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The next morning a messenger arrived at our house informing me that I would be provided with a ride to my meeting with Theodore Locke.

Thus telling me that he had been entirely serious about our meeting, though I hadn't doubted that the previous night at all. I had gotten the impression during our short meeting the night before that Theodore Locke was a man who was well used to his 'suggestions' being taken as commands.

In response, I was very careful about preparing myself for this meeting.

I had put on a simple blouse, with a high lace collar and set a cameo brooch at my throat, as was the fashion in these times, then struggled into the rather confining skirt that social mores demanded of a woman in this era. It hugged my hips tightly, and widened only slightly before it reached my ankles. It was of course, violet silk so wasn't all that uncomfortable to wear. And contrasted quite nicely with the pristine white of my rather plain blouse, though that did nothing at all to discount the feminine charms it contained. Amusing. One can appear to be completely proper and still give hints of the wanton beneath the image.

My maid buttoned up my shoes, since with the required corset, bustle, and tight skirt doing it myself was pretty well out of the question. And such pretty little shoes they were. Leather dyed a violet that matched the skirt, with the delicate pointed toes and little heel that was in fashion, they also implied that even though feminine that I was a woman to take seriously. None of those ridiculous high heels that some women wore, just practical and still pretty.

Add a tight silk jacket that matched the skirt, and cute little hat with a veil that fell to just below my nose, a violet silk purse that was attached to my wrist with a bit of gold colored cord, and I was fit to meet royalty.

However, I knew that this meeting with Theodore Locke would be far more important than a meeting with simple royalty. Survival depended on it. Mine, Josephine's, and Wisteria's.

So of course I was going to look my best for that meeting.

Imagine my delight when the 'ride' turned out to be one of the new motorcars.

The thing was noisy, smelly, and to be honest, a good team of horses could have outpaced it.

But it was a motorcar! The first I'd ever ridden in.

Riding in a conveyance that had no horses pulling it was a thing that amazed and delighted me.

I spent the ride looking forward to see the horses that weren't there, and starting in shock at the bangs the vehicle made off and on. But the ride was the most fun I'd had in years, and I still recall it fondly.

I was almost giddy when the coachman — driver he was called when managing this belching, stinky monster — helped me down from the marvelous machine.

Many of my kind abhor the new, but I embraced it. Not only embraced, but gloried it it. That simple ride in a primitive automobile shaped me for a lot of things in the future. Since that day I have never feared new things, and most of the time enjoy them a great deal.

Ahh, what a grand ride that was.

“Did you enjoy your ride, Miss Du Lac?” Theodore Locke asked once I had been ushered into his private study.

“Very much, so.” I gave him a smile and took the seat he had gestured me to. “How do those wondrous machines move without being pulled?”

“They burn cleaning fluid, believe it or not.” He chuckled. “Gasoline it is called, but the mechanics of how that is done is well beyond me. I am happy that you found your transport enjoyable.”

“I have seen many things, experienced as many,” I smiled at him, “but I will be forever be fond of you for allowing me to have that one. It was exhilarating in a way that lacks description.”

“Yes it is.” He nodded with a boyish grin.

I knew I liked this man the first time I'd seen him, and now was even more sure of it.

“Sherry?” He watched me closely as he poured two drinks into delicately blown little goblets.

“Thank you.” I answered while accepting the drink he had offered, sniffing the bouquet, then taking a delicate sip. “This is very good.”

He noted that I really had swallowed some of his offering and gave me a slightly thin smile. “It is good to know that you can appear to be human.”

“I was human once.” I returned his regard with a direct look, and sighed. “I can even eat mortal food, if in small quantities. Have I passed your test?”

“That one.” He nodded and gave me a genuine smile. “I'll know more once we've had lunch, Miss du Lac.”

“My name is Carmilla.” I nodded at his ploy and gave him a smile I hoped was winning. “Please feel free to use it. You have shown me a hospitality that I've rarely seen when someone actually knows what I am.”

“Thus far, you have done nothing to warrant less, Miss DuLac.” He answered me while looking straight into my eyes. Once again I had the feeling that those eyes were reading my soul, if I even had one left. I hadn't really thought about that for over eighty years by then. “You told me last night that you and your 'sisters' are stuck here. How did that come about?”

“Truthfully.” I let out a sigh. “I haven't the slightest idea. Other than my 'older sister' managed to finally anger someone powerful enough to curse her, and us, then make that curse work.”

“I'll look into that, if you like.” He nodded, still watching me carefully.

“Anything you could find would be most appreciated, sir.” I answered quite honestly. “To tell the truth, being caught in one place, no matter the size, for who knows how long is a very daunting prospect for me.”

“I imagine it would be.” He said with a thin smile. “So if this 'curse' can't be broken, what are your intentions here in Ravencrest?”

