Sebastian takes me back to the bedroom where I woke and locks me in. I curse at him through the door, but he ignores me. I sit on the bed, unsure of what I’m supposed to do while I wait for him to come back. Time passes slowly, and when I hear heels approaching, I guess I’ve been left alone for maybe an hour.

The door slowly opens, and a woman peeks inside. When she sees me sitting calmly, she smiles and proceeds to open the door wide. Though she appears young, her face is weathered, like a woman who’s seen too much. She wears a black dress and an apron across her middle. She tucks the key to my room into her pocket. “Dinner will be served shortly. The masters would like you to eat with them.”

I completely pass over her referring to them as her masters. That’s a different conversation entirely. They want me to eat with them? Smile and act polite and forget they broke into my home, kidnapped my sister and me, and won’t let me see her? No matter how curious I am about them and what they know about me, they can’t make that right.

“I’m not sure we follow the same diet.”

The maid doesn’t care. “If you’ll follow me, I can take you to the dining room.”

She walks away, and when I don’t follow, she peeks her head back into the bedroom. “I’m supposed to tell you that he’ll cut off one your sister’s fingers if you decline. Sorry about that.” She makes an apologetic face as her shoulders hunch.

How can a woman work for vampires who threaten to cut off fingers? For obvious reasons, I give in to their request. But this woman? Why does she follow them? Did they threaten someone she loves too? They must have. I can’t imagine any other reason why someone would stay here unless mind control is real, and they’ve hijacked her brain.

I keep a slow pace as I take in the rest of my surroundings. She allows it, keeping by my side. We descend down a single flight of stairs. My hand slides over the smooth, dark-stained bannister. When we reach the high-ceilinged foyer, I spin around and spy the gothic metal chandelier with proper candles in it that, thankfully, don’t drip in my eyes. How the hell do they light those? My only solution is impossible. Flying. In truth, the longer I’m here, the more I question my knowledge. Can vampires fly? The one in the alley sure as hell seemed as if he could. Though if I’m being honest, it was more of a healthy jump than a flight path. The only knowledge I have about vampires is from books, and I have no idea whether any of it is fact or fiction. If vampires are real, mustn’t all the stuff about them be true too?

We turn down a hallway, and after about ten feet or so, she pulls open sliding wood doors to reveal a dining room with a table longer than my driveway. I let out a whistle. How do people expect to eat and talk to one another when they have to shout across a room?

Alexander sits at the head with Sebastian to his right. While Alexander is dressed formally in a suit and bow tie, Sebastian is in the same jeans and black T-shirt he wore the last time I saw him. They both stand as I approach.

“I’m a prisoner, not a guest,” I say. “Don’t stand on my account.”

Alexander holds the back of the high-backed chair while I sit, and I keep my eyes on him as he pushes me in. I don’t have eyes in the back of my head and having a vampire at my back makes me more than a little nervous.

The vampires sit, and a lady, also in black and white, comes through a swinging door with a tray of bowls. She sets one in front of each of us. It’s red-orange with some green herbs floating on top.

I can’t believe I’m sitting here about to be served a formal meal with vampires while my sister is God knows where. The guilt hits me square in the chest. “Will my sister be joining us?”

Sebastian fills his spoon with the liquid and quietly slurps it. Alexander waits for me, pointing with his head to the bowl in front of me.

“This is ridiculous. I’m supposed to sit here and eat with the two of you while you do God knows what to my sister? Where is she?” I demand.

Alexander rolls his eyes and plucks his phone from the inside of his coat pocket. After tapping, he holds up a live video, muted, of my sister as she kicks the living shit out of a door in a cell. “As you can see, she’s in good health.”

Sebastian takes another sip of his soup.

“Why can’t she eat with us? Why treat us so differently?”

“Honestly, of the two of you, you’re more civilized. We need your help, and quite frankly, she isn’t as motivated to save you as you are her.”

