The Parisians — Volume 07 by Baron Edward Bulwer Lytton Lytton (i can read book club txt) 📕

The colour of power.

He’d only ever seen a soul once with that colour. The memory of its vibrant power was forever lodged in his memory. A thing of enormity, something that seemed beyond belief, but that he’d long hoped and hunted for across the globe.

After trekking down a country road, he detoured towards a pond. The night had descended and claimed the landscape as its own. At the water’s edge, his attention roved inwards: to the currents of life swirling. Like a raging river, his being poured forth the torrent. Like a waterfall, the souls flooded the pond. Flames ignited across the surface, creating archways of fire.

This was the power of tethered souls. This was the power that Enodians sought through tethering the dead. The sluagh horde was what the Enodians called this treasure trove that they carried within their soul. A great powerhouse of energy gathered from the restless dead.

He smiled at the thought of the woman with the third eye. Tonight would be the night. He would tether her soul and she would be the jewel of his collection. He would hold a soul with para abilities. He would be, without doubt, the most powerful mage at the Enodia’s ceremony.

He stepped into the pond, his black jeans and T-shirt staying dry as he walked into its murky depths. Smoke filtered through his lungs, thick and heavy. The smoulder that the tethered souls emanated with permeated every cell and atom. His mind, body, and soul became one with their network and they carried him into the Between.

When Theo stepped out of the water, it wasn’t on the outskirts of Montepulciano, but from a lake, ten kilometres to the west. He trod onto the bank, bone dry. The smoke and heat of his sluagh, as well as permeating his body, seeped into his clothes as if they’d just come out of the dryer. He always felt hot after travelling through the Between, the soulfire heat lingering through all of him.

The rooftop of the villa above the treetops caught his eye. Its terracotta hue was leached to the darkness. Excitement rang through him at the prospect of what was ahead. The possibility. Would the woman with the third eye be what he’d been chasing all these years?

The villa’s parameters were screened by cypresses, the adjoining vineyard obscured too. The greenery teased him. The summer air was heavy and gave him no respite from the heat of soulfire and building anticipation.

Oh yes, Donna, I’m coming.

He strolled towards the villa, a sublime smile on his face. Yet within, he readied himself. From all his years of experience tethering, he knew that you never knew what to expect. You had to be ready for anything. His pulse started to race as the fleeting glimpse of the powerful para soul he’d stumbled across as a kid came to mind.

He quashed the thought.

Now was not the time to allow his mind to wander. After all, an Enodian’s soul could all too easily become your enemy’s weapon.

An ethereal voice floated through the vineyards.

Theo stopped dead as he turned the corner. White light bathed the vineyard. A young woman wove in and out of the vines. Her billowing skirt and voice fell flat as she spotted him. In her black high-necked top and long tulle skirt, she looked like something out of a regency novel. Yet her hair, piled atop her head was like a bird’s nest, her heavy makeup punkish.

Regency Punk.

His thoughts somersaulted. He’d checked that Donna had no living relatives. The place was reputedly abandoned. Had he got his wires crossed?

A man with a guitar peered from behind a cluster of vines. ‘Can we help you?’

Theo regained his self-possession and walked towards the couple. ‘I hope so. I’m doing a study and wanted to look around the villa’

‘At night?’ The guy came around to stand beside Regency Punk. He wore jeans and a velvet jacket. His floppy hair stuck to his forehead in clumps. He must be boiling in this heat.

‘Apologies, I thought the property was empty,’ Theo replied.

‘It is,’ another voice called from behind the vines. Another guy in a T-shirt and ripped jeans appeared. He carried a guitar too.

‘Ricky,’ Guitar One complained.

Ricky shrugged. ‘We’re temporary residents if you catch my drift.’ He winked.

Theo smiled. They had as little right to be here as he did. Both men had English accents and were likely only passing tourists. It was always best when dealing with humans to tell something of the truth; if you didn’t have a vamp in tow to glamour them anyway.

Theo wanted to keep this tethering under wraps. If Donna was as powerful as he believed, he didn’t want any other paras knowing about her. Not even one of the vamps he’d worked with in the past was worthy of knowing what he was on the cusp of tethering.

‘No problem. I’m a parapsychologist, and hoped to camp out.’ Theo lied smoothly.

‘A parapsychologist!’ Regency Punk exclaimed. ‘That’s amazing.’

Oddly enough, proclaiming that he was interested in the dead seemed to have endeared him to her. She’d seemed stand-offish before. Now her raven eyes met his with interest.

Theo soon found himself seated on a crate at the back of the vineyard. The band – it turned out – had been filming a music video. With tumblers of red wine in hand, and amidst the shadowland of vines cast upon the dry earth, they talked.

Guitar One, Antony, had posted the photo of the vineyard on the Ghost Hunters site earlier. Theo asked him if it was where they’d heard about this place.

‘Sort of. The Barrel, a bar in Montepulciano we’ve gigged at, sent us the link.’

‘They know our tastes lean towards the strange and unusual,’ Regency Punk confided. She introduced herself as Von.

‘Von?’ Theo asked, ‘Isn’t that more of a preposition? Like “of” or “from”? In German anyway.’

She laughed. ‘Short for Shavonne.’

Sure, Von like a rockstar … or stripper.

His gaze glittered over her red lips, pale complexion, and raven hair.

‘When