My, My, You’ve Grown
Lucy and Maurice Burim, whom I had known in a former life as pre-teen vampires, stand before me looking closer to twenty than twelve. Despite the obvious difference in their height, their faces have matured. The innocence has been replaced by purpose, the fear replaced by conviction. No, these are not the twins I had known. But somehow, they are the same as ever.
Maurice pats Lucy’s arm around him. It’s an old gesture. He used to do it to get her to let go of him when she was clinging too tightly. Now, it’s an intimate movement of connection between them. They watch carefully as Morena gingerly stands up.
“Actually, it’s Darnell now. Tammy and Thomas.” His voice is richer, polished. His matured in a way I never would’ve thought possible. And she’s bloomed, still slight but lithe and comely. And underneath it all, I feel it. Morena shifts her weight backwards in response. My darling charges are negative vampires.
“You want to help your old auntie up?” I raise my hand.
Lucy smiles widely and pushes Maurice forward. He’s at odds, as an young man would be, reacquianting with his past. He steps forward uncertainly and the effect forces Morena back another step, out of his way. He notices it immediately and I sense him get a handle over himself. The twins had never shown such complete control before. He takes my hand gently and I’m on my feet without the slightest sense of having been pulled up. Yes, grown in every way. Including power.
I stare up at Maurice who stands about 5’10”, not excessively tall, but inches away from where he had been when I had used to tuck them both under my chin for hugs. Lucy had always been willowy but somewhere, her brother has finally surpassed her in height. And there’s more as he holds my hand. I feel the tension in him. He meets my gaze but in a way that tells me his focus is elsewhere, his thoughts in hiding should they show through his eyes. But he’s reading me, trying to at least.
Lucy breaks the silence. “Old? You are much younger than last time we knew you, Auntie Giselle.”
Maurice drops my hand.
“It’s Sophie now. And you two, you’re older. How is that possible?”
Maurice throws a suspicious gaze at Morena, who’s starting to show the signs of her embrace with a wall. “You reek of bad blood. We were certain we’d finally been found.”
I raise my hand up. “My bad. Some clients seem to cling about me.”
A tight smile creeps over his face as he looks back at me. “Still on a fool’s crusade, Auntie?” He shakes his head and sighs. “And what of her? A protege?”
“Hardly,” Morena mumbles, gently dabbing at her bloodied lip.
Lucy steps forward, excitedly staring at Morena. “It was you I smelled first, before Auntie. You smell of blood and light and magic. Very confusing.”
“I wondered why you were so slow,” Maurice chides.
“Slow? You call that slow?” Morena asks, in shock.
Lucy looks somewhat between cowed and annoyed. Maurice fixes his glare back on Morena. “If she’d done as she was supposed to, you never would have seen her at all. And we both would have been gone before you’d even noticed.”
She fights the feeling. “That’s new. Vamps that cut and run.”
Maurice bristles but I put a hand on his shoulder. Like old times. And it turns something deep inside of places I hide away that his response feels the same as when he was a child.
“Forgive her. She’s greener than Kermit the Frog.”
Lucy’s face finally turns unkind. (In French) “Terrible child. She seems more trouble than she’s worth.”
Morena answers back, “Not near as much trouble as I need to be, apparently.”
“Does everyone speak French now?” Maurice asks rhetorically.
“Lucy, Maurice, this is Morena, Morena Fourtenay. She’s a cohort to a local vampire, a client.”
A look passes between Lucy and Maurice and they stop breathing. It used to mean they were having a “twin moment,” as I used to call them, a time when they could seem to know each other’s thoughts, like telepathy. They stare back at Morena, now with more interest.
She notices. “What? I don’t look like the cohort type? My…uh, master…he won’t be happy I couldn’t keep Sophie safe.”
I blink just as my phone buzzes. “What? What are you talking about?”
Vampirony 
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