It’s strange in the house tonight, very quiet, and the candlelight is making phantoms on the walls that dance to some ethereal beat that only they can hear. The animals on the posters seem to slink closer, and the plants seem to be growing when I’m not looking. There’s an owl in the woods not too far away and he kept asking WHO? WHO? until Aloysius whispered in his sleep, “Xenaides, the blood demon.” As though it had heard him, the owl grew quiet. I grew quiet, too, fearful of waking him.

I am still recovering from the last session, when I lost more blood than he intended. We made love tonight, and when his mouth was on me, I could feel him wanting to bite, fighting to be gentle. He only hurt me when he came, and then just a little bit, but it’s growing near...the blood demon is coming out, and this will be an intense session, I fear. He grows ever paler, and needs to replenish.

His eyes are beginning to glow silver in the dark and to shine like a cat’s when illuminated. His finger—and toenails have grown just a little, and he’s stopped wearing...   read more »

The directions had been difficult to follow, but Pendergast knew he was at the right place. It was in the atmosphere; the lull of the crickets in the tall grasses, the sheen of the afternoon sun warming the still river, the Spanish moss hanging in the trees—even the smell of the woods and the river and something else, a heady vapor on the breeze unlike anything he’d ever smelled before. Something about it made his muscles tighten with trepidation.

He crossed the plank bridge over a tributary to the unpainted, tin-roofed shack, hyperaware of the silence after all the racket that it had taken him so long to grow accustomed to in New York City, where he’d lived for several years. With his steps on the plank bridge, even the crickets had quieted. The sky, reflected in the tea-colored river water, was a bright, beautiful blue. A few cottony clouds overhead, as stationary as if they were stuck to the blue with Elmer’s Glue. Nothing moved but him.

He steeled himself and raised a fist, knocking softly on the door. It was opened immediately by an ancient woman of indeterminate age and race. She looked at him as seriously and sternly...   read more »