“I don’t believe you.” But I hear the doubt in my own voice, and it makes my stomach churn. I feel as if they’re trying to divide us, and I’m falling for it.

“Your sister thinks we’re abominations. She’d rather die than do anything to help us. Not that it matters. You’re the one we need,” Alexander says with a sneer.

“Because I’m more than human?”

He ignores my question as he muses to himself. “Surprisingly, she’s as human as the maid.”

In the interest of getting them to talk, I decide to disclose some little details. What better way to gain their trust? Sebastian wants me to trust them back? Well, here’s me offering them a kernel. “It’s not surprising at all. I’m adopted.”

Alexander and Sebastian stop eating, their spoons in mid-air.

“Come again?” Sebastian says.

“You must have done some research on me to know about my parents, but clearly, you didn’t dig deep enough. They aren’t my blood. I don’t know who my mother is.”

Alexander and Sebastian exchange a glance.

“I don’t like this,” Alexander says.

Sebastian holds up a hand to silence him. “That makes no sense. I went through every record of yours I could find. The names of your parents on your birth certificate match the names of the man and woman who died over a year ago in a car accident.”

“That’s impossible. I remember the day they picked me up from the orphanage. You can ask my sister. She’s almost five years older than me. She would have been ten—or just about. I was adopted. I don’t know where you got that certificate, but it’s fake.”

In my mind, I try to remember seeing this document. I have a license, a social insurance card, a passport even…but have I ever seen my birth certificate? I must have, and yet, I can’t recall seeing it once. Why is it that the longer I remain with these vampires, the more I question everything I’ve ever known?

“I want to see it.”

“That can be arranged,” Sebastian says.

I don’t expect him to agree so easily. It stuns me. Without words, I merely nod in thanks.

We sit in silence while they finish their soup. As Alexander quietly sips the very last of the liquid, he asks, “Not hungry?”

I merely shrug.

“It’s not poisoned.”

“It’s not poison I’m worried about.” I pick up my spoon and dip it in the liquid. As I hold it at chest level, I turn the spoon to let it slowly pour back into the bowl, examining the consistency. I am hungry. But for all I know, there could be blood in this—or body parts—all pureed into some smooth sauce meant to look positively normal.

“What is this?”

“Bisque.”

“Blood bisque?”

Sebastian and Alexander exchange a look and chuckle softly.

“You eat real food?”

“Tell me, Emily, what do you know about vampires?” Alexander asks. “I’m curious what rumors humans believe nowadays. There’ve been so many over the years. They vary slightly, but they’re always essentially the same.”

“I don’t know…I guess I only have books and movies to go by. If I’m using those as a guide, I’d have to say I didn’t expect you to eat human food. Just blood.”

Sebastian holds my eyes. “While we don’t have a pulse, our bodies still process food, still eliminate it. Food is a pleasure we don’t deny ourselves.”

I’ll save that thought for later because it creeps me out to think about a vampire on the toilet. It’s entirely too normal to be true.

“What else?” Alexander pushes away his soup.

“The can’t go out in the sunlight. They burst into flames.”

“Fiction,” Sebastian says. “It weakens us, and we prefer to sleep during the day, but it doesn’t harm us. We don’t burst into flames, as much as I’m sure you wish we would.”

“Silver?” I ask.

Alexander holds up his spoon. I pick up mine. It could very well be real silver. So I guess that’s fiction, too.

“Can you fly?”

“Not anymore.” Alexander’s face drops as he looks off to the side. A memory? Sadness? He strikes me as a little crazy so who knows what’s on his mind.

“What do you mean? Anymore?”

He shakes off his musings. “Next.”

I file that one away for later. They could fly. Past tense.

“Do we need to continue when there are more important things to discuss? You wanted to test my blood, and you have. So now that you know what I am—and I’d love for you to fill me in because I’m still clueless—what’s next? How do I get out of here and save my sister?”

“Ready to leave so soon? And here I thought you were warming to us,” Alexander says.

