He bared his teeth. “No fangs either. And one last thing: I do not, nor have I ever, sparkled.”
Matthew’s face darkened to emphasize the point.
I had been proud of Matthew on many previous occasions. I’d seen him stand up to a queen, a spoiled emperor, and his own awe-inspiring father. His courage—whether fighting with swords or struggling with his own demons—was bone-deep. But nothing compared to how I felt watching him stand before a group of students and his scientific peers and own up to what he was.
“How old are you?” Mulder asked breathlessly. Like his namesake, Mulder was a true believer in all things wondrous and strange.
“Thirty-seven.”
I heard exclamations of disappointment. Matthew took pity on them.
“Give or take about fifteen hundred years.”
“Holy shit!” Scully blurted, looking as though her rational world had been turned inside out.
“That’s older than old. I just can’t believe there’s a vampire at Yale.”
“You’ve obviously never been to the astronomy department,” Game Boy said. “There are four vampires on the faculty there. And that new professor in economics—the woman they hired away from MIT—is definitely a vamp. Rumor has it there are a few in the chemistry department, but they keep to themselves.”
“There are witches at Yale, too.” My voice was quiet, and I avoided Shotgun’s eyes. “We’ve lived alongside humans for millennia. Surely you’ll want to study all three creature chromosomes, Professor Roberts?”
“I will.” Chris’s smile was slow and heartfelt. “Are you volunteering your DNA, Professor Bishop?”
“Let’s take one creature chromosome at a time.” Matthew gave Chris a warning look. He might be willing to let students pore over his genetic information, but Matthew remained unconvinced about letting them pry into mine.
Jonathan looked at me appraisingly. “So it’s witches who sparkle?”
“It’s really more of a glimmer,” I said. “Not all witches have it. I’m one of the lucky ones, I guess.”
Saying the words felt freeing, and when nobody ran screaming from the room, I was flooded with a wave of relief and hope. I also had an insane urge to giggle.
“Lights, please.” Chris said.
The lights came up gradually.
“You said we were working on several projects?” Beaker prompted.
“You’ll be analyzing this, too.” I reached into my messenger bag and drew out a large manila envelope. It was stiffened with cardboard inserts so that the contents wouldn’t be bent and damaged. I untied the strings and pulled out the page from the Book of Life. The brightly colored illustration of the mystical union of Sol and Luna shone in the lab’s fluorescent lights. Someone whistled. Shotgun straightened, his eyes fixed on the page.
“Hey, that’s the chemical wedding of mercury and sulfur,” Jonathan said. “I remember seeing that in class, Professor Bishop.”
I gave my former student an approving nod.
“Shouldn’t that be in the Beinecke?” Shotgun asked Matthew. “Or somewhere else that’s safe?”
The emphasis he placed on “safe” was so slight that I thought I might have imagined it. The expression on Matthew’s face told me I hadn’t.
“Surely it’s safe here, Richard?” The prince-assassin was back in Matthew’s smile. It made me uncomfortable to see Matthew’s lethal personae among the flasks and test tubes.
“What are we supposed to do with it?” Mulder asked, openly curious.