the other side // chase

[Mikhail Vakhteiar Iul'ian]

It was only a few days after the incident between Mikhail and Emily the bounty hunter, but rumors were already circulating the neighborhood that the cathedral was haunted; that some kind of ghost had taken up residence. People passing could see candles lit inside, even though the collapsing structure hadn't been used as it was supposed to be used for decades now. And Mikhail could easily be mistaken for a ghost by passerbys; with how silent he was, and how carefully he remained hidden, it was certainly believable.

At least he had a bit of a routine now, venturing out to feed on stray animals, or to explore. He was understanding the surrounding environment a little better now, even if he still avoided its people. The entire environment seemed to be manufactured by human hands, but no word in his vocabulary was even akin to 'machine,' so he didn't know what to call these gigantic, frightening, self-propelled structures. He very nearly was run over by one, carrying a family of people. The structures must not have been intelligent like horses; they didn't stop even if something was in the way.

Mikhail still didn't know what the date was, but he was in no hurry, still focusing on trying to get a grasp on ... well, on being awake. His senses were just as he remembered them, and memory was starting to seep back into his consciousness, little by little. Usually they came back after he slept, thanks to his dreams.

He had found a spare bed in the undercroft; the things in there were surprisingly untouched, despite being separated only by a locked door. He only guessed perhaps there was a superstitious fear surrounding the place, or at least something like that that prevented would-be bandits from ransacking the place.

There he had found more priest's habits, but still no shoes. More importantly, there were blankets, which was a wonderful discovery; beyond candles, he had kept warm by salvaging broken furniture and burning it in the fireplace in the room behind the sanctuary. That room had become his living space, so to speak; he'd dragged the bed up there and huddled up by the fire with the blankets. It wasn't much different from how he had used to live; the drafty stone was what he was used to, and he had not yet enjoyed any of the conveniences of modern comfort.

One of the faucets still worked in the tiny bathroom connected to the back room, so he used it to fill a metal washtub and take his baths.

It was on one such night, after he had finished bathing and dressing, that he emerged back into the sanctuary. There was a patch on the ground where the stone floor had been ripped away, revealing dirt underneath. When the sun came through the windows in the early morning, the angle was just right that the light streamed in through a broken window, illuminating the patch of ground, and just the other day, tiny green sprouts had begun to peek through the dirt. Pleasantly surprised, Mikhail had taken to watering them, wondering what they might grow into.

He had just poured a cup full of water onto the little makeshift garden, when he heard a door slam in the distance. He gasped and dropped the cup, suddenly on the alert, his ears straining to hear. He had become accustomed to the tranquil stillness of his little home, and the slightest disturbance thus had him on edge.

Candles were burning by the altar as they usually were; it wasn't as if he needed the light to see, but their warmth and glow comforted him. He picked up one of the candles in a single prong candelabra, before turning and drifting towards the noise to investigate.

What he came to find ought to have startled him, yet he didn't seem surprised.

"Hallo," he greeted simply, having heard the greeting used by most of the people in the area, even if his version was still weighted by his thick accent.

He blinked down at the huddled form of the woman from the other day. There was a warmth about him that almost suggested he'd been expecting her.

He knelt beside her for a moment, his head tilted quizzically, before he carefully scooped up her hand. Hers was surprisingly cold.

His concerned frown returned to his features. "Požar. Fire. Veni," he insisted, pausing to tug off the blanket he had been wearing like a cloak over his habit. He tucked it over her shoulders instead, fastening it with a pin, before he stood and tugged at her hand again, trying to lead her to the back room, where he would perch her by the fire so that she could warm up.

[Emily Chase]

Chase's next meeting with the Director was not a happy occasion. He chewed her up one side and down the other for losing their quarry, and he didn't want to hear excuses. She'd kept her interaction with the pale Vampire to herself. The Director was a firm believer in the "no unnecessary contact" rule, and the last thing Chase needed was another bullet in the Director's angry gun.

Several days passed, and she heard no word from the Order. She figured that was her punishment for losing the Vamp, who, it turned out, had gone on a killing spree the very next day. All her fault.

Even though Chase told no one of her encounter with the blond Vamp, it continued to be on her mind. It wasn't on the forefront of her thoughts, but the image of his pale, pretty face swam around the very edges of her awareness, often blossoming up behind her eyelids as she lay down to sleep every night.

