Cora and Rayth entered a large gothic dining room arm-in-arm. Everything inside was black with the exception of golden candlelight in sconces and candelabras placed strategically throughout the room and suspended in a grand chandelier at its center. The golden glow only made the darkness loom deeper, shadows arching long on the curved ceiling.
It appeared as if most of the clan leaders were already gathered, many of them huddled at a corner bar, conversing over ornate glasses of wine. When the girl with the beating heart was among them, the discussions halted, and they all turned to the one spot of white in the room that scattered light rather than absorbed it.
She was innocent. And warm and soft and the first thing many of them had seen in millennia like this.
