Chapter 8
People are Stupid about Vampires
Abigail Corelli was a compact, slightly muscled one hundred-forty nine centimeters tall. She had light olive skin with dark brown eyes with the depth and color of a mug of blackberry tea. Currently, one neatly arched auburn eyebrow was raised, and her matching dark red-brown hair was pulled back from her face in a neat dangling french braid. She folded her arms over the light material of her pine green sundress and scowled, looking around with burgundy lips pursed in impatience.
The house elf who had let her in had disappeared several minutes ago, leaving Abby alone in the Malfoy Manor foyer. She looked up, examining the room critically. It had a high, domed roof, plated in a shiny silver coating, white marble floors that extended up both stairways on either side of the closed oak double doors through which the house elf had vanished. The banisters were marble as well, carved in the intricate design of what appeared to be spiderwebs.
Overall, the room gave off a distinct air of class and malice, a curious combination that somehow suited the former mansion of Lucius Malfoy. Abby wrinkled her nose and tossed her hair slightly, shifting her eyes to the shimmering curtain of magical energy that she could clearly see blocking the front entranceway, as well as the first floor windows. She had sensed the wards the moment she entered, layered to keep out at least two or three specific people in addition to the additional general wards to keep out those who wished to do harm. Interesting, she noted to herself. They have enemies.
At least they had wards, she thought. It certainly helped to ease her job knowing that a vampire couldn't simply slip through the front door in order to gain entrance to the house.
She rolled her eyes. Her last clients had been dense enough to whimper out some urban legend about Vampires only being allowed into a household when they were invited. Silly, she thought, snorting slightly to herself as she remembered, to imagine a vampire asking to borrow a cup of sugar in order to get in. The truth was, it was a muggle myth that all of the idiot wizarding families clutched on to like a protective talisman that was, in reality, only a useless joke shop trinket. She sighed, folding her arms. People were stupid about vampires.
"Miss Corelli?" The squeaky voice alerted Abby to the house elf's presence.
"Yes?" she turned and paced the steps over to the elf.
"They are ready to see you now, Miss," it informed her, turning to lead the way.
Abby nodded, supressing the urge to be irritated that she wasn't met personally, and followed the house elf through the double doors and into the atrium beyond.
The atrium was a massive structure of glass and red sandstone, permeated with blazing hearths and framed by fountains and streams of water. IT was a striking and impressive room that seemed to be significantly newer than the rest of the house. She stood in a gallery of red sandstone columns supporting a similar roof, grottolike. She paused for a moment to look out at the room before her.
To her left was a sweeping stairway the led up to what appeared to be a loft-like overlook, and to her right was an elevated platform that supported a grand piano and various chairs for performing. In front of her were her clients. There were three of them, two men and a woman, all watching her with interest. One of the men was standing up, tall and pale with white-blonde hair. He was gripping a crystal goblet of white wine and watching her with icy blue eyes. The second man she immediately recognized as Harry Potter. He looked wary, bright green eyes flickering between Abby and the woman. He was sitting next to her, and as she turned her eyes to the seated woman, she remembered her as Potter's cousin. She was also, quite obviously, the victim of the vampire attack. Tall and pale, her round cheeks were tinged a light pink. She was wearing a creamy silk dressing gown and housecoat, pink slippers, and a platinum ring on her left hand, visible from here It was either a wedding band or an engagement ring, she didn't know which. A quick glance confirmed the tall blonde as her fiancée and not her husband.
She was sitting tall, with one ankle crossed underneath the other, watching Abby with glowing green eyes that reminded Abby eerily of gold coins deposited in a bed of moss. Her hair was swept back, and Abby immediately confirmed the slowly-vanishing pin pricks on her neck.
Abby assembled all this information and started forwards. "I'm Abigail Corelli. I was told you are in need of my services?"
The pale blonde spoke up. "Yes. We need you to kill a vampire for us."
Abby lifted an eyebrow and fixed him with a somber stare. "First of all," she said, "I don't kill vampires. Not unless I can help it. Second of all," she stepped closer to him, "I don't believe you've introduced yourself yet."
"I should think it was obvious," he said, gesturing around. "I'm Draco Malfoy." Abby noted Harry Potter's reaction at this show of arrogance, and therefore disregarded it as harmless and an unintentional by-product of being a jackass. "Why don't you kill vampires," he was asking now, "I thought you were a vampire hunter."
Abby sighed in frustration. "I am a vampire hunter," she said, "but that doesn't mean I kill vampires." She fixed Draco with a look, daring him to comment. "Look, that isn't the point right now. I need to know everything you know about what has happened here in the past few days. When she got attacked. Where. How. And from that, I might just be able to help you figure out who, and stop him before you become the bridegroom of the undead."
