I strode into New Charsburgh with an entourage of three at my back, dressed in a fine travelling suit. Baroness L’escale had tragically perished during the Wolf clan’s raid on her passenger barge, but this simply provided an opportunity for the affluent merchant Mister Gelb to inherit her coin, plus a little extra from the generous donations made by the various other passengers.

  He, or I should say I, was flanked on either side by my two bodyguards: Henrietta the drunken mercenary, and Ana the proud and towering Ostlander. It was considered fashionable for Firmans of means to employ native warriors as muscle in this part of the world, though I had to mind my tongue about such things, lest Ana rip it out of my mouth.

  Behind me, the swabbie, who’s name we’d at last learned was Alfonse, led the donkey which carried our party’s luggage. For this trip, he was playing the part of my nephew, though we did have to do some coaching to get him to stop calling me ‘auntie.’

  We had disembarked from our rowboat at a secluded spot up the river, and soon found ourselves on the road east to town. At first, we were nearly totally ensconced by the forest, to the point where the lanterns my companions were holding were almost useless amid the density of the woodland. Then, before any of us knew it, the scene had completely transformed, and the road we travelled on served as the border between two massive plantations.

  The fields stretched on for acre after acre, occasionally punctuated by ostentatious Firman manor houses or squalid shacks for Ostlander laborers. The divide spoke for itself, but I couldn’t help but pay some mind to the fields themselves.

  “This is a vineyard, this one grows cotton, and that one back there was hemp… where’s the food? The rice, and the wheat?”

  Ana snickered at that. “These planters don’t grow to eat, they grow to sell.”

  I raised a brow at that. “Can hardly enjoy any money you make if you starve before spending it.”

  The Ostlander shrugged. “The planters can afford to buy food for themselves. As for my people, they make do with what little their masters let them grow or forage… and starve when it’s not enough.”

  It was past sunset, so we didn’t see any laborers out in the fields that day, but quite a few of the manor houses had their lights on, and I even saw two well-off Firmans enjoying their supper on a balcony. The Ostlander shacks, by contrast, were all dark, their residents determined to get enough slumber before tomorrow’s labors.

  New Charsburgh was hard to miss; the simple, utilitarian buildings of the town center were surrounded on one side by the river, and all others by wooden palisades, with the road we were on terminating in a small gatehouse.

  A gatehouse manned by a man with a gun, who was quick to point it at us.

  “Who goes there?” He demanded.

  I of course had a canned reply prepared for such an occurrence, but Henrietta stepped in front of me. “Relax, Schmidt, it’s me.”

  Squinting through the darkness, the guard lowered his weapon. “Henrietta? What are you doing here? And who are these friends of yours?”

  The Aquish giant laughed aloud. “Why, they’re here for the auction! I was just showing them the way, making sure they didn’t get lost… or worse. You know how dangerous travel can be with the Wolves up in a tizzy.”

  The guard nodded. “Indeed, we lost a barge to the savages not two days ago. You wouldn’t happen to know anything about that, would you?”

  He seemed to eye Ana as he spoke, but Henrietta just laughed again, stepping close enough to lean against the window of his guardhouse… and leave a whole ducat on the windowsill for him. “Oh, perish the thought, my friend. Now, are you going to let us in or not? My friend Mister Gelb here is dreadfully tired.”

  The guard noticed the bribe, and smiled as he pocketed it, stepping around to throw open the gate for us. “Welcome to New Charsburgh.”

  As for the town itself, it was a small collection of one- and two-story structures in a semi-circular arrangement around a muddy town square. They all had storefronts, selling all the necessities of frontier living, but every establishment save the inn was closed for the evening. To my left was the river Hud, with two simple piers jutting out into the water. To my right stood the most imposing structure in town: a manor house built of hardened stone, tall enough to see any approach to the settlement, and no doubt fire upon it if the need required.

  There was a young man standing on the balcony of that manor, leaning on a walking cane. I stared up at him, and knew immediately what he was.

  “Vampire.” I said to myself.

  Henrietta turned to me, confused. “Alright Sig, you let me know your feelings on nobles yesterday, but you don’t have to go—”

  I cut her off. “No, you fool. That man there is a literal vampire.”

  Henrietta turned to where I was facing, just in time to watch the well-dressed gentleman head back inside.

  Ana nodded. “That man is Sir Bernard Bloem, the Viscount’s nephew. Dietrich appointed him governor of New Charsburgh and all the surrounding plantations.”

