This is My First Spec (available at an elementary education resource center near you), so preceed with care. I'm open to all criticism, so have at it!

Kudos to my beta readers, Chrysanthemum the Meticulous and Kokopeli the Enthusiastic. Hunter, check your e-mail! (By the way, Chrysanthemum, I know the title hasn't improved since Daniel-And-Louis-Go-On-Vacation-And-Drive-Lestat-And-Armand-Up-The-Wall, but at least it's shorter!)

DISCLAIMER: These characters aren't mine. If they were, I'd obviously be the one making the small fortune, but they're not and I'm not. I respect the author's rights and imagination, so let's stop taking ourselves too seriously and get on with the show.

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Even in January, New Orleans was warm. French Quarter shopkeepers propped open their doors and the residents in the apartments above raised their windows to let in the mild coastal breeze. Voices from above mingled with noise from the street below, and it was as though the heart of the city had become a tangible thing. People all around were laughing and crying and fighting and loving and living and somewhere someone was probably getting mugged, but there was something special in the air tonight, something so special that even the tourists seemed to avoid the souvenir shops with their beads and baubles and general kitsch out of something that was almost-but not quite-like respect.

Out on a balcony on Royal Street, a lanky blond balanced precariously on the rail, flicking his cigarette into the pot of a nearby bougainvillea and grumbling about how smoking wasn't what it used to be. A dark-haired man stood beside him, inconspicuously scooping out the ashes.

The careless blond was me, Daniel Molloy, and my host none other than the infamous Louis de Pointe du Lac, whom I consider a longtime friend, though at the moment he appeared to be vacillating between wanting to hold me steady and push me off the balcony. He always was protective of those plants. I hadn't come to wreck his garden or whine about my lost mortal pleasures, so I eventually obliged him by stepping into the library. I've always been impressed by Louis's study, although it's not as extensive as you might imagine. With all that time to collect reading material, you'd think he'd have enough to fill a Barnes & Noble, but as it is, the study is a very small nook of the second story that all the bedrooms open onto.

"Don't you ever miss winter?" I asked, gesturing towards the open French doors. "That's what I always hated about Florida. We never got any snow."

Louis smiled. "I've lived here most of my life, so I don't know what to miss. What I saw of snow in New York and Paris never made much of an impression."

"Of course it didn't," I scoffed. "What you saw in New York and Paris wasn't snow; it was filthy brown slush, and who likes that? What you need is a trip to the Alps or the Rocky Mountains if you're a homebody."

"Ah. A homebody," he echoed wryly. "You're beginning to sound a little like Lestat."

Yes, Lestat. That was why I was here, wasn't it? I cleared my throat, leaned back in my seat and tried for casual. "Speaking of Lestat, where's he gone off to now?" I asked, although I already knew. "It seems awfully quiet around here without him."

Louis glanced at me. "Yes, it is rather quiet, isn't it? Lestat went to London with David several months ago. I would have thought you would have known by now." He was on to me. Louis is no fool.

"If I were going on vacation, I certainly wouldn't spend it all in London," I continued. "I see why you didn't go."

"I wasn't invited." Louis's expression was unreadable. "They've gone to the manor to become... reacquainted. Even if they had invited me, I wouldn't want to intrude. And, as you've said yourself, I'm a homebody."

"I never said that!" I protested. "But I sympathize with you, Louis. I of all people should know what it's like to be ignored by your maker. No one told me Armand went into the sun. No one told me Lestat was comatose on the chapel floor. Hell, I don't even know how they could have told me. I don't even remember where I was at the time, but to have to read about my own maker's burning in a book written by his own hands..."

"They were David's hands, actually."

I shrugged. "So they were David's hands. But still, to read that he no longer loved me... I honestly thought I was going home to him after I appeased my wanderlust."

Louis gripped my shoulder sympathetically.

"I thought he might have written it in anger, and that if I only hurried fast enough there might still be a chance. I was ready to throw myself at his feet, take all the blame on myself, but he merely looked at me and turned to lavish attention on those damn children of his!" I seethed. "I was pouring out my soul to him when that kid walks in, makes the slightest of sounds, and Armand is all his, stroking his hair, giving him his undivided attention." I gazed mournfully into Louis's compassion-filled face. "I've never been more jealous. It's a pain only you can understand, Louis."

