Thea wasn't quite sure what to do with herself. She was afraid to leave the room, yet after having seen nothing but those same four walls for days...the thought of a little fresh air and night sky was a welcome one. Or even simply a different room.
The first few days after the attack she'd done little more than sleep, so there hadn't been much to get worked up about, and thankfully nothing much to say. Jairus had stayed with her those days, leaving during the nights, no doubt to feed, then returning to what had become their bed. He seemed just as inclined as she to simply sleep the days away. He had said they'd talk later, but she was becoming anxious to get it over with. At some point the torture of waiting had begun to outweigh her fear of the conversation's outcome.
The turning had been unexpected and unnerving, but in the end it was not so un-thought of –or even disagreeable—as to account for the tight knot of panic still contorting her insides. She was able to suppress it well enough, but it hadn't left her entirely.
No, what truly troubled her was how he would react to the truth about May and Berin, that it was her who had caused their deaths. He had hinted briefly that he knew what had happened, but it had been so ambiguous that she still feared she hadn't understood him correctly, or he her. He said only that 'he knew.' What could that mean? It could mean anything.
She paced, biting her lip and accidentally drawing blood for the umpteenth time. Her control over her fangs was still spotty at best, and became more erratic when she let herself get upset...which was often lately.
She needed to go, to get out of this room, out of these lands. Hell, out of the empire for that matter. As far from here, from the memories...the pain, as she could. Or...she could stay, and he could go. Othwyn would let her. She'd have no where else to go now anyway, not once Jairus realized what she had done. He couldn't have known it was the Huroth, and that they'd come in search of her. She'd brought them there. Unwittingly, yes, but if she'd just listened to him...just gone when he'd told her to...
He would go. He would once he knew...whether she wanted it or not. She pictured his face, imagining his eyes when she explained it to him—accusatory...the pain and anger that lay almost hidden beneath that cold gaze. The fantasy tore at her cruelly. There was no way she'd survive the reality of it. No. He would have to go, forget her, and salvage what was left. She'd only make it worse. She be a constant reminder, and who knows what other mess she'd end up dragging him into.
**
Jairus frowned at the crumbling stone from his windblown corner of the battlements. It was the same corner he'd picked the last time he'd paid the fortress a visit, and the same one he'd frequented in his youth. 'The non-eternal kind,' he thought sourly. That was the catch, or course. You were only young on the outside. It doesn't sound so bad until you've gotten old enough to stop caring about all the things youth was ever good for. He smirked. Then again, eternal old age would be a much more potent sort of hell. He could think of at least one use for this body which still brought pleasure.
His thoughts drifted toward Thea and his frown crept slowly back. She hadn't come out and accused him of anything, or expressed her anger. Indeed, she accepted his presence next to her as they rested, and allowed him to provide her with blood without repulsion or disgust as he had feared she might. Yet, she avoided him. She was quiet, withdrawn, and had gone back to barely meeting his eyes when they spoke. He was unsure of what he should do next. He assumed patience was what was necessary, but he had never had an impressive supply of the stuff.
But, at least, she was recovering well and had taken to the change with surprising grace. Perhaps it was her previous exposure to him, but something seemed to speed the learning process and she was already adept in knowing when and how to feed, and when to stop. What's more she seemed to enjoy it, something which yet increased his hope that she could adjust fully, and when she was ready, open up to him once more. Until then he'd have to be patient.
His frown deepened. It was that or lose her to Othwyn. He wouldn't normally be so concerned, but the man was persistent though not foolish enough to challenge whatever claim Jairus had, not outright. Othwyn tread carefully on the subject of Thea in the few encounters he'd had with the man, but Jairus sensed that he was biding his time until he could speak with her and asses the situation for himself. He'd been deferring to Jairus, allowing him to look after her, though he'd still insisted she be seen by a doctor, and did so enough that He'd been forced to let the man in to see she was resting and looking well. Which she was. Better than well.
His body responded to the thought and he growled low in his throat. He was glad she let him stay with her without complaint, but he'd not touched her other than to hold or feed her—not even to taste her himself— and the restraint was beginning to wear his control a little thin. He wasn't in danger of doing something rash, not yet, but it was taking less and less to push him.
Point in case, after his last one sided conversation with Othwyn, he was obliged to come up here to this little nook of wind pitted stone in order to cool and order his thoughts before he returned to her with his news.
Othwyn, it seemed, was also growing impatient. After Jairus had put him off once more, Othwyn requested, rather insistently, that Jairus relay a message for him if he couldn't yet see her himself. A message regarding reinstating Thea as a member of the ruling house, and giving her both title and dues: read gold, as befits 'her rightful position.' The sly bit was that it wasn't something Jairus would want to withhold from her. How could he complain about Thea being given what was hers...and even if it wasn't hers how could he not want her to have anything which would benefit her. Ultimately he did want her to accept. The money would give her power and freedom, and she could go and do with it what she pleased. Yet this was the very reason why he didn't want her to have it. The reason why he lingered here on the wind eaten turrets instead of returning to her. He steeled himself for whatever would come of this. With the freedom to leave, she just might do so, alone. Or perhaps worse, she'd take the offer as the invitation it was. An invitation to remain as one of the ruling body, to begin a new house, allied with Othwyn.
She was free to do either. So he glared impotently at the crumbling stone. At least until an interruption gave him something more satisfying to glare at.
"Enjoying the view?" He called. The boy stepped out from behind a turret a few feet down the walkway. "I thought you'd left for the city already?"
Sil moved closer, wary, and nodded. "I did leave. Came back. My uncle wants to know if you'll be coming back as well." Jairus observed him a moment, then shook his head.
"Back to playing errand boy are we?" He murmured dryly. "No, to answer you question. One way or another, I'll be gone." He smirked. "Congratulations, again. Not only are you alive, but you get my job as well."
"You won't re-consider?"
Jairus arched a surprised brow. "Is this your uncle asking?"
The boy shrugged. "No."
"Why Sil, I'm touched." Jairus smirked. The boy glared. But the anger faded into something unreadable.
"What are you?"
The smirk widened to expose a hint of fang. "Nothing you'd like to meet in a dark alley, I'm sure."
The boy let out a laughing snort despite his obvious effort to choke it back. "You could say that about any of us."
"Hm. Especially you, certainly in regards to your bad habit of jumping people in them."
"Ah, yes. I don't do that anymore."
Jairus arched a brow in response and the boy smirked back, "Much."
Jairus cooled his expression and looked back out over the blackened landscape. Sil cleared his throat.
"She's what you are, isn't she." Jairus turned a slow glare back toward him to discourage his line of questioning, but he was undaunted, and stepped forward instead. "Did...did you make her that way? In the clearing? Can you make others that way...like you? You aren't human." Jairus said nothing in return, only stared back, watching with an odd mixture of amusement and annoyance as the boy pushed on, steeling himself against the silent glare.
"Make me as you are."
He raised a curious brow. "Do you have even the slightest clue what you're asking?" The boy's face lit up as the half-sardonic query confirmed for him his answer to all of his previously unanswered questions.
