Fledgling(74)

Meanwhile, the Gordons and their symbionts worked hard to prepare for the fact that they were soon going to have a great deal of company. The Silk family—all their Ina and most of their symbionts—would be coming. Two representatives from each of thirteen other families would be coming, each bringing three or four symbionts. A Council of Judgment traditionally lasted three days.

Most of the Gordon symbionts were excited and looking forward to meeting friends and relatives they hadn’t seen for months or even years. Would Judith Cho sym Ion Andrei be there? Or Loren Hanson sym Elizabeth Akhmatova? Did anyone know? What about Carl Schwarcz sym Peter Marcu? No one bothered asking me since it was clear that I knew nothing, but they chattered among themselves around me, happily ignoring me except to say that it was a shame I wouldn’t get to enjoy any of the parties.

Only a few of them were apprehensive. To most, the Council of Judgment was an Ina thing that had little to do with them. Their Ina had disputes to settle. The symbionts planned to have parties. I enjoyed watching and listening to them. It was comforting somehow.

Several went out to buy the huge amounts of food and other supplies that would be needed to keep well over a hundred extra symbionts comfortable. Others prepared the guest quarters in each of the houses and transformed offices, studios, storage space, and even space in the two barns into places fit for human and Ina habitation. Every house had guest quarters—three or four bedrooms and a couple of bathrooms. These would be enough for a couple of traveling Ina and a few symbionts. And then there was the guest house itself, intended especially for human guests. My symbionts and I had arrived at a time when the Gordons’ symbionts had no guests visiting, so we had had the whole guest house to ourselves. Now we would have to share the kitchen and the dining room and give up the downstairs bathroom, as well as the living room and family room.

The Council meetings would be held in one of the metal storage buildings. Martin Harrison, Joel’s father and William’s symbiont, the man who had given me a cell phone and taught me to use it, now seemed to be in charge of preparations for the visitors. Once I understood that, I found him and asked if I could follow him around for a while to see what he did and to ask him questions.

“I really want you to tell me if I’m in the way or if I’m being too irritating, because I can’t always tell,” I said, and he laughed. It was a loud, deep, joyful-sounding laugh that was a pleasure to hear even though I knew he was laughing at me.

“All right, Shori, I’ll do that,” he said. “I was a high-school history teacher when Hayden found me. It will be good to have a student again.”

“Hayden found you? Not William?”

“Hayden found me for William.” He shook his head. “William hadn’t yet come of age, and Hayden thought the boy could stand to learn more of human history. Hayden thought I’d make a good bodyguard, too, since William goes completely unconscious during the day. He said I smelled right, for godsake. I understand that now, but I didn’t then. I wanted to believe he was crazy, but he’d bitten me by then, and I couldn’t just ignore what he told me.”

“Did you mind that you would be symbiont to another man?” I asked, remembering the question that Wright had asked Brook.

He gave me an odd look. “You don’t care what you pry into, do you?”

I didn’t answer—since I didn’t know what to say.

“There are plenty of women here,” he said. “I married one of them shortly after I decided to stay.” He lifted an eyebrow. “How’s your new symbiont—the one who came in last night?”

“Theodora?” I smiled, seeing the connection. “She says she doesn’t understand her feelings for me but that they are important to her.”

“I’ll bet. I saw you two. You were all over each other. That’s the way it goes. It doesn’t seem to matter to most humans what our lives were before we meet you. You bite us, and that’s all it takes. I didn’t understand at all. Hayden ambushed me as I got home from work one day. He bit me, and after that I never really had a chance. I didn’t have any idea what I was getting into.”

“Are you ever sorry you got into it?”

He gave me another strange look, this broad, tall black man. Joel had his coloring but would never have his size. Martin just stood, looking down at me as though trying to decide something. After a while, he said, “The Gordons are decent people. Hayden brought me here, showed me around, introduced me to William, who was tall and spindly but looked almost as young as you do now. Hayden let me know what was going to happen if I stayed. He let me know while I could still leave, and I did leave. They didn’t stop me. William asked me to stay, but that made me run faster. The whole thing was too weird for me. Worse, I thought it sounded more like slavery than symbiosis. It scared the hell out of me. I stayed away for about ten months. I’d only been bitten three times in all, so I wasn’t physically addicted. No pain, no sickness. But psychologically … Well, I couldn’t forget it. I wanted it like crazy. Hell, I thought I was crazy. All of a sudden, I lived in a world where vampires were real. I couldn’t tell anyone about them. Hayden had seen to that. But I knew they were real. And I wanted to be with them. After a while, I quit my job, packed my things, put what I could in my car, gave the rest away, and drove here. God, it was a relief.” He stopped and smiled down at me. “Your first doesn’t want any other life, girl, no more than Joel does. The only difference is Joel knows it. Wright is still finding out.”