The little scratches on her arm healed to tiny, almost-invisible scars, which would fade over time. The bite, however, was not healing like the Director had said it would. He'd rubbed some kind of paste on it when she'd received the bite, something that smelled strongly of cumin and cardamom. Fortunately, the smell had faded, but the bite itself had turned a frightening dark purple, like the bruise one might expect to get from a bar fight.

Chase opted to wear long sleeves when she went to work at the florist's shop, where she served as an assistant and occasionally did her own arrangements.

But after three days, the bite had gotten worse, and she began to feel feverish. She went to the Director, planning to demand to know why his salve hadn't worked, but the moment she revealed the festering wound to him, he threw her out of his office and tore her contract up before her very eyes.

"The hell's wrong with you?" She shouted at him as she dusted off her palms. The Director just turned around and went back inside without a backward glance.

By the next morning, Chase's fever was even higher, but she had no insurance and definitely couldn't afford a doctor on her own. In the back of her mind, there was a niggling voice that reminded her of the pale Vampire, the one who had tried to heal her wound that night the week before. She decided finally to shelve her pride and pay the Vamp a visit.

Chase walked down the street as the sun dropped below the horizon. The temperature, though still warm and summery, was dropping along with the sun.

Dressed in her typical black pants, paired with a white Adam Lambert t-shirt and chucks, Chase tried to remember the intersection where the cathedral was located.

By the time she located the church, she was shivering, and there was a gnawing pain in her stomach that was both uncomfortable and annoying. Her throat was dry, and her mouth hurt, just like it had when she was eight and had gotten braces for the first time.

She shouldered the huge front door open and slipped silently inside the church. She started toward the altar, where she could see candles burning in several elaborate candelabras. When she reached the altar, she warmed her freezing hands over one of the flickering candle flames.

She couldn't bring herself to call out, in case there was something unfriendly lurking in the rafters high above, but she thought it might be safe to whisper a hopeful "hello" to the darkness. She knew enough about Vampires to know that if one was around, they would hear her.

Exhaustion was creeping over Chase like a shadow. She moved around to the back of the ornate but dusty table and sat down, out of sight, back against the gold leg of the sacraments table. She leaned her head back, thinking she would close her eyes, just for a moment...

The next thing Chase knew, someone was talking to her and taking a hold of her hand. She jerked awake, but after the initial startle had cleared from her mind, she recognized with relief the pale, white-haired Vampire from the week before.

She meant to say "hello," or something similar, but all that came out of her mouth was "I'm cold." The Vampire seemed to understand, because he draped his thin blanket over her shoulders and urged her to get up and come with him. He even mentioned a fire. Chase didn't need telling twice.

She rose to her feet, albeit a little shakily, and followed the Vampire, her cold hand still in his somewhat warmer one.

The Vampire led Chase to a room behind the sanctuary, and she could tell by looking at it that he had made his home her. She made a beeline for the fireplace, and practically held her hands in the flames to warm up. She almost forgot that she was not the only person in the room, and upon remembering she looked over her shoulder at her companion.

"Thank you," she said through chattering teeth.

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[Mikhail Vakhteiar Iul'ian]

Mikhail didn't need to know the woman's language to understand what she was saying. He was, after all, a naturally nurturing creature, perhaps to a fault. That was most evident during the last time they had met, when she had clearly been trying to incapacitate him and he had only been concerned for the wounds she'd displayed.

As they walked back to the back room, he readjusted the blanket around her, making sure it didn't slip off. But once they had made it to the fireplace, he nodded approvingly when she sat herself in front of it.

As for himself, he lowered himself onto the edge of his pallet. The bedframe creaked beneath his weight, but he didn't notice, bending to scoop up a wooden comb. Judging by the pile of wood shavings and the small metal tools by the fire, he'd probably carved it himself.

Crouching next to her, now with another blanket around his shoulders, he gingerly took some of her hair and started combing it through, helping it dry. His attentions were incredibly gentle, and his actions with a finesse that suggested he did this quite often. Or ... well, that he used to.

When she thanked him, he paused, tilting his head in that quizzical manner again, before his face broke into a warm smile. Again, he didn't need to know the words to understand her, and while he didn't know how to say 'you're welcome,' either, he hoped the warmth behind his gentle, "Ne za čto," would suffice.

