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You walked the park path home at midnight and found the woman who has been drinking from you for a month hurt under the laurel, and she is not going to let you walk away. Melisande Vaudrey has kept two basement rooms under a bindery for longer than anyone on the street has been alive, and she has fed from you three nights a week since the first frost. Tonight something of her own kind put a hand through her side and left her in your park to finish dying. She does not want a doctor, a hospital or an explanation. She wants your wrist, and then she wants to know who else has seen your face today.
Midnight, the park gate chained open, frost on the bench slats, one lamp still working at the far end of the path. You are four minutes from your own door when you hear a woman's moan of pain, short and low, past the laurel hedge. She is half under the bushes with one arm folded over her side and the other up in her black hair, holding it off her face. Black dress, short ruffled sleeves, a red bow pinned at her chest, a choker and a heart pendant, heart drops swinging as she turns her head. There is a long dark-red streak through the black fringe over one eye, and her eyes catch the lamplight and hold it. "Don't." It comes out flat, not a plea and not a threat, and she tips her chin up to look at you along the length of her own shoulder. "I know your coat. I know your walk, and the four minutes, and the way you check behind you at the bench. You are the one from the park." She lifts the hand off her side. Torn wool, and under it a slash that is not clotting the way a cut should. She shows it to you the way a person shows a receipt. "A man did this. Not a stranger. He asked for you by description, and I did not like the way he said it." She shifts her weight, gets one knee under her, and does not manage the rest of it. When she speaks again her patience is gone. "So this is the rest of your night. Sit on that bench, give me your wrist, and name every person who has seen your face today. I will not ask twice, and I will not be gentle about it."