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“My lord, I’d hoped—that is, I thought a gift might be in order,” he stammered. “To celebrate this important event.”

“A gift?” Before he could ask what Fabien thought Dragos could possibly need from him, Fabien snapped his fingers and an Enforcement Agent emerged from the shadows of the surrounding trees, guiding a young child in front of him. The girl seemed lost in the dark, her blond hair glowing like cornsilk, her tiny face dipped down. “What is the meaning of this?”

“A young Breedmate, sire. My gift to you.”

Dragos stared at the waif, on the whole unimpressed. Breedmates were a rare enough occurrence among human populations, that much was true, but he preferred his stock to be of fertile, childbearing age. This girl would not be ripe for several more years, which no doubt was what intrigued Fabien the most about her.

“You can keep her,” Dragos said, resuming his trek toward the gathering. “Have your man drive the boat back across the lake while we’re meeting. I will radio him when he is needed again.”

“Go,” Fabien ordered in response, then he was right back at Dragos’s side, as eager as a hound begging for scraps. “Sire, about the child… really, you must see for yourself. She is gifted with an extraordinary talent that I am certain you will appreciate. She is an oracle, my lord. I’ve witnessed it for myself.”

Against his will, curiosity pricked to attention. His steps slowed, then stopped. “Bring her.”

When he pivoted around, Fabien’s eager grin spread even wider. “Yes, sire.”

The child was ushered to him once more, her footsteps resisting, stubborn heels digging into the old pine needles and sand that littered the small slope up from the dock. She tried to fight off the vampire guard who held her, but it was useless effort. He simply shoved her forward until she was standing directly in front of Dragos. She kept her chin wrenched down, her eyes cast to the ground at her feet.

“Lift your head,” Fabien commanded her, hardly waiting for her to comply before he took her skull in both his hands and forced her to look up. “Now, open your eyes. Do it!”

Dragos didn’t know quite what to expect. He wasn’t at all prepared for the startling paleness of her gaze. The girl’s irises were as clear as glass—flawless mirrors that instantly mesmerized him. He was vaguely aware of Fabien’s hissed excitement, but all of Dragos’s attention was rooted on the child and the incredible glimmer of her eyes.

And then he saw it… a flicker of movement in the placid reflection. He saw a form moving through thick shadows—a body he thought he recognized as his own. The image became clearer the longer he stared, rapt and eager to see more of the gift Fabien had described.

It was him.

It was his lair as well. Even veiled in dark mist, the images reflecting back at him were intimately familiar. He saw the subterranean laboratory, the holding cells… the UV light cage that contained his greatest weapon in the war he’d been preparing for all these many centuries. It was all there, shown to him through this Breedmate child’s eyes.

But then, a moment of stunning alarm.

His pristine lab, so rigidly secured and orderly, was in ruins. The holding cells had been thrown open. And the UV light cage … it was empty.

“Impossible,” he murmured, struck with a grim, furious awe.

He blinked hard, several times, wanting to dislodge the vision from his head. When he opened his eyes again, he saw something new in the child’s damnable eyes … something even more unfathomable.

He saw himself, begging for his life. Weeping, broken.

Pitiful.

Defeated.

“Is this some kind of fucking joke?” His voice shook— both with anger and with something too weak for him to acknowledge. He tore his gaze away from the girl and fixed it on Fabien. “What the hell is the meaning of this?”

“Your future, sire.” Fabien’s face had gone quite pale. His mouth worked for a moment without sound, then he finally sputtered, “The child… you see, she is an oracle. She showed me standing here, at this very gathering, presenting