THE UNDYING | TWILIGHT

20. Honeymooners

Inside Room 518, a young, attractive, Russian couple was sitting down to a lovely candlelight dinner. They were celebrating the first night of their honeymoon and considered it a great treat to be able to stay in such a luxurious hotel as the Palazzo dei Volturi.

A rare stroke of good luck, they called it, for they never could have afforded such a trip on their humble salaries. A week before the wedding, Alexei Andropov received a mysterious phone call in the middle of the night. It was a foreign travel agency with a once-in-a-lifetime honeymoon offer that only a fool would turn down. Alexei Andropov was no fool, and he wanted to give his new bride the honeymoon she deserved.

And it worked. When they first arrived at the hotel, he'd never seen his wife happier. As soon as she spotted the castle through the cab window, Anya gasped and cried, "Look, Alexei! Have you ever seen a lovelier hotel? Oh, it's absolutely to die for!"

Once they passed through the gate, Anya hopped out of the cab while it was still rolling to a stop, and then she started prancing around the courtyard with her sandals in hand. Right away, she lost her hat to the wind, but she was too happy to care. Round and round she skipped, arms outstretched, her yellow sundress rippling behind her. In that moment, Anya Andropov felt like a princess.

"The woman's mad," muttered the driver in Italian, but her husband couldn't stop smiling.

After paying the driver, Alexei joined his wife by the fountain. Holding up the skirt of her dress, Anya jumped into the pool of water and began splashing about with her feet. "Oh, the water feels amazing! Come, Alexei, join me!"

"I don't think you're supposed to be doing that," Alexei said with a light chuckle. "Get out of there before you get us both in trouble."

With the grace of a ballet dancer, Anya leapt onto the fountain lip, where she stayed for only a short while before jumping back into the water.

"Take a picture of me with the statue," she suggested as she leaned against the giant stone goddess and flashed a seductive smirk. "We'll send it to my sister and make her jealous."

Little did Alexei know, that would be the last picture he would ever take of her. That would be the last time he would ever see her smile. The woman who now sat across from him was not the same woman in the picture. Her yellow sundress, which once seemed to move on its own, now hung lifelessly on her body. Her blue eyes, which once sparkled with curiosity, now dripped with tears. And he was to blame.

Alexei reached across the table and placed his hand on top of hers. "It'll be okay," he told her. "I promise, it'll be okay."

"No, it won't, Alexei." Anya's quiet voice quivered as she spoke, but her words carried more weight than a thousand of her husband's empty promises. "We won't be okay. You know that as well as I."

"Anya, please."

"He's going to kill us, Alexei," she said, and then her gaze dropped to the steak knife that lay on top of her empty dinner plate. It was covered in sauce but still very sharp. Sharp enough, at least.

Alexei followed her eyes. "No, Anya," he said. "Don't even think about it."

Suddenly, the two were interrupted by the steady ting of a fork striking a wineglass. At once, the newlyweds directed their attention to the man seated at the opposite end of the table.

Cillian was the name he'd given them upon arriving. During dinner, he just walked right in like the room was his, and when Alexei told him to leave, he politely refused and then sat down at their table. Again, Alexei ordered him to leave, going so far as to threaten him with violence. That was how Alexei's arm got broken. He threw a punch, and Cillian caught his fist and twisted it until the bone snapped. Worst of all, Cillian was smiling as he did it; then he told them to continue their meal, to pretend he wasn't there.