Snippet #2790319

Cas' reaction to the hospital made Phoenix recoil ever so slightly, the burst of force taking him aback a moment. Cas had always been so composed, and that reaction seemed... almost out of character. But Phoenix told himself to take hope in that. If Cas really didn't want a hospital, then it couldn't be that bad... right? But the anger disappeared as quickly as it had appeared, and Phoenix felt that concern settle in the pit of his stomach all over again.

"Okay. Okay, no hospitals," he promised. It was a promise he intended to keep. Cas had to have some reason for wanting to keep these wounds a secret, and while Phoenix himself didn't exactly think it was a good idea, he wasn't going to push. He wasn't going to betray that secret. If he'd learned one thing over the years, it was that people tended to have their reasons for wanting to hide. People came to Greythorne all the time in search of an escape.

There was a moment where Phoenix was shocked at how... collected Cas seemed to be, considering his outburst moments before, but given what he'd seen of Cas' character, keeping calm in a crisis shouldn't have been that much of a surprise. "Okay. No questions," Phoenix confirmed.

He didn't know what to expect as he stepped in to the bathroom. A stab wound, probably. Something... well, not normal. But as close to normal as things ever seemed to get around here. But he saw Cas' back, and he froze. It was a mess of scar tissue and of bleeding, freshly open wounds. The blood on Cas' back made Phoenix's head spin- or maybe it was just the fact that he suddenly realised he couldn't remember the last time he'd taken a breath. He forced his lungs to expand, contract, and felt his head clear ever so slightly. His mind was a whir of questions, but he remembered his promise not to ask any questions. He knew that no questions didn't mean no reaction, but he couldn't think of a way to react that didn't involve giving in to the panic that was rapidly starting to build in his chest or that didn't involve asking a million questions.

That hadn't happened in the hunter attack. That much he knew.

"I... I don't think I can-" He stammered out, before remembering his promises, and forcing himself to breathe. "I don't think we really have enough room in here, I'm standing in my own light. Can we move out to the bedroom?" He said. "I can clean it up at least, I... I don't really know how to suture but I can try, if that's what you want." The temptation to just give in to the sheer confusion, the panic, the fear that this evening had instilled in him was almost overwhelming. But once he did, there was no way he'd be able to help Cas. And right now, that needed to be his priority.

Something about the woman's reaction made Evelyn grin. Finally, someone who could match her. She still knew this woman was a threat, but she at least seemed to be fun. She had to stop herself from staring as the woman's tail turned back into legs, and she stepped out of the water. Instantly, her curiosity was piqued, and she knew that she would be back to the lake. The fact that she offered them advice unprompted didn't go unnoticed, either. This woman seemed interesting. But she was still a monster, Evelyn reminded herself. She had attacked the hunter earlier, and Evelyn wasn't foolish enough to think that it would have been a painless death.

But she nodded and went back to Markus, who remarked on the dark history of the lake. Evelyn looked at him and raised an eyebrow, but decided against asking too many questions. They didn't seem like the type of questions he wanted to answer anyway, so she just brushed herself down a little before following him in to the woods.

"You don't seem surprised that I don't want to attack humans," she remarked after a while. "Every... When I was travelling around, people seemed surprised to learn that about me. They assumed all vampires are bloodsucking monsters, and they... they looked at me differently. Why weren't you surprised?" She asked quietly as they walked, conscious to keep her voice low so that they wouldn't scare off any prey. She'd met a handful of vampires who were like her. They had been the ones who told her she could survive like this, survive off of the blood of animals instead of humans. But they'd all just looked at her sadly when she'd asked about a cure and had just advised her to get used to her new life. But goddammit, Evelyn had spent most of her adult human life trying to change things she'd been told she couldn't change, and she'd always made progress. Sometimes, she'd even succeeded. She refused to accept this life as the only one she would ever know. She would find an answer.