All Together Dead

last companion had struck out on her own, since children can’t stay with their maker for long. After a few years, the child must strike out on its own, though it may come back to the maker, and must if the maker calls.”
    “Weren’t you angry with him?”
    She seemed to be trying to remember. “At first, I was shocked,” Pam said. “After he’d drained me, he put me in bed in my own room, and of course my family thought I’d died of some mysterious ailment, and they buried me. Eric dug me up, so I wouldn’t wake up in my coffin and have to dig my own way out. That was a great help. He held me and explained it all to me. Up until the night I died, I’d always been a very conventional woman underneath my daring tendencies. I was used to wearing layers and layers of clothes. You would be amazed at the dress I died in: the sleeves, the trim. The fabric in the skirt alone could make you three dresses!” Pam looked fondly reminiscent, nothing more. “After I’d awakened, I discovered being a vampire freed some wild thing in me.”
    “After what he did, you didn’t want to kill him?”
    “No,” she said instantly. “I wanted to have sex with him, and I did. We had sex many, many times.” She grinned. “The tie between maker and child doesn’t have to be sexual, but with us it was. That changed quite soon, actually, as my tastes broadened. I wanted to try everything I’d been denied in my human life.”
    “So you actually liked it, being a vampire? You were glad?”
    Pam shrugged. “Yes, I’ve always loved being what I am. It took me a few days to understand my new nature. I’d never even heard of a vampire before I became one.”
    I couldn’t imagine the shock of Pam’s awakening. Her self-proclaimed quick adjustment to her new state amazed me.
    “Did you ever go back to see your family?” I asked. Okay, that was tacky, and I regretted it as soon as the words passed my lips.
    “I saw them from a distance, maybe ten years later. You understand, the first thing a new vampire needed to do was leave her home area. Otherwise she ran the risk of being recognized and hunted down. Now you can parade around as much as you like. But we were so secret, so careful. Eric and I headed out of London as quickly as we could go, and after spending a little time in the north of England while I became accustomed to my state, we left England for the continent.”
    This was gruesome but fascinating. “Did you love him?”
    Pam looked a little puzzled. There was a tiny wrinkle in her smooth forehead. “Love him? No. We were good companions, and I enjoyed the sex and the hunting. But love? No.” In the glare of the overhead security lights, which cast curious dark shadows in the corners of the lot, I watched Pam’s face relax into its normal smooth lines. “I owe him my loyalty,” Pam said. “I have to obey him, but I do it willingly. Eric is intelligent, ambitious, and very entertaining. I would be crumbled to nothing in my grave by now if he hadn’t been watching me slip back to my house from meeting that silly young man. I went my own way for many, many years, but I was glad to hear from him when he opened the bar and called me to serve him.”
    Was it possible for anyone in the world to be as detached as Pam over the whole “I was murdered” issue? There was no doubt Pam relished being a vampire, seemed to genuinely harbor a mild contempt for humans; in fact, she seemed to find them amusing. She had thought it was hilarious when Eric had first exhibited feelings for me. Could Pam truly be so changed from her former self?
    “How old were you, Pam?”
    “When I died? I was nineteen.” Not a flicker of feeling crossed her face.
    “Did you wear your hair up every day?”
    Pam’s face seemed to warm a little. “Yes, I did. I wore it in a very elaborate style; my maid had to help me. I put artificial pads underneath my hair to give it height. And the underwear! You would laugh yourself sick to see me get into it.”
    As interesting as this conversation had been, I realized I was tired and ready to go home. “So the bottom line is, you’re really loyal to Eric, and you want me to know that neither of you knew that Bill had a hidden agenda when he came to Bon Temps.” Pam nodded. “So, you came here tonight to…?”
    “To ask you to have mercy on Eric.”
    The idea of Eric needing my mercy had never crossed my mind. “That’s as funny as your human underwear,” I said. “Pam, I know you