“I think it’s a given I don’t like you. Besides kidnapping my sister and me, you threatened to cut off my sister’s fingers if I didn’t come to dinner, so…”

Sebastian dead-eyes his brother, who merely shrugs.

“Do you want to do the honors, brother?” Sebastian’s tone is clipped.

Alexander clears his throat and adjusts in his chair. “I suppose it won’t hurt to tell you. If you know already, it’s hardly news. If you don’t, well, you likely won’t know what to do about it anyway.” He leans in, his fangs elongating enough for me to notice. Instinctually, I lean away and swallow the lump building in my throat. “You’re a blood hunter, a reaper, the first one we’ve seen in centuries. By all accounts, your bloodline was exterminated. I’m not sure how you and your family managed to stay hidden all these years. Clearly, you’ve had help.”

I try to process what he says, but it’s impossible because it doesn’t make sense. I know what a reaper is in the traditional sense, and they might as well be a myth because no one has ever seen one. I’m also focused on his final statement: By all accounts, your bloodline was exterminated. Does this have something to do with why I was put up for adoption?

“A reaper? Like black cloaks and a scythe?”

Another server pushes through the swinging door. The door creaks loudly, causing me to jump in my seat and drop my spoon. The utensil falls to the table and lightly bounces as a clanking noise echoes through the large space. I take a breath to calm myself and my racing heart slows to its normal rhythm.

Another server follows close behind the first one and I can’t help but notice their long blond locks, flawless skin and doe eyes. Clearly, vampires appreciate the superficial.

Alexander and Sebastian lean away from their bowls as one removes our dirty dishes and another one sets down plates of steak so raw it’s blue, potatoes, and mixed vegetables. It’s arranged thoughtfully with the meat cut in slices and fanned out around the middle on top of the potatoes with vegetables around the edges. I notice mine was cooked a hair longer but still bleeds.

The ladies exit, and I wait impatiently for a response to my question as Sebastian and Alexander dig into their meat. Sebastian chews quietly while Alexander relishes his with closed eyes as if it’s the most delicious meal he’s ever eaten. My face scrunches up in horror as I wonder if he eats human meat.

“Where were we?” He presses a finger to his temple. “Right. Reapers.” His tone changes when he says that word, as though it puts a foul taste in his mouth. “They’re not what you think. They don’t exist the way they’re portrayed in movies. For one, they were created by witches. And two, they take undead souls, not human ones. Any soul taken by a reaper goes straight to hell.”

My mouth hangs open. I have a million questions, and they all kind of blend together, so I can’t find the words to voice a single one. Sebastian starts to speak, but Alexander cuts him off by holding up a dismissive hand. It’s very clear who runs the show in their relationship.

“So someone like me…is meant to kill someone like you?” I chew on that a moment.

Alexander nods slowly.

Try as I might, there is no way I could get the better of either of them—not even on my best day.

“There are two kinds of vampires, elders and second generation. Second generation vampires are made.”

“Where do elders come from?”

“There’s a lot of speculation about that, but only an elder can say for sure, and they don’t volunteer that information. No smart vampire would dare ask.” Sebastian takes a break from cutting his steak.

“Now, anyone with a stake could potentially kill a made vampire. It’s unlikely because humans are truly a weaker species, but it can happen. But elders?” He shakes his head, his expression serious. “Only a hunter can kill an elder.”

“And what are you guys?”

When the silence becomes deafening, Sebastian finally says, “Alexander and I were both two of the very first made vampires. Alexander’s master is an elder.”

“Can anyone make one?”

“Yes,” Sebastian says.

“You said hunters were made by witches. Does that mean I was, too?” I have visions of a witch hatching me from an egg. This all sounds so ridiculous, and yet it feels true. Having it told to me by vampires helps with believability.

“A coven of witches got quite upset with us after the Black Plague in the thirteen hundreds, which—” Alexander holds up a hand and talks out the side of his mouth—“wasn’t really an illness.” Wink, wink. “They cast a spell to make each of them…” He looks to Sebastian for help, but I doubt he needs it. “How many were there?”

