Lilith, the new girl, was walking down the hallway toward him. Her steps were somewhat tentative, as if her feet were too small for the rest of her. Paul Michael noticed this because he kept his eyes on the ground. She wore black boots, and their heels clicked lightly against the brown linoleum with its shiny streaks. He could also see her legs, which were long, and her hips that switched gracefully in a predatory, feline way.

Lilith was not like any of the other girls at school, Paul Michael thought. No one knew where she had come from. She had black hair and dark, thickly lashed eyes. She had small, high b.r.e.a.s.t.s; but it wasn't only that she was beautiful. She didn't care what anyone thought of her. She always wore a big hat in the sun and covered her skin under black clothes. She hung out alone, strumming her guitar on a bench by herself. She drove a big old black Mercedes, and the rumor was she lived in it. She was freaky and knew it and was proud. Paul Michael believed that if he ever got to talk to her about Trellibrium she would not laugh or roll her eyes or walk away but might actually be interested. She might actually listen.

Paul Michael.

He heard his name, but he didn't actually hear it. It was a sound in his head. And it was in a voice he recognized from the time he had heard it last week, when he ran into her in the princ.i.p.al's office where they were both receiving lectures on something. It was Lilith's voice. As if she had spoken telepathically, like they did in Trellibrium.

Paul Michael stopped and reached for the amulet he wore around his neck. It was carved with the image of three archangels. Paul Michael's mother had given it to him.

"To protect against evil spirits," she said.

Paul Michael tugged at the chain, hard enough so that it broke. He threw the amulet into the trash can. Then he took off his gla.s.ses, pretending he just needed to rub his eyes, and looked up to meet Lilith's gaze.

She tossed a smile at him like you would give a dog a bone. Her sharp incisors showed, and her lips were the kind you would never see out here in Nowhere unless you were looking at a movie star on the cover of a People magazine in the 7-Eleven.

Someday, her voice said in his head, before she was gone.

Paul Michael and his mother lived in a small plywood house with cactus in the front yard. She was a nurse at the local hospital and worked nights mostly. Paul Michael's mother was so good at taking care of other people that no one thought twice about whether she took proper care of her son. He was strange; Paul Michael knew that was the consensus. She did her best, but he was just strange. Maybe he inherited it from his father, the neighbors speculated. There were rumors that he was a Satan-worshipping speed freak who had left Paul Michael's mother while she was pregnant. He was probably in jail somewhere, everyone said. And his demon seed would grow up to be just like him, probably. The poor mom, they said.

Paul Michael trudged down the sizzling road to the school. The days were long and hot, and he spent them dreaming of the planet Trellibrium. Now he was dreaming about Lilith, too. Maybe he would see her later.

At lunch, Paul Michael sat pretending to write about Trellibrium in his notebook, but he was actually watching Lilith. She sat cross-legged under one of the few jacaranda trees that had been transplanted onto the campus, wearing-in spite of the heat-a black turtleneck tunic, leggings, and boots and playing her guitar. She looked as cool as if the temperature was thirty degrees lower than it was. Her dark hair fell over her face so that Paul Michael could only really see her small, fierce chin, her movie-star lips, and a bit of her high, pale cheek. Her fingers, with their chewed-on, chipped-black-polish nails, were long on the guitar strings, and Paul Michael imagined them touching him. He had washed his hair carefully and applied deodorant for the first time in a few weeks. He was even wearing a fresh T-shirt.

Carter and Kirk walked past him, and Carter spat on the ground near Paul Michael's shoe. A little spittle flew and sparked white on the scuffed brown leather.

"Lookin' good, man. You actually took a shower," Carter said.

Kirk snorted. "I don't smell him."

"Got a girlfriend or something?"

Paul Michael scribbled furiously in his book, just nonsense words in tiny, unreadable script. In Trillibrium the princess Namalie Galamara had fallen prey to the evil Pharmatrons.

Carter and Kirk wouldn't leave. They were smaller than he was, but Paul Michael knew they could smash his face if they wanted. He forced himself to look up and saw Lilith watching him. Almost imperceptibly, she nodded her head. Had he imagined it? His heart jolted blood through his veins.

