In the morning, Mer woke early, as she always did. She stretched into a blissful arch to pop her joints but curled back in on herself when she recalled she was pressed to a vampire's naked chest. Most of her robe had stayed in place, and she slipped into a sitting position before checking if he'd woken. Guy was out like a light, and she tapped his forehead just to make sure. Nothing. Pulling the blankets up to her shoulders, she let out a breath that finally didn't steam. The sun streaming in had warmed the room past freezing, but it still wasn't pleasant with her naked.

It was serene, the silence after the fear of the day before, the stillness when she'd been prepared to fight for her life, and the chirping of bird to remind her that the world around her still lived. She turned back to the vampire where he lay on his side, his hand outstretched to hold her though she'd snuck away. He didn't breathe, so he was completely still, and she took in his statuesque beauty.

Without his lips stretched to show his fangs, they looked soft, a muted pink against pale skin that contrasted well with the stray locks of dark russet hair shading the side of his face. Sharp angles shaped his cheeks and jaw like he'd been carved from marble for perfection, and without the obscurity of night, he didn't look all that scary.

Mer dropped her examination for the more pressing issue—she was naked and needed to find clothes, even if she had to tie a table cloth around her. Anything was better than this godforsaken fluff monster that only tied at her waist.

She made it to the edge of the bed before goosebumps rose on her arms. The robe didn't keep her as warm as being against his body, and she resisted the urge to dive back under the covers. Clothes, clothes, clothes, she thought as she took those awful first steps across the chilled carpets. As if by some magic, her chant ended with her staring at her clean laundry basket, neatly placed at the end of the bed by a bench. Mer rubbed her eyes, but it was still there when she lowered them.

Another box of random things sat next to the basket on the bench, and she rifled through it until she found her phone and headphones. It had been on the charger when she'd left, so it was full when she turned it on, but there was no signal. Not a big surprise.

She headed back to the laundry basket and found her lavender running pants, some undergarments, and her black fitness shirt. The fabric felt so good on her skin, hugging her in apology for ever leaving her side, and she held her phone and headphones close with a sigh of contentment. Music had always been a source of comfort, drowning out her fears and stress, and she didn't need a signal tolisten to it.

"You seem happy." The vampire's voice came from behind her, and she turned to find him lying on his back and looking up at her. He was at the edge of the bed with his head hanging over like a cat that had rolled too far and couldn't get all the way back up.

"Do you have a name?" Mer asked so she could stop thinking of him as the vampire.

"No." His expression didn't change as she narrowed her eyes. "Ask a silly question get a silly answer." It seemed like a smile should have gone with such a tease, but his tone was flat as ever, his stoic expression glued in place. "My name is Remus, but my friends call me Rush."

"Rush it is," Mer said with a tepid smile. The emotion was uncanny considering her situation, but it was hard to look at a half upside down guy with a straight face. "Did you rob my house?" The mages certainly hadn't sent him her stuff. They expected her to be dead.

"I did so while you were sleeping. The location of Luna Aurion's home is well known to the Shades."

Mer froze as she thought about the vampires mapping and keeping track of the Aurions like snacks on a dinner menu. It was no small wonder they thought of them as monsters.

"It is to avoid conflict within society," Rush said as he sat up straight on the bed, his bare muscles in the light warming her face and averting her gaze. "We steer clear of where the Aurions populate."

"You didn't harm anyone, did you?" Though her aunt and uncle had been forced to give her up, it had not been without a significant fight. They would have been in no condition to fight a vampire invading their home.

"No. The house was empty."

At least no one was hurt then.

"I would also not harm your family," Rush said, drawing her attention back up to his eyes.

"Isn't my family like enemy number one to your kind?"

Rush was silent a moment. "Let me rephrase. I would not harm the people you live with under the protection of the societal peace treaty."

Of course. That piece of paper.

Mer riffled through her laundry to distract herself from darker thoughts until she found her sneakers and some socks. If her toes could talk, they would have screamed in happiness at finally being covered, and she tapped the edge of her shoes on the ground to center her foot.

"Preparing to run from me?" Rush asked, the amusement winning out over his calm timbre.

"No," Mer mumbled as she processed how weird this must look. "I always run early in the morning so I put them on out of habit." Mer sighed as her life from before drifted away in fragments, each moment tearing another wound open in her new reality.

