bitten_notshy | Groupe Hospitalier Pitié-Salpêtrière, Paris, 11 Jan. 1902

Leaving Abby Irene deep in conversation with the prime minister's representative, Sebastien came back from Jack's hospital room just before dawn. He found Phoebe Smith sitting on a bed in the hotel suite, a small neat woman in grey serge with her hands folded in her lap and suitcase at her feet. She'd taken her leave of the hospital as soon as her bruises had been sponged off, excusing herself with the claim that she needed to bathe and change her clothing. In truth, Sebastien was almost positive the woman simply did not like hospitals.

Not that he faulted her, really. Her husband had died in one.

It took him only a moment to notice that she'd taken off her court ring and set it in a small dish on a side table. "Leaving us?" he asked, going to pick up the trinket.

She shook her head, jaw faltering -- it wasn't a 'no' but an 'I'll tell you in a moment.' "Tell me how he is first."

Sebastien dropped lightly into a chair, graciously pretending not to notice her hesitation. "The doctors gave him a transfusion and say he took it well. He's" -- drugged -- "asleep now. They won't know more until he awakens."

Saved, if barely, by a medical marvel: Healed by blood, but not the cursed blood that flowed through Sebastien's veins. In a way, it was almost poetic.

"I'll stop by and see him before I catch my train," Phoebe said, and cleared her throat. Sebastien got the distinct sense she'd memorized whatever she was about to say. "Part of being an adventuress is knowing when it's time for an adventure to come to an end. I've been widowed once. I don't want to do it again. Jack almost dying made me realize that this isn't my world. I can't take a holiday in it any longer."

"So you're going away instead," Sebastien said lightly, hoping to amuse her until he could think this through. "A divorce? How shocking."

"A friendly separation," she corrected -- and yes, there was that ghost of a smile. "You're welcome as my guests if you ever come to Boston again, and of course I'll help Jack's friends in the city. But I think it's easiest for us all if I slip away quickly -- unless you need me, of course."

Sebastien bit his tongue against the urge to ask her to stay. She wasn't the first courtesan to decide to go home after a crisis; she wasn't even the fiftieth.

Still. Any loss stung.

He said: "Be kind to us in your novels, Phoebe."

"I'll do you better than kindness," Phoebe said. "I'll be honest."

She kissed him, then, but it was a kiss that spoke of a mind that had already moved on.

****

At first, and for many hours, Jack knew nothing at all.

The monster's claws and teeth had so badly hurt him that the surgeons needed copious amounts of chloroform and morphine just to keep him from thrashing as they stitched over the wounds and pumped clean blood into his depleted system. After that -- and as they, uneasily, noticed that his flesh seemed to be knitting far faster than would have been expected -- he slept a rough drug-fueled sleep.

The sleep came with voices in it.

An oracle: Beware the stalking wolves that prowl the deep cold and dark places.

Felix's: You were hurt and Sebastien helped you

His own:Do you think the wolfman is going to get you?

(There'd been more to that class, he knew, stored in some corner of his brain he couldn't touch.)

The effort to remember was enough to awaken him. He looked around enough to get a rough idea of the setting, and sniffed the air, breathing in what felt like a noxious hospital smell of floor cleaner, damp linens, and pus. Then he touched the pad of one finger to the reddened band of flesh at its base where Sebastien's ring used to rest.

He had the uneasy feeling he should be noticing something. It was so hard to think.

He closed his eyes again, ready to slip away.

