Chapter Eight

They found a Mexican place to eat.  Harold didn’t ask Josephine if she had a preference as he normally would in the company of a woman.  He knew she wouldn’t be eating.  Harold liked to eat at Mexican restaurants when he visited the USA.  It wasn’t quite like Mexican food he’d had in Mexico, and nothing like Spanish food, but the servings were always large and it was hearty.    

The maître d' seated them in a booth and was followed by a busboy with a bowl of nacho chips and three bowls of salsa.  Both couldn’t help smiling at Josephine like teenagers in the presence of an older and intimidatingly beautiful woman.  Harold ignored them and dug into the chips and salsa.  There was no one else in the restaurant, it had only just opened so they wouldn’t have to worry about someone overhearing them.  Nonetheless, Josephine spoke in a quiet voice and glanced in the direction of staff before speaking.  

“So, I just confirmed all the negative impressions you have regarding my kind didn’t I? The ‘humans-are-cattle-here-to-serve-me’,  I don’t have to care what people think of me attitude.”   

Harold was about to answer but the waiter walked up and asked if they would like a drink to start. “Ice tea for me please.  My companion has already eaten and won’t be ordering.”  The waiter smiled at Josephine and walked off to get the ice tea.   

“Yes, you did.  And then you did something I didn’t expect.  You looked ashamed when you came out of the dressing room.  That surprised me.  Why?”  

Josephine adjusted her napkin and silverware.  “They’re victims.  All of them.  They don’t know or even care that they are until the last second when their lives suddenly end.  I’ve been treating them that way since 1940 and it’s a habit I’ve only recently become aware of in myself.  When you snapped at me to get a backpack I realized that I was doing it again.”

The waiter arrived with the ice tea and while looking and smiling at Josephine asked Harold if he was ready to order.  Harold ignored the waiter’s obsequious attention to Josephine and glanced at the menu.  

“Yes.  I’ll have the lonche fajitas.” The waiter pulled his eyes from Josephine and looked back at Harold.   

“The carne fajitas sir.  Thank you.”  

“No. the lonche fajitas.” Harold glared at the waiter slightly to make his point.    

“Yes sir.  The lonche fajitas.” Turning back to Josephine with Harold’s glare apparently ignored the waiter asked, “And for you senorita?” Harold rolled his eyes.    

“As my friend has already told you.  I’ve eaten and won’t be ordering.”  Though she was smiling her voice had become slightly stern.   

“Of course senorita.  If you change your mind I will be happy to take your order.”  The waiter left and Josephine looked at Harold.   

“Yes, all humans, earðkins, do that.  Sorry.” She looked away and tried not to make eye contact with the staff looking her way.  

“Its ‘earðkinar’ and there is no need to apologize.  They can’t help themselves and because you are what you are, you can’t either.”  Harold honestly didn’t blame her, or them.  He didn’t like it, but he didn’t blame them.  

Josephine looked at Harold quizzically, “You don’t seem to be affected by me, why is that?”  Harold looked Josephine in the eye and held her gaze.   

“Oh. Right.”  Josephine suddenly felt uncomfortable and vulnerable.  Harold looked away.   

If Josephine was ulfhedinn or earðkin he would wait for her pheromones to indicate her feeling of discomfort had faded a little.  Instead he let a few seconds pass before looking back at her.   

“You have killed earðkinar in the past but have now renounced that.  I have taken you at your word and the scent of deer blood on you would confirm that.  I have been hunting and killing your kind since 1939.  I have taken an oath not to kill you if you maintain your,” Harold remembered how she’d referred to the draugar he was looking for “reformed ways and you evidently believe me.  We both have very good reasons to, if not trust each other, at least work together.  If I were to search alone and encountered the dra- vampires, it’s likely they’d run like Thialfi from me.  I know that there are supposed to be ulfhednar they associate with.  If you were to encounter the ulfhednar they’d probably run from you. “

The waiter arrived with Harold’s meal and smiled at Josephine, “Senorita, are you sure there is nothing I can get for you?”  

“No.  Thanks.” Her face was set back to the bored model mode.   The waiter left still smiling.  

Josephine looked at Harold and all expression vanished.  Even the jaded model expression was gone.   She sat perfectly still, no intake of air, no blinking, and no movement of any kind.  Harold wondered if this is what all draugar did when they were contemplating something.  A few seconds passed before Josephine inhaled and then looked at Harold’s meal.  “Eat your food.”   