He let his hand drop gracefully onto the couch beside him, his face a mask. "I never said I was jealous of David."

"But you are!" I pressed. "How can you not be? Ah, Louis!" Groaning, I put my head in my hands, elbows balanced on my knees. "You know what we should do?" I said, my voice muffled by my hands. "We ought to run off together. Make our makers insanely jealous."

"What?" he gasped, slightly amused. "And what purpose would that serve?"

"None, I suppose," I replied, raising my head. "I've got to get out of here, Louis, and so do you, whether you realize it or not. We can't keep letting ourselves be buffeted about by someone else's whims."

He rose, arms crossed across his chest as he gave his bookshelves a very thorough inspection.

"Please, Louis," I whispered. "I don't want to go alone."

He sighed, running his fingers through his black hair. His brows knit in anxiety and when he turned, his green eyes were so intense I almost forgot to breathe.

"Where do you have in mind?"

Part 2

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I was astonished.

"You're actually coming?" I asked. True to form, my tongue had been just little quicker than my head, and I immediately wished it hadn't come out that way or maybe that it hadn't come out at all.

Louis cocked his head to one side. "Isn't that what you wanted?" he queried, very sincere.

Shaking my head in self-disgust, I explained, "Believe me, Louis, I didn't mean for it to come out that way. I just didn't expect you to give in so easily. I had a whole slew of arguments worked up just for you, and then you have to go off and be so damn congenial and I never get to use any of them."

"Oh, I beg your pardon," he said, smiling. "I forgot manners were passe. An unthinkable breech of conduct on my part."

"Right," I replied, scanning the bookshelf behind me. The leather-bound book I fished out opened up to a map of North America, only the entire mid western United States was sectioned off and marked la Louisiane. "Um, you got anything a little more recent? Something with all forty-eight continental states would be nice."

Louis reappeared from one of the bedrooms with a handful of maps and travel guides. "These belong to Lestat, but I don't think he'll mind if we borrow them," he explained. "It's not very likely that he'll get lost, and even if he managed to, knowing Lestat I think he'd probably enjoy it."

We sat on either side of the mahogany desk and spread the maps out between us. They were all fairly up to date, save for one with a big chunk of Asia colored yellow and labeled USSR. Running my index finger over the blue line between East and West Germany, I wondered what it would be like in two hundred years when the Berlin wall was something for the history books and no longer a memory. Only I would remember. I was born during the Cold War and remember my uncle's endless ranting about Commies and the Rosenbergs. Would I be like Louis, who read about Napoleon and Thomas Jefferson in the newspapers and not a textbook?

Louis's voice startled me. "What sparks your interest, Daniel?" he asked. "Do you have any preferences?"

I pushed my hair back from my forehead, still a little shaken by the enormity of it all. "Not really," I murmured.

He leaned back, apparently giving this a good thinking over. "What languages do you speak? We can narrow it down that way."

"I don't speak anything but English," I confessed, "American English. I'm a horribly unromantic villain."

Louis laughed, perfect teeth flashing. Studying his expression, I couldn't help but compare him to Lestat and Armand, the other beauties I'd been in close acquaintance of. Well, I'd never been all that close to Lestat, but after that fateful concert, everyone knew what he looked like. His wide mouth and kilowatt grin were known to 80s rock fans worldwide, and a select few (myself, Marius, and perhaps Louis, too) had seen Armand's petulant lips draw back to reveal delicate, pearly teeth. No matter how flawless either of them appeared, Louis remained the paragon. I was beginning to realize the downside to our traveling together-I was a fool for his beauty along with everybody else. It was hard to keep myself from awestruck staring and making him uncomfortable.

"If it's romance you want, some say that French is the language of love," he replied. "I can teach you, if you like, though my speech is-like my maps--sometimes a little outdated."

It was my turn to laugh. "I always wanted to see you again, Louis," I said. "I'd thought of all kinds of things you could teach me after I became a vampire. Somehow French was never one of them."

"It's a good language to know," Louis teased. "Someone might even mistake you for being cultured."

I imagined purring French sentiments into the ears of swooning young women and started to laugh even harder. "That would be one hell of a mistake," I gasped before turning thoughtful. "Actually, a little culture wouldn't kill me. Armand wanted me to be a gentleman once-not that he was one in any sense of the word, but he knew how to act like one when the situation called for it. Now that's an idea!"