  “And he’s a vampire. A blood-sucking demon out of a child’s fairy tale.” Henrietta’s tone made it clear she found the idea rather absurd. “How, in sweet Joanna’s holy name, did the great Sig Messer come to believe that vampires are real?”

  I shrugged. “I mean, I’m a vampire. Duchess Azure turned me into one.”

  Henrietta looked like she was about to start having conniptions. “And you’re only telling me this now?”

  “Quit shouting about it! I don’t know what the big deal is. We’re traveling with a were-beast right now, aren’t we?”

  Ana snickered as Henrietta stammered. “But that’s…different! Were-beasts are common knowledge—”

  “Because the nature of their condition is much less subtle than that of a vampire, yes. But tell me, how is a class of people who can transform into half-man half-animal monsters any less fantastical than a person who drinks blood instead of water?”

  She sneered in confusion, clearly at a loss for how to continue with that line of questioning. She instead pointed at young Alfonse. “Did the boy know about this?”

  He and I exchanged a knowing smile. “Well he saw me survive a fall from the top of a ship’s mast, so I wager he knows a thing or two.”

  Henrietta scoffed in frustration. “Just, keep me in the loop on these things! If I’m dealing with the supernatural I’d at least like to know about it beforehand. I prefer to go un-cursed, thank you very much.”

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  “Only if you agree to quit running your mouth about it.” Ana replied. “Now let’s get inside, shall we?”

  The innkeep was more than happy to rent us a brace of rooms without asking too many questions. Henrietta and Alfonse would have one, while Ana and I got the other. Of course, ours only had one bed, but that was of little concern; she apparently derived a great deal of comfort from my head resting on her chest as she slept, and I had the privilege of feeding on her without fear of making her a thrall.

  Werewolves, it turned out, had constitutions just as strong as vampires, strong enough to resist even the curse of our bite.

  Still, even after having my fill, and listening to Ana snore beneath me, I did not sleep. I did not have to, of course, but I could, or at least do a decent enough job of faking til sunrise.

  Then again, I would have no way of stepping outside until the next evening anyway. Perhaps that’s what was keeping me up, the idea that I was missing out on an opportunity to skulk and reconnoiter, that the midnight hours were becoming my natural habitat.

  Either way, I was glad to have stayed awake, for it wasn’t long before I heard a voice from my windowsill.

  “Interesting conversation you and the pirate were having, Messer.”

  I nearly leapt out of my own skin, though I most certainly leapt out of bed, drawing forth a dagger I’d stashed under the mattress.

  Bernard Bloem was reclining on the windowsill, his posture entirely relaxed. He gently held his hand up. “Come now, there’s no need for that. I wouldn’t have introduced myself if I simply came here to kill you, would I?”

  I did not relax my posture, though I didn’t strike him either. “How did you get in here without my notice?”

  He smiled. “You’re a neophyte, then. A more experienced vampire would have known straightaway.”

  I sneered. “Some magic that I wasn’t taught about, then. I assume your ability to overhear our conversation from more than a hundred yards away was something similar?”

  He nodded. “Yes, though it wasn’t very hard; your pirate friend does not know how to shut up.”

  I took note of that; could vampires selectively enhance their senses, in a similar manner to their physical strength? Either way, grilling Bernard on it would just make me look like a fool.

  “You haven’t had us drawn and quartered, and I doubt you’re here just to make a mockery of my inexperience. What do you want?”

  He rose to a standing position, then. “To let you know that I admire your aims, foolish though they may be.”

  I raised an eyebrow, finally relaxing my posture somewhat. “And what are our aims? I don’t recall us mentioning those.”

  He chuckled. “Well seeing as you’re travelling with the leader of the Wolf clan and her Aquish best friend, I think it’s rather obvious. You mean to rally popular support here, and do my dear uncle some injury in the process.”

  “So you’re going to help us?”

  That earned a laugh. “Oh, heavens no! My hatred for Uncle Dietrich doesn’t outweigh my love of living, or going un-mutilated. I’m simply going to stay out of your way. You’ll probably get killed regardless, and on the slim chance you don’t, I’ll have a popular cause to hitch my wagon to.”

  I sighed, at last sheathing my dagger. “You could at least answer a few of my questions, give me a lay of the land?”

  “What, and risk you ratting me out to my uncle when he puts the screws to you? His torturers can be very persuasive.”

  I took some offense to that. “In my past life, I spent six months in Steinbrecht Gaol subsisting on weevil-ridden hardtack and the sheriff’s lash. All I would have needed to walk was to give up the names of my crew. I never even considered the possibility.”

