Le Coeur A Ses Raisons (The Heart Has Its Reasons)

The cross-country trip had been interesting, but now it was time to take a rest: time to settle for a while, just a brief period, long enough to catch her breath and decide where she might wish to voyage next.

Even after all the years, it was still a new and wondrous thing to be so free, so unfettered. To be unbound by tradition and convention, able to do as she pleased, in a world of technological marvels so closely akin to magic...

The airport shuttle had let her off at the bus station, and she strolled down the street with her carrysack slung over her shoulder; her Walkalong radio was strapped to her waist, tiny earphones spewing rock music, and her feet were almost airborne as they carried her along. Uncaring of who might be watching, she danced to the music only she could hear, nostrils quivering with the scent of the air -- city- tainted, but still cleaner than the wafting CO2 that pervaded the larger metropolises -- thoroughly enjoying the Toronto night.

Instinct guided her unerringly toward the finer section of town, and she absently window-shopped through the diamond- lattice security gates of the stores as she headed toward the hotel that held her reservation. Such pretty things, glittering baubles... she considered whether a diamond necklace might look stylishly gauche in combination with her worn jeans and brightly- colored shirt; tie-dye colors emblazoned over faded flannel plaid and appliqued with sequins, the work of an up-and-coming young Californian designer she'd befriended. Yes, diamonds, perhaps cascading from her earlobes... or maybe rhinestones would be more sensible...

Hands grabbed her abruptly, roughly, and something sharp pressed ominously against her ribcage. "Gimme yer money," grated a voice in her ear, "an' nobody gets hurt."

Unseen, she smiled: a predator's smile.

Faster than thought, she whirled to confront her attacker. His confidence faded as he stared at her, at the fire in her eyes. "Holy..." he began, with the first stirrings of fear.

Her fierce grin became mischievous, almost playful. "Not quite," she said, and laughed.

He tried to flee, but before he could do more than turn, she was on him...

A whisper of displaced air, and the street was empty.

Don Schanke was not having a good night. First the bit with Myra about the new dishwasher, then Jennie and the hundred forty-five dollar sneakers she kept whining for -- what does any kid need with shoes that cost that much? What do they think I am, made of money? And then, of course, I hear it about the late nights and the overtime shifts. Nick doesn't have these problems. Lucky stiff...

He was distracted by the car that cut in front of him and accelerated sharply, sailing down the street. Annoyance turned to satisfaction as he noted that the driver was clearly exceeding the speed limit. "Gotcha," he muttered under his breath, as he pursued. Normally, he wouldn't have bothered with a traffic violation, but he was in a sufficiently nasty mood to enjoy apprehending this reckless driver.

He finally caught up to the car several blocks later, and it pulled over obediently in response to the flashing light on his car's roof. Still, Schanke kept his hand in the vicinity of his weapon. Nowadays, there was no telling what might happen -- granted, this wasn't New York or L.A., not yet anyway, but he wasn't about to chance becoming a statistic. 'Course, then Jennie could buy her sneakers out of the death benefits, he thought morosely.

As he proffered his badge for her inspection, Schanke felt his guard relax despite himself. She was just a little slip of a thing, small and slender, with an open, engaging face. Barely eighteen, if he was any judge. Hard to imagine this sweet-faced child presenting any danger. But then, stranger things had happened, especially in the last few years, Schanke thought, ever since I got hooked up with Nick; I swear, trouble follows that guy like heartburn after souvlaki. "Going a little fast, there," he said casually, alert for any trouble.

She gazed up at him plaintively, huge blue eyes apologetic, without the faintest trace of feminine wiles to mar the effect of complete innocence. "Was I?" she queried. "I'm sorry, sir. It's just such a nice night, and there was such good music playing on the radio, and y'know, my feet got to tapping... I'm really sorry, truly."

Schanke sighed. His earlier annoyance was draining away; impossible to be angry with this winsome angel. "Lemme see your license," he said, out of habit.

She handed it over, and he glanced at it. "Okay, Miz Chase," he muttered. "A tourist, huh? Born July second, nineteen... you're twenty-six?" Schanke shook his head. "You look like a kid!"

"I'm older than I look," she said softly.

It seemed improbable, but the other identification in the wallet corroborated her license, and the papers from the car rental agency were indisputable. "You should be more careful," he told her sternly as he returned the papers.

"I will," she said earnestly, gazing up at him; the streetlights reflected oddly in her eyes for a moment, turning the soft blue an eerie silver. "I promise."

Schanke felt momentarily dizzy -- damn burrito, he thought ruefully. "You do that," he said, nodded a brief farewell, and headed back to his own car. He turned back as her car pulled away, feeling... what? Nothing he could pinpoint. But hadn't there been something... weird about that girl?

"You're losing it," he admonished himself, as he got behind the wheel. Miz Chase was just a regular kid, probably on spring break from school; no reason to harass her for a minor violation, no reason to detain her.

Nothing out of the ordinary, nothing at all.

He barely noticed that his bad mood had disappeared like a wisp of smoke as he continued on his way to work.

Nick was hungry, and fighting it. Every time the need to feed crept over him, it was a bright, vicious reminder of all the things he tried so hard to deny. Added to that was his memory of an evening several nights past, and his bitter disagreement with Janette. Verbal battles with Janette were always ferocious; she was an expert at striking to the very core of his soul, lashing into every sore spot in his psyche.

This latest argument had been especially vicious, centering as it did on the issue of the latest developments in his pseudo-mortal life. Valentine's Day. Natalie... Janette was understandably jealous, but then that was nothing new; Janette had never been fond of his attachment to mortal ways -- or to mortals.

His 'father' might have been deceived by his lies (or might not have been; the jury was still out on that one), but Janette knew him too well for Nick to get away with the same trick twice. She knew he was in love with another, and wasn't there a saying about the fury of a woman scorned? In Janette's case, that fury could be lethal -- to him, or to his mortal love.

LaCroix, on the other hand, was a ticking time bomb just waiting to explode. When and where and how remained to be seen.

Days of self-imposed solitude had not helped his state of mind: and so he sought her out, the one being who could almost always still the maelstrom of turmoil within him. The scent of her mortal body, of her blood, would be as tormenting as always -- yet there was something about her that always seemed to soothe him when he was troubled.

Natalie was indefinable, unique; her complexity was one of the things Nick loved most about her.

It was barely past sunset, far earlier than most of his visits, but Nick felt sure that Nat would be pleased to see him -- even if she did bawl him out for running the risk of spontaneous combustion. She enjoyed his company as much as he enjoyed hers, of course without the legacy of what felt like nearly unbroken loneliness to add an acute poignancy to the intimacy of their friendship. But then, she had her own loneliness, and her own pain. When they were together, though, pain seemed to disappear, assuaged somehow by the chemistry between them. Natalie was a rare being, a rare friend...

And always, lurking in the depths of his mind, was the knowledge that someday she would die, and he would be alone again. Too soon, much too soon.

She was in the midst of an autopsy, dictating notes into a microcassette recorder. "Nick," she greeted him, as if she'd been expecting his arrival. "You're early, aren't you? What time did you get to the station?"

He shook his head, momentarily confused. "I came here straight from home," he told her, "why?"

Her eyebrows lifted. "I assumed Schanke called you. The day shift found this guy tucked into a dumpster this morning."

Nick nodded. "Have you determined the cause of death?" he wanted to know.

"Well, now," she said, "that's why I wanted to see you." Silently, she drew back the thin sheet that covered the corpse's face.

She didn't have to indicate the cause of her unease; his eyes locked instantly on the tiny marks at the juncture of neck and shoulder. Anyone else might have guessed that the wounds were indications of an addict's last intravenous fix, or perhaps oddly symmetrical insect bites -- but Nick knew, as Natalie did, what had caused those small, seemingly innocuous punctures.

"The cause of death is listed as apparent drug overdose," Natalie said. "Which is a logical enough conclusion, considering the concentration of cocaine in his blood. What's left of it."

"So he was wired," he murmured.

"Mmmm. But... he didn't die from that, did he?" She regarded him with calm certainty.

"Not likely." The fang marks were very small, but to a practiced eye, unmistakable. "He had help dying," Nick said grimly.

"That's what I thought. Of course, there's nothing in the autopsy report that justifies a homicide investigation. Or perhaps I should say, an official investigation." Natalie's eyes questioned him silently.

He met her gaze squarely. "Nobody I know would be so careless..." he began.

Until a fragment of drifting memory sailed through his mind, bringing him an image that contradicted his words.

Nick remembered:

It was the heart of the flower-power sixties, The Summer Of Love or another summer like it. He'd journeyed to one of the sundrenched cities along the California coast for a brief respite from the mortal lifetime he'd been living at that point; although the beaches were of course not a suitable tourist attraction for a visiting vampire, there was plenty of diversity to keep him from becoming bored.

Mindful of the dangers of being too distinctive, his own clothing was conservative for the period, although he'd let his hair grow a little longer than he usually kept it -- but it was delightful to watch the young mortal 'hippies', with their outlandish fashions and their love beads. They seemed so exuberant, filled with energy and enthusiasm. As he strolled down the moonlit boardwalk, one lovely young thing reached up to place a daisy behind his ear, as her girlfriends giggled; he allowed her the liberty, and favored her with his best boyish smile as he passed by.

All along the boardwalk, there was music and laughter, the sounds of mortal celebration: the sound of being young and alive on a Saturday night. It was almost enough to make him forget his dark nature, almost enough to let him believe, just for a moment, that he was one of them. The aura of merriment soothed him, and he soaked it in as he made his way down the crowded strip.

He stopped to listen to a trio of youngsters making acoustic music with guitars and tribal drums, tossed a fifty-cent piece into the guitar case left open for such donations, and turned away to move on. As he turned, he caught sight of a figure perched precariously on the edge of the metal railing separating boardwalk and moonlit sand; her feet dangled, like those of a child in a highchair.

Nick could not have said what it was about her that attracted his attention, only knew that he could not look away. She was utterly unremarkable: long straight golden hair kept in place by a macrame headband, Indian-print blouse and worn jeans more subdued than many of the more unconventional fashions gracing the boardwalk, rope sandals revealing toenails painted in the shades of the rainbow. Her eyes were wide pools of calm blue, fringed with luxuriant long lashes - - and they were gazing into his, he noticed with startlement, seeming to bore into his very soul.

The steady gaze was disquieting, sending a chill of apprehension through him. It was as if this small stranger knew him, knew his terrible secret...

Before he could make sense of the feeling, she smiled at him and beckoned, slipping down from her seat on the metal rail.

Still feeling the vestiges of that odd chill, yet strangely numbed, Nick moved to where she'd been - - only to glimpse her retreating form moving lightly, swiftly, almost skipping down the boardwalk.

She paused once and turned back, smiled once more, and one slender arm moved in a 'follow-me' gesture.

Intrigued by the game, Nick followed.

Even vampire vision was sufficient only to barely permit him to keep a fix on her as she darted down the boardwalk, leading him eventually onto the adjacent side streets, further and further from the crowds. Senses alert for any danger, he tracked her to a dark alley...

The girl was there, with a companion. Not seeing Nick's silhouette in the shadows, the burly man dragged her deeper into the darkness, one arm tight around her slim neck. She was a small pale shape against his huge bulk, frail and vulnerable against his greater strength.

As he caught a momentary view of her expression, Nick was startled to see not terror, but a strange calm smile etched across her face.

In a blur of motion, the large man went flying backwards into the wall, and the girl was standing alone. She straightened, as if throwing off an invisible cloak, and all at once Nick felt it, sharp and heavy as a physical blow: a sense of power, of immeasurable strength, a presence more imposing and intimidating than any he'd ever encountered.

Mon dieu, she's one of us, he thought, astonished and dismayed.

She didn't do a thing, didn't say a word, merely stared at her attacker -- but he cringed helplessly and began to whimper, driven by an instinctive fear he didn't consciously understand.

Motivated by a similar unreasoning fright, Nick stood frozen as she advanced toward her attacker- cum-victim, one slow step after another...

"Nick?" Natalie's concerned voice interrupted his reverie.

He roused himself from the memory with an effort. "Hmmm?"

She knew him too well to miss the signs. "Someone you know?" she prodded, discerning his thoughts with uncanny accuracy.

Nick considered. "Perhaps," he conceded.

"Another...?"

"Maybe."

Nat let out a long, long sigh. "Nick," she said, "there are already too many vampires in this town."

"If it's the person I was thinking of, unlikely as that might be," he replied, in an ironic tone, "we have worse problems than population density." The spacing of the punctures indicated a smaller than adult-sized jaw, which would be consistent with his suspicions -- though if it had been her doing, she should certainly have known better than to leave such an obvious kill behind. On the other hand, Nick was familiar with the effects of drug- tainted blood on the vampire metabolism; it was entirely possible that she'd been too stoned to think clearly.

Emerging from his private musings, he could see that he'd piqued Nat's curiosity unbearably. "Nick..."

"It's a long story," he said hurriedly. That was the literal truth; but as well, it masked his real reasons for not wanting to explain things more fully. The very thought of that vampire was unnerving, and he still hadn't come to terms with recent events as it was; Nat herself was unsettling enough at the moment.

"You know," The unusual hesitancy in Natalie's voice caught his attention. "I don't like this, Nick."

He favored her with an inquiring look, inviting her to continue.

Nat drew a deep breath. "I know that this man was murdered," she said, gesturing with the hand that held the file folder containing the paperwork on the vampire's victim. "I know it for a fact, despite what this says." She slammed the folder down on her desk in frustration. "It's supposed to be my job to expose the truth, and instead I'm looking for ways to cover it up! There's a killer out there, Nick, and I know it, and I'm doing nothing about it..."

He held himself steady against the sharp pain that stabbed at his heart. It wasn't Nat's fault; she didn't know what she was saying, how badly her words hurt him -- and that was just the point, wasn't it? For all she knew of him, even despite her love for him, Natalie was mortal, with a mortal's perspective. The reason her words were painful was the simple fact that they were so very true.

"Well, that's nothing new, is it?" he said softly. "After all, there's a killer in here, too -- isn't there?"

Confusion spread across Natalie's face, chased away by chagrin. "Nick, wait! I didn't mean..." she began to protest -- but he was already gone, disappearing down the corridor without another word.

Driving was an automatic thing to vampire reflexes -- although he'd nearly caused several major accidents that way -- but the memories would not be denied; Nick made his way to the precinct, remembering:

Motivated by a similar unreasoning fright, he stood frozen as she advanced toward her attacker- cum-victim, one slow step after another...

"No," Nick managed to say, somehow, through the icy numbness of his fear.

He suppressed an urge to shrink back as her eyes found him, assessed him harshly, raised eyebrows underlining her silent query as to the identity of the young upstart who dared challenge her.

And then, incredibly, she smiled. "You're Lucien's child," she said, to his absolute amazement.

He stared at her -- until the burly man's soft moan caught his attention. "Help me..."

The girl-vampire turned to her victim calmly. "You picked the wrong target, honey," she advised him, and though her voice was melodious and ludicrously gentle, he began to whimper again.

Nick forced himself to speak, but before he could, her blue eyes impaled him, dried his voice up in his throat. "Don't," she told him, and he was powerless to disobey.

He watched helplessly as she lunged toward the cowering thief, eyes blazing brightly, small sharp fangs bared. She fastened herself to the man's neck, and her body molded itself to her victim's as if they were lovers; her face was tranquil, almost childlike, as she drew the hot blood from his veins.

The scent of it was very strong, and Nick had not fed in... too long. He felt his body quiver as it hit him, provoking the bloodlust: a wave of desire closely akin to passion, a need beyond controlling that he must somehow restrain. He struggled desperately with himself, trying to hold back...

She looked up, and her mouth was a red slash of spilled blood -- Nick moaned aloud.

One hand beckoned, that same fluid gesture that had lured him from the boardwalk: from his comfortable falsehood of mortality, into the dark alley of his troubled soul. "Join me," she said softly, warmly.

The invitation caught him off guard, wrenched another moan from his lips. "No..."

"It's all right," soothed the velvety voice persuasively, "it's all right." And oh, how Nick wanted to believe it; the hunger was building inside him, an agony of need that could barely be resisted, and never denied...

In a single lightning move he was beside her, sinking to his knees, bending to drink, succumbing finally to the inevitable. But even as the bloodlust claimed him, a tiny voice of conscience howled in anguish; even in the mindlessness of the feeding frenzy, he could find no peace.

As his fangs pierced the man's flesh, he felt the girl's hand against his face, forming a slow caress that traced his cheekbone before moving to twine fingers in his curls - - an oddly possessive gesture that was somehow comforting. The cry of protest within him receded, as if her touch had withered the seed of self-loathing that grew wild and tangled in Nick's tormented psyche.

He had vowed that he would never do this again... but then, he hadn't attacked the man, it wasn't really his responsibility... and at that moment, the telepathic power the girl was using to calm his guilt seemed to be a very welcome gift.

Then the rush of blood filled his mouth and his aching soul, and Nick lost himself in the smell and the taste and the feel of it.

"Where've you been?" Schanke said irritably, as Nick sat down at his desk. "Nat said you left ages ago."

"Sorry," Nick said, with a quick flash of a smile. His mind was still very much elsewhere, preoccupied with his parting shot at Natalie (unfair of him, he knew; he owed her an apology) and the too-vivid memory that still haunted him. Even recalling the intensity of feeding was enough to evoke a reaction, and the feeling had not entirely receded; he was acutely aware of the pervasive scent of mortal blood, surrounding him, pressing in on him. Nick took a deep breath and tried to steady himself. "Do we have an I.D. on him yet?" he asked, forcing his mind to attend to nominally safer matters.

"You're always sorry," his partner grumbled, but there was no real anger in it. In fact, Schanke seemed more cheerful than he had in days. "Yes, as a matter of fact, we do," he continued, "turns out he had a record."

"Dealing?" Nick said idly.

"Manslaughter," the other corrected. "Assault, robbery, you name it."

"Really." A distracted frown creased Nick's face.

"No great loss to society," Schanke concluded, oblivious to his expression.

"No great loss," Nick repeated softly, thinking hard.

"Nat said she couldn't come up with anything for us," his partner commented.

"Nothing to justify an investigation." Natalie was right, Nick realized; although the deception was necessary, that didn't mitigate the fact that it was a betrayal of the very nature of his chosen career -- and hers. For Nick, deception was a way of life, but for him to have involved Natalie so deeply in his falsehoods was an injustice -- even a cruelty.

He looked at Schanke, and wondered what the other detective would say if he knew that there was a murderer on the loose, and his two most trusted colleagues were doing their best to cover it up.

What am I doing? Nick wondered suddenly, bleakly. In my eternal quest for redemption, what damage have I done to these mortals -- these people who I consider my friends? The one mortal in eight hundred years who I truly love?

"Well, it's not as if we don't have plenty of other work to keep us busy," Schanke said. "Right, Nick?"

When his partner didn't respond, Schanke nudged his arm. "Nick? Earth to Nick..."

"Hmmm? Right," Nick said, and did his best to bury his newfound realization in paperwork.

"Fine, cherie," Janette said in bored tones, handing her platinum credit card over to the sales clerk.

The ultrachic boutiques she favored were only too happy to stay open late on occasion, for Janette was a frequent customer; only the very finest materials and leathers, only the newest fashions - - only the most expensive items. She watched as her driver carried bag after bag to the car, waited for the clerk to return her credit card and the slip for her to sign.

As her gaze drifted across the store, she noticed a young girl poring over a display of rhinestone bracelets. Her interest was piqued; she liked youngsters of either sex, young luscious bodies and their hot, pulsing blood. But this one was odd, somehow -- she was...

The girl looked up, sensing Janette's gaze, and as their eyes met, Janette saw her.

A mischievous smile crossed the girl's face; she selected a bracelet and snapped it on her wrist, and promptly vanished in a blur of unseen motion.

"Ma'am?" the salesclerk inquired timidly, unaware of the vanished shoplifter. "Your card?"

Janette signed the slip and pocketed her credit card distractedly. How... interesting, she thought. No doubt, Nicolas will want to know...

Nicolas. Now there was a thought to warm the heart -- among other things. Perhaps this news would be worth something to him, worth enough to induce him to join her -- for a drink -- and hopefully, much more.

She strode out to her car, eager to return to the club, to don one of her new outfits and prepare for his inevitable arrival.

Natalie's car was in the shop, so she'd called a taxi to take her home. She'd meant to ask Nick to drive her, but... well, considering what had happened during his brief visit to her office, it hadn't seemed a good idea.

As she waited for the cab to arrive, idly watching the sky lighten to the east, her thoughts were preoccupied, filled with endless questions. Coming across this sort of killing had disturbed her more than she liked to admit: among other things, it indicated the presence of another vampire in town. From Nick's expression, perhaps someone from his past -- and whenever Nick's past got tangled with his present, things tended to get messy.

The medical report she'd filed disturbed her too, mostly because she felt it didn't disturb her enough. It was a usual thing for her to file false or incomplete reports on Nick's behalf -- and at what point did I stop being uncomfortable about it? Natalie wondered uneasily. I used to feel guilty, but somehow I don't even think about it anymore. Just how far have my ethics eroded?

Never mind the fact that the fellow she'd dissected had been an eloquent reminder of Nick's true nature. A truth she had chosen to ignore, in view of the extenuating circumstances of his beliefs -- but too often, the lines blurred; too often, she was encountering conflicts. This latest death... years ago, she'd have pored over the test results until she'd found a cause less ambiguous than 'probable overdose', anxious to pursue any avenue that might lead to the apprehension of the murderer. Now, because she knew who, or more properly, what the killer was, she was hanging back, letting Nick handle the situation. Which could be very good, or very bad -- Nick's allegiances and sympathies were sometimes at odds with his self-imposed moral code. The results could be less than satisfactory, to say the least.

