Page 5 of Taste of Forever
The humans I’d seen the other night seemed to walk around freely with the vampires, but the people in the commune had acted…not exactly scared, but certainly wary. They seemed very proud of being an exclusively human community with very little interaction with their fanged neighbors.
It almost sounded prejudiced, if I was being honest. But what did I know?
Before I could formulate a plan, hushed voices and the sounds of footsteps made their way up the hill. Four heads popped into my vantage point as the small group climbed up from the opposite side of the slope.
There was soft laughter, both male and female voices. They didn’t notice me right away, but they looked like teenagers. Two boys and two girls of about high school age, all lanky limbs and youthful exuberance. One of the girls unfolded a picnic blanket and laid it on a relatively flat spot. The boys had their heads bent, examining something between them.
“Are you gonna share, or what?” asked the other girl, who flopped down on the blanket and stretched her legs out in front of her.
“You’ll have to be careful, these are the strong ones.” One of the boys held up something that looked like a cigar. “Nicked it from my dad’s top shelf,” he added proudly.
“My mom smokes those every day,” said the girl who had carried the blanket, unimpressed.
The other boy suddenly lifted his head, inhaling deeply. “Someone’s here. A human.”
All the teens whipped around and in the next instant, I was being stared at by four pairs of very distinct red eyes.
Even though all of their eyes were all red, the variation in them was fascinating. One of the boys had irises that were nearly purple. The girl sitting on the blanket had a bright red, almost pink gaze.
“Uh, hi guys.” I waved awkwardly, hoping that teenage vampires were the least dangerous kind. “Not trying to crash your party or anything, I’m just…” My mind blanked. Justwhat?Lost? And give them an opportunity to pounce, if they even did that?
The kids instead seemed to relax when they realized I wasn’t a threat. Or a tattle-tale, which was probably worse in the eyes of teenagers sneaking off to smoke their parents’ stash.
“Hi. You from Shadowburn?” asked one of the girls.
“Ah, yes,” I lied, hoping it was the right thing to say. “Just visiting…Sanguine.” If there was any awkwardness in how I delivered the name of their world, the teens paid no mind.
“Welcome,” said the boy with the stolen cigar. He gave a polite smile, showing fangs that were almost too big for his mouth. “Where you trying to go? Need directions or anything?”
“Um, well.” I waffled for a few moments, then decided to just go for it. “Can you tell me how the blood bank works?”
“Oh, sure. Humans go in through the donor entrance—it’s on the left side.” He pointed at the corner of the building in the distance. “It’s very above board, clean and sterile, all of that. You never see who you’re giving blood to and they never see you. It’s totally anonymous to keep you safe. Feeding’s always from the wrist. I heard they pay pretty well too, if you’re in a bind.”
“The wrist,” I repeated. “You mean a bite?”
“Well, yeah.” The teen grinned, his overly large fangs sending a shiver of fear down my back. “That’s typically how we do things. Hope you’re not squeamish.”
Considering my job was testing evidence from crime scenes, I was as far away from squeamish as you could get. Blood was the least offensive bodily fluid I worked with. If anything, I found it fascinating. Blood told stories about the person it came from–their diet and overall health, diseases they had or were predisposed to, any substances used, antibodies from lingering or past infections. Blood was data, a wealth of information running through every living creature
“And they’ll pay?” I asked. “For my blood?”
“Yeah.” He shrugged. “Only seems fair. Humans have to buy all of their food. Sometimes vampires have to buy theirs.”
It did make sense when he put it that way.
“How much blood do they take?”
“I dunno. I think it depends.”
“It’s totally safe for you,” one of the girls chimed in. “My mom’s best friend goes to the blood bank all the time. She feeds from the same human male every week.”
I turned to her. “How does she know, if it’s anonymous?”
“We can taste it in the blood,” the other girl said with a shrug. “Sometimes they’ll set up regular appointments from the same source if you have a preference.”
“I see.”
A regulated, clean environment sounded much better than asking some random vampire on the street if they wanted to bite me, and then finding a way to discreetly record it. I didn’t exactly have a plan for getting bitten, but this blood bank place seemed like my best option.