Sebastien de Ulloa	It was entirely possible that Sebastien had not moved since he followed Jack to this room, taking a chair well away from the windows once he had closed the curtains. Waiting. He was aware the moment the boy's breathing changed, and he leaned forward slightly, brow creasing in concern. "Jack?"
Jack Priest	Jack's eyes flickered open again, eyelashes fluttering up, down, then up again. He slid his eyes over to Sebastien, and for a moment there was no recognition. Then it came. "Darling." Jack's tongue moved over his dry mouth. "The beast, is it --?" Was any of this for anything?
Sebastien de Ulloa	"La Bête will trouble no one else, mi cariño," Sebastien promised, setting his elbows on his knees and placing his chin in his hands. "You are far more troublesome to us, Mr. Priest. You gave us quite the scare."
Jack Priest	"Prime minister'll be pleased," Jack huffed, one finger playing along the edge of a bandage. He had a faintly puzzled air, as he tried to place what it was that seemed somehow different about Sebastien. "I'll ... heal. I think." He tried to smile, managed a wobbly one. "You saved me again." He didn't remember Sebastien had tried to feed him blood. If he had, there would have been Words.
Sebastien de Ulloa	"The Prime Minister is the least of my concerns," Sebastien replied gently. "You will heal, Jack, but you were very badly wounded by la bête." In fact, Jack should not be healing this quickly at all, and Sebastien could hear the whispers of the doctors and the nurses in the hallway. "What do you remember?"
Jack Priest	"Nothing." That wasn't true, and Jack knew better than to try to lie to Sebastien. He drew a breath and brought out the unpleasant flashes he had. "It was biting me, and the women had stopped shooting," he said, a moment later. "Don't know where my gun went. You wrestled it away, or were trying to, and I..." He shook his head slightly, wincing a bit at the motion. "I don't remember anything more until I woke up."
Sebastien de Ulloa	"They did not want to risk shooting you," Sebastien agreed, "but I could not let it savage you further; you had already lost a great deal of blood." He had been too late in a way, and he bowed his head slightly. "You have been unconscious for a few hours, between the drugs and the demands of your body. How do you feel?" It should not be this hard, telling him. Yet Sebastien found himself wanting a little more time before Jack understood what had happened.
Jack Priest	"Sore," Jack said. "Weak. I want to scratch under the bandages but know I shouldn't. I won't be fighting any more monsters today, but I might be able to sit up if I tried." He considered it, tensed and released a few muscles. "It must not have gotten at anything important...?" That was hope talking. He'd already gotten the feeling there was something more to this than a few claw marks and another good story.
Sebastien de Ulloa	"Do not sit up." That wasn't a request. "It got everything important," he replied simply. "You should not be alive, Jack. There may have been more of you left behind on the pavement than was brought to the hospital."
Jack Priest	Jack did not sit up -- happy, Sebastien? -- but his fingertips moved across a bandage and came to a rest lightly at the center of his chest. His heart bumped along within, rich and steady as ever. "And yet I am alive," he said, stubborn in his denial. "I can even see a bit of my leg in the mirror over the washbasin, so I know I'm not like you."
Sebastien de Ulloa	"You are," he agreed. "Very much alive, and not wampyr. You were so badly mauled that you were unable to drink when I offered you my blood." "Yet one of the only still-raw wounds on your body is where they had to remove your ring." His court ring, made of silver. "You may have to stay in hospital a day or two more, as they are talking about 'more tests,' but I don't think that is necessary."
Jack Priest	"You shouldn't have done that," Jack told him. He'd gone back and forth on the question of whether he would want to be turned or not; at the moment, his answer was no. The scolding was light, and mostly to give him time to think. He could tell when Sebastien was laying out a mystery for him; he just needed to add the clues together. He became uncomfortably aware that the sound from the street was rising directly to his ears through what looked like thick walls, that he strongly smelled Sebastien's soap and hair oil as well as the vomit from a patient in another room. That his finger throbbed almost as much as his chest and shoulder did. "So what we're saying," he said, "is that I'm something you told me didn't exist anymore." It was a choice between fake bravado and howling terror, and Jack was picking bravado, even though his voice was thin.
Sebastien de Ulloa	"So I suspect," the vampire agreed quietly. "The scent of wolf is so strongly entangled with your own, that I cannot tell where one ends and another begins." "You heal far too fast for one with a heartbeat, mi cariño, and it frightens the doctors." But not Sebastien. It merely broke his heart.
