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There was so An elderly soul Forget about it

Wet earth, rando leaves in the wet suht blocks from here over the the Irish Channel, where a train whistle cut the night, leading the distant soft roar of box cars

The cicadas died down suddenly, but the song of the tree frogs was strong, and there were the night birds, which only a vampire could hear

Low lights along the cement path provided a very feeble illumination And there were other such beacons scattered in the farthest reaches of the garden Two floodlights fixed high in the oak spilled a soft luminescence over the scene As for the moon, it was full but veiled behind the pink panoply of clouds, and so ere in a thin rosy and penetrable darkness, and all around us the garden was alive and bal to feed upon us with countless tiny mouths

As I stepped on the lawn I caught the faint scent of the alien species, the scent that Quinn had caught when he cahost of Oncle Julien I saw the scent hit Mona with her heightened gifts She drew herself up as though revolted, and then took a deep breath Quinn dipped down to kiss her

Stirling played host with the gathering of the chairs about the table He tried to disguise his amazement at the vision of Mona Thecircuht ent to tell him that Merrick Mayfair was no more But Monahe couldn't

quite keep it to himself

Rowan's snohite gown dragged in the , I couldn't tell which or catch any words orto it Then he took off his wrinkled white jacket He put it over the back of a chair But he stood staring at the tree as though finishing a soliloquy He was a big chunk of a eously made

Stirling helped Mona to her chair, and bid Quinn to sit beside her I waited for Rowan and Michael

Suddenly Rowan turned and threw her arht as a mortal woman could do it, sofeverish words I couldn't catch, eyes racing overfrantically And then she began to touchup ers At last she thrust , lettinginto my eyes

I ca my mind Did anyone have a clue as to the crash and thunder inside me? I locked the casket of my heart I punished it I endured

All this while, Michael never looked at us He had sat down at so Mona and Quinn, and he was talking to Mona, singing the fatherly chant again in a soothing voice as to hoeet and pretty she was, and that she was his darling daughter I could see all that out of the corner of my eye, and then in sheer weakness, the lock inside athered up Rowan's supple limbs and I kissed her forehead, the hard sweet skin of her forehead, and then her soft unresisting lips, and let her loose ar her slip into the chair beside Michael Silent Done

I went to the other side of the table and sat beside Mona I was bitterly full of desire It was unspeakable to need soht Ravenous, repulsive creatures singingthe soft fertile earth, creatures of such loathsomeness I couldn't dwell on it And the clatter of the riverfront train unendingly And then the absurd song of the calliope on the riverboat that took the tourists up and down the ay as they feasted and laughed and danced and sang

"The Savage Garden," I whispered I turned away as if I hated them all

"What did you say?" Rowan said Her eyes broke from their feverish movement just for one moment