"You may run if you wish," Rush said with a twitch of his lips that showed his fangs. "I love a good chase." The words had her heart pounding, more so when he disappeared.

Mer spun to find him standing behind to her, fully dressed in a lavishly decorated white silk shirt, black dress pants, and normal enough black shoes. Those shiny things weren't made for running, but she doubted vampires cared much.

"Your name is apt," Meredith sputtered as she tried to calm her heart. "You don't really intend to chase me, do you?"

"Why not?" he asked, slipping his hands into his pockets and prowling with no emotion to indicate intent. "Is running not more satisfying when you have a goal in mind?"

Mer had never considered running for her life as a goal, and she truly hoped he was joking as she grabbed a light jacket from the basket. It was brisk out, and even though her blood was about to be pumping, the chill of a vampire chasing her down would cool her off.

"The terrain around the castle is ill-suited for such a run, but the gardens are grown upon soft soil around a path that will meet your needs. As long as you don't mind the decline down the hills," Rush said as he offered her a hand, a gesture that always seemed more damning than helping. Each time she took it, she was trusting him and falling deeper into accepting this life as reality.

As soon as their fingers touched, the castle around her warped like carnival mirrors, bobbing and wiggling until it melted into a row of bushes just beyond where she stood. Behind them, dense trees crowded the brick wall of the boundary before spreading out further than her eyes could see. The breeze through the trees blew deceptive warmth against her hair and neck, like the wintery night had been nothing but a dream, and she wandered out from under the canopy onto a beaten path. The sun shined down with just a hint of fading twilight, cascading over the downward trek to illuminate a rolling fog on the lowest elevations.

It was stunning, the trees hugging the brick walls that spread out beyond sight, flowers bordering the brush line around a path of sparkling beaten earth, like they'd crushed gold and sprinkled it all the way down into the valley. Rush said garden, but this was a sprawling hillside vista caged in by brick walls at the top and the bottom. It was so alive, the branches reaching above the highest climbs, the wildlife skittering around unhurried by fear of intrusion, and a stream babbling as it flowed under a distant bridge.

"Is this place acceptable?" Rush asked, as if that were ever a valid question.

Normally, she headed down sidewalks boxed in by middle class homes, tripping over toys left outside by the neighbors' kids, hopping dead branches the city hadn't bothered to clean up, and braving the cacophony of traffic as she hit downtown. This was paradise.

A knock on her head had her angling her chin up to Rush, and she accepted a water bottle from his grasps. "This was in your room as well. I filled it for you." It was a water bottle from her school that she'd taken on all of her runs since the year had begun.

Mer couldn't find words nor could she meet Rush's gaze without emotion stealing her resolve. She didn't want to break down right now, she wanted to run, to feel the wind against her face, to embrace the freedom, to let the pumping of her blood drown out everything until there was only the pounding of her feet on the ground.

She popped the cap on her water and downed half the thing to keep the moisture from coming out of her eyes. She would have drank it all, but she didn't want to run feeing like an overfilled water balloon. Stretching reminded her of every ache from the day before, her knees groaning when her hands touched the bruises, but the injury hadn't been deep enough to affect her range of movement. That too would fade soon, as she pushed her body to the brink , this time of her own volition.

Mer doubted Rush was going to wave a starting flag, so she took off out of her lunge onto the path with a deep breath to still everything swirling in her mind. Lazy mornings with her uncle, torturously long hours at college, and exhausted nights of watching her favorite shows to wind down morphed into those bastards breaking down the door and taking her from her family. Anger warped into an agony that she couldn't quite call sadness or anxiety, just a mesh of uncertainty and a reverberating desire to reclaim what she'd lost.

It all faded for the face of her new owner, the word filling her mouth with the metallic taste of disgust that might have just been from exertion. Rush was calm, reasonable, and lax as far as chaining his new pet, but he was still a vampire. The man fed from humans, and he'd only refrained because she was weak. She would not always be weak, which meant her days were numbered before he took more from her than she was willing to give.

Like a devil summoned by mere thought, Rush appeared in her path, and she skidded to the side and rolled through the grass as she avoided running into him. Mer had fallen enough times that she knew how to redirect the momentum without scraping skin, but she definitely had grass stains on her pants as she stood up mumbling curses under breath. And Rush just smiled, that tepid thing that barely showed on his face if one wasn't look for it.