After working on one section of her hair, he tucked it over her shoulder and, before gathering the next bit, he paused and lowered the comb.

"Uhm ... Mikhail," he ventured, gesturing to himself, before pressing fingertips to her shoulder. "Kak vas zovut?" he asked in turn.

Introductions done, he returned to combing at her hair, and would continue to do so until either he'd finished, or she decided to take over. At any rate, once the task was completed, he crawled over to where a metal pitcher was sitting on the floor by the bed - probably once for Eucharistic use - and poured some water into a matching metal cup, before offering it to her, figuring she was probably thirsty.

"Uhm ... clean," he clumsily explained, pointing to the fire to indicate he had already boiled the water (not that that was probably necessary, since it had just come from a tap anyhow).

Smiling happily again, he sank back into a seat by the fire, pulling a book over to him. There was a small stack of books at the foot of the bed near the pitcher, no doubt salvaged from the ruins of the cathedral. Most of them were, predictably, church texts - in Latin - but he found comfort in the texts' familiarity.

He sat in silence for a bit, returning to reading as he left the woman to herself, perhaps to let her collect her thoughts. She seemed fairly shaken as if she had just been through something less-than-pleasant. He wondered to himself what it was, and after a few moments spent in contemplation, he suddenly looked back to her as if only remembering the bite he had discovered on her the other day.

Anxiously he reached for her arm again, pulling up her sleeve to look at the wound. As he had feared, it had advanced significantly, and his gaze fell, his fingertips drifting over the spot.

"Quare ... no heal ... ?" he asked timidly, his face contorted in sympathy. "Late ... now."

He replaced her arm at her side, folding his own hands in his lap and wringing them anxiously. He still seemed to be studying her, and after a moment he reached out to press a hand to her cheek, the pad of his thumb grazing over the corner of her lips to push them back, searching for fangs.

[Emily Chase]

At first, Chase was confused, not to mention a little wary, when the Vampire came to sit so close beside her. Then she saw the rudimentary comb in his hand. She was about to reach out and take it from him when he moved to sit behind her and began running her dripping hair through surprisingly adept and gentle fingers, easing each tangle apart.

They sat in silence, with the Vampire working through her light brown hair, and Chase, feeling warmer by the moment (and not entirely thanks to the fire). After a few moments, though, he gestured to himself, and said simply, "Mikhail." She looked over her shoulder at him, and repeated his name aloud. She didn't say it perfectly, lacking his perfect pronunciation of the name, which she was fairly certain was Russian. She laughed self-consciously at her fumbled pronunciation.

Chase had known a foreign exchange student from Russia in college, and she recognized the words when Mikhail asked for her name.

"Chase," she said instinctively before correcting herself. "Er... Emily. My dad used to call me Emmy. You have no idea what I'm saying." The last part was more of a mutter than an out-right statement.

Mikhail went back to working on her hair, and she let her eyes fall closed lazily. "That feels nice," she said. No one had brushed her hair for her since before her mom died when she was eight or nine. She couldn't say before now that she'd missed having her hair played with, but it was certainly something she could get used to again.

After Mikhail finished working her hair into a long, smooth veil, he got up and walked away briefly, returning with a cup of water. He assured her that it was clean, and she nodded her thanks and took a sip. It tasted fine, but it didn't quite satisfy like she'd thought it would.

Mikhail had wandered off again, and this left Chase to wonder about her situation. She suspected that the bite on her aching arm was the source of her discomfort, and she worried about what its increased side-effects seemed to mean. She didn't want to believe that she'd been careless enough to get herself turned, but it was, after all, an occupational hazard of being a Vampire hunter.

But now, if the Director's actions had been any indicator, she had become the hunted, rather than the hunter. That was a sobering thought.

As though Mikhail had read her mind, he appeared beside her again and reached for her arm. She acquiesced, letting him examine the mottled purple and yellow weal the bite had become. She winced as his long fingers, like pale spiders, brushed the wound, but she didn't pull away. She bit her lower lip.

"Um... is it gonna- oh!" She had been about to ask Mikhail if the bite would make her a Vampire like him, but he had reached out with one hand and caressed her face, and for a very awkward moment, she thought he was going to kiss her, but she realized quickly enough that he was checking for fangs. She couldn't help but giggle. His fingers really were remarkably soft, and their gentle contact with her chapped lips tickled ever so slightly. For the first time, she smiled at him.

