There was, on no current plane wherein the two of them existed, and she, bleeding out before a feral, agitated, hungry Gauthier, a capability of her being fine.

Steaming, precious ilk. Oh- she whimpers, given to the chill and the breeze, but inconsequential to Gauthier as he loomed, watching the blood seep. Waste. His teeth clicked, tongue pressed to their spaces, curled around his fangs. Oh again and she moves, her predatory accomplice lurching forward as more spilled out, stained the pristine lavender of her flesh. It unraveled for gore, the fine fringes wavered, and Gauthier leaned into the bouquet of steam that rose, breathing its essence.

Be still-- he says, but there is no care in it. There is no concern, no worry, no nurse-worthy whelm of cautious tender, no allusion to the idea that he would help. It flatlines, the order. It is dreadful in the dampness of thirst, the awfulness of want, its discordial comfort.

I'm fine, @Elswyth muttered like sunlight and crocus sweet, attempting to rise to her feet. The wave would come next, wouldn't it? The sting of blood loss, its vertigo.

Gauthier moved, pressed a paw against her ribs in a way that he would force her back to the ground. You're not. he insisted once more, again without the congeniality of proper bedside manner. Let me-- he breathed, almost as though catching the spring of his lungs, chasing the words from subconscious. His heart thrummed, perilous. Let me... see... whispered the fiend, attempting to roll her onto her other side, to bare the rip to open air; to open jaws--_{BG — ART — CODE}

elsie is too busy worrying herself about how this would all play out to realize that there had been a change. it was almost imperceptible to even the most astute and most definitely not to the painfully naive.

fighting to find her footing she places a paw wrong and it slips beneath her, losing it's grip on the blood-soaked foliage beneath her. surely that was not all hers? no, no -- there was the beast they had felled, growing colder by the minute.

"m'fine," she insists even though she is not, even though she slides back to the ground with a overwhelming dizziness. her vision swims and darkens and she blinks rapidly to clear it, to focus on the monster friend that towered above her. "promise." evidently only capable of one word at a time, though.

you're not.

he insists and she cannot argue, cannot see the threat that lay behind the distant words, the empty tones. elswyth is blind to the danger she is in, and only smiles weakly as she lays back on the grass, rolling easily with his touch. now exposed the wound is shown to be a nasty thing, ragged and deep and seeping blood. it is the seeping that will safe her -- this is not the spurt of an artery, at least.

"see, fine..." weakly she waved toward the creature they had felled, struggling to hold on to the shining moment of victory she had experienced only seconds before. "eat."

oh -- what a dangerous word.

@Gauthier

TW: gore, vampirism/borderline cannibalism

Gauthier needs no permission, even if it is not the permission she grants. Eat she says, given idly to the possessive press of his paw. She leans, and though the cut begins to crust with the clot of cooling blood it still seeps warmly, dampening the edges. The smell is influenced by that of the wildebeest - tainted, but precious still, and his tongue anticipates with the ride of his glistening fangs. Her wound needs dressed, and he is dangerously far from the accolades of a proper nurse.

The beast they have slain is all but forgotten for the heat of an engrossed moment, one of fervor, fever, and mounting appetance. Her small words of leniency are released to the ignorance of the passing winds, as if she might as well have said nothing, relented nothing - his palate is ruthless and masterless.

Without the sanction of appeasement, Gauthier leaned into the spooling heat of her wound, breathed deep the metallic savor of its decadence, and feasted blithely on what broke the dam of flesh. His senses immersed with ravening famishment, the perusal of grating teeth - softer than he would rake the wounds of a felled prey, but blissfully reckless yet. He lapped what blood seeped from the tear with avid hunger, remorseless pry, careless of the pinch of his fangs or the roughness of his tongue, unaware that a paw still rested heavily on @Elswyth's ribs._{BG — ART — CODE}

The world blurs at the edges and she can barely form a thought. The ones that do come flit in and out of her mind, fickle things escaping her clumsy grasp with ease.

Oh, I wish he would eat.

Heavy grows her head and she rests it on the ground, the thought dancing away and leaving only a question — eat? Mentally she shakes her head.

No, he wants to help. See. So much blood. Help, please. “H-el-“ Broken words, interrupted as he shifts, looming, pressing ever so slightly upon her side as his weight adjusts. Lowering his head to help…

Yes, help.

His tongue is rough, but she grits her teeth and puts on a brave face, fighting back a cry so that only a soft hiss escapes. It hurts — oh, it hurts! — and the pain is an icy bucket that breaks through the haze.

