December 1069

Nothing really happened for the rest of the day. I napped, I wrote in my journal, I walked around to stretch my legs, I ate, I drank, and then I slept again when night fell. No one came to get me, and I didn't go to see anyone. Come morning, I skipped breakfast, packed my bag, grabbed my staff, and headed off for York Castle.

I spent a little time milling around at the base of the motte looking for Lucille, and only went up to the castle after I found her glancing out a window and made eye contact. Dealing with the gate guards was thankfully quick; it seemed like Robert had set one of his own to the task. Said guard took one glance at me and my staff before letting me into the courtyard and directing me towards a pair of saddled and packed horses before disappearing into the castle, presumably to get Robert.

I waited.

A few minutes later Robert came out, the guard that went in trailing after him, a large, bulging pouch in hand.

Lacking a voice, I had to settle for raising my eyebrows.

"Two horses, like you asked, both palfreys. Saddlebags have a mix of rations and two weeks worth of watered ale," he said. "Now, are you sure you wish to travel alone? I can spare a few guards."

I shook my head, and Robert grunted.

"As you wish. Here," he said, offering the pouch to me.

I took it in my right hand, and almost fumbled it because it was a lot heavier than it looked, a few pounds at least. When I pulled on the string and opened it, I found that the pouch was quite literally full of silver pennies.

I wasn't sure of the exact value of a few pounds sterling in me-modern day currency, but I was pretty sure this was the most money I'd ever had on hand at any point in my life.

"I'd offer more, but I didn't bring a war chest," Robert said.

I'm not sure exactly what expression my face was making at that moment, but I was sure "shocked" was a big part of it.

"Take it," he said. "You earned it."

I glanced between him and the pouch a few times, then slowly nodded. I pulled a few pennies out of the pouch, slid them into an outer pocket, and then rewound the string to close the pouch. Once it was nice and secure, I pulled back my duster and put the pouch in one of my inner pockets.

"We will need to speak when I return to Berkhamsted," Robert said.

I nodded.

"Hmm." He stepped back and waved to the horses. "Don't let me keep you."

I nodded again, got on the horse with some difficulty and complaining from my ribs, and then slowly started trotting through the city, pulling the second horse along by its reins. I wasn't feeling up to going fast right away, and in any case I needed to give Lucille some time to get out of the city ahead of me. So, it took me almost half an hour to wind my way around the city, cross the main bridge, get to the west gate, and exit York. I met up with Lucille a few minutes out of town, along the road, and once she mounted the spare horse we were off.

And on the second night of Christmas the vampire gave to me, a frustrating cover story.

You need to sing it, otherwise the reference doesn't land.

Lucille categorically refused to camp outside, and lacking a working set of vocal chords I was not well equipped to argue with her. Not that I particularly wanted to, I just couldn't to begin with. So I didn't put up that much of a fight when we rode an hour after proper nightfall to reach a hostel and set in for the night.

I really, really should've. I don't care to remember much of the details, but I think I can adequately summarize the entire frustrating experience with one line:

"Please, my dear uncle is old, hurt, and mute. Won't you take pity on us?"

Ugh. And the worst thing was that Lucille's ingenue act, while not good enough to fool me, was good enough to fool the innkeep and other travelers, so any negative response would've just been taken as me being a crotchety old bastard.

She was enjoying it, I could tell.

On the third and fourth nights of Christmas the vampire kept the cover story, though by the end of the fourth day my voice had recovered enough that I could faintly croak. It took another night and morning for it to actually start working again, so it was only on the fifth day that we had our first actual conversation.

We'd been following a winding set of roads south for a while now, and would probably keep doing that for another week, if not more. We'd ridden in relative silence the past few days, with me not being able to talk and Lucille not wanting to talk. But now I could actually respond, so.

"Can we talk about my father now?" she asked.

I sighed, shifted in my saddle, and said, "Alright."

"Why are you opposed to killing him?"

