Since—as I might be a vampire—I didn’t DIE on the trip from my apartment to this fascinating, barren, stone cell I’m assuming that my attackers parked in the underground garage below my apartment building. It’s supposed to be one of the benefits of living in converted warehouses—integrated amenities and all that—but given the circumstances I would have preferred my abductors to have a more difficult time absconding with me. Honestly, though, there was no way I could have planned my life around this potential situation.

I don’t know what wakes me up, but the moment I come to I realize that I’m not alone in this horrible little space. Sitting across from me in an ergonomic computer chair that has NO business being in a dungeon is a man that bears a more-than-striking resemblance to a prominent 20th century chicken magnate. White hair, white suit, black glasses and a thin black tie, I giggle,

“Mmmph,” before I burst out with a full-blown, “Bwahahahahahaha!” I continue laughing until I can’t breathe anymore and the man just stares at me, unflappably serene in his high-tech throne. Once I’m gasping and wiping tears from my eyes, he asks,

“Are you quite finished?” in a distinctively affected southern drawl that has me screaming with a fresh bout of laughter. I don’t know if I’m overreacting because of stress, if I’d laugh like a maniac if I walked by him on the street, or if I think I’m dreaming all this insanity but when I crack my skull on the stone wall I quickly sober up. “Is that all?” he asks again and I nod, afraid to try to speak without giggling.

“Yes,” I manage to gasp as I wipe away the last of my tears and his terse nod makes me think that I’ve insulted him terribly but I can’t muster any caring.

“Very well then,” he states, continuing after a moment, “you understand what’s happened, yes?”

“I got assaulted, abducted, and imprisoned?” my cheerful quip earns me a frown and the universal dad-signal of frustration; the world-weary sigh/ head shake/ shoulder slump combo. “Yes?” I ask, giving him over-attentive doe eyes.

“You’ve been given a tremendous gift,” the man says and when he lifts his head I see that his grey-blue eyes have changed to roiling summer storms. I skitter across the floor until my back is flush against the frigid stones; I’m sure I would have beaten a world record if ‘Terrified Backward Four-Limbed Free-Skitter” was an event. “Are you frightened?” he asks, grinning just enough to show me that his fangs have descended.

There are two ways to approach this: contrition (which I’m not a big fan of) and blustering.

“Not at all,” I say, my voice wavering only a little. The elderly vampire smiles, blinks, and when he sits back in his chair he’s returned to the one-hundred percent southern gentleman he appeared to be when I first awoke.

“Very good, Solaine,” his tone conveys pleasure in my capitulation and I decide that I don’t like it at all.

“Who are you?” my pointed question only raises one of his fluffy-white eyebrows and I continue, “I mean, you OBVIOUSLY know who I am. I have to assume you’re not actually the colonel…”

“How thoughtless of me,” he says, more to himself than to me, “my name is Archard. I’m very pleased to meet the woman that Master Jarvis has had so very much to say about. Your…dedication to your chosen profession is most admirable.” I manage to choke back a sarcastic, Gee, thanks. I’m so happy that my service has been satisfactory to the man who attempted to murder me, and glare at him instead. When he does not go on, I ask,

“Okay, so, why am I here?”

“You’re dangerous,” Archard replies quickly and I can’t help but laugh again. “What about that statement do you find funny, girl?”

“I’m dangerous? Me?” cold has started creeping past my disbelief and I wrap my arms around my body to keep from shivering. “I’m as dangerous as a library cat.”

“The four men you’ve murdered might disagree with that,”

“Four?” I ask, freezing and looking down at myself. I didn’t notice before—what with the ‘waking up in a stone cell with a strange man staring at my nearly-naked self’ thing—but I’m coated in blood and underneath that, ash. “Men?” I ask, and something softens in his features. I don’t know if that scares me more or less than when he slipped his human eyes.

“Two on the morning of your…change…and two more when we sent men to collect you,”

“You mean those vampires that were throwing me in a trunk like so much garbage? Or do you mean those thugs that broke into my apartment and kidnapped me?”

“Yes. Them. All FOUR of them,” the blasé way Archard answers me reminds me that vampires don’t place the same value on life that humans do. “It is still a topic of some interest, you know,”

“No, I don’t know,” I mutter as I rub my hands over and over each other, trying to chafe away the stains.

“The fact that your Turning first allowed you to die then revive within a matter of minutes, as well as provided you with an unparalleled set of instincts, is quite contrary to the natural course of these things. You are—to date—an oddity among our kind,”

“Our?” my pointed question curls the side of his lip in something half-sneer/half-smile.

“Yes. Our kind, Solaine. Contrary to what you may think, you’re in this place for your protection. It was bad enough that you disposed of two NewBloods—they’re counted among our ranks and ours to do with as we wish—but then you killed two humans. There’s no question that they were unsavory men that will not be missed by many or for long but mistakes like that are what kept us in the shadows for centuries,”

“I thought it was the sun that did that,” I mutter under my breath but his exasperated sigh tells me he heard me.

“Therefore,” Archard’s emphasis informs me that he won’t tolerate any more interruptions, “we had you brought here as soon as we could make arrangements.” When he falls silent an idea leaps into my mind and flies out my mouth before I can stop it.

“You thought I was dead and that your NewBloods had taken refuge somewhere else. You didn’t know, did you?” I pause for a moment before adding, “So how did you find out I…” I can’t bring myself to say murdered them and instead settle on, “I wasn’t dead? How did you find out before nightfall?”

“There are many things for you to learn, Solaine, things that have been kept from the humans because they wouldn’t allow us to live as we are if they knew our true nature. Master Jarvis has taken it upon himself to instruct you in our ways,” and I’m sure he would have continued if a fine, hot rage hadn’t come boiling out of me on the back of angry words.

“JARVIS CAN KISS MY ASS!!!” I shout and then suddenly there’s a horribly familiar, masculine voice crashing through my mind with the force of a thousand gongs.

Promise? It asks as I feel myself topple over as if struck. Linen-clad arms move around me lifting me up and into the cradle of stick-skinny arms, as satisfied male laughter rolls through my mind; pushing me as inexorably toward unconsciousness as the waves push at the shore.

I’m going to kill you, I think at the intruder’s voice, before even my thoughts are lost. As is his reply.