A/N- Long time no see, huh? Sorry. I live out in the boondocks over the summer, and Internet is redundant out there. The connection is so slow, you could build your child a complete park full of outdoor playthings and still have time to shower (and I take long showers) before anything loaded. Anyway, I’m back at the dorm and ready to roll. I’ve been in a vampire mood lately, so here’s the next chapter of this fic. I hope you enjoy!

Chapter 14- While You Were Gone

A thin, bright ray of sunshine fell through the heavy, navy blue curtains covering the tall windows in the room D had left Lilah in, landing perfectly across her eyes. She groaned and rolled over. She lay there for a moment, willing herself to think that the last few events of her life had been a dream. She wasn’t a dhampire. She was safe at home in her own, warm bed. No one had died because of her. She had not slain a vampire. She had never seen D again…

That last train on her mental wish list had brought a sharp pain to her heart. Suddenly, the truth of it all came rushing back to her, and she sat up and stared around at the foreign bedroom. She noted that if were not for that little ray of light, she would have been able to fool herself into thinking that it was night. The darkness in the room was so complete, yet she could see clearly. She equated this ability to her dhampire blood.

Lilah put her feet to a soft, carpeted floor and found her way to the door. With a heavy sigh, she heaved it open as if it had weight triple her body weight—when it had been almost as light as a feather. She gasped softly at the sight beyond the door. She vaguely remembered the images of the mansion that D had carried her through, but she remembered nothing like this. Marble chilled Lilah’s bare feet (where had her shoes gone?), and elaborate statues served both function and decoration. And it was so white. She stepped softly to one of the two grand curling staircases and descended.

She was looking for L.H. and D. However, her embarrassment prevented her from calling out to them. The memory of begging D to be the one to end her life brought a rush of heat to her face. She walked blindly through the foyer, wandering into corridors beyond. Finally, she found an ornate wooden door, in its natural color, which stood out to her. All the other doors she had passed had been painted white and decorated in gold trimming. She cracked the door and started to peek in. However, the overly cheerful voice that greeted her startled her into falling into the room. She caught herself in time not to actually hit the floor.

“Lilah! You’re okay! D wouldn’t tell me a thing!” L.H. said, rushing forward to hug her.

“‘Okay’ is a bit of an overstatement,” she replied, hugging back. “‘So-so’ would be closer. Where is D?”

“He’s been gone ever since he left your room last night.”

“Gone?”

Lilah’s heart thumped painfully. Had her failure driven D away? No, she thought quickly. That was ridiculous. He wouldn’t just leave her and L.H. here in this mansion, abandoning them.

“Yeah,” L.H. continued. “He walked right out of your room, down those stairs, and right out the front door. I was standing at the foot of the staircase, trying to see if you were all right, Toots, but D just wouldn’t answer. Gotta say, I went a little crazy after that. I mean, it used to be I knew everything cause I was kinda attached to D. Being suddenly out of the know is getting to me.”

Lilah’s face must have visibly fell, for L.H.’s next words were spoken hurriedly.

“B-b-but I still love having my own body! Wouldn’t trade it for anything, kid, really!”

“Did he seem angry?” Lilah said, diverting the conversation. The last thing she needed was the possibility that giving L.H. his own body had been yet another failure.

“D? Who could tell? I mean, I had been attached to his body, not his brain. I could only tell so much. Worried, maybe. But it’s always been hard to pinpoint what goes through that dhampire’s head.”

Lilah dropped her eyes to the floor. She felt L.H. put his hand to her back, rubbing it comfortingly.

She tried to utter the words “thank you,” but she was sure he did not hear them. With a small smile, she moved to sit in one of the wing-backed leather chairs (one of five within this room). L.H. sighed and took a moment to give her her space before he came to sit in the chair across from her. In a desparate attempt to avoide his eyes, she cast hers about this room.

It was gorgeous. The floors were a dark marble and every wall was covered with bookshelves. And every shelf, in turn, was loaded down with heavy volumes of books. And the room was not small. Lilah was sure that she had never seen so many books in her life, not even in a bookbinder’s shop. The shelves were of a heavy wood, she was sure, stained the color of burnt sienna. Between the two shelves on the wall farthest from her stood a grand fireplace, its flames gently licking at the air around them. This room was just wonderful. She could stay in it forever.

Apparently, her expression mimicked this feeling, for L.H. suddenly snapped his fingers in front of her. She jumped, inhaling sharply.

“Sorry,” she said. “Lost in thought.”

“Not about your little incident?” L.H. asked.

“Sort of.”

L.H. stood and shook his head. Then, he kneeled before her, taking her hand comfortingly in his.