Jack Priest	"Oh." Jack turned his head against the pillows so Sebastien could not see the tears rising to his eyes. He wondered if a heart that did not beat would feel as crushed as his did. "What does this mean?" His voice was quiet, desperate, and -- somehow -- very young.
Sebastien de Ulloa	Sebastien moved, then, with all his age and grace that came with his undeath. "That you have much to learn, and none of it that I can teach you," he answered, kneeling beside Jack's bed and resisting the urge to run his fingers through those messy curls. "I have hunted lycanthropes in my day, but I do not have much I can give. Abby Irene is in her books, even now, to find all she can." "...and you may find my presence...distasteful."
Jack Priest	Jack shook his head and wished Sebastien would touch his hair. "Odd, not ... horrible. There's no scent of you." Which made sense, given how light and dry he knew Sebastien's body to be, but it was odd to realize it so strongly. He sniffled to gather his thoughts. "I presume lycanthropes have no place in wampyric courts. Unless of course there's a cure."
Sebastien de Ulloa	"I cannot drink from you," Sebastien admitted, and this time he did allow himself the comfort of putting a hand on Jack's arm. "That does not make you any less family, or any less beloved. I promise." "As to a cure...none that I have ever heard of. That does not mean Abby Irene will ever stop looking." For the sorceress blamed herself, of course, despite Sebastien's repeated statements that she did not shoulder the blame alone.
Jack Priest	"No, it just makes me a bit useless," Jack said. His fingertips went to what should have been an almost-fresh bite mark on his neck, realizing it too had healed. He was grateful he'd forced Sebastien to take that last drink; it made for a fresher memory. He nodded faintly at the rest of what Sebastien said, beginning to feel tired. (He blamed Abby Irene almost entirely, but that was an argument for when he felt stronger.) "If anyone can find one," he said, "she could." He made the effort to turn his head and look at Sebastien. "I don't want to leave you. Please don't ask me to." He knew he might have to someday. That the wolf might not be soothed by Sebastien's familiarity forever. But knowing that and admitting it were very different things.
Sebastien de Ulloa	"For a time, at least," Sebastien replied, cupping Jack's cheek gently. "We stand on the brink of war, Jack, and lycanthropes are highly desired by the military - by all of them - I would give you time, and space, to take care of yourself without needing to worry that I will find you abducted and conscripted one day." "There is also the chance that they will have treatments available in 2012 that you cannot have here," he pressed on. "At the very least, it will give you space to center yourself."
Jack Priest	Jack nodded again, knowing Sebastien was right (and feeling a curious detached distaste for that gentle hand). The arguments he'd made to himself against fearing conscription -- the ones about his size, his finances, his citizenship -- would all fall to pieces if any general thought he could get the first werewolf in centuries into his service. And if that werewolf also happened to be a key bit of the rebellion, well... Jack saw the practical arguments against remaining in Paris all too clearly. "Moscow before 2012," he tried. "When I can walk again, I mean. The war isn't there quite yet. Besides, Irina Stephanova still has your ring. She may have changed her mind about traveling." The artist had been a member of Sebastien's court during a winter sojourn in Russia some four years before. Circumstances had made their arrangement brief, but -- rarely as her name came up -- Jack doubted Sebastien had forgotten her any more than he had.
Sebastien de Ulloa	"Jack, don't try to mother me from your hospital bed," Sebastien sighed, brushing his fingers over the golden curls before withdrawing his hand. Jack's reaction steeling his resolve to spare the young man future pain by separating now. Perhaps with time his beast would accept the vampire, but not now, and Jack attempting to force it would not help. "I can use the clubs for now, there is no hurry." "I dislike the idea of you in Russia, alone," he admitted, "but it is far safer for you than London or Paris. I would send Mrs. Smith with you, but I fear we have given our authoress too much adventure for her tastes. She shall be returning to the Americas, to care for your revolutionary friends."
Jack Priest	"Don't tell me not to fuss when I want to," Jack said, and sighed at the news. "I don't like any of it. I can't say I blame Phoebe, though. And I suppose the clubs make sense, what with Mr. Nast having died with our attempts at anonymity." Which made the ruse even funnier, in Jack's opinion. As much as he could find things funny at the moment, anyhow. He ran his hand over his bandages again -- it was turning into quite the habit, and he'd have to watch it before he made the scars he'd no doubt have even worse -- and thought over the problem. "I'll wait until you and Doctor Garrett can go," he suggested. "Or -- something. It sounds as if they'll be poking at me here a few days longer no matter what."