She had never thought that anything could make her question her own morals and medical ethics, but the simple fact of Nick's existence and her willing complicity with his many subterfuges had long ago made hash of her certainties. And then she had fallen in love with him -- or maybe she had loved him all along -- but either way, the fact remained that her own beliefs and loyalties had become as confused and tangled as his, and the situation wasn't likely to improve any time soon.

In more ways than one, Natalie thought wryly, with equal parts sarcasm and wistful sadness. For ever since that fateful Valentine's Day, she and Nick seemed to be drifting inexplicably apart, and she hadn't the faintest idea why.

She knew better than to be so oblivious to her surroundings, but the familiarity and relative safety of the area lulled her into a false sense of security, and her preoccupation was so severe that she didn't notice the young man until he was upon her.

His dirty fist shoved into her mouth, so that she couldn't cry out; he dragged her down, into the shadows, where no casual passerby (if one were to happen along -- the area was deserted) would see. "Hold still, honey," he leered, "this'll only take a second."

She fought and struggled, but he was bigger than she was, and the knife he produced and held tight against her throat was an effective persuader. Natalie closed her eyes as he ripped at her clothes, thinking, Nick, oh god, help me, and the fact that she was praying for heavenly intervention in the form of a vampire was an irony that never occurred to her in the face of the imminent rape. The man's hand fumbled lower, invading her most intimate parts, and she whimpered involuntarily.

And then, salvation.

Her first thought was Nick! but it wasn't; faster than thought, blazing eyes, yes, but not Nick... It tore the man away and drove a fist into his face with a force that obliterated it: blood spattered everywhere, and Natalie, who had never been even slightly squeamish, shrank away from the crimson shower.

The figure shoved the body away and licked its fist, obviously savoring the taste of the blood -- then it turned, and looked at her.

It had the face of an angel, so innocent that neither the blood nor the fangs nor the fever- bright eyes could dispel the aura of little-girl sweetness. "Are you okay?" it inquired.

Nat shook her head slightly, stunned, instinctively moving to rearrange her torn garments. Her skirt was salvageable, the zipper still functional though the button at the top had popped off, but her blouse was a ruin. "I'm going into shock," she observed clinically, as if from a great distance.

"You'll be all right," her savior decided. She brushed at her bloodstained jeans with one slender hand, then moved to place that hand against Natalie's forehead.

"What are you doing?" Nat wondered aloud. "Who are you?"

The angel's face creased in a warm smile. "I'm a friend," she said soothingly. "Okay?"

Oddly enough, Natalie felt no fear. Perhaps it was that this creature had earned her trust by rescuing her from her assailant; perhaps her exposure to Nick had simply numbed her to the terrifying prospect of such immortal hunters. As the girl's wide blue eyes gazed soundlessly into hers, she felt the knot inside her unravel and loosen; her dizziness and nausea ebbed away, and her pulse evened and slowed.

Time slowed as well, became a thick syrup in which Natalie floated effortlessly. She sensed the vampire's close scrutiny, as if the girl could see inside her, discern her every secret -- yet there was a feeling of benevolence, of vast understanding, that made the inquiry seem utterly unthreatening. She gave herself over to the other's limitless strength, and let herself drift...

Her eyes blinked open suddenly, and she looked around wildly. The ruined corpse of her attacker lay nearby, on the blood-spattered pavement. She shuddered at the memory of what he'd nearly done to her, then frowned -- it seemed as if there was something she should remember, but couldn't quite manage to recall. An almost familiar feeling of vagueness hazed over her consciousness.

Something had saved her -- but what?

The cry of sirens told her that someone had already called the police. The very first thing, she would tell them her name, tell them which precinct to call, and Nick would come; Nick would be there for her. She needed him now, needed the comfort of his strength, his protection.

She knew that Nick would be there when she needed him.

Almost sunrise... he knew he had time to get home safely, but still it made him nervous. There had been enough times when he'd been trapped in daylight, had felt it scorching his tender skin, screaming through his nerves...

He breathed a sigh of relief when the door shut behind him, the closed shutters sealing him in a secure womb of darkness.

All night long, he'd been busy tracking down old acquaintances, trying to find out whether the 'new kid in town' was the person he most feared it would be, without having to consult the two sources who would be most likely to have an answer for him -- and most likely to make him pay through the nose for that information. A difficult pursuit, made more frustrating by the fact that he had turned up zero data: a complete waste of time that would have been better spent otherwise.

Have to call Nat, he thought, feeling a pang of remorse that he hadn't done so earlier. his earlier realization that he had inadvertently betrayed Natalie by involving her in the complexities of his existence had disturbed him, more than he had been already; he'd hoped to come to terms with matters before contacting her again. It didn't look as if that was going to happen, though, and his conscience was bothering him. He wondered if she would still be at work, or if she was already home...

There were messages on his machine, far more than was normal. He thumbed the switch, and waited. "Nick," said the familiar voice at last, "it's Schanke. Where the hell are you? We've been looking all over." The voice grew somber. "Listen, something's happened..."

Nick listened, and felt a sick feeling take hold of him.

There were eight messages from Schanke, increasingly anxious as to his whereabouts; the ninth was from Natalie herself. "Nick?" came her voice, small and scared, and each word was a stake through his heart. "Please come. I need you..." A short silence, and then the click of the phone disconnecting.

He sprang for the window control, but the smallest crack in the shutters told him that it was far too late. The sun had risen, and the world had become a deathtrap for him.

Too late to go to Natalie. Too late.

Please come. I need you...

His fist lashed out and shattered the closest object -- the glass surface of the small table where the machine rested - - and Nick hardly felt it; the pain inside him was too great. "Damn!" he swore uncharacteristically, vehemently.

Natalie needed him, and he was useless... She was the closest thing he'd had to a friend in years. She understood and accepted him as none of his own kind ever had. Her friendship, her affection, was the single bright point of light in the otherwise impenetrable blackness of his existence. He loved her as he had loved no one in the entire course of his immortal life...

And now that she needed him, the facts of his nature kept him from being there for her.

Betrayal, indeed.

The other hand, the one not studded with small sparkling shards of glass, dashed at his eyes, which burned suddenly as if sunlight had struck them.

Natalie had told the detectives all she knew, all she could remember of the incident -- which wasn't much -- and afterwards, she'd waited at the station for Nick to respond to her messages, to come and get her. She'd waited fruitlessly, long past sunrise, until finally she gave up and let Schanke drive her home.

Once alone in the privacy of her bedroom, she'd unplugged her phone and given in to the quivering emotion which lay beneath the thin veneer of equanimity she'd maintained since the attack; Natalie the strong, the brave, the unshakable, collapsed on her bed in helpless sobs.

She awoke to the dying embers of late afternoon sunlight spilling through the thin curtains of her bedroom, and the dull ache of loneliness. The coolness of a breeze wafting through her window... she didn't recall opening it...

And a figure, poised motionless against the wall.

Natalie let out a long sigh. "Nick," she moaned.

He was shrouded in heavy fabric, long hooded coat and unseasonable scarf, which he discarded as he came to her bedside. "Nat," he murmured, in that soft, compassionate voice of his, and she burst into tears again. Nick held her as she cried into his chest, reliving the terror of the attack in a nearly incoherent rush of words. So strong, and so caring; the warmth of his embrace was the sweetest thing she had ever known. "Oh, Nick," she pleaded, "why didn't you come sooner?"

An odd, guilty look came over his face. "I came as soon as I could," he said softly. "I tried to call..."

She hated to see him look that way, so defeated and lost; "It doesn't matter," she said hurriedly, "you're here now." And snuggled against him, feeling safe in his arms as nowhere else.

Nick was such a wonderful man, and she'd cared for him so much, for so long. Hard to understand in retrospect why it had taken them so long to get together, when it had been virtually inevitable from the start. Whyever hadn't she done anything about it before? Uncertainty seized her for a moment, and Natalie thought that there was something else, something she was forgetting, some difficulty between them... and there was that vagueness again, a weird hazy feeling...

Then his lips grazed her forehead, and both vagueness and uncertainty disappeared in burgeoning desire.

"Nick," Natalie whispered, and kissed him properly.

Such hesitancy, at first, such restraint -- and then all at once a response so intense it left her reeling. She surrendered blissfully to her passion, and Nick's.

Her hands moved with a life of their own; they clutched at him with fierce urgency. She wanted so badly to be close to him, wanted...

"Nat." Nick's voice was breathless. "Nat, stop." He disengaged from her embrace with infinite care, and held her at arm's length.

"I... I'm sorry." Flustered, disoriented, Natalie backpedaled; she hadn't expected Nick to reject her, and her embarrassment brought a hot flush to her face. "I -- I didn't mean... never mind."

"No, Nat..." Nick seemed uncommonly awkward, as if he was as embarrassed as she felt. "It's not your fault." His arms slipped around her again, holding her loosely. "It's mine."

She shook her head, dazed, not understanding. "Why?" she queried.

"My... control... has limits." Abruptly, he released her, took a deep breath, and ran his hands through his hair in a quick nervous gesture.

"Maybe you shouldn't worry so much about control," Nat said softly.

"You don't know what you're saying." His voice was flat, lifeless. "You don't know how dangerous this is."

She moved toward him, not thinking, only longing to ease the hurt, despairing look in his eyes. "How dangerous could it be?" Her hands moved over his shoulders and drew him closer. "There's nothing wrong with... intimacy."

He stared at her, as if she was speaking some foreign language he couldn't understand. "Nat," he said, "you know why... it can't be that way between us."

"No, I don't," she pressed. "Tell me -- help me understand. I love you so much, Nick. I just want..."

"Nat, don't," he said hastily, as if he couldn't bear to hear what she might say next.

"...to be closer to you," she finished lamely, trying to comprehend the distant, pained look in his eyes. "Nick, please -- I need you now, I need to be close to you..."

He flinched, as if she'd punched him. "Nat, we can't... you know why we can't..." All at once, his face changed, from anguish to dawning realization. "You know why, Nat."

She blinked at him, surprised. "What are you talking about?"

He moved, uncommonly swiftly, cradling her face in his hands and gazing deeply into her eyes. "Are you on medication?" he said suddenly. "Or taking drugs?"

She was outraged. "Are you out of your mind?"

"No," Nick said, "but I think you may be." He held up his hand at the first sign of her protest. "I believe someone's tampered with your memory," he said gently.

"Don't be ridiculous," Natalie scoffed. "How could that be?"

"One of my people might have done it..."

"What do you mean, your people?"

Nick stared at her, and Natalie stared right back, unaware, unknowing.

"Lydia," he growled under his breath.

"Who?" Natalie asked.

"Never mind. Nat, I want you to stay here until I return. Don't argue," he overrode her. "Don't go to work, don't leave your apartment, and don't let anyone else in. I have reason to be concerned for your safety." His eyes bored into hers, almost frightening in their intensity.

"Nick, what's wrong?" she asked him, her voice subdued.

"I don't know yet," he muttered, "but I'm going to find out."

He moved to leave -- but turned back after only a few steps and returned to Natalie's side. His lips brushed across hers, and lingered there for a long moment. She could feel him trembling, could feel the tension and longing in him, and wondered distractedly why he seemed so afraid to give in to it.

"Be careful," he whispered in her ear, slipping away from her embrace in a quick evasive motion.

"You, too," Nat said forlornly, in the direction of his retreating form.

There was only one vampire he knew who possessed telepathic powers of the strength necessary to affect mortal memory to such a degree. Only one vampire whose presence inevitably led to disasters such as the one he was living through now.

It was obvious that Natalie didn't know -- had somehow forgotten -- that Nick was a vampire. To all intents and purposes, he was a stranger to the woman he loved, his closest friend.

For all the damage LaCroix had done to him throughout their long and tempestuous association, nothing had ever hurt Nick as badly as the realization that Nat didn't know him anymore.

Memory stalked him, crouched and leapt, assailing him with images from his past:

"We share a certain affinity," she told him, as they sat together in her small apartment. "You feel guilty about the kill I made, even though you were given no choice in the matter. You're ashamed of even the small part you played in my actions."

His face burned, and he turned away from her in discomfort.

"He intended to rape me, Nicky," she elaborated. "In his mind, I could see the evidence of a dozen assaults. He preyed on young girls, dear; he used their ideals and their slogans of 'peace' and 'love' to gain their trust, and then he raped them -- and killed them afterwards."

"And that gives you the right to be his executioner?" Nick protested.

"I don't tolerate the victimization of the weak by the strong," she said stridently. "So I use my strength to compensate for mortal weakness."

He shook his head. "No," he said softly. "It's not right."

She smiled, an expression halfway between innocent mischief and predatory venom. "Dear little Nicholas," she said, her voice condescending in its gentleness. "I am over four thousand years older than you are. When you're my age, then you can try telling me what's right and wrong."

Helpless against that incontrovertible statement, Nick was silent.

"You're misguided," she decided, "but at least you have morals, twisted though they are. I can tell you, I don't have any particular liking for most of your kind. Bloodthirsty creatures, the lot of you. When I was created, back at the very dawn of humanity, I was a goddess of the moon, of the night. I helped my people, I protected them, and they paid me tribute willingly, gladly." She drew a slender hand across her eyes, as if to banish her vision of the past. "Then one day the invaders came and tore our tribe apart, and I was alone. So I voyaged afar, looking for others of my kind -- and what I found sickened me." Her gaze was appraising. "And now I find you, and all at once I think there may be hope for our species."

"We're not a species," he said bitterly. "We're an obscenity."

His words provoked startled laughter. "Maybe you are," she teased him, "but I refuse to accept that designation."

"You hunt," Nick shot back, marveling at his own daring; this creature could easily destroy him, yet he spoke as if he were her superior. "You kill."

"But only when the death has meaning," she said earnestly, leaning forward in her intensity. "Only when by doing so I can alleviate pain. In my eyes, anything else would be immoral."

"In my eyes," Nick muttered, "it's immoral to kill, no matter how much meaning one might place in the death! We have no right to interfere with mortal lives, no right whatsoever."

He expected her to be angry, perhaps to lash out at him as LaCroix would have, but instead she seemed pleased. "Better misguided morals than none at all," she said philosophically. "And by the way, please do not compare me to that one again. Not even in the privacy of your thoughts, which by the way are not nearly so private as you'd like to think. Aside from the fact that my mental powers are quite advanced, you, Nicky, are extraordinarily transparent."

He set aside the question of her telepathy and his own transparency in favor of a more tantalizing puzzle. "You knew I was LaCroix's... creation," he said, preferring that term to the one she had used.

She smiled. "His child," she emphasized. "Don't make the mistake of turning your back on that fact. It's the strongest bond our kind can ever have between us -- and the only bond that not even time can obscure."

"How did you know?" Nick demanded, disregarding the rest of her words.

Her hand extended, caressing his cheek as intimately as if they'd known each other forever, fingertips brushing the wilting daisy that still dangled from behind his ear. "There was no way I could fail to see such an obvious truth," she said. "His influence has guided you throughout your immortal existence. You labor desperately to be the exact opposite of everything Lucien is. That struggle shapes every part of you."

Violently, Nick shook his head. "No matter what affinity you claim we share," he told her, "no friend of LaCroix's can possibly be a friend of mine."

She laughed, but this time there was no merriment in the sound, only a strange, wistful sadness. "I am no friend of LaCroix's, believe me."

"Then how do you know him?" he pressed.

"Imperfectly," she said. "I am the force which has driven him to the extremes he so favors, and you so despise. It's my doing that Lucien has become what he is -- and so, by extension, you are to some degree my child as well as his." Her sadness lifted abruptly, replaced by a wickedly mischievous grin. "A cute kid, at that," she said whimsically.

He couldn't help but be pleased by the compliment, but, "You didn't answer my question," he prodded.

A small sigh. "Then you may assume that I didn't intend to," she stated flatly. "Leave it alone, Nicky -- believe me, it's better that way."

He acquiesced, but could not ignore her more trivial infraction. "Don't call me Nicky," he said.

She smiled, a mischievous look much more suited to her elfin face than the despair that had been lurking there. "Nicky," she said placidly, "I do what I want. I always do what I want."

"Not this time, Lydia," Nick growled under his breath, and took to the air.

"Janette," he said some time later, as he stood in the doorway of her office at the Raven, trying for equanimity. It was hard; memories of their argument left a bad taste in his mouth, and the more recent recollections of Natalie's blank expression, and of the sweetness of her kisses, still haunted him. Janette was the last person he wanted to see, but he had no choice -- he preferred not to confront LaCroix unless absolutely necessary, and he needed any information he could get.

"Dear Nicolas. Come in, make yourself at home." She glided over, hands caressing him possessively. "I have news for you," she cooed, "at a price."

"Well, of course there's a price," Nick murmured. His body was reacting to the lure of Janette's, but he forced the arousal to the back of his consciousness. The memory of Natalie in his arms was still too sharp; Janette's closeness seemed too much of a betrayal.

"Not such a terrible cost," she countered. "It's been such a long time..."

It had been a long time, a very long time. Nick's body was acutely aware of that, no matter how hard Nick himself tried to deny it. "Tell me what you have to tell me," he said roughly, forcing himself to back away from her, "and leave personal considerations out of it."

"Oh, but there are always personal considerations," Janette whispered.

Her body was as sinuous and lovely as ever, attracting Nick despite himself, and it infuriated him that even after seven centuries she still had that power over him. "Tell me, Janette," he demanded, letting some of his anger show.

She regarded him with amusement, and Nick was annoyed to realize that here was one more person who could see right through him, along with such disparate types as Lydia, LaCroix and Natalie. "Why do you resist?" she asked him. "Why do you persist in tormenting yourself?"

"I've chosen the only path I can consider worthwhile," Nick stated, drawing strength from his irrevocable gut-certainty in that truth.

"You'd rather remain celibate with your mortal sweetheart than indulge yourself with me? Am I really so hideous?"

"That has nothing to do with it, and you know it. Janette, what do you have to tell me?"

She sighed, and acquiesced. "We have a new... associate in town," she said offhandedly.

"Yes, I know," Nick affirmed, "the day shift picked up a victim."

Eyebrows rose. "You know more than I do," Janette said. "And this... rogue left the corpse behind? Hmmm. Careless."

"There won't be an investigation," he told her, "the cause of death has been listed as 'probable overdose'." The exchange of information went both ways, Nick knew -- if he didn't divulge what little he knew to Janette, he'd get nothing in return. "I'm not sure who did it..."

"I saw her," she said smugly.

His eyes narrowed. "Lydia," he said, not as a question.

"Of course, darling; who else?" Janette smiled at him, an expression that reminded Nick disconcertingly of LaCroix. "I'm surprised she hasn't already looked you up."

"In a sense, she already has." He moved to go, was restrained by a long-nailed hand clutching his arm.

"Don't go, Nicolas," Janette purred seductively. "Stay here, with me."

"I have other concerns at the moment," Nick said firmly. Then decided to indulge himself, just a bit. He reached out and seized Janette's hips, pulled them together with vampire strength and kissed her fiercely. "Thanks for the information," he said with a smile, separating from her despite the throbbing ache within him, and left. It wasn't difficult -- it had been much harder for him to walk away from Natalie's embrace.

He could almost feel Janette watching his departure forlornly.

The security people knew him, though not by name, and he made his way into the studio. LaCroix glanced up, looking (as always) as if he'd expected Nick's arrival, though Nick (as always) had given no warning.

"Nicholas," LaCroix said, in a velvety-soft purr. "To what do I owe the pleasure of this visit?"

He drew a deep breath and launched into his query without preamble. "Lydia's in town, and I need to know where she is."

Genuine startlement lit up the elder vampire's face; he laughed, long and loud. "And you've come to ask me?"

"I thought you might know," Nick said steadily. "Well, you're wrong." All traces of mirth left the severe face. "I neither know nor care," LaCroix stated coldly.

"Are you quite sure?" In some distant, unacknowledged corner of his psyche, Nick was enjoying himself; LaCroix had so few vulnerable points that it was a real treat to have the excuse to probe one of them.

Of course, LaCroix was at his most dangerous when he was vulnerable -- that was part of the game, Nick supposed. It was always interesting, playing with fire...

The other vampire chose not to attack, instead retreating behind a barrier of haughty unconcern. "If you wish to find Lydia," he said, "inquire elsewhere."

"I have, to no avail. But tell me," Nick said, matching LaCroix's subtle defense with his own brand of cool contempt, "if I manage to locate her, do you wish to be informed?"

LaCroix's eyes narrowed, and he turned away. "Unlike you, Nicholas," he said smoothly, "I don't enjoy suffering."

"And you believe I do?"

"I know you do," came the instant answer. "You have a gift for it. You inflict punishment upon yourself more efficiently than even I could." A bright, toothy grin, directed at the far wall. "Go ahead and suffer, Nicholas -- it seems to be what you're best at. But if it's Lydia's brand of torment you seek, please leave me out of it." He flicked a switch on his console, effectively ending the conversation.

Nick stood there silently as the other launched into his smooth monologue. LaCroix had ceased to notice him, as if he had vanished, and after awhile, Nick took the hint and departed, closing the door silently behind himself.

Another fruitless endeavor, as indeed he had expected -- but he'd had to try. Confronting both Janette and LaCroix in the same evening had left him feeling exhausted, drained of everything except his growing despair.

Instinctively, he sought out Natalie: she might be missing a few vitally important memories, but she was still the best friend he had. And besides, she'd been through a terrifying experience, had had her mind tampered with and rearranged by an expert; he needed to be sure that she was all right.

He hovered just outside her window, peered anxiously through. Yes, there she was, bustling around her living room, absently tidying up, whistling...

Nick frowned. She looked almost too good. Almost as if nothing had happened. Natalie was extraordinarily resilient, but still...

He descended to the street and entered normally, rang her bell and waited anxiously for her to answer.

"Oh, hi, Nick," she said cheerfully, between mouthfuls of danish. "Come on in."

He did as he was told, studying her closely. "Are you all right?" he probed cautiously.

"Well, sure. Why wouldn't I be?" she said breezily.

"The... assault..." he began, without the faintest idea of how that sentence might end.

