I blinked at her. That was a good question.
I shrugged. “Just curious. I’ve run across a couple of the victims and wanted to make sure whatever this is doesn’t get any worse.”
Sarah smiled, her face amused and full of knowledge gleaned from years, perhaps centuries, of experience. “You tell the truth or some version of it, but not your whole truth, I suspect.”
I shrugged again, not wanting to examine my motivations any further. Right now I was curious, that’s all they needed to know.
I turned the question back on them. “What does my reasons have to do with anything?”
Suddenly Sarah’s expression made her seem ancient, as if she’d seen the passing of countless ages and had distilled that knowledge down into one expression. “The reason makes all the difference.”
Reason, huh? I didn’t have a reason for wanting to know. At least not one that made sense and could be shared with them.
“Just call me a concerned citizen.”
That might work. It sounded good at least.
Miriam’s smile was wry. “Somehow I think it’s a little more than that.”
I shrugged. It was and it wasn’t. I couldn’t help but remember the sphinx’s desperation when it feared I was the monster. Something about that experience didn’t sit well. If I could ask a few questions and get some answers for him, it cost me little and would mean a world of difference to the sphinx.
Sarah’s gaze was assessing as she cataloged my features. I wondered what she saw when she looked at me. Did she see the monster that was sometimes closer to the surface than I’d like? Or did I look like a normal twenty six year old whose life hadn’t turned out the way she planned? One of the boomerang generation? Someone’s whose life didn’t live up to its promise?
I stared back, keeping my thoughts to myself and my expression polite.
She cackled, her laugh sounded like sandpaper.
“Very well, little vampire. I’ve heard of the sowing.”
The sowing? I’d never heard that term.
Sarah sighed, seeing the confusion on my face. “You know so little of our world. It should not be that way.”
I fought the urge to roll my eyes. Another vote for the vampires conscripting me into one of their clans.
“It is what it is,” I said, some impatience threading through my voice despite my best efforts. “I’ve got to live with the world as it is, not wish for a change that is never coming. You mentioned the sowing. What is that?”
Miriam and Sarah shared a long look. It felt as if they were having an entire conversation just by a slight shift of expression.
I let them have their argument and sat back, watching, cataloging their communication cues. I imagined I could almost hear the conversation they were having.
Sarah’s tightly pressed lips said ‘that information is on a need to know basis.’
Miriam’s eyebrows lowered seeming to say, ‘I think we’re past that don’t you?’
Sarah flared her nostrils, clearly saying, ‘We’re never past that.’
Miriam blinked. I took that to mean, ‘do what you want. You always do.’
Sarah focused back on me, their conversation on pause for now.
“How much experience have you had with demons?”
I blinked, not sure I had heard her correctly.
“Can you repeat that?”
She sighed, looking at me with all the patience of a teacher with a student who wasn’t particularly bright.
