Glasya (cartographist) wrote in thisdarknight, @ 2016-07-04 18:16:00 |
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Entry tags: | !locale: garden district, david malvot, emmeline rothschild |
what a nasty wound
Who: David Malvot & Emmeline Rothschild.
What: A seance and an unexpected family reunion.
Where: Church of St. Bartholomew.
When: Approximately 27 years ago.
Warnings: None.
Progress: Gdoc, complete.
The room held only a small table, ringed with chairs that were perfectly in place. Despite the fact that there was no dust, it was clear that the room saw little use.
"Must we really do this?" Emmeline walked into the room, one hand rising to light on the back of a chair as she glanced back to her brother. Meunier had asked if they knew if Emmeline's mortal gifts had blossomed into something more, and with no reply, gently encouraged them to investigate. Emmeline had been less than enthused with the request, and with Nathalie's current absence, there was no one for her to turn to in objection. "There is so much more that we could be working on."
"So much else, perhaps," David said. "But certainly nothing more. Your gifts are stagnating, if indeed they have not retreated altogether. Surely you would not have your reborn self a weaker being than the human you were before." He clucked his tongue. With an outstretched hand he gestured to the seat on which her hand rested. "One simple seance. That's all I ask. Are you afraid you'll prove yourself unworthy of the gift of immortality? Of the blessings of the Church?"
Her shoulders slumped, eyes gliding over the smooth surface of the table. Nathalie's recruitment of her had been on the promise that she would help souls find their way back to God, but Emmeline had not imagined that this was what it would require. In the back of her mind, she'd hoped that she would not have to deal with her 'gift' any further, even though she recognized the desire for the foolish wish that it was.
"One seance. I suppose we'll see if anything happens." She wished that nothing did. Would it mean an end to her time here at the Church? Would she be cast out, nevermore to see her family? Emmeline drew in a breath and pulled out the chair, taking a seat. She pushed at the chair parallel to hers, implying that he should sit as well. She looked to her brother. "Have you ever done one before? A seance, I mean."
"Only a few," he said, "and only in jest. Until you, I never quite took them seriously. But I suppose you know for every one of true talent, such as yourself, there are at least a dozen charlatans." He took the seat she offered him, drawing close to the table's edge. He brought his hands to rest atop the table, neatly folded, fingers laced. "How would you like to begin?"
She sighed in annoyance, unsure if he was making fun of her or merely stating a fact as he knew it. Instead, she put her hands out on the table, palms down, fingertips spread evenly.
"Put your hands like mine, with only the fingertips touching. I don't know how well this will work with only the two of us -- I'm used to having a larger group. The energy... More people make it easier to channel." She felt slightly embarrassed to talk about her trade as though it were a science, even when it had been so thoroughly disputed by experts of the day. Part of her wished to go back and show them the truth of it all, but that time was long behind her. The only person she was here to impress or convince was herself, which she mentally repeated even as she didn't feel the argument.
David followed her instruction, a small smile on his shadowed face. "Don't forget," he said. "We aren't just people. Whatever energy your human crowds had was nothing to us. Be careful you don't continue to impose old, unnecessary limitations on yourself."
He watched her closely in the light of the few candles in the room. She did not seem as confident as he would like; he doubted his continued prodding would help, so he tried a different tack. "You know, I once had a friend who started these with an offering of opium. The ghosts never seemed to want it, but we made sure it never went to waste. Perhaps you and I should try that next time."
Em shook her head in some mock amusement toward his suggestion, one hand rising and settling on the tabletop. A ghost of a smile lingered at her lips, which was tempered by a bad memory.
"My parents used to give me whiskey, when it first started. It helped...make things smoother, but the possessions would last days at a time. People started to think that the spells were merely a side effect of the alcohol, but my father insisted on it, up until he died. I was glad when that stopped. I never had control over any of this, except that I was able to end it when I wanted it to. Since then, I've tried to avoid any of that." She had not meant to start delving into her past, but it seemed that it was inevitable. Instead, she closed her eyes and breathed out unnecessarily, her dead lungs obeying all the same.
