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"I was a drunk man at the height of his folly, regretting nothing. I lay in the bath, naked, as the dark fluids poured out of me. At last the pain stopped and the streams of fresh water ran pure. The human death was over.

"I looked at the three servants -- the Adonis and the two sharp-featured young girls. They were either horrified or perfectly astonished.

"As I washed in the fresh water, as I scrubbed with the sponge, it was the young Adonis who brought the soap to me, and the towel, and helped me out of the bath and into fresh clothes -- the same fancy garments as the others wore -- black dinner jacket, trousers and white satin turtleneck, so that I would look like my new companions who I was now to join, or so I imagined.

"I felt a sharp unconscionable hunger for the blood of these young servants, born of the very sight of the blood moving under their flesh and the strong smell of it in the air around us. I wasn't one of them. I wasn't their brother. They couldn't feel what I felt. They couldn't know what I knew.

"Arion's admonitions came back to me. Evil Doers. I realized I was looking into the eyes of the roughest of the girls, who had most assuredly expected me to be murdered, and as I did so I could see into her mind: I could see her anger, see her bitterness, see her heated temper. And as I stared at her, with the tender Adonis adjusting my clothes, there came from her the nastiest voice.

" 'Why you?' she demanded. 'Why you instead of one of us? Who are you that it should be you?¡¯

" 'Hush, no,' said the boy quickly. 'Don't be so foolish. ¡¯

"The other girl affected a cold, cynical air, but she felt the same sentiment. She felt cheated and angry. Hatred emanated from both women, and I realized it was angering me, and I detested them, detested them that they would have dumped my body this very night with no thought more than that it was a cumbersome task for them.

" 'We work, we wait,' said the brash one, 'and then you're brought here, and she chooses you. Why!¡¯

" 'No, quiet,' said the boy again. He had finished adjusting my turtleneck and the lapels of my coat. He looked pleadingly into my eyes, wondering, adoring. He seemed to feel some mammoth sympathy for me that I hadn't died. He seemed to think it marvelous.

" 'How many others has she brought here?' I asked him.

"He had no time to answer. The two doors to the bath were shut with a snap. And before the two girls or the boy could turn around, another two doors were also shut. No exit now remained except the terrace, and I knew the drop that existed beneath it.

"I turned around. I found Petronia against the doors behind me.

" 'Very well then,' she said, 'so you've finished dying, and you'll never know it again unless you choose to know it. Now you'll make another choice. You'll choose your first kill. And that will be one of these. Be swift about it. I don't care who it is. No. I do care. I'm curious. Go on!¡¯

" 'The girls gasped and screamed and, reaching for each other, backed up against the marble-tiled wall. The boy merely looked at Petronia and did nothing. He seemed to feel a profound disappointment but never made a sound.

" 'I can't do it,' I said.

" 'You can and you will,' said Petronia. 'Choose one of these or I'll choose for you. They're Evil Doers par excellence. They would have hauled you away tonight, a mere carcass to them, had you died. ¡¯

"She came up beside me. Her face softened and she put her arm up over my shoulder and she looked up at me tenderly. She spoke in a gentle voice as the girls still shivered and whimpered in panic and the boy stood his ground, frozen.

" 'Quinn, Quinn, my pupil,' she said in her loving voice, a voice I'd heard before so seldom from her. 'I want you to go forth strong and on your own. So take my harsh lessons. Read their minds. Use the Spell Gift to charm. You're hungry for them. Yes, yes, there, my pupil. Use your gifts and take the scent of their blood as your guiding genius. ¡¯

"I found myself staring at the hard-speaking one. Into her mind I did look. I saw her evil, her casual and vicious disconnect from the human herd, her brittle, cheap egocentricity. And as I drew close to her, her face was smooth, her eyes large and empty, as if I had put out my hand to her and stilled her. Her partner in crime had slunk away and with the boy moved across the room. She was all mine, deserted, enthralled, unprotesting. There was nothing but peace in her now.

" 'Devour the evil,' said Petronia, near to me like my Bad Angel. 'Eat it and make it into your clean and everlasting blood. ¡¯

"The girl had gone limp. She tumbled, silky and hot into my arms. Her head went to one side. Her mind was broken like the stem of a thorny rose. I kissed her throat. And then I sank my teeth and I felt her rich delicious blood pour forth, saltier than that of my vampire teachers, somehow more pungent, and there came the wretched story of her life, putrid, common, indecent. I sought the lush taste of the blood only. I sought the rich thick flow of the blood alone. I repudiated the images. I turned my heart away from her heart. I turned my senses only to the thick seasoned blood, and then Petronia was pulling me back, and the girl was lying at my feet, a crumpled corpse with large empty black eyes, such lovely eyes, and blood all over her neck, and Petronia said,

" 'You've spilt the blood, look at it. Bend down now and catch all of it on your tongue. Clean the wound until nothing remains. ¡¯

"I knelt down and lifted her. I did as I was told.

" 'Make a cut in your own tongue,' said Petronia, 'and with a drop of your own blood seal the wound until it disappears. ¡¯

"I was intent as I did this. I watched the tiny punctures vanish, and then the girl, pale-faced and purplish, fell limp to the tiles as I let her go.

"I rose groggily. Again, I was the drunk man. The most common object or surface seemed to pump with life.

"In a daze I reached out for Adonis. I said, 'I thank you for your kindnesses to me. ' He was too afraid to answer. He paused, merely staring at me as though I'd forced him to do it, and then I turned away.

"Was I walking out of the bath with Petronia? Were we going up a great staircase? The evening seemed a mist rather than a thing of light. The stars seemed to move in the night sky as we walked along a roofed terrace. I could hear and smell the sea.

"We came into the room where Manfred sat at his chessboard still with Arion, and both of them appeared magnificent to me, infinitely more glorious than the two girls and the boy.