Chapter 142: Heirloom of the Dead

Past midnight, snow fell over Sexton, settling over the empty courtyards and the dark rows of windows. In her room, Ruelle sat on the floor beside a low-burning candle stand, the wooden box open in her lap as she stared down into the small mirror inside it.

There had once been a belief that the soulless and the dead cast no reflection. For a long time, people said it was true of vampires. But they carried reflections. She was not like them… was she? She had never craved blood.

Maybe she could compare the mirrors, she thought to herself.

So she emptied the contents of the box onto the floor and turned it over in her hands, tapping at the back in an attempt to loosen the mirror.

“A little early to be summoning ghosts,” came Lucian’s voice. Ruelle looked up and found him standing at the door. At that same moment, the mirror slipped free and fell onto the floor. “Trying to wake the dead?” One of his eyebrows lifted slightly.

Ruelle watched him step into the room and close the door behind him. She raised the mirror so that it faced him. She asked, “What do you see?”

Lucian looked at her for a moment before his gaze shifted to the mirror.

“Nothing unusual. Just my reflection.”

Ruelle’s stomach sank at his words. She replied, “Can your corruption know if something is wrong with someone?”

“If something were wrong with you, I would know,” Lucian answered, making his way to her.

“But the mirror doesn’t show me. Not me, my hair or my clothes. Nothing,” Ruelle shook her head in worry. She saw his hand reach towards her and she handed the mirror to him.

Lucian took the mirror from her and turned it slightly in the candlelight, his thumb running along the sharp edge of the glass as it didn’t look out of the ordinary. When he turned it over, he found two initials engraved into the back.

“M. D,” he murmured.

“Those are Mother’s initials. Mirabelle Dorian. My birth mother,” Ruelle said, leaning slightly closer to look at the mirror. So the box had belonged to her mother after all. She wondered how she had come to possess a mirror like that. “I doubt Father would know anything about this. He once threw it out of the house. The crack is from that.”

“I wouldn’t be surprised,” Lucian muttered under his breath. He then stated, “Mirrors have long been believed to be doors for the deceased. Maybe you can pass through it.”

A small laugh escaped from Ruelle’s lips. She pointed, “I don’t have any abilities, Lucian. I am an average human.”

“You won’t know until you try.” Lucian handed the mirror back to her, the look in his eyes patient as he waited with slight curiosity.

Her lips pursed for a moment before she placed the mirror on the floor. She touched the cracked surface again, but nothing happened except her fingers pressing uselessly against the cold glass. Maybe it was just a strange mirror that did nothing at all.

When she picked it up again, her grip slipped, and the mirror fell from her hands, shattering into pieces against the floor.

“I broke it…” Ruelle frowned, but just as the words left her lips, the pieces began to move. Like liquid mercury, the shards slid across the floor toward one another, joining together until the mirror was whole again.

A self-healing mirror…

Lucian narrowed his eyes slightly as he watched the mirror mend itself. He had never come across anything like this before. Only the dead cast no shadow and no reflection, yet Ruelle’s heart was beating steadily. She possessed no known ability, and if she did, it was not one that revealed itself so plainly.

When his gaze fell on the items she had emptied from the box, he lowered himself to her level and asked, “May I?”

“Go ahead,” Ruelle said, watching as he picked up a clear glass vial to his eye level against the fire still burning quietly in the fireplace. “I used the perfume only on special occasions. The last I used it was two years ago.”

Lucian quietly stared at the vial before asking, “For your engagement with Allen Sheppard?”

Caught off guard from his response and knowledge, Ruelle stared at him before giving him a small nod.

“Yes…” she answered softly. She did not ask how he knew it, but she found herself wondering what else he knew.

“Your parents have terrible judgement when it comes to picking men for their daughters,” Lucian said, picking up another similar-looking vial.

After a moment, Ruelle said quietly, “Actually, he courted me for some time. And when he asked, I agreed…”

Lucian’s hand paused at her words.

“He came from a respectable standing and was fairly well sought after…and Mother thought it was a good thing for me.” But two days later, the man who had once shown interest in her broke things off in a letter. When Lucian didn’t say anything and continued to inspect the vial, she bit her lower lip before letting it go. “Are you displeased by my choice?”

“No,” Lucian replied calmly as he looked up to meet her eyes. “I was thinking that it might have been inconvenient if I had met you after you belonged to someone else.”

Ruelle didn’t know how to respond to that. She only lowered her eyes, but her heart had begun to beat a little faster.

“This must be made from something else. Perfumes don’t last this long,” Lucian said as he pulled the cork from the vial. When he brought it to his nose and inhaled, his movements froze. For a moment, he said nothing, only stared at the small glass vial in his hand. “This isn’t perfume.”

“No?” Ruelle asked.

Feeling a little embarrassed for having used it as perfume, she picked up the other vial and brought it to her nose. The scent was still sweet and warm, faint but lingering. She had always thought that this was probably how her mother smelt.

“These are Siren’s Tears,” Lucian revealed as he put the cork back in its place. “They are rare because sirens do not cry. If one wished to collect it, it would have to be done during a blood moon night, and that only happens once every century. It has a floral, honey-like scent to draw its prey.”

“How did she even come into possession of something like this?” Ruelle murmured. As she had grown up, she had witnessed her family not mingling with the vampires or talking about anything that didn’t belong to humans.

Lucian’s gaze shifted to look at the other things one by one, until he caught the button between his fingers and sniffed it. The next second, his corruption spilt out to carry the button. A soft chuckle escaped his lips, startling Ruelle.

“This button is craved from a bone that doesn’t belong to this world but binds it to the living,” he said quietly. “And the earrings, they belong to the silver-scaled dragon’s talon. All of these things are impossible to find now. You won’t see them even in the black market.”

He paused for a second before adding, “The last time I came close to holding the potion these ingredients are used for, it was already broken by the time I could inspect it.”

Ruelle’s eyes widened slightly as she looked down at the items spread across the floor. “Belladonna…?” she whispered. That was the one that she had broken…

Lucian saw her beginning to carefully put back the things in the wooden box one by one before closing it. She then pushed the box in his direction.

“What are you doing?” he asked.

Ruelle hesitated slightly before answering, “It is for you.”

It was a past apology. She had broken his vials before and she wanted to make it right. She knew how much he wanted to contact his mother, which was why he knew so well about the rare ingredients needed to create the potion.

She caught the tightness in Lucian’s jaw before it eased. He then said, “It was passed down from your mother. Don’t give it away so easily.”

Lucian straightened himself before offering his hand to her, which she took to stand along with the box in her hand. “Now don’t give the scarf away if someone says they are cold,” he added dryly. Ruelle felt her cheeks grow warm.

“Of course, I wouldn’t,” she replied quickly, before leaving his side.

When Ruelle went to keep the box in her trunk, Lucian’s eyes followed her.

It was almost impossible to find even one of these things now, yet she had all of them in her possession. The box must have come to her mother by chance and had stayed with the Belmonts.

But the mirror said otherwise, as it reacted differently with Ruelle, thought Lucian. That only meant the box was a family heirloom that was passed down.

Was that possible? He wondered, his eyebrows drawing together slightly. Because if it was true, then Ruelle was one of the ingredients.

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