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

Two clusters of incense had been lit on either side of the slab—the thin sticks had been stuck into the cracks in the floor to keep them upright. Jeramiah, standing a few feet back from the memorial slab, his eyes calm and steady, appeared to be waiting for something. He was watching the two incense clusters intently, and it was only now that I looked at them more closely that I realized how quickly they were burning and how much smoke they were emitting. Clearly, these were no ordinary incense sticks. They were burning at the speed of a match, and as the sticks disintegrated, the room was choked with a thick smoke. I could only guess the kind of aroma that emanated from them, but as Amaya strangled a cough, I imagined that it would be overbearing. The smoke was so thick that I had to move closer to the couple to see what they were doing.

Jeramiah reached inside his robe and drew out the wind instrument. Raising the mouthpiece to his lips, he blew into it, and it sounded out louder than ever. So loud that I staggered back. This was the loudest I’d ever heard the melody, and certainly the closest that I’d been to it. I stared at the vampire as he played, his fingers moving skillfully over the keys, as if he’d played the instrument his whole life. From far away, the sound was breathtaking—more beautiful a tune than I could ever play.

According to the clock hanging from the wall, he played for only five minutes before he replaced the instrument within the folds of his robe. Silence overtook the Dome.

It was more than clear to me by now that this instrument was like a kind of dog whistle for ghosts. Nobody else could hear it—not even Jeramiah.

“Do you really trust that old yogi?” the witch asked.

Jeramiah’s jaw twitched. He grunted curtly. “Throughout all the years I spent in India, he was the only true medium I came across. He knows more about ghosts than almost any supernatural. Yes, I trust him.”

Doubt still flickered in the witch’s eyes. “It’s just that… I mean, you’ve been playing that thing every few hours for the last two days. How do you even know it’s called anyone?”

“That will soon be clear to me,” Jeramiah replied, his eyes settled on the memorial slab. “Now we must be silent.”

He lowered to his knees and tilted his head slightly downward before whispering words that sent chills down my spine. “Father, if you heard my call, make yourself known to me.”

He’s trying to summon… Lucas Novak?

Could it possibly be that my uncle became a ghost?

“Send me into a deep, dreamful slumber,” Jeramiah said, his voice slightly raised as he addressed the witch. “I need to make myself available.”

“What if somebody comes?”

“You’re a bag of nerves, Amaya,” Jeramiah said impatiently. “Just do as I say. We’re invisible, for a start, but if somebody comes, even in my sleep you can transport me elsewhere to safety. But I don’t wish to be unconscious for long. Watch the clock and wake me up in ten minutes. That will be enough time for me to know whether or not my attempts have been successful.”

Amaya gulped, then nodded. Jeramiah lay on his back, stretched out directly in front of the raised platform where Lucas’s memorial stone reigned over the room.

The witch fumbled her way over to Jeramiah and, feeling his form, placed both of her hands on either side of Jeramiah’s head. Flattening her palms, she moved her thumbs up and down Jeramiah’s forehead, slowly and gently, until it was clear that the vampire had fallen asleep. His breathing pattern changed, becoming slower, deeper, and the muscles in his face relaxed.

The minutes that followed were tense. Silence engulfed the room once again, leaving me to brood over what exactly Jeramiah was trying to accomplish by attempting to connect with his father’s ghost. And how did my cousin even get into The Shade to begin with? I moved closer to him, daring to stand just two feet away and stare down at his face, still slack and expressionless. The smoke in the room was beginning to thin now, and I could see all the way across the Dome to the other side, where the entrance was. I half expected to see the ghostly form of my uncle strolling through it, but as the minutes passed, I saw no such thing.

Ten minutes went by, at which point Amaya approached Jeramiah. She reached down and touched his forehead, making the same gentle motion with her thumbs against his skin. His eyes shot open, and he sat bolt upright.

I could tell from the dark look that took over his face that he hadn’t gotten what he wanted, and from Amaya’s expression, she had realized that too.

“Well?” she whispered.

Jeramiah shook his head slowly. “Nothing.” His voice was thick with disappointment.

“So what does it mean?”

Anger flashed in the vampire’s eyes. “It means that when my father died, despite the sudden circumstances, he did not become a spirit.”

Amaya frowned deeply. “I don’t understand how you can just draw that conclusion,” she said. “Any number of things could have gone wrong. To start with, what if his spirit simply wasn’t close enough to hear your call? What if—”