Shew realized that this was part of her memory when Cerené designed the Chosen One’s ultimate sword. She had once heard her father say ‘if you’re going to show me a sword, you better use it.’ Suddenly, she remembered all the training her father gave her. She’d been trained to ride horses and kill with her sword. Her father had prepared her for war.

So my power isn’t just my silly fangs and scary looks?

“You have to kill Loki,” Alice insisted again behind Cerené’s back.

Shew shook her head ‘no’, and Cerené noticed.

“What is she telling you?” Cerené said. “Don’t listen to her. She isn’t your friend.”

“If Cerené leaves again, you will be shifted to the memory of your birthday, and you don’t want that to happen,” Alice spoke aloud, neglecting Cerené’s confusion. “The only way to wake up from this dream is to kill Loki, or he will kill you on your birthday. You still don’t remember how you met the Lost Seven or how Loki fell in love with you because of Charmwill’s spell. If you’re transported to your birthday scene, it’s unlikely you can survive it.”

“Now she’s talking about dreams and Loki and all kinds of madness again,” Cerené puffed. “She is crazy.”

“I will not kill Loki,” Shew gritted her teeth with the sword in her grip.

“No, you will. You have to get back to the Waking World and find a way to go to Murano,” Alice whispered the ‘Murano’ word, pointing at Cerené. “You need to go to where you can find out what the clue is,” Alice looked up as the bathhouse’s door sprang open again.

Shew and Alice stood paralyzed as the Queen of Sorrow appeared slowly in front of them.

“Shew?” Carmilla inquired. “What are you doing in the bathhouse?”

“I—” Shew stuttered.

“I asked you a question, Shew,” Carmilla’s demanding voice stirred the air and sent shivers into the princess.

Shew wasn’t concerned about explaining her intrusion into the Queen’s forbidden bathhouse. She worried how she’d explain Cerené and Alice standing next to her. Trying to stall, she turned at Alice but was surprised to find she wasn’t there. Then she turned to look for Cerené, who was also gone.

The fluttering curtain by the window suggested they’d escaped. Cerené must have escaped, fearing the Queen. Alice must have followed trying to stop her or Shew would be transported to the next part of the dream.

“Answer me!” Carmilla was in her face now.

Shew felt dizzy already, knowing that she was about to be shifted to the next part in the dream. She wanted to seize the moment and tell the Queen to go to hell. A perfect line before she escaped this scene. Unfortunately, Shew was too late. The dream had shifted and Shew was worried she was the one going to hell.

30

The Weighing of the Soul

Shew was standing in front of the Schloss. The world around her was quiet as if everyone had died.

It was noon. The beautiful sun slanted its rays upon the huge curvy design of the Schloss’ facade. Shew held the rim of her dress with both hands and entered the unguarded castle. She was expecting a surprise celebration for her sixteenth birthday—her intuition told her this was the day Alice had mentioned.

Inside, the Schloss was strangely vacant. She could find no one. The blue curtains covered every enormous window inside. The curtains looked like wall tapestries with golden curvy drawings, and they blocked the sunlight from peering at the wide hallways. A single, stubborn sunray still managed to peek its way through the thin gap between the curtains, slicing the brownish walls with thins lines of gold.

Shew nudged her toes free, kicking her shoes in the air, each shoe landing on one of the cushiony chairs on both sides of the hallways. They were made of mahogany and cypress with tulip poplars. Everything in this part of the dream was detailed and sharp.

She lifted her dress up with both hands again and walked barefoot beneath the shades of the curtains. She felt comfortable walking barefoot. The sound of her feet flapping on the marble floor was her only company.

The castle’s residents must have hid somewhere to surprise her, she told herself. Important day or not, it still was her birthday and she was longing for celebration. In fact, it was Shew’s last birthday. She knew she’d never grow older than sixteen.

The further she walked in the hallway the more the silence grew on her. Silence usually made her feel uneasy. It made her think that life had stopped, and she feared it would stay that way forever. The silence in the huge castle was deafening today.

Where are Cerené and Alice?

As Shew swallowed, a butterfly broke the silence, fluttering before her eyes. It had blood-orange wings with black spots all over.

Shew followed the butterfly’s path as it fluttered underneath the thick curtains shielding it from the sun. It looked like a ballerina dancing on air in the shades of her private dreams. The butterfly continued its flight up high toward the mosaic cross-arched ceiling. Shew watched it with fascination as if it were her first time in the Schloss.

Looking ahead again, Shew realized she was walking toward Carmilla’s private chamber, a special place she’d built while Angel was away. It featured Carmilla’s individual throne and it was a part of the castle where no noblemen were allowed—she’d only allowed the Huntsmen in when one of the Slave Maidens resisted.

Shew’s bare feet walked her, almost hypnotized, to the huge double-sided, heavily engraved door leading to the chamber with Carmilla’s throne.

There was a circular handle on the door, made of shiny brass. It was the shape of a snake curved all the way around so it’s mouth looked like eating its own tail. She grabbed it and pulled the head apart from the tail. The door opened on its own, the sunshine widening Shew’s pupils.

The butterfly fluttered into the large place, which was illuminated with the light coming through the huge windows on the left and right.

Shew stood at the threshold, examining the place behind the door. It had a bluish golden hue to it with a cross-arched frescoed ceiling even higher than the hallways. The large windows were framed in gold, and were so large that a carriage could pass through them, allowing infinite amounts of golden and dusty sunlight to fill the space.

A few feet away from Shew, a red carpet led the way up to the throne where her mother, Carmilla, sat elegantly, chin up, with a conservative smile on her face.

Light didn’t hurt vampires like Carmilla after all.

Carmilla’s throne, made of black obsidian stones, had her full name engraved on top:

She Who Must Be Obeyed

Queen Carmilla Karnstein.

The Queen of Sorrow.

The throne was framed with engravings, some that Shew had known of and knew how to read, and some written in the same undecipherable language Loki’s necklace was written in. Few of the readable names Shew could read now were Mircalla, Carmilla, and Ayesha, all among a number of other name that didn’t mean anything to Shew.

Looking at Carmilla, Shew thought her mother was born to be a queen, unlike her who never felt she fit the role of a princess.

Carmilla’s golden, voluminous hair trailed down her shoulders. Part of her hair was braided into a headband at the top. Of course, it was also attached by a braid to her thin crown on her head, except that this time the hair waved like an Uraues poisonous snake, protecting the crown from harm as if it would lash out and bite whoever dared to take the crown from her.

Everything was so vividly detailed in this part of the dream, Shew couldn’t take her eyes off her mother. Carmilla had icy blue, cat eyes; devilishly innocent, seductive, and smart. Thin eyebrows crowned her majesty’s eyes. Her eyelashes, black like raven feathers, were so beautiful they looked fake—they weren’t.