Heirot

Tenele looked at the glass warrily for a moment. She remembered quiet well what happened the last time a doctor ordered her to drink something. However, she figured they weren't dumb enough to try killing her a second time that way.

"Uh..." she shifted over onto her side, being stubborn like usuually. She tried pushing up with her hands, her arms just shook and she lefted off the bed slightly, only to fall gently back down. Silver hair fell in front of her face and she glanced up at Vlad. Green eyes peering through strands of spider silk. "I guess I do." She didn't like admitting weakness, especially in front of Vlad. As far back as she could remember he had fround on weakness. At least... a long while ago he had. In fact, now that she thought about it, lately he hadn't mentioned much about it.

Her hand moved to her neck idly, as if it were bothering her for some unexplained reason. She frowned, but let the frown fade away as she waited for Vlad to help her up. "Are you alright?" she asked, remembering that he could have been hurt in the fight. She was unsure, everything from the moment Lothos's fangs peirced her skin until right now was just a long stream of jumbled blurry events.

"Of course I'm alright. Who do you suppose you're talking to?" Vlad scoffed, playing things casual as he lifted her weak form into a sitting position with one arm. She was so light, so completely frail. He knew her weight well, and she should have weighed more. He'd sucked enough humans dry to be used to that unnatural lightness, but this time it was unsettling. He glanced at the bandaged ruin of her neck. It had been a sloppy, destructive bite. She was lucky.

Supporting her back with his arm, he picked up the cup and held it to her lips. This was pitiful, but he'd decided to stay with her anyway. A few hours ago, he'd thought she seemed like the strongest human he'd ever met. Now she was little more than a rag doll in his arms. He couldn't decide what to make of her, or why he was drawn to her so much.

She drank the water and it actually didn't taste half-bad. When she was finished she rested her head triedly against him. Usually she would help hold herself up, but she hadn't the strength to even manage that. She closed her eyes, sighing deeply.

"I wonder if they will let me go to my room to rest. I hate being in this place. I see it far too much... I'd like my bed..." she glanced at Vlad for a moment and gave him a soft smile. "Or yours. Something besides this dreary hospital wing."

Then a thought came to her at the sight of his red eyes. She put a hand gently to her sore neck. "Vlad..." her voice was faint. "Will I become a vampire?" Vlad had bit her many times, but had never once drained her almost entirely of all her blood. She didn't know the rules well enough. Her tired heart began to beat faster, which made her tremble from the effort. Her body wasn't ready for her heart to work so feircely.

Vlad frowned at her. "If he had turned you, you would be ravenously searching for blood right now to refill your body. Instead, you're unable to sit up. You remain human." It was clear from the way he said it that there had been some doubt on the subject. There was a reason Vlad had been left alone with her in the room, and no human doctors or nurses were present. A freshly made vampire was a dangerous, rabid creature. In a way, Vlad had almost hoped she had turned. It was a selfish hope; he could have her by his side, strong, like him, without the burden of knowing he had turned her. Changing her was something he was fiercely against, but if someone else beyond his control changed her...

"You are not well enough to get out of bed. How do you propose to go to another room?" he said rather coldly.

Why was he being so frank and cold with her? She stared at him for a long moment, looking taken aback. Then, she finally turned her face away from him for a moment, letting her hands slip down to her sides. She forced herself to push away from him so that she could slip back under his arm and lie back down without his help. She didn’t want to be a burden on him, maybe that was what was bothering him. He didn’t want to take care of her? He didn’t have to, after all it wasn’t his responsibility. Or maybe it was because he was angry with her still?

She laid to rest on her side, her cheek resting comfortably in the palm of her hand. She stared off somewhere behind him, thinking of the horrors in the night. How she knew she was going to die. How she thought for sure she would. She put her other hand to her neck. She could still feel that horrifying pull as her blood and life was being sucked away from her. She could still feel his fangs pressing harshly into her skin. Her could still feel his cool breath on her skin and those damned hands on her form. She shivered slightly, blinking the image away.

He had been a monster and tried to devour her like a monster. For what purpose? Just to please his on hunger?

Vlad had almost done the same once and she remembered clearly the only thing that could make him stop was that pendant. No pleas had reached him, not screams... He had been driven to a monster by his hunger. But, otherwise he had always been gentle with her. He bit her in a way that made it pleasurable and kind...

She glanced back at Vlad, her eyes glistening in the candle light. Glazed and watery with the sign of tears. She didn’t know if it was horrors of the night, or the weakness of her body. She felt as if her feelings were made of glass that could shatter at any time. The fierce beat of her heart had faded weakly to rest now that she was calm, but a knot in her throat had been replaced. “I’m sorry, I was thinking foolishly,” she said softly. “I think I’ll rest now.” She weakly and slowly rolled until she faced slightly away from him.

Vlad's annoyance melded slowly into alarm as she turned away to fall back asleep. She'd only been up a few seconds...

He knew he should let her rest. He knew it would be foolish to strain her any further. He knew all that, but still... He had watched her sleep on the brink of death for many hours. This time...he might lose her.

A heavy weight shifted onto the cot behind her, spooning her back. Vlad's pale hand reached forward and cupped hers tightly. "Don't sleep yet. I won't know when you'll wake up again. Stay with me just a minute," he said from behind her.

