Chapter 2

"He's awful!" Sarah said passionately. "He's rude, obnoxious and acts like he's doing us the favour by being here!"

"His highness Prince Kierlan!" Susie giggled and Sarah collapsed in laughter, rolling over in her duvet. They were acting like two girls at a sleepover, even though they had lived in Susie's house for three good years.

There was a rap on the floor as Rita tapped the ceiling of the room below warningly with an extra long piece of firewood. "I chopped that log!" Susie yelled back and Sarah looked at her friend, bemused and only very slightly jealous. What must it be like, she thought, fascinated, to just know things, even though none of your own five senses are telling you it?

Susie shrugged slightly, then winced. "Sorry."

Sarah hid a smile. "Keep out of my head, Suze."

Susie shrugged again. "You're loud, Sarah. Part of what's good about you."

"What else would be good?" Sarah wondered aloud. "To hit Kierlan over the head!"

Susie burst out laughing. "What's got you hating him so much?"

Immediately, Sarah shoved thoughts of Kierlan out of her head, suddenly realising that she absolutely didn't want Susie to know what Kierlan had been saying about her. Susie's feelings were just as human as her own. "Oh, never mind," she said lightly, pummelling her pillow gently. "Let's just get some sleep."

Susie happily obeyed. Her voice was muffled, half by a yawn, and half by her own pillow, as she spoke again. "Blade'll be off guard duty soon. No worries."

"Not worried," Sarah said lightly, surprised at herself. She hadn't even thought of Blade in the last few minutes. For that, she felt slightly guilty. Oh, come on, she told herself sternly. It's not like he expects you to think of him twenty four seven! She smiled ruefully, her eyelids slowly falling shut, releasing her to good dreams, as Susie sleepily murmured her night's prayers, gazing dazedly at the window, at the ripe white moon that graced the sky.

A dark shape loomed up in front of the beautiful full moon. "How is she?" he asked quietly, climbing in the window.

Susie swallowed her yawn. "She doesn't like our new houseguest," she said, in wry amusement.

"New houseguest?" Blade asked enquiringly, his sharp eyes interested. "I was in the woods, so I didn't see. But I heard the car. What's this new guest like?"

"Drives Sarah insane," Susie smiled slightly, knowing Blade had been on guard duty all day. "Sit down, handsome."

Blade was used to Susie's good-natured flirting, and he obeyed, sitting down at the edge of the bed Sarah had hastily made for herself. "Why's Sarah sleeping in here, and not her own room?" he queried.

Susie shrugged. "Bad dreams, maybe. I don't know."

He sighed, his amber eyes troubled. "You haven't answered my question. Who's the new houseguest? Why is she upsetting Sarah?"

"She?" Susie asked slyly. "I never said she. It's a he. Kierlan Harman."

Blade frowned slightly. "Oh. Bother."

"Oh, don't worry," Susie said impatiently, flapping her hand dismissively. "He's too arrogant for Sarah's taste. An absolute big-head, according to her."

A slight smile formed on Blade's face. "That's okay, then."

Then, for a moment, he was silent, musing. "A Harman," he said eventually. "So do the rest of your family think he might be in danger?"

That was one of the things she liked about him. He took care to point out that she was descended from the Harmans, knowing she liked a bit of the prestige due to any descendant of the Harmans. Otherwise, she'd never have said what she said next.

"His mind's very wary," she admitted finally, swallowing a slight shiver. In fact, when she'd first caught a glimpse of Kierlan Harman, she'd felt briefly as though she was wrapped in hot wire: he was so tense and on edge! "He certainly feels like he expects to be hit around the back of the head any second. And…he's not afraid of it. More like, his fear's turned into anger. And I don't know how he'll express that anger. He makes me nervous, Blade." She met his eyes. "And I want to know why he's been sent here. Sarah's here, after all. She's only human. I mean, I can defend myself, but she…"

"I'll keep an eye on her," Blade promised with a gentle smile, his eyes worried, glinting amber in the darkness.

"Thank you," Susie whispered, relieved, as he left by the door this time, making his way silently down the hall, down the stairs. He'd seen the car was still parked outside the house, so that meant there must be another guest this night.

"And you couldn't have sent him somewhere else?" Rita said, losing her temper, flicking aside an untidy copper ringlet of her hair through which silver threads ran, a sign of her dedicated hard work for Circle Daybreak and her family.

"There was someone trying to track us," the dead gentleman explained coldly. "This was the nearest safe house with the right protections to baffle them. So sue me, I was irrational."

To Blade, the dead man sounded like he'd never been irrational in his whole life, not even when he must have once woken up to find himself inside a coffin.

"But we have a human here!" Rita said, distressed. "Kierlan's barely in control of his power—"

"And how do you propose we train a Wild Power?" the vampire asked sardonically.

"Send him to the other Wild Powers!" Rita snapped. "I've taken care of Sarah and Susannah for too long for some moody, teenage, wild witch to come along and ruin it!"

"Then why do you keep her here?" the vampire asked smoothly. "Surely she has her own family that she could be sent to? Isn't the oath you swore to Daybreak more important than running a…guesthouse?"

"I know the importance of my oath!" Rita hissed, her misty grey eyes murky as storm clouds. "But Sarah's mother asked me to look after her when Sarah's father died! Sarah needed months of healing, to come to terms with her father's death! And now Sarah knows too much to go back to that...that hell hole! She doesn't deserve to go back to that filthy, squalid little rat warren!"

"Sounds like she'd come from a rough neighbourhood," the vampire said lightly and Blade gritted his teeth, biting his tongue and willing himself to stay silent. "Where, may I ask?"

"One of the slums of Chicago," Rita said witheringly. "I'm just glad I was only there for a week!"

"Well, that's perfect," the vampire said coolly. "I don't see any problem with having Kierlan and this…Sarah…here at the same time."

"Are you insane!" Rita yelled, then clapped her hand over her mouth, muffling plenty of her own curses. Fighting to calm her breathing, she dared to uncover her mouth, to speak again. "Goddess! Your logic is screwed up, ever since you crawled out of your coffin!" she told him witheringly.

He didn't bother to look insulted. "I'm merely not worried. It seems, by some twist of fate, your new charge, and your young human charge come from the same place. Maybe that means something? From a Chicago slum, to here. Coincidence or not?"

"It had better be coincidence," Rita hissed.

He smiled thinly. "It's more your line of work to determine if it's coincidence or not. Who knows? Perhaps she could sweeten Kierlan's temper, and make him want to help Circle Daybreak."

"You are a soulless monster," Rita said softly. "It is no wonder you have never found a Soulmate, Damoran."

He shrugged and made his way to the door. "I'll stay on hand, in case anything should happen, don't you worry."

"In case Kierlan should accidentally kill Sarah?" Rita snapped.

Damoran smiled icily. "Nothing he's done so far is accidental, Mrs Lewis."