Sarafina POV
Silence lingers long after Vesper disappears.
Not the peaceful kind of silence, the heavy kind.
The kind that presses against your chest and makes breathing feel like war and struggle for survival.
No one speaks, not immediately at least.
We just stand there, staring at the empty space he left behind, like if we look long enough, he might step back through it and say this was all some elaborate joke or give us a reasonable and understandable explanation. That none of it was real.
That my mother didn't just send a message through a stranger.
That she didn't tell me to find a man everyone else fears and who may also have me on his death list; Valerios Valzo.
The name echoes again in my head. The Vampire King.
I swallow hard.
"This isn't the first time," I say out loud, it was supposed to be a thought.
My voice sounds strange, even in my ears, like someone spoke through me.
