Great Yarmouth, England, 1904

It was long past midnight and the beach was deserted, the stretch of golden sand faintly illuminated by the lights of the seaside town behind it, the moon a bright silver coin hanging in the sky.

These were the nights that Gideon Hartwright liked best, when the beach was his, when he could kick off his shoes and walk through the shallows, smell the brine rolling in from the North Sea, feel the wind in his hair.

This was when he felt most at peace.

His boxing days were long behind him.

He had moved on from the loss of Isaac, and had even had another relationship two years ago. It hadn't lasted – Frank had always suspected that Gideon was keeping something from him, which of course he was, but Gideon, remembering Howard's reaction, had never dared tell Frank the truth. Ultimately that had killed the relationship, and that had hurt, but Gideon was coping with it.

He no longer felt the need to hurt himself to feel anything.

His life in the town wasn't perfect, but it was the best it had been in a long time.

Kicking off his shoes, Gideon walked across the sand, first where it was dry and golden and then where it was damp and dark and packed down until he reached the sea itself. Small waves rolled over his feet, deliciously cold, and he smiled, pulling the smell of the sea into his nose.

But he wasn't alone tonight.

A woman was walking down the beach from the opposite direction, long blonde hair fluttering in the breeze.

Gideon narrowed his eyes.

There was something . . . familiar about her, and he couldn't put his finger on it.

She was a petite slip of a woman, a girl really, with delicate features and hair that glimmered like pale gold in the moonlight –

Something clicked in Gideon's head and suddenly he remembered exactly where he had met this woman before.

"Jemima?" he said.

Sixty years had passed since he had met her on the banks of the River Cherwell, since they had sat together and talked, and he'd all but forgotten about her, but now that she was walking towards him, the memory of her became crystal-clear.

She froze when he said her name, looking suspiciously at him. It seemed her memory of him was not so clear.

"It's Gideon," he said. "We met in Banbury sixty years ago. I had only recently left the vampire who made me, and you thought I needed help so you offered to let me travel with you."

Jemima's expression cleared, the coolness fading from her eyes. "Gideon!" she exclaimed. "I almost didn't recognise you – you look so different."

She was barefoot too, and her feet left small imprints in the sand as she approached him.

"Do I?" Gideon looked down at himself to try and see what she was talking about. As far as he was aware, he looked exactly the same as when they'd first met. So did she.

"I mean, you look the same, but you're different too. You carry yourself differently. You don't seem so . . . lost."

Gideon considered that. "I don't think I am."

Jemima sat down, pulling her skirts up to her knees so the sea could wash up her legs. "Sit with me," she said, patting the sand beside her.

Gideon sat.

The damp sand leaked through his trousers but he barely noticed.

Jemima was still practically a stranger to him, and yet at the same time it felt so ridiculously good to see her again.

"Do you live here now?" she asked.

"For the time being."

Jemima wiggled her toes in the sea, her feet creating small barriers against the waves. "I'm just visiting. I've started travelling by railway – it's amazing how much faster you can get around. I never thought it would be possible to travel like that."

"I still haven't been on a train," Gideon admitted.

"Really?"

"They're just . . . so loud. And like you said, they move fast – I don't trust them."

Jemima laughed and splashed water at him. "It's a train. It's not going to eat you." She tilted her head a little, appraising him from under her lashes. "Why don't you come with me when I leave? It'd be nice to have someone to travel with."

"Thank you again for the offer, but I've found a certain contentment in this town. I'd like to stay as long as I can."

"You can't stay forever," Jemima reminded him.

"That's why it feels important to get as much time here as I can. The next place I go to might not make me so happy."

"I can understand that." Some seaweed snagged around her toe and she leaned forward to pull it off and toss it into the next wave that ran over their feet. "Maybe we'll meet a third time and then you'll finally agree to my offer."

"Maybe." Gideon meant it. He liked Jemima, and the possibility of travelling with a friend was certainly appealing, but . . . he just wasn't ready to uproot his life again. Not yet.

"Are you sure you can't stay?" he said.

Jemima's gaze grew distant as she looked out to sea. "You're not ready to pull up your roots, and I'm not ready to put any down." She offered him a little smile. "We always meet at the wrong time, don't we?"

Gideon smiled back. "Actually, I think we always meet at the right time."

He couldn't explain how it felt to see her again, or why it lifted his spirits. There would never be a romantic connection between them, and did he really know her well enough to call her a friend? Maybe, maybe not, but the world was changing around him, the advancement of technology rapidly reshaping England into something he no longer recognised, which was more than a little intimidating, and there was something reassuring in sitting here with someone from his past, someone who never changed.

"So tell me," Jemima, leaning her weight back on her palms. "What have you been doing since we last met?"

Gideon didn't tell her everything. He didn't mention Patrick or how he had injured that man in the boxing ring. He didn't fully explain why the relationship with Isaac had fallen apart. But he did tell her how lonely and wretched her had come to feel, and how he had been angry with himself, and how he had then come to fear himself, wondering if he was unable to control his strength.

There had never again been an incident like the one in the ring, but Gideon had never forgotten the awful crunch of that man's jaw shattering beneath his fist, the soft thuds of his teeth scattering in the dirt. He had never let himself forget just what he was capable of.

In return Jemima told him of her experiences travelling by railway, and how the development of the country meant that she planned to revisit all the places she had been before to see how much they had changed.

Privately, Gideon worried that things were changing too fast, but there was little point in souring Jemima's excitement by saying that.

Like they had done the first time they met, they talked until night slid from black to slate-grey, and the edge of the world began to burn.

Then Jemima stood up, stepping out of the waves. "I suppose it's goodbye again."

"It would appear so."

Jemima surprised him by giving him a quick hug – so quick that he didn't have time to hug her back.

"It was really good to see you again, Gideon," she said. "Until next time?"

"Until next time."

Jemima started to walk away, but after a few minutes she stopped and looked back. "You never know," she called, "with technology advancing the way it is, we may one day have a proper way to stay in touch with each other."

The thought was nice, but it was impossible. No vampire lived at any address for too long, and Gideon couldn't imagine there was any technology in the world that would enable them to contact each other no matter where they were.

But he smiled and waved anyway, which seemed to please Jemima. She waved back, her hair streaming like a flag in the direction of the sea.

Then, for the second time, Gideon watched her leave.

He wished she didn't have to, though he understood why she did, and maybe she was right. Maybe they would meet again, and that time circumstances would be different. Maybe they would be able to cultivate a proper friendship.

After all, no one knew what the future held.

Next week, we're entering the World War One phase of the vampires' lives, and I'm super-excited to share those stories with you :D