Night of the 5th, long past midnight.


Humming to himself, a romantic but melancholy chorus of von Weber's De Freischutz, Tristan stepped lightly into the late night quiet of a Sunday evening. Hooker's was peopled by only three or four patrons and then a half dozen of his own kind partaking in blood or chatter. He raised his hand in an effete little wave as he walked past Anaïs on his way to the backrooms.

The door shut close behind him and left the vampire in relative darkness. Here, where there were fewer lamps and therefore fewer lights to languish against the polished dark wood, the air was charged. He could smell an open wound - and gillyweed. A long corridor led straight to a lounge at the very end but there were many doors lining it.

These were Terry's infamous backrooms, where coven members led their especially delicious delights into private corners to sin and blaspheme to their heart's desires. Tristan walked quietly, glancing into one of the open rooms; barely lit, decorated with the same 1950s abandon of antique furniture. Jin-ho was crouched over a young wizard sprawled on a velvet divan. The vampire lifted his eyes, unhinged jaw still clasped around a pale neck. He winked.

Tristan smiled back and hesitated, tempted. But he pushed on towards Terry's lounge and knocked once before entering. In here, Terrence Hooker sat at the far end in an armchair by a window overlooking the back alley. He did not look up from the book he was reading. There was a fire on, though nobody enjoyed its heat on the pillows and rug laid before the hearth.

"That had better not be Bram Stoker," Tristan quipped in greeting as he circled the room, treading wooden floorboards and looking at the various portrait sketches on the walls as he always did. Each coven member had their own self-portrait in pencil or charcoal or the odd pastel.

           "Not looking for tales tonight mate," Hooker shut the book and waved it to show him the cover of John Berger's Art of Seeing.

"Are you certain, mon frèrei?" asked the Frenchman, coming to a halt before the coven leader. "Because I have a story for you tonight, if you are amenable."

Behind him, another knock before the door swung open. Terry glanced past Tristan with a soft snort. "Laz. Tristan 'ere has a story for us. What do you think? Should we suffer him?"

Lazarus Blackburn brought the smell of winter and wet with him.  The shoulders of his black jacket bore tiny beads of mist. All this he carried in addition to a brown papered parcel. He'd been out tonight on worthy errands as was his occupation. Returning now, he found Terry Hooker wasn't alone. Their guest was a familiar sight around the coven, Tristan Vallaincourt, one of those rare vampires. Rare indeed for his balancing act. He was neither here nor there, Vallaincourt. Lazarus may be known to teeter on his feet and wax wistful and odd, but he always knew where he stood.

Terry's mood was unreadable, but Lazarus was in good enough spirits. He set the parcel down (book-shaped, as usual) on a side table and came up beside Tristan wearing a grin. A thoughtful grunt rolled in his throat like gravel.

"Hmm, well, he is very pretty. That has to count for something," Lazarus said.

In truth Lazarus was cautiously curious. He'd not been advertising his (what would you call it) common encounters with mortals; they had the chance of making things strange. In any case, a tale from Tristan was likely to come from those borderlands.

            "Hmm, well, he is very pretty. That has to count for something."

"Better to count for, than to count against me." Tristan agreed, bowing his head slightly as Lazarus joined him to stand before the ever-relaxed leader of the coven. "My tale is more of a gossipy nature, to be frank, but I think you will find it most entertaining."

What passed for entertainment amongst the Camden Town Hookers might make a regular wix sick. Even Tristan had to remind himself to not slip up at the Ministry - to refrain from teasing or condescending, to stop short of using a careless word such as Terry's favoured bloodbag. Blackburn's sense of humour was more of a mystery to him; still, he was one of them.

"Earlier this very evening, I received two witches in my office..." the old vampire stepped away, walking to the fireplace now to feel its unusual heat. "Mothers. Les mères, they come to me with frazzled nerves and flaring tempers, oui? They come to ask me about," a mock pretentious gesture, "consensual feedings."

A good word for the Ministry, not for this corner of town.

Terrence sat up straighter in his armchair and tossed his book aside. A good book, about drawing conclusions from visual clues. He exchanged a look with Lazarus, a dark-eyed and alert look that seemed to say: we're getting into our territory now, because biting bloodbags was their lot in life. And the visual clue to the gravity of this story was Tristan's back turned to them.

The Frenchman cut a tidy silhouette, standing in front of the fire with his hands behind his back. A touch tense.

"Go on then." Terry crossed his legs, ankle over knee, and watched Tristan turn slightly. "You called 'em mums, so there's a kid involved yea? I didn't hear about no sprogs getting bitten recently. Have you, Laz?"