"Oh... that. It's over now," Natalie demurred, "no sense dwelling on it." Her brow creased thoughtfully. "I'm tired," she mused, "I'm really, really tired."

Nick took her face in his hands and gazed deeply into her eyes. There was an abstracted look there, a look he didn't like at all.

"What's the matter?" Nat asked him. "Nick?" Her concern faded, becoming something else; her hands rose to cover his, stroking gently. "Nick..."

He disengaged in a hurry -- that mistake, he would not make twice. "What happened between us before," he began, again without knowing what words might come next.

"Come to pick up where we left off?" she asked, in a soft, seductive voice.

"No! I..." Nick collected himself with an effort. "I just wanted to check up on you," he said nervously, "see that you were okay..."

"Well, I'm fine," Nat reassured him. "I wasn't hurt -- and you know what they say about falling off a horse; you're supposed to get back in the saddle as soon as you can, right?"

She was too close, much too close for Nick's comfort; her scent filled his nostrils with the distinctive, alluring aroma of mortal blood. Her body was just as compelling, arousing within him a desire that was all too human. But more torturous and tantalizing than any physical longing was his emotional hunger -- his need for consolation, and acceptance, and love. Of all the millions of mortals on the earth, of all the immortal beings he had come to know, Natalie was the only person who could satisfy that aching need...

Nick stood still, trembling, as Natalie moved toward him, and felt his resolve and his resistance melt away.

Her cheek brushed against his, her lips caressing his earlobe. "Nick, please," she breathed in his ear. "I need you..."

And all vestiges of logic and reason evaporated in the surge of heat that accompanied Natalie's passionate kiss.

For a few blissful moments, Nick lost himself in the heavenly pleasure. So long he had wanted this, to taste the forbidden fruit, and it was every bit as sweet as he'd imagined it would be -- and impossibly hard to be content with such a small taste, when the lushness of her beckoned to him with a siren song of mortal beauty. He pulled her close, desperate suddenly to touch her, to feel her against him: the softness of her skin, the rapid beating of her heart, the taste of her lips, the taste...

They parted, and Natalie gazed up at him, smiling -- but her smile dissolved into puzzlement as she stared at him, into his eyes.

He had become so completely immersed in their passion that for one crucial moment, Nick failed to understand why she was looking at him so strangely. "Nat?" he said curiously.

And realization struck as she screamed, and lunged away from him, landing in a tangle of sprawled limbs on the floor. Oh, God -- I've changed...

Nick drew a deep breath and managed to reinstate his precarious control, all remnants of their brief intimacy banished by her terror. "It's all right," he attempted to placate her. "Here, let me..." and he extended a hand toward her, to help her up.

She scrambled away from him on all fours, frantically trying to put some distance between them. "Get away from me!" Natalie shrieked. "Get away from me!"

He recoiled as if she'd struck him. "I'm sorry, Nat," he said desperately. "Listen... listen to me... I can explain..."

She was shaking so hard it was a wonder she could still breathe; Nick knew with sudden certainty that anything he did would only upset her more. "Nat," he said softly, despairingly. "Please..."

"Get out!" she howled, only a step away from hysteria. "Get away from me, you monster!"

All the agony he'd endured throughout his eight hundred years of immortality was as nothing beside the pain of that one word.

For a single moment, he'd allowed himself to forget what he really was, and in that brief instant, he'd destroyed... everything. There was nothing he could do to correct his mistake. Even his presence in Natalie's apartment was corrosive, destructive. She was quite clearly terrified of him, and the only truly helpful thing he could do at this point was to leave.

"Go away!" Nat pleaded, and burst into tears.

His lips compressed into a tight line; with one last longing look back at her, Nick gathered himself and departed.

Natalie paced the length of her bedroom, found it too confining, extended her path to take her through the main room as well. She had to keep moving; if she was still, the fear would set in again, the shakes, the chills. The memory, horrifying beyond words, of Nick's face altering into something savage, something inhuman...

She couldn't bear to think about it; she hugged herself and moaned.

And she couldn't escape the feeling, subliminal and indefinable and annoying, that something was wrong: that things shouldn't have happened as they had, that she had failed Nick in some vital way. Every time she tried to analyze the feeling, everything got all vague and fuzzy and she couldn't think straight -- but the feeling persisted, and she couldn't shake it.

Nat breathed deeply, fought for calm despite her turmoil. Rationality intruded, sorting through the terror and the pain, separating strands of tight-knotted anxiety within her. It was a hard- earned skill, the ability to quiet her nerves by sheer force of will, a side effect of medical detachment. Without it, she'd never have survived this far.

She almost hadn't survived tonight...

No, that wasn't true, Natalie realized instantly. Nick could have hurt her, could have killed her easily. If he had intended to do her harm, he'd certainly had his chance...

But what had happened? Try as she might, she couldn't make sense of it. It was an effort to think about it at all; there was a strong compulsion to forget, to ignore it all, the assault, Nick, everything.

She was tired, so very tired. Defeated, drained, confused, Natalie fell across her bed and was instantly asleep.

Monster.

You monster.

Get away from me, you monster!

It echoed over and over in his mind, a relentless loop of hatred battering at his soul.

The fear in her eyes, the horror. "Get away from me, you monster!" One moment of ecstatic yielding, sweet beyond bearing, and then...

Nick groaned and buried his face in his hands.

He'd half expected something like this from the very start, but the reality of it was worse than anything he could have dreamed. Natalie's face, contorted with terror. Monster. But worst of all had been the revulsion in her eyes...

Go ahead, Nicholas, suffer. It seems to be what you're best at. Oh, yes, LaCroix, Nick thought, that's all I ever do. I suffer. I suffer a thousand agonies, while you laugh...

"Not this time, Nicholas," came the voice from before him.

Wearily, he raised his head, not even caring about his red- rimmed eyes. "How did you find me here?"

LaCroix seated himself beside Nick on the park bench, settled one arm along the backrest, behind Nick's shoulders. "You were calling to me," he said. "Your pain beckoned to me like an open wound."

"That you might sink your fangs into," Nick said bitterly.

"But of course; what else would I do? Certainly, I would never go to the trouble of tracking you across the city, merely to offer... consolation." LaCroix smiled brightly, and the effect was fearsome. "So you lied to me, Nicholas. Congratulations -- I applaud your growing skill at deception. Perhaps there's hope for you yet."

"So I lied to you," Nick murmured hopelessly. "What are you going to do about it? Bring her over? Kill her? Kill me?" A short, contemptuous laugh. "I wish you would kill me. The way I feel now, it would be a relief."

"Ah, what an invitation. But what pleasure would there be in such an easy victory? I find that I prefer to watch you wallow in your misery. A much more insidious vengeance, I think."

"Fine," Nick said. "Enjoy your vengeance. I assure you, it's every bit as excruciating as you've always hoped it would be." He buried his face in his hands, too tired and heartsick to summon up his usual venom for LaCroix's benefit.

An exasperated sigh. "You really don't see, do you? For a change, Nicholas, we have something in common."

Curiosity overcame despair, and Nick glanced up, was caught and held irrevocably by LaCroix's gaze; his eyes were like lasers, piercing in their intensity. "I loved a mortal once," he said, "and you took her away from me."

"My sister." Memory of a sweet face filled with light and warmth...

"Fleur." The elder vampire pronounced the name as if it were a prayer. "You know, Nicholas, the pain has never left me."

"I believe it," Nick said, in a moment of bleak empathy.

"Yet I will always have the memory of her innocence. I suppose that that is better than nothing." A faint mocking smile touched LaCroix's lips. "And now Nicholas has found his mortal love. I had thought that denying you that love would be the ultimate revenge for the eternal pain which you have inflicted on me. As it turns out, allowing you this doomed romance is its own punishment." The condescension disappeared, replaced by an expression Nick had rarely seen: honesty, untainted by facades or pretenses. "But I have endured this incessant pain for centuries, and I find -- oddly enough -- that I cannot wish this agony on another." LaCroix sighed, an uncommonly human expression. "Not even you."

Nick sighed as well, a long shuddering sigh. Yes, he despised this man, but there were times... times like these, when LaCroix was there, was the only one there, the only one who knew what he felt, who could possibly understand...

The arm around his back tugged at him, just a slight nudge but enough to urge him forward, closer, until his head rested against the other man's shoulder; and aching inside, Nick succumbed to the comfort of the slight embrace.

He had no recollection afterwards of how long he lingered there, knew only that for that time, the pain was blissfully remote. He remembered a time long past when he had truly cared for this man, when LaCroix had represented all the warmth and safety that there was in the world, and for those few precious moments he was in that sheltered past once more.

And he knew that despite all their conflict, despite all the bitterness that had intervened in the past and surely would again, he would remember these moments of comfort for the rest of his days.

Slowly, he regained a measure of composure; slowly, he drew away from LaCroix, until he felt capable of managing on his own. Solitude: the legacy of the vampire. He straightened his lapels, rubbed at his eyes, and was startled to discover the soreness there -- he hadn't known he was crying.

The proof of that was the dampness of LaCroix's shirt. "Wash your face," he advised curtly. "You look ridiculous."

Nick nodded, surprised by the comparative gentleness of the reproach. "Thank you," he said softly.

A strong vampiric hand clamped on his shoulder. "You're welcome," LaCroix said, still with that startling mildness; smiled briefly, sadly, and took to the air.

Alone, Nick made his way to the park's water fountain, splashed his face until his eyes stopped burning. He determined that he would return home, clean up properly, change clothes; perhaps then he might go to the precinct, bury himself in work, anything to forget.

Instead, he found himself at the Raven.

Janette merely glanced up as he strode into her office; her attention focused more strongly on Nick as he grabbed the bottle on her desk and popped it open, draining a third of its contents in a swallow. "It's human," she warned him.

"I don't care," Nick said savagely, and gulped down another portion.

She rose from her desk and came to him, draping herself across him seductively. "Ah, Nicolas," she sighed, "perhaps this is the beginning of a new phase in our relationship, oui?"

"Don't press your luck!" Nick seized her and pulled her close. "I'm desperate," he said in her ear, "just desperate enough to come to you. Don't take it as more than that."

"I'll take what I can get," Janette breathed, succumbing to Nick's urgency.

The press of her body against his, the feel of her fangs brushing against his neck, were as electrifying as any mortal erotic impulse. He sank his own teeth into her flesh and felt it begin: contact, intense and intimate and gorgeous. It was as if their central nervous systems were wired together, giving them each access to the other's pleasure as well as their own. With the blood flowed communion, closeness more complete than any mortal joining, more thoroughly satisfying.

But even as he clung to Janette, inhaling her fragrance and savoring the taste of her life's essence, even as the human blood he'd drunk spread through his system, warming and filling him as animal blood never could, even as physical pleasure spiraled through him in an endless eddying wave... even in the midst of inhuman ecstasy, his mind was filled with the memory of Natalie's loathing, and there was no peace, none at all.

"You okay?" Schanke said, concerned.

Natalie made a concerted effort and pulled herself together. "I'm fine," she said without hesitation. It wasn't true, for she felt distracted, hazy, as if she'd been drugged. Nick's words returned to haunt her, and she wondered what he knew that she didn't -- although she couldn't substantiate the feeling, she was oddly sure that there was more to all of this than met the eye.

"Y'know, after last night and all..." the detective pursued.

What had happened last night? Memory kept drifting in and out of focus -- the assault, growing ever more distant -- and a scene between herself and Nick that was so unreal it had to have been a nightmare. It disturbed Natalie to have so little control over her own thoughts, and Schanke's presence was making her unusually edgy. "Thanks for stopping by," she said, "but you should probably get back to work."

"Look, I don't know where Nick disappeared to," Schanke continued, unaware that he was making matters worse, "but y'know, I want to help, too. If you've got a problem, you can talk to me."

"I'm fine..." she began.

"I'm your friend, okay?" Schanke concluded.

His words seemed to echo weirdly, dissolving into another voice that spoke the same words -- Natalie shook her head. And shook it again.

And then memory exploded inside her consciousness in a great wave. The vagueness dissolved, artificial barriers toppling like dominoes inside her mind, and it was all crystal clear -- she remembered... everything.

"Oh, my God," she said, dazed. "Ohmigod, ohmigod... Schanke, where is he? Where's Nick?"

The detective made an annoyed sound. "Does anyone ever listen to me? I don't know where he is, and what's the big deal, anyway?"

"I have to tell him something," Natalie said, heading for the door, barely remembering her purse and coat, completely ignoring Nick's edict in her desperation to find him.

He wasn't anywhere, and finally, forlornly, Natalie took a taxi home. Realization had made her aware of the hugeness of the disaster that had occurred between them, and she wondered if Nick would ever speak to her again. I called him a monster, she thought miserably. How could I? How could I ever have been so cruel?

The eventual knock on the door startled her badly, and she jumped up anxiously to answer it. She searched his face for a clue to his feelings, but his countenance remained carefully neutral. "Natalie," he said courteously, as if she were a stranger.

"Nick, I have to talk to you," she said hastily, as he moved past her and inside, shying away from the open windows where the faint tinge of impending daylight shone too brightly for his comfort.

"You're not screaming," he said, face ironic. "That's a good sign."

"I want to explain what happened..."

"It's all right," he said, very softly, as she busied herself closing the blinds securely.

"Nick, you don't understand!" Natalie rushed, afraid that if she didn't speak now, she would never get the chance. "Last night, when I was attacked, this girl saved me, but she wasn't a girl, she was a vampire..."

"I know," he murmured, under his breath.

"Nick, what I said..." She moved closer tentatively, shyly. "She saved me from being raped, I think maybe she saved my life, but afterwards... she was looking in my eyes... and I didn't realize until Schanke said something..." The words spilled out of her in an incoherent jumble, composure shattered by her desperation to convey the truth. "She hypnotized me, Nick," she said urgently. "And very efficiently. Until Schanke triggered the memory, I didn't know that she'd saved me -- and Nick, what happened before... I didn't remember what you were. I forgot that you were a vampire." She floundered, wincing at the inadequacy of the words that were all she could think of to say. "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry..."

"Forget it," Nick said, in that same soft, gentle tone. "I know what happened. And besides, you were right." Emotion broke through his mask of nonchalance; that awful look of self-loathing and wistful longing. "I am a monster, Natalie."

All at once, she felt herself trembling. "No," she said firmly. "That's not true."

"Ah, but it is. And it's what I've been telling you all along. My nature, Nat." The soft voice had become strangely intimidating, almost predatory. "No matter how hard I try to evade the truth, I can't escape it. I am a vampire." His voice dropped lower, became nearly inaudible. "I am a killer."

Natalie could not let that stand unchallenged. "You are," she said forcefully, "my best friend. Not to mention... the man I love."

Her words affected him, she could see; for a moment, she was sure he was near tears. But the weight of guilt which he carried -- the burden of shame that she had placed upon his shoulders, she thought remorsefully -- was far too heavy to be lightened by her declaration. "Maybe you should make your choices more wisely," Nick said, his voice quiet and implacable.

He paced toward the door, as if to leave. "You're going to just walk away, then?" Natalie said stridently. "You can't escape that easily."

One hand came to rest against the wall, propping him up. He seemed to slump in on himself, sheer weariness taking its toll on even an immortal form. "I shouldn't have come here," he muttered.

"I'm glad you did," Natalie whispered.

He didn't reply, and for long moments the silence stretched out between them, bleak and endless.

"Who is she, Nick?" Nat asked at last, curious.

"She usually calls herself Lydia," Nick said absently.

"Another old friend of yours, I suppose," she said, probing without asking.

A burst of wry humor brought an involuntary smile to his lips. "Actually," he said, "she's my grandmother."

She could almost see the memory seize him, taking him far away from the here-and-now...

"French," she said with certainty. "Or French- Canadian?"

"French," he agreed, "thirteenth century." And studied her closely. "Scandinavian? Celtic?"

"Nope. And the designation wouldn't apply in any case. Remember how old I am, dear." She stretched her legs and yawned, a curiously human gesture. "Actually, I was born in Mesopotamia... somewhere. Keep in mind that I was only barely adolescent when I was brought over," she said, "to be the new 'goddess' of my people. We didn't leave many traces for the archaeologists to find; there's no written history for me to fall back on. I only know that I served as goddess and guardian for several hundred years, until the invaders came to my people's lands and massacred the only way of life I'd ever known." Her expression was pensive, abstracted. "That was... traumatic, to say the least. For a long while, I was a mindless thing, taking one victim after another without reason, wanting nothing more than a continual supply of mortal blood to assuage the pain." Abruptly, she returned to the present, focusing on Nick's face as an anchor against the old memories. "I don't remember much of what happened to me before, oh, twenty-seven hundred bee cee or so. I remember virtually nothing of my mortal life; it's as if I was never anything other than what I am now."

Studying her intently, Nick couldn't help thinking that that fact explained a great deal of Lydia's detached view of human morality.

"You are remarkably easy to read, you know," she commented casually.

Somehow, Nick didn't mind her evaluation as much as he minded it from Janette or LaCroix. "So I've been told," he murmured.

It was near sunrise, perilously close, yet Nick didn't want the evening to end. He'd been talking with Lydia for hours as stick after stick of incense burned to ash, filling her tiny apartment with pungent smoke; he felt as if he could talk with her for hours more. "I should leave now," he murmured, though it was the last thing he wanted to say.

She looked surprised. "Why? It's perfectly safe here."

A vampire's first concern was always to ensure him/herself a sanctuary through the deadly hours of daylight; it did seem a sensible alternative, to spend the day with Lydia. "Why do you want me to stay?" he countered, vaguely distrustful -- he'd seen enough of LaCroix's hidden motivations to be suspicious of anything that seemed to be too much of a gift, and Lydia's oblique offer was indeed a gift -- though Nick didn't dare take that line of analysis too far; he hadn't yet been able to bring himself to admit how strongly he was attracted to her.

Lydia sighed heavily, and Nick became aware that once more she'd read his thoughts, apparently effortlessly. "Lucien and I do not maintain contact," she said, "for the sake of our mutual safety and mental health. To put it in modern terms, we aren't on the same wavelength. I resent any comparison between us as much as you would dislike any assertion of similarity between Lucien and yourself, if not more so. Therefore kindly abandon that line of thought; it makes me, shall we say, uptight."

"Why don't you get along with him?" Nick probed warily.

She smiled at him, a smile that was about as friendly as a snarl: all bared teeth, and no humor whatsoever. "Why don't you?" she shot back.

He decided that it would probably be prudent to abandon that line of inquiry, and sensed her unspoken agreement. Still... "After all your talk of family, I would have thought..."

"Drop it," she said suddenly, sharply, and Nick complied.

They sat in silence together for a few awkward moments. Lydia poked at the ash in the incense burner with one restless finger briefly before her quiet voice rose to break the stillness. "Lucien LaCroix," she said softly, sadly. "The light of the cross. I was the one who extinguished that light, Nicholas. I snatched it away, took all the light for myself, and left him only darkness."

There was nothing Nick could say to that, but the distant misery lurking behind Lydia's placid facade led him to edge closer, to slide one arm around her hunched back, offering what little comfort he could.

Without a word, she settled against him. A small unhappy sound emerged from her lips, and without conscious thought Nick found himself embracing her, holding her. The warmth generated by their closeness permeated his awareness, pervasive and powerful, driving away everything else...

One small query rose to the surface of his distraction. "When you were brought over," he murmured. "What happened to the one who made you?"

Something warm and wet splashed against his neck, trickled down his chest; a single teardrop, Lydia's tear, as startling and contradictory as was everything about her. "He went into the fire," she whispered. "He was tired, Nicky. As tired as I am now."

He drew her closer, wanting to ease her pain, and wanting much more; his lips met hers, and they kissed...

"My grandmother," Nick repeated absently. "And possibly the most dangerous creature I know."

"She saved me," Nat reminded him.

Roused from the memory, he spared her a glance that, while devoid of anger, seared her to the core nevertheless. "Trouble comes in odd shapes and sizes," he said dryly. "You could doubt that, after what she's already done?"

"She blocked my memory of you," Natalie clarified. "Why?"

"Ostensibly to protect her privacy, or so she would probably claim," Nick stated, and it was clear from his expression that he didn't believe it one bit. "It's my opinion that she thought it might be fun."

"To mess with my head?"

"To mess with mine," Nick growled, his voice uncharacteristically ominous. his face was closed, set in a grim look of foreboding; accordingly, Natalie was silent.

It had been a mistake, of course. If she had remembered, she'd never have come on to Nick that way; why remind him of the dangers of their relationship, and the frustrating impossibility of any consummation of their passion? If she had remembered, she would have been content -- no, not content: blissfully happy -- to simply rest in his arms and feel the gentle warmth of his love for her. Love could go a long way all by itself; physical passion was a delightful fringe benefit, but by no means essential.

Monster. Oh, God. How much more cruel could she have been? All the more so because it had been inadvertent, a natural response to an unnatural reflex. If she'd had access to her memories, if she'd remembered, she might have been startled by his change, but she would have understood -- not run screaming from him like the heroine of some B-movie. How horrible it must have been for Nick, lulled into complacency by their ongoing friendship and blossoming love, to be confronted with terror and loathing from the one person he'd dared to really trust in almost eight hundred years.

"Oh, God," she said softly. "Nick..."

He spoke as if she hadn't already been speaking, cutting her off. "It looks as if you've overcome Lydia's conditioning. Most mortals couldn't do that, but I thought you probably would. I have faith in you." His words were laudatory, but his voice was nearly expressionless.

"Nick," Natalie pressed, "we have to talk."

"You should be immune, now, to a repeat attempt," he continued, ignoring her. "All the same, I don't think she'll make the same mistake again."

"Nick, don't do this..."

"Not even she can afford to make enemies so casually," his voice overruled Natalie's. "She must realize I may never forgive her as it is."

She sighed. "Nick, can't you forgive me?"

A brief pause. "It's myself I can't forgive," he said finally. "I betrayed you, Natalie."

