Free One With the Night by Susan Squires

stood out whitely. “What’s wrong?” she asked.
    He straightened. “Nothin’. I … I need ta go out for a bit is all.” He reached for his coat.
    “It’s still light.”
    He chewed his lip. “An hour. I’ll go in an hour.” He looked around as if wondering what he could possibly do with himself for an hour. His hands definitely shook. He looked down at them and clasped them forcibly together.
    Everything became clear.
    “You need blood, don’t you?”
    He looked up, startled. She raised her brows. He must know she of any would understand. But she hesitated to think what he might be willing to do to get it.
    His eyes said he realized she knew at least some of his secrets. He shrugged as though it didn’t matter to him. “Last night seems ta ha’ drained me.”
    “Well, I should think so.” But she must make one thing clear. “You can’t take your blood in the village.” She imagined panic over stories of a strange man-beast lapping at knife wounds.
    He nodded. “I’ll find a shepherd’s cot.”
    “No,” she protested. “You can’t take it forcibly from anyone!” But she couldn’t stop him. She changed her approach. “And you needn’t. I have several bottles cooling in the well. Only wait until the sun sets and I’ll get you some.”
    His eyes narrowed. “Bottles o’… blood?”
    She nodded.
    “How do they get there?”
    “Well…” She cast about for an answer. “I lower them in the bucket.”
    “Nay, lass,” he said impatiently. “How does th’ blood get in ta th’ bottles?”
    “Oh, sorry.” He wanted to know about her father’s invention. “Papa connects a tube to a needle. We insert the needle just here.” She held out her arm and pointed to the vein in the crook of her elbow. “You make a fist and squeeze and the blood flows out. He then uses a squeeze-bulb to push it into the arm of a patient or into a … a bottle. He calls his device an Impellor.”
    “People … give th’ blood without compulsion?”
    What did he mean, “compulsion”? Overpowering them with her strength? She shrugged. “They didn’t exactly line up for the privilege at first. That’s when we lost the servants. But Papa and I helped at a difficult birth, and … and the lucky grandfather helped us get donors. Of course we pay for the blood. They think it’s for Papa’s experiments. Which it is, in a way,” she added, lifting her chin. She and her father hadn’t really lied to the villagers.
    “D’ye … d’ye have enough ta share?”
    “They give more than I need. One can hardly stop them. Papa doesn’t like to be interrupted, so I ask them to come up in the evening and take the donations myself.”
    He looked at her strangely. She wasn’t sure why.
    “Come downstairs,” she said. “I can heat water for a bath if you like.”
    He rubbed his beard convulsively. “A bath is good. I can smell th’ blood on me.”
    That would be hard if he was hungry. “The hour will be up before you know it.”
    As he walked down the stairs behind her she suddenly realized the next hour might be difficult for her too. He would be bathing in the little room off the kitchen with a solid wood door between them. But just the thought of his naked body with rivulets of water sluicing off the slick soap … Oh, dear.
    *   *   *
    Callan folded his clothes and set them in a neat pile on the stool. The room was warm because it backed up to the kitchen hearth. The hunger itching in his veins was painful. His Companion demanded sustenance. Soon, he promised it. Watching the blood beat in the girl’s throat as she poured the huge pot of boiling water into the bath had been torture. He stepped into the hot water and eased himself down, feeling some of the tension go out of his body. He could last. At least his need for blood took his mind off the other effect she had on him. He slid down to duck his head and came up streaming. He lathered his hands. The soap smelled like lavender, and more subtly,