In the Company of Vampires

Page 11

“It was a ewe,” Isleif said, just as if that made it all right. “It wasn’t a ram.”
“Does that make any difference?” I asked.
“It would to the ram,” Eirik said sagely.
The others nodded.
“I never thought I’d have to say this, but bestiality has officially been added to the list of things we don’t discuss, okay?”
“If you wish,” Eirik said and shrugged. “Although Isleif has many amusing tales about—”
“I don’t want to hear them!” I said loudly.
To my annoyance, he patted me on the shoulder as if I was upset about nothing. “You rest for a bit, virgin goddess. When you need us, we will be here.”
“Well, I can try, but I suspect there are going to be a few mental images I’ll have a hard time getting rid of,” I muttered as the Vikings left.
The silence that followed their departure was almost overpowering. I looked around the trailer, desperate for something to do, noting absently that Mom had a new coffeemaker, and a laptop. Davide, her fat black and white cat, wasn’t there, but I didn’t expect him to be if she had gone away for the weekend. Likely one of the Faire people had taken over cat-watching duty while she was gone. I made a mental note to find out who, and retrieve him.
“He might hate me, but at least he’ll be some company for my bleak, unbearable life,” I said, my voice echoing slightly in the trailer. It was the sound of it that brought me to my knees in a ball of abject misery, the horrible reality of the situation piercing me to my very soul. For the first time in a year, I admitted that I had made the biggest mistake of my life. The fact that Ben and everyone else expected me to just accept what fate had thrown at us still rankled, but it had been my choice, and no other’s, to end the relationship.
And now that I realized just what I’d lost, it was too late.
I cried out the tale of my broken heart to no one, and when I was done, I lay hiccupping on the floor, wondering what I was going to do with the shattered remains of my life.
“Go on without him,” I said in a voice that was as empty as my heart.
Chapter 6
It took me a bit to gather myself and get cleaned up so no one would know I had indulged in a major fit of crying, but an hour after we arrived at the Faire, I walked slowly down the steps of the trailer inhabited by Peter Sauber and his son, Soren, the latter of whom was attending the University of Marburg. “It’s just not like her to do this,” I reiterated to Peter as he accompanied me. “It has to mean that Loki has her. Especially after the attempt to kidnap me back home. Loki clearly went after Mom when he couldn’t get me.”
Peter rubbed his face, leaving me with a momentary guilty twinge about having woken him up. Peter was the main act magician, in addition to being co-owner of the Faire with his sister, Absinthe. Most of his act was big, flashy illusions, like turning his horse Bruno into a member of the audience, but every now and again he indulged himself in an act of real magic, the kind that left you with goose bumps. “It is possible, although why would he do that?”
“Revenge against me, I suppose.”
Peter made a tch noise in the back of his throat. “If he wanted that, he would have done so years ago.”
I frowned, thinking about that. I had to agree that Loki had had many opportunities to strike at me, as he had promised. Why would he take Mom now and not earlier? “I’m not sure what to say, Peter. If Loki didn’t take her, then where is she?”
He shrugged. “That I do not know. She was seeing that Frenchman, so perhaps she went away with him instead of going to Heidelberg.”
“What Frenchman?”
“The one she met in Brussels. He sells some sort of farm equipment. Did she not tell you about him?”
“Not a peep.” Once, back when I assumed my future was secure with Ben, I had hoped that she’d find someone with whom she could share her life. Now the thought just made me feel ostracized, as if everyone had paired up but me. “Do you know his name?”
Peter gave me the little information he knew about the man, which I wrote down in a little notebook. “I guess I could talk to the police about this guy, just in case he, and not Loki, has abducted her.”
“Will that not be very extreme?” he asked, worry filling his eyes. “What if she has gone away for a romantic weekend?”
“A romantic weekend is one thing, but five days without telling anyone?” I shook my head. “Not at all like my mom.”
“Perhaps she left some note or sign of where she’s gone?” he suggested.
I stared at him for a second. “You know, that’s not a bad thought. Let’s both of us go have a look around her trailer.”
“Both of us?” He looked sleepy, but came along when I tugged him toward the trailer. “I don’t know what I can do to help.”
“You dated Mom for a bit, didn’t you?”
He looked a bit abashed. “Just for a few months. We . . . it wasn’t meant to be.”