The thought that she'd fired her bow at Mikhail only a few days before flitted across her mind, and she felt suddenly very guilty. "I'm sorry," she said, unsure if he could even understand her. "About... about last time." Just to make sure he got the point, she mimed holding the crossbow, and then shaped her hands into a heart, which she then "broke" into two pieces. It was pretty lame sign language, but she hoped he'd get the point.

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[Mikhail Vakhteiar Iul'ian]

The woman had responded so quickly to his inquiry about her name, that it took him a while to pluck her name from the whole string of words she had said.

"Emily. Chase," he parroted, assuming that the first name had been her patronym, and the next name was her given name. "Emily," he worded again, carefully, the foreign name feeling awkward on his tongue. Eventually, though, he smiled again. "Pulchellus," he hummed, content, laughing a bit too at his probably butchering of her name - that way they were even, he supposed.

Mikhail was one to enjoy simple pleasures, and it was evident he was a very empathic person; Chase's enjoyment of his attentive grooming was enough to make him feel all sorts of fuzzy as well. Perhaps there was a deeper reason to that, but if there was, he wasn't yet aware of it.

The appearance of Chase's wound, however, did seem to unsettle Mikhail quite a bit, and after inspecting her lips and finding no fangs beneath them, his gaze darkened further, and he released her, sitting back again. He folded his arms, frowning to himself, though his frustration was briefly distracted by Chase's apology.

Blinking in surprise at her, he tilted his head questioningly, trying to decipher her words through her tone. He sensed regret, and for a moment he thought she was thinking the same thing he was; that the bite had taken effect, that it was too late to reverse now ... but she elaborated, and he watched her hands, his brow still wrinkled as he tried to understand.

"Sor-sorry?" he repeated. "Last time ... " But then his gaze brightened as he made the connection, and giggling childishly, he imitated her gesture with the crossbow, then elaborated on her story, huddling in a ball to pantomime his pitiful cowering behind the altar, before dissolving into more quiet laughter.

It didn't last, however, as he remembered his train of thought, and, frowning suddenly again, he took her arm just as before, pointing a finger towards the purple bruise.

"Bite. No heal, late now," he repeated sternly, shaking his head abruptly. Then he released her arm, instead tapping a finger against her lips. "No ... teeth, early, yet." he explained, before dropping his hand and tapping his fingertips over his own lips, thoughtful.

Now his gaze fell, as he approached the explanation he didn't know how to make - or didn't want to make. He sat back on his haunches again, tugging the hem of his robe down around his ankles, as he stared at her for a long moment, thinking.

"Moriemini ... tu ... die. Cito, bibentes bibetis sanguinem ... uhm ... thirst ... drink now," he stammered, frustrated at his limited vocabulary when it was needed for such a delicate situation.

Figuring this was one case where actions explained better than words, he drew a rather ornate dagger from under the mattress of the bed (it was quite old; he'd been buried with it and, understandably, it had lasted longer than his clothing had), and without ceremony, pointed it at his throat and dragged the tip over his neck to draw blood.

"Ecce," he indicated, drawing his hair away from his neck and tucking it over his opposite shoulder. He only hoped he made enough sense.

[Emily Chase]

Chase was glad Mikhail was laughing with her, and not at her. Even with the language barrier, they were communicating, and with someone to pass the time, her situation didn't seem so bleak. She even understood what he meant when he spoke about the bite on her arm.

"Late... too late," she repeated, when he looked sadly at her and touched the wound on her arm. She sighed, wishing she'd been a bit more careful during that particular raid, but what was done, was done, and, at least according to Mikhail, it was too late to do anything about it.

Chase didn't know much about the process of changing, even though she was a Vampire hunter. She was more concerned with the extermination, and less worried about the reproduction, as it were.

Lost in thought, it was a moment before Chase realized Mikhail was speaking again. He clearly didn't know how to express what he wished to say in English, and he seemed to be getting increasingly frustrated with his lack of communication. Chase struggled to grasp the meaning in his fractured sentences, but she wasn't doing a very good job.

Suddenly, Mikhail had moved to the bed and drawn a frightening looking dagger from under the mattress, and Chase hadn't the foggiest idea what he was planning.

