Chapter Two
Providence, Rhode Island
December 13, 1984

The house was filled with heated conversation on the night of the accident. Only a few hours had passed before Victor was ordered to seek out Erica’s father. He had been given a copy of her birth certificate, a photo of a man, and a file of information on the father that did not share Erica’s last name.

When Victor first read the man’s name he smiled for just a moment. His mission was to locate a person named John Smith, a man who left Providence days after Erica’s birth. Victor found the commonality of the man’s name to be absurdly fitting but at the same time fitting. The man who was never spoken of had the name ghost or at least of a man who did not wish to be identified. The true irony was that John Smith was his real birth name; it was almost as if the man’s parents had known decades before that their child would want to disappear into the shadows of society.

There was a great sense of urgency in the household over the need to find Erica’s father. Erica was sleeping in a large bedroom which her grandmother reserved for her use in the grand house on Benefit Street. Victor looked in on the child before being summoned to the private chamber of Madame Pike. He found the tiny girl in a canopy bed which could have been built for a king. The room was slightly illuminated by the street lamps below which allowed him to see a darkened version of the small handmade furniture that her grandmother had so lovingly purchased for Erica during various trips to Europe and the Orient. However, it was not the small perfectly proportioned chairs and tables that interested Victor; instead it was the neatly arranged toys which he could see through the darkness. Erica’s toys were from a different age, wooden and cast iron playthings which seemed to belong in a museum rather than a modern child’s bedroom. The toys were assembled around a white rocking horse of hand carved wood with the noticeable horn of a mythical unicorn. He left without waking the child and went to discuss the father she had never known with his mistress.

Madame Pike’s receiving room was accessed by a long hallway which at all times was guarded by one of Victor’s fellow Templars. Victor nodded his head to his fellow as he passed without the traditional search that most guests were forced to endure. The hallway had no doors except for the large hand carved wooden double doors which protected Madame Pike’s private sanctuary. Victor slowly walked the long hallways taking in the many paintings of past Grand Mistresses of Ormus out of the corner of his eye. The portraits always filled him with a sense that he was not just a simple French peasant but a witness to history, a history which had been hidden from the world it had shaped. When Victor reached the doors he put his hand to the door knocker, a solid gold owl with a heavy ring held in its beak. As tradition dictated, he knocked three times before his mistress’ voice instructed him to enter.

Chapter One
The Diary of Erica Pike
January 19, 1997- Paris, France

It is not surprising that my earliest childhood memory is of my mother. This would not be strange if not for the fact that this is my only memory of her. Recollections of childhood memories are never clear or fully accurate; they are in fact little more than dreams. So in reality I have no memories of my time with my mother; I have only one brief dream that I keep locked away with the other heirlooms of my past.

The day which I remember is the day of her death. I was four years old at the time. In many ways, this was the day that I of my birth. The tension and the chaos of that day seems to have washed away any earlier life I might have had; a life that today only exists only in photographs and paintings. I don’t mourn these stolen memories as much as I am intrigued by them. I feel no connection with the little girl in the scores of photographs of my mother and me. Nor do I recognize images in the several oil paintings of our time together, which is why I had them moved into the attic after my grandmother died.

Throughout my life there has been an underlying current of sadness. I have never connected my mother’s death to these feelings. I have always simply accepted her departure from the earthly realm as a simple matter of fate. Long before her death, I was a child with a cold soul. I was never a real child; as such a state of mind completely goes against the nature of my being. Even when my body was that of child, my soul burned with memories of past lives that flowed back so far through time as to make any new experience a simple mundane act. The essence of my soul is so ancient that I am unable to truly feel any type of joy or happiness.

This cursed soul meant that I was born a stoic. The courtiers must have found my childhood amusing. I have never cried, felt disappointment, or expressed myself in a fashion which would be considered normal or even human. It is as if my soul coupled with the blood of my great ancestors to strip me of any true nature of humanity. My mother was not like this or so I have been told. She too was a sad person, but she was ruled by all too human emotions. It was these awful feelings that destroyed her mind and caused her to extinguish her physical existence.

Her last day has haunted me for seventeen years. She died when I was four years old, a death which raped my mind of all earlier memories. It was this day which provided me with my first memories. My Grandmother had sent a car to drive us the short distance to her house. When we arrived, the grand hall was filled with men and women wearing black robes of various designs. Some of the women wore veils; some wore masks; while others had their heads and faces exposed. It was a natural event. The Brothers and Sisters mulled around chatting like adults do at a cocktail party or church social. My mother and I were dressed in normal clothing but shortly after arriving, my grandmother’s bodyguard and closest friend, Victor, directed us towards one of the unused bedrooms. Inside was one of my grandmother’s dressers who had carried a rather ornate robe for my mother and a beautiful black dress for me to wear. I remember that my mother was very aggravated and confrontational with all of the servants. Despite being a child, I was very embarrassed by her behavior. She even spoke firmly with Victor who with his large frame and tough French features was not the type of man one would ever think to confront. Mother pushed Victor out of the doorway and he wordlessly gave way. I followed behind my mother taking a second to smile at Victor who leaned towards me and fixed the bow in my hair that my mother had ignored. His love made me happy. His was a powerful and protective love which reminded me that I was safe from the evils of the world. He even smiled at me before I ran towards the Great Hall and my mother.

When I arrived in the Great Hall I found that all the