�I must ask you sir�are you the gentleman who saved me from being�taken at the pub?�
The man was silent for a moment and when he answered it was final, as if he wished to discuss what he had done no further.
�Yes.�
This man entranced Farayne! The men she knew would have expected medals and parties and would have basked in the �honorable deed� they had done for months! Yet this man expected nothing but a simple �thank you� for his heroic deed.
�I can not thank you enough sir. I shudder to think what those characters would have done to me, had it not been for your intervention.�
�Think nothing more of it. I did nothing that any other gentlemen would not have done. Please, allow me to walk you home.�
�Yes. Thank you.�
Farayne could not explain it but she felt completely at ease with this man, yet she knew nothing about him. How did she know that he was not the same type of man, like the men who tried to have their way with her, at the pub? She didn�t. How did she know that he would not do worse to her than anything she could imagine? She didn�t, yet she had no fear of him. She felt at ease with him.
The walk home ended much too quickly for Farayne, and she stood at the gate for a long while watching, after the strange man left her.
She didn�t know how, but she knew she had to get to know this dark angel as she called him.
Farayne saw Garrison every night after their first meeting. She was intrigued by his mannerisms, his speech, and his actions. He was a perfect gentleman and always made her feel like a real person, not some trophy to be had, to raise one�s social standing.
He lived in a stylish, but quaint country manor. It was neither pretentious nor showy. It was filled rather, with objects of interest. Objects he claimed to have picked up in his many travels.
He didn�t speak much about himself, preferring to hear more of her interests. The men she had been raised around could, and oftentimes did, talk endlessly about themselves. Yet here was a man that would say nothing to her beyond what was required. She ached to learn more about him and hoped that with time, he would open up to her.
So far he had told her he was the only child of a Scottish Duke, Gandarwyn Maxwell and his wife, a Duchess in her own right; even before she married his father, Duchess, Elsabet Urquhart. Like she, and her new friend Aggie, Garrison had shunned his royal upbringing, and left home at the age of seventeen to see the world. He had never retuned to his ancestral home at The Isle Of Skye. The last time he had visited his home was when his mother died. He was not warmly received. The rest of family had never forgiven him for breaking his parent�s heart by deserting them, when he should have taken up his position as heir to the family castle, after his father�s death. The title of �Duke of the House of Tronquin� had died out with his father, and that was something the family would never forgive.
Now, he traveled and wrote memoirs that he hoped to one day publish. He let Farayne read a few of them and they were fascinating. What an exciting life he had led, sailing the seas with pirates, traveling the English countryside by horse, studying the ways of the Orient with wise Chinese masters, and exploring the ruins of Greece! Farayne hoped that she could one day see the things that he had seen, and more.
As time went on she found herself deeply in love with her handsome savior. She hoped he would return her feelings. On impulse, as they walked the countryside by the bright light of the full, harvest moon, she hugged him. He didn�t pull away, but instead slipped his arm around her. His feelings soon became evident.
After a lovely, quiet dinner one evening he bore his soul to her. Never could she have prepared herself for what he was going to tell her. She encouraged him to talk freely. She loved him deeply and nothing he could tell her, she assured him, could sway her feelings for him.
He began slowly at first, and then as he spoke, the words came more easily.
GARRISON�S STORY
�My dear, I have told you I was born on The Isle of Skye to nobility, but I never told you when I was born. I was born in the year ten eleven. Yes, I know, the year is sixteen hundred and
twenty now. You wonder how that can be possible? It is possible because I am not a mere man you see. I am no longer mortal. I am vampyr, a vampire, cursed to walk the Earth until time holds no sway.