The Iron in Blood

Mark arrived straight after school, still dressed in school uniform and carrying his bag.

"Hey, Sis," he grinned at me. "You look a lot more, er, civilised than you did this morning!"

I grinned back. "Come say that here!"

"Nah, it's alright. You got anything to eat here?" he asked Angus, who stood behind him.

"Frozen pizza. They're in the freezer." He looked at me over Mark's shoulder, his eyebrows raised. "You ready for those iron tablets now?" I nodded, and felt my face flushing traitorously. "I'll get them for you. Mark can heat up the pizza."

"Excellent. I'll be in the kitchen if you need me. Anyone want pizza?"

"Yes, please." I was suddenly very hungry. Angus tilted his head slightly as if considering something.

"Yes," he said, and took a small container from a nearby cabinet drawer, and tossed it my way. I caught it one handed, surprised. "Five daily, Rebecca." I shook the container briskly. There were a lot more than five in there. I nodded, grateful for his confidence in my reliability. Or maybe he was relying on me not wanting to take too many tablets and go berserk. Fair enough.

"Coming up!" Mark disappeared into the kitchen, returning twenty minutes later with three steaming pizzas and a huge smile.

"I have questions," he announced as he took up his usual position on the floor against the wall, biting hungrily into a massive slice of pizza.

"Let's have them," Angus smiled, and bit into his own slice.

"Well, let's see." Mark pulled a small notebook out of his bag, and flipped the pages until he found what he was looking for. "I have a list."

Angus groaned slightly. "Not a list!" he said, his voice tinged with false dismay.

"Number one. Is it true that you react to sunshine?" Mark took another huge bite. I glanced at Angus.

"No. But we always look like we can't go in the sun because we're so pale. We don't tan. Normal humans tan to defend their skin from the sun. We don't need to do that."

That explained my continuing colourlessness in the face of weeks of tanning. So there was a reason for it! I was strangely pleased.

"Number two." Mark grinned at Angus. "Vampires on TV and in legends and books are usually kinda hideous. You both look normal. Good looking, even." He pulled a face as he said the last three words, as if it cost him to do that. I was flattered.

Angus grinned widely. "Thanks, Mark." Mark looked sour.

"My brother Marcus has done a lot of research on vampire legends, and he's come up with a theory that, knowing him, is probably pretty accurate." He took another bite, and chewed for a few seconds, and swallowed. "Marcus reckons that we look normal because we eat like normal people too, besides taking iron supplements. He compares it to people who are addicted to heroin. Some will give themselves over entirely to the drug. Their lives revolve around the drug, obtaining it, and then using it. They don't eat normally, or look after themselves in other ways, like bathing for instance. They soon start to look pretty grim, but they don't seem to care. Marcus thinks that older vampires used to be a bit like that. Their addiction hit them like a bus, and they were never able to recover. He also thinks that we manage to live relatively normal lives because we take iron tablets instead of blood. Iron is released fairly slowly into our systems, so we don't have that massive rush that you get from sucking blood." He grinned again.