"I would like you to study privately with a friend of mine," Amelie said. "For credit, of course." She looked around, smiling very slightly. "This is his library. Mine is far more orderly."
Claire's throat felt tight and uncomfortable. "A ... uh ... vampire friend?"
"Is that an issue?" Amelie folded her white hands together on the table. The candlelight flickered in her eyes.
"N-no ma'am." Yes. God, she couldn't imagine what Shane was going to say.
"I believe you will find him most interesting, Claire. He is indeed one of the most brilliant minds I have ever encountered in my long life, and he has learned so much through his lifetime that he could never teach it all. Still, he has much to pass along. I have been seeking the right pupil, one who can quickly grasp the discoveries he has made."
"Oh," Claire whispered faintly. So ... an old vampire. Her experience wasn't so good with the older ones. Like Amelie, they were cold and strange, and most of them were cruel, too. Like Oliver. Oh God, she wasn't talking about Oliver, was she ...? "Who -- ?"
Amelie looked down. Just for an instant, and then she met Claire's eyes and smiled. "You have not met," she said. "Not formally, at any rate. His name is Myrnin. He is one of my oldest friends and allies. Understand, Claire, that your actions since you came to Morganville, including your agreement with me, has won my trust. I would not grant this honor to any but those I found worthy."
Flattery. Claire recognized it, and knew the slight warmth in Amelie's voice was probably calculated, but it still worked. "Myrnin," she repeated.
"It is an old name," Amelie agreed, in response to the question in Claire's tone. "Old and forgotten, now. But once he was a great scholar, known and revered. His works should not be forgotten as well."
There was something strange in that, but Claire was too nervous to figure out what Amelie could be trying to say. Or not say. She was working hard to swallow a lump in her throat, but it was about the size of a poisoned apple and seemed to be growing larger. She could only nod.
Amelie smiled. It looked kind of artificial, like an expression she'd practiced in a mirror rather than learned as a child. Smiling was something her face just didn't naturally do, Claire decided. And sure enough, the smile was gone in seconds, without a trace.
"If you're ready ...?"
Claire cast an involuntary, helpless look at the blank wall behind her. There wasn't a door, and that meant there was no way to retreat. So she didn't really have a choice.
Amelie wasn't waiting for her answer, anyway. The ice queen stood up and walked -- oh so very undead Grace Kelly -- to another small, low doorway with the key in the lock. She turned the key, withdrew it, and looked down at it for a moment before holding it out to Claire. "Keep it," she said. "Leave your book bag here, please. I shouldn't want you to forget it. You will leave through the same door that brought you."
Claire's fingers closed around the key, registering rough, cold, heavy metal. She shoved it in the pocket of her blue jeans as Amelie swung open the door, and leaned her backpack against a convenient bookcase.
"Myrnin?" Amelie's voice was low and gentle. "Myrnin, I've brought the girl I told you about. Her name is Claire."
Claire knew that tone of voice. You used it with old, sick people, people who didn't really understand what was happening anymore. People you didn't think were really going to be around for long. Coming from Amelie, it was really odd, because she could hear the love in that low voice. Could vampires love? Well, sure, she guessed; Michael could, right? So why not Amelie, too?
Claire stepped out from behind Amelie at the vampire's imperative gesture, and anxiously scanned the room. It was big, full of the weirdest mixture of equipment and junk she'd ever seen. A brand new widescreen laptop computer with a shimmying belly dancer as a screen saver. An abacus. A chemistry set that looked straight out of some old Sherlock Holmes movie. More books, carelessly piled around as trip hazards, leaning in columns on every table. Lamps -- some electric, some oil. Candles. Bottles and jars and shadows and angles and ... and a man.
Claire blinked, because she was expecting an old, sick person; expecting it so much she looked around again, trying to find him. But the only man in the room sat in a chair, peacefully reading a book. He marked the spot with a finger, closed it, and looked up at Amelie.
He was young, or at least he looked it. Shoulder-length curling brown hair, big dark puppy-dog eyes, flawless, faintly golden skin. Frozen at the age of maybe twenty-five, just enough for creases to be forming at the corners of his eyes. Also, he was really really ... pretty.
And he didn't look sick. Not at all.
"I've been waiting for you," he said. He spoke English, but with some kind of accent, nothing that Claire could identify. It sounded a little bit like Irish, a little bit like Scottish, but more ... liquid, somehow. Welsh? "Claire, is it? Well, come forward, girl, I won't bite." He smiled, and unlike Amelie's cool attempt it was a warm, genuine expression, full of merriment. Claire took a couple of steps toward him. She sensed Amelie tensing behind her, and wondered why. Myrnin seemed okay. Seemed more okay than any vampire she'd seen so far, except maybe Sam, Michael's grandfather -- next to Michael, the youngest vampire in Morganville.
"Hello," she said, and got an even wider smile.
"She speaks! Excellent. I have no use for someone without a backbone. Tell me, young Claire, do you like the sciences?"
That was an antique way of saying it ... the sciences. People usually said science or mentioned a specific thing, like biology or nuclear studies or chemistry. Still, she knew the right answer. "Yes sir. I love the sciences."