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Ivan closed the door behind me once we were indoors. The house seemed empty so Paul and Felix must have been at work.

Usually, that meant I’d be cooking dinner tonight but Ivan surprised me when he passed me in the hallway and said, “You relax, okay? I’ll cook dinner tonight.”

I wasn’t surprised because Ivan couldn’t cook. He was actually a great cook. I was surprised because the last time he cooked me anything it was to cheer me up from a nasty breakup. That meant he was offering because he knew I’d need to be cheered up today.

I narrowed my eyes suspiciously. “Ivan, is there something I need to know?”

My brothers rarely kept anything from me. I’d like to think that we were honest with each other about anything even if it meant hurting someone’s feelings. It was always Paul who taught us that honesty was the best policy no matter what.

Ivan doesn’t look at me as he walks into the kitchen so I follow him. He opens one of our grey kitchen cupboards and pulls out some spaghetti. Then he walks to the fridge and pulls out fresh tomatoes, grabbing a knife and a chopping board before placing everything on our granite kitchen side.

“How does spaghetti sound for tonight?” Ivan asks me over his shoulder, already knowing how much I enjoy his spaghetti.

I can feel my frustration growing. “You know I love it but that’s not the point. Why aren’t you answering me?”

Sighing, Ivan starts chopping the tomatoes. “I have to wait for Paul and Felix to come home. We have something to tell you at dinner.”

Something doesn’t feel right. I can feel how uncomfortable Ivan is at the thought of telling me this announcement at dinner.

“Is it the family trip Paul is forcing us to go on?” I lean against the doorframe, biting my lip because now I’m nervous and worried. I hate not being in the loop. They’d never gone behind my back to discuss something like this without me before and I hated the feeling.

“Yes, and it’s not Paul forcing us to go. Now, please,” He pauses his chopping to look at me, “go upstairs or watch tv and I’ll call you when dinner is ready.”

Defeated, I huff like a brat. Maybe more childlike than a brat but I can’t help that I’m so angry. “Fine.”

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“Rose!” Ivan calls up to me from the bottom of the stairs.

I open my bedroom door and head downstairs. I’m now wearing my black pyjama’s with my white dressing gown wrapped around me.

While Ivan was cooking dinner, I locked myself away in my bedroom and watched whatever was on television without actually paying attention. My mind was focused on what my brothers were about to announce once we were all at the dining table. I don't understand how this trip could be treated like it's such a big deal.

Paul was already at the head of the table with Felix to his right when I walked into the dining room. I heard them come home ten minutes ago and in that time Paul must have had a quick shower because his dirty blonde hair was dripping water onto our mahogany dining table.

I wrapped my dressing gown tighter around myself and took a seat on the other end of the table, opposite Paul.

Paul looked at me and smiled. “How was college today?”

“Good. I met a new guy called Mark.”

I inwardly smiled when Paul gave me the reaction I expected. His body tensed and his jaw ticked. “Who’s Mark?”

Ivan, sensing the rising tension, brought in dinner and told Paul, “He’s a guy in her class. I saw them talking in the car park when I picked her up.”

I thank Ivan when he hands me my dinner and I look back at Paul, giving him a provoking smile. “What Ivan said and he asked me out.”

Felix makes a noise. It’s his warning to me whenever he knows I’m trying to piss Paul off. I ignore it, of course, enjoying myself.

“And you said no, right?” Paul clenches his teeth.

“I said no tonight but he seems like a good guy and I think a date would be nice.” This time I’m not saying it to annoy him. I genuinely mean it and I’m twenty for god's sake. I should be allowed to have some fun.

“Rose, you were only attacked last month. You need to be careful with anyone new you meet—“

I stir my spaghetti with my fork whilst cutting off Paul’s sentence. “Not everyone is a crazy psycho. He’s just a new guy at my school and I doubt he’s going to try and kill me.”

Ivan joins us at the table with his meal now, looking between Paul and me like he’d rather be anywhere else but here. Felix has given up on warning me not to poke the beast so now he’s just stuffing his face with spaghetti.

“Look, I thought this conversation was going to go in another direction but clearly I was wrong. So, unfortunately, I’m going to have to tell you the truth right now,” Paul says, and Ivan and Felix instantly look at him with surprise.

I immediately stopped eating.

What did he mean when he said he was going to have to tell me the truth now?

Felix said to Paul, “I don’t think now is the right time.”

“Felix has a point,” Ivan added.

Paul calmly leant back in his chair with an expression on his face we all recognised. He’d already made up his mind and nothing was going to convince him otherwise.

I looked between them, growing more and more nervous the longer Paul didn’t say a word. “What is this truth that you have to tell me, Paul? I thought we were honest about everything with each other. You enforced that on all of us.”

Paul winced slightly at that as if I had physically slapped him. “I know but there are some lies that are necessary, especially when you promise someone else to maintain them.”

“What lies?” This time Paul heard the anger in my voice.

“Rose, the man that attacked you, what do you remember about him?” Paul pressed like this had everything to do with what he wanted to tell me.

The memory was blurry as I tried to put the pieces together. “I don’t know… he was fast, really fucking fast. And his teeth— No, I was so frightened I imagined most of it.”

“Rose,” Ivan touched my hand and my eyes flew open. I hadn’t even realised I’d closed them so tightly. “Just tell us even if it sounds crazy.”