“It happens, sweetie. We all slip. None of us are perfect. Not even the nobles. What matters is how we overcome. Physically, you’ve done excellently. But emotionally…well, let me just say this. You’ve done so well for someone who knew nothing of the Nobility to suddenly become a dhampire. Don’t screw it up now. I know you can do this.”

Before Lilah could respond, and almost on cue, the doors to the room opened. D strode in, his boots clicking—Lilah knew deliberately—on the marble. Lilah stood so suddenly that she knocked L.H. over.

“Sorry,” she said, offering to help him up. He waved away her hand and jumped, cat-like, to his feet.

“D, I’m—” but she never got to finish.

D looked, almost coldly, past L.H. and let his eyes bore into hers.

“Come with me. Now.”

No one could agrue with that voice. D turned, his hair flowly freely—for he was not wearing his ususal hat—behind him as he walked out the door. Lilah followed at his heels.

She felt as if she were having some sort of allergic reaction. She couln’t breathe properly—not that that was too much of a problem now. Her throat was too constricted. She tried to clear it. Tried to ask where they were going once they had cleared the front door of the mansion. But she couldn’t. The words just wouldn’t come. She continued to struggle with her lack of ability to speak as D led her farther and farther away from the mansion, into the deep forest surrounding the area. Soon, because the two dhampires had walked so swiftly, the mansion was no longer visible. Not even with their preternatural sight. This is when D ceased his steps. Lilah suddenly found her voice.

Fear jolted through her. He’s going to kill me, she thought frantically. Pushing that away—but unable to rid herself of the fear itself—she cleared her obstructed throat.

“Why are we out here, D?” she asked, not quite sure she wanted the answer.

He turned to face her. For a moment, he did not speak. Suddenly, he stooped down quickly. With seemingly all the skills of the most basic street magician, D held a small rabbit in his hands.

“I’ve been denying this lesson too long,” he said, more to himself, Lilah thought, than to her.

The rabbit was still. Lilah could hear its rapid little heartbeat. Instinct told this poor creature to escape from D’s pale hands, but the dhampire’s beautiful and mysterious aura held it in place. This was an amusingly human reaction.

“D, I’m sorry. I should have had more control!” Lilah burst out, realizing suddenly that she had been waiting for a while to apologize to him.

Holding the rabbit easily in the crook of one arm, D held up his free hand—his now unpossessed left hand—to silence her.

“I’m the one who should apologize to you,” he said.

Shock etched Lilah’s face.

“No…why?” she asked.

“Because I’ve been denying this lesson so long. It was foolish of me even to think, to even dare hope, that you had been left without the hell of the bloodlust. I was the reason you almost killed that child. If I had taught you before how to control it… Well, no matter. We’ll get rid of this problem here and now,” he explained.

“I don’t understand.”

D held the rabbit forth. Its poor little nose twitched as Lilah heard its heart speed up.

“Controlling your bloodlust is not the absence of feeding. Controlling bloodlust is controlling from what you take blood from. Dhampires must feed. We can go much longer without feeding than vampires can, but not indefinitely. Lilah, tonight, you will feed on this rabbit.”

She gasped. “No.”

“Would you rather it be that little girl from the village?”

“No!” Lilah said with much more conviction.

“Then it’s this. Or I will end up having to make good on my promise.”

“But D…” she groaned as the rabbit’s nose twitched again. “A rabbit? Can’t it be something else?”

“I suspect that your lack of feeding has left you weak. You’re not strong enough to take down any big game. Five or six rabbits will suffice.”

“Five or six! No!” she cried.

But the look in D’s eyes was clear. No more arguing. Lilah took the soft, warm animal in her hand. Groaning, she closed her eyes and opened her mouth to reveal her growing fangs…

…………………

Lilah flung the sixth lifeless bunny from her, sure that she must look like quite a monster. She chanced a look a D—who had indulged in a few rabbits to make her feel better, she suspected—who had not a drop of blood nor piece of fur anywhere to be seen on him. She sighed, thoughts of the bloodlust far from her mind. She wiped at her mouth, noticing that her fangs had retracted. She sucked the still lukewarm blood she found there from off her hand, reclining back on the damp forest floor. D himself was sitting with his back against a large boulder that Lilah had not noticed before with his legs stretched out in perfect stillness in front of him.

She was glad that it was D and no one else there with her. Instead of looking at her as the monster she was sure she looked like, his eyes were unjudging. She sighed contentedly, trying to ignore the rabbit corpses—whose fur was now mostly pink—that was lying close to her.

“How do you feel?” D asked.

