The shoeless stranger haunted Estella in the following days. For some reason she felt as if there was a person pushing at the boundaries of her existence, looking for the seams of her life so that they could rip the stitches out. Her grandparents in all their grief (and perhaps arrogance) were unaware of the danger searching for the very edges of their lives.

The tearing up of her life officially intruded upon her person a full six months following her fathers funeral.

If someone had asked her how she felt after the death of her father—a man so absent she didn’t truly feel the label as it applied to him—she would have said that it was life changing. But if you pressed her, she couldn’t have explained how the death of such an absent person would radically alter the course of her life. It wasn’t him exactly but what came after. What came before.

Estella rubbed her hands over her arms while her and her grandmother were walking through the woods. She was cold. And anxious. Marguerite was beginning Estella’s practical instruction in the magical properties of the natural world and she was barely paying attention to any of it.

“Estella, tell me, what is this?” Pointing to an early spring flower Estella knew that she'd seen but could not remember.

Estella responded in mumbled English, not wanting to stay silent but not wanting her grandmother to know that she did not know the answer.

“What? What are you saying Estella? Be clear, my old ears cannot hear your words.”

Estella again mumbled but only slightly louder than a moment before.

Marguerite’s eyes narrowed and then her hand flashed out, gripping Estella’s chin to make her granddaughter look her in the eyes. She pointed angrily at the inoffensive flower. “Do you know? Do you know what the flower is?” Estella thought her grandmother had always been intense but she’s gotten more so these last few months.

Against the pressure of her grandmother’s firm hand on her chin Estella shook her head ‘no.’

Marguerite let go then. “You do not pretend to know more than you know Estella. Magic is dangerous and must be done with the comprehensive knowledge of what you are using and what you are doing. One day it could be the difference between life and death. If you keep your ignorance quiet then you do not give yourself the opportunity to learn. Or to develop the abilities to help. Instead you harm yourself and those who might seek your aid. So. With words, Estella, do you know what this flower is?”

“No, I do not know.”

“Good, it is good to be honest, no? And so helpful.” Marguerite crouched next to the flower and Estella joined her, expecting her grandmother to begin instructing her on the particularities of its properties to help her identify it in the future. “Pull out your book and begin searching. As a witch, books will be your best friend.” At the white face of her granddaughter Marguerite sighed, “you should carry your magic aids with you Estella. You never know when you might need one.”

“Do you have yours on you?”

“Yes,” Marguerite replied, grinning like a cat spoiling her granddaughter’s attempt at catching her off guard. “And you can’t have it. Walk back to the house and get your copy. A witch must always have her materials about her.”

Estella huffed but made her way back to the house. Upon her return to the woods, Estella felt a change in the air. She had walked in these woods her entire life, had just come through them even, so why now did the air feel so electrified, like static rippling across her skin? The deeper she went the more closed in the woods felt around her, as if the trees were telling her no, go back. No further.

It happened very quickly.

One moment Estella was marching back to her grandmother, early spring ferns grasping at her jeans trying to slow her down. The next she was in a vice grip, staring up into the face of the shoeless stranger from her father’s funeral. He smelled like damp dirt and moldy clothing in his stained red t-shirt.

His eyes bored into her, his mouth not moving, but Estella swore the faintest word left his still lips. “Endlich.”

In a flash his head snapped down at her like a snake striking for the kill. Estella reacted instinctively, her free arm moving to block the blow but still catching his teeth.

God, his teeth. It was like being cut by a blunted knife. An acute yet rusty kind of tearing instead of a clean cut. A ripping of her skin.

The quick searing pain brought her back to her body. Estella screamed. It was a blind panic kind of noise that belonged to the feralness of the soul. A strong gust blew through the woods then, picking her up and throwing her backwards. She put everything in her into that scream, releasing an unexpected force unto the man who was pushed back by it.

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Forced back by a child! Dear God he had done it. He had found the line.

The unknown man posed to strike again, the young girl still crumpled on the ground.

And then something happened very fast that neither stranger nor girl could easily recall.

One moment he was poised to jump at the girl. Estella was still breathless, her vision tilted and the ground lopsided. Her lungs burned with a debilitating intensity.