Was she?

Yes.

Lilith was standing. She took her guitar off and left it on the gra.s.s. She put on her black sun hat and dark gla.s.ses. She was coming over. Carter and Kirk looked at each other, laughed nervously. Lilith kept stepping along in that precarious way on her black suede boots. She stood in front of the boys. Carter and Kirk moved back away from her. She ran her fingers across Paul Michael's scalp, took the long strands in her hand and gently pulled so that his neck fell back and he looked up at her. His eyes were blue with pinp.r.i.c.k pupils, and hers were very dark, ravenous.

Carnivorous, Paul Michael thought. She has carnivorous eyes. Black moons.

In Trellibrium, Norser prepared to rescue Namalie.

I'm coming for you, Lilith said. Soon. Then she added, You don't have to be afraid.

He hadn't really heard her voice, but he knew what she had telepathically communicated, the way Namalie "spoke" to Norser. Paul Michael felt the transplanted gra.s.s under his fingertips, tugged at the blades the way Lilith tugged at his hair.

Eventually the gra.s.s would die too. It wasn't supposed to be here either.

Succubus.

Paul Michael lay in his bed in the dark. He had fallen asleep thinking about Lilith. She had run off after tugging on his hair like that, and he hadn't been able to speak to her anymore.

"Come in," he said aloud in his sleep. He was known to say things in his sleep and even to get up and walk around sometimes. Once his mother had found him naked at the foot of her bed, staring at her in a way that she said turned her blood to blue ice. So she gave him the pendant with the archangels and started locking her bedroom door at night.

He felt a pressure on his chest and opened his eyes with a gasp.

Lilith was squatting on his chest, balanced on her feet on the bed with her elbows on her knees and her hands cupping her chin. He realized he had never seen her skin under all the clothes. It was so white that it glowed a pale blue. She had a long neck, long, graceful arms, and a delicately formed collarbone that looked like a bird in flight. Her black eyes were staring hungrily at him, and her teeth were bared. She shifted her weight and drummed lightly on his Adam's apple with her long fingernails. She bent over him and swayed so that her shiny black hair caressed his face.

It was hard for Paul Michael to breathe. He struggled to move, but she had him pinned. His hands grabbed at her legs-the flesh of her calves was cold and covered with small b.u.mps. He ran his fingers down and felt her feet on either side of his torso. They were even colder and had a rubbery texture. What felt like webbing connected the toes.

"What are you?" Paul Michael asked. It was as if she had come down from outer s.p.a.ce (maybe from Trellibrium?) to rescue him. He was still having trouble breathing, but he was not afraid. He was suddenly hard, and all his extremities tingled. He felt-what was it he felt? He felt lucky. He felt chosen.

"What do you like best?" Lilith said. "Queen? Beautiful Maiden? Storm Demon? Wind Demon? Succubus? You tell me."

"You are a G.o.ddess," he whispered, and she leaned over and pressed her teeth against the vein along the side of his neck, leaned in hard and sweet until the skin ripped and a bead of blood burst forth.

A vampire? Paul Michael thought. But not like the ones in the books all the girls in his school carried around like bibles.

"I'm just going to have a little this time," she told him. "And you'll have just a little too. Then we'll do it again." She paused and wiped the blood from her mouth. "Maybe at Kirk's party this weekend?"

Paul Michael closed his eyes. When he woke the next morning, there were a few black feathers in his bed and blood on the sheets and on his mouth.

Geek.

He decided to go to the party, even though it was at Kirk's. Paul Michael needed to see Lilith. And after the other night he felt different, braver and more intuitive. Had she done this to him? Could vampires do that? He tried to recall what he had read about them in comic books and seen in horror films. He thought so....

The party was at a ranch house with a pool where kids splashed in a haze of aqua blue light. Paul Michael got beer from the keg and looked around for Lilith. He saw only Carter and Kirk.

"Look who crashed the festivities!" Kirk said.