"What is?" Louis asked, looking a little troubled, and rightfully so.

"What I wouldn't give to see the look on Armand's face if I ever displayed the slightest interest in those operas of his!" I mused. "He took me to the symphony shortly after I was made, and I loved it. All those sounds and preternatural hearing-amazing! We went to the opera the next week and I disappointed him by falling asleep fifteen minutes into it. It's hard to like something you can't follow."

I didn't see much chance of me liking opera even if I could follow it, but I had found the fishlike expressions on the singer's faces amusing. Louis, on the other hand, was a great lover of the opera, so I kept that thought to myself.

Louis, still wondering what this was leading up to, asked skeptically, "Why didn't you ask Armand to explain it to you?"

"What would be the point?" I let my eyes meet Louis's with a deliberate intensity. "In some ways, Armand underestimates me. I think Lestat does the same to you."

He didn't break my gaze, but the corners of his mouth curled up in amusement. "Daniel, stop trying to manipulate me."

"I'm not trying to manipulate-"

"Yes, you are." Louis's words were firm, but not angry. "From your form and style, it's obvious you've been studying under a master, but unfortunately, Daniel, Armand has a few years on you. You lack finesse." He shook his head in disapproval. "Honestly!"

"I was trying to be subtle," I returned.

He found this amusing. "But Daniel, you're not subtle. You're blunt. Whatever you're trying to say, be straight about it or we're not going anywhere."

I thought of a snappy comeback, but held my tongue. "I was thinking that you can help me and I can help you. If we're going to drive our makers insane with jealousy, we've got to show them what they're passing up. Now, one of the pitfalls in my relationship with Armand is that I-in his opinion-am uncultured and classless. You, on the other hand... well, your refinement is renowned, but Lestat thinks..." I cast a nervous glance at Louis, who sat with eyebrows raised expectantly. "Lestat thinks you're a little uptight. But then look at me: the immoral, immodest Daniel Molloy. You may call me an idiot, but you can't call me uptight."

"You're not an idiot, Daniel."

I wasn't sure I believed him, but I replied caustically, "Why, thank you. Try telling that to the rest of the coven."

Louis ignored that, focusing his attention back on the maps. "Where do you want to start? France? Belgium? Martinique?"

"Norway."

"Norway?" he repeated, wondering if he'd heard correctly.

"This isn't going to be completely revengeful," I explained. "I want us to get to know each other, and I think it's only fair we start out on equal footing."

Louis sighed. "I'll start packing right away."


Part 3

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I remember the lake in springtime, smooth as glass and reflecting the overcast skies and surrounding firs like a silver mirror. Fog hovered just above the surface, making the entire scene so surreal I expected to wake up at any second. I have never been one to sit and ponder nature, but there was something in that eerie early morning quiet that was almost profound. I could have drowned in it.

Now the lake was dark, save for the stars above and the electric lantern at the boathouse, shining across the frozen waters like a beacon. It was beautiful in its way, but I was frustrated that my companion couldn't see it in its sunlit glory. In fact, he couldn't even see the lake. It was covered by a heavy blanket of snow, the only visible difference between the water and the bank being that the lake didn't grow fir trees.

I looked out over the smooth whiteness one last time before heading up to the cabin, a red wooden box with white trim that was intended to be a summerhouse. The Swedes make annual summer sojourns out of Stockholm to the extreme northern regions, the serene wilderness that is the home of their ancestors and the rural Lapps. The cabin had a fireplace and I was sure that Louis had it blazing by now, being chilled to the bone. There wasn't much hunting to be had here, and the villages were few and far between. I supposed that if I got much hungrier, I could tackle a reindeer, but somehow that image failed to be appealing. I trudged through the snow and ice, using preternatural talent to keep my body light and balanced.

Just as I had suspected, Louis was stoking a roaring fire, alternating between warming his hands and adding wood to the flames. He turned to me and smiled, shoulders shivering.

"I never thought of dressing in layers," he noted, watching curiously as I peeled off my heavy anorak, vest, and two layers of clothing. "I'm not accustomed to being susceptible to the cold. When you told me to expect winter weather, I hadn't the slightest idea what you meant."

"You're the one who didn't even know to miss snow," I teased. "I have more experience with the stuff. I grew up in Sacramento, not New Orleans."

"You obviously know how to dress for it."