"Easy there," she said, apprehensively.

"Thirst," Mikhail said, almost sounding as though he was desperate for her to get the point. "Drink now." And then he slit his own throat.

Chase stifled a scream, her hand flying up to her mouth to muffle the sound.

"What are you- oh, my god," she still felt absolute terror for what she'd just witness, but suddenly she felt something else, as well: longing. The sight of the blood seemed to have flipped some sort of switch in her head, and suddenly she could smell the coppery, salty-sweet scent of it, and the way the blood rolled in beads down Mikhail's neck and pooled in the hollow of his throat sent feelings of desperate thirst radiating throughout her whole being.

At first, she tried desperately to tamp down the overwhelming urge to launch herself at Mikhail. She tried to reason with herself inside her own mind, pleading with herself to remember that Mikhail had been so kind to her, and had they not just laughed together moments before?

After a few second's brutal struggle, she understood what Mikhail had grasped long before she had: she was turning, and if she wanted to make it through the night, she had to feed. But not this way. Not like this, she thought.

Finally her terrifying need to drink overwhelmed her human judgment, and she crawled forward on her hands and knees until she was only a few inches away from Mikhail. She met his gaze, and she understood without hearing a word that he was offering this freely to her, this chance to continue on.

It seemed so intimate, this act. Chase felt as though she was using Mikhail, even though he had initiated the whole affair. She sat back on her feet, an expression of wonderment on her face, unsure of how to proceed. It wasn't as though she'd ever done this before, and she didn't know what protocol dictated she do. Finally, she reached for his hands and took them in her own, gently pulling him toward her, and then she placed his graceful hands on her waist.

She hesitated ever so slightly, but her need overwhelmed her and she reached out, threading her fingers through his long, white-blond hair and pulled him down to her. Her lips found the wound on his throat quickly, and the taste of his blood washed over her like a wave from the sea. In it she tasted life itself, and so many other sensations that had nothing to do with food coursed through her veins, which felt as though they were filled with a delicious warmth.

Chase's body tensed, her fingers curling into a fist in Mikhail's hair, her other hand finding its way to his cheek, where she traced the lines of his cheekbones, down his face, and to his neck, where she used her hand to pull him closer.

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[Mikhail Vakhteiar Iul'ian]

Even if Chase's logical brain didn't quite understand what Mikhail was intending, he hoped, at least, that her instinct would kick in and take over for her. It was a terrible decision to make, but he had accepted it as the only option. She was too far gone for his healing to be effective, and it was either this or death, as he had tried to explain. There wasn't much time to dwell on it, either, as Mikhail was prone to do. He acted simply on his gut feeling, which urged him to nourish her.

He knew his plan was working the moment that Chase's gaze fixed on the self-inflicted wound. Then would follow an inevitably internal struggle; Mikhail was very familiar with this process, as he underwent it far more frequently than he would like to admit.

"Veni," he urged again in gentle encouragement, having set the dagger aside, his fingertips gingerly feeling around the wound, swabbing up some of the excess blood that had trickled away. He dabbed his fingertips off on a clean hand towel, just as Chase finally scooted closer, pulling him to her.

The offer had been made strictly on the basis of necessity, but when she placed his hands on her waist and closed in to drink, Mikhail swallowed, trying to still his breathing, which had risen in pace at the closeness, though he didn't understand why. While he was repulsed by the thought of enjoying such an act, a corner of his mind admitted to it, and that made him uncomfortable. He squirmed slightly in discomfort - or so he thought.

Not realizing his eyes had been shut tight, as if to try to block out the onslaught of sensory input, he blinked, an eye cracking open to peek at Chase's fingertips now wandering over his face. He had half the urge to turn his head and try to nuzzle at them, but he resisted, though he didn't notice the idle patterns his own fingertips were tracing over her waist.

She abruptly tugged him closer, and he winced slightly, anxiety twisting a knot in his stomach. He didn't know how much was too much, truth be told; he would be content to let her take what she needed, but he was starting to feel a little bit dizzy himself.

"Ah ... stoj, požalujsta ... " he murmured, his hand slipping from her waist, trying to cup to her face instead. She had him locked in a rather tight embrace, which might have been pleasant in any other situation, but he pushed gently, trying to urge her lips away from his throat.

