Her father nodded. “I thought perhaps your employer would wish to sample it,” he explained. “Then you could tell my daughter how he liked it and if it would be worth my while to pursue that avenue.”

“Thank you,” Chad said as he took the bottle. “I’ll be sure to let you know his opinion of the suitability this wine would have for other magic users.” Her father handed him the cork and he stoppered the opening with it. He held the bottle up and glanced at it for a minute. Intricate designs had been incorporated into the glass of the bottle as was the custom in wine bottles destined for the wealthy. Those heading for the common man’s tavern tended to be stored in plain, blown glass.

He held it up to the light to see the designs better. There were what looked like hills bordering a lake. From the banks of the lake rose a single tall mountain that towered over the hills. “This is fine craftsmanship,” he observed.

“The bottle itself could almost be worth more than the wine it contained,” agreed her father. “From an artistic viewpoint.”

Chad nodded. He rotated the bottle to see the designs as they continued around to the other side. The hills came to an end and what looked like a family crest took up most of the other side.

Alicia came around the table and sat in the chair Erin had occupied as she moved in closer to look at the bottle with him. His pulse began to race as her shoulder rubbed against his. He glanced to her and smiled.

Returning his gaze to the bottle, he saw that the family crest had four separate designs upon it. One was of a horse and rider, another was of what had to be vines growing atop a hill. The third looked to be a fruit bearing tree, perhaps depicting the very trees from which the wine derived its fruity flavor from. The fourth one was a sword broken in two.

Running behind the four designs was a stripe moving diagonally from the upper left corner to the bottom right. At first he wasn’t aware of what he was seeing, but then he gasped. If you took away the four designs and other frills, what you had left was an exact match to the fourth coat of arms from The Crypt.