Vampire 01 - Daughter of Darkness

but I do.”
    “See what?”
    “Fear,” she said.
    “Fear? Fear of what?” I asked.
    “Yourself,” she said. I watched her walk out.
    Fear
wasn’t a word we used in this family. As far as I could see, there was nothing either Daddy or Mrs. Fennel feared, and Ava acted as if she could face down a stampede of elephants. Was I that different from her, from everyone else? How could I be afraid of myself, anyway?
    I thought a moment, worried, and then I shook my head. No, she was wrong. To claim that she could see something Daddy couldn’t see was ridiculous. If Daddy didn’t see it, it wasn’t there. It was just jealousy, I concluded. Lately, Daddy was spending more time with me and giving me more of his attention, and I could tell she didn’t like that. It was the sibling rivalry at work, just as he had described it. It flattered me to think that Ava could ever be envious of me, but if anything also could frighten me, that might be it.
    Happy again, I put on my nightgown and slipped under the blanket. Just as I was about to reach for the light switch, I heard a gentle knock on my door.
    “Yes?”
    Daddy entered. He hadn’t come to my bedroom for quite some time. As far back as I could remember, no one really tucked any of us in. There were no bedtime stories. Mrs. Fennel certainly wasn’t going to do anything like that. One thing we were taught especially was never to fear the dark. Even when I was a very little girl, Daddy told me the darkness was our friend.
    “We exist because of the darkness,” he told me. “All of you are daughters of darkness.”
    I wasn’t sure what he meant by that back then, but I was sure now. Darkness, secrets, and anonymity were tools that helped keep us alive and safe.
    Maybe that was why Ava thought I was different, why she thought I might be afraid of myself or for myself. She knew that I was never completely comfortable in the dark, or at least as comfortable as she and, apparently, Marla were.
    “How’s my new beauty?” Daddy asked, and sat at the foot of my bed.
    “I don’t know if I’ll be able to sleep,” I said.
    “Why not?”
    “Ava just told me I’m to go out with her this weekend. Only to observe, but at least I’m going out, going to exciting places, and I’ll be able to wear the beautiful new dress you bought me. Do you think I’ll do all right?” I asked, this time admitting to myself that I was fishing for a compliment.
    He laughed. “I know you will. When I first set eyes on you, I knew you were one to drink deeply of every pleasure this world has to offer us. When you were an infant, I saw the way you ate and drank, enjoyed a bathor simply being comfortably wrapped in a blanket. Even the way you slept told me you were soaked in pleasure.”
    “Really?”
    “Of course, but none of this will be anything close to what you will be experiencing in the time to come, Lorelei. In fact, consider it all to be nothing more than a taste.”
    “A taste? Now that you’ve told me all that, I surely won’t be able to sleep, Daddy,” I said, and he laughed.
    “You’re a delight, Lorelei. You are, in fact, one of the brightest little girls I’ve ever had. You were precocious at the age of two. I see how well you do in school, and I see how curious you are about everything. Just be patient and never frustrated with time or the care taken to educate you properly, okay?”
    “Yes, Daddy.”
    “Don’t worry. I’m sure you’ll fall asleep,” he said. “Mrs. Fennel always includes something in our food to help my little girls sleep and grow more beautiful.”
    “What does she put…”
    He put his finger on my lips. “Don’t ask for details. Just enjoy,” he said, then leaned over and kissed me on the cheek. The aroma of his cologne filled my nostrils and made my head spin. Like almost everything in a bottle in this house, it was surely something Mrs. Fennel had prepared, some magical scent that would stir any woman’s libido. Where did she learn how to do all these things? Where did she live when she was my age? Who taught her all that she knew?
    Sometimes I wondered if she was ever my age. Maybe she was created in some laboratory like Frankenstein’smonster. I knew I could think these thoughts, wonder, but never voice them unless Ava voiced them first. Daddy certainly wouldn’t. It was because of how much he obviously respected and depended on Mrs. Fennel that I did all I could not to cross her. It certainly wasn’t because I had great