The Vampire's Claim (boyxboy)

Chapter 8: Brendto's Bridal Botiuque

"I'll be damned," I muttered, staring up in disbelief at the thing before me. Never, not even in my wildest dreams, would I have expected this. A creepily haunted mansion at the top of a hill? Definitely. A smoky, seemingly endless alleyway to nowhere? Sure. A spooky cemetery echoing with hollowing wind? Wouldn't surprise me a bit.  But this?

This was utterly and disappointingly ordinary.

I read the elaborate cursive scroll on the storefront: Brendto's Bridal Boutique. Emilia, the last lead left unturned for finding Eskil, was in a wedding dress shop. The universe had a sense of humor, that's for sure. 

Rhys wasn't as amused as I was. He passed me and opened the door. A small chime sounded as he entered.

"Shouldn't we knock or something?" I asked as I climbed up the steps. Who in their right mind leaves a store unlocked overnight? Obviously theft wasn't concern around here or they were just asking to get robbed.

He stopped and met my eyes before painfully slowly knocking twice on the door and disappeared into the blackened shop. 

A knock never seemed so condescending before.

"Don't just do it on my account." I followed him in. I walked slowly around the white racks that surrounded the store. It was quiet. My gut clenched. Something was bound to jump out any minute and kill us.

Rhys started towards the staircase that led to--presumably--an apartment above the shop.

"What are you doing? You can't just walk upstairs to someone's bedroom and wake them up. I'm sure she'll appreciate that heart-attack--" I yelped as I fumbled over something. My hands instinctively shot out to grab something--anything--to stop my fall. With my damn luck, it was a dress rack that--surprise, surprise--was on wheels that offered zero stability. It and I fell smack on the hard ground, my head slamming even with the floor and the rack crashing atop me. 

It was a mess of crashing and swearing. 

I winced clutching my forehead and struggling to pry the thing off me.

"Jesus on crackers," a high-pitch feminine voice gasped as lights flicked on. "Are you alright Sir Knightly von Fluffers!?"

Rhys took pity and lifted the rack off me. I managed to sit up in time to see a woman reaching down and plucking a furry gray mess from the crash zone. She cooed at it, Eskimo kissing it all over, before she lovingly tucked it to her hip and swung around to scowled me.

She stomped over tower over me, eyes balls of fury, her auburn hair disheveled like Medusa's snakes crowning her head. She turned her furious gaze to Rhys. "I would appreciate it, Rhys, if you watched your klutz more carefully. Everything in this shop costs more than his life!"

What. the. hell.

Livid. I was livid. Here I was, laying on the fucking ground, in clear pain, and all she cared about was her damn little beast and her shop. 

"Hold up a damn minute," I said stumbling to my feet to match her glare for glare. Sure, this mess was my fault but it wasn't like I did it on purpose.  "Yeah, I tripped, but only because of your stupid cat. And you're the one who left your door unlocked. If you didn't want people coming in here and potentially causing trouble, then lock your damn door!"

My counterpoint was utterly ridiculous, but I didn't care. I didn't deserve to be talked to like I was a subhuman. No one deserved to be talked to like that. 

Her eyes narrowed to cat-like slits and she pursed her lips. I prepped myself mentally for the yelling match I was sure was coming. Then she did something that caught me off guard and that I never, never, wanted to witness again.

She smiled. A real, genuine smile.

It was disgustingly, innately, wholly wrong.

A shiver spasmed down my back and to my core.

"My, my, my. Eskil sure picked a spirited one, didn't he? And here I was afraid that, after all this time, he'd choose someone dull. But his Kyle sure is a firecracker, isn't he Mister Knightly von FLuffers?" She lifted the cat and held it in front of her face, speaking directly to it.

"You know my name?" I glanced at Rhys trying to see if he told her, but his expression told me he was just as surprised. 

"Of course. Oh, I know all about you Kyle Harris and not just your name. I know your hopes, your fears, and all your dirty little secrets."

There was something off about her. I looked at her—really looked at her—and it clicked, catching me off guard.

"You're not a vampire." She lacked the lethal perfection that Eskil and Rhys had and, while she did appear young, she didn't share their stone-like youthfulness. I had assumed that a lead for finding Eskil equated to meeting with another vampire. Rhys never confirmed or denied this, but I couldn't fathom our last lead would be human.

"Thank Gaia, no."

"You're human?" That didn't feel right either.

"Nope, nope, nope." She hummed sauntering towards the checkout counter and placing Sir Who-Gives-a-Shit gently on it. She whirled around and snapped both hands dramatically. 

All the dresses vanished. The entire shop vanished, replaced instead by a dusty library. The library was littered with piles of discarded books stacked to the ceiling like paper skyscrapers. Jars filled with unknown substances lined display ases and the smell of smoke wafted from the working fireplace in the center of the room.

"I happen to be a witch!" She exclaimed before cackling. 

 And that folks, was my first impression of Emilia Brendto.

So it's short but I did update as promised! I have decided to attempt to update a chapter (at least) on Thursdays by midnight. You'll have to help me keep my word on this because I'm prone to forgetting but hopefully I'll get in the habit and be prompt on it. This chapter is unedited and I am most likely going to work on and add more to this chapter since I feel it's so short so be warned on that. Thanks for reading and I hope you enjoyed!