First Meeting

         A tall man with oddly pale skin and dressed in a black suit stood across the street from the window of the Hastings apartment in Bayswater. He ignored the heavy rains as he watched the youngest daughter move about in the candlelight. He had never before felt for anyone what he felt for the young woman now, not even for Ludivine, the one who made him.

         He thought back to the ball in the City where he had first seen her. She had just been introduced into society and that ball had been her first. Her beauty was matched by her wit as well as her talent. Emrys couldn’t stop thinking of her which is why he had followed her to her home and was now watching her, considering how to enter the residence.

         Although one of the servants could invite him in, calling at this time of night would surely put the already unhospitable Mr. Hastings into a murderous frenzy. He considered other ways of getting to her. Perhaps getting her attention and luring her out after talking through the window, if it weren’t for the cursed rain. He decided he would come back the next day, even if the sun decided to find its way through the clouds, as the light in the window had gone out a minute before.

         As he turned to leave, the man heard a voice come from the darkness of the alley behind him.

         “Her name is Elisabeth,” it said. “You hadn’t bothered to ask at Mr. Mitchell’s party earlier had you? You lot never do.”

         Emrys swung around to attack the woman who had somehow managed sneak up on him, only to jump back into the street in surprise. The voice hadn’t been from a woman or from a human at all. Before him stood a horse, slightly smaller than full grown with tawny fur that seemed to glow in the darkness. What startled him most was the opal horn in the middle of her forehead. Ludivine had told him of unicorns and their uncanny ability to sneak up on vampires, but had never believed her or met one until now.

         He stood there, stupefied, as she continued, “You’re Emrys, aren’t you? I’ve heard a lot about you and Ludivine. You had a hand in some of the violence in the Spanish war didn’t you? How’d you manage that anyway? Vampires aren’t capable of that sort of magic. Who was the warlock that helped you?”

         Emrys recovered from his shock as the unicorn reminded him of the events of the war a few decades earlier. “Why do you care?” he asked her.

         “I would like to have a chat with that man,” she replied.

         “That will be rather difficult,” he smiled.

         “You killed him,” she said simply before he could finish. “I was afraid of that.”

         She bored him quickly with the constant jabbering and again he turned to leave.

         “Why are you two in Whitechapel?” she asked “I get that the slums are easy pickings, but you don’t usually stay in them.”

         He turned back to her confused, “How?”

         “I’ve been following your work for several years. I usually can’t do much about it as I am never in the same country, but I thought you might eventually come back to your island. I knew exactly when you came to London,” she said this all very quickly and stared at him accusingly.

         Emrys just shrugged and turned away for a third time.

         “You may want to run,” the unicorn was starting to irritate him now. “I know quite a few people who are itching to kill a bunch of dead things.”

         Emrys’ grey eyes flashed briefly with fear as he shot off down the street before she finished. He ran past the City, through Aldgate and into the Blue Boar Inn on White Chapel where he and Ludivine were staying. He burst into their room to a startled couple in the bed.

         “Hunters,” was all he could manage to the young, blond woman.

         She understood immediately. “Guess I’ll have to make this quick,” she said and she turned to the drunken man in the bed next to her. He leaned in for one last kiss, but cried out in surprise as she bit his neck and didn’t let go.

         “He wasn’t that interesting anyway,” she said as she stood and separated her clothes from the man’s. “You’re oddly quiet, mon cheri.”

Emrys shifted uncomfortably in the doorway. The man in Ludivine’s bed didn’t bother him. His fate would have been the same by the time the sun came up. She came up to him, still only half clothed and kissed him.

         “What is the matter, mon cheri.” She asked him. “We usually laugh so loud at these silly humans who think they can catch us. What is so different about this lot?”

         Emrys shifted again and opened his mouth, but nothing came out at first. He closed it for a second, then tried again, “I met a unicorn.”

         Ludivine stepped back a little and stared with what looked like a touch of fear – an emotion Emrys had never seen in this very old and experienced woman. She turned and started dressing more quickly now. “How far?” she asked.

         “Bayswater,” came his reply.

         “That close? Do you know if the others are human?” she grabbed her purse – the only item they really possessed – and they ran down onto White Chapel Street. The rain had eased to dense fog.

         “No,” he said.

         “Merde, imbécile!” Ludivine cried. “We have no idea how to plan our escape.”

         “Fool is right,” said a now familiar voice. ”He didn’t even bother to find out if I was lying or not. I’m not by the way.” They both turned to find, not the unicorn this time, but a woman in her thirties with tan skin and brown hair.

         Emrys just stared while Ludivine engaged, “Solana. Shape shifting at this time of night. They must be humans.”

         “Yes. Heading to the City? You don’t have much experience with us, do you, boy?” said Solana to Emrys.

         He didn’t reply. They could hear the shouts of men and horses through the London streets. They were still several miles away.

         Ludivine asked the woman, “What do you want with us? We’ve done nothing to you.”

         “Emrys here was about to turn Elisabeth. I had to step in the way.”

         Ludivine grimaced. The damned unicorn had given Emrys the name of the young beauty who had caught his eye earlier that night. Now the kill wouldn’t be easy.

         “Why do you keep saying her name?” Emrys asked Solana.

         “Nescis? What have you been teaching him, woman?” Solana was amazed. In the world of magic, names had power. Usually to know another’s true name gave a sorcerer power, but in the case of vampires, knowing their victims’ names took theirs away, in a manner of speaking.

         Emrys didn’t much care at the moment, though. He pulled at Ludivine’s arm, in the direction of the City, as Solana had mentioned. Even if she had told the others, they wouldn’t expect the route he had planned in his head. As reluctant as she was at the moment, Ludivine followed spouting a string of French and English curses behind them.

         When they reached the City, they would direct the hunters towards the Thames directly south while actually heading north and then back to the river in the west during the day. That was their plan, at least, until the hunters managed to somehow surround them.

         “Merde!” Ludivine cursed again. “That damned horse warned them.”

         “How could she possibly have known?” Emrys asked.

         “Up,” she said instead of answering.

         They ran into the nearest building to the roof. It wasn’t ideal, but it was the only option left. Ludivine stripped off her outer skirts and threw them to the east of the building as they jumped to the building on the west. Sunrise was in only a few hours; unless the fog stayed thick, if they couldn’t lose them this way by then, they’d be done. Luck was on their side as they found a carriage moving slowly on the street below. They jumped down next to it lightly, killed the driver, and with Ludivine inside and Emrys driving, they blended back into the now awakening streets. They continued at the slower pace the previous driver had used for an hour, then, when Emrys decided they had lost the hunters enough to risk it, threw the horse into full gallop. They would head for Cardiff, his old home, then escape to Ireland from there.

         Emrys wasn’t sure what to think of Solana or unicorns, but he knew as soon as he met her again – preferably well in the future – she wouldn’t get even the smallest sentence out of her mouth before she was dead.