  Bernard scratched his chin at this. “You do have a point, I doubt the ‘Greatest Thief Who Ever Lived’ would be in the habit of ratting on their colleagues. What do you want to know?”

  “We wish to start a rebellion among the Ostlanders here. Which plantations should we target for infiltration?”

  He waved his hand dismissively. “Oh, that’s easy! The two cruellest taskmasters are my uncle’s other scions, Grayson and Griffenwald. You probably passed by their properties on the road into town; they’re competing to see who can pull the most money out of the ground this harvest, by way of the taskmaster’s lash. There’s also Colm the Boar’s plantation down the river, but your friend Ana there can tell you all about that.”

  I asked several more questions, about the other plantation owners, any free Ostlanders or other Firmans I should know about, and the strength of Bloem’s forces in the region. Of special note, one of the Confederation fortresses a few miles upriver had just finished erecting a signal tower, which they could light to send a distress signal all the way back to Bloemsport.

  And given that Bloemsport had a garrison of twenty thousand soldiers and an entire squadron of warships, that would be very bad news indeed.

  Satisfied that I had pumped Bernard for all the most useful information, I moved on to a more personal question. “I’m looking for a woman named Hilda Schwarz; she should have just entered your uncle’s service, or else been handsomely rewarded by him.”

  He shook his head. “If she’s here, I haven’t the slightest idea where she is. I haven’t seen Uncle Dietrich in well over a month; conquering a continent is very busy work, you know.”

  I furrowed my brow in frustration. “Fair enough. Thank you, Bernard.”

  He rolled his eyes. “Don’t thank me, I doubt any of it will do you much good. My uncle’s the Emperor reborn, and he should have little trouble turning your whole party to mincemeat once he uncovers what you’re planning here.”

  He turned to leave, but before he left, I couldn’t help but remark on a detail that had been bothering me all evening.

  “You walked with a cane earlier; where did it go?”

  He paused, and sighed. “I was club-footed since I was a boy. My embrace… ‘cured’ me.”

  He spoke that word ‘cured’ like a vile curse. “You don’t seem too happy about that.”

  He let out a humorless chuckle. “I should be, shouldn’t I? Not only can I walk, I can fly, leap through the air, make whole hosts of mortals my thralls. But getting rid of it was hardly an act of charity on my uncle’s part.”

  “How come?”

  He turned to face me. There was a profound sadness in his eyes, one that I hadn’t noticed before behind his smug self-assurance. “One of the most vile magics our kind have at our disposal is Reconstitution; we take a mortal subject, drain them dry, skin them alive, and through dark ritual transform our bodies into a perfect copy of theirs.”

  I immediately drew some grim conclusions from that. “And the vampire aristocracy use this to forge new identities for themselves, so their mortal peers don’t grow to suspect their long lives?”

  Bernard nodded. “My uncle has done this five times over the course of his afterlife, and I was to be the sixth. My disability, however, proved an issue; Dietrich didn’t want to spend the next four decades faking a limp, and he thought it incautious to conjure up some miraculous recovery.”

  “So he embraced you instead, made you into one of his lieutenants.” I didn’t know what to say. “I’m sorry.”

  He sighed. “I resented it, you know. The pity of my caretakers, the mockery of my peers, never getting to fence or dance or play ball. But it was a part of me, part of what made me human.” He turned back to the window. “Let that be your final lesson of the night, Messer: you can lie to yourself all you like, but you’re not human anymore. None of us are.”

  I watched with some amazement as his body faded into a cloud of shimmering mist, which seeped outside through the small slits cut in the window shudders.

  “You’ll need to practice that,” Ana observed, “and enhancing your senses.”

  I turned to face her, not all that shocked to find that she was awake. “And I assume you’ll be donating the blood I’ll need for it.”

  She smiled in a way that made me shudder. “Happily, so long as you don’t get greedy.”

  I climbed back into bed with her, nuzzling myself into her towering frame once again. “Do you trust him?”

  She exhaled through her nose. “I hardly trust you, you know?”

  I chuckled. “Fair enough, but do you think he’ll betray us?”

  She twitched her ear. “If his uncle confronts him face to face, then yes. But so long as Dietrich stays aloof, we shall be fine.”

  “And why do you say that?”

  She stared out the window. “He fears the tyrant. I could smell it on him.”

  Knowing what I knew of how vampires are embraced, and of Bloem, it made sense. “What about you, Ana? Do you fear Viscount Bloem?”

  It was a short while before she replied. “I fear neither men nor vampires. But he is something far worse than both.”