Something about him made me apprehensive. [It was the adamantly religious thing, though.] I will keep that in mind.

I am going to try and mitigate any potential problems. Even if he is a liar from a questionable background he is a young vampire and he has a need for community and support. I won't condemn him before the fact, but...be wary.

In my universe, there is a race that I have mentioned. They are the Magog. They eat sentient beings, invading whole worlds and devastating their populations. They reproduce through rape, infesting unwilling living sentients and then their progeny devour their way out. The first planets they attacked and destroyed when entering the Known Worlds were ones settle by my people.

But among this race, there was a Magog who infested a monk. This monk taught him the ways of the Saints. Most religions by that time had become a uniform fixture, and he taught him about the iconic figures of Buddha, Jesus, and the Divine and the Way.

Wayism was started by Magog that wanted to live with others in the universe. A Magog in monk's clothing can almost undoubtedly be trusted as safe, or as having great restraint. Magog aren't given to lying or deception, anyway, so they find strength in their religion rather than use it against anyone. Even as what they are, they still represent it well.

I knew a Wayist and he was a good man. If you've not noticed, I've been careful not to attack someone who has yet to do anything to me or mine. Mostly thanks to the Wayist I knew, as there's nothing I despise more [or he's more bone-quakingly afraid of] than the Magog.

A story you might want to keep in mind when talking with Mr. Newlin.

[He listens quietly, and gradually his expression becomes one of mild horror and grief. He pities these beings even as he despises their actions. But...at least some of them seem to have found a way of becoming...different.]

It is my ambition to lead my people, and as many of other bloodlines as will listen, in the pursuit of a higher form of vampiric existence. I have hope that both he and Willow will eventually embrace such a path. But I suspect they're both quite a ways off from that.

And now I understand the depth of tolerance you showed when I was wounded and you led me down to the blood stores. I am in your debt.

I believe very strongly that an organism capable of deeply contemplating its future should have the ability to choose how its body should enter that future.

I'm... unsure of how to approach my current inmate, and I doubt she will take my claims in earnest.