Draco scowled at her, and Abby sighed. She didn't like him, but unfortunately she had a feeling that she'd be seeing a lot of him over the next few weeks. "That isn't going to happen," he said firmly.
"Well, I'm going to do everything in my power to make sure it doesn't." Abby folded her arms. "Now, are you going to let me sit down, or do I have to remain standing?"
***
"Absolutely not," Draco Malfoy refused a few moments later. "We are not putting her in danger again." He was now sitting on the couch next to Diana, one arm around her shoulders protectively. Diana looked tired, but alert, watching this conversation in silent interest. She had been quiet during the entire conversation, glancing from person to person with glittering green eyes.
Harry agreed, nodding his head. "Isn't there some other way?" He was on Diana's other side, sitting on the edge of his seat and watching Abby with wariness. "I mean, that's a bit dangerous, isn't it?"
Abby sighed. "Look, first of all, the vampire won't come back unless Diana's in the house. Secondly, as long as she's not in sight, he's going to be wary."
"He?" Harry cut in, "how do you know it's a she?"
There was a moment in which Abby stared at Harry and Harry stared right back, apparently confused. "I mean, you can't *know* can you?"
"Well, no," Abby conceded, looking irritated. She folded her arms and leaned against the back of the armchair she was seated on, one leg folded neatly over the other. "I don't know that the vampire is a male. She gave him another annoyed glance. "May I continue?" Harry looked slightly rattled by this, and nodded. She nodded curtly. "Good. Now, as I was saying, as long as he hasn't lured her out into the open, he'll be wary of an attack, but as soon as he sees her, blood will be on his mind. He'll be vulnerable to attack, and that's when I strike."
"I?" Draco interrupted, leaning forwards. "You can do it by yourself?"
Abby was instantly incensed. "I work alone, Mr. Malfoy," she hissed. "I always have, and it works for me. I have never failed to subdue my vampire." She gave him a cold, quite angry look. Out of the corner of her eye, Abby registered Diana wincing in sympathy for Draco.
"That isn't what I meant," Draco said quickly, holding up his hands in front of him as though to ward off a punch. "Honestly, I just was wondering what I was supposed to be doing. I mean, I can't exactly just sit in bed knowing that Diana's about to be attacked, can I?" He looked at Abby, a bit plaintively, with his blue eyes sparkling in the light that was filtering in through the windows in the atrium.
"You're going to have to." Abby gave her dark hair a little toss. "You can't go running after her, or we may never catch the vampire. The moment he sees you, he's gone." She folded her arms. "And that means that he'll come back, eventually. You don't want that, do you?"
Draco watched Abby for a moment. One dark eyebrow was arched, her eyes piercing. Obviously, she meant it. Beside him, Diana had moved to place a hand gently on his arm. The soft pressure was comforting, and he nodded. "Fine," he conceded. "I understand." Beside him, Diana smiled for just a moment, and then looked over at Abby, growing serious. "When are we planning on doing this?"
Ron had, once again, found himself to be dangerously close to inebriation. Three shot glasses, empty of the rum they had once contained, were stacked one atop the next, upside-down on the bar in front of him. A fourth was being rolled around between the fingers of Ron'' left hand. He stared blankly at the rough dark wood in front of him, dark brown eyes glassy and forlorn. He liked it this way, when he was feeling just drunk enough to blur the edges around his stagnant life and make it seem more profitable. "After all," he muttered, holding the small glass up for a refill, "I'm doing okay for myself." —he knocked back another shot, slamming the glass onto the table–"I've got a good, solid job, right? I mean, jeez, they need me!" he scratched his chin in a futile effort to rid himself of the itching of his five o'clock shadow. "I've got a nice flat. Sure, it's a bit small, but I do okay. It needs painting, yeah, but I can do that easy." The bartender, a large pale hulking mass of a man, was used to Ron's usual pattern of drunkenness, and scooped up the empty shot glasses.
"You had enough yet, Mr. Weasley?" Ron looked up at him, eyes practically sloshing in a bath of rum.
"Gimme another rum, Dan," he muttered. He looked up plaintively at Dan. He arched his eyebrows up, eyes widening at a sudden drunken realization.
"Oh, Bugger," Ron said, letting out a slight sigh and wobbling dangerously on his stool. "I think my life is shit."
As Ron keeled over unconscious onto the top of the bar, Dan turned with a tired sigh and drew a handful of floo powder from a ceramic pot on the hearth. "Mr. Potter?" he called, tossing the powder into the fire. "I believe you need to come and collect him again."