Sebastien de Ulloa	"Abigail Irene and I will stay until you are able to leave hospital, no matter what," Sebastien stated firmly. "I have asked that they release you so that you may take a few days convalescence in your own bed, if there is no risk of infection." If needed, he could always find lodging elsewhere, if his presence made things problematic. "We are not abandoning you, Jack." "There is, of course, an additional option." He withdrew a telegram from his inside jacket pocket and placed it on the bed next to Jack. "I get the sense that Miss Frost is quite irate with both of us. Is she, perchance, clairvoyant, or does she simply know you that well?" The telegram itself was short and terse, as they tended to be, only saying 'Whatever you are doing, cease immediately. STOP. E Frost." "It arrived only an hour ago."
Jack Priest	"I trust you not to abandon me," Jack said. Then, because he knew that trust was precious: "Thank you." He reached to pick up the telegram, holding it over his head to read it for himself without sitting up. He didn't quite manage a smile, but his mouth and eyes twitched as if he wanted to before he laid the paper aside again. "She's Emma," he said simply. "I've long since learned not to ask. Do you think she could behave herself, if she came here?"
Sebastien de Ulloa	"I think the French government would be very disappointed if their Russian spy and murderer 'happened' to have an accident before they could torture more information out of him," Sebastien offered dryly. "Her French is impeccable, her mannerisms ... would not pass as easily."
Jack Priest	"She's too American to pass for anything else," Jack pointed out. "We can put a long skirt on her and let her be thought some kind of free-thinking barbarian." His eyes went softer, and he looked down and along the blankets to his hands. "I'd like to see her, if she'd be willing." His voice was almost a mumble. These relationships had never been easy for him to navigate, and certainly not now, when so much had changed.
Sebastien de Ulloa	"We could allow her menswear, like Irina, and claim she's a heathen Russian," Sebastien joked, "Although that's rather like waving meat in front of a lion." Think of the chaos she would cause, Jack! "Although if that is your desire, I will pen a letter to her once you are asleep again. I would rather not have the hordes of your friends pour down on us, when we are under such scrutiny, but one or two ought to be safe."
Jack Priest	"Just her at first," Jack said, with a bit of a sly smile. "I'm not well enough to talk about it all that much yet." And if he knew his friends, he knew they would want to talk. "Sebastien?" he said, and yawned -- another round of sleep was definitely coming near. "Can I ask you one thing before you go?"
Sebastien de Ulloa	"Of course," he answered. "Although I am afraid you are stuck with me for a time; at least until the sun goes down." He trusted that Abby Irene would rest, eventually, at home. He did not trust the doctors not to poke at Jack any more than necessary.
Jack Priest	"Whatever will I do, darling?" Jack teased, and for a moment talking to Sebastien from his bed felt almost brutally natural. He lifted his shoulders slightly to make it easier to speak, wincing a bit as he did. Right. Well, that reminded him what was unnatural about it. "If there isn't a cure," he said, skipping the and we both know there probably isn't, "can this be managed? I don't want to be what the beast was."
Sebastien de Ulloa	"Paris has an enemy, the wolf said," Sebastien replied, half to himself. "The enemy has a dog. Remember your own discovery, Jack. The original La Bête was a slave to a sorcerer, as was this one. You are something else entirely." Sebastien would make Jack no promises, and he would tell him no lies. "We will find out."
Jack Priest	"Twenty-six days, and then we will," Jack agreed, if unhappily. "I'll do my best not to consort with any untrusted sorcerers until then." He noticed a new scent of starched cotton and looked to the door, where a nurse hovered, glass morphine dropper in hand. Jack gratefully waved her in. "So we're clear," he said before he could be drugged again, "I will laugh if you ever again claim anything doesn't exist."
Sebastien de Ulloa	"I didn't say they'd never existed," Sebastien protested mildly. "Simply that they weren't contemporary. I had not taken into account the idea of ghosts or shades of lycanthropes past." "But your point is taken, Mr. Priest. Now sleep." Sebastien would be there when he woke again.
Jack Priest	"As you wish," Jack said, though he still looked amused as he calmly accepted his medicine. ... as amused as he was going to manage for the time being, anyhow.