"No!" she protested, anguished. "I betrayed you!"

He laughed grimly, a hopeless sound. "And how do you figure that?"

"What I said..."

"Is as nothing beside what I did. Natalie," and the tone of his voice held an agony of self- loathing, "if you hadn't screamed, I would have... I don't know what I would have done." A brief, humorless laugh. "Actually, I know exactly what I would have done."

"You wouldn't have hurt me," Natalie said steadily. "I know you wouldn't have hurt me. You see, I have faith in you, too, Nick."

His eyes met hers in incredulous wonderment -- then, in abrupt, fierce denial, Nick wrenched his attention away.

A few moments later, he spoke again. "There can be nothing between us, Nat," and though the familiar nickname warmed her, the rest of his words coupled with the death's-mask of finality he wore chilled her to the core. "It's far too dangerous."

She dared to reach out and touch his hand, clasp it gently as it clutched the doorjamb with white- knuckled ferocity. "To which one of us, Nick?" she queried. "Me... or you?"

He didn't answer, only slid his hand from beneath hers, denying even that small contact. "Leave it alone," he said, his voice achingly bleak. "Leave it alone, Nat. It... it's better that way."

And though it wrenched at her, it seemed the only kind thing to do was to obey. She had never seen Nick so tormented; she feared that the smallest stress would tear away his perilous control, leaving him defenseless. He was a creature of the night, immortal, a drinker of blood -- and she had never known anyone so utterly vulnerable in all her life.

"All right," she murmured, hating it, hating herself for what she'd done, and hurting from the knowledge that she couldn't fix the damage. "All right, Nick."

"I have to go." He seemed to be searching for an excuse, any excuse, to get away from her. "It's almost sunrise... and I have to find her, before she does any more damage."

She didn't bother pointing out that any other time, he would have sought sanctuary in her apartment until nightfall. "And when you find her," she said, "what are you going to do?"

"I don't know." There flashed in his eyes an incandescent fury unlike anything Natalie had seen before, a savage ferocity so great it frightened her. "I'll talk to her," Nick said, his voice very carefully controlled. "Explain to her in words of two syllables or less that her actions are unacceptable." His fist slammed into the wall -- and she noticed that the uncharacteristic gesture was apparently not his first; there were tiny scars gracing his hand, unnoticeable except to a trained eye, and disappearing as she watched.

Concerned with Nick's welfare, she barely noticed that his impulsive gesture of anger had knocked a neat hole in the plaster.

"You think that'll help?" she wondered aloud.

"Probably not. Probably get me killed. Quite frankly, I don't much care anymore." His eyes slid sideways, the better to avoid Nat's gaze, and focused abruptly on the damage his fist had done. "I'll pay for that," he said sheepishly, hopelessly.

"I'm not worried about the wall!" She reached out and grabbed his hand, examined it closely. "Funny," she said absently, "LaCroix thought that I loved you because you were a vampire." The marks were rapidly fading, leaving no sign. "But without that memory, I loved you as much as ever."

"You remember that...?" She wouldn't have thought it was possible for Nick to be any more distraught than he already was.

"I remember everything," Natalie said levelly.

His face darkened, and he turned away.

"Our conversation afterward," she elaborated, though he hardly needed to be reminded. "The things you said to me. And what I said to you."

"Nat, please..." he began.

"Why did you want me to forget that, Nick?" she asked him intently.

His eyes were ablaze with pain, a flame that frightened her far more than the light of vampiric bloodlust. "It hurts, Nat," he said, with an intensity of his own. "It hurts too damn much for me to bear."

All at once, he was moving, out of her apartment, and -- Natalie feared, with a sudden rush of instinctive apprehension -- out of her life. "Nick!" she cried out, almost without thinking. "What about... what about us?"

Halfway down the hall, he stopped, turned halfway around so that only his profile was visible. "There can be no us, Nat," he said quietly, painfully.

She watched him go, until his figure disappeared around the corner, not bothering to wipe away the tears that streamed silently down her face.

A day's worth of nightmares haunting him -- Natalie, and Lydia, and Natalie, and LaCroix, and Natalie, and Janette, and Natalie again; a thousand times Natalie, images of loving her and losing her and hurting her and himself. No chance for rest, and no relief, only an eternity of waiting for darkness to come and make the world accessible to him again.

Finally, night, and freedom. As soon as the last painful traces of sunset had faded, he was aloft, searching blindly for his 'grandmother'. No leads, no clues, leaving him with no other choice than to roam helplessly, searching for any sign of the errant vampire.

Now, if I were a tourist here, he asked himself, where would I go? Not just any tourist, but a vampire, and female: almost five thousand years old and yet still a child, born to darkness in her early youth, and separated from most aspects of their demonic society by her immense age and her quirky nature. A creature more alien to him than any mortal could be. If I were Lydia -- where would I go?

He diverted his course, swinging away from the sports arena in a wide arc. There was a show there tonight, some rock concert of another, and the bright lights that ensured no drunken teenagers would be copulating in the corners would surely make him visible if anyone happened to look up...

A show. A rock concert, he thought, irrelevantly.

Born to darkness in her youth...

It was possible; in fact, knowing Lydia, it was entirely probable. After all, she was the one who'd dragged him to Woodstock -- both times. Why not? Nick thought. So far, it was the best lead he had...

Arena security verified his I.D. and let him inside, and he made his way through the crowded venue. The place stank of sweat and beer and human bodies, and the loud music grated at his sensitive hearing. He scanned faces as he passed, searching, in vain he knew, for one face among thousands...

And then he saw her.

Second tier, right by the edge, leaning over the railing and shouting her approval of the band. No longer the flowerchild he remembered, thoroughly modern in her grunge- rock clothing, but golden- haired and angelic as always, slim and tiny as a china doll -- Nick shoved his way through the throngs until he was one section away, struggling toward her.

Abruptly, she became aware that she was being watched; her head jerked around, and her eyes met his. Youthful countenance, blue eyes lighting up as she registered his presence, and his identity - - and then she was gone.

Nick knew that trick too well himself, as indeed every vampire did; he followed her up, into the rafters of the arena, where the speakers and the lights hung from the rigging.

She was perched on one of the highest I-beams, watching him closely.

"Hi, Nicky," she said lightly, warmly.

Gazing at her so-familiar face, he remembered:

"You." The smooth civilized tone sharpened to acid with the single syllable, the pale eyes narrowing eloquently.

Lydia, seemingly so fragile beside LaCroix's larger frame, drew herself up to her full height - - which wasn't much to speak of, but the aura of power she exuded more than made up for it. "Me," she agreed soberly. "Who else?"

Nick looked around nervously, but though Venice Beach's Oceanfront Walk was teeming with mortals, no one seemed to be taking any particular notice of the confrontation. LaCroix was utterly consumed by silent rage -- while Lydia, by contrast, seemed wholly at ease with the situation. Nick, feeling powerless between the two elder vampires, took a step backward and hoped that his luck held: that the other two would continue to be so absorbed with each other that they would continue to fail to notice his presence.

"How dare you interfere?" LaCroix spat, with a fury not even Nick (who was so good at provoking such outbursts) had seen from him before. "He's my child!"

"He's my grandchild," Lydia shot back sharply.

"We had an agreement!"

"I'm changing the terms."

Eyes locked in a fiery glare, lighting with the telltale red glow -- and Nick found himself suddenly reluctant to let the encounter continue; he could extrapolate its ending, and much to his surprise, he found that he didn't particularly want to see tiny Lydia beat the tar out of LaCroix. "Stop it!" he spoke up suddenly.

When both sets of angry eyes focused on him, Nick wished he hadn't been so quick to intrude.

He moved forward, one swift step that took him from Lydia's side to LaCroix's. "Let's go," he urged his vampire 'master', "come on, let's go home."

This was so far from what LaCroix had become accustomed to hearing from Nick that his rage vanished in a blank-eyed stare of astonishment. Lydia threw back her head and let out a long, derisive laugh. "You see?" she confided to LaCroix. "I've done you a favor already."

The malevolence returned in an instant. "Don't do me any more favors!" LaCrois hissed at her, enunciating each word with ominous clarity.

Lydia's smile was innocent, thoroughly filled with sweetness and warmth -- which made it even more of an insult. "Ah, Lucien, mon cher cauchemar," she cooed, "I missed you too, sweetheart."

A dark scowl shadowed his face, and LaCroix turned on his heel and strode away; his hand locked on Nick's arm, propelling him along with the steely grip. Nick twisted, managed to catch one last glimpse of Lydia -- she seemed unconcerned with LaCroix's anger, simply blew him a kiss and waved.

The hand on his arm tightened, tugged him forward roughly. "Stay away from her," LaCroix advised, "she's nothing but trouble."

"And you're not?" The words were out of his mouth before Nick realized the foolishness of provoking LaCroix when he was already enraged.

He glanced sideways at his 'father', and was surprised to see that the fury he had expected was absent; instead, there was an expression that defied analysis -- thoughtful, among other things, and a bit wistful, and very definitely irritated.

"If you think that I am trouble," LaCroix said, his voice oddly calm, "then you have not had sufficient time to get acquainted with Lydia," pronouncing her name as if it were something distasteful. "She is highly manipulative and extremely dangerous."

"She's your mother," Nick shot back.

"And since when do such relationships carry any weight with you?" The smile on LaCroix's face was an eloquent indication that it would be wise for Nick to be silent.

He didn't argue further, but wondered privately -- deep within his mind, so deeply that his 'father' couldn't discern the thought -- whether LaCroix had brought him over as some sort of retribution for his own relationship with Lydia.

Maybe he just resents the fact that she's easier to like than he is, he thought rebelliously, and had the sense to bury that thought deeply as well.

He shook off the memory, faced the one who'd evoked the reminiscence. "Hello, Lydia," he said quietly, to the still silent figure perched on the ceiling beam closest to his.

In a flash, she moved to stand beside him, and as she looked up at him, he was struck once more by her smallness, her apparent vulnerability. That appearance was extremely deceiving, as he knew so very well.

"I knew it had to be you," he murmured. "Your style of killing hasn't changed."

She did not dispute his charge. "Ah, the old argument again," she said, with a trace of annoyance. "Couldn't you just say hello, and leave it at that?"

Silently, Nick withdrew his wallet and displayed his badge and identification.

She stared for a moment, then laughed. "Oh, I see," she said, and promptly held her wrists out. "I admit my guilt. Go ahead, arrest me. Slap on the cuffs, Mister Cop."

"Don't be absurd," he snapped, "you know I can't do that."

"Of course you can't," she agreed. "And therein lies the fallacy of your existence, dear."

"Stop it," Nick said, almost inaudibly.

"Your loyalties are betrayed by your morality," Lydia continued, oblivious, "and vice versa."

"Stop," he repeated, his tone virtually pleading.

"When will you learn?" she scolded him. "You cannot continue to try to adhere to mortal standards, Nicky! You're not one of them, nor will you ever be again..."

Unthinking, Nick lashed out; his hand struck her face, hard, knocking her off the narrow beam and sending her plummeting down toward the cheering crowd that lined the arena floor.

Aghast, he knelt and peered downward, striving to see what had become of her.

A swift, subliminal sound of flight, and Lydia was sitting on the beam beside him, so abruptly that he nearly fell himself.

Her expression radiated calm, but her eyes were dangerously bright, hovering on the edge of bloodfever. "Maybe you'd like to tell me why you did that," she said casually, "before I scatter your remains across eastern Canada."

Involuntarily, Nick shivered, for she was perfectly capable of doing so if she chose.

He rallied, summoning the anger and pain he'd locked away within himself as a defense. "To begin with," he told her, his voice as falsely nonchalant as hers had been, "you've done a lovely job of destroying a relationship I value far more than my association with you..."

Slender eyebrows shot up. "Ah, your mortal friend Natalie," Lydia recalled. "In case you were unaware, Nicky, I saved her life."

"And tampered with her mind!" he challenged.

"I was not about to take a chance of compromising my anonymity," she replied with dignity.

"You knew who she was, you knew she was keeping my secret!" Nick held himself precariously on the edge of the fury he felt threatening him; Lydia might tolerate one lapse of control, based on her affection for him and the fact of their 'family' relationship, but another would likely provoke her wrath.

"And I know, as you do not," her quiet voice rang unnaturally loudly in his ears, drowning out even the amplified music emanating from the stage below, "that your dear friend 'Nat' is more than a little ambivalent about this thing you two have going."

It stopped him cold. "Ambivalent?" he said, hearing his own voice as if it were coming from a great distance. "What do you mean, ambivalent?"

"What do you think I mean?" She reached out and touched his face, the same gentle caress that had captured him over a decade ago in a California alley. "She's a doctor, Nick," Lydia said compassionately, caringly. "She's sworn an oath to preserve life. How well do you think that fits into her association with you?"

"But I don't..." Nick's voice faltered as his relentless sense of honesty forced him to examine the subject more closely. He didn't hunt, he didn't kill, that much was true, but it was equally true that over the years he had caused more death than any mortal murderer in history. And how many times had Natalie had to cover up for him, had to falsify reports of otherwise obscure the truth, in order to keep his secret -- when her nature and her occupation demanded the very opposite...?

"You love her," Lydia said softly, a whisper of sound that pierced him as sharply as a scream.

Nick sighed. "It's pure folly to love a mortal," he said.

"But you do," she observed.

"But I do." His admission was hardly audible, even to vampire hearing.

Lydia smiled sadly. "Poor baby," she said. "It's inevitable, of course. How can one not love mortals? They're irresistible. Especially that rare human capable of comprehension. Those few precious souls who understand who and what we are -- and who manage to love us despite that." Her hand settled on his arm, not grasping with vampire strength but in the weak pliancy of a human grip. It reminded him of Natalie, the way she'd covered his hand with her own while she'd pleaded for him to listen, to forgive her.

"I have wronged her," Nick said, almost unaware that he was speaking aloud. "I've wronged her terribly."

"By loving her?" Lydia's voice was nearly as gentle as Natalie's had been.

"By making her a part of my life." Nick forced the words through clenched teeth. "By desiring her."

"But that's the nature of love," the smaller vampire insisted. "To wish to unite, to become one, in whatever way possible."

"Well, it's not possible!" Nick slammed his fist against the beam, felt the sturdy steel yield slightly beneath his hand. "Not with Nat; I won't do that to her."

"Do what? Love her? It's no crime, Detective Knight." Beneath her teasing tone, Lydia's sympathy was deep and genuine; he could feel that with certainty.

Her fingertips stroked his arm slowly. "I've had my share of paramours," she told him. "Some have been lovers for a lifetime; some I've brought to join me, so that we could have even more time to share. Some have become rivals, or enemies. And of course, you know about Lucien, who is as always in a category all his own." A short, humorless laugh. "Lucien is a testimonial to the fact that even I make mistakes on occasion. But your Natalie... she's no LaCroix, Nicky. She's strong without being vicious, and unlike you, she is a realist -- she could be such a perfect companion for you, yet you hold her at arm's length."

"My love for Natalie," Nick said, spitting out the word as if it were an epithet, "could substantially shorten her lifespan."

"Or lengthen it," Lydia interjected.

He glared at her fiercely, angry enough to strike her again despite the risk. "Don't say it," he warned her. "Don't even think it!"

"Why not? It's perfectly natural to want a family of one's own," she said, delicately drawing euphemism over the blunt reality of her suggestion.

"I would never betray her that way," he argued.

"Which is the worse betrayal?" Lydia said thoughtfully. "To give eternal life, or to watch mortal limitations snatch all life away?"

"Either choice is a betrayal, and both are unthinkable... everything I do is wrong! And you tell me that loving a mortal is not a crime?" Nick said rhetorically.

"And so we return to the eternal argument," Lydia murmured, into his anguished silence. "Am I an unrepentant murderer -- or are you hopelessly deluded? Or does the truth lie, as I suspect, somewhere between those extremes?"

His chin lifted in defiance. "So tell me, oh wise one," he said, with open sarcasm, "what do you do with the human lovers you deem unworthy of immortality? How do you evade the conflict?"

"I don't," she whispered, her voice so bleak that it dampened Nick's anger, reduced his fury to a muddled snarl of confusion and concern. "I watch them die. And I suffer. And you know what, Nicky? It's worth it. It's worth all the pain, if only for a moment of happiness! What else is there, in this unending loneliness we call a life?"

He didn't reply; couldn't reply.

"Don't be foolish," Lydia urged him. "Don't shut yourself away from someone who matters so much to you, just because you're afraid!"

"I'm afraid for her," he groaned.

"Of course you are," she nodded. "Because you love her. But consider this, Nick: in any decision that concerns you both, should she not have the opportunity to make her own choice?"

He was saved from the necessity of a reply by the overwhelming roar of noise that rose from the arena below them. "Show's over," Lydia said. "In a few minutes, the house lights'll come up. Time for us to go, I think."

She extended her hand to him, and he took it, and together they descended to the stadium floor.

Soaring over Toronto with Lydia at his side, he remembered:

The 'morning' after the incident on the boardwalk, he'd awakened with the sunset. He could hear voices in the other room of LaCroix's suite; his natural curiosity piqued, Nick went to investigate.

A few steps into the corridor enabled him to discern the conversation, and wrapped in the complimentary hotel bathrobe, he leaned against the wall and eavesdropped shamelessly.

"I could do great things with that one," said a familiar girlish voice.

"You will do nothing with that one," returned a velvety voice laced with fury, a voice so much a part of Nick's life that he heard it sometimes in his dreams. "He is mine."

"He doesn't seem to think he is," she said reflectively. "But then, children never do."

"You agreed to stay away from him!" LaCroix was more than simply furious, Nick realized; he sounded almost desperate.

"And for seven hundred years I've adhered to your whim," Lydia countered, "and denied myself the pleasure of your company, to boot. Surely you must realize that I have been extraordinarily patient with you."

"I want you out of my life," LaCroix hissed. "More importantly, I want you out of his!"

"Why must you always meet me with hostility and contempt? Why must you always be so damned contrary?"

"You should know, dear mother." Pure malevolence in his voice, unyielding. "After all, you made me what I am."

"You mean, the same way you made your child what he is?" Nick winced at the casual rejoinder; he could predict LaCroix's reaction.

But the rage he'd expected was absent from his 'father's' voice when the other finally spoke. "Perhaps," LaCroix said slowly, to Nick's utter shock; it was the closest he'd ever heard him come to an admission of guilt.

"Perhaps I did," he continued. "Perhaps I made the same mistakes with him that you made with me. Which does not change the fact that they were mistakes."

"But, perhaps, makes them comprehensible?" The tone was one of pure pain, of honest pleading.

"Perhaps," LaCroix allowed, very softly.

A long silence. "All I ever hoped for from you, Lucien, was understanding," Lydia said, after awhile.

"Oh, you hoped for much more than that," LaCroix shot back, on the heels of her remark.

"Yes," she admitted, "at first." Her voice strengthened, from near-breaking to steely resolve. "And then I gave up on you."

There was no reply to that. Nick edged forward another half-step; he could just make out their silhouettes, facing each other across the room, only a few feet apart yet separated by a much greater distance.

Lydia traced a circular path on the thick carpet with one sandaled foot. "Probably should have given up a lot sooner," she muttered.

"Probably," LaCroix agreed. "It certainly would have been healthier for both of us."

"At least we're speaking again," she said, in that philosophical tone that said: hell of a universe, ain't it? "Definitely an improvement over snarling at each other."

"Is it really? I hadn't noticed." Pleased with the dig, LaCroix turned away from her.

Lydia sighed. "I hope you know how much I love you," she said, to his back. "Despite everything we have done to each other over the years, I've always loved you -- cold consolation though that might be."

LaCroix was utterly still and silent, revealing nothing.

Defeated, she shrugged hopelessly. "Oh, well. I tried," she said.

Her hand was on the doorknob when LaCroix finally spoke. "Leda...?"

She swiveled back to face him, and he moved toward her. Their embrace lasted only a second or two -- but in the space of that moment, there seemed no barriers whatsoever separating them; there existed between the two an intimacy of which Nick had never dreamed, and which he envied more than a little.

He could not have said who he envied more: LaCroix, for his intimacy with Lydia -- or Lydia, for her closeness to LaCroix.

They parted, and spent another few seconds simply gazing at each other. Then Lydia reached up and pressed the very tip of her index finger against the tip of LaCroix's nose, a gesture both humorous and touching. He reached out and rested his palm on the top of her head, and she smiled -- then her hand found the doorknob again, and turned it, and Lydia was gone.

Nick remained in concealment, trying to sort out the intricacies of what he'd seen, trying to make sense of it in light of the facts. If he had not known LaCroix for centuries, if he had not witnessed first-hand the atrocities of which the man was capable, he would have sworn that this was a very different person from the one he knew. This LaCroix seemed to be someone Nick could live with, someone Nick might love...

How was it that he could despise LaCroix so completely and yet feel bound to him so strongly? They had been allies at times, enemies more often than not, never quite friends. Yet even in the midst of his most frenzied attempts to escape the elder vampire, Nick had never been able to deny that bond. It tugged at him, no matter how hard he fought it.

He wondered, briefly, whether his 'master' was subject to a similar constraint with his own creator.

The silhouette in the living room paused, then turned to face Nick. "You can come out now," LaCroix said, his voice utterly polite.

With trepidation, Nick emerged, expecting the worst -- but LaCroix only beckoned him closer with a fluid gesture reminiscent of Lydia's grace. The elder vampire seemed content with his silent company, seemed disinclined to renew the old enmity that lived continually between them. Nick, on the other hand, felt as if they were perched on a razor's edge, and that any slight misstep might send them both hurtling over the precipice.

"Do you really?" he ventured, after awhile.

"Mmm?" LaCroix was gazing out the window; the heavy blinds had been pulled back, but the thin white inner curtain still hung like a veil between them and the view of the California surf.

"Understand," Nick clarified.

LaCroix was quiet for so long Nick thought he wouldn't answer. "A little," he said finally, "sometimes."