David nodded. He could not bring himself to regret causing her discomfort; it was rare she showed him a vulnerability that did not directly revolve around Nathalie, and any knowledge he gleaned about other aspects of his sister was quite welcome. So he did not apologize, but held his tongue, his hands still atop the table as she had directed. His eyes fell to the candle's dancing flame, distracted by its flickering as the room remained quiet and still.
Likewise, Emmeline said nothing more. Any lingering breath had quieted to the point of dissolution, and she held eerily still. The room as a whole seemed to wait for something to happen, but nothing did. Em's head tipped forward as though she were falling asleep, and eventually she hunched over entirely. Then she did not move at all.
Across from her, David waited in stillness, not a breath between them stirring the candlelight. His eyes were on her, unblinking. Desperately he wanted something to happen, wanted to bear witness to something unique and unexplainable. Doubt lingered in his heart, but still he longed for more.
Suddenly, Emmeline's shoulders rolled in a serpentine manner, her head tilting back. Strands of brown slid over her face like a veil, eventually parting to reveal her features. Her eyes were open, but unseeing, half-lidded even as they rounded on David. Her face kept an expression of apathy, but as her gaze landed on David, a familiar anger filled her eyes.
"David? What in the name of God are you wearing? What have you done now?" Her voice was anything but its usually light, timid sound; instead it had deepened, and the Spanish that flowed from her lips was clearly spoken by a man.
With the very first syllable, David recognized his father's voice. He flinched only a little, squaring his shoulders as he met the medium's gaze. If it was a trick, it was a good one: mimicking the voice of a man long dead was not a skill he envisioned Emmeline possessing. He had wanted something real. Now, faced with it -- or at least the appearance of it -- he wasn't sure how he intended things to go. He slipped into his native tongue easily and without conscious thought.
"To whom am I speaking?" He frowned softly, feeling equal parts angry and foolish.
"You don't recognize your own father? Show some respect, boy. Why are you in this ridiculous get up?" Emmeline's hand rose from the table, a slight tremor making the small, slim hand shake as she gestured to the black cassock wrapped around David's form. "What mud are you about to drag our family through now?"
Whatever slight thread of calm David had managed to grab hold of broke beneath his dead father's sharpness. It was a stupid, childish reaction, and the only one the vampire had. "None," David snapped. "I'm a priest, and you're in my church. For whatever reason my… friend decided to pull your spirit out of Hell instead of someone worthwhile."
Emmeline's brows climbed her forehead in surprise, and then she burst out into a rough chuckle that held back none of the condescension the spirit apparently held for his last semi-living heir. "You? A man of God? You're the last person to cling to any moral trappings, David, though you would love to believe yourself above others. Truly, what charlatan's game are you at now? How much will this cost the family to cover up?"
David brought his hands down on the table hard enough to jostle the candle. The spirit and its host showed no signs of concern at his tantrum. "This is no game. I serve God because I found Him in my likeness. Not the weak-willed god you claimed to serve. Something better. Something more." He tasted blood on his tongue and the sharp edges of his teeth. "Believe me or don't. Surely this argument isn't how you want to spend your time aboveground."
Emmeline snorted, shaking her head. She muttered something about ungrateful children under her breath, the words coming and going in quick succession. "Another attempt to fulfill that weak ego. And no, seeing your face is not how I imagined I'd be spending my time after my death. Why did you bring me here?"
The priest fought back the disappointment that tried to show on his face. He was less successful in tamping down its persistence in his chest. He tried for a sneer, though that, too, was not as strong as he would have liked. "You're a test," he said. His smirk deepened. "That's all. For my dear parishioner here." He gestured to the body inside which Mateo Segura temporarily resided. Emmeline looked at her hands, though her eyes never quite seemed to focus. "I need to know if she's able to use this gift in service to the Church, or if it's just a useless parlor trick."
"You would waste my time on this?" Emmeline snarled. "You had so little respect for me and your mother in life. Things haven't changed in death, David. You continue to disappoint me." Em's hands went back to the table as the spirit felt the smooth wood beneath the medium's touch. A new thought struck Mateo Segura. "So you believe me to be a trick, something conjured by this woman's mind? You claim to believe in God, but you cannot believe in the dead?"