Another moment and the air smelled acrid. Her grandparents were there. There was a commotion the likes of which Estella, in her state, could not describe. Her grandmama’s and nonno’s voices boomed through the woods but what they were saying she could not hear, what language they were in she could not say. They felt powerful, those words. Like they could tear the world apart.

And in a moment the stranger was gone. Estella couldn’t see exactly what had happened but she noticed when the air cleared, when the oppressive atmosphere in the woods lifted, and of course she knew the moment her grandparents kneeled on the ground in front of her, their presence ever the comfort.

“Are you hurt? Show us where it hurts.”

Her entire back hurt but God her arm. Her arm is what made her whimper as she clutched it to present to her grandparents.

She only moved it half an inch.

“Your arm, bébé? Let us look at it… Mon Dieu! Il l’a mordue!” My God! He bit her!

“Mio Dio… Rapidamente! Dentro!” My God… Quickly! Inside!

Of the two grandparents, Marguerite was the better versed in magic and the wider supernatural world but Timoteo had heard the stories. Stories about little children taken in the night. Stories about children turned into immortal soldiers to serve in vampire armies. Stories about… Rapidamente! Quickly! Quickly! They weren’t moving fast enough, Estella’s life was in that bite.

If you asked Estella to describe what followed next she would not be able to give you a clear answer. To her, the following moments were what she could only characterize as loud. Her heart hammered in her ears, her grandparents labored breathing filled the air around her as they carried her, the words flowing from their mouths sounded like an echo chamber but their meaning didn’t land on Estella.

It was, simply put, overbearing. The pain. The noise. The pain.

Until it wasn’t. And then it was nothing.

____

Marguerite collapsed into the chair beside Estella’s bed, exhausted from the effort to save her granddaughter from her fate.

She was only partially successful.

“Marguerite, my love, what do you need?” Timoteo was at her side, sweat beating on his brow.

Her chest hurt, like her rib cage was wrapped in constricting bandages. “I need…I need to go back in time and save her. That is what I need to do.” She had to go back. She had to save Estella from what will be.

“You know you cannot change what has been, Marguerite. We’ve tried that. The gods, they will not allow it.”

Her hand violently smacked off the rocking chair, “I know that dammit! I know… I don’t know what to do, Timoteo. We…we have worked so hard to protect her. To keep her from paying my price. I have left offering after offering to stave off those vicious wraiths. But…this? This I don’t know. Vampire.” She spat the last word like a curse. “Where did he come from? What corner of Hell did this taker of children crawl out of?”

Timoteo saw that his wife was losing the plot in her anger. “Perhaps, Marguerite, it is time then.”

Marguerite closed her ancient eyes and let out a painful breath. “Timoteo…I cannot.”

“Not even for our little bambina?”

She shook her head. “We have time. We have time to look for answers before the magic reacts to her magic.”

Timoteo could have shaken his wife’s shoulders then. “Time? We have time? Do we? Do we have time Marguerite? We are old. Our bones are becoming more brittle by the day. Saving Estella tonight has driven you into exhaustion and how will you feel tomorrow? Our bodies are not what they were. Your condition will take your life in time and soon, my love. And I gave up my magic to follow you.”

“Timoteo..”

“No.” Marguerite drew back at her husband’s sharp tone. Rarely did he challenge her. “We do not have time, Marguerite. We will be lucky to see her begin to bloom into adulthood.” He paused in his speech because the truth had settled within him, right into the marrow of his bones. “We will not live that long, Marguerite. We will not.”

“Timoteo…mmmm merde.” She knew what he wanted. Who he wanted to solve their problems. “We will try. We will try to find him.” She shut her eyes, leaning back further into her chair. Her voice came quietly now, less fierce, more vulnerable. “But where to start? We cannot leave her and I will not take her to France. I cannot go back to that haunting place and you…you tremble at the thought of returning to Italy.”

“We can start with Jacques. Maybe we should ask him to visit first? Finally tell him the whole of it.”

“Yes, Jacques is a good place to start. There have never been many such as Estella will become. My mama told me a story once about how others have made their lives very difficult. Tried to turn them towards their own gains, not realizing how life-threatening the transformations of witches and vampires are when combined. And then later…if they survive…” A shakey, terrified breath escaped Marguerite’s chest. “Perhaps we should test the waters with Jacques.”

“He is an old friend, he will not hurt her.”

“No, no hurt her. But he could choose not to help her.”