“To blend in.” I answered simply. “To not draw undue attention to me or my sisters, to not upset the people in power here if that is possible, and foremost, to help the town prosper as much as it is within my ability to do so.”

“Why would you do that last one?”

“Oh, please.” I actually laughed. “Like you, I have no wish to be surrounded by poverty and misery in the place I live. Believe me, I've seen far too much of that already.”

“So I might be right in thinking that the sudden rather large endowment to our local college is something you would be responsible for?” He questioned, though it was clear it wasn't much of a question on his part.

“A good school would benefit the whole town.” I shrugged, acknowledging that without actually saying I had been responsible. “It would draw in business from the students, their families at times, and only enhance the reputation of the town as a whole.”

“And what if people around here would not wish for that kind of reputation, or a flood of students coming in every year?”

“Oh, come now, sir.” I gave him a direct look, again something that more or less took him by surprise given the way things were in those times. “The Academy is a very small school, and truthfully, I don't see it becoming a really large institution. Oh, I'm sure it will expand with time and proper guidance, but it will never come close to rivaling the universities in New York city, or the other large towns.”

“Quality rather than quantity.” He nodded thoughtfully then actually smiled. “I can see that well enough, but are you up to managing that kind of thing, given your nature?”

“You and yours deal with your own natures.” I shrugged, letting him know that I knew what he and his family were. “We would be poor residents if we couldn't maintain that same kind of restraint, would you not think?”

“True enough.” He gave a small nod then again let his eyes, those magnificent eyes, bore into me again. “But will your elder agree with the constraints that we are likely to work out regarding this?”

“My mother,” I let out an annoyed sigh, “got us into this mess and she will agree. Besides, I have been handling our 'family' business and negotiations with others for nearly a century, sir. Any agreement I make will be honored by the other two and any subsequent — children.”

“Yes, regarding that.”

Then came the real bargaining. I happily agreed to limiting our numbers, and to refrain from killing townsfolk or students unless absolutely necessary.

At his skeptical look I laughed again and shook my head. “Oh, Theodore Tobias Locke, surely you know that even though we require blood to survive, we are not rapacious demons who drain everyone around us. A bit here, a bit there will suffice nicely, and I assure you that our 'victims' will not only survive, but have some very 'interesting' memories of the encounters even if they are vague.”

“But your new ones are precisely that. I mean rapacious demons.” He answered while giving me a pointed look.

“Yes, but that can be controlled.” I answered. “All we need do is have a suitable supply of blood available that doesn't involve attacking any person they might encounter. The initial blood lust fades after a few weeks in most cases.”

“If it doesn't?” He questioned.

“Then we will eliminate the ones who are unable to adjust.”

He stared at me for a few moments, then nodded. “I do believe you, Miss DuLac.”

“I always honor my promises and agreements, sir.” I said softly. “I can afford to do nothing less given what I am. If people I am working with can't trust my word, then I would truly deserve to die, do you not think? I was a noble in my first life, and even then I honored my agreements, though that was not at all expected or required in the times I was born to.”

“I can see that in you.” He nodded. “I can clearly see the honor, the sense of ethics in you. I saw that last night. French?”

“Originally.” I nodded with a faint smile. “Though the times I grew up in were not pleasant for a lot of titled people.”

“You have a mix of accents, dear lady.” Jeremy nodded. “But French is the one that underlies all of them. And you are giving me a lot of information you really should be careful with right now.”

“If I am to live peaceably in this town,” I shrugged, “That is the best way I can show you that I am sincere about everything else, sir. You and yours could kill us, we both know that. But a lot of innocents could die in the doing. That is something I would really prefer to avoid if at all possible.”

“I would prefer to avoid that as well.” He nodded, then gave me a genuine smile. “And my name is Theodore.”

“ As I have told you already, Mine is Carmilla.” I smiled back.

Odd, the reason for why I'd killed the former headmaster of the school never came up in that conversation. Nor that I was now the Headmistress.

And Ravencrest Academy also received a rather large endowment from the Lockes shortly after that conversation. Though the rough patches in that relationships were far from over.

“You do understand my caution regarding you and your 'sisters'.” Theodore told me while raising a beautiful goblet filled with an exquisite port once we had finished our meal. I raised my own and gently touched his with it.

“My kind are uncomfortable neighbors, I know.” I took a delicate sip of the wine then nodded. “Many of us have no discipline, and do tend to get — overwhelmed with the blood. And the lust for it.

“I was guilty of such things for my first fifty years.” I told him then smiled with a delicate shrug that gave a very enticing hint of my breasts beneath my blouse. “But I have learned control, sir. As has my own daughter Josephine.”

“And the other?”

I gave him a direct look again, in response to his direct question. “My mother will abide so long as she is able to feed. She will not kill, I promise you, and those she uses will not remember they were so used.”

