Tara watched as I wandered around the trees in the dark. She kept quiet for a few minutes, but eventually she had to ask.

"This isn't quite what I expected when you mentioned seeing the sights and being tourists, you know? Why are you obsessed with this place? I get it's the spot you died, but why did you want to come back and see it again?"

It was Wednesday evening, nearly midnight. We had in fact done some touring both yesterday and today. We took the ferry over yesterday afternoon and wandered around the Toronto Islands, though there wasn't much to see there. Then last night we walked all the way out to the end of the Leslie Street Spit. Neither of us had ever been out there despite spending most of our lives in the city. And today we visited the CN Tower, which was another one of those touristy things neither of us had experienced before.

Tonight I'd insisted on returning to Thomson Park, back to the place where I died. It was a long-shot but there was a puzzle I needed to at least try and solve.

"I'm not obsessed," I replied with a sigh. "I've been thinking about what you said when we were here on Friday. Why was Isabelle here? It's been bugging me since then. I can't shake the idea that she was here for something specific. It also seems strange, or at least a weird coincidence, that this whole area was never part of anyone's patrol? Almost like the Family intentionally avoided this part of the city."

Tara frowned, "You know it's going to be impossible to find out why she was here? I mean, that was almost four decades ago, and she's been dead for years."

"Yeah I know," I replied as I continued looking around. "I'm trying to remember what direction she came from when she showed up. I want to retrace her steps back to wherever she came from. It's a long-shot but it's all I've got."

After another minute or two of circling around I finally gestured east, "Ok. I think it was that direction."

"Let's go," Tara said as she moved to my side.

The two of us set off through the woods. After a couple minutes we emerged from the trees at one of the footpaths, right where a little bridge took it across the creek. My heart sank slightly. If this is where Isabelle came from, then she probably came across the bridge which meant there wasn't really any way to know what direction she originally started from.

From Tara's expression I knew she was thinking the same thing, but she didn't say anything.

I sighed, but moved across the bridge then continued heading east. Now I was basically just winging it and Tara knew it. She stayed quiet as she walked with me, through more woods and underbrush.

We muddled along for a few more minutes, before we came up a little hill and emerged from the trees into an old cemetery. A little winding road ran past the area on our left, and on the far side of the graveyard ahead of us was a relatively new church and parking lot.

I knew there were some really old graves here, it was originally a settlers cemetery or something like that. Or maybe the park used to be a settler's farm or something. Whatever it was, I knew there was some old stuff here, and I vaguely remembered there was something historical about the park.

"I mean," I said with a grimace, "It's cliche but maybe she was lurking around a cemetery that night?"

Tara suppressed a smile, "Since we're here we may as well look around."

Me and Tara wandered around the gravestones for a bit, but I knew the whole outing was futile. There was no way I'd figure out what Isabelle was doing out this way almost forty years ago.

After five or ten minutes I finally sighed, "Ok I guess I've wasted enough time. Thanks for indulging me Tara, and thanks for not complaining too much. Let's head back to the car. We can get back downtown and maybe do something productive."

She slipped an arm around my waist and gave me a hug as we turned back the way we came. "It's ok Sam. I'm sorry we couldn't find what you were looking for."

We were almost back to the edge of the graveyard when we spotted the girl. I had no idea where she'd been hiding or where she came from, or why we didn't see her or hear her or even smell her.

She looked fifteen or sixteen. She had long sunny blonde hair, her skin was fair and her eyes were bright blue. She was maybe an inch taller than me, and just as slim and petite. She was wearing colourful leggings and a powder-blue hoodie, and dark blue running shoes on her feet.

Tara and I stopped, and I almost did a double-take. It was one of the school girls we'd seen when we were here on Friday, the one who frowned at all of us when we emerged from the woods with Jess and the others.

The girl had her hands stuffed in the pockets of her hoodie and she was casually leaning against one of the larger grave monuments as she looked me and Tara over. There was something about her that set my nerves on edge, but I wasn't sure what it was. As far as I could tell she was just a normal young teenage kid, hanging out in a graveyard in the middle of the night.

A moment later I realized what was wrong about this girl. I couldn't hear her heartbeat, or see any body heat coming off her. I'd have suspected she was a vamp except I couldn't smell any undead scent from her.

Tara and I exchanged a glance, then I asked the girl "Who are you? What are you?"

A wry grin settled on the blonde's face, she seemed amused by my questions.

"What am I?" she asked, mocking me. Her voice was pretty, and she sounded like any typical teenage girl. "I'm a vampire, blood sucker, leech, Nosferatu, undead. Does that ring any bells? Sound like anyone else you know?"

My girlfriend frowned, "You don't smell undead. And we saw you on Friday walking home from school with some other kids, you weren't protecting your eyes. No sunglasses."

She grinned again, "What can I say, I'm an enigma."

Me and Tara exchanged another glance. If this girl really was a vampire, she was something different. I was also getting a little impatient with her attitude, but I realized if she was as young as she looked then she was basically stuck as an immature teen forever.

I asked, "So what's your name? And what do you want with us?"

"You can call me Penny," she replied. "You lot invaded my territory the other day. When I had a look at you I realized the two of you smelled like my Dame. So when you came back tonight I decided to get a closer look."

I frowned, "Who's your Dame? You don't mean Isabelle do you? She was my Dame."

Penny scoffed and rolled her eyes, "Hardly."

"So who's your Dame then?" Tara asked. She sounded like she was getting impatient with the girl's attitude as well.