I nod slowly and draw in a deep breath. Looking down at the table as if I could see the memory on the wooden surface, I continued. “His teeth looked more like fangs. I remember the light shining off them and they looked so sharp. After that, he told me to show him my neck and I did. It was like I had to and then he was biting my neck…” A tear falls onto the table and I can feel myself shaking.

Ivan quickly moves closer, placing a hand on my back to rub soothing circles. Felix has his hands in fists, thinking of ways he could kill the man that hurt me. And Paul watches me with guilt.

“How did you get away, Rose?” Paul uses a softer tone this time, trying to gently coax me to keep speaking.

Ivan’s soothing rubs on my back help me calm down. Another second and I’m able to speak again. “I fought my body. It sounds crazy but that’s exactly what I did. My body wanted to obey his command so I had to force it to listen to me instead. My attacker was surprised by this and when I told him to leave me alone, he listened.”

Now that I hear myself say the whole story out loud it sounds more than crazy. I sound like I should be checked into a mental hospital.

“Rose…” I look at Paul when he trails off. The words appear stuck in his throat for a second but then he looks me in the eye and says, “That man was a vampire.”

“Excuse me?” I blurt out, not believing I heard him right. I look to Felix and Ivan for help but both of them look nervous and refuse to look me in the eye. I do the only thing that seems rational right now. I laugh. Loud and hard like Paul just told me the funniest joke I’d ever heard.

Instead of laughing with me, they all look at me like they’re afraid I’ve gone crazy.

When I finally stop laughing, my face falls. “A vampire? Are you trying to play some sort of trick on me?”

“No,” Paul says simply. Either he’s telling the truth or he has a perfect poker face. “I’m being serious, Rose. Vampires are real and they’ve been around for thousands of years.”

Now I’m concerned with Paul’s health. “Are you on drugs or do you really believe that?”

“Felix, help me out here,” Paul practically begs, annoyed that I don’t believe him. You’d have to be crazy to believe it so I guess I’m not as crazy as I thought.

Confused, I look at Felix. Felix is now more nervous than ever but he nods. Suddenly, Felix’s chocolate brown eyes turn into black bottomless pits.

I stumble back in my chair when he flashes sharp fangs that protrude from his top lip.

No. No, no, no. What the fuck is going on?

I’m quick to stand up from my chair, pushing myself back into the wall to be as far away from him as possible. My body trembles with fear and I have no idea how to process what I just saw.

Felix’s face returns to normal before he looks away from me like he’s ashamed.

I barely register Ivan before he’s beside me. “Rose, it’s okay. You’re safe.”

I look at Ivan with pure terror on my face that makes him flinch. “How is this okay? Are you all fucking vampires?“

“Yes,” Paul says so calmly it makes me angry. How can he be so calm about all this? “We’ve been vampires since March twelfth 1753.”

“T-that would make you—“

“Nearly three hundred years old, give or take,” Paul finishes for me.

I’m still shaking but I don’t fight when Ivan takes my hand and leads me back to the table. I sit down, feeling like any moment I could throw up with all this information swirling in my brain.

“How is this possible?” I whisper.

“Witches created the first vampires. From there we spread through the planet like a plague. We’re not much different than humans in that aspect,” Paul chuckles but I don’t find his joke funny.

“Witches are real, too?” How am I entertaining this? It’s all so far-fetched but I can’t deny what I just saw. Why would they lie about witches being real?

"You're not really my brother." I realise, my voice is too quiet. "None of you are."

"No," Ivan says, sadly. "Not in the genetic sense but we are your brothers and we love you like a sister."

"But our parents—" All my life I was told they'd died in a car accident and I'd hated myself for not remembering them but what if none of it ever happened?

"Our parents died but yours? We have no idea what happened. You were given to us anonymously and they swore us to secrecy. We're bound by a blood oath so we couldn't tell you even if we wanted to."

Something in my chest tightens. How do I live with this?

“Paul, she knows. I think we should get to the other thing now?” Felix urges because apparently, we’re going off-topic.

“Really? The fact that you're vampires and that we're not really related isn't the big news?” At this point, I didn’t think I could handle any more news.

“Rose, the vampire who attacked you has your scent. He’s tasted your blood which means if he wanted to he could find you.”

Paul’s words make me shift uncomfortably. “He can? But it’s been a month and nothing has happened?”

“I know. We thought he’d attack by now and we could put an end to him but instead, he’s done something much worse.” Paul runs a hand through his hair, suddenly looking exhausted. “ Instead, he’s alerted some very important people back home that you're here.”

Back home?

“What? Why would he do that?” I press, so very confused. I didn’t think this could get worse.

Ivan answers me this time. “When you fought his compulsion, which is what vampires do when they want you to do as they say, it alerted him that you aren’t just a normal human. Humans can’t typically fight compulsion. It’s impossible actually.”

“So we’ve been ordered to take you back home with us. King Matthias and his high council demand our presence and if we don’t go, it won’t end well,” Paul continues, seemingly horrified by the thought of taking me to this king.

“I— I don’t want to go. Can’t we—“

“No.” Paul looks wholly defeated. “I’m sorry but we have no choice. So we’re going on a trip.”

“Where is this place?” I ask.

“The invizibil isles. A small group of islands that humans aren’t aware of. It’s basically a hidden society filled with vampires.” Felix responds and he looks annoyed at having to take me to this place just as much as Paul.

I swallow nervously. “When do we leave?”

“Tomorrow night,” Paul sighs.

Fuck, so I have no choice but to pack.