“Please,” a whimper, then, though she has no strength to move. Nor is she entirely aware of what she is asking of him. To help? To stop? To… what?

Another tiny cry as his teeth scrape her ruined flesh, blood welling under his tongue, the pain keeping her semi focused. Enough that she questions, suspects, and manages a whispered “not me.”

midnight mass
a crimson pool so warm and deep
lulls me to an endless sleep

Her pain is nothing to him in the undulating waves of ecstasy that wash smoothly over him - the dull cry of her voice lackened to a distant moan, like the wind, like some forgotten season on the silver edge of his glee. Please goes unnoticed. Despair goes unnoticed. Gauthier only takes and takes, he drinks, he delves.

To him there is no Elswyth, no friend, no hunting partner. She is no better than the wildebeest left behind, though much more delicious to savor.

There is no guard to pinching teeth. She is prey now. Meat and split vein, weakened, useful still. Gauthier rested, adjusting, bathing his lips and cheeks in the clotting warmth of her blood as it seeped, not dare to be wasted to the cold! The winter would not have more than it had already taken, it is his now.

Her simpering not me is answered by a conflictive growl, low and warning. She is too quiet and too tasty. The broad paw pushed against her ribs with idle force, ushering a soft roll of more, her only fortune being that an artery was not split.

@Elswyth could still run. She should run. He plucked at a tuft of fur matted with her blood, demanding a deluge that had yet to come, that would be her end. There is only fever now as their prize grew cold.

Run.

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Too late. Too late.

Realization is slow to dawn, sluggish. A bullet shot underwater, shockwaves that stretch too far.

Eat.

The word bounces around in her mind, the quiet command she had given to him. Oh and he had obliged! He pressed a heavy paw against her, savored the blood that poured from her wound, and pulled another hiss from between her teeth. His own tore through the delicate skin and she felt another rush of warmth.

"N-no," there is a gurgle in her throat as her eyes roll blindly in their sockets, her compromised vision swimming.

Red, so much red.

Too much.

Her back legs kick uselessly against the ground "stop!" and she is too quiet. Too mousy. Hushed.

But then his teeth snag again and she snarls, fierce, and there is life to her. For a second, a fleeting second, but it is hopefully enough. Back legs bend, now, and aim for the beast that pins her down, fighting back.

She curls against the pain, reaching at the same time with the claws of her front leg, slashing blindly through the air and hoping to hit something. "Le' go," she slurs as she kicks again, struggling to get away, fighting for her freedom.

Fighting for her life.

midnight mass
a crimson pool so warm and deep
lulls me to an endless sleep

N-no -- useless whimpering, a dull whine lost to the feral pulse pounding in his ears, its violent music antipathic to her cries. It knows only hunger, rage, the totality of consumption bathed by willing or unwilling sacrifice, unprejudiced. Elswyth stirred and he gave no pause, her kicking legs merely shallow waves against the torrent that he is. Stop! is drowned there, sputtering and cackling out of its simpering existence. Its urgency is chased out of the mind as quickly as it has rolled in.

She would have relent to the same end as the wildebeest. Prey. A consumable.

He would have left her in the fields for vultures, cannibals.

But there are suddenly claws at his face and a snarl that breaks through the monotonous drone of frenzy; heat against his cheeks, a building weight behind the shove. He snarled, barbaric, lost to all senses but the dominion of taste, its sovereign rite. The claws of the broad paw he pressed against her side dug for grip as his face was pushed away, and he swatted absently for the feet that thrust against his cheek.

Le' go! she cried, weakly still but loud enough for its resonance to settle at the forefront of his mind. He reeled in his bloodmongering trance still, lips dripping with the luscious thick of her blood, eyes wild with a chilling cruelty, void of any inkling of memory, courtesy.

Yet it isn't some ill fated, nameless stranger that bled into the cold, hard ground before him. @Elswyth, who, for all the hard work she had desperately put in to the successes she earned recognition for, had been punished for her ambition. Gauthier is a shameless wretch. He scowled, viperously snapped into the wintry air with a great clack of his draconian jaws bathed in red, and turned ruthlessly on the carcass they had brought down.

With unmatched brutality he sliced its belly wide and ripped the weight of its innards steaming into the cold air, tore leg and haunch from the beast with an ungodly popping and squelching, and threw it before her paws.

His face pinched with wrath, knowing full well she deserved better, and too uncaring to do anything for it. And without another word, began to drag the mutilated cadaver the way to the Bluffs.

exit.

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