"We never had anything this cold," I explained, my voice muffled by my sweater. "I learned the art of dressing warmly from Armand. If you want to know how to cope with the cold, ask a Russian." Pulling the garment off of my head, I smoothed my hair and looked around at the bare white walls. "That's how I first discovered this place, you know. Running from Armand."

Louis nodded once, giving me a cautious sideways glance. He was being very careful not to step on my toes, careful not to ask any questions about Armand.

"I've never been here in the winter," I continued, unable to put away the memories that pulsed in my brain. "I came here in late spring-after Armand had left me alone again. I spent the winter in Stockholm, which was foolish of me. You don't escape a vampire by running to somewhere that has night all season long. It was just that the cities get so desolate during the wintertime; it matched my mood." I laughed. "Of course, Armand showed up eventually. He appeared in my hotel room with bags full of woolen clothes, mostly Russian-made. He trusted them, I guess. They had been the key to his survival, so I suppose there was something deeply personal and symbolic about him choosing them to be the key to mine. But of course, I didn't know that at the time. I knew nothing."

"Nothing of his past?" Louis asked, looking a little befuddled. "Or do you mean that philosophically? You knew nothing of life?"

I shrugged and collapsed on the couch. "All of it. I didn't know much about Armand's past, especially at that point. I later learned of Marius and of Armand's experiences in the brothel, but the rest I didn't learn until I read it in his book. He didn't choose to tell me much. Just brief explanations of why he was the way he was, if you follow me."

Louis sat down beside me. "I had been under the impression that you and Armand knew each other very intimately."

"Well, he knew me intimately. He knew my every thought, which was incredibly annoying, let me tell you."

Louis smiled. "I understand, Daniel. You have the good fortune to have a barrier between your minds. I, on the other hand, am far too weak to keep him out of my mind at all. Armand has a tendency to take advantage of the situation, I would say."

"Certainly. In time I grew to understand him as well as one can expect. I understood his mannerisms and who he was, but there were things we didn't discuss. Even when we drank from one another, Armand was highly selective of what images I saw in the blood. Not me. I have a hard enough time keeping my thoughts to myself during conversation, so you can just forget it when I'm drowning in passion." Smiling bitterly, I added, "That's part of our trouble. Armand doesn't feel passion. Passionate is a word for someone like Lestat or myself, someone who throws himself into things wholeheartedly. Armand rarely puts any of his heart into anything at all."

Louis was nodding as he spoke. "Yes, there is something about Armand that he keeps completely to himself. At the time I experienced it, I thought it stemmed from our circumstances. I was holding on the memory of her, you see, even when Armand and I shared blood. It was not until later, after I had read Lestat's book did I realize that for Armand it must always be that way; he must keep an iron grip on that most tender, private part of his soul." He brushed my hair off my brow, smiling tenderly. "He's been betrayed so many times, mortal and immortal. But that is something you already know."

"I never knew that you and Armand were lovers," I said, wondering whether I ought to feel jealous. I'm not an overtly possessive person by nature, but with Armand I feel mildly threatened by everyone who has ever caught his fancy; alive, dead, or undead. "I know what you told me in your interview, of course, but I didn't know you'd ever drank from him. I was under the impression that you never drank from anybody."

Louis's face darkened. "Lestat believes that I refuse to share blood with other vampires. Perhaps that's for the best. I allow him this because the truth would wound him so badly."

"And the truth is?"

"The truth is that I refuse to share blood with Lestat."

I didn't try to camouflage my stare. I was trying to decide if Louis was out of his head, because try as I might, I couldn't logic it out. "Let me get this straight," I said, rubbing my temples. "You're in love with your maker, you've made love to my maker, yet you refuse to give the same intimacies to the one you're actually in love with. Louis. Louis! Tell me, how does this make sense? Does this even make sense to you?"

He paused for a long moment, raised his green eyes heavenwards, and heaved a deep sigh. "Lestat is another topic entirely. It's too late in the morning to talk about Lestat. Right now we're talking about Armand." When I continued to stare at him in disbelief, he lifted his chin, urging me to continue. "Daniel?"

"All right," I agreed at last. "But we're going to talk about Lestat very, very soon. I think your logic is somehow impaired, but no, by all means, back to Armand."

"Thank you."