"Because I don't know anything about him?" I replied, wondering how that was even in question. "All I know is that you seem to view him as an existential threat to your wellbeing. That's nowhere near enough for me to go on. And if you're saying I should kill him just because he's a vampire involved in politics, I would really recommend you take a closer look at yourself and consider whether that's the argument you want to advance."

Lucille looked my way, and a few seconds later asked, "Why are you tolerant towards vampires? Because of a single example?"

I took a deep breath and considered her answer. Was it just because of Thomas? Well, sort of. I had been willing to accept and stomach an alliance of convenience with Lara where I hadn't with Bianca because of Thomas, in part. Because Lara was Thomas' sister and killing Lara, and thus killing Lord Raith, would have made things so much worse. But also, Lara had just been a lot more reasonable than Bianca. I mean, sure, both Lara and Bianca had tried to kill me shortly after meeting me, but after the misunderstanding had been cleared up Lara hadn't kept a grudge. Bianca had.

A grudge that had started a war.

But then again, Lara was also a much bigger threat than Bianca. Bianca had power, but only in Chicago. Maybe she could've grown to be a genuine major player, but Lara was already big. She was Lord Raith's right hand, and had no qualms about getting people killed to further her plans.

I guess it came back to a mixture of experience and Thomas.

"I wouldn't say I'm really tolerant," I said. "Just not intolerant. I don't judge people just for being a vampire. Vampires never really have a choice in becoming one." In the White Court's case, anyway. Probably in the Black Court's as well, though they're not around now. Less so in the Red Court's case. "I judge people for who they are. If they're assholes that hurt people, I don't like them. I oppose them. But… there are lines, I suppose. If I proactively killed every bad man and woman involved in politics, I'd have to remove a large chunk of the nobility. That would prompt chaos and wars and death and leave plenty of room for predators to thrive. And that's talking about people that couldn't really retaliate against me, not properly. Vampires are a different subject." I sucked in my cheek and sighed. "I'm willing to accept that your father is an asshole. Is he enough of one for me to go out and kill him?" I shrugged. "I don't know. Now, let me ask you a few questions."

"Very well," she said.

"Is this about safety, or about revenge?" I asked. "The way I hear it, you've been part of Robert's court for years. Has your father come after you in that time, made any requests?"

"No," she said grudgingly. "But only because I suspect he thinks he can use me and my connections."

"Suspect, thinks," I said. "I'm not saying it's not possible, but it could be unreasonable. Let me give you some food for thought: your father probably went through the same experience you did."

Lucille turned and gave a scathing, practically contemptuous glare.

"See, that's the problem with your whole Court," I went on. "Or, well, I guess I shouldn't speak for the Skavis or Malvora. I'm sure they have their own horrific initiation rituals, but I don't know the details there. But in the case of the Raiths, there's this continual cycle of abuse probably stretching up all the way to the first generation. Kid kills their first lover, parent comforts them and says it just had to happen, it's actually good for you, yadda yadda yadda. Kid grows up believing that's right, because they have to, because it means they're not at fault and their parent isn't at fault, and when they become a parent they do the same thing to their children. And on and on and on the wheel of horrific parental abuse turns."

"And you have a solution, I'm sure," Lucille snarled.

I shifted so that I could slightly lean in her direction. "Have you ever considered why the first feeding is lethal?"

Lucille frowned.

"Two reasons, the way I see it. A lack of knowledge leads to a lack of restraint. And the Hunger, when not held back, is strong enough to just tear apart a human. Could be that if you were actually told what you were, made aware of the Hunger, you could actually learn some restraint. I'm sure you've thought of something like that, maybe asked that of your father."

Lucille scowled and looked away. "What is your point?"

