Serafina stood by the table in Anthony's lab. She felt like shouting and wished Anton was there to share in her victory.

Bringing the dead back to life had sounded easy when she read the incantation in the book, but she had expected the actual execution of the spell to be far more complicated than it appeared on paper. With that in mind, she had found a spell for bringing animals back to life. She had practiced on a cat, a dog, a monkey, a sheep, a goat, and, lastly, a small ape she had stolen from a kid's petting zoo.

Restoring life to the dead had given her the most amazing sense of omnipotence, and reaffirmed her own powers, as well.

She could do this. She could bring her beloved back to life.

Anton walked through the house, wondering where his mother had gone. She had been away from home and the bookstore more and more of late. When he asked where she was spending her time, she just smiled and said she would tell him when the time was right He wondered if she was having an affair. He wondered what she would say when he told her that he'd struck out with Cara. Not that he cared. True, her rejection had stung his pride, but that was all. He'd never wanted to date her in the first place. She was too blond and far too innocent for his taste. He preferred women with dark hair and dusky skin, women who knew the score and were willing to play the game according to his rules. As for his mother's plans for revenge, well, he'd worry about that when the time came.

After grabbing a beer from the fridge, he went down to the basement. Lately, he had become more and more fascinated with his father's journals and diaries. His father had made a note of the date he had met Brenna Flanagan, and of the subsequent times he had met her either at Myra's bookshop or at The Nocturne. The name Roshan DeLongpre was also mentioned, as was a young vampire named Jimmy Dugan. His father had used Dugan's blood in some of his experiments. All experiments with Dugan's blood had failed.

His father had taken copious notes on his research. He had listed the people he had tested, among them a young man named Roger West. Anton studied the various compounds and ingredients his father had used, and the reaction of each subject to each new injection. His father had noted that Roger West had rejected the vampire's blood and that he had died a violent death, his body slowly shriveling up until, at the end, he had looked like a human dried apple.

Anton read the entries with cool detachment. His father's anger and frustration as each new attempt failed came through loud and clear. Anton didn't make any judgments about whether what his father had been doing was right or wrong; instead, he studied his father's notes and tried to figure out where his father's formula had gone wrong.

An elixir with the power to grant eternal life. Anton smiled, thinking of the possibilities, the fame and fortune that would come to a man who could provide mankind with such a wondrous gift.