This week’s Character Interview – Heroines – wraps up the entire Blog Hop. If you missed any of these amazing interviews, you can start at the very beginning by following the link at the end of this post. Last week’s interview of Maggie Van Well’s heroine, Kate Henderson, a strong and caring widowed mother of 2 teenage boys from her small-town contemporary romance, CRAZY LITTLE THING CALLED MATCHMAKING, can be found here on her blog.

This week, I’d like to introduce you to Sirah, maker, master, original… from Gwen Petrarch’s paranormal erotic romance, MASQUERADE.

Take it away, Gwen:

I enter the Green room, having a bit of de ja vu hit me when I see the back of the couch and a starkly pale hand hanging lazily over it. I think of Gabriel for some reason, the vampire I’d interviewed a few months before. I know Sirah and Gabriel are connected, but I don’t know how (she hasn’t shared their connection with me). Sirah has agreed to let me interview her with the understanding that I would hold back the interview until July. She said she had a reason for asking this of me (she didn’t share that reason either) and would only acquiesce with my assurances. She’s not the sort of individual a girl said ‘no’ to. She makes the hair at the back of my neck stand on end so I gave her my promises.

The door clicks shut behind me and Sirah rises up from the couch as if she’s rising on a platform in the floor. My eyes follow as her sinewy form towers over my 5′ 9 inches. Finally she stops and smiles at me in such a way that now my goosebumps have goosebumps. She is starkly beautiful, her skin is flawless and is so pale it shimmers and has the slightest icy blue tinge. I’m mesmerized as I watch her hand rise ever so slowly as if its placement had been carefully thought out, and comes to rest on her naked hip. In fact, all of her is naked. I close my mouth. I hadn’t expected naked, but I don’t want to seem awkward especially that she doesn’t appear to feel awkward at all.

Sirah: Hello pet. Her full lips move smoothly into a smile, the tips of her fangs peek out first, followed by perfect while teeth. Her accent sounds… Russian, but I can’t be sure. Her eyes are obsidian. No pupils. More chills run up my spine.

Gwen: Good morning Ms. Sirah—

Sirah: Just Sirah, pet. I do not adhere to the niceties of mortal kind, da? Her voice is like cream, deep and husky but smooth. It reverberates in my chest as if the words and the sound can control my heartbeat.

Gwen: I clear my throat. Thank you for agreeing to be interviewed.

Sirah: But of course. Her eyes flash and her long clever fingers gesture toward me. I hear her request to hold the interview back in my head, though she had not spoken. The words wind themselves around my spine at the base of my neck. I nod my assurances again a little freaked out that she inserted her thoughts into my head.

Gwen: I… uh… suppose we should just jump right in.

Sirah: She laughs, another husky sound and another gesture with her fingers encouraging me to continue. Or maybe she’s amused by my discomfiture. There is a flash of movement and then she is standing next to me. I should be used to a vampire’s speed after interviewing Gabriel, but Sirah is soundless, faster and is so quick the air doesn’t even move. She runs her finger down my arm from my shoulder to my elbow. I tingle everywhere and, as if she is commanding me to sit with the gesture, I sink into the chair that just happens to be beneath my backside. I know I would have fallen on the floor if it hadn’t been under me.

Gwen: I swallow as I look up at her and squeak out the question. What is your greatest fear?

Sirah: Her laugh is a cold, inhuman husk. Her fangs flash. Pet. She says, I am fear. A moment later she’s sitting across from me, leaning toward me, her scent everywhere sweet and heady, lulling. She reaches with her slender finger, its long black nail looking every bit the lethal scythe I knew it to be, touches the base of my throat and gently sweeps up my flesh, under my chin where it stops, holding my face up. She does not cut me but holds my gaze.

Gwen: I clear my throat and blink but when I open my eyes she’s still there holding me captive with just the edge of her fingernail and her black gaze. What can I do but continue? S-so there’s nothing that frightens you? Concerns you, maybe? I’m losing nerve, and my faltering voice shows it. She’s still holding my chin, her marble eyes roaming all over my face as if she could read every thought. I can’t help thinking that she must have some reticence somewhere, otherwise why would she ask me to hold back the interview?

Sirah: For the first time her expression changes from shuttered to contemplative. She flicks her finger, I jolt at the small pinch. Then she is on me, holding my head. I’m too startled to say anything and a moment later she is sitting back in the chair across from me, her eyes closed and her throat moving in a swallow. A slow smile curves her lips again, they are plumped and stained red with blood. My blood! I touch my chin, but there is no more pain and no more blood. It is healed. She says as if I should have already known and then her eyes sparkle as she captures my gaze. Your terror, Pet, I can taste it. It makes your essence sweet. I open my mouth to speak but she interrupts me as if she hadn’t noticed. Concerns, you say. Perhaps those I do have. They are specific to a female, da?

Gwen: How do you mean? I am wondering if by female she means she gets PMS or something like that, but I daren’t say that out loud.

Sirah: PMS? What is this thing? She asks. Now it is confirmed that she can read my mind.

Gwen: Uh, it has to do with procreation. I don’t want to have to give her a run down on the female reproductive cycle and wonder if she knows anything at all about being human. I’m beginning to think not. Wasn’t she human once?

Sirah: No. I am an original, Pet. But I have but one need. It surmounts even the thirst, and I have not slaked it. Not in centuries. But I must… and soon.

Gwen: I wait for her to finish, but she only stares at me, sending a new crop of goosebumps down my back. Is this need a secret?

Sirah: In a blur she is standing next to me, her cold hand is around the side of my throat tilting my head to suit her. Her grip is unrelenting, frigid. Her tongue is cold as she licks me. Terror seizes me, my mind active and frantic but my body is limp in her hands, my flesh where she’s licked me, numb. I feel my notebook slide from my fingers. She rears back and smiles, her fangs elongating. My mouth opens in a tortured scream. Nothing. No sound. She bites. I come. No pain. Just infinite pleasure. I must mate… with Gabriel. I do not feel her pull away. An errant thought, before everything goes dark, is that she’s inserting her thoughts into my mind…

Gwen: When I awaken four hours later, I am alone. I remember everything, Sirah’s dead stare, cold hands and tongue against my skin. My neck is sore, though there are no marks. I look down and my notebook is on the table. Next to it is a bottle of water. Funny, I hadn’t brought one in with me. I wondered briefly if my guest had left it for me. Then I pushed myself out of the chair. I hadn’t gotten to ask her my list of questions, but I still have one hell of an interview to write.

Image within this post purchased from depositphotos.com, copyright holder: Ekaterina Yudina Katalinks

Summary

Article Name

GUEST POST - Character Interview Blog Hop - Heroines - Sirah

Description

The Character Interview Blog Hop - Heroines continues: I see the back of the couch and a starkly pale hand hanging lazily over it. I think of Gabriel for some reason, the vampire I'd interviewed a few months before. I know Sirah and Gabriel are connected, but I don't know how.

Author

Gues Post - Gwendolyn Petrarch