Tenele stared at the strong hand that held hers. She felt his body behind her, his arm draped over her. She felt safe like this. She swallowed hard, but still couldn't seem to fight down that compulsion to just cry until she couldn't anymore. It was so strange. She sighed heavily, letting her body relax back against him.

"Okay," she said softly, her thumb brushing up against his hand. Back and forth, rubbing it ever so lightly. "I won't sleep yet." Her voice was faint, but she knew Vlad could hear her. She didn't know what was wrong with her or why things seemed suddenly complicated when it wasn't. Her thoughts were acting so strange, jumbled and rampaging through her head. "I feel so strange..."

Vlad took a deep breath. "How so?" he asked, though it made sense that blood loss would make someone feel strange.

Tenele pressed closer to him. "Scared..." she said softly, pulling his hand with hers to her chest and hugging it there. "I don't know why I feel scared. There's something else..." She closed her eyes. "I don't know, Vlad. I'm just being weird. Ignore me." She sighed heavily. She remembered dying once in that torture camp and they had brought her back to continue that torture, but... this seemed so different. There was something different about life being sucked from you that was effecting her.

Vlad swallowed dryly. "With a little more rest, you will be fine. The doctors said the worst is past," he lied. His frustration had dissolved into fear, and he wished he could have it back. He was more comfortable with frustration. "No one will bite you that way again."

Tenele nodded, closing her eyes. Her hand slipped to her neck. "I still feel his fanges," she whimpered softly, burrowing the side of her face into the pillow and resting against her lover. She felt safe there next to him, she was too weak to fight of any attacker. Vlad was there, he'd keep her safe. Besides, there was no one left to attack them at the moment...

"It will heal, you'll heal," Vlad said sternly. He glanced down at her hair draped across the sheets. What she'd experienced was too close to a Turning. It made sense to him that her memory was vivid. He could still remember every detail of the bite that brought on his Change; the fear, the sensations, the anger. He'd come to embrace it as his passage into a higher life, but Tenele had gained nothing from her experience. If she couldn't forget it...he prepared himself for the possibility that he would not be able to make her enjoy his bite again. It was really the least of his worries at the moment.

At that moment, the door swung open and a doctor with two nurses rushed in. "How long has she been awake?" the doctor asked, staying by the door.

"She has not Changed," Vlad said, pushing up on his elbow to look at them.

"Really, just for once, it would be great if you could refrain from bedding with the patient," the doctor scolded, walking up in front of Tenele. "My dear, we just need to change the bandage," he said soothingly as a nurse began removing the bandage on her neck carefully. "How do you feel?"

Tenele winced as the nurse began to unwrap the bandage from around her neck. "I feel tired and weak," she told him. 'Duh, how else would I be feeling? Giddy?' she thought. The banaged moved away to reveal a large purple, red, and black bruise on her neck with four puncture holes where his teeth had bit down twice. Her attacker clearly had not cared about trying to hit the same spot again. The wounds looked messy and deep and the nurse herself had to look away or a moment. She applied a cool cream to it and then took a fresh gause banaged and began wrapping it around her neck again. Then, the nurse stepped back away from her.

Tenele rested against Vlad again, having no desire for him to move away. It was clear she wanted him to stay there.

Vlad ignored the skeptical glances the nurse kept giving him as she bandaged Tenele's neck. "This is all we can do for the time being. The rest is up to her," the doctor said, stepping back.

"Do another transfusion," Vlad ordered. "She's practically empty, I can barely smell her."

The doctor shook his head. "She's taken all the foreign blood her body can tolerate. You have to let her sleep, Lord Dracul," he said more sympathetically than he'd meant to. He noticed the angry stare Vlad immediately gave him for his pity. "We'll get out of the way as well," he said quietly, and left.

Vlad still felt angry as the door shut behind the nurses. Was he so easy to read that humans could feel sorry for him? No...he knew he wasn't. That meant they weren't expecting a good outcome. He ran his fingers through Tenele's hair, then lowered back into the sheets next to her. "Sleep," he whispered, "It will be fine.'

Tenele sighed softly, enjoying the feel of his fingers running through her hair. It was more than her tired form could take. The idle movement slowly but surely lulled her off to the realm of unconciousness and she went slack again.

She slept for almost a day and a half after that. Barely moved or even flenched. Pale as death the only thing that alerted anyone to the fact she was still alive was the gentle rythem of her heart. Finally the afternoon of the second day she stirred. Her head turning as she woke with a weary groan. She had never been so hungry in her life. She was hungry to the point she was nauseated and the thought of food only made it worst.

To her she had only slepped a few hours, maybe a whole night. Time didn't seem to pass so fast when you were weary beyond measure.

"Vlad?" she said, her mouth dry. Was he there still, holding her? She couldn't tell. She pushed herself up, but didn't stay there long. "Its very dark..." She felt around on the bed for him, almost as if she were panicing.

In the dark. The dark. Lothos is there in the dark. No! He's dead. He's dead.... It was unclear how she did it, she was only rolling over, but she felt herself falling through the air, coming to land with a hard thud on the infirmary floor. "Oww..."