Harold took a few bites and a couple of sips of the ice tea.  He glanced at Josephine a few times. She was frozen again but for her eyes following Harold’s movements as he ate.   

“You were the one chasing me in Coventry weren’t you?  Your team captured one of the guild stalking me and tortured the information out of him didn’t you?” She sounded slightly angry, but only slightly.  

Harold decided there was no point in denying anything and being forthright might engender the same behaviour in Josephine. “Yes.  I didn’t perform the interrogation myself, but have read the transcripts and watched the video.”    

“Which one did you capture?” Harold thought she sounded a little too nonchalant asking the question.  

“The younger one.  He apparently sacrificed himself to allow the older one to escape. Why does that matter to you?”   

Josephine shrugged her shoulders and looked across the room.  “It doesn’t really.  But it would have been nice if you’d killed the older one.  He’s the one that caught me killing a sheep and tried to take me in.  I escaped and he tracked me into Coventry.”

Harold took another bite and washed it down with some more ice tea.  “Why’d the older draug, sorry, vampire, not call in the rest of the guild to bring you in?”   

Josephine shrugged again, “I’m not sure.  He was probably hoping to kill me himself and keep the whole thing quiet.  The story about the reformed vampires and their werewolf friends caused a huge argument in our guild.  No one believed it, but everyone was scared that it might be true.  Some thought they should be found and killed.  Others denounced it as a falsehood created by some apostate to cause dissension amongst our people.” Josephine’s looked at Harold with an earnest expression, “Can you imagine it?  A guild of apostates? If it’s true then all that Lilith and Cain mean to my people could be ignored, changed, overthrown.”  She sounds excited by the idea.

Harold’s face reflected his thoughts, “What’s wrong?  You look shocked.” Josephine asked with a grin.   

“I am shocked.  Very shocked.  Until recently I’d never heard of any draug hunting animals instead of earðkinar.  It’s blasphemy for your kind.  And here you are, excited about finding them and contemplating a revolution against your faith.” Harold shook his head, the moment seemed surreal.  He looked at Josephine intently. “Are you lying to me?  Is this all some bizarre game or trick with an end goal that requires the use of a willing ulfhedinn?”

As Harold spoke, Josephine’s expression changed from excited to irritated.  She turned to look at the staff and immediately regretted it.  The waiter quickly walked over, “Senorita has re-considered and would perhaps like to order something?”

“No.  Leave us alone until he calls you over” she snapped with a jut of her chin at Harold.   

“Of course senorita.” The waiter scurried away like a puppy that had been reprimanded.  Josephine looked back at Harold and stared at him with anger.  

Her voice was quiet but powerful, “I am never going to kill another human.  I am going to find others that feel the way I do.  Meeting you was a bizarre coincidence.  Or perhaps it wasn’t.  You and your kind hunt mine.  Perhaps meeting you is all part of a dog’s plan to find a guild of vampires and kill them all!”   

Harold sat back in the booth.  He held Josephine’s eyes and thought through a few scenarios to determine which one would be the best if he needed to kill Josephine in the restaurant.  He’d sworn an oath, but her intensity made him fall back on his training and habits.  Settling on one he leaned forward and spoke quietly.   

“I will tell you my mission.  You can then decide to work with me to our mutual benefit or leave.  I am to find this rumoured clan of ulfhednar and establish communications with them and the larger community of ulfhednar.  I am to find this rumoured guild of vampires,” Harold emphasized the word as a counterpoint to Josephine’s calling his kind dogs, “and determine if it is true they have forsaken their faith and no longer hunt and kill earðkinar.  If they have, I am to report this back to the Jarl of North America.  At that point the Althing will most likely be called to discuss this radical change in your people’s culture.  It could possibly herald the same sort of change my people went through 500 years ago.  If they have not, then I am to call in as many packs from the Jarl’s Fyrd as I think are needed to wipe them out.”

Sitting back Harold waited for Josephine to talk.  Again, she became motionless, staring at him with her pale blue unblinking eyes.  She sat like that for almost a minute.  Harold didn’t try to match her unblinking motionless.  He calmly finished his fajitas and ice tea.   

Drawing in a breath, Josephine smiled, “Tell me about this culture change your people went through while we drive out to the coast.”

Harold snorted a laugh, “Damn.”