He couldn't just shove her away, in case she cause damage, but he whimpered again, pushing at her a bit more urgently. "No ... finished," he pieced together, brushing her hair out of her face.

When finally she did break away, though, he sighed in relief. Yet, even though he was the one who technically ought to have been attended to first, he picked up the cloth from earlier, and immediately went back to her, tilting her chin up so that he could dab at her lips with the cloth, cleaning her off first.

Only then did he do the same with his throat, tidying up the spot, before he swept his fingertips over the cut, murmuring his usual verses. His fingers glowed a faint blue, just as when he had tried to heal her bite before, and the light spread to the cut, sealing it up almost instantaneously.

Sighing again, now in satisfaction, he looked back to Chase, tilting his head. He didn't know the words to ask how she felt, but his expression was probably enough to ask the question for him.

[Emily Chase]

Chase was only vaguely aware at first of Mikhail's efforts to push her away, so wrapped up was she in the experience of feeding for the first time. Soon enough, however, she heard his plaintive requests for respite and she detached herself from him, falling back to her hands and knees. She pushed herself backwards, away from Mikhail, terrified of what had just transpired.

There was an ache in her mouth, and she thought at first that it was the thirst, but it refused to abate. She covered her bloodstained mouth with one hand, and tried to slow her harried breathing.

When Mikhail approached with what looked like a soft rag, she shrank away from his touch and shook her head in protest. It was only then that she realized her hair had come loose of its knot where she'd tied it at the nape of her neck, and was falling over her shoulders and down to her waist.

Chase fought a powerful urge to cry. She hated crying, especially in front of strangers. More than anything, she wanted to be at home in bed, waking up to discover none of this had really happened.

At last she moved her hands from her face, and Mikhail, with a gentleness she couldn't have predicted, began to dab at her mouth as though she was a messy child. Only then did he tend to the wound on his neck.

Chase took a few deep breaths, but after the second or third one, her chest began to ache and tighten painfully. Each breath seemed harder and harder to bring in, and she felt a horrible stillness inside. Her chest felt empty and hollow, like a cavernous abyss.

Just as she was approaching levels of panic she'd only heard of in new reports, it occurred to her why normal things like breathing were so hard now. I'm dying, she realized.

"My heart... my heart's stopped," she whispered, wondering if she would ever get used to the absence of the thump thump in her chest, which she had never noticed before this moment.

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[Mikhail Vakhteiar Iul'ian]

Mikhail's gaze fell slightly when Chase scrabbled away, but he'd half been expecting it. With the cloth still clutched in his hand, he sat back again, blinking patiently at her, his eyes sweeping over her in both concern and curiosity. When she allowed him, though, he focused on cleaning her lips, guiltily avoiding her eyes.

He knew what was coming next, and at first he looked away, his eyes shut tight, not wanting to witness the horrific sight of the woman struggling to cope with the artificial death. It took him right back to that cold, starless night in the cloister, the gardens trampled, the snow stained red. The air had been thick with the cries of his brothers, committed to peace; even faced with the heartlessness of their murderers, the monks had refused to raise a finger against the unnatural, demonic invaders.

The brothers had been left scattered in the snow. It was an isolated place, as most monasteries were; nobody was near enough to hear the despair that night had brought.

Mikhail was the only one who had survived, and he had only survived because he had been a coward, afraid of death. He'd given into the instinct, the same instinct of Chase's that he'd just tempted into manifestation. Brother Pavel was dying anyway; he hadn't needed what blood he had left in his body, yes?

And then that icy grasp on the heart, as if a hand had physically reached through his ribcage and taken hold of his insides; he knew it was the same thing that Chase was suffering now.

Mikhail abruptly shook his head, his eyes wide as he brought himself back to consciousness in time to see Chase on the floor in silent panic.

He cupped a hand over his eyes, his empathic tendencies surfacing again. She refused to cry, so he was doing it for her, and he reached his free hand out, his fingers crawling across the stone floor to find hers, whereupon he grasped tightly at her hand, trying to offer her some measure of support, however dwarfed it was by the pain of her body's transformation.

Breathing slowly, Mikhail peeked through his fingers, watching her anxiously. Had he made the right decision? He could never imagine such an act being the right thing to do, and if this was a test, he did not like it.

Finally, after several tense moments, Chase spoke again, and Mikhail's hand dropped from his face as he leaned nearer, blinking wide-eyed at her. He seemed nearly as shocked from the entire ordeal as she did.