I bit my lip, an old habit, and I found myself surprised when a droplet of blood welled there. I wiped it away, annoyed. "I have to admit I felt jealous of you a few minutes ago," I said slowly, carefully choosing my words and keeping my emotions in check. "Not just you, but all of Armand's old paramours, which doesn't fit my track record at all-Daniel Molloy, who used to let them all slip away from him. When I was in high school, and later in college and even after that, I was so laid back about everything. Relationships came and went, no bitterness, no broken hearts. But with Armand I'm insanely jealous. Not so much that they were with him, but just the constant fear that maybe there has been someone or that there will be someone that I just can't measure up to."

I felt foolish, talking to Louis like that. I wasn't sure how he'd take it. I'd had a girlfriend back in San Francisco who used to want to talk about everything. She was a psychology major, and she'd keep me up late at night, talking about how I looked at things and thought about things and trying to analyze my soul. She also had this part time job reading tarot cards, but that's really beside the point. The point was that I had never talked to another man the way I was beginning to talk to Louis, never mind that he'd poured his heart out to my tape recorder; he could've easily killed me when it was all said and done. I'd learned well enough from my father and my uncles that talking this way was taboo, a pastime better left to women. Of course, I'd learned from them that a lot of other things were taboo as well, but I'd never heeded them; the other things were just too much fun.

But Louis is a thinker, and didn't appear to be troubled at all. He stared into the flames, nodding slowly, considering what I had said. "There's no reason to fear me, Daniel," he said, his voice gentle and soothing. "My time with Armand cannot hold a flame to what he feels-or at least has felt-for you. Our relationship was odd, to say the very least."

"Tell me," I said before remembering how intensely private Louis can be. "I'm intrigued. I know he's desirable, but I can't even imagine you wanting to be with Armand in the first place. There are some things about him that I think you'd find, ah, permanently damaging."

I received another sideways glance, and my companion licked his lips and began hesitantly, "This is a difficult thing for me. Our relationship was so severely affected by Claudia's death... I couldn't give him the chance I had so wanted to. I couldn't forgive him for allowing her to die. It's even harder now, after..." Louis winced, a shudder running through him. "I continue to tell myself that what he told David is not true, that it could not possibly be true... As you know, he has no great love of David, and I'm hoping that he was trying to shock the great Talamasca scholar. But to think that's what lurks in his black little heart-it repulses me.

"Yet I love him despite his black little heart. Maybe even for it." Louis and I exchanged a knowing smile. "You know as well as I do that Armand is irresistible when he wants to be. He is capable of being whatever you wish him to be, and that was how it was with us. I desired him, but I did not want to give up Claudia. He allowed me a companionship without any deep responsibilities demanded from either of us. He allowed me to live separate from the world, precisely as I had wanted to. We could walk down the street simultaneously, match step for step, but we never had to walk together."

I rested my head on my hand, trying to take this in. "Yet you made love to him."

He shrugged, a gesture I had not thought Louis capable of. Amazing how he could make something usually considered insolent so graceful. "I drank from him, yes, and he from me. And it kept me from feeling utterly alone. Yes, I love him, and I believe that he loves me, but it was more of an action to keep from drowning than anything else. It was something I could give him in repayment for his tolerating my aloofness."

"Guilt?"

"Gratefulness."

"But you gave him your blood to repay him," I pointed out. "You felt guilty."

Louis raised his eyebrows. "I gave him my blood because I wanted to. I felt guilty as well, but"--Louis punctuated his words with another sharp lift of his eyebrows--"mostly because I desired him."

We sat in silence for several minutes, caught up in our respective thoughts. "He is hard to resist, isn't he?" I said, my voice ringing in the silent room. "Especially after he's fed and he's warm and amorous. He started kissing behind your ear, didn't he?" I grinned. "That's his favorite trick, coming in smelling delicious and kissing right behind your ear."

Louis gave me a long look, letting me know that question was beneath him. "I'm not answering that question, Daniel," he said, but after a moment's thought I saw the hair on the back of his neck rise and the skin lightly shiver.

I laughed. "You already have."

Part 4

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It was mid morning when we headed to our resting places, still fully conscious and free from the pinpricks and tingles that come with the approaching dawn. It was Louis's idea that we seek shelter now, being cautious and practical as ever, but I was unwilling to drop our conversation without a fight.

"We still have time," I insisted. "I am more susceptible to the sun than you are, and even I don't feel anything yet. What's the hurry?"

