Fledgling by Octavia E. Butler Read Free Book Online Page B

work, I would bite her. Then she would accept my being here, keep it secret, feed me, and then maybe help me find some of the answers I was looking for.
    “I’m glad we’re going back to the site of the fire this weekend,” I said. “I found articles that said the place was abandoned and that vandals set it afire.”
    “Good work,” he said. “I thought you’d find something online.”
    “But why would it say that?” I demanded. “I’m sure it wasn’t abandoned. In fact, I’m pretty sure I was there. It was close to the cave where I woke up and not really close to anything else.”
    He thought about that, then shook his head. “I found articles at the library that said the same thing,” he said. “They were from two small newspapers in the area. The reporters wouldn’t have any reason to lie.”
    I shook my head. “If I can find them, I can get them to tell me why they lied. But first I want to go to the ruin. I’m connected with that place somehow. I’m sure I am. And Wright, the clothing I was wearing when you found me, I got it at one of the burned houses. It had been folded and put away … maybe in a drawer or on a shelf. When I found it, it was at the bottom of a big pile of half-charred clothing, and it had only been burned a little. Why should an abandoned house have piles of clean, folded clothing in it?”
    Wright nodded. “I’ll take you back there then,” he said. “Saturday?”
    “Friday night.” I stood on tiptoe and still could not reach him. I was annoyed for once that he was so tall, but he picked me up again and held me against him. I bit him a little at the base of his throat, drew a few drops of blood. It wasn’t necessary, but we both enjoyed it. He stood still, holding me, letting me lick at the wound.
    After a while, he sighed. “Okay, Friday. Are you going to let me eat my pizza while it’s hot?”
    I licked once more, then pulled away from him reluctantly and slid down his body. “Eat,” I said, and picked up the vampire book. “I’ll read and wait for you.”
    The book was interesting but not that helpful. Many cultures seemed to have folklore about vampires of one kind or another. Some could hypnotize people by staring at them. Some read and controlled people’s thoughts. It would be handy to be able to do things like that. Easier than biting them and waiting for the chemicals in my saliva to do their work.
    Not all vampires drank blood according to the book. Some ate flesh either from the living or from the dead. Some took in a kind of spiritual essence or energy—whatever that meant. All took something from their subjects, usually not caring how they injured the subject. Many killed their subjects. Many were dead themselves, but magically reanimated by the blood, flesh, or energy they took. One feeding usually meant the taking of one life. And that made no sense, at least for those who took blood. Who could need that much blood? Why kill a person who would willingly feed you again and again if you handled them carefully? No wonder vampires in folklore were feared, hated, and hunted.
    Then my thoughts drifted back to the man I had killed at the cave. I killed and fed as viciously as any fictional vampire. I ate a man without ever recognizing him as a man. I’d not yet read of a vampire doing that, but I had done it.
    Did others of my kind do such things? Had I done such a thing before? Had someone found out about us and tried to kill us back at the ruin? That would seem almost … just. But what about the other people who had been at the ruin? Had they been like Wright or like me? Had the ruin been a nest of vampires? I could still remember the scents I had found here and there around the ruin where flesh had been burned. Now I tried to sort through them, understand who was who.
    After a while, I understood that some of them had been like me and some like Wright—vampires and other people living and dying together. What did that mean?
    Wright got up, came to