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k_a_webbThat was a question that Alice wasn’t certain she should answer, but she had no other option. “You’re in the Donor House, honey.” Leanne’s eyes told Alice that she knew about the House and what she knew wasn’t good. “We’re not going to hurt you. All of the vampires here have made the decision to only feed from people who have made an informed choice as to whether they want to be donors or not. In order to do that we give them all the information they feel they need and they aren’t forced to stay here if they decide, before their first feed, that they aren’t ready for this.”
“Why before the first feed?”
“It’s safer that way. When a vampire feeds from a human it leaves what I can only call a scent marker and all other vampires can smell that, which, for reasons I have yet to understand, means that they’re more tempting.” Alice shrugged. “As we don’t want to make anyone more tempting to the auction vampires we make certain that a donor isn’t fed from until they are certain that this is what they want.”
“Okay.” Leanne brushed her hand through her hair. “Is it wrong that I want to learn more?”
“No, of course it’s not, but there are humans who automatically assume that all vampires are dangerous, we’re all hunters, we’re all creatures of darkness… and I don’t blame them for thinking that way. There are vampires like that, but it’s not all of us. We’re doing our best here to change things for vampires and humans, so we can learn to live together, rather than one of us feeling like prey.”
“My parents told me to stay away from the Donor House.” Leanne bit her lip. “They have certain beliefs about vampires, the ones you’ve just talked about, and I didn’t stop to think that they might be prejudiced. I just assumed they were being sensible after all the stories I’ve heard about vampires hunting humans, and the auctions, and the addicts.”
Alice tried to find a way to explain what she was thinking, without affecting the way Leanne saw her parents. “They were, in one way, because I would be extremely wary myself of a place like this if I didn’t know what it was like. I’d just appreciate it if people would do their research before they judged us, because we aren’t dangerous. We only let vampires come back if we know for certain that they aren’t going to hurt one of our donors.”
“You might not believe this but we wouldn’t be here if we didn’t accept what Alice was saying as the truth.” Dominic walked out holding the items of clothing she’d asked for. “Nick sent me out with these and said the hot chocolates are on their way, as are the snacks, but Jean-Luc can’t decide what to bring.”
“Leanne, this is Dominic. He’s one of our donors, who’s been here since the beginning, and Jean-Luc is a vampire, who happens to be related to Nick though Nick’s creator.”
Mirrored from K. A. Webb Writing.