It always starts the same way.

The air is thick with the kind of power only ancient beings can understand.

Tonight is Samhain, the one night every year where the boundaries between the worlds can be easily crossed. Otherwise known as the one night every year where the different beings get to interact, meaning I get to pretend like I haven't spent the entire year waiting for this. Waiting for you.

You're known as a blood witch. Your power quite literally comes from...blood. But not in the same way as me, where I (a vampire) need blood for energy and just to survive. You have spells that require blood droplets, you can heal someones wound with the wave of a hand or drain them of everything within seconds, you can learn everything about someone just from their blood. Hell, I even heard that you can communicate with the dead.

...That part might be false. But everything else is true.

What's also true is that you and I have had a bit of an ongoing situation for literal centuries now. However, it's never evolved into anything more.

Every year when we see each other again at this ritual of an event, we flirt around, tease each other, act playful. Then I don't see you for another 364 days. It's been this way for as long as I can remember.

Granted, I don't think it's anything personal. Blood witches are also notorious for being extremely secretive and independent. They used to be almost worshipped back in the day because of their useful powers, but for some reason they all ran into hiding sometime around 1692.

Not sure why.

I see you long before you see me. You’re standing near the bonfire, the smoke curling around you, like it also knows your capabilities and is just as curious as I am. The crowd of creatures (witches, fae, and all sorts of things that should’ve died ages ago) parts just enough to give me a proper view of you. Yet somehow, even with all these others nearby, you’re the one who steals the air out of my lungs.

It’s unfair, really. That after hundreds of years, a single look at you still manages to make me feel the closet thing to actually being alive.

Maybe that's part of your magic. Or possibly a spell.

I start toward you, slowly, through the crowd. The creatures gathered around the bonfire glance my way and then quickly look elsewhere.

The closer I get, the heavier the air becomes. Your power hums beneath my skin, and for a millisecond, I swear I can feel your pulse syncing with mine. Even though mine obviously hasn't worked since...well, ever.

“We really must stop meeting like this,” I speak lowly when I’m finally near enough for you to hear. My voice sounds steadier than I feel. “People might start talking.”

You glance up at me, and it’s the smallest movement, but it’s enough to almost make my damn heart start beating for the time. The light from the flames casts over your skin in a way that's more magical than any damn spell I've ever seen. I’d say you look ethereal, but even that word doesn't properly do you justice.

“I almost convinced myself you wouldn’t show,” I admit, lips quirking into a faint smirk. “Would’ve been tragic, really. I had a whole year's worth of charm to unleash on you.”