Dawn Thompson by The Brotherhood

holy. Many could not stand the light of day, while others, though lethargic, like the coachman, could go about during daylight hours, but they could only exercise their greater powers at night. His own parents were such as these. Hedidn’t know the whole of it, only that they had been spared the bloodlust that drives all vampires by a mysterious blood moon ritual they’d learned of through another like them, and fellow vampire hunter, the equally mysterious Gypsy, Milosh, whom they had met in Moldovia. At best, his information was contradictory. There had to be a way to tell for sure. Thus far this woman had passed two critical points. She was able to be abroad in daylight, and she had been staying on holy ground. But still . . .
    It was a moment before he realized the woman was answering his question. “Then, when I came to,” she was saying, “I heard the dogs howlin’. I was all alone, sir, and I was scared o’ them dogs. One o’ them had bit me already. I couldn’t stay there, so I started to walk toward the lights I saw at the foot o’ this hill, and finally come upon the kirk. The good vicar and his wife took me in and tended me. Then they told me young miss was here. Is she safe, sir? Can I see her, please?”
    “What happened to the others?” Joss said, avoiding the question. He wasn’t prepared to answer it yet. “There were three men in that carriage besides you and your charge when I found it.”
    “ ’Tweren’t nobody in it but me when I woke, sir,” she said. “They musta wandered off lookin’ for help, too—and good riddance, if ya ask me, leavin’ me there like that, to say nothin’ o’ the rest o’ their mischief! Bad hats, the lot o’ ’em—the poor lass’s father, too, God forgive me, ’cause ’twas him what’s been payin’ my wages, but that don’t make him an upstandin’ gentleman. Please . . . can I see her, sir, the young miss? I ain’t goin’ ta rest until I do.”
    Joss grunted, unconvinced. “In due course, Lyda,” he said, turning to the vicar. “Was she seen by the surgeon?” he asked.
    The vicar took his arm and led him off toward the corner of the room, out of Lyda’s hearing, and spoke in a low whisper. “I had Dr. Everett in,” he said. “She ran a high fever. The missus couldn’t bring it down. We thought it could be due to exposure, her coming so far in such a storm ill clad for such a trek. We feared pneumonia. Dr. Everett was afraid it might be something . . . more. He fears the dog may have been rabid, but we have no way to be certain without the dog. Others have sighted dogs since the storm as well—big, shaggy, wildlooking animals—and the word has gone out to shoot on sight any four-legged creature that cannot be accounted for among the villagers.” Joss started to move away, but the vicar held him back. “As you well know,” he went on, “old Everett tends our livestock as well, and he says the animal’s bite more closely resembles the bite of a wolf, though there hasn’t been a wolf in England for centuries. He has books on such. Could be a crossbreed, something that came over on a vessel from the east. Who is to say? She will have to be watched.”
    “Have no fear of that,” said Joss. He wasn’t about to let the woman out of his sight until he was certain she wasn’t what he feared she might be. For if she were
vampir,
albeit through no fault of her own, she would have to be dealt with. He knew enough about his sorry predicament to be certain of that. Why hadn’t his parents prepared him for such as this? He knew the answer. When the years rolled by and the only manifestation of his level of infection was his ability to shapeshift into the dire wolf, they had evidently decided he knew all he needed to know.
    Joss spewed a string of expletives in a low mutter. The vicar heard, and raised his eyebrow. Joss ignored him. The poor man had no knowledge of the situation—thatat least two of his parishioners were vampires, and that