Vanitas No Carte Novels & Stories

The indigo haze that had once terrified the global markets was now as mundane as the morning dew, a soft hum in the background of human existence that made it impossible to stay angry for too long. Avery Vane-Thorne stood in a sun-drenched studio in the foothills of the Alps. She wasn't holding a pulse-rifle or a data-spike. She was holding a charcoal stick, her fingers stained gray and black. On the canvas before her was a sketch of a mountain that didn't exist in any atlas—a peak from the "Violet-Winter" that she had promised to forget, but which still lived in the muscle memory of her wrist. "It’s too sharp," a voice said from the doorway.

Charlie Vane stood by the floor-to-ceiling glass of his office, the sprawling lights of the city mocking him from below. In his hand, he crushed the printed photo Marcus had captured at the plaza. The graininess of the image didn't hide the truth the boy’s eyes were a defiant, dark mirror of his own. " holy shit" he whispered, his breath hitching. "It’s a ghost. It has to be a goddemned ghost."

All that was left in the vast house was himself as he waited alone for the day to break. … The next day, Evan didn't even bother changing out of the robe that still reeked of alcohol before heading straight to the healing center. When he pushed open the door to the apothecary room, my workstation had already been cleared, leaving nothing behind. A thin document sat on the desk. Evan opened it with trembling hands, and a bold line of text came into view. "Due to multiple irreconcilable differences between both parties, the mate bond has broken beyond repair. By mutual agreement, both parties voluntarily dissolve their mate bond under the following terms—"

Scrambling through the drawer, I pull out a lighter and flip the lid. The flame ignites immediately, burning softly. Holding the picture over the floor, I set the flame to the bottom right corner, where my little self stood in the picture. The flame swallows the picture almost immediately, and I drop it to the floor, letting it burn and die out, leaving ashes in its wake. Well, the first part of getting Dante to trust me worked, and now, on to phase two. I pull the burner phone from where I hid it and turn it on.

0f course, he did. I give Julien a weakened smile and we exchange a few sentences of small talk before I thank him for driving ways here. Waving goodbye from the window as he slips into his car again, I pretend not to rush to the unknown contents that hide inside the white-encased box. There are cursive letters in black, engraved into the cardboard material, reading Matériau Féminin. Gnawing on the skin of my lip, all I do is shake mny head at a parallel memory that comes into mind when we spent time together in this very store, replacing the various lingerie of mine that he has ripped.

"Ms. Wren? I'm Evan Durham. Please call me Evan. Come along, and I'll show you the studio." I trailed him up the stairs, and there she was—or rather, there I was. The body on the table was my mirror image. My breath caught. She looked uncannily real. Lying there with her eyes closed, she seemed so lifelike I almost expected her to wake. Evan looked pleased with my reaction. "Our work is one of a kind," he told me. "Up close, most people can't tell the difference." He explained the rest with a calmness that felt surreal. It was as if we were picking out wedding flowers instead of orchestrating my disappearance.

Since my parents were killed in a pack war five years ago, Adrian was the only family I had left. But now that he had betrayed me, he was no longer my family. "Elder Slone, that won't be necessary. Please submit a request to activate the Moon Goddess's Veil and erase all records of my existence." Her surprised voice came through. "Why? Once the Veil is activated, the person known as Camilla will completely disappear from the werewolf world. Your Alpha will lose his mind." I gave a bitter laugh. "He won't. He betrayed our mate bond."

There was no comfort there, only resolve. Whatever the Phoenix was, it wasn’t a bluff. Vanessa had planned this for years. Nathan opened another folder. It was filled with maps, pale blue and gray. With dotted lines across the continents and seas. But one location pulsed brighter than the rest. “Monaco,” Adrian said immediately. His voice was flat and controlled. “Typical Vanessa. She always liked places that look clean.” Nathan ran a trace. But encryption fought him at every turn. Code spilled on the screen faster than I could follow.

I followed the sound and saw a faded tent standing crookedly by the roadside. The canvas was worn and sun-bleached, the letters painted across it uneven and garish. “Mysterious Creatures of the Northern Night.” A traveling circus. I had no intention of stopping. But then, at the edge of the crowd, I saw Elara. She was dressed in a cheap stage costume, the fabric thin and overstretched, its dark colors dulled by constant exposure to sunlight. Her skin was unnaturally pale, hastily concealed beneath layers of heavy makeup that couldn’t quite hide the damage beneath.

Vane’s voice drifted from the other side of the curtain, calm and detached, as if he were ordering a glass of water. Elara stood frozen in the center of the room. Her heart was a frantic bird trapped in her ribs. "I... I won't," she whispered, her voice trembling. "The contract said I was a consort, not a... a whore." The sound of his footsteps was rhythmic and slow. The curtain was swept aside, and Vane stepped in. He had removed his charcoal blazer, his white shirt unbuttoned at the collar to reveal the tops of the black, living ink tattoos that coiled around his throat. He looked more human in his shirtsleeves, but infinitely more dangerous. The predatory grace of his movements was undeni