He gestured at Laz and the pressed on regardless of the response. "We don't do little ones here."

If Tristan prowled above, Lazarus prowled below. If Tristan was a poem, Lazarus was a scratch in the margins. Alike, though, both of these vampires had a non-traditional relationship with the living, flexible and permeable. Hooker's, to Lazarus, was, hmm, post-modern classic. Proof of both attributes, at Hooker's house there were rules. The rules protected them from the future and grounded them in the past, they kept everyone cheery, fed, carefree, and free. Can't be reckless, can you, and keep your head?

Tristan called it gossip, but Lazarus sensed a line was crossed.

Laz folded his arms and let Tristan wander about unwatched. Instead, he watched Terry.

Terry questioned Laz who responded with a small shake of his head. No children. Last kid in the house had been the screaming sparrow and she'd been done the easy way. Lazarus uncrossed his arms to light a cigarette to put a taste in his mouth.

"Mom don't mean kids," he said out the corner of his mouth, his face momentarily illuminated by the flash of a brass lighter. "Pups, man," he grumbled and let the smoke fall from his nose and mouth, "they get bigger."

            "Pups, man, they get bigger."

"Don't they stop being a problem after that?" Terry replied carelessly, drumming his fingers on the glossy surface of a small side table - his eyes were levelled attentively in Tristan's direction.

Oh, no, Terrence Hooker had run from mater and pater as soon as he could, had never had the luxury of a concerned mother, had gone straight to the docks for a lifetime of adventure. Only he hadn't realise how long a 'lifetime' might be, or how much living could be squeezed into a walking corpse. The kids these days, though, they had it different.

"So is that it?" Hooker gestured at Tristan, impatient now, trying to get to the heart of Tristan's rambling ways.

"Oui," the consultant vampire finally turned back around to face the other two, watching their expressions carefully. "A young witch, fresh out of Hogwarts. A naughty mademoiselle... flavoured, I think, with notes of gillyweed and drug use."

Some of their kin did not enjoy the taste or were sensitive to elements that could 'taint' a pure palette; Hooker himself, he knew, didn't like it when his bloodbags drank too much. Tristan did not mind if a good vintage was consumed, prior. "Her mothers were besides themselves, demanding names and establishments. Such sensible hens, normally."

Witches who were good at their jobs were not immune to the irrational effects of having children. He glanced at Lazarus, dryly.

"Of course I refused them. Can you imagine, mon amie?" he smiled a laughing smile, all teeth. "You might have had to receive the most insufferable company."

Lazarus coughed a gravelly laugh, his throat doomed to carry a legacy of his last moments alive.

"Mmm, I'm not interested in any," he took a long draw, "any parade. Torches and pitchforks, heads on pikes."

He could laugh now, but it had happened before. Not here since his arrival in the 1980s, but once upon a time on another shore. Mortals so jumpy in their desperation to survive, and none more driven than parents of children grown as they may be. The wayward youth had panicked,

"This our problem, Hook?" he asked straightening up and sliding a hand in a pocket. It wasn't unusual for Lazarus Blackburn to play his role for the coven, scrounging around the city and paying visits. He was a gentle one, Lazarus, or could be. And after Christmas Eve when he'd wandered too far, he could stand a chance to square up.

Lazarus didn't know if this came from inside the house, but it seemed more likely than not. They were the only game in town - or at least the best one.

The picture Tristan had been painting took sudden form in Hooker's mind.

He stopped drumming his fingers as Laz remarked that he didn't want any pitchfork kinds in their coven, screaming accusations and the like. This was a mutually shared desire by every single person in this room - or even this building. Terry's hands met over his middle and he intertwined his long, dark fingers. His nails were sharp and varnished in gleaming black.

            "This our problem, Hook?"

Fresh out of Hogwarts, hints of Gillyweed and an aftertaste of something fouler[1]. There was one very obvious answer to that helpful description. Recent one too, so it fit.

"Yes," he decided, "but it won't be a problem for very long, mate." Hooker looked at their guest and made a gesture of thanks, which caused the other vampire to make another one of his bows. "I'll handle it. Or we will," a nod at Blackburn. "So she won't go singing again."

The very least Terry expected of his patrons was discretion; and he was not insensible to the favour being paid to him by Tristan, who would no doubt find favours to ask for in return. "Just give me a name."

Tristan Vaillancourt smiled pleasantly. "Waverly Roh-Ballentyne. Be warned, one of her mothers is an auror, and the other a werewolf."

1.

Muse.