Page 13 of Tell Me Why
“You havehistorywith Isabella?” Tina asked, and Tell laughed.
“The world has changed much, but it is still much as it has always been. Men grasp at power anywhere they think they can find it, trying to put subordinates under them, even as the subordinates scramble to find the most powerful benefactor they can to protect and organize them. I’m convinced it’s an emergent property of humans writ large with vampires. We’re naturally independent compared to men, in certain ways. I’m not lonely when I am alone because I don’t have the ticking of my death clock driving me to finish things that are important to me and find meaning in other people. And perhaps because we are now predators at a level that men will never understand, and more designed for being alone. Regardless, when vampires feel an insecurity of solitude, they either build or join armies, just as men do. Keon made himself a king, with hundreds of vampires going about, doing as he said.” For a moment, Tell paused, watching the road ahead of them thoughtfully. Then he turned a glance at Tina. “Hunter was going by Odin at the time, and… well, neither of us had any interest in being a part of anything ofthe kind, but you did have to be aware of what he might think of your decisions. And sometimes you have to take help where itisrather than where you’d prefer to find it. Ginger was in the middle of something somewhere in north Africa, and Odin was feasting in courts to the north. Saxony, I believe.”
“Saxony,” Tina said softly. She knew solittleEuropean history outside of England and France. She couldn’t even find such a place on a map.
Tell nodded.
“I was in the middle of something. The details don’t matter. And there was a village that was… cut off from enough of the outside world that a pack of vampires intended to rule them as livestock until they ran out, and then move on. I was still much too young to take them on by myself. The leader of the pack, a woman called Sibylle, was at least four hundred years old, and she’d been doing this for centuries. The idea that I might object was… unthinkable to her. Or to Keon, for that matter.” His eyes went distant again for a time, then he nodded and came back. “The details remain unimportant. I negotiated for Keon to kill Sibylle and her pack in exchange for favors and support, and he’s called them in, trickling along ever since.” He looked at Tina once more. “There are only a few vampires alive who are older than he is. And Isabella is one of the oldest of the women he’s turned, very much a daughter to him. She was there when I made my plea for the village, and she advocated for me. Taught me much of what I know about the politics of the era, to try to help me succeed. I don’t know why; she is no more humanitarian than Keon is. But she liked me, and she always has. If Keon sent one of his men to find her, Italian Andrew for one, she would just kill them, but she’ll let me get close.”
“And what does all of this have to do with me?” Tina asked. Tell swallowed, then looked over at her once more.
“I’ve turned men, in my life,” he said. “A few. All long dead and part of forgotten parts of my life.”
“I havebrothers?” Tina asked, mostly just because she knew it would bother him. He didn’t like the word ‘sire’, and she’d seen Hunter use it to great effect, teasing him.
He glowered sideways at her.
“Our relationship is not one of parent and child,” he said. “The world is not the way that it was. Women were, many of them, kept away from… the things that you have that make you independent. They relied on men socially, even as they had this new power and capability from their vampirism, and some women, like Sibylle, or Ginger, found a way out of that, but many didn’t. Vampire men would take a woman as a wife or as a daughter, but seldom as a peer or a friend. You are myfriendand…” The corner of his mouth came up slightly. “I know that you joke in good faith, but I want you to hear that. There’s nothing wrong with the humor. But you are not my subordinate, not my dependent, and not a liability to me, socially or professionally.”
“Except that I’mallof those things,” Tina said with humor. “I work for you, you pay for my life, and you spend half of your time worrying over how to keep me alive.”
He grinned at this.
“And yet you feel no hesitation teasing me,” he said. “Things are not as they were.”
She shrugged.
“I still don’t understand why he made such a big deal about megoing,” she said. “I’m fine… no. I wouldfollowyou if you tried to leave me here. But why is me being me so important?”
“You’re my first,” Tell said, his voice sounding slightly tighter. “Keon told me once… many decades ago… that if we couldn’t find any other way to square my debt to him, he would just take my firstborn daughter as a match for Isabella. AndI didn’t think that I would ever turn a woman… I didn’t everintendto turn anyone, so I thought very little of it. Apparently Keon feels differently.”
Tina frowned slightly, almost amused at the idea of someone trying totakeher from Tell.
“Not that I don’t trust you to handle it, but Hunter wouldn’t put up with that for a second,” she said, and Tell smiled.
“He didn’t even look back when he left,” Tell said. “That’s how unconcernedheis.”
Tina nodded.
“Why is it such a big secret?” Tina asked.
“Because Keon has enemies. Isabella is old enough to take care of herself, but if one of his enemies was looking for a way to hurt him, or if just about anyone with the power and an inclination to start a vampire war back up again were to hear about it, she’d be in more danger. He also doesn’t like the idea of people getting the impression that he’s losing control of her. She’s been a rebel her whole life, and everyone knows it, but he doesn’t want them to actuallytalkabout it, because he thinks it makes him look weak.”
“Because a woman who is hundreds of years old does something because it’s what she chose to do,” Tina said, and he nodded.
“Some of us take longer than others to move on from the past,” he said evenly.
“Tell,” Tina said, and he waited a moment, then answered with ‘hmm’. “Are you always the good guy in your stories?”
He glanced over her, quite serious for a moment.
“Are you afraid that I’m lying to you or that I’m keeping the worst stories from you and only telling you the good ones?” he asked.
“You…” Tina started, hesitating as she tried to figure out how to say it without it coming across as an accusation. “You seemambivalent aboutgoodorbad, and you keep warning me that you’ve done stuff that is… unthinkable, but… It’s just hard to believe, given the person I feel like Iknow.”
“With many decades come many personalities,” Tell said wryly. “You’ll be surprised, if you actually go through with this in the long term, how much variability a single person can have and still be the one that you know, underneath it all. The difference between behavior and identity… Mmm.”
She stared at him for a moment, then shook her head.
