16 A shame to the family

I stood up, suddenly nervous. What was Avarice doing here? Did she find me on purpose? I didn't see any bodyguards near, but she was a vampire. I've seen what vampires could do. Did she decide to extort all my debts here and now, with blood?

It took a moment for my brain to kick in. We were in public. There were dozens of people around. Yes, Avarice could hypnotise one, or two, or several—but not all of them, surely. There was no way she'd start doing anything vampire-ish there. Didn't mean she couldn't trouble me in other ways.

"What an unexpected meeting, Avarice," I said, eyeing her with wariness. "Did you search for me?"

Avarice scoffed. "You are not the centre of the universe. I was just passing by."

Her voice was unfriendly, but not scornful, as I expected. She wasn't happy to see me, but she didn't hate me outwards. That was good, and mutual.

Someone else, though, was glad to see her. The con artist rose from his seat too, and now looked at Avarice like at his personal saviour.

"Aunt Avarice! It's such a pleasant surprise to see you here! I was just thinking about calling you. This woman," the con artist pointed at me, "was slandering my wares and creating trouble."

I just gaped at him. Aunt Avarice? AUNT Avarice? I turned to her, my jaw still on the floor. In this moment, I'd give my left hand to see her expression. Damn you, sun!

To add to my astonishment, Avarice let out a small sigh. She turned her head towards me. "Are you, girl?" she asked, her tone tired.

"Are you really his aunt?"

"Girl," Avarice said in a warning tone. A very warning tone. So warning, that I couldn't help but stand to attention and gulp.

"Sorry. Anyway…" it took me a moment to gather my thoughts and my guts together, "no, I wasn't slandering anyone. These sketches are obvious fakes, and the entire story is an obvious lie. I mean, what are the chances of him being some bastard of Vasnetsov's line?"

"It's not a lie!" the con artist's expression was full of offended innocence. "Aunt Avarice, you can confirm! Right? There's no way she won't believe you."

There was a certain meaningful emphasis on the last sentence that didn't escape me. I looked between the con artist and Avarice with narrowed eyes. Was he hinting at her to hypnotise me? What will I do if she will? Besides buying all these sketches for whatever absurd cost Avarice's 'nephew' will tell me.

"I'd like to hear what exactly was wrong with my foolish nephew's story and wares, girl," Avarice said instead, to my relief. Maybe she wasn't able to hypnotise me through her veil. Or maybe she just didn't want to help her nephew. She clearly didn't like him much.

Neither did I. He was a shame on all con artists of the world, and I'd be glad to explain it to everyone who'd like to listen—and several passersby grew interested in the commotion already.

"For starters, did you hear what I told about the paper?" I asked, and when Avarice nodded in response, continued further, "I'm sure an inspection in a lab would show even more inconsistencies. Then, there was no mentions that Fyodor Vasnetsov ever had children. Hum… I'm sure that if I just google his photo, you will look nothing like him, man."

"I look like my mother!"

"If you only were as smart as her," Avarice threw at her nephew, causing him to shut up with a face as if he had a lump stuck in his throat. "Continue, girl."

I snorted at the scene. Maybe Avarice wasn't without zero redeeming qualities. "Right. Say, if we imagine, just imagine that you are really Vasnetsov's son, and close eyes on the fact that these sketches were made very recently, there's still a fact that they weren't drawn even close to Fyodor's style."

"These are just sketches. Of course they would look different from big paintings," the con man muttered. The fight was leaving him.

"There's that, and there's the fact that they are drawn in a simple, but striving towards realism style, with completely different proportions from human figures on Fyodor's paintings. Who, mind you, was a modernist. And he rarely painted humans at all, though this is a moot point. And of course…"

"This is just too unbelievable! Vasnetsovs are all famous artists, what are chances that someone I just met are really related to them? About the same as having a real Nigerian prince ask for my help!" I pointed an accusing finger at the con man.

The audience that gathered around snickered and cheered for me. I stood straighter, my chest puffing on its own. The feeling of pride… of justice served… of having people root for me…

"Indeed, girl. Good to see you aren't going to waste all the money you owe me on fakes," Avarice said, instantly dampening my mood. She just needed to remind me about the debt, did she?

'I need to learn more about JJ's plan to not pay her, today,' I thought to myself. 'He's been way too tight-lipped about that for my liking. I sure hope his plan doesn't mean ditching me in the last moment…'

"You know, it's late already. I, uh, better go home now," the con artist said, hurriedly gathering his sketches. He didn't bother handling them carefully, now that his act was clearly blown.

I was almost too slow to do it, but I caught the strangely scorching sketch just as he was picking it up. My fingers felt as if I was touching a hot frying pan, but I ignored it to the best of my ability.

"Wait! I want to buy this one."

The con artist paused, and I took my fingers away, happy to not have them boiled by nothing. "Buy?" he asked. Then a bright smile returned to his lips. "Of course! It's only ten thousand."

"Are you kidding me? It's just a sketch some mediocre artist drew in ten minutes. I should take if for free as a payment for my professional appraisal of your merchandise!"

An agreeing hum travelled through the crowd, and the con artist's face turned into a defeated scowl. "Fine, fine, take it, I'm just leaving anyway…"

I grinned and stuffed the painting in a folder in my backpack, careful to touch it as little as possible. By the time I finished, the con artist had already left, but Avarice still stood near like an ominous cyan shadow.

"So," I said, feeling awkward now. Apparently, the greedy lady vamp had an actual human family. As weird as it sounded, she suddenly felt much more human for me. "Bad relatives, right?"

I wanted to bite off my traitorous tongue there and then. To say something like that… This was the stupidest thing ever. But, to my surprise, instead of dousing me with contempt, Avarice actually snorted in what sounded like amusement.

"And I wondered what Dragonslayer found in you, girl," she said. "You had clearly come from the same pod."

While I wondered whether she insulted me or complimented, Avarice walked away.

It was the time for me to go home. I had a lot to bug JJ about.