The wind-borne cries of wild beasts streamed like banners across the darkening sky.

On the left side of her neck in the vicinity of the main artery, a pair of festering wounds the color of fresh meat swelled from the sun-bronzed flesh.

“It’s the Kiss of the Nobility,” the girl said in a low voice, feeling all the while the eyes of the youth bearing down on her from horseback.

The youth tugged down the scarf shielding his face. “Judging by that wound, it was a vampire of some rank. It’s surprising you can even move.” His last remark was a compliment to the girl. The reactions of people who had been preyed on by vampires varied with the level of their attacker, but in most cases the victims became doll-like imbeciles, with the very soul sucked out of them. Their skin lost its tone and became like paraffin, and the victim would lie in the shade day after day with a vacant gaze, waiting for a visit from the vampire and a fresh kiss. To escape that fate, one needed extraordinary strength of body and spirit. And this girl was clearly one such exception.

However, at the moment the girl wore the dreamlike expression of the average victim.

She had lost herself in the beauty of the unmasked youth, with his thick, masculine eyebrows, smooth bridge of a nose, and tightly drawn lips that manifested the iron strength of his will. Set amid stern features shared only by those who had come through the numerous battles of a grief-ridden world, his eyes harbored sorrow even as they sparkled. That final touch made this crystallized beauty the image of youth incarnate, chiseled, as it were, by nature itself, perfect and complete. Nevertheless, the girl was shaken back to her senses by something vaguely ominous lurking in the depths of his gaze. It sent a chill creeping up her spine. Giving her head a shake, the girl asked, “So, how about it? Will you come with me?”

“You said you were knowledgeable about Vampire Hunters. Are you also aware of the fees they require?”

Scarlet tinged the girl’s cheeks. “Uh, yeah...”

“Your offer being?”

The more powerful the supernatural beasts and monsters a Hunter specialized in, the more expensive their fees. In the case of Vampire Hunters, they got five thousand dalas a day minimum. Incidentally, a three-meal pack of condensed rations for travelers was about a hundred dalas. “Three meals a day,” the girl said, as if she’d just settled on it.

The youth said nothing.

“Plus...”

“Plus what?”

“Me. To do with as you please.”

A faint smile played across the youth’s lips, as if mocking her.

“The Kiss of the Nobility is probably preferable to being bedded by the likes of me.”

“The hell it is!” Suddenly tears glittered in the girl’s eyes. “If it comes down to that or becoming a vampire, I have no problem with someone havin’ his way with me. That doesn’t have anything to do with a person’s worth anyway. But if you must know, I’m... no, forget that, it doesn’t matter. So, how about it? Will you come with me?”

Watching the girl’s face for a while as anger and sorrow churned together, the youth quietly nodded. “Very well then. But in return, I want to be clear on one thing.”

“What? Just name it.”

“I’m a dhampir.”

The girl’s face froze. This gorgeous man couldn’t be... But come to think of it, he was too gorgeous...

“Is that okay? If you wait a while longer, another Hunter may come by. You don’t have to do this.”

Swallowing the sour spit that filled her mouth, the girl offered a hand to the youth. She attempted a smile, but it came out stiff.

“Glad to have you. I’m Doris Lang.”

The youth didn’t shake her hand. Just as expressionless and emotionless as when he first appeared, he said, “Call me ‘D.’”

Doris’ home was at the base of a hill about thirty minutes at a gallop from where the pair happened to meet. The two of them rode at a feverish pace and arrived there in less than twenty minutes. The second she wrapped up her discussion with D, Doris put the spurs to her horse, as if pushed by the encroaching twilight. Not only vampires, but also all the most dangerous monsters and supernatural beasts waited until complete darkness fell before they became active. There wasn’t cause to be in such a hurry, but D remained silent and followed his attractive employer.

Her home was a farm surrounded by verdant prairies that were most likely rendered permanently fertile by the Great Earth Restoration Project three millennia earlier. At the center was the main house. Constructed of wood and tensile plastics, the house was surrounded by scattered stables, animal pens, and protein-synthesizing vegetation in orchards consisting mainly of thermo-regulators fastened to reinforced sheets of waterproof material. The orchards alone covered five acres, and second-hand robots were responsible for harvesting the protein produced there. Hauling it away was a job for the humans.

When Doris had tethered her horse to the long hitching post in front of the main house, the reason for her hasty return threw the door open and bounded out.

“Welcome home,” a rosy-cheeked boy of seven or eight called down from the rather lofty porch. He hugged an antiquated laser rifle to his chest.

