Page 43Evade

The girl stood up, very elegantly. It was as if she knew every muscle in her body even better than I did. She didn't move towards or away from me though. It was just a simple move to stand up and nothing more. Still, it made me feel she was listening to music in her head. Dancing to an unheard melody. She waited patiently for her previous word to fade before she spoke again.

Though she had me mystified already, it was nothing compared to what she did next.

"Defend yourself."

While speaking those words, her feet moved swiftly over the candle, dousing it with the passing wind. The room was surprisingly dark. And anyone not able to see in darkness would probably have been very surprised. But she moved as if she could see easily.

Her dress barely flapped as she daintily stepped towards me and made a high sweep with her feet towards my face. Her agility and speed amazed me. Not a movement out of place. Perfect harmony in her body. It was surprisingly difficult to dodge. She could feel the strands of my hair with her feet as I moved my head backwards, avoiding her kick.

But she didn't give me any chance to reconcile. In one movement, she stood on the leg she just kicked with and made an easy punch with her other arm. I had to sidestep it. I tried to move as quietly as I could, but there was nowhere to hide. Though her eyes hardly ever appeared to look at me, her face just neutrally forward, she knew exactly where I was. Every move, kick and punch she dealt my way were swift and efficient.

It wasn't easy to keep up with her at all.

Even worse, anything I tried to do back, failed almost as soon as I thought about it. Could she read minds? That actually felt unlikely. My mind was so buzzing with moves, evasive manouvres and analytics, that it would be improbable that someone else listening to that would be able to read it, filter out what I would actually decide and act on that. No, something else must be going on here.

Things were speeding up.

Her feet moving easily around the candle on the floor, never touching it, but staying close. As I was defending faster, her attacks were speeding up as well. Didn't she have human limits?

Just as those thoughts raced through my head, she stopped. She stood back and waited for me to calm down as well. She was only breathing a little heavy, but nothing that would even be noticable by a normal person. Who was this girl?

She definitely was not a vampire. She had a heartbeat too fast for that and she smelled right. She actually smelled very, very nice. Natural and clean. Elegant and simple. As I looked at her with surprise, she turned to the table with the laptop to retrieve some matches, using one of them to light the candle once more.

It was then she smiled at me and spoke again.

"You're too fast. Are you human?"

Simple words, spoken in sweet tones. I decided to do the unpolite thing for once and satisfy my own curiousity first. Especially because it felt a lot more pressing. I wanted to know where I stood with her. I didn't want to kill a child.

"Why did you attack me?"

She giggled. "As a test. You moved so swiftly yesterday that I wanted to know if it was real or not. However improbable, it appears to be real."

Her words and the body speaking them didn't match up. "How old are you?"

"Twenty one. Would you kindly answer my question now? Are you human?"

Twenty one? She really only looked like she was only fifteen. And it wasn't just the candle light. Her slight stature, frail body, all of it pointed towards a younger age. But her words and her manners were much older. Since she had been forthcoming in her answers, no dishonesty in her voice, I believed her.

And now to decide if I wanted to answer her question honesty. Of course I still saw myself as... human. More or less. I didn't exactly feel different. Even though I'd slept for a year or hadn't seen a sunrise for even longer. Not that many people looked at those anyway. Much too early. Sunsets were a lot more popular.

There was an easy answer that was true. "Mostly."

She smiled at me with an interesting glint in her eye. "Will you indulge me in guessing what makes you faster while we have a cup of tea?"

I didn't want to refuse, curious what would come. "Eh, I'm not really thirsty, but sure."

"Wait here."

She moved through the other door on the side of the room, beyond which appeared to be a small kitchen. While I heard an electric water boiler doing it's sacred duty, I looked around. She'd left me here with her laptop, but considering my knowledge, that didn't mean much. And... It occurred to me that if she was able to place me so precisely in darkness, knowing where I was in the room, generally speaking, was easy.

She knew I wouldn't do anything.

Who was this girl?

Who indeed...