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not to be taken seriously by a grown man."

"Some of them stories is part true," Marsh protested feebly. "I mean, I know lots of pilots who claim they seen the lights of the phantom when they went down the Raccourci cutoff, and even heard her leadsmen cussin' and swearin'. And the Drennan Whyte, well, I don't believe in no curses, but she went down just like Mister Framm tells it, and them other boats that came to raise her went down too. As for that dead pilot, hell, I knew him. He was a sleepwalker, is what it was, and he piloted the steamer while he was dead asleep. Only the story got exaggerated a mite goin' up and down the river."

"You've made my point for me, Abner. If you insist on the word, then yes, vampires are real. But the stories about us have gotten exaggerated a mite as well. Your sleepwalker became a corpse in a few years of telling stories about him. Think of what he'll be in a century or two."

"What are you then, if you ain't no vampire?"

"I have no easy word for what I am," Joshua said. "In English, your kind might call me vampire, werewolf, witch, warlock, sorcerer, demon, ghoul. Other languages offer other names: nosferatu, odoroten, upir, loup garou. All names given by your people to such poor things as I. I do not like those names. I am none of them. Yet I have nothing to offer in their stead. We have no name for ourselves."

"Your own language..." Marsh said.

"We have no language. We use human languages, human names. Such has always been our way. We are not human, yet neither are we vampires. We are... another race. When we call ourselves anything, it is usually one of your words, in one of your languages, to which we have given a secret meaning. We are the people of the night, the people of the blood. Or simply the people."

"And us?" Marsh demanded. "If you're the people, what are we?"

Joshua York hesitated briefly, and Valerie spoke up. "The people of the day," she said quickly.

"No," Joshua said. "That is my term. It is not one my people use frequently. Valerie, the time for lies is past. Tell Abner the truth."

"He will not like it," she said. "Joshua, the risk..."

"Nonetheless," Joshua said. "Valerie, tell him."

Leaden silence for a moment. And then, softly, Valerie said, "The cattle. That's what we call you, Captain. The cattle."

Abner Marsh frowned and clenched a big, rough fist.

"Abner," Joshua said, "you wanted the truth. I have been giving you a great deal of thought of late. After Natchez, I feared I might have to arrange an accident for you. We dare not risk exposure, and you are a threat to us. Simon and Katherine both urged me to have you killed. Those of my newer companions whom I have taken into my confidence, like Valerie and Jean Ardant, tended to concur. Yet, though my people and I would undoubtedly be safer with you dead, I held back. I am sick of death, sick of fear, endlessly weary of the mistrust between our races. I wondered if perhaps we might try working together instead, but I was never certain that you could be trusted. Until that night in Donaldsonville, that is, that night when Valerie tried to get you to turn the Fevre Dream. You proved stronger than I had any right to expect when you resisted her, and more loyal as well. Then and there, I decided. You would live, and if you came to me again, I would tell you the truth, all of it, the good and the bad. Will you listen?"

"Do I got much choice?" Marsh asked.

"No," admitted Joshua York.

Valerie sighed. "Joshua, I plead with you to reconsider. He's one of them, however much you like him. He will not understand. They'll come up here with sharpened stakes, you know they will."

"I hope not," Joshua said. Then, to Marsh, he said, "She is afraid, Abner. This is a new thing I propose to do, and new things are always dangerous. Hear me out and do not judge me, and perhaps we can have a true partnership between us. I have never told the truth to one of you before..."

"To one of the cattle," Marsh grumbled. "Well, I never lissened to no vampire before neither, so we're even. Go on. This here bull is lissenin'."

Chapter Thirteen

Of Days Dark and Distant

LISTEN then, Abner, but first hear my