“Twenty-four.”

“Twenty-four,” Alexander repeats. “They cast a spell to make each of them strong enough to kill all vampires, elders included. Reaper was the name vampires gave for them because when they met a reaper, they surely met their end.”

“But Sebastian said that hunters were eradicated, so that doesn’t hold true,” I say.

He sighs. “One on one, sure, the vampires would fall, but the elders came together to kill each and every one of the reapers. Hunters were strong and resourceful, but even they didn’t stand a chance against an elder army.”

“But they missed one?”

Sebastian cuts into his steak and forks a bite. He chews and swallows. “Apparently.” But he doesn’t sound convinced and with good reason because here I sit.

“Well, I’m thoroughly confused. If I was made to kill vampires, why would you want to keep me alive?”

Alexander narrows his eyes at me. “You can thank my brother for that one. We’re safer with you dead, decapitated, and buried.”

I gulp loudly as I meet Sebastian’s eyes. He holds them for longer than it’s comfortable. The same vulnerability I saw in his eyes when he saw my blood results is back. How I’d like to know what he’s thinking. Alexander clearly thinks they should kill me, and I’m alive because Sebastian doesn’t. I need to know why. When I pose the question, neither wants to be the one to answer. “This is what I’m here for, right? You might as well tell me. You’ll have to eventually.” I wait with a raised eyebrow, willing him to get to his point before I die of old age.

“We want you to kill a vampire.”

I scrunch my face up, confused.

“You can’t kill one yourself? Is that a vampire rule or something?”

“If it was a made vampire, I would have done it already,” Sebastian says. “Emily, we need you to kill an elder. And unfortunately, no made vampire is strong enough to kill one. Not even us.”

They want me to kill an elder vampire, one they aren’t strong enough to kill themselves? Are they crazy? “I don’t care what the blood test says. There is no way I could kill an elder when I can’t even fight one of you.”

“Well, that remains to be seen,” Sebastian says.

“Or not.” Alexander forks another piece of steak. “All you have to do is get him to drink your blood. It’s hardly a test of strength or endurance. Even one as unimpressive as you could manage that.”

It takes all the energy I have not to flash him a middle finger as I frown at his model-like face. He’d probably bite it off. But that isn’t what stops me. In this moment, I finally feel a shifting of power. If they want to kill an elder bad enough to use me—a reaper—to do it, they must want this elder dead very, very badly. It doesn’t matter to me why. All that matters is what they’re willing to give up in exchange for my help.

“And what do I get in return?” I sound a hair braver than I feel.

While Alexander rolls his eyes, Sebastian speaks up, “What do you want?”

But I think they already know. “I kill this elder, then I want my sister and me to go free. And you never look for me again.”

Sebastian’s lips twitch at the corners.

“Consider it done,” Alexander says.

“But on one condition,” Sebastian adds.

I eye him suspiciously, and surprisingly, so does his brother.

“You and I will kill him together. You’re going to need all the help you can get if anything goes wrong. Your sister will be released only after he is killed. She doesn’t strike me as the kind of girl to go quietly while you remain here.”

I should give him an emphatic hell, no. They can’t keep my sister here for God knows how long while we track and kill a vampire, but I can’t deny he has a point. Staying here will keep her safe, and I also can’t deny that they know more about me and about vampires than I do. As much as I hate to admit it, their knowledge will give me an edge. I could demand we all work together, my sister included, but I already know she’s not like me. Plus, they’re my only hope of ever finding out who I really am and maybe, with their help, I can finally find my blood family.

When I offer a small nod, Sebastian and Alexander share a look of surprise.

“I want your word.” Whatever that’s worth. “And make sure she’s treated well and isn’t kept chained in a dungeon somewhere.”

“Done,” Sebastian says without hesitation.

“And I want to see her. Now.”

“As you wish. And when you see her, how about telling her to be nice? A vampire’s patience is only so thick.”