Hotel Sanguinaria

Chapter Five

Over the next week, Shiloh began to learn how to speak Latin, how to be a vampire and how one should never, ever, under any circumstances trust Neith with a fountain pen, a rubber band and thirteen plasters.  Rachael was good, though.  The red-headed New Yorker had begun to teach her Latin and Shiloh had been surprised to learn that her new friend wasn’t going to run ordinary language lessons.

“In most language lessons today you start off with ‘Hello, my name is, how are you?’ and all that jazz.  I’m going to teach you how to introduce yourself without sounding like an idiot.  Trust me, it’s better this way.  You’ll know how to strike up casual conversation before I teach you how to say ’when I was younger I played soccer because it was fun and energetic.’  You’re not aiming to include as much vocab as you can; it’s not for a grade.  Now, the sentence structure is…?”

Shiloh rolled her eyes, a smile playing around the edge of her lips.

“Subject, Object, Verb.”

“An example in English would be…?”

“Instead of ‘I hate you’, the Latin equivalent would be ‘I you hate’.”

Rachael smiled and Shiloh felt her stomach flutter with – pride.  She was getting to grips with a new language and wasn’t messing up; she had reason to feel proud.

It was Wednesday when Neith began to teach her about vampire species.  Neith mentioned the multitude of variation among their kind and waved her hands loftily as she began to explain how they’d branched out from a single ancient species millennia ago.  Shiloh huffed out a breath.

“Vampire species?” she asked.  “We’re vampires.  Is there anything else?”

“Plenty,” replied the dark girl smoothly.  “The genus Sanguinaria is split into multiple species, such as the common Slavic, Sanguinaria slavia – such as yourself – Sanguinaria graecus, the red-haired vampire that frequents Greece and the surrounding islands.  Sanguinaria vallis is a shy Welsh species that keep largely to themselves; one of their rogues almost brought the whole species to light with a spate of sheep killings in Bodalog – that’s a little before your time, though.”

Rachael cut off her rambling with a sharp look.

“Each species has different rules to help keep its members safe.  The general rules, though, apply to all of us.  One; keep to the system of your species.  It’s there to protect you, so don’t just dismiss it.  For you, that means no sliver, crucifixes, garlic, rowan-wood or pure running water.  Stay out of the sun.  Don’t – on any account – force entry into a building of sacred significance.  You’ve gotta be invited.”

“So – stick to basic vampiric lore and I’m 50% less likely to die?” Shiloh interjected.  Neith grinned.

“Pretty much.  You’ve had the easiest transition.  Some guy a few years back – have you met Mo?  Little Korean guy, blue hair and the thickest cockney accent you’ve ever heard?  Yeah, him – he got bit by a rare species whilst visiting some distant relatives – the children of his great-aunt’s something-or-other – and it took us six months of painstaking research through the Korean section of our Archives before we were able to let him do anything without supervision.  On top of that we found out that this “rare” species wasn’t rare at all, but had simply lost contact when the country had begun to split and the conflict had cut them off.  Mo was a last-ditch attempt to say ‘hi!’”

“This is gonna be quite a heavy lesson for you,” Rachael said.  “Sorry.”

“It’s fine,” Shiloh looked across at her.  “What else is there?”

“Don’t bite.  Ever.  Even if they beg you to bite them, don’t do it.  Bring them to somewhere near the hotel, somewhere out of the way, and send up a flare.  We’ll find you and then deal with the situation as it comes to us.”

“More importantly, you’ve got to remember we don’t exist,” Neith smiled sadly at her.  “The sooner you understand that, the better.  Even if you see the love of your life walking down the street, you turn away and walk home.  Don’t even think about it.”

It wasn’t easy to keep all of this in mind, but Shiloh was by no means stupid.  The laws that were put I place to protect both sides – vampires and humans – were strict and could result in execution if broken.  They explained to her the IHA – the International Hunter’s Alliance – which took care of rogues and gave the vampire race a link with humans that also allowed them to remain hidden.  The WPD – the World Population of the Damned – was the official name for the global vampire community.

“And we couldn’t come up with a better name for us?” Shiloh asked.  Neith laughed.

“’Fraid not,” Rachael smiled too.  “Just remember; the laws are equally strict on both sides.”

“Don’t worry about it, though,” Neith chipped in.  “Stick around Rachael and you’ll be fine.”

Shiloh looked over at Rachael, but to her surprise the other woman’s eyes were fixed on Neith, only looking across at her when the dark girl had finished speaking.  Shiloh looked away, but sensed Rachael’s eyes remain fixed on her.  Neith looked between them.

“Looks like whatever work I need do tonight is done.  I’ll see you both tomorrow?”

“Yeah,” Rachael said.  “Tomorrow.”

“See you then,” Shiloh smiled, and Neith left.  Nervousness bubbled in the pit of Shiloh’s stomach, but she pushed it aside.  It was nervousness about her bizarre new life, she told herself.  Nothing more.

The pair of them resumed Shiloh’s Latin lesson where they had left off yesterday, and Shiloh felt herself relax into the teaching of the language.  It was several hours before they finished, but she didn’t feel all that tired.  Perhaps, she mused, vampires didn’t require as much sleep as humans.

Rachael said goodnight and left.  Shiloh was about to do the same when the door opened behind her.  She spun round, but found herself staring at – Neith.

“Oh,” she gasped.  “It’s just you.”

“’Just me’, huh?” Neith grinned.  “Not somebody important?”

Shiloh shook her head at the other girl’s antics.

“Anyway, I’ve got something for you.”

“What?”

“This,” and with that, Neith stepped forward and pressed a piece of paper into Shiloh’s hand.  Unfolding it, Shiloh could see it had a line of jumbled numbers on the top, and a line of funny symbols – like hieroglyphics, but not quite the same – beneath.  Each symbol and number was separated by a thick black line to show how each was singular.

“What is this?” Shiloh asked.

“You’ll know when you’re ready for it.”

“Seriously?” she groaned.

Neith shrugged.  “Sorry.”

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A/N: Hey look! Plot! Hope you enjoy this chapter - Neith's been the most fun I've had writing for a while...

~Elri