Nick drew a deep breath, released it in a sigh. "I hope you know..."

His profile visible to Nick only in outline, LaCroix's chin lifted fractionally in an almost defensive motion.

"...how I feel," Nick finished lamely.

"Oh, yes, Nicholas." LaCroix's voice was smooth as silk, but utterly without hostility. "That, I understand perfectly."

Well, that makes one of us, Nick thought.

He tore himself away from the memory as Lydia dove sharply, beginning her descent to the ground; he followed her, and was unsurprised to find himself on the roof of his own apartment building. Of course Lydia knew where to find him, and of course she had waited for him to come to her, bringing him closer by the most insidious of lures.

Anger surged up within him again, his most common emotion where Lydia was concerned; almost before he'd landed, his diatribe had begun. "How could you tamper with her memories that way?" he spat. "You can claim all you like to have the right to judge whether or not a mortal should die for his sins, but there is no way you can pretend you had any right to come between me and Nat!"

"Is that what I did?" she wondered aloud. "I rather thought my 'tampering' struck straight at the heart of the matter, so to speak. After all, it has forced you to confront things you'd rather avoid..."

"Such as what?" Nick demanded. "The fact that I am doomed to an existence of constant suffering, simply because I'm unlucky enough to have gained some measure of conscience over the years?"

"You don't have to be so unhappy," Lydia countered.

"No, that's right," he agreed, "I can proclaim myself a god, and thereby give myself the right to kill whoever and whenever I choose!"

A flash of genuine anger flared blood-red in her eyes. "Be very careful, Nick," she admonished, in a soft voice that nevertheless reverberated with overtones of imminent peril. "Be very careful where you place your contempt, and your blame. I will not take responsibility for a situation that is not my doing."

"If not yours, then whose?" he parried.

In another situation it might have been comical, this sweet-faced girl emitting such an air of menace -- but this was Lydia, survivor of the millennia, and there was nothing at all humorous about the barely-leashed fury lurking behind her deliberate calm. "I may have thrown a monkeywrench into the works," she said, "but you built the machine, Nicky, and you wrote the program. If it's not working for you, I strongly suggest that you re-examine the blueprint."

Faced with the prospect of an abrupt end to his immortal existence, courtesy of a momentary lapse of Lydia's obviously precarious restraint, Nick backed down. The realization that she was maddeningly correct in her assertions stripped him of his anger, leaving only the usual lingering residue of shame. "I should never have involved Natalie in my life," he murmured, almost unaware that he was speaking his thoughts aloud. "If I had any sense, I'd leave now; I'd go see Aristotle, and simply disappear..."

Lydia made an exasperated noise, blowing a stray lock of hair away from her face. "Stubborn damn fool," she retorted. "Listen to yourself. D'you think it would hurt her less if you disappeared? Leaving her with a lifetime of guilt over driving you away?"

"Why must you be so relentlessly logical?" Nick questioned.

Another bright burst of laughter. "You mean, why am I so consistently, annoyingly right," she countered. "Nicky, you need to go to her. Talk to her. Trust me -- women know these things."

He looked her up and down with a probing gaze he usually saved for Janette. "Women?" he inquired, with polite disbelief.

"All right, so physically I'm a girl," Lydia amended, unaffected by his scorn. "And a vampire. I'm still female, dear, and you're not, which means I'm one step closer to understanding your friend Natalie than you are. The dichotomy between mortal and vampire is as nothing beside the difference between male and female; and if you haven't learned that in eight hundred years, sweetheart, there's no hope for you whatsoever."

Nick smiled, a wistful expression. "All right," he responded, "tell me, oh wise one -- if you were Natalie, what would you want me to do?"

Lydia didn't return his smile; her eyes filled, inexplicably, with tears. "If I were your Natalie," she said softly, "I would want you to come to me and take me in your arms, and tell me how you truly felt." She heaved a deep sigh. "Nicky, my saving her was no accident. I was blocks away when it happened... I heard her, Nick. She was calling out for help." Her eyes were very dark, thin rings of blue around huge black irises. "She was calling out for you."

Nick didn't reply, lost in thought. When Natalie had nearly been raped, he hadn't been there. Hadn't been there when she'd needed him, not at the time nor later, and when he had come to her, everything had gone wrong...

"For a mortal to know your nature," Lydia continued, "and to trust you so completely nevertheless, to look to you for salvation in her time of need -- what do you imagine that signifies?"

"But I let her down," Nick muttered. "I always let her down..."

"Nobody's perfect!" Lydia stared up at him with her fists jammed into her hips, the very picture of confrontation. "If you don't go to her," she delivered her ultimatum in a stern tone, "I will shove my fangs so far down your throat that you'll be sucking your own blood for breakfast!"

He couldn't help laughing -- the mental picture of the fate she threatened was humorous, and the sight of this tiny creature facing him down was utterly ludicrous, despite the very real danger. "Yes, Lydia," he acknowledged solemnly.

"I mean it! Don't be an idiot, Nicky. You know how rare it is to find a mortal who understands?"

"I know," he whispered.

"So talk to her," she insisted.

"Later," he relented.

"Now!" she demanded.

"All right." Overcome by a sudden impulse, Nick pulled Lydia into an embrace, lifting her off the ground effortlessly. "You think you've won," he said into her ear. "You haven't, you know."

"Oh, sure I have," she said breathlessly. He would have released her, but her arms locked around his neck, maintaining the contact. "You only think you're angry," she said with certainty. "Someday, you'll thank me for this."

"You think so?" he wondered, with honest curiosity.

"I know so. I know you, dear."

"Someday, you'll thank me for this."

"You think so?" he wondered, with honest curiosity.

"I know so. I know you, dear."

Her smug sureness annoyed him. "As well as you know LaCroix?" he spat venomously.

"Far better. You're so much more like me than he is. You spend your immortal existence looking for the truth, and never realize that it lies right before you..." Sadness engulfed her, but only for a moment; she banished it with a bright smile. "But you're lucky, Nicky. You have people to help you through your turmoil. Me, for instance."

"If this disaster is your idea of help...!"

"A first small step. You can't see that; you don't have my perspective. Not your fault -- you're just a kid."

"I'm just a kid?" He shook his head. "You're insane."

"Sometimes, certainly," she agreed, "but not at the moment. Just... lonely." A long, heavy sigh coursed through her, sending a tremor through her small body, and she released her grip on Nick and turned away. "Believe it or not, I didn't really come here to interfere with your life. Or with anyone's. I just... I wanted to see my family again. Lucien, and you..."

"Well, here I am," Nick said sharply. "Do you like what you see?"

"What do you think?!" Lydia's face held outrage. "What is there, here, to like? You're killing yourself, Nicky!" She stared at him, with an expression halfway between anger and misery. "You're killing yourself."

"I'm trying to save myself," he murmured.

"You ain't doin' a damn good job of it," she scolded.

"Perhaps not. But at least I'm making the attempt."

"How? Tell me how," Lydia demanded. "You mock me for trying to ensure the safety of the mortal flock, and then you turn around and become a police officer?"

"Detective," he corrected.

"So you got a promotion. Congratulations." Her eyes were accusing. "You want to redeem yourself, so you choose the most ineffective and frustrating way possible to do so. You want to feel a connection with the mortals you seek to emulate, so you make friends with all your usual skill, and then berate yourself for caring about them! You refuse to be a proper vampire, you're incapable of being a proper mortal, you exist in limbo between two conflicting worlds and deny yourself any form of companionship that might bring you pleasure -- and you wonder why you're constantly miserable?" "I'm not always miserable," he protested.

She cocked her head sideways, looked up at him, and didn't say a word.

Nick shrugged helplessly. "Sometimes I'm not miserable," he said weakly, attempting a smile.

"Let me guess. When you're with Natalie... right?" She took his silence for assent. "And this would be the same Natalie who you're considering running away from. Right, Nicky?"

Exasperation and fatigue combined to make him reckless. He grabbed her upper arms, held her in a grip that would have bruised mortal flesh, momentarily unintimidated by her immense age and superior strength. "Do you think," he said roughly, "that you could find something, anything to call me, other than Nicky?"

Her eyebrows lifted. "Certainly," Lydia said. "Idiot."

The stern expression on her face dissolved into mirth, inviting a suitable response -- despite himself, Nick felt his anger fade away. "Bitch," he countered, trying to muster up resistance to her insidious charm.

"S'me." She pulled back, eyed him suspiciously. "I'm not gonna leave you alone 'til you fix things with your lady friend."

"I'd better 'fix things' quickly, then, hadn't I? Before you annoy me into doing something that will cause you to kill me." Misery spread over his face. "If it is in fact possible to repair the damage."

"Oh, it's more than possible; it's extremely likely. Long as you don't do anything stupid like try to shut her out of your life. Make no mistake, Nicky -- Nick," Lydia corrected herself pointedly. "That would hurt Natalie a great deal. Maybe even more than it would hurt you.""I don't think I could feel any worse than I do right now," Nick whispered.

Her eyes closed tightly, as if holding back tears. "You're just a kid," Lydia said. "You haven't lived long enough to know. Believe me, there's worse pain than this. Whatever suffering you think you've endured -- you have no conception." She blinked hard, looked up at him. "Let go of Natalie," she murmured, "and you'll start learning real quick."

She looked so forlorn that Nick's instinctive response was to embrace her; he regretted that action as soon as he moved toward her, for he was still furious with her, and it looked as if she'd found an effective way of neutralizing his rage. But Lydia sank into his arms, almost melting into him, trembling -- and he realized that he couldn't stay angry at her, he couldn't: the same compassion and empathy that made him such a good cop and such a lousy vampire rendered him unable to do anything but try to soothe her.

Unexpectedly, she wrenched herself away from him, and Nick recognized what an effort it had been for her to do so -- as hard as it had been for him to turn away from Nat. "My pain is not the issue here," she said firmly, ignoring her own tears. "I'm not the one on the edge of imminent breakdown."

"And you believe I am?" he wondered.

"Oh, yeah." Absolute certainty in her voice. "You're losing it, Nick. Your mortal friends don't know enough to recognize the signs. Lucien knows, I'm sure, but you won't let him near you, and it seems that for a change he's got enough common sense to leave you alone and let you figure it out for yourself. Except that you won't, because it's not what you want to believe." Lydia's voice became sardonic. "Whatta time for Lucien to learn common sense. Somebody oughta be taking care of you."

"Not him," Nick said firmly.

"`Course not. Nor me, right?" She folded her arms and studied him. "Who, then? Who will our Nicholas allow to give him the support he needs?"

His eyes narrowed. "So that's what all this is about."

"What did you think? That I was fooling around with your personal life for my own amusement?" She made a disparaging noise. "There is this thing that mortals have invented, dear; it's called television. Believe me, there are less strenuous ways for me to entertain myself." Her expression turned whimsical. "Y'know, maybe someday you can teach me how to program a veedee... vee tee... the little black boxes that play picture tapes."

"VCR," Nick furnished.

"Right. Vee-cee-arr. What a funny name," she mused.

"You can barely manage the Roman alphabet," Nick said patiently, "and here you are, making a psychological evaluation based on very little data..."

"Sweetie, I was born before the pyramids. Human technology, I'm still getting used to." She took his hand and held it in a simple, non-threatening grip. "But the workings of the human heart and soul haven't changed in five thousand years."

"But I'm not human," Nick muttered, "am I?"

"What are vampires," Lydia asked reasonably, "but humans with odd dietary needs?"

He was silent, absorbing that.

"Gotta go," Lydia said, her voice cheerful, her face containing its usual look of cocky sweetness and suppressed mischief. "Call me, hmmm?" She held up one hand and waggled her fingers at him in a farewell gesture, grinned. "We could go down to the city jail and... do lunch."

"I don't think so," Nick said ironically. "Do me a favor, will you? If you must mete out justice, be a love and do it in someone else's jurisdiction, yes? Or at the very least, fake a reasonable cause of death..."

"Hey, I was tired," she protested, "three hours circling over O'Hare, wondering if I'd make it to cover before sunrise; it wasn't a pleasant trip. That's the last time I take a commuter flight!" She poised on the edge of the rooftop, studied him for one last long moment. "It's getting late," she said, waving one hand vaguely eastward, at the telltale glow in the sky. "Get some sleep, dear. You'll feel better in the evening."

"I wish," he said sourly.

Her smile this time held an edge, the faintest trace of smug knowingness muting its angelic innocence. "You'd be surprised, she said, and sailed upward and outward, into the fast-fading night.

He watched her go, then made his own way to shelter, down the stairs from the roof and into the secure shelter of his own home. The shutters closed, enfolding him in comforting darkness. If only I could shut out the pain as easily as the sunlight, he thought grimly.

Hesitantly, he picked up the phone... set it down again. A vision of Natalie's face swam before him: her concern, her guilt, her tears -- and then it was gone, replaced by a picture of her in the midst of her terror, staring at him as if he were a loathsome creature...

He checked his answering machine. There was only one message, and the sound of the voice warmed him and chilled him at once. "Call me," was all she said, nothing more -- but even the sterile technology of magnetic media was sufficient to allow him to discern the tears in her voice.

Nick picked up the phone again, pressed the rapid- dial button that would connect him with Natalie, listened to the swift series of tones as the call was relayed. At the other end of the line, the phone rang -- and he jammed his finger against the disconnect button in an instant of near- panic.

He was in too much pain already, and any further discussion with Natalie held the potential for even greater agony; despite Lydia's admonitions, despite his memory of Natalie's tears, he couldn't call her, he just couldn't.

The refrigerator yielded a bottle of blood -- after a moment's thought, Nick replaced his selection and reached deeper, to the back of the shelf. A gift from Janette, a gift which had in fact provoked their last argument, but which was now his only source of relief. Human blood: solace and torment wrapped up together in a neat package.

Janette, who he could have -- his vampire nature was no threat to her, resulted in fact in some pretty mind-blowing sex, to use the vernacular. Natalie, who he could never have -- not without either killing her or bringing her over. It seemed so unfair... and guilt assailed him for what he had done, for dispelling the arousal and pain Natalie had provoked in him by going to Janette. A particularly nasty betrayal, the most unjust of all.

Nick looked at the bottle he was holding, and thought, betraying Nat's trust again? And even though the pain inside him cried for the luscious relief, for the real thing instead of the poor substitute of animal blood, he put it back and chose the lesser option. He'd done enough damage to his mortal love in the past few days; unfair to continue, even if Nat would never know of his sacrifice on her behalf.

He curled up on the couch and drank, and tried desperately not to think, not to feel... not to hurt. Impossible to find peace, but eventually he managed to reach a state of numbness, and that in itself was a blessing.

"Thanks for the lift," Natalie said, as Schanke held the car door for her.

She'd succeeded in recapturing some measure of serenity, mostly by forcing the entire issue with Nick to the back of her mind. "I need to get back to work," she murmured under her breath. Anything to avoid thinking about the disastrous events of the past... had it only been two nights? It seemed as if she'd been miserable for a lot longer than that.

Of course, she had spent most of the day agonizing over what had happened, and what might happen next, and she'd started to dial his number so many times that her index finger was sore...

It wasn't quite dark yet, so there was a good chance she wouldn't encounter Nick for at least a little while. During that brief respite, she could pretend that nothing had happened, that her life had returned to normal.

"You should probably take some time off, after... well, you know," Schanke said uncomfortably. "But I can't pretend I'm not glad to have your help with this one."

She turned to look at him sharply. "What's up?"

He exhaled, a long loud sound of fatigue. "That probable overdose of yours?" he said. "Well, you might want to take another look, Nat, `cause we got another one. And this time, the killer left a note." Schanke's expression darkened. "It looks like we might have a vigilante on our hands."

Caught between startlement and dismay, Nat was silent. I should have known I couldn't escape so easily, she thought. Oh, God... another victim... Nick...

What do I do now? she wondered.

The note was short and simple, printed in a neat hand on a sheet of paper torn from a six-by-nine spiral notebook, without concern for the lines. It had been fastened with a safety pin to the corpse's lapel. Schanke had furnished her with a copy, and Natalie studied the xerox sheet intently, looking for any clues.

Death to Vermin, the note read; underneath it, in block letters, KEEP OUR CITY CLEAN.

If this is Nick's grandmother at work, Natalie thought, she's at least got the right idea. Long hours of thought had minimized the animosity she might have otherwise felt toward the unknown vampire -- after all, the girl had come to Nat's rescue.

The girl. She was only a kid, for chrissake. Nick's grandmother? Too weird.

But if Natalie had learned one thing from her passing acquaintance with the wonderful world of the undead, it was never to judge by appearances.

The autopsy itself was a relief. No fang marks, blood volume within normal ranges, considering -- and this was the key point -- the fact that the cause of death was very obviously the sizable knife wound in the corpse's chest. And although she couldn't precisely fix the time of death, the killing had occurred sometime within daylight hours. Definitely not a vampire M.O.

At least I can give Nick some good news, Natalie thought ruefully, if, that is, he ever speaks to me again.

She tried to imagine what it would be like: seeing him only during the course of their jobs, conversations limited to the most recent investigation. No more late nights hanging out together, no more all-day movie marathons, no more shared secrets and covert kisses. No more friendship, only the sterility of a working relationship. But that would be better than nothing -- what if Nick decided to relocate? What if she never saw him again?

Natalie turned around, intending to transcribe her findings -- and nearly shrieked; she forced herself to calmness by brute force, willing her heart to slow to its normal rate.

"Hello," she said cautiously to the figure perched on her desk.

"Hi," said the newcomer, with an angelic smile.

She was sitting cross-legged in the midst of piles of papers; she had somehow managed to seat herself without disturbing the disarray that had taken over during Nat's brief absence. "Should I have knocked?" she asked innocently.

"Yes," Natalie said firmly, "you should have."

"Okay. Next time." She shifted position carefully, extended her hand. "I'm Lydia," she introduced herself.

"Natalie," Nat said, warily taking the proffered hand. It was cool and soft, imbued with a hidden strength that the girl didn't try to exercise; she merely clasped hands as another mortal might.

"What brings you here?" Nat probed delicately.

"A number of things," Lydia said serenely. "For starters... how are you doing?"

"All right," Natalie allowed, unsure of how much to trust the other's seeming benevolence. She found she liked Lydia; she couldn't help herself. There was something subliminal, something indefinable, that made it impossible for her to dislike the girl vampire. But this encounter reminded her too much of her once-forgotten meeting with LaCroix -- and Natalie was unsure that she could ever wholly forgive her for the disruption of her memory. Not for the plain fact -- not even for the harsh way it had caused her to react to Nick -- but for the truths Lydia's tampering had forced her to face.

If she hadn't done what she did, then I would have never done what I did... and Nick would never have known how I feel... and neither would I.

"Doesn't seem like a very satisfactory solution to me," Lydia counseled her aloud.

Startled, Natalie glared at her. "How did you... don't do that!"

Lydia shrugged helplessly. "Can't help it," she admitted. "It's a sense, not a talent -- like hearing. You can pretend you never heard something, but you can't not hear it; it's not under voluntary control. I didn't mean to violate your privacy, but you're virtually screaming. And for some reason, your mental `voice' is exceptionally clear to me. Besides... I've kind of already intruded into your life, haven't I? So as long as I'm already involved, I might as well go whole hog."

"You're not involved," Natalie said, with no small amount of hostility, "and I don't need your help."

"And I saved your life and everything. Don't be so mean." Lydia appeared to be a thoroughly modern teenager, almost nothing in her dress or speech betraying her hidden truth. Only the intelligence in her eyes -- wisdom? Natalie wondered, or just age? -- gave any hint that she was more than she seemed to be.Nat was wary... but also powerfully intrigued by Lydia, despite her better judgment. As she'd told LaCroix, vampires were fascinating creatures.

She was realistic enough to know which impulse would triumph.

"You should chill out, Nat," Lydia advised her. "After all, I am kind of on your side."

"Oh? And just what precisely is `my' side?" Natalie retorted, growing annoyed.

"The side that wants to keep Nick alive," Lydia said quietly.

Caught off-guard, Natalie couldn't think of any reply to that.

"There are more people on that team than you'd imagine," the vampire continued. "People you wouldn't necessarily think of as your allies." "What makes you think Nick's life is in danger?" Natalie said steadily, determined to give no hint of how desperately she needed that question answered.

"Natalie," Lydia murmured, "he's been at risk since the moment he was made. Every day, the danger grows worse. Our existence isn't an easy thing, y'know. We live in a world of darkness, in so many ways. The potential for pain is... extremely high. And Nick is more susceptible to pain than most." She sighed. "I know what he's going through, because I've seen it before; hell, I've lived through it, more times than you can imagine. Enough pain, enough loss, and immortality becomes more of a curse than a gift. The temptation to end the suffering can be enormous." Her eyes met Natalie's, eyebrows punctuating her words eloquently. "Why else d'you imagine I'm one of the oldest vampires still alive?"

"One of the... how old are you?"

"Nick's age plus about four thousand years, near as I can figure. I've kind of lost track."

"Four thousand...? You must be very strong," Nat hazarded a guess, feeling entirely out of her depth.

Lydia shook her head in abrupt denial. "Not strong at all, not that way. Just very, very tenacious. I end up hanging on, even when I'd rather let go." Her hands smoothed along her jeans, indicating her youthful mode of dress. "I sway with the fashions," she added, "make sure I keep up with the times. Otherwise, if I'm not careful, years pass in moments... It's a frightening thing, to live outside of time as we do."

"And you don't think that Nick... is going to make it?"

"He's in a lot of pain, and he's feeling very alone. Not a good combination." The girl shrugged. "He's fighting. Trying to keep things in some sort of perspective. But... I think he's losing ground, a little more each day."

Natalie forced her unwilling mind to consider what Lydia was telling her: she tried to imagine Nick so despondent that he would consider suicide an acceptable alternative -- and was horrified to find that it didn't require much effort. Nick was a walking mass of pain and trauma, held together by emotional scars, and sometimes it seemed to her as if one more heartbreak might send him irrevocably over the edge.

