A Vial of Life (A Shade of Vampire, #21)

I let out a breath.

“All right,” I said heavily. “With Jeriad’s assurance, we’re going to assume that what Nuriya told Sofia is correct. We’ve been wasting our time… I have not the first clue in hell what we can do now, if anything, to help my son. But before we do anything, we ought to return to The Shade.”





Chapter 4: Derek





As we traveled back to our island, the dragons’ supernatural speed didn’t seem fast enough. As I’d admitted to everyone, I didn’t have any semblance of a plan for how to help my son. And the thought that we had just made things worse for him by getting the Nasiris kidnapped by the Drizans was eating away at me. What would happen to him without the protection of two jinn? Would the Elder really manage to draw him back to Cruor? The latter shouldn’t even have been a question, for I knew the kind of powers the Elders could have over a person—I knew them too well. I was just fumbling for some hope in this predicament.

When we finally reached The Shade, I was glad that it was overcast again. The spell that Ibrahim had cast over us to keep us in shadow while we were gone had lasted till now, but I didn’t want any hunters detecting our movements.

The dragons remained above the clouds until we were past the boundary, then descended upon The Shade, silently and gracefully. They touched down in the clearing before the Port.

We had been gone longer than I’d hoped, and the first thing I wanted to do was check on my sister and Xavier. I wondered if Vivienne might have given birth already. But aside from checking that she was in good health, and possibly meeting my new niece or nephew, I needed to see how they’d been holding up since we’d been gone.

Sofia and I hurried through the forest to the couple’s penthouse. The lights were on, but as we knocked, nobody answered. Sofia couldn’t detect even the slightest sound of anyone inside. The door hadn’t been locked. I pushed it open and we stepped inside. We moved from room to room, seeing if they might have left a note for us as to their whereabouts in case we returned.

“Derek,” Sofia called from Vivienne and Xavier’s bedroom. I hurried to the room to find her pointing to a wet patch on the bed. “I’m guessing Viv’s water broke already. Maybe she’s been taken to the Sanctuary?”

For all we knew, Corrine was still mysteriously absent from The Shade. But it was possible that Vivienne had been taken there to be tended by other witches.

We descended from the treehouse and ran back through the woods toward the witch’s residence. We bumped into Rose and Caleb, who followed us to the Sanctuary.

When we arrived outside the door, my spine tingled as my ears caught the crying of an infant. Sofia gasped.

“Oh, my God, it’s happened already!” Rose exclaimed.

Worries about my son momentarily drifted into the background as excitement overtook me. I forced open the front door, too impatient to wait for somebody to come to answer it, and barged into the entrance hall. We hurried toward the crying, stopping outside one of the bedrooms.

“Vivienne?” I spoke up, a slight tremble in my voice.

The door flung open a moment later, and we found ourselves standing face to face with Corrine. Her thick brown locks were wrapped tightly above her head in a bun, beads of perspiration shining in the roots of her hair.

Her eyes widened, and a look of relief washed over her face. “Oh, thank goodness you’re back. Come in! Come in!”

We rushed in to find Vivienne lying on a double bed, cradling a blanket-clad baby in her arms. Xavier sat next to her on the bed. Vivienne looked drained and exhausted, but both of the new parents were positively glowing with happiness.

My throat tightened. My voice choked up, and I could hardly even greet them. I broke out into a smile, joy billowing up within me.

I hurried to Vivienne’s bedside and kissed her forehead while looking down at her beautiful baby.

“A boy or a girl?” Sofia asked, arriving by my side along with Rose.

“A girl,” Vivienne replied, tears moistening the corners of her eyes as she gazed at her baby.

“How late are we?” Rose asked, smiling at the baby girl.

“A few hours,” Xavier replied. His eyes had the same glistening quality as his wife’s. They both looked in a daze, lost in their own little bubble with their new child.

Vivienne raised the baby from her chest and handed her to me. I held her in my arms, taking in her features. Fine strands of dark hair covered her head and her eyes were bright blue, closer to my mother’s—and my—eye color than to Vivienne or Xavier’s. I dipped down and planted a kiss on her tiny nose.

“So you’ve named her Aurora?” I asked.