When I came back the next time, Lucy bit me.

I was moving the lid off her coffin. It had only moved about two and a half inches or so when a pale face jammed itself against the gap and long, white teeth buried themselves to the gums in the base of my left hand. The crypt she was in shivered- I could hear her writhing around in there, trying to force herself upward through the crack. She was quite literally bouncing off the walls.

I yanked my hand free. There was a heavy rip, which bled and throbbed some. If it had been inflicted under other (ie: "normal") circumstances, it would have healed immediately, but vampire bites are notoriously slow to heal. It wouldn't fix itself for a few days, max.

I banged on the lid with my good hand, hard, and barked, "Stop moving!" All motion inside ceased without pause- scowling, a pushed the lid the rest of the way off.

Lucy sat up. Her eyes were duller in color, almost brown, but they glowed with fever. "You didn't have to yell."

I gestured with my left hand. Blood dripped onto the grass. Lucy eyed it. "Actually, I did. If you're hungry, dear, I wouldn't suggest biting me. I'm not terribly satisfying . . . like that."

If she understood that last comment, she didn't show it. "You bit me."

I took her chin in one hand and held her face steady. Lucy's spine curved and her eyes flicked down, a misbehaving child. "I am the master here, and you, Lucy, are the Fledgling. I will ask you not to forget that- if you decide your decisions carry more weight than mine, you will end up getting hurt. Keep that in mind."

I let go of her jaw. Lucy straightened up, brushed hair out of her eyes, and climbed out of her casket and onto her feet. She moved gingerly.

"What are we doing tonight?" she asked in her still-gently-treading voice.

"What do you want to do?" I already knew the answer.

"Eat," she blurted.

"No more moral dilemmas?"

"I'm too hungry for that."

"Wonderful. In that case, come along."

Our walk to the massive stone wall was a silent, heavy one. She kept her mouth closed around questions she was burning to ask, I think, but I didn't bring them up. We had eternity ahead of us.

"Have you got a hair pin?" she asked when we got to the stone barrier and its heavy, iron gate, which sported a padlock easily the size of my fist.

"Yes, dear, I always carry a hair pins around." I blew a piece of hair that had escaped my habitual ponytail out of my face. "Can't you tell?"

Lucy half-laughed, half-scowled. "Well, if you haven't got something to pick the lock with, how are we going to get out?"

I frowned at her and waited for something to prove she was kidding or lying or anything but being serious. Lucy looked back, wide-eyed and innocent and confused. Her blonde eyebrows were raised.

"You're not serious, are you?" I asked eventually.

"Of course I am. How- are- we- to- get- out?"

"We could do one of two things- climb or break the padlock. Since breaking the lock is likely to cause some suspicion and curiosity, I think we ought to climb out." She had a distasteful look on her face. "Are you opposed to climbing?"

"I'm in a dress."

Big whoop. "And I'm in a coat. So?"

"So I can't climb."

"You can move, can't you?" Katherina's dress was much more revealing, and she could do plenty. I stuck my foot into a chink in the wall and scaled to the top, which was perhaps a foot wide, in a matter of seconds. "See? Easy. You try."

She eyed the wall hesitantly and pulled herself upward slowly. I sighed in annoyance.

"We haven't got all night."

"I'm working on it!"

I held out a hand and hoisted her to the top of the stone wall. Lucy started to relax; I swung her over the other side and let go. She made a noise the likes of which I have never heard (kind of a yelp mixed with a shriek mixed with a warble, together making an "EeeYAHHeeeee" type noise) before landing, perfectly on her feet. I hopped down beside her.

"What did you drop me for?" Lucy demanded.

"It's not like you were going to climb down." At least, not quickly.

"Well, you didn't have to."

"Hah! As if." I tugged on her sleeve. "Now. To dinner."

"How do we get dinner, exactly?"

I shrugged. "Carefully, Lucy. When you get older, you can start feeding on adults, but for now, think small."

"Children?"

"That's right."

"You eat children?"

"Lucy, one, I myself don't eat children, and two, do you really want to go down that road again?"

"Oh, right."

I took her hand and we went down the streets of London. The cobblestones were cool and damp, the sky dark and vaguely wet. A cloud of fog hung around the square, logical buildings in much the same way bricks don't.

"How pretty," Lucy sighed.

"Yes."

"You know, I've never been around here before. Isn't that awful? I've never even been to my own cemetery."

I laughed. "Well, when you're nineteen you can't go around visiting all the graveyards. The neighbors would think you suicidal."

"How scandalous."

"I breathe scandal."

"Nineteen," she said. "That reminds me."

"Of what?"

"How old are you? You said you were twenty-seven before, but that's certainly not true, is it? I mean, vampires are immortal, aren't they?"

"Good of you to remember." I closed one eye. "I don't remember my age. But I was born in 1306, and it's 1895 now, which means . . . 589 years old on June 6th."

Lucy gaped at me, shocked into silence.

"The worst part is I keep getting brochures from the AARP. They won't take me off their mailing list."

She kept staring at me with her mouth open.

"Lucy, you are making me extremely nervous."

Lucy shut her mouth with a snap and blinked rapidly. Looking positively awed, she asked, "Are you sure?"

"Fairly sure."

"Oh my god!"

"Yes," I agreed. "As you say, 'Oh my god.'"

"That's insane!"

"That's truth, dear. Harping on it is not going to change that fact, and we have more than one thing to do tonight."

"We do? What?"

I smiled. "We have to get dinner, of course, and then there's someone I'd like you to meet."

"Who?"

"They call him Renfield."