"Welcome," said the man in the wheelchair. His white hair was disheveled. He wore thick horn-rimmed glasses, plaid pajamas, and felt slippers. A folded newspaper rested on his lap.
"Can we come in?" asked the man pushing the chair. Liver spots dotted his bald scalp.
"What do you want?" Kendra asked, not moving out of the way.
"To introduce ourselves," said the man in the chair. "We're your new neighbors."
The man behind the chair lowered his voice. "We know some things that might be of service." He winked.
Kendra stepped aside. "Isn't it late?"
"What do we care about late?" griped the man in the wheelchair. "Too many days are the same here. You get sick of it. A new face is front-page news." The bald man guided the wheelchair into the room.
"I'm Kendra."
"Haden," said the guy in the wheelchair. "The other geezer is Cody."
"We're not really geezers," Cody said. "I'm thirty-two. Haden is twenty-eight."
"Oh, no," Kendra said. "She drained you! What was it like? Can I ask?"
"The first bite is quick," Cody said. "It leaves you paralyzed. Then she really latches on, and you can feel your life ebbing away. Your body withers. Deflates. It doesn't hurt. It's dreamlike. Hard to describe."
"Torina can put on quite an act," Haden warned. "Don't trust her. Not for a second."
"Why do you guys live here with her?" Kendra wondered.
"We're prisoners," Haden said. "Torina chooses her victims wisely. I don't have any close relations. Even if I somehow busted out of here, old duffer like me, I'd have no place to go."
"Ditto," Cody echoed.
"So we cooperate," Haden said, resignation in his tone. "It beats the alternative."
"You don't want to end up in the basement," Cody cautioned. "Some of the other guys in our situation ended up down there. Not pleasant. They don't always return."
"How many of you are there?" Kendra asked.
Haden inflated his cheeks and exhaled slowly. "Seven, right now. Two in the basement. One on his deathbed. One mostly keeps to his room. Quiet type. And Kevin is her lap-dog. Hangs on her every word. Steer clear of Kevin."
"Two others have died since I've been here," Cody added.
"That doesn't add up," Kendra complained. "You're talking about hundreds of years of vitality. Are there lots of lectoblixes here?"
"Just her," Haden said. "She's an old one, and she's slipping. Like a reusable battery that doesn't hold a charge anymore. Every year she ages, what, at least twenty-five?"
"Closer to thirty," Cody asserted.
"She steals forty or fifty years from us and consumes them in less than two."
"How terrible," Kendra said.
"She tries not to overindulge," Cody said. "She hates to show any wrinkles, but too many disappearances and she'll have to move the whole operation, find a new lair. She's been here close to twenty years, near as we can figure."
Haden lifted the newspaper from his lap and began unfolding it. "She's on the prowl for new blood. Been running this ad in all the nearby counties for a week now." He directed Kendra's attention to a certain want ad:
Wealthy Dowager Seeks Young Male Companion [email protected]
"This is how she nabs victims?" Kendra exclaimed.
Haden and Cody exchanged an uncomfortable glance.
"We were dumb enough," Cody said.
"Sounded like easy money," Haden admitted. "I was curious."
"She has something of a conscience, you see," Cody said.
"Especially when she gets on a talk-show binge," Haden interjected, rolling his eyes.
"She tells herself she's just sapping years from gold diggers. Taking from takers. 'Course, we never got a chance to take anything. And she didn't bother to find out what kind of guys we were."
"No worse than most. No malice. We just stumbled across the wrong ad."
"As some other poor fool will shortly."
"And then we'll have another new face."
Cody raised his eyebrows. "Misery loves company."
Despite the actual ages the men claimed, the duo sure acted like crotchety old fogies. It made Kendra wonder how much their aged bodies affected their personalities. "Speaking of new faces," she said, "what were you guys going to tell me? You know, to help me?"
Haden adjusted his glasses. "Don't trust her. Don't disobey or you'll end up in the basement. Don't make her angry."
Cody's face became solemn. "I saw her suck the last years out of a guy who didn't know when to lay off the insults. She got younger and he got... dead. She normally leaves her prey with some final years. She feels enough guilt to leave most of us something. But don't cross her. She's capable of ugliness like you can't imagine."
"You're scaring the girl," Haden complained. "Here's the best tip--flattery works wonders. Even when she knows you're laying it on thick, Torina can't help but respond to generous remarks. Pathetic, really. Way I see it, deep down she so desperately needs to feel admired, she absolutely treasures sugary words, especially about her looks."
"She's extra vulnerable right now, while her age is showing," Cody agreed.
Haden harrumphed. "Old or young, she's always a sucker for compliments. Not so much that she'd let you go or anything. But she'll make your life easier if you play to her vanity."
"Word to the wise," Cody said, adding a wink for emphasis.
"Now that we've made our introductions," Haden announced, "we had better leave this young lady in peace."
"Don't be in such a hurry," Cody complained. "One last question. Kendra, tell us, what did you do to earn her attention? Why did Torina bring you here?"
"Don't press her to spill her guts on a first meeting," Haden growled.
Cody shushed him.
"I think it's mainly because I have information she wants," Kendra said.
"You're part of her world," Cody confirmed. "Not some girl off the street."
"I know there are magical creatures hidden among us, along with other dangerous people like her," Kendra confirmed.
Haden and Cody nodded in silence.
"We don't know much about the supernatural," Cody said. "Only what we've gleaned since living here."
"Tread carefully," Haden advised. "We'll try to watch out for you, keep our hearing aids to the ground."