"He's probably looking for his girlfriend," said Carter, and Kirk sn.i.g.g.e.red. "Fat a.s.s really cleaned up his act. I even think he's losing some of that paunch." Carter smacked Paul Michael in the gut with the back of his hand, and Paul Michael bent over as the pain flashed through him. He had lost weight. He had hardly been able to eat since Lilith had come to his room, but he didn't feel hungry or weak at all. If anything, he had felt stronger until Carter slammed him like that. That strength was because of her, Paul Michael was sure, vampire or no.

He wished for a second for the archangels on the pendant his mother had given him, but they hadn't really helped in the past. The only thing that had helped was Lilith. Maybe she had bitten him like a vampire, but she was the closest thing to an angel he'd ever come across, inside his mind or out.

She was standing outside the sliding gla.s.s door by the pool, and lozenges and trails of blue light trembled over her skin. All she wore was a thin black satin dress that looked more like a slip, and she had her boots on. He felt a tremble of desire go through him because he was the only one there-he was sure-who knew what was under those boots. It wasn't gruesome to him. He knew her intimately. He knew her secret.

Carter saw Paul Michael and Lilith looking at each other. He said to Paul Michael, "You know where the word geek comes from? You must know, right? Geek?"

Kirk laughed, sputtering beer down the front of his shirt.

Carter snapped his fingers at Kirk without looking back at him. "Go get it," he said.

Kirk ran off and came back holding a sack. It was making squawking sounds and writhing. Kirk opened the sack and handed the chicken to Carter. It flapped its wings in terror and tried to wrench away. Carter held it by the neck.

"What does geek mean, Kirk?" Carter asked like a maniacal teacher.

"It means someone who bites the heads off live chickens," Kirk answered obediently. He went behind Paul Michael and grabbed his arms. Paul Michael struggled, but Kirk was stronger than he looked. His ropy arms held fast.

Paul Michael thought he might vomit. He wanted to look over at Lilith, but he kept his eyes on the ground. Kirk jerked him back, and his gla.s.ses fell off. They lay near Carter's sneaker, ready to be smashed.

Carter held the chicken up in front of Paul Michael so he could smell it, and its feathers flapped against his face. He tried to move away, but Kirk still had him like that.

"Bite," Carter said. He reached into his pocket with his free hand and pulled out a pocketknife. He held it up to Paul Michael's throat. A few people had gathered around, laughing nervously.

It was hard to tell if it was the chicken or what, but Paul Michael felt something swoop down, scratching his face, and then Lilith was there.

Someone screamed.

"You have no idea," she said, in a voice much deeper and lower than what should have come from the throat of a seventeen-year-old girl, "how big my mouth is. I could take your head off in one bite."

She grabbed the knife out of Carter's hand so swiftly and with so much force that he backed away and the bird fell to the ground and flapped in the dirt.

Then Paul Michael broke free of Kirk and she reached for his hand, took it, and began to run. Paul Michael heard a soft shattering sound as his gla.s.ses crunched under his feet.

They ran for what felt like a long time, but Paul Michael wasn't really tired. He thought he might be getting stronger. It was almost like flying.

When they got to the highway, he started to cross, but Lilith pulled him so his back pressed against her b.r.e.a.s.t.s. He turned his head to look at her and a car roared by, speeding crazily out of nowhere from around a bend. For a moment he saw her lit up in its headlights.

"Look both ways," she told him.

She was so beautiful, he thought. He would do anything for her.

They crossed. There was a dry creek bed along the road and a beat-up old black Mercedes parked at the side. They went under a chain-link fence, and she led him down into the creek. It was usually full with water from the mountains, the only proof in Nowhere that the white-capped peaks were real, even in the valley heat. They lay down there, among the river rocks and dirt, looking up at the stars in the sky.

"Why did you want to go to that party?" he asked.

She laughed. Almost coyly. "It's practically foreplay to watch those p.r.i.c.ks acting out like that."

He took Carter's knife from her hand. She had been clutching it the whole time.

"What are you doing?" she asked softly, smiling.