“This is my little brother Dan,” Doris said to D by way of introduction, and then in a gentle voice she asked, “Nothing out of the ordinary while I was gone, was there? Those mist devils didn’t come back now, did they?”

“Not at all,” the boy replied, throwing out his chest triumphantly. “Don’t forget, I blasted four of the buggers just the other day. They’re so scared they wouldn’t dare come back again. But just supposing they do, I’ll fry ’em to a crisp with this baby here.” That said, his expression suddenly grew sullen. “Oh, I almost forgot... That jerk Greco came by again. Carrying some bunch of flowers he says he had sent all the way from the Capital. He left ’em here and asked me to pass them along to my ‘lovely sister when she gets home.’”

“So what happened to the flowers?” Doris asked with obvious interest.

The boy’s mouth twisted into a delighted grin.

“Chopped ’em up in the disposal unit, mixed in some compost, and fed it to the cows!”

Doris gave a deep, satisfied nod. “Good job. Today’s a big day. We’ve got company, too.”

The boy, who’d been sneaking peeks at D even as he spoke with his sister, now smiled knowingly at her. “Say, he’s a looker, ain’t he? So, this is how you like ’em, eh, Sis? You said the robots were in such lousy shape you were going out to look for someone to replace them, but it looks to me like you went out hunting for a man.”

Doris flushed bright red.

“Oh, don’t be ridiculous. Don’t talk that foolishness. This is Mr. D. He’ll be helping us out around the farm for a while. And don’t you be getting in his way now.”

“There’s nothing to be bashful about,” the boy chuckled. “I know, I know. One eyeful of him, and old Greco don’t look much better than a man-eating frog. I like him a heck of a lot better, too. Pleased to meet you, D.”

“The pleasure’s mine, Dan.”

Showing no signs of being bothered by the emotionless tone D used even when addressing a child, the boy disappeared into the main house. The pair followed him inside.

“I’m sorry, he must have really gotten on your nerves,” Doris said in an apologetic tone when dinner was finished and she’d finally managed to drive Dan off to his bedroom, ignoring the boy’s protests that he wasn’t sleepy yet.

D passed the sword he normally wore on his back from his right hand to his left as he stood at the window gazing at the darkness beyond. Thanks to the clear weather that had persisted the past four or five days, the solar batteries on the roof were well charged and glittering light showered generously on every corner of the room from lighting panels set in the ceiling.

Apparently there was something about the inhospitable stranger the boy liked, and he’d planted himself by the man’s side and wouldn’t leave, imploring him to talk about the Capital, or tell him about any monsters or supernatural creatures he might have slain in his travels. Then, to top it all off, he created quite a commotion when he said his sister was being a pest and grabbed D by the arm to try and bring him back to his room where they could talk man-to-man all night long.

“You see, he gets like that because travelers are so rare. And we don’t usually have much to do with the folks in town, either.”

“It doesn’t bother me. I take no offense at being admired.”

As he spoke, he made no attempt to look at Doris sitting on the sofa, wearing the shirt and jeans she’d changed into earlier. His tone was as cold as ever. Closing his eyes lightly, he said, “It’s now nine twenty-six Night, Frontier Standard Time. Since it has already fed once on the person it’s after, I don’t imagine it’ll be in that much of a hurry, so I suppose after midnight will be the time to watch. In the meantime, could you tell me everything you know about the enemy? Don’t worry; your brother is already asleep. I can tell by his steady breathing.”

Doris’ eyes went wide. “You can hear something like that through the door and everything?”

“And the voice of the wind across the wilderness, and the vengeful song of the spirits wandering the forest shade,” D murmured, then he came to stand at Doris’ side with the smooth strides of a dancer.

When she felt that cold and righteous visage peering down at the nape of her neck, Doris shouted, “Stop!” and pulled away without thinking.

Though the abhorrence was quite evident in her voice, D’s expression didn’t change in the least. “I’m just going to have a look at your wounds. To get a general idea of how powerful a foe I’m up against.”

“I’m sorry. Go ahead, take a look,” she said, turning her face away and exposing her neck. Even if the slight trembling of her lips was a remnant of her reaction seconds earlier, the redness of her cheeks was caused, no doubt, by the embarrassment of a virgin having her flesh scrutinized by a wholly unfamiliar young man. After all, in her seventeen years, she hadn’t so much as held hands with a boy before.

Seconds later, D’s expression had a distant air to it. “When did you run into him?”

Doris breathed a sigh of relief at the sound of his voice, which was entirely without cadence. But why was her foolish heart pounding so? Unaffected by her racing pulse, and gazing raptly at D’s face all the while, she began to recount the tale of that terrible night in the most composed tone she could muster.