Burnt Offerings   ::   Гамильтон Лорел

"Can I trust you?" she asked in a voice as fragile and pale as she seemed.

I hate being asked questions like that. I wasn't in the mood to lie. "Maybe. It depends on what you want to trust me with."

Caroline looked a little startled, as if she'd expected me to just say, sure. "That was very honest of you. Most people lie without thinking about it." Something in the way she said it made me think that Caroline had been lied to often, by people she'd trusted.

"I try not to lie, Caroline, but if you have information that'll help us here, you need to tell me." I took a drink of my own soda and tried to appear casual, forced my body not to tense up, not to show how much I wanted to simply scream at her until she told me whatever it was. Short of torture, you can't make people talk, not really. Caroline wanted to tell me her secrets. I just had to be calm and let her do it. If I was overeager or abusive, she'd either fold and tell all, or clam up and let us rot. You never knew which way it would go, so you try patience first. You can always browbeat them later.

"I've been the human liaison for this halfway house for three months now. The guardian who oversaw the younger ones was Giles. He was strong and powerful, but he was trapped in his coffin until true darkness. Then two nights ago he woke in the middle of the day. The first time for him. The one on the stairs has to be one of the younger vampires."

She looked at me, brown eyes wide. She leaned into me, lowering her soft voice even further. I had to lean into her just to catch her voice, close enough that my hair brushed her shoulder.

"None of the younger ones has been dead two years. Do you understand what that means?"

"It means that they shouldn't have risen during daylight hours. It means that the one on the stairs should have been burnt to ashes."

"Exactly," she said. She sounded relieved to finally find someone who understood.

"Was this early waking restricted to your halfway house?"

She shook her head, whispering now. We had our heads together like first-graders talking in class. I was close enough to see the fine red lines in her eyes. Caroline had been losing sleep over something. "Every house and all the churches were suddenly having vampires rise early. The hunger seemed worse on the young ones." Her hand went to her neck and the messy wound. "They were harder to control, even by the guardians."

"Anyone have any theories as to why this was happening?" I asked.

"Malcolm thought someone was interfering with them.