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Carissa felt Ryan's growl and laughed. "Well, apparently tomorrow night is soon enough."
"Good!" Ryan picked Carissa up and carried her up the rest of the stairs. From the way Ryan's eyes devoured
her, Carissa suspected she would not have the opportunity to wear her anniversary gown again. Well, perhaps
Nora could make some nice children's frocks from the fabric.
Carissa woke a bit late the next evening, but then Ryan had kept her up until after dawn. Their lovemaking
seemed only to get better. Carissa felt the bite marks on her breasts and neck. Ryan had drunk from her many
times the night before: little teasing sips that inflamed both their desires. Carissa knew what control it must
have taken for Ryan to tease them both in such a way. She still felt a deep sensual stirring. Well, she could
finish her business with Master McKay early and be home in time to seduce Ryan tonight. Perhaps she should
hunt first, so that she would have the energy to continue last night's game.
Carissa enjoyed the ride in the crisp, autumn weather. She still missed Nightshade, her beloved stallion, but the
horse could not bear her in her changed form. Rather then risk breaking either the horse's limbs or spirit,
Carissa had sent the stallion out to stud. Ryan's stable master assured her that she would be able to train one or
more of the stallion's offspring to bear her if she handled it from birth, but it would not be the same. Ryan's
horses bore her, but they did not move with her the way Nightshade had moved with Carissa. She sighed,
thinking that some losses were easier to bear than others. She did not mind being barren. Most of the time, she
did not even miss the daylight. But she did miss galloping her horse into the wind taking whatever obstacles
came with the confidence that she and Nightshade could move as one.
Carissa sent the coachman to wait at a nearby tavern. She knocked on Master McKay's door and was surprised
to hear no sounds of music from within. McKay held classes well into the evening hours, and, by his standard,
it was still early.
"Come in, Carissa. Thank you for coming so quickly."
"Not at all, Master McKay. I was& am in some concern for your health. Clywd said you had been unwell."
"Haven't we been friends long enough for you to call me by my given name?"
Carissa smiled. "I would if I knew it."
"Ahhhh, I am Ian."
Carissa came in and sat on the sofa, a much more comfortable one than McKay had when she first came to see
him. The warehouse had been almost transformed since Ryan bought it. Ryan had not only repaired all the
leaks, she had also built a few partitions and had the whole place painted. It still managed to look dark, but no
longer quite so seedy. The children slept in real beds now, and there was a real kitchen where meals were
cooked. Carissa's main contribution, aside from clothing and food, was a small but growing library where the
children learned to read and write. Clywd had discovered that he enjoyed teaching almost as much as he
enjoyed playing the piano. Carissa was as proud of her contribution here as she was of the orphanage she and
her friends had built, but she never forgot that it was McKay himself who had taken the children in and had
shared what little he had with them long before Carissa had arrived.
"Can you tell me what is wrong, Ian?"
"I& I died a few days ago. Or, I think I did."
Carissa's eyes widened. She looked at McKay with her vampire sight, and what she saw was very strange. She
could see the deeper colors that were vampire blood beginning to tinge master McKay, but his human blood
still glowed with a fire of its own. Where the two met, it was as if two kinds of fire burned. It looked painful to
Carissa.
"Did Clywd give you some of his blood?"
"No& I& " McKay looked away from Carissa, and she could see he was both troubled and embarrassed. He
got up and began to pace the room, and Carissa noted that his movements were much more fluid then those of
the old man she had first met.
"How did you die, Ian?"
"I think it was a heart attack." This was easier to talk about. "Your friend Lady Augusta had come by to take
the children for an outing. They don't get many treats, and she was having a party at the orphan-age, and she
invited my charges to go. Well, you probably know about that."
Carissa nodded.
"Not long after they left, I felt this terrible pain in my chest. I collapsed there, at the piano, and I didn't even
have the breath to call for help. Not that Clywd would have heard me. He is the soundest sleeper. After a while,
the pain seemed to diminish, but so did my sight. I remembered thinking that it was just too much work to
breathe, so I stopped. And then everything turned rather black."
"Did the children find you when they came back?" Carissa wondered why Augusta hadn't said anything.
Surely she would have, if she had found Master McKay collapsed.
"No, Clywd did. He said something woke him early. He wasn't sure what. He found me and put me on my
bed. He knew I was dead. My body was cold already. He didn't say anything to the children or to Lady
Augusta. He wanted to talk to you and Ryan first. So he gave the children their dinner and put them to bed,
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