He didn't understand her words, but he heard the quavering behind each one, and he tilted his head, hastily blinking away a couple of silent tears. He was at a loss of what to do now; it seemed he was always looking after one's comfort and well-being, but what, ever, could help in this situation?

His mind returned to the cloister, and he remembered the extreme, absolute cold, not from the snow but from the turning that followed the feeding. He frowned, hesitating, before he crouched at Chase's side again. Without permission, he scooped her up with a strength that betrayed his malnourished frame, and he swiftly transported her to the bed. Immediately he swathed her in all of the blankets he had collected, as the uncontrollable, fever-like shivering would follow. That much he remembered.

That done, he sank into a seat on the floor by the bed, his chin propped up on the edge of the moth-eaten mattress as he continued to watch her, infinitely anxious.

[Emily Chase]

Chase could sense Mikhail hovering just at the edges of her awareness. She seemed to recognize on instinct that he was giving her privacy, and while she appreciated the thought behind the gesture, there was a part of her that wanted him nearby, though whether she would embrace him or pummel him to death was to be seen.

The first thing Chase noticed, after the initial shock that accompanied the lack of a beating heart, was that her extremities were quite cold. She turned to face the fire, only to find that it had burned down to embers.

When she turned back again, Mikhail had moved down to the floor beside her in that silent way of his. She wondered if the ability to move about silently was universal in the Vampire world, or if he had been a professional stalker in a past life, and if she would be as clumsy in death as she had always been in life.

The cold was spreading up her arms and legs and into her core, but she barely noticed, distracted as she was by Mikhail's nearness. She longed to reach out and touch his perfectly smooth alabaster skin, and she noticed with a slight twinge of jealousy that he had the eyelashes of a demigod. She wondered off-handedly which angel he'd had to bribe to get eyelashes like that. This flash of her usual good humor brought a small smile to her lips.

She realized suddenly that she had leaned toward him without meaning to, and just as she moved a hand to reach out to touch that flawless skin, he swept her up in his arms, as though she weighed little more than a feather, and no sooner had she placed her arms gently around his neck, then he deposited her very carefully on his bed and wrapped a more substantial blanket around her shoulders. He actually tucked her in, and she would never have admitted it, but she found the gesture quite nice.

She was aware suddenly that she was very tired, her eyelids heavy with fatigue. She would have liked to stay awake, talking to Mikhail, but the language barrier made that rather difficult. Instead, she recalled a word the exchange student had used quite often and murmured to him, "spaciba."

He moved as if to leave her in peace, but she shook her head mutely, and he contended himself to descend to the floor by the bed, his chin resting on top of the covers, watching her carefully.

Chase fought to keep her eyes open. He was just so darn pretty to look at, and she fought sleep for a good three or four minutes before the dark overwhelmed her.

*****

The next morning, Chase awoke with a beast of a headache. It didn't take any time at all for her to remember the night before. Unfortunately, perfect memory seemed to part of the Vampire benefits package. Also unfortunately, her hair, which Mikhail had combed so carefully the night before, had now formed a veritable bird's nest, and Chase decided that her first order of business was to locate the comb of the night before.

She stood up and realized that she was still in the clothes from the day before, and now they were crusted with dried blood. She decided to worry about that later, and was about to search again for the comb, when she realized two things: one, she was alone in the room, and two, she was hungry.

She decided to worry about the hunger first, but soon realized that she had no resources with which to acquire food. She supposed she could find a rat or something in the abandoned church, but the thought made her acutely uncomfortable. She decided instead to focus on finding something to wear that hadn't been drenched in blood. The smell was only making her hungrier.

She wandered out into the cathedral and located the vestments closet, which thankfully contained the white, lace-trimmed robes of the acolytes. She shimmied out of her tight black pants and dirty top and slipped one of the white over-robes over her head. She tied a robe belt around her waist, and upon looking in the mirror, she assessed that she didn't look half bad.