Louis peered inside the hall closet. "It's true that you are more susceptible, but it's also true that you will have less warning. While I am capable of carrying your unconscious body to safety, I do not want to run the risk of falling asleep on my feet. It would be fatal to us both." He moved quickly across the room and threw open the front door. "Ah, Daniel! Come this way."

I followed as he loped down the icy steps and out into the snow, making a sharp turn round the corner of the summerhouse. Louis stopped in front of a large white lump, bent down and wiped the ice away with one sweep of his arm. Beneath the frost lay a set of heavy wooden doors.

I backed away. "No. I am not spending the day in a cellar."

Louis looked over his shoulder in surprise. In the blue moonlight his lips had a faintly purplish hue, and I wondered if mine looked the same. They were certainly cold enough. "Why not, Daniel?" he asked, raising a thick door slab. "We can't go to earth, and the cellar is dry and protected."

I turned my back to him, shaking my head.

"I don't usually show others where I lie, so I understand if you're uncomfortable, Daniel, but this really is the safest place-"

"No, Louis," I said, my voice sorrowful. "It's not that at all. I just can't stay cooped up in a cellar."

The look he gave me was the mirror image of the one I'd given him when he'd told me about refusing Lestat. After a long, disbelieving pause, Louis sighed and dropped the door with a muffled bang. "Let's go look inside."

The summerhouse was filled with windows, perfect for staring out at the lake on a clear day in July, but deadly for a couple of vampires seeking shelter in January. Louis was beginning to grow frantic as we raced from room to room, but salvation came in the form of a walk-in cedar closet in the back bedroom.

"This will have to do," Louis sighed, relaxing. "We can put a quilt at the bottom of the door and we'll be safe from the sun."

I stuck my head over his shoulder, examining the walls lined in red wood and inhaling the scent. It smelled like mothballs, but it was much better than the cellar. I've developed a dislike of being put in small, underground places, which in my case is probably a very healthy reaction.

"It's great," I said, and turned to busy myself with hauling the mattress off the bed and cramming it into the closet. I straightened it and tucked the corners of the blankets under, grinning up at Louis's baffled smile. "Mortal habits, I know, but I like to be comfortable when I lie down. I also still hate sleeping in clothes"-Louis's eyebrows shot up in either apprehension or amusement-"but don't worry. It's so cold I'll be sleeping in layers."

As Louis went to put out the fire and lock the doors, I settled into the padded nest I had made and tried to ease into mortal sleep. I arranged my limbs, closed my eyes, and tried what might have been yoga, but my mind was racing with the excitement of this adventure Louis and I had embarked on. The man himself excited me, though not in the same way I had been when we first met. Then I had been intrigued by what he was and what he'd seen, but after awhile things like Waterloo and Aristotle and Troy, all the things I'd asked the Children of the Millennia about, grew dull and now I was concerned with Louis himself. I'd heard the old ones talk about how open he was, read all of Lestat's descriptions, but I couldn't believe that this passive scholar was the same angry vampire I'd interviewed all those years before. Behind all the manners, who was this person I thought I knew? I was on to the second biggest story of my lifetime. I could feel it in my bones.

There was a soft rustle and Louis was seated beside me, quietly unlacing his boots and placing them beside the wall. He took one last look around the room before shutting the closet door, giving a disdainful sniff that I was sure was due to the mothballs.

I snickered. "Strong, isn't it?" I said as he slipped in beside me. "You were looking a little green around the gills."

"Green around-I despised the nineteen twenties." Louis's breath was cool against my ear. "This isn't so bad, really. You ought to have visited the townhouse when Lestat was remodeling. The things we took out of trunks..."

He shuddered in disgust, and I patted his elbow playfully before scooting closer to hook my arm over his side and press my cheek against the back of his head. I felt him tense and glance over his shoulder at me. When I made no further movements, he relaxed and permitted my embrace.

I had missed this closeness with another of my kind. I reveled in the fact that this was physical contact that did not end in destruction. The gentle hands that stroked my face or touched my arm tended to become dinner, but I did not have the opportunity to express this to Louis because the death sleep was descending fast and I had scarcely moved my lips when they were turned to stone.