“Can you guarantee that?”

“I have, in no uncertain terms informed her that we are far from the top of the food chain here.” I let out a sigh. “And that any number of people here could destroy us with what amounts to a wave of a hand. She does understand survival.”

“Would you,” he paused while sipping at his wine, “be able to — eliminate the problem that she could be if things come to that?”

That question made what I had left of a heart go cold and skip a few beats. But again survival was paramount, and I knew that, and that yes, I would do my best to stop my maker if her actions endangered that even though she was older and definitely stronger than I was.

“I want to live, Theodore.” I answered quietly. “I want my children to live.”

“Is that your answer?” He asked.

“Yes.” I nodded with a heavy heart once I realized that I would even try to kill my maker and likely die in that attempt to preserve myself and my children.

He looked at me, for more than a few breaths, then nodded. “You aren't like the Vampires I've heard of.”

“I wouldn't know.” I shrugged. “I have not met any others of my kind. Other than my Mother and the daughter that I made.”

“You are looking forward.” He nodded. “Not simply working in what is now.”

“Is that wrong?”

“No,” he shrugged, “Just unusual for your kind.”

“I never fit the rules when I was human.” I had to chuckle. “So why would I be different now?”

“Indeed, dear lady.” He smiled. “You are most unconventional for your kind.”

“I just want to live in peace, sir.” I answered then added. “But I would much prefer to do that well and in comfort.'

His answer was a laugh.

Theodore and I were friends from then till his untimely death. Which I mourned, but wasn't able to let his family know beyond the usual condolences from a business associate. In the few years I knew him, the patriarch of the Lockes and I became very good friends.

His death hit me as hard as it did his family.

As a result, I have always had a soft spot for the Lockes, and for some reason most of them not only tolerated me, but considered me a friend and ally.

And even if I was outclassed in power, I was still strong enough to be someone who could influence the direction the town of Ravencrest took. And the other invisibles knew that I had allies who would defend me and mine if there was no reason to attack us.

So the balance was struck.

And my kind became an accepted part of the puzzle that Ravencrest is.

My cell phone woke me from a restful sleep I'd just really gotten into.

Grumbling, I sat up, checked the number that was calling, and answered it. My personal phone number wasn't something that many people had, and a call at this time of day meant it was important. Or it had better be.

“Hello?” I answered.

“We need to talk.” Tobias Locke's voice answered.

“Now?” I asked.

“Now.” He affirmed. “Meet me at the country club in an hour.”

The connection closed and I sat there fuming for a few seconds. I hadn't had a call like that from him since his son Terrance decided I was the love of his life. Something that was awkward enough for me in any case, but was compounded by the hidden politics in Ravencrest.

Even then the current patriarch of the Locke family had been polite,inviting me to dinner. This time he was abrupt, and there was no doubt the invitation was a command.

Tobias may not like me much, for reasons the he finds valid even if they are wrong, but he was always carefully polite with me, observing the accepted social mores. But not this time.

Something was wrong, badly wrong, and I knew it had something to do with the girls in the house.

“Damn.” I breathed then started getting myself presentable.

I did a quick check on the girls, to see if one of them had done something to violate the pact, but found nothing there. Even Pandora gave me a shocked and honestly innocent look when I asked her if she had tried taking a were.

Then I checked the local news.

Oh, shit.

Two very drained bodies had turned up in town over the past few days, and it was clear to anyone who knew about how things really were in town that a vampire had been responsible. Though that wasn't mentioned in the mundane news. The Invisible news was a different matter and speculation was rife, and not all that favorable for us.

The one thing in our favor was that the victims were female. I knew none of my girls went after other girls that way. So I left the house, and drove to the country club with as much curiosity as trepidation.

“You've seen the news?” Tobias asked me once we had taken the obligatory sip of wine in the private room we were meeting in.

“Yes.” I nodded. “It's been so quiet lately I hadn't checked for a few days. I won't let that happen again, I promise you.”

“One of yours is out of control.” He actually glared at me.

“No they aren't.” I glared back. “My girls don't kill girls. Or even drink from them. It's hard to explain if you don't feel it, but females just don't taste right to us and are nowhere near as satisfying as a male. Besides, none of my girls has killed anyone in sixty years. And that one was insane, and met her end at my hand.”

“You're sure of that?” He favored me with another gimlet stare.

“Yes.” I answered shortly, working to hold my temper in as hard as he obviously was. “I canvased all the girls after your call. No one of mine did this.”

“It's one of your kind.”

“Obviously.” I nodded. “But not one of mine.”

“Fortunately, the witches agree with you.” He sighed. “My family is out on a very thin limb here because of our alliance with you and yours. If you go down because of this, we would suffer.”