"What the hell was that?" Mer growled as she reclaimed the path, and Rush inhaled sharply enough that she leaned back from him.

"Emotions," Rush said as he breathed out through his nose. "Vampires can taste them like humans do flavors. Your anger is quite spicy." The chuckle that followed the words had her wishing she could throw a rock at him, but that was rude. Maybe. "It smells better than distress."

The final words had her simmering down. Rush had noticed the crappy state of her mind and put himself in the way to derail her. That was almost considerate if not for her nearly rolling down a ravine.

"Come on, let's play." Rush's lips flicked up on only one side for a smirk. "You run," Rush whispered into her ear as he moved behind her. "I'll catch you." The low growl of the final words had her shivering, but the playful glow in his emerald eyes didn't seem sinister. The man was trying to distract her, not terrify her. She hoped.

"Whatever," Mer didn't agree with the wave of her hand, but she also didn't say no as she took off back on the trail.

As she ran, this time she kept an eye out for Rush, and she jumped to the left when he appeared on the path. His outstretched fingers just brushed through the edges of her flailing curls before they drifted out of reach, and by the time she was solidly upright, he was in her space again. This time he came out from behind a tree, and she veered away only to almost land in a bush when he stood on the path again. As she spun to avoid him, she stuck her tongue out and skipped past him.

Rush clearly wasn't taking catching her seriously, not with how quickly he blinked from one location to the next as a vampire. This was his idea of helping her feel better, and as crazy as it might look from the outside in, it was kindness that had her heart skipping as she barely avoided his next grab. Rush's fingers grazed her arm, pulling her balance just enough that she tipped, and she squeaked as she lost her footing and rolled down the hill. They were near the end of the trail, and the grasses were smooth enough that she wasn't stabbed by any twigs, but her heart pounded as she landed on her back.

Rush wasted no time in doing what vampires did best, prowling as he dropped to the grasses and leaned over her. With an elbow resting next to her splayed out hair, he lowered his nose so close that they touched before he breathed her in a shallow breath. Mer wanted to believe that he was just sensing her emotional state, but the closeness was more than that and heat warmed her cheeks. Part of the flush was from stopping after exertion, but more of it was the slow trail of Rush's thumb over her chin.

"Does it hurt," she asked, trying to catch her breath as his eyes searched her for the rest of the question. "When you bite," Mer specified, lifting a shaky hand toward his fangs but dropping it as she remembered how he'd reacted to her fingers near his vulnerable points.

"Not as much as you'd imagine," Rush said, still as stone as her heart calmed from the run. "If you wish, I could show you." Cool fingers trailed her neck with the barest scrape of claws that had her arching her chin. It was in nervousness, but it gave him enough space to lower his lips to her throat.

"Didn't you say I'm too weak to give blood," Mer objected as the tips of his fangs grazed her skin. Curiosity was really killing the cat on this one. Why had she even asked when he'd been half all over her?

"I would not take much," he breathed out onto her throat with a trill to the end of his words that sounded like a purr. "Just a taste to satisfy both your curiosity and titillate my palate." Rush nuzzled her neck like it was a comfy pillow, nudging it with his nose, pressing his lips gently to the skin, and treading his fangs over her vein in turn.

"And if I don't want that," Mer asked, so deep in it that she had no idea how to resurface in one piece.

"Then I won't bite you," Rush murmured into the groove between her chin and neck, like the closeness was driving him closer so sleep. That was entirely possible considering the growing light creeping into the copse over the castle walls. "If you would desire the experience, however, I assure you, you would not regret it." A dark chuckle shook Rush's body as his hand wandered lazily through her hair, so very patient, yet awkwardly intimate.

What would it hurt to let him bite her now? It was eventual, wasn't it? There was no going home for her, yet being here also wasn't the end she'd thought it'd be. Plus, the way Rush cradled her body against his and tread his lips so gently over her skin was warming her face and alluring her in ways she knew it shouldn't.

With a shuttering breath that hiked her heartrate, she lifted her chin higher to press her skin to Rush's mouth. A low purr shook her as his lips sealed over her softest skin, and his tongue ran her vein in an awkward stroke that increased the pitter patter of her heart. Rush's fangs pressing to her skin had her instinctually gripping the front of his shirt, and her breath came quicker as the pressure of his fangs increased.

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Word Count: 2926