"I'm scared, Nat," Lydia said, with stark honesty. Her eyes were dilated, huge black orbs growing larger and darker with fear as she spoke. "I don't want to lose him. Nick happens to be very important to someone who's crucial to my existence. Not to mention, of all the people I've encountered over the last few thousand years, he's one of my all-time favorites. There's something so unique about him, so different and special..." She paused. "But then, you know that already," she said. "Don't you."

"I had noticed," Nat said, a definite understatement.

Lydia nodded, satisfied with the answer behind her words, the ones she had not voiced.

"You really think he'd..."

"I think so, yes. And soon." Lydia shook her head, not in denial this time but as if to clear it. "I keep forgetting to phrase things in mortal terms. Our soon, perhaps, rather than your soon, but... soon, nevertheless."

"And you think I can help," she said cautiously.

"Oh, I know you can. He needs you -- more than even he knows." She unfolded herself from her lotus position on Natalie's desk, stood slowly and carefully so as to avoid scattering the assorted paperwork across the floor. "Someone to keep him from getting too caught up in his own worldview. Someone to show him a different perspective." Lydia's eyes bored into Nat's. "The main difference between you and I is that I don't die," she said. "If Nick decides he wants to be mortal badly enough... d'you think he won't figure out the most obvious solution?"

Natalie was silent, thinking.

"Or that he hasn't considered it already?" Lydia added.

"What do you want me to do?" Natalie asked. The conversation had unsettled her, both the topic of Nick's depression and the question of 'losing' him -- not to mention the possibility that Nick's grandmother had some unspoken agenda of her own, of which Natalie was unaware; she was still vaguely suspicious.

"You should be aware," Lydia mentioned, "that I'm a rather effective mind-reader."

Nat's face burned, but she refused to avert her eyes, keeping them fixed on the small vampire bravely.

"The reason I'm telling you all this," Lydia said, "is that I believe Nick's welfare is as important to you as it is to me." She tilted her head sideways, appraising her auditor. "Maybe even more so."

Natalie's feelings for Nick had been uppermost in her consciousness for a very long time, and especially since Valentine's Day. It wouldn't take ESP to figure out how she felt, only a modicum of intuition. "All I'm asking is for you to keep doing what you've been doing," Lydia continued. "Just... be his friend. Take care of him."

Nat sighed. "I do my best." How? was the unspoken plaintive cry.

"It might be harder now," Lydia conceded. "He's afraid..."

"Of me?" Guilt rose to join the already tangled morass of emotion that haunted Natalie.

"Of what you feel. But mostly, of what he feels."

"Which is...?"

"You're not stupid, Natalie. Figure it out." Lydia eyed the other woman consideringly.

Nat thought about it. Love? She knew that already. Affection, friendship, concern -- old news. What else was there?

Hunger?

Well, of course; what else could make Nick so reticent? His physical need for blood was his greatest shame. She had provoked that in him -- and then called him a monster for his inevitable reaction -- and now she was asking him to trust her again with his so-vulnerable heart. And always, he would feel that hunger...

....unless he succumbed, and brought her over...

....and that, Nick would never do. He'd been perfectly clear on that point.

The newly-recovered memory was as sharp as if it'd happened yesterday. LaCroix's challenge, and Nick's contemptuous denial of his love for her -- which she had not believed for a moment. The way he had caught her in his arms and held her after LaCroix's departure, the way he had stroked her hair with trembling hands. The damp warmth of his silent tears, splashing onto her shoulders: human saline tinged faintly pink with vampiric blood.

She managed to revive herself somewhat from the dreamy daze LaCroix had induced, and held him at arm's length briefly, savoring the sight of him. "I knew you'd come," she said, with certainty.

"Nat, I was so afraid..." Nick drew her close again, covered her face with small tender kisses. The moment was as perfect as a teenager's misty dreams of romance, more exquisite than anything she had ever read in the pulp novels she smuggled home to read secretly in the tub. "I love you," he whispered. "Dearest Natalie, I love you so..."

And it seemed that for an eternity they stood there, holding each other close and murmuring soft words of love and kissing, and Nat was certain that nothing could ever approach the absolute bliss she was feeling.

"I didn't know if I could save you!" Nick confessed, his anguish painfully obvious. "I thought he would make me do it, and I couldn't..."

"Would you have let me die?" she wondered aloud.

"I couldn't have done that to you," his voice came to her, barely audible. "I could never betray you that way."

"You would have let me die?" Natalie repeated, still dazed, unable to comprehend his words fully.

"I could never bring you over," Nick said in a stronger voice; his hands clutched at her, with sudden desperation. "To do that would be to destroy you, Nat."

"So you would let me die," she queried, "so as not to destroy me? Could you... explain that, maybe?"

He sighed. "Not now," he said, "please?"

His tone was so plaintive that she acquiesced, yet Natalie couldn't quite leave the subject alone. "If the alternative was death," she told him, "I would have wanted you to do it, Nick."

Pain crumpled his face into a tight knot. "Nat, no."

"A hundred years to find a cure," she urged him, "or a thousand! As much time as we'd need. An immortal lifetime together, the two of us..."

"You'd be a killer," he muttered bleakly.

"This is not the Middle Ages, Nick," she disputed, in her no-nonsense professional tone. "There are other sources of nourishment. I wouldn't have to kill."

"Nat, you don't know... I couldn't do that to you. I couldn't." He broke away from her as if it pained him to do so. "Don't ask that of me!"

"I don't want to lose you, Nick!" she cried.

"I don't want to lose you, either. I don't ever want to lose you, Nat..." His arms wrapped around her again, held her tightly, and she succumbed utterly to the sweetness of the embrace.

And then Nick caught her face between his hands, and gazed deeply into her eyes, and commanded her to forget; she came to in the taxicab, blankly unaware of what had happened.

But now the memory had returned, as unsettling as it was sweet. And Natalie wondered: was part of Nick's fear due to worry that she might pose that question again? Or the certain knowledge that eventually he would face that choice in any case, as she aged and died?

Or just the same fear she felt -- the wholly human fear of immersing one's soul in another, the perfectly natural fear of falling in love?

Love. Loving Nick. Being loved by Nick. So wonderful, and so very terrifying. Nick was her friend, her best friend... but he was more than that: he was a vampire, a creature of the night. Their minds, their hearts, ran along parallel lines, but physically they were so different...

Lydia came to stand at Natalie's side, grasped her arms for emphasis. "If you have any doubts," she said soberly, "if you have any problem whatsoever with the facts of Nick's nature, you'd best deal with it now."

"I don't know," Natalie whispered, in sudden anguish. "I don't know what I feel anymore."

Inexplicably, Lydia laughed. "Believe it or not, that's a fairly good sign," she remarked. "Uncertainty is the first step to resolution."

Whatever that means, Nat thought, dazed. Everything was moving far too quickly for her liking.

"Natalie," the girl said, capturing her full attention. "The most important thing to remember about Nick..."

"Yes?" she encouraged impatiently.

"Don't let him." Having administered her prescription to the doctor, Lydia turned away, snatching up a long black cape that lay (Nat noticed suddenly) in a crumpled heap on the floor.

Exasperated, Nat followed her toward the door. "And just how do you propose I do that?"

"By whatever means necessary." She grinned, and abruptly it was impossible for Natalie to see her as an ancient creature of the night; she looked too young, too vibrant, to be anything so incomprehensible. To Natalie, she looked almost mortal -- and that made it easier for her to believe Lydia, to believe in Lydia.

She wrapped the cape around herself, drew on a pair of leather gloves and took out a huge pair of sunglasses, which she held in her hand. Swathed in black except for the incongruous worn jeans and clunky sneakers, she looked almost comical. Not at all like the archetypical vampire - - instead, the cape merely created a visual image of 'Little Black Riding Hood', off to greet a wolf in granny's clothing.

"Nick's a lot more fragile than you're capable of realizing," Lydia advised Nat, the somber sobriety of her tone at odds with her amusingly cartoonish clothing. "I've spent thousands of years watching others of my kind be created and destroyed. Nick's been walking a very lonely road for a long time. Natalie, you're the first person who's ever walked that road beside him."

Nat found that she could envision the metaphor: a cobblestone pathway through a bleak and rocky desert, phantom shadows moaning off in the distance, twisted and withered shrubs reaching clawlike twigs to tear at him as he struggled past. Perhaps somewhere along the road lay the answer to his prayers, and perhaps not -- but Nick had no choice but to journey onward, through the harsh, desolate wasteland, his steps growing ever more halting and weary.

"But you gotta know, Nat -- can I call you Nat?" Lydia asked, and she nodded. "The road is full of traps; pitfalls and potholes and a zillion different kinds of trouble. He may never find a way back to the mortality he craves. And you... you'll always be caught between his reality and your own. Your allegiance to him is going to cause you endless conflicts in your mortal life -- and anything less than your complete loyalty to him is unacceptable," Lydia said, and for an instant there was a menace in her voice that sent a cold chill along Natalie's spine. "You must always be utterly trustworthy where Nick is concerned," she stated, "though you may not always receive the same consideration."

"Why are you trying to scare me away from him?" Nat said bluntly.

"I'm not. But you need to be absolutely aware of the responsibility you're in the process of assuming," Lydia replied, favoring her with a level gaze. "You know a great deal about us -- including an unprecedented amount of medical knowledge. You are a rather formidable threat to a large community of very dangerous people. Every moment you spend with Nick makes you that much more of a danger to us, and sooner or later, someone's going to take offense. Added to that is the fact that every moment you spend with Nick means you two are that much closer, and the closer you get, the more vulnerable he is to you."

Nat was silent -- not intimidated, but thoughtful. "From the moment I learned his secret," she said slowly, "when I decided to keep his secret, I knew I was taking an irrevocable step. I knew that once I took it, I couldn't turn back. It was like walking off a cliff."

"Merely taking the first step on that long road," Lydia disputed. "And now you're at a turning point. You can keep walking with Nick, or you can turn your back and walk away. But if you decide to stay with him, you can't change your mind later. You mustn't. It could be dangerous for you -- and it would certainly be devastating to him." She regarded Nat steadily. "You cross that threshold now, you're making a commitment that could quite literally last for the rest of your life."

Natalie swallowed hard and nodded. "I understand," she murmured.

"I kind of thought you might." Lydia donned the sunglasses, turned to go.

"By the way..." Nat indicated the subject of her autopsy. "This wasn't... your work, was it?"

The girl strode over to the table, stripped back the sheet and took a long look, shook her head. "Never seen 'im before. And I don't bother with knives -- though I did spend a few years learning martial arts. Just for kicks, so to speak. Guy named Michelangelo taught me, back in New York City -- and no, he was not a mutant turtle."

"The M.O. isn't consistent with a vampire killing," Natalie admitted, "but I thought I should check to be sure."

"The M.O... oh, lovely: a medical examiner who can identify our victims. Well, just make sure you tell Nick that this wasn't me. He's already annoyed with me as it stands." Lydia laughed. "I wonder how many people I can piss off in a week? I think the all-time record is a hundred forty- seven. Not counting that lynch mob in Salem."

"Why do I find that so easy to believe?" Nat wondered, as the black-clad girl made her exit.

"Well, well. So he finally condescends to show up at his job. Where've you been?" Schanke clapped a hand on Nick's shoulder, glanced past him at Natalie, who had (coincidentally?) shown up at the same time with an armful of reports. "Hey, how're you doing, Nat?"

"Fine," she said automatically, although it wasn't exactly true; her thoughts were awhirl with silent turmoil. So much had happened so quickly, and she hadn't come to terms with it all yet.

"No leads on your case," he told her, "not that we expect any. Whoever offed your assailant seems to have vanished with the breeze. You sure you don't remember anything...?"

"Only what I already said," Natalie said evasively. She glanced at Nick, who was doing his best to avoid meeting her eyes, and remembered what Lydia had said about his vulnerability to her. As if I needed her to tell me that.

"I have the results on your vigilante killing," she said, and proceeded to outline her findings. She watched Nick's face as she detailed the dissimilarities between the three cases: guilt, as she concocted an explanation for Schanke's benefit as to why the `probable overdose' could not possibly be related to her own assault -- relief, as she listed the items that alibied Lydia for the third killing, followed closely by concern as he realized that there was yet an unknown murderer running around loose. One who would most likely kill again, if not stopped.

"So basically, we're after at least two different people. Wonderful," Schanke said grimly. "Although, not for nothing, I somehow can't bring myself to hold a grudge against your good samaritan, Nat. I don't want to even think about what could have happened to you."

"That makes two of us," Nick said in that soft voice of his, glancing at her for just a moment, and though there was still an uncommon tension crackling in the air between them, it warmed Natalie to see the love in his eyes.

It was clear that Schanke felt their tension too, although he didn't ask; he looked from one to the other, and his eyes narrowed. "Where were you last night, anyway?" he said to Nick, leaving unspoken the question that blazed in his eyes: what the hell is going on between you two? "Y'know, I'm getting tired of making up excuses for you. It takes all my energy and imagination to make up excuses for myself."

"It's personal, Schanke," Nick answered shortly, aware that it was an inadequate answer, wondering in the back of his mind just how long he could keep pacifying his partner with such bland responses.

"Yeah, well, you'd better come up with a better one before Cohen sees you," Schanke continued, as always oblivious to Nick's preoccupation. "She's steaming. Your timecard looks worse than mine, pal."

"Worse than Schanke's? That's pretty serious," Natalie said gravely, and was rewarded by a brief flash of a smile, as if Nick appreciated her attempt to lighten the discomfort between them. But behind the smile, she could see his pain, that the awkwardness should be there at all.

"Right now, I think we have bigger things to worry about than my timecard," Nick pointed out predictably -- not just his usual conscientious attitude; he seemed almost desperate to focus his attention on anything other than his situation with Natalie.

"Right now, I happen to agree with you," said the Captain, who had come up unnoticed; the suddenness of her voice made Schanke jump slightly. "Although we will talk later, Knight. Another one's just come in. Seems like the same M.O. -- or at least, it appears to be the same note. Check it out," she directed.

"Time to go earn those big bucks you've been stashing in that million-dollar savings account of yours," Schanke needled Nick as they headed out.

"I'll have to run some tests to be sure," Natalie said, a short time later at the crime scene, "but I think it's pretty obvious that this was the same person's work."

Schanke held up note number two, securely encased in plastic; the paper was glossy enough to (hopefully) hold a print. "Looks like a vigilante, all right," he said ruefully. "But then, you never know -- appearances can be deceiving."

Nick seemed about to say something, but all at once his attention was caught by an approaching figure. Natalie looked up, and the reason for his distraction became all too clear. "Speaking of which," she muttered under her breath.

The blonde sauntered over casually, thumbs hooked in the beltloops of her jeans, oversized men's shirt hanging sloppily loose. Her eyes roamed across Natalie's face, then Nick's -- but it was Schanke who she spoke to. "Aren't you the guy who pulled me over, a couple nights back?" she wondered.

The detective turned, and his face lit up with recognition. "You been watching the speed limit?" he lectured her.

"You traffic, or homicide?" she countered.

"Speaking of which," Schanke said, "this is a crime scene..."

She dug into a back pocket, withdrew a vinyl holder and displayed its contents -- a press pass; Nat watched Nick's eyes widen in disbelief. "Lydia Chase," she identified herself, "New York Daily News."

"You're a writer?" Nick said involuntarily, the last word coming out in almost a squeak.

Lydia glanced at him, and her eyebrows went up. "I do have a certain facility with the Roman alphabet," she said, "despite vicious rumors to the contrary."

"Aren't you a little bit out of your region, though?" Schanke wondered.

"I freelance, too. Besides, you know how it is, right? Something comes up that looks interesting, you check it out, whether it's your line or not. Right, Mister Homicide Traffic Cop?" She smiled at him, one of those dazzling little-girl smiles that was impossible to resist -- even by vampires who knew better. Schanke was only human, and completely in the dark; he didn't stand a chance.

"C'mon," she coaxed the detective, "tell me what's up, huh? Satisfy my curiosity, strictly off the record."

"It's not exactly proper procedure," he hedged, with a sidelong glance at his partner.

"Oh, I don't think it would do any harm to tell her about the case," Nick said lightly, with just the right amount of veiled irony; behind him, Natalie snickered into her hand, and tried to pass it off as a cough.

Encouraged, Schanke relented, gave Lydia a brief rundown of the facts, and showed her the two notes -- the one they'd just retrieved, in its plastic case, and the photocopy of the previous one. "It's the same note," she said at once, glancing at both.

"Yeah," Schanke confirmed, "same handwriting, same wording..."

"No, that's not what I mean. Look." Lydia held both pages up to the streetlamp, aligned them carefully. "There's no deviation in the handwriting," she said unnecessarily. "Both notes are exactly the same."

"It's not possible for anyone to write that precisely," Natalie mused.

"But both of them were handwritten, in blue ballpoint ink..." Schanke picked up the line of thought.

"On thin paper," Nick spoke up. "Perhaps traced?"

"To keep us guessing," his partner suggested.

"Or maybe to implicate an innocent party?" Nat wondered.

"Or it could indicate a person with a reading problem," Lydia pointed out, "a dyslexic, or an illiterate, or someone who doesn't know much English. We had a case like that in Brooklyn about a year ago. But ours was a bias thing -- an Arab immigrant going after Hassidic Jews." Her face grew thoughtful, solemn. "Any link between the victims?"

"Well, they're both male Caucasians," Schanke said, "the first one had priors up the wazoo; we don't know about this one yet." He regarded her curiously. "Say, you're not half bad."

"I've spent too much time hanging around NYPD Midtown South to not have picked up some idea of what goes on," she replied with dignity, her eyes flickering toward Nick for the barest instant. "I worked the crime desk for awhile, though usually I prefer to handle softer news. It's funny, but I have this serious problem with children dying." She shook her head. "I don't know what it's like up here -- hell, I'm American, I don't even know your system -- but the one problem with New York is that there is just too much of that kind of thing going on. I'd rather interview politicians or do editorials or even cover dog shows."

"I know how you feel," Nat found herself agreeing. "There are days I feel like packing this all in and becoming a pediatrician."

"Guess we're the luckiest ones here, Nick," Schanke said to his partner. "At least we sometimes get to make a difference."

"Sometimes," Nick said slowly, very aware of Lydia's eyes on him.

"We all do what we can, the best we can," she said. "We all make a difference in our own way, right?"

Natalie watched Nick react to that, his sudden sharp pleasure at her words. She had some understanding of how much it meant to him, how rarely he had encountered acceptance from his peers. It only underlined the damage she had inadvertently done -- how deeply her rejection had hurt him.

Gazing at Nick, she remembered...

A soft noise made her look up, to see Nick standing in the doorway. She'd been expecting him; she'd made him promise to come by so that she could check on him, see what his brief flirtation with the Lidovuterine-B had done to his physiology. She'd certainly been waiting long enough -- had started to wonder if he'd show up at all.

"Hi," he said hesitantly, almost shyly.

Nat smiled. "Come on in," she invited. "What, suddenly you're a stranger?"

Sheepishly, he sidled in, casting a single guilty glance at the cabinet he'd smashed in his singleminded pursuit of the drug. Nat shook her head ruefully and got up, moving toward him, distracting him from the sight. "How do you feel?" she asked him.

"Fine -- physically." The defeat in his voice, the despair, wrenched at Natalie; she reached out and took his hands in hers.

"Nat," he began, "I'm sorry..."

"Don't," she said.

"I just want to..."

"Don't. Nick, please, don't." Anguished, she turned away. "I wanted it to work," she murmured.

"Nat?" He sounded puzzled.

"I wanted it to work! I wanted to help you." She hugged herself, feeling suddenly chilled. "I should have run more tests before we tried it, I should have taken better precautions. Damn it, maybe I shouldn't have done it at all!"

"Nat, you tried! you did your best..."

"You were so happy," Natalie said bleakly. "When you ran out into the sun, you were so happy. I would have done anything... to see you that happy." The first sob took her by surprise, for she hadn't known she was so close to crying, but once the floodgates had opened, there was no stopping the tears.

She became aware of Nick's arms around her, holding her close: his hands smoothing her hair, stroking, caressing. "I hurt you," he said softly. "I said... terrible things to you."

"It was the drug -- the side effects. My fault. My fault." She leaned into Nick, taking comfort from his strength. "When I realized that you could die -- that they were going after you, and you could die -- I knew that if you were killed, it would be my doing. My fault."

"It was my choice," he reminded her.

"And I made it possible! It was a mistake, Nick. I was so anxious to proceed that I ignored the most basic principles of scientific procedure. Well, that's not going to happen again. If we ever try anything like this again, we're going to do things very differently." She looked up at him soberly, calmer now, but tears still glittered in her eyelashes and on her face. "I'm not ever taking a chance like that with your safety again. You..." She hesitated, decided it needed to be said. "You mean too much to me," she said, almost defiantly.

Fingertips brushed the last few tears from her cheeks. So much power in those hands, yet Nick's touch was so gentle, so tender. He didn't speak, simply smiled -- that small, shy smile that meant he was deeply affected by her words, and trying not to show it.

For a few long moments, they remained in the loose embrace, each of them drawing consolation from the other. Then they parted by mutual consent; silently, Nick rolled up his sleeve, while Natalie prepared to draw his blood just as quietly.

Another incidence of hopes raised and dashed; another episode of heartbreak and pain and forgiveness. Just another day in the life of Nick Knight. Natalie knew, perhaps better than anyone else, just how ubiquitous such turmoil was for him.

Watching him walk to his car with Schanke, Natalie thought how weary he looked, how dispirited. Lydia was probably right about his condition -- at least, the senior vampire's observations were consistent with her own. Nick was balancing on a tightrope, in serious danger of falling into a deep pit of despair. Natalie could either steady him, or send him toppling over the edge. It was a little frightening, to realize how strongly her actions affected him, to realize how easily she could damage him. He was so willing, almost eager, to assume the burden of responsibility and guilt for nearly any disaster...

