I'd walked by the house where she'd lived with her parents several times since returning, half-hoping she still lived there. But new tenants had moved in and there was no sign of the Hemlocks. Just as well, really — as a half-vampire I aged at a fifth the human rate, so although nearly thirteen years had passed since I last kissed Debbie, I only looked a few years older. Debbie would be a grown woman now. It would have been confusing if we'd run into one another.

The door connecting the bedrooms opened and Harkat entered, drying himself with a huge hotel towel. "The bath's free," he said, wiping around the top of his bald, grey, scarred head with the towel, careful not to irritate his round green eyes, which had no eyelids to protect them.

"Cheers, ears," I grinned, slipping by him. That was an in-joke — Harkat, like all the Little People, had ears, but they were stitched under the skin at the sides of his head, so it looked as if he hadn't any.

Harkat had drained the bath, put the plug back in and turned on the hot tap, so it was almost full with fresh water when I arrived. I tested the temperature, added a dash of cold, turned off the taps and slid in — heavenly! I raised a hand to brush a lock of hair out of my eyes but my arm wouldn't lift all the way — I was too tired. Relaxing, I decided to just lie there a few minutes. I could wash my hair later. To simply lie in the bath and relax… for a few minutes… would be…

Without finishing the thought, I fell soundly asleep, and when I awoke it was night again, and I was blue all over from having spent the day in a bath of cold, grimy water.

CHAPTER TWO

WE RETURNED to the hotel at the end of another long, disappointing night. We'd stayed at the same hotel since coming to the city. We hadn't meant to — the plan had been to switch every couple of weeks — but the search for the vampaneze had left us so exhausted, we hadn't been able to muster the energy to go looking for fresh accommodation. Even the sturdy Harkat Mulds, who didn't need to sleep very much, was dozing off for four or five hours each day.