Page 1 of Cursed Lifeline

Prologue

Draven

Song: Prologue to Beauty & The Beast | Mathias Fritsche

1692 | Salem,Massachusetts

“Spellbinding Storybooks closes in one hour,” her father calls out, as the ladies quietly sneak out the backdoor of their cottage, “be home before your mother realizes you're gone.”

“Yes, Father,” the girls whisper in fits of schoolgirl giggles as they hurry along the path leading from the back of their house to the main road toward town.

I follow them closely. My feet glide through the air, ghosting over the earth, rocks, twigs, and pooling puddles of rain. The storm from earlier continues to lightly bathe us in a foretelling downpour that warns I’d be smart to pay better attention to its dire, relentless drizzle.

But I can’t. Not with my eyes and heart set on her.

The taller of the two girl's eyes glance back over her shoulder, sensing my presence. When her emerald irises meet mine, all reason I’ve wrestled with for weeks, months, and years now fly away with a strong gale from the overhead squall.

Smirking, the woman’s gaze leaves mine as she focuses back forward. She knew I’d be here. She knew I couldn’t stay away. Even after she tried to push us both to listen to reason a few nights ago.

Knowing so, I quicken my pace as the girls grip the hoods of their pointed capes, tighten their hold around their collars to ward off the storm, and hurry to their destination.

Spellbinding Storybooks.

A hidden bookstore operating as a front for the Divine Raven Coven of Witches mystical supplies. The coven is a community of sorceresses, enchantresses, mages, wizards and warlocks in Starlight Hallow. A subdivision in Salem where the infamous twins, Ember and Drusilla Darkmore, have just come of age. Their rise to maturity signals an unfortunate prophecy that has pricked and trailed its panicked touch across every immortal’s heart for centuries as its raspy,whisper relentlessly haunted, “Foul deeds will rise through all the earth.”

When they reach town, the duo duck into a dark alleyway and wind their way down a cobblestone path before stealthily maneuvering behind a seemingly dead-end wall covered in dark foliage, which helps to mask the enchanted entrance to another world.

As the girls slip inside the bookstore, I mist through the walls and stay hidden behind a shelf, offering me a small window to watch them through two tragic volumes of literature.

Romeo and Juliet and Hamlet, a lethal combination that threatens to be everyone’s downfall if they’re not careful.

One of the girls slides her hood off her head, turns to her twin, and teases, “To think, in a fortnight, you’ll no longer be by my side, sneaking off in the night to gather secret ingredients for forbidden spells.”

Rainwater ripples down the ebony fabric of her cape as she unties it at the nape of her neck and shakes excess water from her dark hair. But she’s not the one who has garnered every second of my attention since I set eyes on her. My heart aches as her sister’s right hand rises and gently pulls at the pointed hood above her head. Her veil falls to her shoulders, and I suck in a thirsty breath, then silently groan from the fragrance of her damp skin drifting towards me on an enthralling breeze.

“I’d rather spend my life putting my time and effort towards an obtainable reality, sister, than dabbling in forbidden fantasies that may or may not come true,” she smiles.The smaller of the two sisters pouts and opens her mouth to speak, but she’s cut off, “especially if it means meddling where fate and destiny are clear they don’t want you.”

“Casting spells is what we were born to do,” the smaller of the two girls argues.

Besides their slight height difference, the girls' features are almost identical. Raven black hair. Emerald eyes. Their high cheekbones are made more breathtaking by their ghostly white skin decorated only by an adorable dusting of freckles across their nose that lead a tempting path to full, ruby-red lips. Though they are young, their bodies are mature, mouth-watering, and filled out in all the right places males are so eager to explore, touch, and taste once young boys start to feel the calling on their souls to turn into men who claim.

“Perhaps,” the taller of the two taunts playfully, bringing my attention back to why we’re here, and the spell they’re secretly shopping for. She slides her cape off her shoulders and gracefully places it across her forearm. “But playing in the land of the forbidden never ends well, even when you have magic on your side.”

She moves past her sister towards the back of the shop as the smaller of the two girls rolls her eyes and starts to peruse the shelves for ingredients.

“What are we looking for again?” she calls out, as I mirror the taller girls' movements step for step on the other side of the bookshelf. Her eyes meet mine through pages littered with words that will become classics someday.

Tension builds as we walk toward the end of the line of storybooks.

“Rose quartz, tourmaline, hawthorn berries, rose petals…” her sister’s voice drones on in a muffled tone as we eagerly move simultaneously towards the crystals tucked away in the back of the shop.

Illuminated by moonlight cascading in through a stained glass window, I watch from the shadows as the woman’s fingertips lightly graze across moonstone, amethyst, and tiger’s eye, before falling on black obsidian.

She picks up the stone and studies it sadly in her small palm. Known as a root chakra to help keep one grounded, obsidian is also popular for protection, particularly when warding offmykind.

Blood thirsty demons that stalk their prey in the night.

“Embracing a new future so quickly,” I growl, emerging through the iridescent gleam of the full moon overhead.

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