Natalie's eyes lingered on Nick's car until it had disappeared down the road and out of sight -- at which point she realized that Lydia's eyes were trained on her, just as intently.

The tiny blonde strolled down the street, away from the crime scene, immersing herself in the sights and sounds of mortal life. It had been interesting, running into Nick and the others as she had -- and delightful to witness Nick's startlement, when she'd revealed her current occupation: he deserved the shock, after that snide remark about her dubious command of the language. It was true that she was still most comfortable writing in a shorthand system of modified cuneiform, and that not even intensive tutoring had enabled her to grasp the basic concepts of algebra, but she was annoyed that an eight-hundred-year-old fledgling should dare to disparage her intelligence. Especially Nick, who was utterly oblivious to what Lydia considered elementary facts of their vampiric existence.

What a funny coincidence that one of the first people she'd encountered in Toronto happened to be her grandson's partner. But then, Lydia didn't believe in coincidence; it was her opinion that such things were the doings of some greater Power, one with an odd sense of humor. A sense of humor that was very close to her own.

It was Lydia's opinion that this Power reigned over mortals and vampires alike; that they were all part of the Grand Scheme, no matter how innocent or guilty each individual might be, no matter how good or evil. Nicholas' quest for salvation in the form of mortality was kind of sweet, in a twisted way, but heartbreakingly unnecessary: anyone could find redemption, even a drinker of blood. Nick had already found his -- he just didn't realize it yet.

She could have taken to the air, but that would have denied her the mortal experience of walking, feeling the pulsing rhythm of the streets. The neighborhood was such that there was a distinctive menace to the late-night street crowds: people buying and selling and doing all sorts of deals. Loud boom-box music emitted from cars and apartments; conversations, arguments. The sights and sounds of mortal life.

Lydia understood Nick's obsession with mortality, to a certain degree. She was fascinated by humans herself, although for different reasons. Their brief lives gave them an intensity of experience that vampiric immortality so rarely held. Too many decades were unremarkable, passing by in a vague haze. After awhile, even painful incidents were welcome; at least they provided distinguishing marks in an otherwise vanilla-bland lifetime.

There were advertisements plastered directly beneath stenciled admonitions to "Post No Bills", a kaleidoscopic array of color. Lydia paused to consider a bus shelter covered with the flyers, appreciating the sight as only an ancient immortal could. Here, mortal men and women waited, comfortably sheltered from the elements, for giant metal conveyances that would take them wherever they chose. Thousands of years of human evolution had created this convenience, yet humans were unable to savor the enormity of that technological progress. Only an immortal creature knew how momentous were these achievements, which today's mortals took completely for granted.

"Hey," said a tentative voice beside her.

She glanced sideways. "Hi, Nat," she said.

For a moment they stood there silently, Lydia staring at the bus shelter while Natalie watched Lydia. "You shouldn't be wandering around out here," the vampire said absently. "White mortal woman in these parts -- could be dangerous."

"It's dangerous everywhere," Natalie reminded her.

"So it is. Best, then, to take no unnecessary chances." Lydia's youthful exterior was suddenly no more than a mere facade; her voice rang with authoritative wisdom.

"True," Natalie acknowledged. "But then, I'm not alone -- I'm with you."

"Lotta trust to place in a stranger," Lydia said idly.

"You're not a stranger," Nat returned, "you're Nick's grandmother."

"Lucien LaCroix," the young-looking ancient vampire stated, "is Nick's father."

"True. But he tried to kill me," Nat said thoughtfully, "whereas you saved my life."

"I altered your memory of Nick," Lydia said quietly, "and Lucien did not, in the end, force your demise. Consider that for a moment, Nat." She paused for emphasis. "Things are not always what they seem."

"So now you're telling me we're not on the same side?" Natalie parried.

"Nothing of the sort. Merely encouraging you to view all aspects of the situation, not just the most obvious one. Lucien is not necessarily your enemy, any more than I am -- necessarily -- your friend." She laughed merrily. "But then, where Nicky is concerned, nothing is ever certain."

"That's for sure," Nat muttered under her breath.

"Don't call him Nicky, by the way," Lydia added as an afterthought, "he hates it. Or maybe he just hates hearing it from me; I dunno."

"Do you get along with... Lucien," Natalie ventured, "as poorly as you do with Nick?"

"Oh, I don't get along with most other vampires at all. None of them really understand me -- not even Nick, though he comes closest." The vampire's eyes were very blue even in the dim glow of the streetlamps, and incisive. "You understand me, though."

"Excuse me?" Natalie shook her head in sudden confusion. "I do?"

"You understand why I saved you," Lydia said mildly, "and why I killed the man, instead of merely halting him in his tracks -- even if you don't necessarily agree with my reasoning. And it's obvious that you understand why I find Nicholas so lovable... and I believe that, were I to tell you the fact, you might even understand why I so love Lucien."

"You didn't have to tell me," Nat discovered as she spoke the words, "I think I already figured it out."

"You see? Already, you comprehend more of my nature than either Nicholas or Lucien ever has." Lydia seated herself comfortably on the bus shelter's bench. "I like you, Nat. You're not at all what I had expected."

"What you had expected... when? When you saved me?"

"You could say that," she murmured.

Natalie's intuition sharpened, detecting the evasion -- but before she could probe further, something else caught her eye. Above Lydia's head lay a patchwork of advertising posters, a colorful miasma of printed pages. What had made her take a second look? Idly, she read a handwritten ad for an exterminating company calling itself 'Joe's Roach Coach', her eyes skimming over a painted stencil apparently placed there by the Sanitation Department. An ad for a deejay service, housecleaning, Avon cosmetics...

And then Natalie froze, and surveyed the bus shelter again.

"Lydia?" she said uncertainly. "Look at this..."

The smaller woman turned, and looked, noticed immediately what Nat had seen. "Nice one," she said, appreciatively. "Irony. Coincidence. Cool, dude."

"I'm calling Nick," Nat decided, and scanned the area for a pay phone.

When he answered his cellphone and she heard the familiar voice at the other end of the line, she hesitated for the barest instant; it seemed silly, suddenly. "You're going to think I'm crazy," she told him.

Twenty minutes later, Natalie and Lydia stood beside the bus shelter with Nick and Schanke, watched as the mortal detective held the photocopy up next to the wall:

Call Joe's Roach Coach! Death To Vermin ----------------------- KEEP OUR CITY CLEAN Sanitation Dept.

"Where was the first one found?" she heard Nick ask Schanke.

"Two blocks north," replied his partner, without having to consult the report.

"And a half-block east," Nick mused.

"Mmmm," Schanke agreed.

Lydia leaned against the wall of the bus shelter, looking smug. "Score one for Natalie," she said, grinning.

The transaction was conducted swiftly and efficiently; the buyer stuffed his acquisition into his jeans pocket and hurried away, anxious to sample his purchase. Unnoticed, a figure slipped from shadow and followed him, away from the bus shelter and south.

Also unseen, another figure trailed the first two, a shadow in shadows, invisible.

Around the corner and into a narrow alley, a mere air vent between two close-set apartment buildings. Crouching low, the buyer withdrew the tiny foil packet and unfolded it with infinite care. A cut-off soda straw came from another pocket, and the bedenimed young man poked at the small mound of white powder, breaking it up and separating some from the rest; just a quick snort, to keep him going until he could get home.

He inserted the straw into his nostril, bent over -- and a huge, meaty hand closed over his, over the packet of cocaine.

"Hey, what you..." was as far as the buyer got. One sharp blow to the head, and he fell over sideways, unconscious.

Carefully, the assailant removed the packet from the young man's hand. He licked at the white powder that had adhered to his palm, then at the foil itself, undeterred by the drug's bitter taste. The jolt hit him almost immediately as the cocaine entered his bloodstream, making him quiver. One shaking hand reached beneath his jacket, withdrew a knife...

"Hold it!" came a commanding voice. "Metro Police!"

Pumped up, the tough's first impulse was to fight rather than to flee. He turned to face the figure who stood at the end of the alley, gun drawn and trained on him...

....and into the dark crevice between buildings swooped another figure, small and slight; it landed atop the hulking assailant, and took him down.

Nick rushed toward them. "Lydia!" he said urgently. "No!"

It was California all over again, and he was watching her poised on the brink of her kill: her eyes were flaming, her fangs extended...

....and her hand chopped against his neck; with a grunt, the man went limp, and Lydia stood over him motionless.

She drew in a quick, sharp breath, containing the reflexive vampire response, and the eyes that locked with Nick's were mortal-blue and guileless. "Your way," she said. "Satisfied?"

He smiled at her, and didn't bother to answer.

There was the usual paperwork, the red tape and hassles of police procedure. Nick didn't care; it didn't annoy him the way it did Schanke. The case was solved, a small triumph against the many recent defeats. Lydia's concession was an even greater achievement, and though he suspected she'd only let the man live in order to humor him, it was still a victory of sorts.

The one situation as yet unresolved in his life at the moment was the most difficult and painful to face, and accordingly Nick postponed acknowledging it. He told himself that he would call Natalie later and straighten things out, knowing that he would put off that call as long as he could -- for the moment, he was feeling mildly good, and wasn't in any great hurry for the inevitable pain to resume.

But that procrastination proved fruitless. As soon as he walked into his apartment, he knew that he could evade the issue no longer.

Natalie was curled up on the couch, watching him as he entered, her face set in an expression that had nothing whatsoever of medical detachment in it.

She gave him time, a few crucial moments to compose himself. "We have to talk," she murmured, "please, Nick?"

He regarded her fondly, seeing anew the soft curls of her silky hair, the gentle curve of her face, the lovely form of her body, all contributing to her physical beauty -- none of which mattered, when compared to the beauty of her soul. Yes, Natalie was indeed a rare and precious being -- which made it all the more important to protect her from harm. From himself.

"Nick, I'm so sorry," she pleaded with him, rising from the chair to approach him timidly. "You know I didn't mean what I said, it's not true! You're not a monster, you're my best friend... you're my Nick..."

His arms moved to encompass her of their own accord, so comfortable with the embrace that it was an automatic reaction. So warm, so sweet, so mortal-fragrant with the scent of blood; so alluring to all his senses, vampiric and human perceptions alike. "Natalie," he whispered.

Her hands moved upward, cradled his face, caressing his cheeks with a gently possessive motion that was unbearably intimate. "Nick," she moaned, "please, forgive me..."

It was that plea for absolution which shattered the last of his resistance; he could not bear another moment of her anguish. Nick drew a deep, deep breath, and somehow managed to speak. "If you can forgive me..."

"There's nothing to forgive," she said. He began to protest, and she silenced him with the brush of a fingertip against his lips. "Nothing," she insisted, with quiet assurance, and he saw the truth of it in her eyes.

Overcome by a sudden wave of tenderness, he covered her face with kisses, tasting her tears on her eyelids. He kissed her neck, daring to linger there for a moment, just a moment, lest temptation become too great -- she didn't flinch; instead, her hand rose to the back of his head and urged him closer.

Nat, you don't know what you're doing, a part of Nick's mind groaned, while another part howled for more.

And then her lips were at his ear. "I love you, Nick," she murmured. "I never wanted to hurt you -- I love you so much..."

Somewhere inside his heart, a tight knot of pain loosened, eased; elsewhere, nerves pulled taut with increased longing. He wanted so badly to speak his heart, say the words that struggled for expression within him -- but he held back. Words of love could so easily twist and strangle them both, and once spoken, they could not be taken back.

In the deepest recesses of his mind, her voice echoed: I have faith in you...

Which leaves the burden of choice up to me, Nick thought. And what other choice can I make? I love her. All I can do is try to give her the best of me -- and never, never the worst. I can never, will never bring her to join me in this living hell. No matter how much I may yearn for her; no matter how terrible her -- inevitable -- death will be.

And if that choice was painful, prolonging his desperate solitude, well, that was just something he would have to endure.

In any case, it was such a relief just to hold her, to be close to her, and know that he hadn't lost his dearest friend.

He closed his eyes and pulled her against him; he inhaled the scent of her, savored the feel of her, and wished the moment could last forever.

At some point during the recurrent cycle of tears and shame and kisses, they slept; and Nick awoke with the setting sun to find Natalie's head pillowed against his chest, still sleeping, respiration a soft warm rhythm against his skin.

Her eyes were red and swollen; she'd cried for hours before sleep had overcome them both. He'd never seen her cry like that before, not even after her brother's death. Natalie had a degree of self-control he envied, and to see her stripped of that restraint had worried him, even frightened him a little. Between the assault and their 'conflict', her reaction was wholly understandable, but still...

No doubt the tender flesh around her eyes would ache when she woke up. Nick wondered whether there was any ice in his freezer -- there had to be; Natalie liked ice in her drinks, and he liked to please Natalie. A cold compress would reduce the swelling, and perhaps ease the pain. For his own, less visible pain, a warm compress -- specifically, Nat herself -- was doing wonders.

He didn't even consider rising; Nat snuggled against him was heavenly, and he had no intention of surrendering a single instant of that sweet pleasure.

Yes, sweet, innocent and pure. No vicious hunger rising to intrude, to sully the pristine clarity of his heart's desire. Doubtless it would, in time -- less time than he hoped, certainly -- but for now, he was content to simply cradle her in his arms, in an innocuous, guiltless embrace.

She moved in her sleep, sighed softly; her lips curved into a smile, and she nestled closer.

"Natalie," he whispered.

Granted, LaCroix was probably correct: in the end, Nick would most likely suffer, if for no other reason because he was so very good at finding pain to take into his soul. But Lydia had made a valid point -- what else was life for, if not to savor a love such as this? What other purpose could there be?

A tiny rogue vampire, with the face of an angel and the irrepressible spirit of the moon-goddess she had once been: in the space of only a few days, she'd managed to turn his life upside down, to shatter his tentative complacency and replace it with a whirl of uncertainty that was simultaneously terrifying and wondrous. But then, that was Lydia's nature, to cause upheaval wherever she voyaged. He'd learned that years ago.

He and Natalie had long been colleagues, and friends, and now they were more than that -- lovers, although there had been no formal sealing of that pledge. But we love each other, Nick thought, and a smile stretched across his lips as the impact of that truth reverberated through him. Even if that love can never find physical expression, we are lovers, by definition if not by action. As for the implications...

I'm not going to think about that, he decided. Time enough for that turmoil later.

Soon enough, he suspected, his life would become immensely complicated -- but for the moment, everything was perfect.

And Lydia was right, Nick thought. One moment like this is worth any amount of pain, anything at all.

He kissed Natalie's forehead until she stirred and blinked up at him, lips curving into a slow, sleepy smile. Her face crinkled into the sweetest expression he had ever seen, filled with happiness. "Hi, Nick," she murmured, and wriggled until she could kiss him full on the lips.

Pure heaven, it was; and when inevitably his darker nature rose to bring on the change, Natalie didn't back away. It was Nick who made that decision, who brought his vampire nature under control, to give her only the gentler evidence of his heart's passion.

Nat let him make the choice, but refused to allow him to retreat. She gazed straight into his flame-bright eyes and repeated her vow, the words that could break his heart and fill it with joy all at once: "I love you, Nick."

He didn't, couldn't reply, but something in her eyes told him that she understood.

And he kissed her again, fangs and all, and made his own silent vow: no matter what came to pass, he would never allow anything to harm Natalie. Least of all himself.

They were both due at their respective jobs, but neither cared; it was a long, long time before either rose from the couch where they'd spent the night curled in each other's arms.

There was a stiff wind whipping up, tousling Natalie's curls delightfully. A sign of an imminent storm, but for a change there existed no such tempest in Nick's heart; for a change, he actually felt good. It was an amazing feeling, one he hadn't known for a long, long while.

He was opening the passenger door of his car for Nat when Lydia appeared out of nowhere, landing on her hands and knees on the hood of his car with a jarring thump that startled the mortal woman severely.

Nick shot her a reproachful glare on Natalie's behalf, but couldn't remain genuinely angry for long. Her golden hair was wind-tousled, streaming around her face like a silken halo; she seemed almost to glow in the moonlight, to emit a pale aura, and Nick knew how her mortal followers of so long ago had believed her to be a goddess. Lydia's childlike face could look saintly, in the right light.

Sprawled over his car, the moon-goddess looked about eight years old, as deceptive an appearance as any could be.

She grinned at him, saintliness disappearing in mischief, as she scrambled down to the ground. "Wild nights are my glory," she said happily. "I just got caught in a down draft and blown off course."

Natalie's eyes lit up. "Like Mrs. Whatsit," she said suddenly, leaving Nick (who had never happened across the books of Madeleine L'Engle) completely in the dark.

"Yes," Lydia concurred approvingly, "just exactly like Mrs. Whatsit."

"Who?" Nick asked, mystified.

"No," his smaller contemporary corrected, "she didn't fly. Mrs. Whatsit flew -- Mrs. Who quoted."

"Le coeur a ses raisons que la raison ne connait point," Natalie recited in flawless French, to Nick's immense (and obvious) surprise.

Lydia shot her a conspiratorial glance, and giggled.

"The heart has its reasons, whereof reason knows nothing," Nick translated unnecessarily. "Pascal, I think. Appropriate enough, but... what are you talking about?"

"A book," Natalie explained.

"Oddly enough," Lydia added, "a children's book."

"A very good book," Nat elaborated, "one of my all-time favorites. It's about -- people who travel a very long way for the sake of love." Her hand found its way into Nick's, and he clasped it tightly.

Lydia barely repressed her laughter. "How's it going?" she asked cheerfully.

"Well enough," Nick answered, responding as well to the many questions she hadn't uttered.

She nodded, and focused on Natalie. "You okay?" she wondered aloud.

"I'm fine," Nat told her. It was clear that she was comfortable with Lydia's presence; bemused, Nick watched the two women share a secret grin. "Everything's fine now," she said shyly to the smaller vampire.

"Good." Another intimate look passed between them before Lydia expanded her attention to include them both. "I'm leaving," she informed them, adjusting a strap of her backpack. "There's a media convention going on in Lansing, Michigan this holiday weekend; I think I'll poke my nose in and see what's happening." The mischievous grin returned to her countenance. "I'm conducting an experiment, sort of," she confided in the pair. "Some of these people know me, but not what I am. They're sci-fi and horror fans, a lot of 'em, probably the only people in this rational age who have the imagination to see through our facade of normalcy. I'm trying to see how many hints I have to drop before they figure me out." She laughed gaily. "I reckon, if we can 'pass' among science fiction fans, Nicky, we can pretty much get over anywhere."

Natalie laughed with her, and Nick found himself joining in as well.

"Don't be too pleased with my departure, though," Lydia warned them both. "I will be back. And soon."

"Wonderful," Nick grumbled.

"Well, I don't mind," Natalie said impulsively. "Come and visit me, if nothing else."

Lydia didn't seem to know what to do with the invitation; her eyes softened and misted over, and her lips stretched into a wide, foolish smile. And though Nick had never seen that expression on her face, he knew the look -- had felt it on his own face. It was the look of an exile, reconciled to solitude, being suddenly welcomed and accepted. The look of something thought irrevocably lost, being suddenly found.

He imagined he must have looked very much like Lydia did, when Nat had told him she loved him.

Then the mischief returned and obliterated the soulful expression, banishing the tears that had threatened Lydia's composure. "Oh, I'll see you again," she said brightly. "Count on it."

She took Natalie's hand in her left, and Nick's in the right. "When shall we three meet again," she said, quoting again from the 'children's book', "in thunder, lightning, or in rain?" As if on cue, a low rumble sounded in the distance, and the first few raindrops began to fall. "Soon, I think," Lydia said. "It's always good to make new friends, and to be reunited with old ones."

And then she released them both, and smiled; in a heartbeat, she was gone, only a swift rush of air marking her departure.

For a long moment afterward, neither of them spoke, nor made a move to get into the car. "Somehow, I can picture her at a science fiction convention," Natalie mused, "wearing a pair of pointed ears to go with her fangs."

"Mmm." Nick was thinking of LaCroix, and Janette, and their contrast with Lydia. Both of them were properly mysterious, but Lydia was the true enigma. Her moral code was similar to his own, yet she seemed immune to the anguished longings and regrets that bedeviled him. What secret had she found, Nick wondered, to give her the inner peace which he lacked?

"I like her," Natalie ventured. "She reminds me of you. Except... not as troubled."

Startled, Nick roused himself from his reverie to study Natalie's eyes, and wondered when she had become so skilled at reading his mind. Am I that transparent, that even a mortal can see through me?

"We have certain things in common," he answered. Lydia had understood his feelings toward Natalie. For that matter, even LaCroix had understood, in his own unique manner. I cannot wish this agony on another. Not even you.

But LaCroix had never forgiven Nick for denying him his mortal love -- would Natalie ever forgive Nick for giving her his immortal love?

There's nothing to forgive. Nothing.

If only it could truly be so; with Natalie by his side, Nick could easily withstand any amount of trauma, through the end of the century and beyond...

But that could never be. Even if Natalie forgave him for the betrayal -- even if she welcomed it -- would he ever forgive himself?

"Nick?" She reached out to him, breaking into his thoughts. Her hands fastened on his arms, warm and strong. "We should get going," Natalie said prosaically. "Duty calls..."

He smiled. The day-to-day routine, which gave his immortal existence structure and meaning. More so because he truly believed in what he was doing, that making the world a bit safer for mankind was a responsibility worth assuming.

Janette thought it was all very strange, and LaCroix found Nick's lifestyle hilarious beyond compare, but Lydia understood; she might badger him throughout the next dozen decades, accusing him of hypocrisy and hounding him with unanswerable questions, but beneath it all, she understood. Better misguided morals than none at all. And Natalie -- more than anything else, she was the sole element that made his existence worthwhile.

"You've... talked to Lydia, yes?" he inquired placidly, as he settled himself behind the wheel.

"She came to visit," Nat answered. "We had a nice chat."