"My point is that what your father… allowed to happen, if not outright encouraged, is horrific. And sure, if you want to kill him for that, that's your right. But it…" I sighed in frustration. "It's hard to put this into words. It doesn't make him so bad that I should risk starting a war by killing him. Especially because it's not going to be a nice, easy war. I know the way the White Court work. They're not going to come at me or the Council directly. They'll swarm us with thralls, stir up religious and political tensions and superstitions, spur on witch hunts. They'll go after the smaller practitioners, enthrall or kill them, and if they can they'll try and enthrall wizards. It won't be a conventional war, not on either side."

"So you'll pile up a mountain of corpses for your daughter, but the rest of us just don't matter."

I brought my horse to a halt.

"Lucille," I said, my voice way too calm. "If you ever try to use the memory of my daughter again, we are through. Do you understand me?"

Lucille looked over her shoulder at me, peering first at my face and then glancing down to see me almost strangling the reins. "Perfectly."

I took one deep breath, two, three, and then nudged my horse back into motion. "Here's what I'll offer. If your father comes after you, or tries to do anything to you, I'm willing to stand in the way. If that escalates into a conflict between us or even a war, fine, I'll live with it. But if you want my protection, there are terms. Otherwise find some other patsy."

Lucille didn't respond to that, and I didn't feel like saying any more. We rode in silence for about an hour when Lucille turned to look at me.

"Two reasons," she said.

"Hmm?"

"You said there were two reasons the first feeding was lethal. The first reason you mentioned was a suspicion. What is the second?"

"Oh," I said. "The Hunger, when it wakes up, doesn't feed until it kills, it feeds until it's sated. And humans just don't have that much life force, relatively speaking, so the Hunger takes it all. But there are people and species out there that have enough life force to survive that first feeding. I once ran into a couple like that, actually."

Lucille shifted in her saddle to properly face me. "What do you mean?"

"Well, there was a girl, a vampire whose Hunger hadn't woken up, and a boy, a scion, the son of a woman and a…" I had no clue if the Forest People were an intercontinental group or limited to the Americas, so I hedged. "And a spiritually powerful being. One with enough power to make me look like a child playing with sticks next to a professional soldier. Anyway. Their son had inherited that power, that life force. So when the first feeding came and went, I guess he exhausted her or something. I don't know, I don't really want to dwell on the details."

"And what happened then?" she asked.

"Way I understand it, neither of them even realized what happened. So they stayed together, presumably continued having sex. Then the girl's father came along, tried to get her to kill the boy because 'that's the way things are done'," I said, affecting Barrowill's tone and drawl for a moment. "I took exception to that. Not effectively, but I did. Then the boy's father came along. He took exception much more effectively." I rolled my shoulders to work out a kink. "Last I heard, he took his son and the girl to keep her safe from her father, and that's all I know. Whether that relationship worked out or not…" I shrugged.

"Hmph. And how many scions of spiritually powerful beings are there running amok?" Lucille asked.

"Not many," I admitted. "But the point is the amount of life force, not the specifics of how someone ended up with that amount. There are plenty of beings with enough power that could handle a vampire's first feeding. Not for free, and probably not cheaply either, but if it's between that and horribly traumatizing your children… I don't know, seems like an easy choice to me."

"Could you provide an actual example?"

I thought about it for a moment, then nodded. "Svartalves. They love beauty and sex is transactional to them. Probably wouldn't even have to pay them that much, honestly. I imagine that much like humans, there are some svartalves that get off on, uh… initiating virgins."

"Svartalves?" Lucille asked.

"The best magical craftsmen on earth, and debatably anywhere. They live in underground fortresses around Denmark. Strong, not kind at all, but they stick to their word like a faerie and don't deal in as much wordplay. And very, very transactional about sex. A literal goddess had her necklace stolen and sold to the svartalves, and when she went to get it back, their price was to have sex with all of them."

Lucille furrowed her brow. "And she agreed?"

"Must've been a really nice necklace," I said.

Lucille's brow furrowed further. "So they deal in beauty and sex," she said slowly.

I gave her a look. "Yeah," I said.

"Hmm. Interesting."

Author's Note: At a rough estimate, Harry just got handed over twenty grand American.