Royal shuffle: Vampire’s mate

ANDREA

I woke up to the insistent ringing of my phone. I groaned and rolled to the side of the bed, reaching my hand out for my phone that lay on my bed stand. I looked at the caller ID and sighed. What did Stacy want?

“Hi. Did I wake you?”

“Yes.”

“Oh. Well, sorry about that. This is important.”

“Really? What is it?”

“I need you to come down to Sundown’s cafe. There’s someone you need to meet,” she said.

“Who is it?”

She sighed. “Don’t worry. You’ll see her in person. Just hurry up.”

“Fine. I’m on my way.”

I lazily rolled out of bed and got dressed. I sighed as I put my hair up into a messy bun, and looked at my reflection. She was tired, and she just wanted to be in bed. I decided to walk down to the cafe as it was close and I needed the exercise. I opened the door, and the sweet smell of pastry and tea hit my nostrils. I took a deep breath and smiled. I looked around the cafe and saw Stacy waving at me from the farthest table in the small cafe. I smiled and made my way over to her. I got to their table, and had the surprise of my life. Savannah.

“Stacy, what is she doing here?”

“You should sit first.”

“Stacy-”

“Please, just sit.”

I took a deep breath and sat beside Stacy. Savannah smiled faintly at me and I rolled my eyes. She shifted nervously in her and cleared her throat.

“Well, go on. What is she doing here?”

“First of all, I would like to apologize for just springing this up on you, Andrea. But the truth is I needed eyes and ears in the palace after we had left, and that’s where Savannah came in.”

“And you trust her?”

“We’ll, yes-”

“You,” I said, turning to Savannah. “What is it you really want? Why are you here?”

“I…I’m just trying to help,” Savannah replied.

“Oh, please. You don’t like me, you’ve never liked me. From the days of when we were both maids at the palace to when I became queen. You’ve never liked me.”

Savannah shrugged. “That may be true. But you also want to know what else is true?”

“Please. Indulge me,” I folded my hands and leaned back in my seat.

“One, I owe you an apology for how I treated you all those years ago. I’m sorry. I didn’t know better. Two, this is a way to pay you back for not taking me out of a job when you became queen. Instead, you promoted me and doubled my pay.”

“And that is all the reason why you’re here?” I asked.

She nodded, “Yes.”

I looked over at Stacy and she shrugged, and began sipping on her tea. Savannah looked to her as though passing some sort of secret message that I as trying to decipher.

“Well, are we going to get to the point?!” I asked.

“Look. I have news. We have news. But before that…” Savannah dug her hand into her bag and produced an envelope. “Take.”

“What is it?” I asked.

“You’ll find out,” she replied.

I took the envelope from her and opened it. My breath caught in my throat and tears sprung to my eyes when I saw the content. It didn’t help that k was pregnant and my hormones were already haywire.

“I just thought you would like to see it. They were taken on her birthday,” Savannah said.

I looked at the pictures of Adela’s birthday party and I smiled widely. She looks so happy, so beautiful. I went through all the pictures and my smile widened when I saw my necklace on Adela’s neck. Leo had kept his word, although it was sad that it had to be this way. That I had missed my own daughter’s birthday party.

“He kept his promise…” I whispered to myself.

“What promise?” Stacy asked.

I cleared my throat. “Never mind.”

Stacy looked at me and opened her mouth to say something but I gave her a look that said I didn’t want to talk about it, and thankfully she backed down.

“Well, now that we’ve cleared the elephant in the room. I’ll get to the real reason I called you here. I have found out the spell Esmeralda has in Leo.”

I scoffed. “Is he under a spell or does he not love me anymore?”

“We’ll, we’re going to find out after the spell is broken,” Stacy replied.

“And let me guess, the council is also under a spell.”

“Actually, no. The head of the council is being blackmailed,” Savannah replied.

“Really?” I asked, shocked. “What could she possibly have on him?”

“Murder,” Savannah replied.

“And rape.” Stacy said.

“Murder and rape. Of who?”

“His fated mate, and their daughter,” Savannah said.

My hands flew over my mouth. “What?! So she didn’t die of a sickness.”

“Well, back to the matter on ground. The spell breaking,” Stacy said, draining her cup of tea.

“Yes. Back to that. How do you plan to do it?”

“I’m going to kill her,” Stacy said and shrugged, as though that was the easiest thing in the world.

“You really think it would be that easy to kill Esmeralda? You just found some books and you think you can kill her?”

Stacy shakes her head, “I didn’t just find the books. I’ve been reading them since Esmeralda came into the palace. I came across them by chance.”

“Okay, then. Walk me through.”

“You see,” Stacy began. “Esmeralda isn’t powerful on her own.”

I frowned, “What does that even mean?”

“She shares her body with an ancient spirit. Sure, she might be able to cast a few spells here and there, but individually, she isn’t powerful. And that’s a good thing, because it reduces our workload by half.”

“Can you hear yourself, Stacy?” I scoffed. “If she has a powerful being in her, that only makes her more difficult to kill.”

Stacy nods, “You are correct. But, that just means that all we have to do is separate rhe being from her.”

“So, an exorcism.”

Stacy snapped her fingers, “Well, yes. I guess you could call it that.”

“How?”

“The spell is quite simple. But she has to be tied down and in a vegetative state,” Stacy said. “That’s where Savannah comes in.”

I turned to Savannah. “Okay…”

“I’m going to drug her,” Savannah answered simply

Stacy cleared her throat. “I have prepared a very strong potion capable of knocking down an elephant. She won’t be able to fight back until after the exorcism is complete.”

“If this potion is capable of knocking her down, why don’t we just kill her from there?”

“Because this being in her would simply bring her back. Her body is immortal as long as the being lives in her.”

“Oh.” It all made sense now.

“Yes. And once the being has been removed, she would be very weak to pass spells of her own on anybody leaving her vulnerable.”

“I think there is another elephant in the room.” I said.

Stacy rolled her eyes, “Which is?”

“How are we going to get into the territory?”

Stacy blushed and looked away. My eyes widened in surprise. There was definitely something going on. My Stacy doesn’t blush. She was hiding something.

“You don’t need to worry about that. It has already been figured out.”

“By who?”

“You don’t need to worry about that,” Stacy replied.

“Is there something you aren’t telling me?”

“Yes. But you’ll find out soon.”