The Belgrave Legacy

Chapter 1

No men were at the table. What Thanksgiving dinner didn't include the whole family? Fawn wondered. And what was she doing in her uncle's dining room, anyway? She only ever sat at the mahogany table once a year, and she inexplicably knew it was too soon for the holiday.

Looking around, she realized she only recognized her mom and grandmother, but also felt like she'd seen the woman on her right before. She examined the woman more closely.

Evelyn? It was the venerated matriarch of the Belgrave family.

This had to be something from her imagination. It was impossible to eat a meal with dead relatives.

Scanning the faces again, she remembered the special silver album. It was traditional for each family witch to have a picture taken when her powers first emerged.

She was about to ask why they were assembled when her ginger ale began to ripple as if the table was shaking, but everything else remained completely still.

Suddenly, a man's face appeared in her drink. Her eyes widened in horror. She noticed his irises were black as coal and indistinguishable from his pupils, shining with sinister intent.

She backhanded the glass across the room, smashing it.

No one moved. Were they oblivious to what had just happened?

She froze when the same face stared back at her from the mirror hanging on the wall across from her. "You can't get rid of me." Flames flickered in his eyes, but then he surged forward. The man came out like Alice in the Lewis Carroll story.

When he was fully out of the mirror, she could see he wore an all-black version of James Bond's signature look complete with a dress shirt, tie, suit, and black Italian leather. Remembering the fictional character's motto: "Be polite, be courteous, show professionalism, and have a plan to kill everyone in the room," and hoped this man didn't emulate Bond in more than just his wardrobe.

The stranger stood on top of the cabinet, surveyed her relatives and chuckled. "A whole room of you and none of you could stop me. What a waste of talent. My father should have put better defenses in place to protect his precious champion." As he said the last words, he made eye contact with her, sending a shiver through her.

"What are you talking about?" she asked, searching for the door which normally led to her uncle's kitchen.

"Ah, he's left you in the dark. How unfortunate for you." He took another step forward. "And don't bother looking for an exit. I can assure you there isn't one."

Backing away, Fawn forgot to step around her chair. It fell backwards and clattered to the floor. Was she going to die like the kid who inspired A Nightmare on Elm Street had?

The man chuckled. "No, I have much bigger and better plans for you, Fawn Belgrave." A loud boom made her cover her ears and the menacing man looked up, glaring at the ceiling. "How inconvenient," he muttered.

Before she could ask why, the space began to rumble and the dining room started peeling away like old wallpaper, disappearing into the void as gray wisps of smoke.

Fawn woke up to someone shaking her. She blinked multiple times until her eyes adjusted to the darkness after being in such a well-lit room, even if it had only been in her dream.

Her twin brother Alec loomed over her, his forehead crinkled with worry. "What just happened?"

Pressure in her head stamped out her senses as if a vice were squeezing her mind to the point where the pain was the only thing she could focus on. Black spots peppered her vision. "Don't yell. I have a migraine." Despite that fact, she grabbed her smartphone off the nightstand and, once her eyes adjusted to the offensive glare, read the digital numbers which declared it was past midnight. They were officially sixteen years old. A nightmare and a headache were not what she wanted as her first memories of the year.