The blonde replied, "Her name's Lucilla. I haven't seen her since the eighteen fifties though, I have no idea if she's still around."

That threw me for a moment. If this teen wasn't lying, she'd been around for nearly two hundred years. That would make her the oldest vampire I'd ever met. I was still confused though, because I wasn't getting 'elder vamp' vibes from her. But then I couldn't pick up her undead scent either.

I shook my head, "I've never heard of Lucilla. And if you haven't seen her in a hundred and seventy years, how could Tara and I possibly have her scent on us?"

Penny shrugged, "I'm guessing it has something to do with a couple little glass vials of my Dame's preserved blood. I'm wondering how you got your hands on them, considering I gave them to Isabelle."

Tara and I exchanged another glance, I could tell she was thinking the same thing I was. This kid was full of surprises.

"How did you know Isabelle?" I asked. "Was she a friend of yours? Was she here to see you that night in nineteen-eighty-eight?"

Tara added, "Isabelle gave the blood to Sam. Please can you just give us some straight answers? This could be important."

The young teen looked back and forth at me and my girlfriend, then sighed "Fine. So how do I know I know her? Isabelle's Dame was Claudia. And Claudia's Dame was me."

My eyes widened as I stared at the girl. I'd never known who Claudia's Dame was, but I assumed it had to be someone powerful. I knew from Isabelle's stories that Claudia was always strong, even when she was young.

Penny continued, "And yeah, Isabelle dropped by for a chat that night she found you. I guess things worked out ok for you huh? You're lucky she was so curious. She'd probably have been a scientist, if she was born sixty or seventy years later and didn't become a vamp."

Tara asked, "Do the rest of the Family know you're here?"

"Nah," the kid shook her head. "Claudia and Isabelle knew, but they both kept my existence secret. When the city got big enough that Family territory bumped into mine, they set it up so the Family never crossed into my turf? But they never actually told anyone why they set it up that way."

I had about a million more questions for the girl but it was hard to know what to ask next. "So you're some kind of elder or something? You don't act like a vampire elder. You don't talk like one either."

She rolled her eyes, then stood up straight and spoke in what I took to be some kind of posh upper-class English accent. "Would you prefer if I talked like this? I am Lady Penelope Westcott, I am your great-grand-Dame and I am not amused."

Me and my girlfriend exchanged another glance, and Tara asked "Lady Penelope? You're some kind of English noblewoman?"

The teen slumped back against the monument and shrugged, "Something like that. Whatever. I'm not stuck in the past like some vamps are. The world changes, gotta keep up with it right?"

Tara and me looked at each other again. I had no idea what to make of this person. I wasn't even sure I believed half the stuff she'd told us. I was positive my girlfriend was thinking the same thing.

"Hey Penny?" Tara asked. "How old are you? When were you turned?"

The kid rolled her eyes again, "Ok, time for a history lesson I guess? I have no idea when Lucilla was turned, but I know she was around for the fall of Rome. She's positively ancient. I was born in seventeen-thirty and Lucilla turned me in seventeen-forty-six. I hung out with her for almost fifty years before we parted ways. I met Claudia in London and turned her in eighteen-forty-seven, and the two of us hung out there for a while. We ran into Lucilla there too, that was the last time I saw her. And that's when she gave me some of her blood, told me to keep it handy incase it was ever needed. She never elaborated what that meant, but she was always vague and mysterious that way."

"Me and Claudia came to Canada in eighteen-seventy, and in eighteen-eighty-two she joined the Toronto vamp clan while I kept to myself. Claudia met and turned Isabelle in nineteen-sixteen, then in nineteen-eighty-eight Isabelle met your girlfriend Samantha and turned her in the park over there. And finally Samantha turned you a few years back. But you already know that part of the story."

Penny finished with a shrug, "So the three of us are all on Lucilla's line. And coincidentally, all three of us share Lucilla's blood. I got a bunch of it direct from her in seventeen-forty-six, you two got a few ounces of it a lot more recently."

I sighed and rubbed my forehead, "This is a lot to take in. So our ancestor was an ancient vamp named Lucilla, and you're a sixteen-year-old girl who's been around nearly three centuries. And Isabelle knew you and was consulting with you?"

Tara added, "You still haven't told us how you don't have a scent, and why you didn't need sunglasses the other day. And what about those other three girls you were walking with? I'm positive they were human, we'd have noticed if all four of you were undead."

The girl smirked, "Ok, the other three are normal living kids. They don't know I'm a vamp, and I'd appreciate if you avoided feeding on or killing my friends, or any other humans in my territory. Hiding my scent and not getting blinded or sunburnt are a few of the tricks I've learned over the years. A little bit of magic."

I stared at her again in surprise, and maybe a little envy. I'd long since given up on the idea of ever being able to enjoy the sunlight, but suddenly I was imagining what it might be like. The idea of actually owning a bikini or something, or at least a swimsuit, and going out in the summer sun and feeling that warmth on my skin as a girl was too alluring.

"You can be in the sun without it hurting?" I asked her with maybe a little too much curiosity in my voice. "Could you teach us that?"

"Uh Sam?" Tara said as she looked at me. "Maybe there's some more pressing things we should ask about? Like maybe Penny here knows about the Slúag Marb?"

I sighed, "Yeah, good point."

Penny looked back and forth between me and my girlfriend, then said. "C'mon. Enough of this hanging out in the graveyard crap. We can talk at my place, it's more comfortable there."

Without waiting for a response, the girl turned and started walking north-west, out of the cemetery and onto the road.

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