### WORDS | COMPLETE/INCOMPLETE | TAGS | OUTFIT
LYRICS BY SKILLET | TEMPLATE BY ARRO
NOW GIVE THEM A NICE NOTE HERE!

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[Mikhail Vakhteiar Iul'ian]

Mikhail had watched her, worry written all over his face, until she had finally fallen asleep. He waited a little while longer to make sure she was okay, and that she hadn't actually expired in her sleep or something, before he scooted away from the bed and over to the hearth, where the fire was naught but a handful of embers now. He spent a bit of time coaxing the fire back to life, adding some more pieces of splintered furniture (chair legs this time), and giving the makeshift firewood a few pokes with what looked like the pole from one of those candle snuffers the altar servers usually used.

Once satisfied with the warmth coming from the hearth again, Mikhail nodded to himself and curled up on the mat in front of the fire, his own shivering subsiding eventually as the fire reheated the room.

If he expected sleep to follow, however, he was mistaken. His mind was much too awake, replaying in his head the scene that had just taken place. It wasn't only Chase's pain that had disturbed him; it was the memories it had summoned from his own mind, locked away during his sleep. At least some things were beginning to return, even if, at times, too abruptly.

So he lied awake for another hour or so, before shaking his head to himself and sitting up again, rubbing his eyes. He stood, wobbling for a moment, before snatching a candelabra up (the same single-pronged one from earlier) and vacating the room, slipping back into the sanctuary. There, he trudged over to the spot at the end of the very first pew on the right, sinking to his knees with a soundless sigh, the candle beside him.

He remained still for a couple of hours, his fortitude impressive. But then again, considering what he had been before he had died, this was hardly a fraction of his former daily routines. He prayed for guidance, for continued strength to endure the hardships each day had brought; he also prayed for decisiveness, that he might know how to care for Emily in the days to follow. Then he gave thanks that they had been placed in one another's paths, for, though he might not yet have understood the necessity of her curse, he felt that the outcomes would be much more worthwhile.

After those couple of hours had passed, Mikhail finally put out the candle. With a weary sigh, he stood, dusting off his knees, and then padded back to the room to return to his spot by the fire. Curling up once more, he found sleep came much more easily, now that his mind was clear.

-----

Only a few hours later did Mikhail awaken. He was still groggy, but nothing out of the ordinary; the stress of everything since awakening did take its toll on him, but he never once uttered a word of complaint.

He found that Chase was still sleeping, and so he silently crept from the room to the adjoining bathroom to draw his bath and have a wash. His method of filling the metal washbin was to just stick it under the sink, turn on the faucet (which he had found fascinating and had spent nearly an hour turning it on and off on the day of discovering it), and let the sink overflow until the water poured into the bin, much like a fountain.

There was no water heater (not that he knew what those were anyway), so the water was cold, but he was used to that. He had always been a bit obsessive over cleanliness; yes, his order had minded cleanliness, but by modern standards that probably wasn't enough. Taking into account his 'obsessiveness,' then, that was about equivalent to 'normal' in modern terms.

Nobody took long baths when he was alive, though (that would be silly since the water was cold), so he scrubbed down quickly and then used a small towel to dry. Redressing in a fresh habit, he returned to the fire to dry out his hair, combing it through, and when that was all done, he used the water in the tub to wash his old clothes, laying them by the fire to dry as well.

After that, he left the sleeping Chase, venturing out to the streets. He didn't dare wander far, especially not without the cover of night. It was still very early; dawn had hardly broken, so the area was still quiet. That was good; he only wanted to venture so far as to find some food. Scavenging stray animals was far from an enjoyable act, but he had to opt for it to avoid the temptation of human blood, which he knew would only lead to a plethora of unwanted complications.

Following his so-called 'breakfast,' he began his short walk back to the cathedral, his chin tilted back so that he could watch the sky. He loved sunrises; they were refreshing, and to him, each new day was a blessing.

Upon arriving back at the cathedral, he looked around, a bit worried about how to spend the day. After all, up until now, he had only had to look after himself, which was easy enough as his needs were few, but with Chase in residence, he wasn't sure what he needed to do. Still, he found her still sleeping upon his return, so, figuring he would wait for her to wake up, he dug a leather-bound book from his mostly-empty bag, along with some ink and a pen he had found in the undercroft.

Retreating back to the sanctuary, he returned to the same spot at the pew in the front, taking a seat and opening the book to balance it in his lap. It was blank, or rather, he had found it that way; now, a few of the pages were decorated with meticulously drawn illuminations, accompanied by writing. Smiling to himself, he dipped the pen in the ink and carried on with his work.