Free Blood Vivicanti (9780989878579) by Becket Page B

curtains were drawn over a
floor-to-ceiling window in a nook. And through a slight parting in
the curtains silvery moonlight was spilling in across the
floor.
    My senses greedily devoured
all this fresh data. My photographic memory swallowed all these new
sensations. Stomaching so much all at once was dizzying. Like being
drunk on knowledge. My cup runneth over.
     
     
     
     
    I could perceive the
structure and form and purpose of things.
    The golden carpet – my
eyes could see all its tiny fibers. My mind could count each one.
Somehow I could envision the machine that had woven them together,
the carpet inspectors who’d made ticks on their clipboards, and the
carpet layers who’d crawled all over my room.
    And the tufted chair in
the corner – somehow I could see deep into its craftsmanship. I
could perceive the intent of its craftsman. I saw that the chair
had been commissioned over two hundred years ago. The craftsman had
been an angry Italian. He’d been lonely, a widower, an obsessive
compulsive by our standards. He’d made the whole chair in a day and
a night. Then he’d tried to destroy it. Now it was mine.
    How did I know all
this?
    The laptop computer on the
table – I saw it now – another man had personally handcrafted it –
all of it – inside, outside, keys, screen, ports, and cards. I
could also see that the man was a gifted engineer. He had
programmed it with his own operating system. He’d loved his work.
There was no other computer like it in the world. And now it was
mine, like the chair.
    Yet how could I know this
too?
    The tufted chair and the
laptop computer had been made centuries apart. Yet they were
connected by patterns of human behavior. Both men had a passion for
working with their hands. Both loved freethinking and
independence.
    Separating them only was
means. The two hundred-year-old craftsman had been poor. The
contemporary engineer is exceedingly wealthy.
    How could I see all this in
mere objects?
    My ability to know knew. My
ability to understand was trying to play catch-up.
     
     
     
     
    Slowly I
inhaled.
    The scent on the laptop,
the scent on the chair, the scent on everything in the room, I knew
that scent. It was the scent of the man who made me a Blood
Vivicanti. It was the scent of Wyn. His scent was everywhere. I was
in his house.
    I inhaled again. I realized
more.
    No, I wasn’t in his house.
I was in his mansion! A great big mansion that seemed to go on forever, like a
magic castle. Wafting into me were the scents of too much wealth
and much more worry.
    The strong scent of fresh
pine needles told me I was elevated a few stories from the ground.
The scent of Cool Beans Coffee House far in the distance told me I
was still in Idyllville. Filling this mansion was the strong scent
of new – new cars, new computers, new things – I love that
scent!
    Yet that scent also
perfectly blended with the scent of old. Ancient history dwelt in
this mansion too.
    All these old and new
scents of the mansion also mixed with the clean scent of spring
water and smooth river-rocks. The water and the rocks were not in
the mansion. But they weren’t far away either. They seemed right
beneath me. They hummed of mystery.
     
     
     
     
    My clothes were gone. I was
naked beneath the sheets. New clothes were laid out for me on the
nearby table.
    No one else was in the
room.
    I slipped from the
bedclothes. The air was cold and fresh and it gave me goose
bumps.
    The luxury carpet was thick
and soft. It felt good beneath my feet.
    Folded neatly on the table
were undergarments, a white t-shirt, a red V-neck sweater, and blue
jeans. Snug shoes lay on the floor.
    All my new clothes fit as
though they had been tailored to my petite size.
    The clothes had tiny rough
filaments that only a Blood Vivicanti can feel. They scratched my
skin, satisfying places I never knew had been itching for
years.
    My clothes smelled of fresh
laundry. I love that scent too.
    Yet their aroma was also
the scent of