light rather than reflect it. It coils around a stone pillar near the back of the garden, its leaves rustling despite the absence of wind.

Approaching it cautiously, I reach out. The vine recoils from my touch, slithering higher up the pillar.

“Great,” I mutter. “Sentient foliage.”

I need to coax it, not force it. Drawing on what little I remember from my herbology lessons, I prick my finger with my fang, letting a single drop of blood fall onto the ground near the shadow vine’s base.

The effect is immediate. The vine dips down, a tendril snaking toward my blood offering. As it extends, I quickly snip off a small section with the garden shears I found hanging on the wall. The severed piece writhes in my palm, then stills.

“Sorry,” I whisper to it, feeling oddly guilty.

With six of the seven ingredients secured, I head back to my room. The final ingredient, blood of the forsaken, is not something I’m willing to contemplate just yet.

Back in my room, I spread the ingredients across my desk, arranging them according to the ritual instructions. The shadow vine still twitches occasionally, as if trying to escape back to its pillar. I secure it with a paperweight to stop it from wriggling away.

I glance at the window, now clear of any spectral messages. In a few hours, I’ll have my first official class at SilverGate. The thought sends a flutter of excitement and dread through me. I need this spell working before night falls again, but that final ingredient is going to be a bitch. Although, I’m pretty sure that there are plenty of forsaken around here, the question is, how do I get their blood?

The ritual is simple enough in theory. Combine the ingredients in a specific order, chant the incantation, and anoint my eyes with the resulting potion. It should grant me the ability to see what’s hidden for a full cycle of the moon, which is plenty of time to identify my unseen threat.

As I work, grinding herbs with a small mortar and pestle I found in the desk drawer, my thoughts drift to CJ. My body responds traitorously to the memory of his fangs against my skin.

The potion gradually turns a deep, iridescent purple, shimmering with flecks of silver. It smells of earth and ozone, the scent of magic brewing. Without the blood of the forsaken, however, it remains incomplete, maybe a half-measure that might offer glimpses but not the full clarity I need.

Sighing, I secure the potion in a small vial and tuck it into my pocket. I’ll have to find that final ingredient soon. Deciding to return to the dining hall to fill up on blood before my classes start, I frown at a commotion coming from outside.

I move to the window and gasp before I groan. “Dammit, CJ!”