Re: In the orchard: Daniel/Aubrey
Daniel was a certain sort of vampire. He was not special, that's not what is meant here, it is more than there at a handful of different types of vampire in the world, and Daniel was just one. His was a European strain, one that goes back farther East and finds its roots in Hellenic Greece, but for the purposes of Repose it just means the following significant biological curiosities: one, that he was perfectly able to see in the dark, moon or no; two, that his hearing was as good as the wolf's; three, that if pressed he was probably good enough to put up a fight with one, because he was quite old and quite canny. That being said, Daniel was also the kind of vampire to whom werewolf bites were venomous and quite likely fatal, so just because he could put up a fight doesn't mean he'd survive the experience.
Let it also be said Daniel was a certain kind of man, too. He had walked a decent portion of the world, given his personal biases and social tendencies, and he bore a certain wide-eyed curiosity that came from being more of a nosy neighbor than a scholar. His current fog of mind had the effect of allowing him a Get-Out-Of-Jail-Free card from a particularly malignant case of agoraphobia. Unfortunately, the two traits were amplifying each other like two timpani drums pointed at each other.
Conclusion. Daniel heard something in the wood, discerned it to be a large animal, and instead of running along like a sensible undead gentleman, he came to a stop and peered around. He had been making no effort at silence (his sort of vampire being dangerously effective at the stalk and bite) and so his tramping through the cold grown was probably just as evident as the smell of cold death and fine fougère. "Hallo-oo." Old British. When he was like this sometimes Daniel sounded like a parody of himself.