He hated to sleep on trains for many reasons, but the continuous sweet rocking of the car that brought him to London had pulled him in and made his head feel heavy. He didn’t like sleeping anymore at all, for he feared to dream of them one last time, or for the first time. It had been so long that he could not tell.

At first he believed that he would be able to resist it due to all of the eyes that watched him. It had happened as soon as he boarded the train and he could not help but feel slight dismay at the feeling of polite contempt that he felt from the other passengers. He found instead a certain respect for those who did immediately stare.

             He seemed handsome enough, with a tall graceful frame and fair hair. The dark circles about his eyes (for everyone had those) had seemed far too dark. He looked pale and hungry, and while everyone near these parts did, his had an edge. The garlic flowers ringing his neck told a story, and it was not a story anyone particularly wanted to hear.  His clothes were fine so many thought he was rich, but the flowers- they made him seem like a mad man.

            Perhaps he was neither rich nor mad, but whatever he was, his disheveled appearance and ominously large black leather bag made people assume the worst.

            They had seen that look in a living man before; there was always one walking around. The desperate hunger of a man who lost everything was not so easy to ignore. The preparation, the darkness about his eyes framing the fact that he mostly kept to the night caused the passengers to squirm in their seats uncomfortably. For what purpose could he be following to bring him into London? He could not possibly be here for the Lady.

            He could tell these thoughts as openly as he could read a book; for they seldom varied the closer he got to the city. Truly, the reach of the Lady was even wider than he had originally anticipated, having bedded himself down in a small inn so far south from London that he believed he would be amused. The wife of the innkeeper had eyed him suspiciously and charged him double for the luggage he carried. The loyalty was something he had not noticed as a young man. Perhaps it was merely because he had felt the same loyalty many years ago.

 He did not blame these people for their ignorance, but the pinched look on the faces of the other passengers blamed him for his wisdom.

They wanted nothing to do with a man who had decided to call himself a hunter. Murmuring in panicked outrage, one by one they stood to leave, not wanting his madness to infect them as well. One man had half a mind to give the hunter what for- they didn’t need that in these parts, but his wife took him by the arm and gently lead him away with a kind word.

Keeping his face untroubled by what conspired around him, he watched as rain began to streak the windows. The pattering of the tiny droplets sang a sweet and deceptive lullaby, and soon his chin rested on his chest, finally giving into the sleep he had staunchly denied himself. A harried young mother quickly got to her feet, clutching a young toddler close to her. The baby soon began to cry, confused over his mother’s sudden movements. Desperately she shushed him, casting a worried glance over at the sleeping man as she quickly made her way out of the car.

            Only she stayed. With a serene face she stood to her feet and grabbed her own travelling bag with gloved hands. The train lurched forward and she held onto the back of her seat before standing up straight and making sure her hat was right. She thought that the large feathers and flowers were utterly ridiculous for travel, but that was the fashion these days. The train lurched in a turn again, but this time she did not falter as she made her way to his seat. She paused only once- heart pounding- for fear that she would wake him before she sat. Only when she was certain that he would not did she move forward.

            Once safely seated across from him, she watched the shadows of the rainy afternoon play across his face, chased by horrible memories and worse regrets. She studied him like an artist would, tracing the lines of his cheekbones, the gauntness that was beginning to leave hollows in his cheeks. She studied him as though she would have to recall these features on some later date, and her face remained unreadable.

            Lazy fingers of afternoon light began to creep through the slats of the blinds covering the window as the rain slowly began to let up. Light touched his cheek like a lover might, the watery sun caressing his pale skin gently, causing him to turn into it, fold into it with the subtle longing of one who had finally come home.

            She caught her breath as one eye opened; the brilliant icy blue of a winter sky. And still so tired. His eyes locked onto hers. She watched as strange recognition dawned in them.  His lips moved slowly, forming a name that was not hers. She stayed still and allowed the sleep to clear from his mind.

            She allowed him to remember.

            He sat up further, straightening his wrinkled (but fine nonetheless) dark gray waistcoat. His dark blond hair was disheveled in a most ungentlemanly fashion; he raked a hand through it in a weak attempt to make it presentable. Winking on his right hand was a simple mourning ring; she wondered whose hair lied within it. He cleared his throat politely, his eyes flicking over her as he righted himself. She could feel a tension, of nerves bordering on anxiety. She felt perhaps that she should speak first, but he relieved her of that responsibility as soon as those ice blue eyes scanned the car, finding that they were the last two people inside. He greeted this with dull acceptance, before turning back and pinning her beneath his gaze.

“Are you not afraid as well?” he asked her. For a moment she flirted with the notion of pretending to not understand what he meant, but the empty car spoke louder than her own thoughts, and she smiled wryly.

            “I have dealt with worse things,” was her simple reply, the musical lilt of her Scottish accent making her sound far warmer towards him than she felt. A bitter burst of a chuckle escaped his lips at that and she could hear a slight tinge of nervousness in his voice. Had she been too cavalier?

            “I have no doubt that you have, Miss-”

            “Evangeline,” she interrupted with an even tone to her voice.

            “Evangeline,” his lips rounded around the syllables as though he was not completely comfortable with calling her by her first name.

            “And you are Oliver Chattoway,” she continued. She had expected him to look at her in complete astonishment, as though she had performed some great feat of magic. Instead he merely frowned. She watched as his hands flinched instinctively toward the bag at his feet. Her nerves frayed slightly in the knowledge that she would not be able to defend herself if he got his hands on whatever weapon in the bag.