“That’s okay, Peter,” I said, laughing at his expression. “I don’t mind that you guys were dating. I’m sad it didn’t work out, but you don’t have to be uncomfortable with me on that account. Now, where to start?”
We had entered the trailer and stood looking around it. “Bedroom?” Peter suggested.
“Good idea.” We both toddled back to it, making a quick search of the dresser pressed against one wall. There was just clothing in it, no big note saying where she’d gone, or even a love note from an admirer. More reassuringly, there were no signs of a struggle, so if Loki did take her, she hadn’t fought him.
I sat on the bed and thought for a few minutes. Peter went out into the living area and poked around in the drawers and cupboards out there, but I knew they wouldn’t have anything important. I mulled over where I would leave any references to a weekend trip, and after another few minutes’ thought, reached under the bed and pulled out a small metal box with a combination lock.
“What is that?” Peter asked as he returned to the bedroom. “I found nothing out there. Not even a note-pad.”
“I’m not surprised. This is mom’s lockbox. She keeps things in it like her passport. I can’t imagine why she’d put anything in here about her weekend trip, but it can’t hurt to look.” I spun the dial to register my birth date, my mother’s standard password, and sorted through the contents. As I suspected, it contained a few legal documents, a picture of the two of us together when I was about eight, her passport and various stamped visas, a credit card, three necklaces in silk bags, and a couple of stiff pieces of yellow paper.
“Well, that was no help,” I said as I replaced everything, absently unfolding the paper.
“What are those?” Peter asked.
“Nothing. Just birth certificates. Mom’s. Mine.” I tossed the first two aside and glanced at the other one. “This must be a copy of mine that she got when she thought she lost the original. Well, this has been a lesson in frustration. . . .” I stopped and looked back at the last paper. Something about it had registered on my brain as being not quite right.
“This isn’t my birth certificate.” I frowned at it as I read the name of the child. “Petra Valentine de Marco. Who on earth is that?”
“A friend of your mother’s?” Peter asked, looking in the tiny wardrobe that held Mom’s dresses.
“Why would she have someone else’s birth . . . green grass and salamanders!” I raised my gaze to Peter. “My mom’s name is on this.”
“It is?” He sat next to me and looked as I handed it to him.
“Right there. Where it says mother’s name.” I pointed. “That’s her name. Miranda Benson.”
“Is it your birth certificate? With a different name? Sometimes parents change the names of their babies. Perhaps this was your original name and they changed it.”
“Alphonse de Marco. That’s not my father’s name.” Chills ran down my arms as I realized what it was I was seeing. The birth date of the baby was almost ten years earlier than mine. “Goddess above! My mom had a baby before me. I have a sister.”
Peter looked suitably shocked. “I don’t believe I’ve ever heard her mention another daughter.”
I studied the birth certificate. “She was only sixteen when she had this baby. And it doesn’t say they were married. Stars and stripes forever. I’m just . . . I don’t know what I am. Flabbergasted, I guess. I never had the slightest idea I wasn’t her only child. Why didn’t she tell me?”
He took the birth certificate from me and tucked it away in the box with the other two. “I think, perhaps, this has nothing to do with your mother’s weekend in Heidelberg.”
“Even if she was sixteen, and it doesn’t look like she was married to this guy, did she think I’d judge her for that? I have a half sister out there who I didn’t even know existed.” The idea was so strange, I had a hard time processing it. I won’t deny there wasn’t a bit of hurt with the realization that my mother kept something so important from me, but I was more confused than anything else.
“Fran.”
“Hmm?” I realized what he said. “Oh. Yeah, you’re right. This is something I’ll have to talk to her about once I find her. It’s just . . . I never knew. I don’t understand why she would hide this from me. And speaking of that, just where is this Petra person?”
“Perhaps she did not survive?” Peter said, his expression sympathetic as he patted my arm. “I think we’ve pried enough. You will talk to your mother about this later, yes?”
“She must have been ashamed, but . . .” I couldn’t imagine my mother being ashamed of having a baby, even an illegitimate one. “Yeah, I guess it’s not really of vital importance right now. I’ll have to visit the police, though, since there was nothing in the trailer to show us where she’s gone. I’ll drop in on them and see what they have to say.”