LONG LIVE THE QUEEN! the headlines trill, above a full-color photo of Elizabeth II, tiny and wizened and waving happily at the photographer. Beneath, a subheading: England's favorite monarch celebrates her 100 year reign--and may there be many more!

Beside the papers are the gossip mags, bedecked with dozens of photos of the same woman in varying high-fashion outfits. ELIZABETH: 100 years of trendsetting!

Kat bypasses all of these, drawn instead to a drab newsletter shoved carelessly into one of the backmost shelves. The queen's picture on this one is far less flattering; her face is twisted into a horrible grimace, and there's a strangely red glow to her eyes. Her skin hangs on her small frame, and she looks positively ancient. The headline is simply What Dark Secrets is Elizabeth Hiding?

Kat glances around shiftily. There's no one in the aisle, and the store itself is practically deserted. Gnawing her lip, she reaches forward and snags the newsletter--the only one there. Behind it is yet another rainbow display of Elizabeth's romp through decades worth of fashion. She seizes one of those as well, and hides the other grubby pages in its center. 

Hiding herself in the back corner of the shop, she flicks the magazine open and holds it up to her face, making sure to keep her treasure hidden. A quick skim of the article in question reveals the accusation that Elizabeth II has maintained her health, not through a strict vegan diet and thirty minutes of exercise daily, but rather through a potent combination of vampirism and expensive medical treatments paid for by taxpayer coin.

She blinks, fighting a mad urge to laugh. It's ridiculous. And here she'd been getting a bit suspicious herself--after all, had there ever been such a long-reigning monarch? Especially one who didn't appear to be aging at all? Shaking her head at herself, Kat moves to close the newsletter again. 

Before she's done it, though, her eye catches on a note that had been handwritten at the end of the article. Anyone with information about Colin's whereabouts is encouraged to contact the police immediately. He has now been missing for well over a week.

Kat's brow furrows. It's strange, certainly, but...well, it could be coincidence, couldn't it?

She crams the magazine back onto the rack and resolves to forget about it. And she would have succeeded, had not the story of the missing reporter cropped up on the late-night news, in conjunction with a series of other strange disappearances that are all connected, in some way, with the queen.

She dives into an investigation the following morning. And she's careful, at first. Conducts her interviews in isolated places, and writes her notes in code. After several months, she thinks she might actually have a story--evidence, real evidence, that Colin's reportings had been true. She publishes them to a blog, under a fake name.

She'd thought that would keep her safe, until the day they come for her.