Her body bucked wildly as she tried to throw him off, but he held like stone, waiting for her to suffocate.

Magiere lost awareness that her breathing had stopped. Loss of air now made room for her to grow, as if the grip on her throat held in her rage, letting it build up inside of her. She stared at him, her eyes unblinking and wide until they began to water.

As the first tear rolled down her cheek, a screaming, wailing cry of pain sounded from below, and the nobleman's head jerked slightly in surprise. Magiere felt his grip on her throat falter only for a moment. She let go of his wrist and grabbed the back of his head, then drove her own head forward and bit into his throat.

She felt the vibration of his panicked shout tingle across her face, as she pressed harder against his cold skin and blood leaked into her mouth. A knot of hunger twisted up suddenly in her stomach. Both his hands came in to push at her head. She pulled her mouth away before he could find his grip, and struck downward with her falchion. This time the blade connected with a solid crack as steel met with bone in his left shoulder.

"Magiere!"

The voice pulled at her from somewhere out of sight and far away-from downstairs.

The nobleman roared and swung with his right fist, even though the movement caused her blade to cut deeper. The blow caught her jaw.

The pain Magiere felt was as far away as the distant voice she'd just heard. The room spun until she saw the floor rushing up to meet her. She fell halfway on her side, and her breath rushed out. The moment that her head bounced off the floor, she thought she heard the sounds of shattering glass and wood. She struggled to sit, walls tilting haphazardly in her sight. She swung her blade blindly around, unable to focus. By the time the room stopped rocking before her eyes, and the pain in her head began to truly register, the room was empty.

Breathing was difficult. Rage and hatred leaked out of her as each breath, suddenly harder than the last, seemed to expel her strength. Her arms and head felt heavy, and she crumpled back to the floor. As she lay there, trying to gasp in air, realization of what she'd just done crept into her awareness.

Not all the blood in her mouth belonged to that hated nobleman, but she had tasted it, tasted his blood. And that memory caused fear to replace lost rage.

Footsteps on the stairs doubled that anxiety-the nobleman. She tightened her grip on the falchion and struggled to pull herself up.

Leesil appeared above her. He dropped to his knees and pulled her upper body into his lap. Relief caused fear to fade at his presence, but for some reason, she didn't want him to see her. She pulled away, covering her face with her free hand.

"Magiere, look at me," he said. "Are you all right?"

"It wasn't me," she whispered, finding her voice. "It wasn't me."

"Magiere, please," he said, his tone desperate. "Beth-rae is dead, and Chap's badly hurt. I have to get back downstairs. Are you all right?"

Shame, horror, and reality hit her all at once. Why was she hiding from Leesil?

She sat up, Leesil pushing her from behind, and turned to look at him. As she pulled her hand from her face, he grimaced at the sight of blood on her jaw. He reached out to inspect the damage to her lower lip where the nobleman's fist had landed.

Leesil pulled his hand away abruptly and glared at her, as if wary of her presence.

"What?" she asked urgently. "What is it?"

He hesitated before answering. "Fangs."

Night wind blew in from the shattered window frame across the room and stripped the last of anger's heat from Magiere's body.

The scene they found in the common room pressed Leesil down to the point where he was almost unable to perform any more action.

A lit lantern rested on the end of the bar, and Caleb kneeled by Beth-rae's body. He looked up at Leesil in confusion, wanting someone to explain everything away. Chap also sat by the body, whining and pushing at Beth-rae's shoulder with his nose. The fur on his chest was matted with blood, but from the way he moved, it seemed he was not as seriously injured as Leesil had feared.

"I went out for fresh water," Caleb said numbly. "I came back and…"

"Caleb, I'm so sorry," Magiere whispered from the base of the stairs.

Magiere still appeared shaken, but at least fully aware of her surroundings. If not for the blood on her chin and the split lip, Leesil would have thought her no more disarrayed than she was after one of their old mock battles played at the expense of frightened villagers.

Beth-rae's throat was jaggedly torn from one side to the other. Leesil knew the weapon had been a dirty fingernail.

"It was him," he said finally, "that filthy beggar boy we fought on the road to Miiska." He didn't look at Magiere as he spoke. "He attacked us… or, actually Chap attacked him, but he climbed through that front window. Beth-rae threw something over him, and he started to scream, and his skin turned black."

"Garlic water," Caleb said softly, touching Beth-rae's hair.

"What?" Magiere asked.

"We've been keeping a cask of it in the kitchen," he answered flatly. "If you boil garlic for several days in water, it makes a weapon against vampires."

"Stop it," Magiere said harshly, stepping closer. "I don't want to hear it right now. Whatever they wanted, they were just men. Do you understand?"

For the first time since meeting her, Caleb looked at Magiere with something akin to open dislike on his face. He struggled to carefully lift his wife in his arms.

"If you stopped lying to yourself and dealt with the truth, maybe my Beth-rae wouldn't be dead."

He carried the body through the curtain to the kitchen. Chap followed, still whining.

Magiere slumped down to sit on the bottom stair and covered her eyes with her hands. Strands of her loose, messy hair caught in the drying blood on her chin.

"What's going on?" Leesil asked. "Do you know?"

"The man at the Vudrask River was the same," she said quietly.

"What are you talking about?"

"He was the same-pale, bones like rock, too strong-surprised my weapon hurt him. He was the same."

"You mean the same as the beggar boy on the road, the one in here tonight," Leesil added, growing more angry. "Something else you neglected to tell me, yes?"

He took several deep breaths. Shouting at her would do nothing to help the situation, so he turned away. He wanted a drink and walked to the bar, found his old cup, and filled it.

"I can't feel them now," Magiere said, and Leesil looked up to see her hesitantly running one fingertip across the tops of her teeth, slowly, one by one. She pulled her hand away. "Maybe you just imagined-"

"I imagined nothing!" Leesil said, his voice growing louder on each word. He slammed the cup down on the bar and walked back to crouch before her. 'This is not just something in your head and certainly not in mine."

His hand reached up quickly, about to grab her jaw. Magiere started to pull away, but then remained still, staring at him. At first, her features were flat and emotionless at the closeness of his hand, and then they shifted. The look on her face told Leesil she was defying him to find again what he thought he'd seen.

Leesil moved carefully. Magiere did not open her mouth, but she did not resist as he gently pressed his fingers on her lower jaw to open it. He didn't touch her teeth, because he didn't need to. There was no sign of the elongation of her eyeteeth. Leesil let his hand drop away from her face, but he did not look away.

"We have to inform the constable about the attack," he said. "Word is going to spread soon enough about Beth-rae's death."

Magiere sank back, eyes closing slowly.

"Leesil?" a tiny voice called from the top of the stairs.