He lifted his hair up away from his neck-thinking he would have to cut it off, it got in her way-and exposed the tendons to her. Then held up the knife to his neck. She laughed.

"I don't need that, silly," she told him.

Of course, Paul Michael thought. Duh. Can you say teeth, Paul Michael?

When she pulled away from him, his neck was throbbing and her mouth was black with blood in the dark.

"Your turn," she said.

The Rescue.

There was only one more time.

He woke in the middle of the night knowing he had to go to her. He got into the shower and scrubbed his skin with a rough washcloth until it almost hurt. Got out, wrapped a towel around his waist, shaved. Then he took a pair of scissors and cut all his wet hair off, shaved the remaining hair with his razor. There were a few nicks on his scalp that he dabbed at with bits of toilet paper. He put on a white undershirt and Levis. The jeans were loose-he'd lost weight in his gut. He didn't put on his gla.s.ses. They were broken, gone, lost in the dirt, and he didn't need them anyway. Paul Michael went outside and began to run. Suddenly he realized he probably shouldn't have taken so much time getting ready.

He found her old diesel Mercedes parked by the riverbed. Carter and Kirk's bikes were nearby, and the trunk of the car was open.

He walked up so quietly, amazed at how light and quiet his step had become, and saw what was happening. Carter and Kirk were bent over the trunk. He could see past their shoulders-his eyesight even in the dark and without gla.s.ses was different now. They were staring at her legs, and her legs and feet were bare. Paul Michael felt the violation of their eyes on her strange legs and feet. He took Carter's knife out of his pocket, grabbed Carter by the collar, and pulled his head back so his throat was exposed. Kirk stumbled back and began to run, and Lilith opened her eyes and smiled at Paul Michael. He lunged into Carter, pushing his teeth into Carter's neck, just breaking the skin a little. There was blood, and he moved back and bowed his head toward Lilith, who came forward and bent to drink like a little girl at a drinking fountain, demurely tucking her hair behind her ears. Paul Michael heard a soft gurgling sound. The taste of Carter's blood was still salt and sticky on his lips, and he didn't know if he could get used to drinking as much as he might eventually need. But he wasn't all the way there yet, anyway. Lilith had said it was going to take a little while. She finished with Carter and mounted him the way she had mounted Paul Michael in his bedroom, but this time doing something complicated and quick to his neck and then tossing him aside onto the dirt. His body looked like a stuffed SpongeBob Paul Michael had as a kid after the dog ate all its stuffing. Lilith looked up at Paul Michael and her face was radiant, her cheeks and lips plumped up and her eyes bright. She grabbed him by the back of his neck and kissed him, sliding her mouth down over his chin and clamping her teeth into his neck. He was instantly hard. This time she drank for a little longer. He felt long, slow waves of pleasure, as if she was touching him below the waist. When they were done, she took the knife and made a suicidal slash across her wrist. She offered it to him, and he tenderly tasted the droplets, then lapped thirstily as more came out. When he was done, he watched as the cut sealed itself up without a mark.

He looked up at her and she glowed, infused with moonlight. "What do we do now?" he asked her.

She tilted her face to the sky, cupped her hands around her mouth, and made a strange, shrieking sound. They waited.

The birds came out of nowhere in the dark, a huge flock of black carrion birds that swept down upon Carter's body, tore it to shreds as Paul Michael and Lilith watched, and spirited it away without a trace.

"What about Kirk?" Paul Michael said. "He'll get help. Someone will come."

"He didn't make it home." She squinted into the sky after the last bird. "There will be an investigation eventually, but for now I have time."

They got into the back of her car, and Paul Michael told her all about Trellibrium. She listened carefully, asking pertinent questions.

"So Norser rescues the princess?" she asked.

He nodded, stroking her hair.

"But they should rescue each other," she said.

He smiled to himself in the dark. There was a long silence. Paul Michael thought he could hear the stars crackling in the sky.

"What about you?" he asked her. "I want to know all about you. Where you come from and why you are here and how you became what you are."

She sighed. "It's better for you to know me only as I am, without the weakness I had before, to inspire you."

"I want to know everything."