chapter 3 (seemed about time to switch)

In the nearly two hundred years he'd been a vampire, Aurelian had learned a couple of things. (One of those being that he really liked being called Aurelian. He hadn't hated Ruslan, but there was something about owning a name that you'd chosen for yourself, instead of being tied to something your parents had given you.) He'd learned that sunlight would, indeed, kill him. Garlic wouldn't. A cross held right in his face would repel him, but he'd been in the Sistine Chapel and Notre Dame and Chartres without any ill effects, other than a little nervousness. Holy water would burn. It hurt, but it wasn't fatal.

A hundred and fifty or so years ago he'd met the Castillons, Clare (who was Irish) and Alexandre (who was French), and had gotten some very smart financial advice. He'd learned how to cover his tracks from decade to decade, usually by packing up and moving on. He'd learned a number of languages, he'd learned that Italians tasted different from Austrians who tasted different from Greeks who tasted different from Spaniards, and humans of the twenty-first century tasted different from humans from the nineteenth. That made sense to him, though - it had to be the difference in diet. He imagined humans in the sixteenth century tasted even more different.

( cut for randomness about aurelian )

chapter 4 (sam, three weeks later)

This is the thing, Sam thought, as he took his saxophone apart and put her away in her case. I like guys. I've known that for a while. So ok, so I've only dated girls, but I kissed Teddy on New Year's Eve, which counts for something, and this guy is really pretty good-looking, and I'm nervous why?

He wished his cousin Spencer was there to give him some advice, although knowing her it would be "Stop seesawing and ask the guy out, dammit."

( cut for length )