Page 20 of Illuminated

Auris was sitting in the same spot, just as immaculately dressed as he had been, his laptop open again. “Absolutely. I’ll also happily take you to a restaurant, if you prefer. There are some here that I hear are rather good.”

“No, that’s fine.” I walked along the other side of the kitchen island and pulled the fridge open. “So you said you have a housekeeper. Does she know what you are?”

Auris closed his laptop to give me his full attention. “In a sense. I entranced her so she would be aware but would keep the knowledge from others.”

If the woman disliked him for it, it didn’t show in her thoroughness as far as stocking the fridge went. There was everything I could want in there and stuff I didn’t care for. There was also more than I would be able to eat in a week.

“How does that thing work? The entrancing? It felt like the server in the restaurant last night was still acting weird even after you were gone.” I looked over to Auris as I pulled out some whole grain bread and apricot jam. It felt natural, having him watch me. Good, even.

“Oh, it has nothing to do with proximity. Although you can cut off the connection if you submerge the human in water, specifically, a body of water that is deemed holy can easily remove all traces of a vampire’s influence. But in a pinch, a swimming pool will do. It just might take a few more repeats.”

“But crosses don’t do anything? And are you saying holy water is magic?”

“No. What I mean about the water is a pond or river or lake that has been regarded as a special place over a long period of time. It need not even be religious. I would imagine Niagara Falls would do the trick. Oh, and wells will work in general. There’s a special magic in wells.”

I closed the fridge and pulled the overfull fruit bowl on the counter toward me. “What else is real?”

He shrugged. “Probably less than you think. I have only ever seen a werewolf once, for example. Witchcraft is real, but the skill has become very rare over the centuries. Some practitioners develop very uncanny divination skills, but again, very rare. Find what you like?” he asked, looking at my bread and jam selection uncertainly.

“Plenty. Your housekeeper was not wrong. I don’t think I’ll be able to eat all of this food.”

“Good. I’ll make sure she’ll know to take care of any leftovers. And do me a favor and let me know when and what you prefer to eat. For some reason, even when I’ve been closer to humans for long periods of time, it’s always been something that I found difficult to keep track of.”

I snorted as I took some fruit from the bowl, rinsed everything in the sink. “You can tell when a person is lying but not when they are hungry?”

“Oh, I can tell when they show symptoms of hunger, physically. I just forget it’s something that people also enjoy, something that they should do at least once a day, but likely more.”

There was a toaster, and I filled it with two slices of the bread while I searched the cabinets until I found a plate and a cutting board. I sliced my pear and orange and put it on the plate along with the grapes. That was when my toast was ready, and I spread the jam on it, which made my little selection of breakfast favorites complete, never mind that the nap had taken us well into early evening.

“You don’t have to drink blood every night, then?”

He laughed. “That would get noticed very fast. I can comfortably feed once every month or two.”

No wonder keeping track of eating wasn’t something that came easy to him. I took my plate and rounded the counter, sat next to him on a bar stool, and put a slice of pear in my mouth, and chewed. “Do you miss food? I think I would miss food.”

He considered this. “At the beginning I remember that it was odd, not eating. There’s a lot of habit that goes with it, a lot of social connotations. The preparation, the community, the way it structures a day. I think I was still very attached to that, at least for a time after.”

I nodded and took a bite from the toast while he patiently watched. “What happens if you try to eat food?”

He shrugged. “Nothing much. It is very unpleasant because a vampire body is made for liquid sustenance. Other than that, I either expel it very rapidly by throwing up, or my body treats it like a foreign object and just dissolves it.”

I nodded while I chewed another piece of pear.

“What, no more questions? I’m almost disappointed,” he said with a smile playing around his lips.

“It’s a lot to absorb. All the world seems different today than it was yesterday.” I finished the pear and continued with the orange.

“People are still people. There is no reason you can’t go on living like you have.”

I stopped eating and looked into his silver eyes. “What if I don’t want to go on living like I have?”

Auris gave me a hard look, ran a hand through his long hair. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, what if you made me a vampire?”

He stared at me with his shining silver eyes. “I wouldn’t,” he said. “Or at least, I wouldn’t yet.”

“What is that supposed to mean?” I said, straightening.

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