Free Vampire Instinct by Joey W. Hill Page A

down with a decided thump, Elisa jumped. He scowled.
    “Girl, put your ass in that chair and stop acting like I’m going to attack you. You’re in no danger here. If you annoy me excessively—more than you’re already doing—I’ll simply send you home. Do you really think Lady Danny would send you anywhere she wasn’t certain of your safety? She’s very protective of you.”
    “Yes, sir. I apologize. It’s . . .” Sitting down in a stiff perch on the edge of the guest chair, she tried to stop the nerves constantly jittering in her stomach like tiny electrified wires. Unfortunately, any arc could jolt her like this. “I’m ready for your questions.”
    “It says that, according to Ruskin’s records, he took quite a few fullblooded Aboriginal children, but they had a higher death rate than the white children.”
    She nodded. “Dev says he expects it’s because the Aboriginal children understood better, at a spiritual level, that what had been done to them was . . . wrong, not the way Nature is supposed to be. They let themselves die to escape.”
    When he paused again, she wondered if he thought that was nonsense. Something in the way his fingers tightened on the edge of the desk made her think he wished it was nonsense, but knew better. Then the curious moment passed. “Hmm. Your notes mention seizures.”
    “Danny calls them bloodlust episodes, but for Leonidas and Jeremiah, it’s like nothing she’s seen before. Victor was like that as well. The girls and William and Matthew have episodes, but they’re less severe.”
    Mal grunted. “Tell me how often you’ve noted it in each one.”
    As she recalled those details, Mal scribbled on the pad in front of him, glancing at the open file as if comparing data. This was yet another version of the male she’d met last night. She marked the faint frown on his forehead, the way the earth brown eyes shifted back and forth between the two sets of paperwork. Delving into the behavior of a creature and ferreting out what was needed, that was his gift. Danny had said so. Only her vampires weren’t cats, big or small, like the ones she’d yet to meet or those on his desk.
    Sitting back, he braced his foot again and crossed his arms across his chest. “During the time I was in their compound last night, two of them had fits like you described. I wanted to be certain. They’re likely caught in transition.”
    “What does that mean?” Too late, she realized she didn’t know if she had permission to ask questions. Fortunately, he didn’t seem offended.
    “A normal adult vampire transition is over in several months. For some time after that, a fledgling deals with bloodlust, and is typically under the care of a sire for at least a year as he or she learns to manage it. What Danny gleaned from Ruskin’s sparse files suggested he had Matthew and William for just over a year. There’s no history on the others. You said they don’t communicate. Do they verbalize at all? Talk, that is.”
    “They’ll gesture, point, nod. Miah and Nerida will sometimes sing together, like chanting. I can’t make out any words, though, and neither could the blackfellas at the station, more humming and made-up sounds than anything. All of them seem to understand everything we’re saying, but it’s as if their spoken language skills are gone.”
    “They’re not.” He pushed the file away from him, a frown on his face. “I marked them as a sire, as I said I would, but that won’t give me much of an advantage. Ruskin wanted them to be savage animals, so he punished them for any behavior, outside of their hunting skills, that demonstrated reason, intelligence, gentler emotions. Their minds are a thicket of chaos, the best defense they could manage, though it only adds to their impulse-control problems.”
    She of course had suspected that, but to hear it confirmed made her heart hurt anew for them. She masked it, though, already well aware of Mr. Malachi’s impatience with