            “What brings you to London, Evangeline?”  

            “You do, Mister Chattoway.”  Using his formal name was the least she could do since refusing to give him her last and perhaps it would put him at ease.  There was a pause as he quickly sorted over which item on his list to address first. Quicker than Evangeline expected, the blade was at her throat. She took a deep breath to still the quickening of her heart. She did not know he could move so fast. His body was still as a shadow in the seat beside her; she could hear his uneven breathing and wondered if he felt more afraid than she did.

            “Call me Oliver,” he replied, first item stricken.

            She carefully nodded.

            “What kind of business could you need me for? I was a banker once, but I can no longer claim to handle money.”

            Her smile widened as if she were amused by some private joke. Evangeline could see his gaze sweep over her and take in her appearance for the first time. While mostly she assumed from men that they were taking in the beauty of her thick dark hair, her white skin free of blemishes, and her eyes that were dark yet sparkled with intelligence, she knew that he was searching her features for the signs.  

            “I know what you hunt,” she said simply. “Frankly I am surprised to find you in England.”

            He bristled at the assessment. “I hunt all manner of things,” he replied gruffly.

            “I would like to offer my assistance,” she said. At the mere mention of this his eyebrows shot up in disbelief. She smiled at that, taking brief pleasure in taking him off guard.

            “Not what you expected?”

            “I am travelling into the territory of the enemy. The last thing I expect is to meet an ally. Enemy, more like.”

            This wasn’t true, but Oliver knew better than to admit that to a potential agent of the Lady. Evangeline seemed to guess this, and laughed lightly.

            “Do you think I work for the Lady? A Scot like me? She’d sooner toss me out than hire me!”

            It was true, the Scottish had staunchly refused to bed the knee to her Ladyship; it was her well known point of contention, though a thorn in the foot of a giant. He cut his eyes at her suspiciously.

            “It isn’t hard to mimic,” he said with his voice now tinged with a passable Scottish accent. “It would be the perfect cover up, wouldn’t it?”

            Evangeline could tell the difference of course, but those who weren’t native most likely would not give a fig one way or the other. She chucked slightly before wincing as the edge of the knife bit lightly into her flesh. There was a cut, she could feel it, but it couldn’t have been deep.

            Any deeper and she would be dead.

            The blood was so negligible that she barely knew it was there until a tiny drop ran down her throat. Oliver’s pupils grew large as the scent hit his nostrils, and Evangeline kept calm as he convulsively moved away from her, rubbing his eyes. His breath had quickened and she knew better than to be flattered.

            She didn’t have the tainted blood that would mark her as the Lady’s own. Oliver exhaled with something that sounded like tortured relief. Evangeline could have told him that earlier, but what good was her word? Blood at least always ran true.

His grip on the knife relaxed in his hand, and his face took on a look of boyish embarrassment at what he had done.  Evangeline breathed easier and brought her hand to daintily massage her throat.

Oliver studied her, less cursory this time. Evangeline dressed modestly, but she dressed well. His banker’s eye no doubt could pick out the expense of her silks in her dress that she wore beneath her practical wool coat. It was growing chilly in November. She wore her gloves high, with buttons winking all the way to the elbows. Her traveling hat seemed fashionable enough, but Oliver could never understand the meaning behind the jumble of ribbons and carefully arranged feather plumes. There was little he knew about the fashion of women, but what little he did only served to baffle him.

They sat in stalemate for several moments while he regarded her. She bit her lip slightly as she looked back, a nervous habit she had yet to stamp out from her childhood.

            “How old are you?” He asked, finally breaking the silence. The conversational question took her off-guard at its forwardness, but she supposed that she had been the one to forgo propriety the moment she had him call her by her name.

             “Nineteen,” she replied fearlessly. He flinched at that.

             “A woman your age should be getting married, having children. Safe. You do not want to join me on this path. It is not a mere adventure to be sought out with a girl’s fancy. This path ends, and I am not fully sure that it would end happily. I knew a girl once who-“

             He cut himself off as the train began to slow as it rumbled into the station in London. Far off in others cars Evangeline could hear the murmuring of the other passengers preparing to disembark on their own journeys. Journeys far away from this so-called vampire hunter in his madness.

           Oliver stood, retrieving the bag at his feet. Evangeline could hear the clink of metal on metal and wood on wood in that bag and wondered where he had produced the knife. Most likely his sleeve, she thought. There were ways to keep ones concealed in all sorts of places on the body, though it was unladylike for Evangeline to admit that she knew such things. Stepping out of his seat into the aisle, he turned to give her one last look.

            “I’m sorry miss, but it is best if you stayed away from me, and run as far as you can in the other direction with all due haste.”

            He gave a little gentlemanly bow and tipped his hat before turning to walk towards the exit of the car.

            “I know what you are,” she called after his retreating back. She hadn’t meant to say it, she hadn’t meant to say anything, and her heart began to beat a little faster as he stopped at her words.

            “I’m not afraid,” she insisted, standing and gripping the back of the seat. She saw his shoulders move as a wry chuckle escaped his lips. He turned to look at her again, and their eyes met.

            “That,” he replied. “Is precisely why you cannot help me.”

            Standing among crumbled dried garlic flowers, Evangeline watched him turn and walk away. There seemed to be a chill in the air and she held herself tightly, noting that instead of indifference in his blue eyes, all she had seen was a terrible and ravenous hunger.