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"Your mom?"
I stopped, an afghan in my hands. Like a little knife, twisted into my chest. "I don't know. She died when I was very young. My dad loved her so she must've been nice."
"So both your mom and your dad are gone? You have no family left?"
"Yeah."
"Kind of like me," she said in a small voice.
Poor kid. I came over and sat on the corner of the bed. "I know my mom's dead, because my dad saw her die, and I know my dad's dead because I was there when we buried him on a hill behind my house. I visit his grave all the time. But we don't really know anything about your mom. I didn't see her body anywhere. Did you see her body?"
She shook her head and stuck her face into the pillow.
"Well, there you go. No body, no proof she died. Maybe she somehow got teleported to a strange part of the city by that Bran idiot and now she's walking home. Maybe she's there right now. We'll just have to keep looking."
Julie made a sad kittenlike noise.
What do I do now?
I scooped her up, blanket, pillow, and all, and scooted her close to me. She sniffled. "The People probably turned her into a vampire."
I petted her hair. "No, Julie. The People don't just grab women off the street and make them into vampires. That's illegal. If they started doing that, the cops and military would exterminate them in a blink. They have to account for each vampire and they only want specific people for it. Don't worry, your mom isn't a vampire."
"What if she is?"
Then I'll walk into the Casino and there will be hell to pay. "She isn't. If you want, I'll call the People tomorrow and check on it."
"What if they lie to you?"
Boy, this kid had a major hang-up on vampires. "Look, you have to remember that vampires are mindless, like cockroaches. They are just vehicles for the Masters of the Dead. If you see a bloodsucker and it's not ripping everyone to shreds, there's an actual human being riding that vamp's mind. That human being has a family, probably has kids, cute little Master of the Dead babies."
She swiped a tear and tried a weak smile.
"The People have dozens of vampires. The People don't need to kidnap anyone. They have an applicant list a mile long."
"Why would anybody want to be a vampire?"
"Money. Let's say you have an incurable disease. Vampirism is caused by a bacterial infection, which transforms the victim's body so much that a lot of those diseases become irrelevant to the final vampiric organism. In other words, it doesn't matter if you have colon cancer - your colon is going to shrink into twine after a month of undeath anyway. So you apply to become a vampire. If you're selected, you'll be offered a contract that authorizes the People to infect you with the Vampirus Immortuus. Basically, you let the People kill you and use your body after death. And in exchange, the People will pay your beneficiaries a fee. A lot of poor people think that it's a good way to leave their families with a little bit of money after they are gone. It takes a week and a stack of paperwork to make a vampire, and the whole thing is reported to the State Undeath Commission. Making a vamp against a person's will is illegal, and they won't do something that would land them in prison for just one vamp. Listen, why don't you tell me about your mom? It might make it easier for me to find her."
Julie hugged the pillow. "She's nice. She reads books to me sometimes. Just the booze makes her tired and I leave her alone. Go outside or something. She's not like an alcoholic or anything. She just misses my dad. She only drinks on weekends, when she doesn't have to work."
"Where does she work?"
"Carpenter Guild. She used to be a cook, but the place got closed down. She's a journeyman now. She says once she makes carpenter, we'll see real money. She said that about the coven too and now she's gone. She always worries about money. We've been poor for a long time now. Ever since Dad died."
She drew a little circle on the pillow with her hand - the circle of life. Something the shamans did when they mentioned the deceased. Picking up Red's habits.
"When Dad was alive, he used to take us to the coast. To Hilton Head. It's nice there. We went swimming and the water was really warm. My dad was a carpenter, too. A piece of the overpass fell on him. Just squished him. There was nothing left."
Sometimes life just kept punching you in the teeth, no matter how many times you got up. "The pain gets better with time," I told her. "It always hurts, but it gets better."
"People keep saying that." Julie did not look at me. "I must be unlucky or something."
One of the worst things for a child is to lose a parent. When my father died, it was as if my world had ripped open. Like a god dying. Part of me refused to believe it. I so desperately wanted to put things back the way they had been. I would've given anything for another day with my dad. And I was so mad at Greg for not being able to wave his hand and make it right somehow. Then little by little, it set in: my dad was gone. Forever. No turning back. No amount of magic would fix it. And just when I thought the pain had dulled, my mind would betray me and bring Dad back to life in my dreams. Sometimes I didn't realize that he was dead until I awoke and then it was like a punch in the stomach. And sometimes I knew in my dream that I was dreaming, and I woke up crying.
But back then, I still had Greg. Greg, who dedicated his life to making sure I would be fine. Greg, who took me in. I didn't have to live on the street. I didn't have to worry about money.
Julie and her mother didn't have that luxury. Qualified carpenters were paid well, because woodwork was magic-proof. The death of Julie's father must have destroyed their lives. It knocked them down and they just kept sliding lower and lower. It would've been easy to keep rolling until they hit rock bottom. I hugged Julie to me. Her mother must've loved her a great deal, because she picked herself up and she started climbing. She had fought her way into the Carpenter Guild, which couldn't have been easy with all the competition out there. She became a journeyman, which was a hard step up from apprentice. She was trying to keep her daughter off the street.
"You never told me your mother's name."
"Jessica," Julie said. "Her name's Jessica Olsen."
Hold on, Jessica. I'll find you. And I'll keep your baby safe. Nothing will happen to Julie.
As if sensing what I was thinking, Julie squirmed closer to me and we sat quietly, cloaked in the warm night.
"Tell me about the coven. Was your mom in long?"
"Not long. Couple of months. She said they were worshipping a great goddess and we'd all be rich soon."
