I had no idea what had made me push him. I didn't know how strong or fast he was compared to me, and I certainly did not want to find out. I sent a quick prayer to the gods that his curiosity would overcome his rage, and spoke quickly.

"My kind has no name." He was on his feet and close to me again by the time the sentence had left my mouth, his hands on either side of my head and his face inches from mine. The vampire speed was definitely something I was not used to. I could feel the rage pouring off of him in waves, but it lessened some as my words sunk in.

"'Your kind'? How many of you are there? And what are you?" His voice lowered to a growl that dove straight from my ears to somewhere much, much lower. Vampires and I seemed to have that in common. Danger, death, blood, fighting- they were all somehow very closely tied in to sex. I did my best to ignore the fact that a very pissed off sex god of a 1,000 year old vampire satisfied every single one of triggers.

"Like I said, we have no name for what we are- and we're not even remotely the same. Our powers can differ from seeing ghosts to reading minds to this." I punctuated my point by showing my teeth again and running a sharpened fingernail along the under side of his arm. He gave no outward reaction but I could feel some of his left over rage transferring into lust- for my body and my blood. Shit. I don't know how far into my explanation I was going to get if he kept that up.

"There are no more than a couple hundred of us living right now- I don't know how many there are altogether," I admitted. "We run in units of five or six, usually, and don't often make contact with one another outside those units."

"I see. What else can you do?" he asked, becoming increasingly less hostile as we spoke. I considered for a moment, and then decided I wanted to be honest with him. I had no idea why, but I did.

"Well, besides the obvious, I can read emotions- in short, I'm an actual empath. So this whole desiring my blood and my body this has got to stop, because I crave sex and blood enough on my own time without you making it worse." I felt immediate shock followed by amusement, but if anything, the lust got worse. Great. "I also have heightened senses- not quite like yours, but almost the same. On top of the regular senses I can also sense energy. And I'm immune to just about any kind of mental or psychic attack, hence the reason I'm not glamoured right now. I think that's just about it. Any other questions?"

At that, he looked away from me, as if struggling with something; and the lust did begin to fade. His sudden mood change surprised me, and I waited for him to explain.

"What did I see?" he asked, his voice soft and low. He looked back at me, his face finally showing some of the turmoil I knew he was feeling. "What did your blood show me?"

I felt my teeth and claws begin to retract as his mood and his question sobered me.

"You saw my memories," I explained, my voice softening to match his. "You saw flashes of everything I've been through." Disbelief washed over me as he straightened, the resentment beginning to return.

"Do not lie to me. I saw things that had happened long before I was born. What did I see?" he demanded, glaring down at me from his full height. I buried my own animosity that had risen to meet his, and answered as calmly as I could.

"I am not lying. The power that I have comes from my soul- a soul that has been reincarnated since the beginning of civilization. My body may be young, but in years lived, I am almost eight times your age, Viking. When the gods made my kind, they broke the mold. No more of us can be created- so we must be sent back. Always," I said, my chin lifting defiantly. It was a fate that I had long ago accepted and learned to enjoy- much more so than any of the others in my unit. I saw our version of immortality as a blessing- no matter that an entire religion saw it as a curse.

The hostility was gone again, and the dominating emotion I felt from him was something akin to awe accented by confusion- better than rage, at least. He was looking at me again, in a way that made me feel like he was trying to look through me- it was all I could do not to squirm from the intensity. I had to break his gaze and the silence- it wasn't awkward, but it was heavy, as if waiting for something to happen.

"Now that you're done being angry, would you like to sit down and have a drink?" I asked, half way surprised at the words coming out of my mouth. Here I was, inviting an actual vampire to sit down and have a drink... uh oh. I realized what he must be thinking as I felt the wave of lust, and his gaze immediately switched from trying to see through me to trying to see through my clothes. I rolled my eyes, exasperated.

"Not a drink from me! I have real blood in the house," I explained. He quirked his eyebrow at me again, half amused and half excited.

"You drink blood?" he asked me. "Or do you often entertain hungry vampires at your house?" I laughed, pleased that he was relaxing enough to joke.

"Actually, I do drink blood. I'm just not on such a strict diet as you all are. So I get to enjoy blood AND chocolate." I grinned up at him before I moved away from the wall, our bodies brushing together as I walked towards the door. "Do you have a preference?" I looked back at him, my hand on the door knob. He shook his head.

"Not particularly. I'm sure you know as well as I do that unless they contain something... more, the blood types don't differ in taste enough to matter," he said, sinking gracefully into one of my deck chairs. "So- surprise me." I turned to back to the door and walked inside, a little relieved that he was not trying to follow. As intrigued as I was by him, I was not about to invite him in. Not just yet, anyway.