Chapter 158 - Life Among the Tanti part 4

Time passes quickly for mortal men, they say. How much more quickly, then, do you suppose it passes for an immortal? The season turned from autumn to winter in the blink of an eye—if you'll pardon the cliché. Ilio announced that he wished to live on his own, so I helped him to construct his own thatch hut. He wanted to show Priss's father that he was capable of providing for a human wife and child. And, I guess, he had begun to feel the need to strike out on his own.

I was cheerful and supportive, but it felt like someone had reached inside me and ripped out my guts. I'd always known the boy would one day leave the nest, but that day's coming was much too soon for my liking, and I worried that he would get into trouble without my constant supervision. He was such an impulsive young man!

Finally, one evening, Priss's father, accompanied by two of her male siblings, approached as we worked on the roof of the boy's new dwelling. With our vampire strength and speed, the construction of the home had gone quickly. We were all but finished, really, just adding a last layer of thatching to further insulate the structure. The roof had leaked the previous night.

A light snow was falling as we scurried about the roof, securing bundles of dried reeds to the previous layer of thatching. We would be finished with it within the hour, and just in time for the first snow of the season. A rainstorm had lashed across the village the day before, and the temperature had dropped precipitously in its wake.

Our visitors' torches whipped and crackled in the blowing wind as they marched across the village toward Ilio's new hut. All three men were dressed in multiple layers of clothing, their breath spilling from their lips in puffs of white vapor.

I was surprised they would come to visit on such a cold dark night. The entire village had retired to their homes early because of the weather. The village shaman had predicted a fierce snowstorm. I'd heard this from some of the fisherman earlier that evening as I helped them haul in their catch, and it looked like the seer's visions had proven correct. The sky was pitch black, thick clouds occluding both moon and stars. Even the jagged teeth of the Carpathians were veiled, a vague shape in the swirling dark.

We watched the men approach, sitting down to rest as spicules of icy snow whipped past. We had made a fire in the lodge's stone hearth, and the aromatic smoke billowed from the chimney opening, keeping us warm, though the cold is not much of a bother to our kind.

"I would speak to the father of the young man named Ilio!" Priss's father called up to us.

"Finish tying these bundles," I said to Ilio as he glanced at me anxiously. He nodded and I leapt nimbly to the ground, startling the three Tanti men.

They fell back a step or two at my descent, then drew themselves up. They were not armed, I saw, though their torches could be used as weapons if the need arose.

"I know you," I said genially. "You are the father of Priss. Your name is Valas." I bowed as I greeted the heavyset man. The Tanti way of speaking was still strange to me, but I was fluent enough by then to need no translator.

The father bowed back and said, "I know you as well. Your name is… Thest." It seemed to pain him a little to speak the name Thest. From what I could discern, he was a religious man and did not believe I was the literal deity, incarnate or otherwise. He had never spoken ill of Ilio or I when I was eavesdropping on his family, but I could tell he was not comfortable with my pretense of godhood.

His sons watched me with wary eyes, the wind plucking at the fur collars of their heavy winter coats. They were both stout men, with long hair and beards.

"I do not know how you can work on a night such as this," Valas said after a pause, switching to a more casual form of speech. "And with so little clothing for warmth! Does your species not feel the cold?"

He was trying to be friendly. That was a good sign.

I smiled faintly and shook my head. "We feel the cold, but it does not tax us as it does your people," I said. "And we can see in the dark."

"Yes, your eyes flash in the torchlight like the eyes of a large cat. It is... somewhat disconcerting."

"I apologize."

"No need to apologize… Thest. Does the snake apologize for its bite? In all honesty, I have sometimes wondered what it would be like to have the strength of your people. It must be a wonder to leap great distances or snap the trunk of a tree in one's bare hands."

"All living creatures have their strengths and their weaknesses," I replied. "I have long envied your people. But you have come to talk about my son, not exchange idle pleasantries in the cold. Won't you accompany me to my lodge so that we may speak in comfort? I have a warm fire, and food and drink, if you desire."

"That would be greatly welcome, Thest," Priss's father said, bowing formally to me. "I have grown old, and this cold makes my bones ache."

"You are not old, Father," one of his sons said, and Valas shushed him.

"Bid your boy to follow, if he has time to rest from his labors," Valas said, and I waved for Ilio to join us.