He caught the irony in her tone. "Like the one you had with LaCroix?"

"No, not at all. Actually, it was... very interesting." She regarded him with a long, thoughtful look. "She's worried about you," Nat said.

"Oh, nice," Nick said, with an irony of his own. "Lydia's worry is in itself something to be concerned about."

She didn't mirror his smile. "I'm worried about you, too," Natalie admitted.

"What do you mean?" He was caught off-guard, although (he conceded to himself ruefully) he should have been prepared for it. Natalie was wonderfully consistent in her concern for his welfare.

She looked down and away for a brief awkward moment, then took a deep breath and faced him squarely. "What if we never find a cure?" she wanted to know.

He sighed. "Then I continue as I am," he said, "what else can I do?"

"You could choose," Nat said, very softly, "not to continue."

"Ah," Nick said, understanding, "so that's it. Lydia, like most of my kind, believes that my desire to become mortal is equivalent to my having a death wish."

"Is it?" Nat said starkly.

"Sometimes I wonder," he admitted.

"Sometimes... I wonder, too." Her gaze slid away from his. "I wonder, sometimes," she went on, "if it's really me you love, or... simply what I represent to you."

Nick inhaled sharply. "Please don't tell me you believed what I said to LaCroix..."

"Not for an instant," Nat assured him, with calm certainty. "But I can't help but think... if we had never met, would any mortal woman have been equally lovable to you?"

The raindrops pattering against the windshield abruptly seemed deafeningly loud. "In eight hundred years," he murmured, "no other ever has."

"In eight hundred years," Natalie said, "have you ever been this alone?"

"Nat," Nick said patiently, "I never realized just how alone I was until I met you -- and suddenly, I wasn't alone anymore."

She smiled, and extended her hand toward him; he caught it in his own, twined his fingers with hers. "I lied, Nick," Natalie said soberly. "I am scared. Not of you... for you. For us."

He didn't respond, but his hand twitched involuntarily.

"We both have so many issues to deal with, and so many difficulties..."

"Star-crossed lovers," Nick summed it up, "just like in some third-rate romance novel."

"Hey, I like third-rate romance novels," Nat protested.

"Enough to live through the plot?" he inquired.

"Nick," she countered, "we might try writing the plot ourselves."

He considered that. "If other forces don't rewrite the story for us."

"LaCroix?"

"Or Lydia. Don't be fooled; she's not the creature she appears to be."

"She warned me herself to examine all aspects of every situation," Nat told him. "Believe me, I know better than to take her at face value."

"But you like her," Nick said.

"Yes, I do," she admitted.

"No fault in that. Everyone does, you know. It's Lydia's particular talent. People can't help but like her." He grinned despite himself. "Even LaCroix likes her -- although of course he loathes her and despises her as well."

A mischievous glint lit Natalie's eyes. "What I wouldn't give to see the two of them together," she said.

"It's a sight to behold," Nick agreed, "regardless of the circumstances."

He dropped Natalie at her office and continued on toward the precinct -- but his hand flicked the turn signal before he was consciously aware of it; glancing down, Nick realized that he was about to make an unplanned detour. He favored the radio dial with a wry smile, wondering if LaCroix knew (as he always seemed to) that he was heading over. Some prescience was involved, at least; LaCroix was opining about family ties, how the bonds of blood might constrict, or caress -- separately, or simultaneously.

As usual, his 'father' sized up his mood in the space of a breath; for a change, Nick didn't much mind. "I see you've straightened out your difficulty with your mortal friend," LaCroix commented, as Nick strolled in.

"No thanks to our mutual ancestor," he said dryly. It wasn't altogether true, but it wasn't often that he and LaCroix shared any common points of reference, and it was strangely comforting to feel the renewal fo the old connection between them.

"Well, that's Lydia." The elder vampire favored Nick with an indulgent half-smile. "She creates difficulty and wreaks havoc wherever she goes, so that when she finally rectifies the damage that she caused, one ends up indebted to her for her assistance."

"Oh, she's not that bad," Nick spoke up on Lydia's behalf. "Not quite."

LaCroix didn't say a word, merely smirked silently at him.

"I never said that she doesn't annoy the hell out of me," Nick continued, after a few moments.

"Just as you have a gift for creating suffering for yourself," LaCroix intoned, "so our beloved Lydia has a talent for pissing people off."

Nick had to laugh. "She does, doesn't she?" he agreed unwillingly.

LaCroix stretched his legs, leaned back in his chair; Nick seated himself in another chair, and together they shared a comfortable silence. He wondered how long it had been since he'd actually enjoyed his 'father's' company, tried to think back -- and couldn't dredge up a single recollection. Which, for him, was nothing short of astonishing. Has it really been that consistently disastrous between us? he mused, troubled. Or is it just that the bad memories overwhelm and destroy the good ones?

A slow smile stretched LaCroix's lips. "There was a song," he mentioned, "a rather popular one, oh, some years back. It was quite a hit. The title was, I believe, 'Love Stinks'." His eyes met Nick's squarely, without the usual layers of heavy defenses to keep them separate. "Remember that, Nicholas," he said softly. "It is, after all, a universal truth."

Nick thought about that for a moment, wondered whether LaCroix's statement had been a response to his thoughts or his words, or simply an amazingly perceptive non sequitur. "I would have thought," he mused, "that your own 'universal truth' would run more along the lines of 'Life Sucks'."

Startlement lit up the pale eyes, and his companion laughed -- genuine mirth, a sound so pleasant that Nick found himself smiling too. "That as well," LaCroix affirmed. "But only on a good night."

A shadow lengthened along the corridor wall, and an apparition appeared on the other side of the glass -- a bright-eyed slender creature who gazed at them both silently.

"Time for you to leave, Nicholas," LaCroix murmured, head turned sideways so that Lydia wouldn't notice the slight movement of his lips. "I believe my mommy wants to speak to me."

The giggle Nick tried so hard to repress came out as a cough. He turned away from LaCroix to lessen the impact of his inadvertent taunt, and Lydia nodded solemnly -- soundproof glass presenting no obstacle to her telepathic skills.

"Lucien," he said involuntarily, instantly claiming the other's full attention with the unaccustomed familiarity.

He hesitated, for the words that were springing to his lips ran contrary to everything he'd battled for -- but the words were there, accompanied by an indefinable emotion that demanded they be spoken. LaCroix had been astonishingly accommodating throughout this mess; perhaps it was time for him to make a few concessions in return.

"Stop by sometime," Nick said finally. "Keep in touch."

The severe countenance softened, just for an instant.

He left quickly, unwilling to spoil the rare moment of closeness between them. Passing Lydia in the hallway, he shot her an inquiring look; she raised her eyebrows at him, her expression revealing nothing, and moved through the doorway into the room he'd just vacated.Halfway down the hall, he glanced back worriedly, his imagination presenting the image of Lydia and LaCroix at each other's throats... His eyes gave him a very different scene, however: Lydia was curled up on LaCroix's lap, and though he couldn't tell what was being said, he could see a small smile on LaCroix's face.

I don't want to know, Nick decided, and departed, back out into the pouring rain.

"You look well," Lydia said, snuggling closer to LaCroix. It was an awkward position, but Lydia was small and the chair was fairly sturdy, and they managed. She had taken the liberty of seating herself in his lap, expecting to be rebuffed at once. When he had failed to throw her across the room as she'd assumed he would, she'd taken advantage of the unprecedented opportunity and stayed put. "Surprisingly well," she went on, "considering the circumstances."

"Oh?" He feigned surprise. "And what circumstances are those?"

She smirked at him. "What circumstances, he says."

Their eyes met, and Lydia draped her arms around LaCroix's neck. "Remember when we were lovers?" she said whimsically.

LaCroix smiled, and slid his hands to encircle her hips. "Remember all the times I tried to kill you?"

"With equal fondness," she said, with the gently sardonic grin that still lived in his memories, returning to haunt him at the oddest times.

Lydia leaned forward and kissed him full on the lips, and he responded with equal fervor. She and LaCroix had been LaCroix and Nicholas, only worse than LaCroix and Nicholas had ever been; the battles they'd fought had been far more vicious. But time had won the final victory -- they had both survived for so long that they were in some essential way part of each other. Fury had forged an intimacy beyond that of affection, an intimacy that bound them still.

In another moment, they might be hurling flaming stakes at each other -- but in the meantime, it was wholly natural, right, that they be in each other's arms.

"Idiot," Lydia said softly, when they parted. "To have made yourself so utterly dependent upon a creature as weak and flawed as Nicholas."

LaCroix was silent, not liking her words but recognizing the truth of them.

"He's tearing himself apart, you know," she remarked.

His eyes were searing, blazing with anger and something more. "I know," he shot back.

She placed one small hand on his chest. "And you can't do a damn thing about it, can you?" she said sympathetically.

"Of course not. This is Nicholas we're talking about, after all." He considered. "Although sometimes, there is the smallest glimmering of hope."

"He came to you tonight," Lydia agreed. "To bitch about me, I'd wager."

"You'd win," returned LaCroix smoothly.

"I know." The hand on his chest moved, tracing a slow caress. "The mortal woman he's in love with..."

"Natalie," he said. "The woman is incredibly dangerous to us, you know."

"Potentially -- but not as long as she's with him. She's very good for him, actually," Lydia said. "In fact, I think she's just what he needs. And I think, with the right guidance, he might come to realize it, too."

He studied her closely. "Is that your professional opinion, or your personal one?"

"Both." Lydia leaned in to claim another kiss, and LaCroix obliged.

"So what is it that you want me to do, mother?" he inquired afterwards.

"Absolutely nothing." Her eyebrows rose in punctuation. "I mean it. Don't goad him, don't provoke him, don't give him any grief. At least, not on that subject," she amended. "Anything you do is liable to push him in a direction we don't want him to go."

"And that direction is..." he prodded, and waited for her answer.

"Well, where do you think he's headed?" she parried.

LaCroix's expression darkened, and Lydia's lips twitched in silent sympathy. "Yes, exactly," she affirmed, and shook her head. "This is no good for you, this... sitting around and watching him slide downhill. Maybe you should get away for awhile, do something else."

His face was reflective, almost wistful. "How can I?" he said softly.

"I know, I know." She hugged him tight, an embrace more comforting than passionate. "Mon cher cauchemar," she whispered. My dear nightmare -- her old endearment for him, appropriate now as it had ever been.

She still remembered how it had been, when Nick had nearly succeeded in killing him: the assault on her psyche, the onslaught of pain that had told her one of her children was suffering, and the unique telepathic signature letting her know which one. Her frantic voyage northward, to be with him when he needed her. Nursing him back to health with repeated infusions of her own blood, giving him strength to recover from his wounds. The long months spent in that dark little room (for even the faintest trace of light was agony against his charred flesh), struggling to ease her son's pain...

Hiss of indrawn breath, in lieu of a scream. Harsh words, grated out through clenched teeth. "I despise him!"

Smoothing chilled blood over his raw skin as if it were lotion, for nothing else could heal him as quickly. "No you don't," spoken softly, with compassion.

Doubling over against the sharp pain, wincing away from her hands; even her gentle touch was too much for him to bear. "I will kill him!"

"No you won't." Drawing him closer, body and mind; using all her telepathic skills to try to ease his torment. "Drink, dearest. You'll feel better..."

"I will never feel better!" Shuddering in her arms, more helpless than she had ever seen him, save for the fateful day when she had brought him over to join her in darkness. "Damn him, damn Nicholas..." and the feel of his fangs piercing her neck.

And at that moment, with Lucien's agony resounding throughout every preternatural sense she owned, it had been all she could do to keep from killing young Nicholas herself.

From the first moment Lucien had set eyes on the youth, he had been lost -- Nick, with his crusader's vows, so filled with faith in the church, had been a twin to the man LaCroix had once been. No surprise that her son had been drawn to Nicholas so many years ago; the astonishing part of the whole thing was that Lucien had not avenged Nick's near-lethal assault. And Lucien exacted vengeance for everything...

Her favorite son, now completely immersed in his own favorite child; for all the damage she had done in his life, she figured she owed Lucien a little help.

"I think I'm going to stick around awhile," she said in his ear, "keep an eye on him."

"Is that supposed to make me feel better?" LaCroix said sarcastically.

"Well, he won't let you keep an eye on him," Lydia replied pragmatically.

"True," he conceded.

"And someone has to," she finished.

"Don't think you're staying with me," he retorted.

"Wouldn't dream of it. I want us both to survive to the turn of the century." Lydia grinned. "I'll make my own arrangements. And keep my distance."

"It would be best that way." He reached up and stroked her hair. "You know, I almost missed you."

"I know. And I missed you terribly. I always do." She took the opportunity to seize one last kiss, made it a lingering one. "How about... one for the road?" she purred, not really hoping for agreement.

But to her surprise, he seemed to mull over her suggestion. "It has been a very long time," he admitted.

Even that much acquiescence was remarkable: as good as a 'yes'. "I promise, I'll leave when it's over," she murmured.

"Love 'em and leave 'em, eh? What a lovely role model you are," he teased.

"As if you ever needed my guidance in that regard. You're brilliantly ruthless all by yourself."

"And you would prefer me to be a weak, flawed creature like Nicholas..."

"Oh, no, Lucien." Her fingers stroked his neck -- a vampire's main erogenous zone -- in a slow, sultry rhythm. "I adore you just the way you are."

"That's a new one for you, mother dear," he retorted. "You're being astonishingly agreeable. Do you have some hidden motive lurking behind this compliant facade, or are you simply hungry?"

"Make up whatever answer suits you," Lydia breathed, "but grant me this one favor..."

She saw his eyes glint silver as his hand moved to caress her neck, and she knew that she had won.

He spun the chair around, so that his back was to the audio technician manning the board -- who moved sluggishly, Lydia noticed; he must have been keeping her under tight hypnotic control, to keep her from noticing anything out of the ordinary. The tiny vampire nestled against him, found a comfortable position, and kissed the spot she intended to puncture, savoring the scent/taste of him, letting the fire well up inside her until it was a roaring blaze.

LaCroix's fangs penetrated her neck as Lydia's sank into his: to an unsuspecting bystander, the embrace might have seemed innocuous, but it was anything but.

She would have liked to have crawled into bed with him and enjoyed a sexual interlude as well; that would have been fun -- but that degree of intimacy was too great a favor to expect Lucien to grant her, at least at his point. It didn't really matter, though. The blood was at the heart of their passion: the lust for it, the hunger, was at the root of every vampire's desires. Sexual passion was a pale thing beside the bright intensity of the bloodlust, and the delirious ecstasy that came with the satiation of that need.

The blood flowed between them, hers to him, his to her, and with it came a rush of sensation, an emotional and telepathic bonding beyond compare. Pleasure cycling between them, growing in intensity, into feedback, into sensory overload...

"Damn, you're good," Lydia sighed, when it was over.

"Someday perhaps I'll take you to bed again, and show you the rest of my talents," LaCroix said smoothly. Not quite returned to his usual imperturbable facade, his face was ever so slightly flushed, an endearing reminder of their interlude. Already, the puncture wounds on his neck were fading -- though not the rest of the toothmarks; she'd always had the bad habit (terribly rude, Lucien had told her on countless occasions) of chewing on her victims and lovers.

It was a measure of his satisfaction that he hadn't chided her this time for doing so.

"Promises, promises," she muttered. "You've been saying that for the last two hundred years. You're a tease, that's what you are." Lydia leaned forward, to tongue away one last small smear of blood on his neck. "Still want me to leave?"

"Yes," he said sweetly, "please."

She acknowledged his request with an ironic smile that matched his, and unfolded herself from his lap. "As you wish," she said, and straightened her clothing (when had his hands found their way into her shirt and under her bra?), preparing to depart.

As she reached the door, one last inquiry reached her. "Did you come here of your own accord, Lydia?" LaCroix wanted to know. "Or were you sent?"

She grinned. "Does it matter?" she said. "The result is the same, dear. Either way... Mama's home," she finished, in a singsong tone.

The door shut behind her soundlessly. "I'm overjoyed," LaCroix said to the darkness, baring his teeth in an unseen feral snarl.

"Happy Valentine's Day," Nick said, somewhat sheepishly, touching his glass to hers.

Natalie returned his shy smile with one of her own. "Better late than never," she replied.

Her glass held champagne, while his held blood; that difference was as symbolic as the toast itself. The setting for their belated celebration was Natalie's office, where so much of their blossoming relationship had taken place -- it might have seemed unromantic to any detached observer, but Natalie was drifting on cloud nine.

He'd arranged a diversion, a delivery of flowers that demanded Nat's personal signature, and she'd returned to her office to find candlelight and crystal stemware and more flowers, dozens of them... and Nick had swept her off her feet, quite literally, into a passionate, tender embrace.

"I have a gift for you," he said, passing a small box across the table -- the gurney that generally held corpses, sometimes an injured vampire, and presently supported a linen cloth, twin bottles and matching crystal, and a lobster dinner from a fantastically expensive restaurant, stylishly packaged in a foil take-out carton.

"Oh... you didn't have to..."

"Open it," he urged.

She peeled away the wrapping paper -- and a delighted smile stole over her face. "So you finally figured it out," she said gleefully.

"It took awhile," he admitted.

Natalie opened the box of candy hearts, picked one out at random and read it aloud. "Choose me..."

Nick grinned at her, radiating anticipation. "What?" she said, curiously, in response to the look.

He made a little hand gesture, and perplexed, Natalie upended the box, spilling its contents onto the crisp white tablecloth.

Candy hearts, yellow and pink and blue and white - - and something that glittered and shone in the flickering candlelight.

"Ohhh..." With trembling fingers, she lifted the object, held it to the light. Gold, delicately etched, set with a diamond...

"Turn it over," Nick said, very softly.

She did, and beheld the inscription:

Dearest Natalie
We are such stuff as
dreams are made on
I LOVE YOU
Nick

The heart-shaped locket slipped from her quivering fingers as the tears began to flow. "Nick," Natalie managed, and ran out of words.

He came to stand behind her, picked up the locket and undid the clasp, prepared to fasten the chain around her neck. "May I?"

"Oh, yes," Natalie said, "anything, Nick." Time seemed to slow to a trickle as the words spilled from her unbidden. "Anything... anytime."

His fingertips stroked her neck, the sensitive spot that was a vampire's preferred incision site, and she shivered - - not with fear, but with a sudden, sharp surge of desire.

Then she felt the small snick of the chain being sealed around her neck, symbol of a heart's- bondage that had happened long before Valentine's Day. Her hand rose to finger the locket, then let it drop; it fell beneath the thin fabric of her blouse, to nestle snugly between the twin curves of her breasts.

She felt Nick bend to kiss her, his lips gliding over her shoulders, her neck, and she was not afraid: she had faith in him, and in their love.

We are such stuff as dreams are made on. A line from Shakespeare, and (secondhand) from the book she and Lydia had been quoting to each other outside Nick's building. Dreams... Nick had his, and she had hers; and now, it seemed, their dreams might be converging and even coming true, something Natalie had until a very short while ago believed to be impossible.

Talk about a wrinkle in time, she thought wryly.

The visit with her family had been interesting, but now it was time to take a weekend off; time to wander for a while, just a brief period, long enough to catch her breath and decide where she might wish to hang her hat for the next decade or two.

Even after all the years, it was still a painful thing to be so completely without roots, without a place to call home. To have no one to recognize and welcome her, no one to chide and censure her when she screwed up, or grant her grudging admiration when she managed to get things right. To be alone and isolated, a vagabond soul, in a world of technological marvels that she still didn't quite understand...

The taxicab had let her off at the airport, and she strolled toward the terminal with her carrysack slung over her shoulder; her Walkalong radio was tucked in her pocket, tiny earphones spewing a rhythmic rap beat, and her feet were almost airborne as they carried her along. Uncaring of who might be watching, she danced to the music only she could hear, nostrils quivering with the scent of the air -- redolent with the pervasive smell of airplane fuel, one of her favorite aromas: it reminded her of traveling, moving, journeying through the dark and endless night.

Instinct and the habits of long experience guided her unerringly through the pre-flight process, and she absently window-shopped through the brightly- lit windows of the concessions that lined the terminal. She considered whether her adopted mortal daughter Daisy might find a use for a ceramic pig bearing a decal of the Toronto skyline, or if dear Lucien might find a moment's amusement in a large black and obnoxious dayglo yellow rubber tarantula prominently labeled 'Nightcrawler'... no, knowing Lucien, he'd think it was a taunt. On the other hand, Nick would appreciate the humor -- dear Nicholas had a wicked sense of humor, too often repressed in favor of his mortal guise.

Might as well remind 'em just who's in charge around here, she mused, with a measure of grim satisfaction. It was small consolation: all her power would come to nothing, if the 'situation' truly degenerated to the point that the Circle thought it might. By taking responsibility, she had placed herself between Nick and Natalie (and yes, even Lucien) and the wrath of the others; had placed her own neck squarely in the guillotine. If and when the excrement began to hit the fan, she would be the first one caught in the deluge.

Lousy spot to be in, but what else could she do? Just another part of motherhood: protecting one's flock.

Kids. Gotta love 'em...

Someone jostled past her, surreptitiously (he thought) lifting her wallet from the back pocket of her jeans. "Excuse me," a deceptively courteously voice declaimed.

Pearson Airport, she thought. Nick's jurisdiction? Tough luck, if it is -- I'm hungry! Sorry, Nicky: you can't win 'em all.

Unseen, she smiled: a predator's smile.

Faster than thought, she whirled and grasped the hand that still held her billfold. The pickpocket's confidence faded as he stared at her, at the sharp points of her fangs. "Wait a second," he began, with the first stirrings of fear.

Her smile was angelic, sweetly innocent, in glaring contrast to her fever-bright eyes. "Sorry," she said mildly, almost apologetically, "but my flight leaves in twenty minutes."

He tried to flee, but before he could do more than turn, she was on him...

A whisper of displaced air, and the corridor was empty.

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