“Better,” she admitted a little sheepishly. “Not as hungry. Is this how you’ve always held off the bloodlust?”

D glanced away and off to his side. Instantly, Lilah regretted her question.

“I’m sorry. That’s too personal. I shouldn’t have asked,” she said.

“No. It’s fine. I’m your teacher. How are you supposed to learn if you don’t know? The answer is yes, mostly. My goal for you is one that I should have set for myself. My goal is for you never to have to taste human blood,” he answered, staring her in the eye now.

“‘Should have set?’” she quoted back to him. “You mean that you have tasted human blood?”

“Yes.”

Lilah sucked in a breath. “I’ve always known that you’ve killed anyone—demon, noble, or human—that’s attacked you. That’s self-defense, I understand that. But…you’ve killed a human by feeding on them?”

“No, I haven’t.”

Lilah’s brow knitted in confusion. “I don’t understand.”

“I’ve never killed the humans—the women—that I’ve fed from,” he replied.

“I still don’t understand. Didn’t they fight?”

D chuckled quietly under his breath. “No, not really.”

“Then, how—” but D cut her off.

“Now, that’s a bit personal. Let’s just say, I’ve avoided feeding on humans for quite some time now.”

“Oh,” Lilah breathed as the truth hit her.

She stared at D, who had cast down his eyes now—not in shame, simply to remove any uncomfort that a constant staring can to do a person. She found herself wondering who the lucky women could have been that the Vampire Hunter D had taken to his bed? Those were bite marks, she thought, which those women must wear in pride.

“I’ve been thinking,” D said suddenly, cutting into Lilah’s musings. “Perhaps this lack of feeding is why I was having so much trouble training you.”

“You mean you’re going to try to teach me the sword again?”

Again, that small chuckle. “No. You honestly had no talent for that. But there are other ways of fighting.”

“Like my magic.”

“That’s right, but magic requires much concentration. Concentration that you may not be able to spare in a desperate fight. I was thinking that I might teach you how to fight hand-to-hand.”

Lilah tossed the idea around in her mind a little before she replied.

“But…you don’t fight hand-to-hand.”

“Again, that’s right, I don’t. However, I know how to. I’ve just favored the sword over it,” D answered, standing. There wasn’t a spec of dirt on his clothes.

Lilah stood with him, dusting off her less than sparkling outfit. With the rabbit’s blood coursing through her, she felt much stronger. Much more in control. Her hearing and sight had gotten better, although she had hardly thought that possible.

D appraised her. Obviously, he could see—or feel—the change in her.

“Let’s run back. I think you might be able to keep up,” he said.

Lilah nodded. For once, she felt no doubt in her abilities.

The time it took to get back to the forest that was just on the outskirts of the mansion’s grounds was significantly lowered due to the two dhampires’ speed. Lilah felt that if she had blinked she would have missed the trip altogether. They stopped just within the bounds of the mansion. D had tensed, and Lilah knew why.

There was a strange scent in the air. And no heartbeat within the mansion.

“Where’s L.H.?” she asked.

D didn’t answer, but instead ran into the mansion. The front doors were off their hinges and lay around them in splinters. Decorative vases were in dust, floating in the air. Still, no sign of L.H. The scent was stronger. Lilah could tell—she wasn’t sure how—that it belonged to something unnatural.

She approached D, who was crouched over something on the floor. Deep scrapes in the marble, Lilah could see once she got closer.

“What happened?” she asked.

“Aider demons,” D answered, standing. “Go, get something to fight with. They’ve got L.H.”

Lilah shuddered even as her next question slipped out of her mouth.

“How do you know they haven’t killed him already?”

“Because they cocoon them first. I’ll explain it all on the way.”

“Okay,” Lilah nodded, racing to find something—anything—she might be able to fight with.

She returned with several small daggers strapped to her bodice. She hoped that she was better with these than their larger counterparts. D nodded once, approvingly, and the two set off into the night, following the invader’s scent.

End Notes: Okay, so how was that? Worth the wait? Now, some sad news. I plan, as any who have read my recent profile update might know, to focus on just one fic for a while. In efforts to start finishing some off. First, before I really focus, I’m putting up a chapter on two more of my stories: Untested and From Diamond to Coal. Then, I’m going to be finishing off one fic that’s close to being done called Crimson Princess. From then on out, I’ll be focusing on a fic called Tip of the Theological until I can get it finished. I’m going to try to do all of this as quickly as possible. So, don’t expect an update on this one for a while. I might add a chapter or two once I get Tip going, but who knows? Anyway, the next chapter is called “Out of the Frying Pan…” Hope you enjoy!