Part 5

**********

My first thought when I came to a few hours later was cold. My second thought was hunger. Beneath the heavy blankets I felt my wrists, which are skinny to begin with, and was surprised to find that they weren't completely skeletal. It was then that I noticed Louis had already risen and that I was alone in this dark, musty wooden box. Shivering, I kicked the covers aside and went searching for my companion.

The air in the summerhouse smothered me with waves of palpable heat. Louis had thoughtfully built a fire before leaving, but even the flames couldn't melt the ice in my marrow. There was some sort of note on the back of the door, written in a long, slanting eighteenth-century hand, complete with all the intricate whorls and loops that were supposed to designate your signature as your own. I glanced at it as I tugged on my anorak and rubber snow boots, looking at the form of it but not the message. It was all formality anyhow.

I hopped on the snowmobile we had rented, slightly surprised that Louis hadn't taken it already, and sped off across the ice. I was in no mood to travel all the way to the village; the hunger was gnawing at my insides with pointy little teeth. I was going to take the nearest meal and run.

As I paused at the top of a hill, I spotted a light between two firs. A house alone in the forest-my hunting ground could not have been more perfect. I turned off my motor and traveled the rest of the way down the hill on foot. I could smell human blood as I approached, but oddly I could sense no heartbeat. I circled the cabin twice before peering in the tiny window.

An elderly man lay asleep in a wooden bed on one end of the room-a single bed, I noted. He had no spouse who might come in and discover us. A fire flickered in the hearth, casting an inviting red glow on the weathered skin, but I still could sense no heartbeat. Had he died in his sleep? The scent was so strong...

Throwing caution to the wind, I stepped inside the cabin and made my way over to the body. His callused hand was still warm in my own, but as I bent my head and smelled the wrist, I realized the blood scent hung in the air, but not on the corpse. There was scarcely a drop of blood left in his veins. This, I realized with a jolt, was Louis's work. I examined the face with its gentle expression, the tender way the arms were folded atop the coverlet. Even in his hunger, Louis had made a loving kill.

I stepped away gingerly. Louis didn't like anyone to see him hunt, and I was sure he wouldn't appreciate me examining his victim. I was about to head out again when my eyes fell on a rack of recently butchered reindeer meat. My mouth watered, even though the blood was cold, animal, and dead. I hadn't been this hungry since I was mortal. Sheepishly, I pressed my finger to a rib, then licked the blood that remained on the tip. My stomach clenched, and I stepped away, no longer tempted. The taste was one I quickly wanted to forget.

Outside it had begun to snow again, and I didn't have to travel far before I ran into a disoriented traveler who came to the sound of my engine. He waved his arms and called out to me in the blinding whiteness, and remembering the expression of Louis's old man, I approached him tenderly. But my prey would have none of the gentle death and fought me, leaving violent red gashes on the forest's white flank. When I had finished with him, I healed his wounds and buried him deep in the ice, where he would be discovered come spring and labeled another victim of hypothermia. For the first time that evening, my breath made cloudy puffs as it met the colder air. Still, I couldn't suppress a shiver as I straddled the snowmobile and gazed out over the makeshift grave. There was nothing to do but head back to the summerhouse. Out of sight, out of mind.

I pulled up beside the woodpile and set to dusting the snow off of the snowmobile and covering it with plastic. I was squatted by the wheel, tucking in the corners when I first saw Louis. He hardly looked real as he stepped out of the woods, moving so smoothly he seemed to glide. He wore a heavy, charcoal gray woolen coat, a scarf flung lightly across his shoulders, his black hair long and loose and speckled with snowflakes. The snow reflected the moonlight as did his skin, and staring at the shimmer I had the sensation that I was dreaming this. Everything seemed too stark to be real; the white of the landscape broken by the dark trunks, Louis's mother-of-pearl vampire skin next to his night-dark hair. I continued to stare, transfixed, until he looked up and smiled.

"Wow," I said as he came to stand beside me. "Quite a drastic change from last night." I touched the ends of his hair where it fell a little below the top of his shoulder. "When my hair grows back during the day, it goes from nice, neat haircut to bad, overgrown haircut. I don't get to have any magnificent transformations."

Louis smiled. "But you can go into a hotel one evening with cut hair and leave the next evening with uncut hair and no one would know the difference. I must always be careful to remember how I wore it the previous night. It's a nuisance. I don't know why I didn't cut it right away." He started towards the house, pausing to look back at me. "Are you coming? I think we have a conversation to continue."