Veronica LaGrange sat on her royal purple chair that she bought ages ago. It started to snow. She hasn’t seen snow this early in December in….well, probably around the same time she bought this chair. It was a light snow, it’ll melt the next morning when the Sun comes out. But still. It was nice to sit in her study, with a fireplace roaring, knitting as the snow fell down to Earth.

Her friend Penelope would tease her about the use of the fireplace. “But Veronica dear,” she’d say. “You don’t even need the warmth. Why bother?”

And Veronica would laugh and say she just likes the aesthetic. But in reality, there were a few things about being mortal that she missed. Warmth was one of them. She hasn’t felt warmth in about seven years when she decided that being immortal outweighed the limits and fragility of her former self.

The shadows from the fire used to distract her when she was human. She’d always thought they were some ne’er-do-well coming up from behind her. She was attacked one night when she was a teen. The attacker slashed at her and caught her left cheek, she dropped her purse and he ran off with it. She was left with a small scar. Years later, she found that thief, hiding in the shadows, about to attack another young woman. She made sure he didn’t see another drop of blood that wasn’t his.

She was ready to cast off this last hat she had made for the homeless in her city. She loved to knit. She loved it so much she gave up her humanity for it. She loved the creation of taking something as simple as a string and transforming it into a sweater or a hat or a scarf. She likened it to alchemy. When she was offered immortality, she had several reasons to say yes, but the one that tickled the back of her mind was “You’ll have all the time and energy you want to knit.” She accepted the offer, and the dark figure sunk his two fangs into the side of her neck. The first sensation she felt was what she would later describe as her soul leaving her body, but then, she felt power. A lot of power. She spent the first month of being a vampire flying around the city.

She rang her small bell.

“Mr. Simon!” she called.

A young man, her cohort and companion, walked in. He had chestnut brown hair, brown eyes, a light complexion, an average everyday looking man who would go unnoticed in a crowd as he ran errands for his mistress.

“Yes Madam?” he asked.

“I’m heading out to deliver these hats and scarves to the homeless shelter,” she said. “Please prepare the next batch of yarn. Let’s try something…myrtle and gold? And get my car ready, please.”

Mr. Simon bowed his head and walked away, down the stairs to the garage. He didn’t understand why he had to “get it warmed up” but just like the fireplace, Veronica liked to keep some parts of her humanity intact.

The drive through the snow was quiet and calm. There weren’t a lot of people out driving this time of night, and the drop off for the shelter would be closed. But Veronica could make it inside without any issue, and she felt a little breaking and entering was okay in certain situations. She had over fifty hats, scarves, and gloves, in different sizes. She hated making gloves, especially for little children. They were extremely important for the little ones but then they would out grow them and get cold again. She tried finding fabric that would stretch, and even looked up a mitten style that could be unbuttoned to make it larger, but it was a poorly made design and would be destroyed before the child could use it.

The donation box for the shelter was still open, it looks like the shelter took her advice after all, and she dropped the box inside. It landed on something soft, hopefully other donations, and not someone. On the drive back to her estate, Veronica couldn’t help but think of her first winter as a vampire. She was still getting used to the rules and weaknesses, she burned herself quite a bit in the Sun, and had to be reminded several times about wearing silver. She had a silver necklace her mother gave her, and she tried to wrap it in some cloth or leather, and yet, it still burned her skin. She was surprised that some myths about vampires were untrue, garlic wasn’t an issue, neither was fire, and running water was fine as long as it was underground or under a bridge.

Veronica arrived home and called out for Mr. Simon.

He walked in, with his head hung low.

“Did you find the yarn?” she asked.

“Well, no Madam, you have run out of myrtle and gold…”

“Oh darn. How about….silver and mauve?”

“No, you ran out of silver two weeks ago and mauve just this Thursday…”

“Fine. Black and crimson. Not exactly festive, but still…”

“I’m sorry…”

“Any blues?”

“Madam…”

“Greens? Reds? Whites???”

“I’m sorry Mistress Veronica, but…”

“Don’t tell me Simon, don’t ruin my night with the sentence that I know will come out of your mouth…”

“You have run out of yarn,” Simon said.

Veronica grabbed a candlestick and headed down to the basement to see for herself. And just like Mr. Simon said all her yarn boxes were empty. Nothing in any of the solid primary colors or the plaid patterns she found charming once, nothing in the various whites that she would use to experiment with dying, nothing in the blacks and golds and silvers and blues. All the boxes. Empty.

“Oh,” she said. “Well, I guess we need to place an order soon. Put it on rush delivery Mr. Simon.”

“But…”

“Okay, nevermind rush delivery, overnight it.”

“Madam…”

“Fine, I’ll go to the store myself and buy some, just for tonight.”

“I can’t allow that Madam,” Simon said, standing up firmly, for the first time today.

Veronica looked at him. “And why not Simon?”

“You made me promise you…”

“Oh, that thing? Don’t worry about that. That was years ago. Start ordering.”

“No, Mistress Veronica, I cannot order you anymore yarn. You made me make a pact. I cannot go against the blood pact. I literally cannot until you fulfill the other part of the pact. You said all yarn orders will be forbidden until the other horde you collected has been successfully used.”

“My god, I was really serious about that, wasn’t I? Well, how bad could it be?”

“The problem is, Madam, you…stopped ordering yarn, but you never said to stop ordering…”

Mr. Simon stopped talking as he opened another door in the basement.

Rows and rows of books covered all the walls. Boxes and piles of books were thrown on the ground. It was like a dragon’s horde, but instead of gold and gems, it was books and stories.

Veronica sighed.

“Get me some tea,” she said, picking up The Awakening by Kate Chopin. “And a wheel barrel.”