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Had her nose changed? Phoebe got up and looked in the time-clouded ant curves of the Second E that turned the bed into a cozy enclosure, the elegant arh that you could curl your feet up underneath you when you were reading
A crease had reappeared in the bedspread
Phoebe frowned She had s it
Before she could co on the mattress Her hands pressed the fabric, over and over Every fiber of the sheets was palpable, and rough to her touch
“No wonder I can’t sleep They’re too coarse” Phoebe tore at the linens, intending to drag the proper, so that wouldn’t scratch her skin and keep her awake
Instead, she reduced the thele’s talons
“We’ve reached the terrible twos, I see” Freyja entered the rooh cheekbones as she surveyed the dae Phoebe had inflicted on the room
Phoebe had been warned about her second day, and how it seemed to mie, but she’d had no context for the warning, having never been a mother She could not rele one of her friends had children yet
“Are you nesting?” Françoise, whose once-miraculous omnipresence had become just another source of irritation, studied the mess Phoebe had made
“The sheets are scratchy I can’t sleep,” Phoebe said, unable to keep the petulance from her tone
“We have spoken about this, Phoebe dearest” Freyja’s voice was reasonable, corated on Phoebe’s raw nerves nonetheless “It will be months before you take your first nap A deep sleep is still years away”
“But I’ like a troublesome child
“No, you’re bored and hungry A draugr must be very precise about her eht up in fantasies of feeling Your blood is far too strong and restless to need sleep” Freyja noticed so in the , a tiny imperfection One of the panes was cracked Her attention zeroed in on the crazed glass “How did that happen?”
“A bird” Phoebe lowered her gaze There was a split in the floor—or was that the grain in the wood? She could follow the line forever
“This crack begins on the inside,” Freyja said, inspecting it more closely “I will ask you one more time, Phoebe: How did this happen?”
“I told you!” Phoebe said, defensive “A bird It was outside in the tree I wanted to get its attention, so I tapped on the glass I didn’tI just wanted it to look at me”
The bird would not stop singing At first Phoebe had found the song enchanting, her vampire ears attuned as they never had been to the trills and warbles As it went on—and on—however, she wanted to wring the bird’s neck
If she drank the blood of a bird, would she understand why they sang all the time?
Phoebe’s stoled
“I’otten what a pain in the ass children are” Miriam had arrived She put her hands on her slender hips and adopted her preferred stance: legs slightly separated, usually clad in soh-heeled and suede), and her elbows pushing into the surrounding space at sharp angles, daring sonificant
The rush of pride in herPhoebe Miria and powerful She ht be small and worthless now, but in time Phoebe would be a vampire to reckon with, too
Disappointhtened
“What is it?” Freyja asked, concerned “Is the light too bright? Françoise, close those drapes immediately”
“It’s not the sunshine It’s just I’ve grown only an inch” Phoebe had been ress every ten minutes or so on the frame of the door that led into the bathrooht hours Phoebe had scratched so ernail that the paint was ruined
“If height hat you were after, you should have had Freyja sire you,” Miria into the roolance she studied the lass was indeed cracked, and fixed dark eyes on her daughter “Well?”
There was nothe demand for an explanation in her maker’s tone
“I’m bored” Phoebe said it quietly, embarrassed by the puerile confession
“Excellent Well done” Freyja nodded approvingly “That is a tremendous achievement, Phoebe”
Miriam’s eyes narrowed
“And,” Phoebe continued, her voice increasingly plaintive, “hungry”
“This is why no one should be made a vampire until they are thirty,” Miriam told Freyja “Insufficient inner resources”
“You were twenty-five!” Phoebe said hotly, her defenses rising at the insult
“Back then, twenty-five was practically old age” Miria every tiure out how to fill your time”
“Do you play chess? Ean to rattle off the activities of a medieval Danish princess “Write poetry?”
“Cook?” Phoebe was bewildered at the prospect—and the ht made her e when she was human Now that she was a vampire it was out of the question
“It can be a very rewarding hobby I knew a va the soufflé She said it was very soothing,” Freyja replied “Veronique did have a human husband at the tih in the end they killed his that he died at fifty-three”
“Do you mean Marcus’s Veronique, orks in London?” Phoebe didn’t know that Freyja and Marcus’s former lover were acquainted
Marcus
The thought of hi
When Phoebe was a warmblood, Marcus’s touches had ile human limbs to liquid Now that she was a vampirePhoebe’s restless mind dwelt on the possibilities Her lips turned up into a slow, seductive smile
“Oh, dear,” Freyja said, a bit of alarm in her tone as she detected the direction that Phoebe’s wandering attention had taken “What about a ?”
“Noonly a vae “When Jason discovered the drum, it nearly drove his father and me around the bend”
Phoebe had not yet -dead mate
She began to thruers on the tabletop in anticipation Phoebe had never had a brother, only Stella Sisters were different—younger sisters, especially What ht she do with an older brother? Phoebe wondered
Miria and painful “No Dru”
Bored, hungry, and restless, held captive by Freyja and Miriam—hoas Phoebe supposed to endure it? She wanted to run outside and breathe fresh air
Phoebe wanted to chase soround and then—
“I want to hunt” Phoebe was a for weeks before she beca the idea resolutely fro from a live human, and Phoebe wasn’t sure she was ready for that
Yet er nose changed? Phoebe got up and looked in the time-clouded ant curves of the Second E that turned the bed into a cozy enclosure, the elegant arh that you could curl your feet up underneath you when you were reading