it impossible to see more than an outline of his body.
It was the music, though, that caught my attention. The notes were rolling off the guitar with great sadness and melancholy. Despite the beauty of the music, I hesitated to walk closer. A bit of pressure was building in my head. I took a sip of water from my bottle, thinking that I was dehydrated, before it dawned on me. The pressure was coming from him. I was being pecked at again, which meant that the man I was staring at was actually a guitar-playing vampire. I was in no mood for examination after such a long ride and immediately shut him out.
Out of the shadows I saw him raise his head and laugh, and then he looked away and continued to play his guitar. It was an easy decision to leave, but as I turned to head back toward my bike, the mystery musician spoke.
“Don’t worry,” he said in a voice that carried a trace of a Southern drawl. “I won’t try again. I didn’t realize who I was dealing with.”
I decided not to answer. I don’t normally speak with strangers under any circumstances.
“Don’t you want to finish what you started?” he asked, a touch of sarcasm in his voice. “It’s worth it to get to the other side.”
I wasn’t sure what he was saying. The previous evening’s discussions had further opened my eyes to the world around me. There were two dimensions to everything. Was he saying I was afraid, or did he mean something else? I wasn’t afraid, although I had never been alone with a vampire in a dark tunnel before. Now that I was really focusing, I could detect a very bright green aura surrounding him. He was very calm and I didn’t feel threatened in any way. His stance made me curious: who was this mysterious, guitar-playing vampire with the velvet-green aura down at the end of the tunnel? I walked toward him to find out.
Walking briskly, I closed the gap between us, but he made no effort to move or rise to meet me. In fact, as I approached, all I could make out was a cowboy hat, bright red hair and a pair of faded jeans beneath an old acoustic guitar. Whoever he was, it was clear he was not prepared to speak with me again.
I had been raised to never chase boys or men—a policy I amended on the spot to include the undead—so I gave him a feeble wave and he tipped his hat back in acknowledgment. Then I walked through the tunnel and into the clearing. The air was growing colder and I could feel the fog beginning to push its way in. The chill in the air convinced me that it was time to get myself back across the bridge and into a hot bath.
Elsa would want to discuss Gabriel’s offer to come and work for the Council when I got home. The fee he had offered me was enormous, certainly more than I made on my own in a year. Although I didn’t need the funds, it was intriguing to be offered a king’s ransom for doing a job I loved doing. When I finished gazing at the churning sea below, I walked back through the clearing and approached the tunnel, hoping to catch a glimpse of the guitar player again.
When I stepped into the shadows, I discovered I was alone.
By the time I returned home ninety minutes later, I’d decided to accept Gabriel’s offer. Whether it was the encounter with the vampire in the tunnel, or Gabriel’s remarks, I now knew I had to make some changes. Despite my resolution, I decided to call my mother to gauge her reaction. After all that I had experienced, the visions I’d seen of my grandmother, I felt I needed to talk to her.
We’d parted ways so badly weeks before, and now I was anxious to clear the air.
Within seconds of dialing she picked up her receiver. “Olivia,” she said warmly. “You have found your gifts. I can feel the energy pouring out of you.”
“Wow,” I said. “Even over the phone, Mom?”
“Your energy is very powerful,” She said. “How did this happen?”
“I met someone, a woman who’s been helping me. Her name is Elsa and she has been a sort of, umm a mentor. She said Grandmother sent her.”
There was a pause on the line.
“That is exactly the kind of thing she would think to do. Interesting that she