Summoned

The room was quiet, the only sounds a pen scratching on paper and the occasional flicker from a nearby candelabra. Celeste stood still, waiting patiently in front of the massive mahogany desk. Her cold blue eyes seemed almost black in the dim light as they studied the man across from her. His silver hair shimmered in the warm firelight and the shadowed lines on his face seemed much deeper than they actually were. Idly she wondered how old he must have been when we was turned, 50 perhaps 60? Not that it mattered, he had lived centuries since then.

It was obvious after waiting for 10 minutes like this that he was in no hurry to tell her why she had been summoned. It was one of his favorite games, to remind those around him how insignificanct he viewed them. So she continued to stand unmoving, determined to wait him out. Hopefully he would be done and she could be gone before her cousin Cavalier arrived for his nightly meeting. She'd managed to avoid seeing him for almost a year this time and had no desire to run into him, ever. He was just a reminder of things and someone she wished she could forget.

Gritting her teeth she turned her gaze to the study around them, glancing from the ornate gold leaf mirror that hung over the unlit fireplace and across the racks of old books. Years of accumulated knowledge and history. There were first edition Poe, Dickens and Shakespeare as well as so many other authors lost to the ages. 'All wasted in the hands of the fool who doesn't appreciate them.' Her lip curled faintly in disgust, but she did her best to maintain a neutral expression.

Another 5 minutes passed until the man before her sat up and applied a gob of wax to the papers and pressed an ornate seal into it. Celeste rolled her eyes. It escaped her why the man was so adamant to live a few hundred years behind the times. Satisfied, he leaned back in his chair and studied her over steepled fingers for a long moment. When he spoke his voice was gravely and thick with an accent that could be German.

I've grown impatient. You will go and retrieve my possession.