She scoffs. “Fine. A vampire bit my foot in a brawl, but I escaped. I wanted to hunt him down, though. A bit of a pride thing. I don’t like how close he got to actually causing damage.”
“Sure.”
“I’d been hunting the vamp for weeks after he nicked my foot, but he kept getting out ahead of me. When I realized I had a shadow, I sat still and waited for the creature to come to me. Avet stumbled upon me because it turns out, the vampire was hunting me, instead of the other way around. And Avet was hunting whatever he could get his hands on, which just so happened to be the vampire I had my sights set on.”
“Why was the vampire hunting you down?”
Sevan tugs a necklace from under her shirt. “Because of this little trinket I picked up a few years ago.”
I frown at the locket. “What does it do?”
“It’s a Sarkisyan locket, blessed by the jewelry maker himself.”
I have no idea what she’s talking about and convey that fact via a nonplussed look in her direction.
She runs her fingertip over the golden surface of the oval, showing off the green stones along the outer edge. “It makes my blood taste sour to the vampires who are daft enough to come after me. The vampire bit me but he didn’t go in for the kill because he was disgusted at my foul blood. Then he was intrigued after I escaped, I guess. I was hunting him, trying to trap him and end his life, while he was trying to figure out why my blood tasted so weird.”
I gape at her. “That’s cool.”
She scoffs at my lame assessment. “It’s more than cool. It’s rare and it’s mine.”
Her snappish retort tells me a lot about her value system. She likes rare trinkets and keeps them tight to the vest. Not a bad quality, but good to know.
“Avet is good at figuring out how things work. Has he taken a look at it? If it’s a spell, maybe he can figure out which one. Or if there’s something inside that’s making your blood sour, he can taste it and repeat the concoction so we can all have one. That would be useful on the job.”
She rolls her eyes at me. “If it was that easy, this wouldn’t be a rare artifact, would it. If witches could actually turn a person’s blood sour, they would infuse the public drinking supply with the stuff to eradicate vampires altogether.”
I frown at her dismissive attitude. “How do you know it’s not that simple? You’re not a witch. Avet should at least look at it.”
Chagrin colors her cheeks. “I can’t open it, okay? Are you happy? I don’t know what makes it work. All I know is that every time a vampire tries to drink from me, he spits out my blood and looks at me as if he doesn’t understand why my blood tastes gross.”
I settle into my seat. “We can figure that out together. That’s the one benefit of not doing things alone all the time. Other people might be able to help you.”
She pauses, seeming to consider my words before dismissing them out of turn. “Now you talk,” she insists after a few seconds, crossing her arms over her chest after she tucks the locket back inside her shirt.
“I don’t need to talk.”
Sevan doesn’t back down. “That’s how I met Avet. How did you meet him?”
I swallow hard, knowing I can’t wuss out now. Not after she revealed a raw part of her story. “Avet and I met at a support group for teens who had lost their parents.” I pause for the pity that usually comes, which is a big part of why I don’t tell my story. I don’t need pity, and I really don’t need to be known.
Sevan remains silent until it is clear I am not going to speak unless prodded. “How old were you when your parents died?”
My gosh, this woman asks too many questions. But my gruff “none of your business” is replaced with the truth. “I was twelve when my mom died. My birth father is probably still alive. Not sure. Avet lost his parents when he was thirteen. Avet and Cher went to go live with their grandparents, and I went into foster care when things with my birth father didn’t work out. Avet and I met at a support group, and that’s that.”
I indulge in a long inhale, again waiting for the pity that always comes when people hear the term “foster care”.
Sevan doesn’t carry on but gives the situation appropriate consideration. “That sucks. I’m sorry.”
I appreciate her blunt assessment. I prefer it to the predictable fawning. “It was fine. Sargis took me in.”
“I didn’t realize he was a registered foster parent.”
“He may have forged a few documents so he could take me in. You know how he works.”
“He’s a good guy.”
“Sure. I was a kid with a lot of questions. Seeing your mother murdered in front of you by a creature with dripping fangs will do that to a kid.”