“I don't want that to happen any more than you do, Tobias.” I honestly told him. “I''m very fond of your family and have considered you all as friends for a long time. I would never do, or condone anything that would harm you and yours. You know that.”

“Then find the one who is doing this.”

“Oh, I will.” I said without a shred of doubt in my voice. “And he will either leave or die once I find him.”

“Can you do that with one like you who isn't in your family?”

“If not, I will die trying.” I answered with a shrug. “I value the alliances, and friendships I've forged in this town. Someone, something, threatening that is a thing that I won't tolerate if I'm able to stop it, or at least find it and point the more powerful to the problem.”

“How will you find him?”

“My girls and I have appearing human, even to other supernatural beings, down to an art, Tobias.” I shrugged. “The few vampires who have passed through here never even knew we were here. We'll find him.”

“Do that.” He nodded and actually gave me a rare smile. “More than your own will suffer if you don't. But I'm sure that you will manage.”

“It's what I do, dear.” I nodded with a smile when he flinched at my form of address.

“Then make sure you do.” He nodded then picked up a menu. “The Parisian chicken is quite good.”

The meeting was over. The two of us exchanged pleasantries and thinly veiled barbs through the meal, which was normal. And the chicken was exquisite. I found myself wishing I could actually do more justice to it than just taste and move things around on my plate.

“What exactly should we be looking for again?” Josephine asked while she and I seemed to aimlessly wander through some of the less well lit, okay darkest, parts of the town. At my roll of the eyes, she shook her head and raised a placating hand. “Okay, okay, I know it's a male of our kind, but hasn't anyone given out even a vague description of the guy? You know, tall, short, light, dark, anything at all?”

“No.” I grimaced then took another look around the dingy little area we were in. It held some old warehouses and storage facilities, and a lot of poorly lit open ground interspersed with sagging fences, the odd piece of junk that hadn't been cleaned up by the town fathers and not much else. “Just that someone, something, is killing humans — females — and it looks like one of our kind is doing it.”

“Does that mean you think it isn't one of our kind?” She questioned.

“Maybe.” I shrugged. “I've felt someone out here, but it's pretty vague as to what exactly it is other than it is undeniably male and undisciplined for the most part. Other than being able to hide himself, which is a puzzle itself.”

“Some of us are just naturals with certain things, you know.” Josephine shrugged. “Maybe that's this one's particular talent. Obscuring himself.”

“I was kind of hoping that wasn't the case.” I grimaced then let out a sigh. “But it makes sense given the situation and how hard he is to track down.”

Aaaak! The mental yell of shock reached us both at the same time. We had almost all the girls out searching and that one sounded distressingly familiar.

“Why did it have to be Pandora?” I groaned as her shock turned to outrage and incredulity then laughter.

My eldest daughter and I didn't waste time with more words, just moved as fast as we could, and our kind can rival weres in the speed we can maintain, to where our senses told us Pandora was.

The tableau we found once we arrived was surreal enough that I could understand why Pandora was nearly in hysterics she was laughing so hard.

She was still on the ground, but sitting up and holding her stomach from all the laughter she couldn't contain. That she was in danger probably never entered her mind at all. We all knew that particular daughter wasn't really wrapped too tight, as they say, but she was usually cute about it. And generally aware of potential danger even at her worst.

The figure who was currently the object of my daughter's amusement stood in front of her still wearing a partially outraged and totally perplexed expression on his face. Drawing the long, flowing cloak around his shoulders then flinging it back dramatically he glared at Pandora and showed his fangs. Which only got the girl laughing even harder.

“You DARE laugh at ME?” He shouted and started to move forward threateningly.

Pandora shook her head and waved him off, still laughing and completely ignoring the facts that the object of her amusement was over six feet tall, well muscled, and was a male vampire who wasn't happy at all with her reaction to his self proclaimed magnificence, or whatever.

I found myself really wishing that something simple like aspirin would work on my kind at that moment because I really felt a headache coming on. “Why me?”

But... Business first, then I could find a wall to bang my head against. Josephine and I glided out of the darkness to confront the guy, who had the obligatory bad horror movie slicked back hair and widow's peak and stood to either side of Pandora, who was still giggling.

He swirled his cloak and hissed at us. Actually hissed like a snake then glared at all of us. “This isn't over.”

Then did what he thought was a vanishing act into the deeper shadows.

“Follow that dufus and make sure he doesn't kill anyone else.” I sighed and waved Jo on. See if you can find his 'lair' while you're at it.”

“What do you want me to do when I catch him?” She asked.

“I dunno, throw some garlic at him or something.” I grumbled. “Just either find where he goes to ground at daylight, or get him to the house somehow.”

“And keep him from killing anyone else.”

“Right.” I answered while dreading the reactions the calls I needed to make would generate.

And I had thought Pandora was bad.