41 Are You Alright?

Cirdan was waiting for them rather impatiently because they arrived nearly fifteen minutes late but was all smiles once he saw they were looking at him. "Welcome back Miss Gardner! I assume this is the vampire friend you spoke of?"

"Yes," Ruby said simply. "We need to set up an account for him and deposit some checks."

Greed glinted in his eyes. He was remembering the check she deposited earlier and was hoping for more like that. Today would be his lucky day.

Cirdan led them back to his office and began asking the same sorts of questions he had earlier when Ruby was setting up her account. Ash was reluctant to answer any of them.

"Tell me…do you keep your clients confidential?" he asked. "I can't make an account here if someone is able to find out I'm a customer."

A tic burst on the elf's forehead. He was obviously insulted. "Client secrecy is our top priority, sir. Your personal information will be safe with us. Please place your right index finger on the pad and tell answer the questions so we can get started."

Ash frowned but did as he was told. "My name is Ash Mayhew. I'm a vampire and am six hundred eighty-two years old. My phone number is 702-283-7099 and I live in a castle at the edge of a redwood forest not far from the Oregon/California border. It doesn't have a human address number."

Cirdan's professionalism slipped once again. "…did you say Mayhew? As in the Mayhew coven?"

The vampire's glare grew so ferocious that he shut up immediately and got back to work after apologizing. The air in the office was horribly tense after that and Ruby realized she knew absolutely nothing about vampire politics.

Witch covens were named after something distinctive about the area they resided in rather than the city because borders changed over time. The one back home was commonly referred to as the witches' coven but to non-locals it was the Redwood Coven.

It appeared that vampire covens were named after their members. Was everyone in that coven a Mayhew as well or was Ash special somehow?

If he was important in that coven, why would he consider it an enemy now? Ruby didn't understand. She kept her mouth shut until they needed her. She was added as an authorized user on the account too so checks with her name could be deposited in it.

Once the checks were deposited it seemed like Cirdan was happy to see them go. His business-like smile was incredibly strained as he waved them off and thanked them for choosing Elite Financial Solutions.

"Are you alright?" Ruby asked hesitantly once they were outside.

"No," Ash growled.

"Do you want to talk about it?"

"Also no."

Ash looked at her blankly. "Humans know how to imitate fairy flight?"

"In a very loose way. Why don't you try it and see for yourself?"

So he did. Ruby watched from below and could barely make out him screaming the entire time. She found it so hilarious that she recorded the entire thing on her phone. If she ever needed a good laugh she could bust this out and remember the sound of a shrieking vampire who otherwise didn't seem afraid of anything.

Ash stomped back to her at the end of the zipline and glared at her but there wasn't any real venom behind it. "That was terrible. You never said anything about flying being terrible."

"Flying isn't terrible to a fairy," she replied laughing. "Come on, there's somewhere I want to take you before I get too tired."

They headed back to the rental car and Ruby took the freeway out to Red Rock Canyon. It was far enough from the city lights that you could actually see the stars there. She figured it would be a decent distraction and she could sneakily summon some jewels while claiming to need to find a bathroom while she was at it.

She felt sorry for him. Really sorry for him. He had been forced to talk about something painful twice in the space of less than an hour tonight and it had obviously taken a toll.

Ruby drove to a place that was far from any other cars and flew forward, beckoning him to follow. "Do you know anything about constellations?" she asked.

Ash shook his head. "No."

"Me either. But I still like looking at the stars. Maybe we could try and come up with our own. That one right there could be an apple! Doesn't it kind of look like a circlish thing with a stem?"

He squinted at the place in the sky she was pointing to. "I don't see it. I think it's more like a thumbs up."

Ruby grinned at him for getting into the spirit of her silly game. The distraction was working. "Alright, now it's your turn. You pick something and I'll tell you what I think it looks like."

Ash took her directive seriously and pointed out a star cluster that he thought looked like a shoe. She didn't know what it was supposed to be but it definitely wasn't a shoe so she ended up laughing.

He smiled at her more genuinely than he had since he woke up tonight and her heart skipped a beat. She had been right about his smile looking better with his fangs.

Ruby wished he wouldn't be upset about whatever it was that drove him from his home anymore. She wanted him to be happy and smile like this all the time. He was a bit of an oddball but hey, so was she.

Spending time with him was never boring and she was more comfortable with him than she had been with anyone other than her baby cousin. It would be nice if they could both outrun their problems and simply enjoy the novelty of being together as friends.