David saw himself benevolent in his extended consideration of the question. It was one he had already considered, one he turned over and over in his mind every time his sister's gifts crossed his thoughts. "I don't believe the dead have any reason to return," he said. "Least of all for a little party like mine. Yet here you are. Undeniable. So like Thomas, I suppose I believe."
Emmeline's lips thinned to a line; her knuckles cracked against the table as the spirit bent her hand into an unnatural position.
"Then let me give you something to believe." Emmeline abruptly fell forward onto the table, her arms catching her at the last minute. Her hair fell over her face, and she immediately set to pushing it back, her wide, open eyes taking in the scenery around her. Her gaze landed on David in confusion.
"That was...different." She worried at her bottom lip with her teeth for a moment, then opened her mouth to say something more. She was stopped before the words even left her throat -- instead, her eyes bulged slightly as a hand went to her neck, as she began to choke. One hand grasped at the table for something to cling to, gasping sounds escaping as she tried to free herself from whatever was inside her.
David rose with a start, his chair clattering to the floor behind him. He slid around the small circle of the table, his hands moving to Emmeline's throat to try to pry away whatever held her. A litany of Spanish and English curses commingled fell from his lips, sharp as broken glass. His nails dug into her skin, fighting for purchase against his dead father's grip. "Em," he said, almost frantic. "Em, shake it off. Force him out."
God could tell she was trying, even as her face turned red. Her eyes bulged more, and suddenly something was pressing against her tongue, through her mouth and against her teeth. One hand clutching at her throat chose instead to grab at David's cassock as she turned to him, eyes pleading. Her mouth opened, and instead of sound, dark red fingers curled over her incisors. They strained for more space, for room to stretch themselves freely in the air. Inside the dark cavern of Emmeline's mouth, it was clear that the fingers weren't the end of the strange abomination attempting to crawl its way out of her body.
The priest's eyes widened. "Jesus Christ," he muttered, without a hint of irony. His mind grasped for the words of the exorcisms he had studied, but his readings of them had only been half in earnest, his rational mind unaccepting of demonic possession -- or anything like it -- in spite of his own supernatural existence.
He fell more easily back into the Theban sorcery of his recent research. It was not well known to him, and he was unsure how effective it would be against this new threat. But he was grasping at straws, and this was the only one within his reach. He raised his wrist to his lips, biting through his own flesh. With muttered prayers he drew forth vitae, swiping his thumb through it as it welled to the surface. He marked Emmeline's forehead in a thick swipe of deep red, every word of his prayer coming more quickly than the one before. If he could not stop what tried to come through her, at least he could try to lessen the damage it might do.
Her eyes rolled back into her head, turning white as the hand inside her mouth spasmed. It pushed further at her teeth, refusing to release the life it had suddenly tasted. The red that contained the hand smeared over her teeth and lips, fore and middle finger pushing down over her chin to smear a matching mark to the one on Emmeline's forehead. The grip on David's shirtfront tightened, turning her knuckles ashen.
David's prayers grew more fervent. He leaned upon the belief he had seen other priests display, the faith he had watched his own brothers exhibit. He could not doubt what was before him. He could certainly not afford to doubt what few tools he had at his disposal to deal with it. His prayers turned to Longinus, first and greatest of their saints, father of the church to whom he had pledged himself. Fear and anger roiled within each word, granting strength to his repetitive recitation.
Nails made of blood bit into her skin as the hand refused to abate. It was strong, made strong by the will of the man who fathered the vampire standing over the scene; it was clear from whom David drew his unrelenting ego. Emmeline's hand loosened in David's cassock, both hands transferring to the table to grip the edge of it tightly. The blood had drained from her face, perhaps to join the spidery thing that had assumed control of her form; its nails cut crescents into her chin, the tears it created giving nothing more to the air as everything was drained dry. Em's pallor was whiter than usual, the hand having taken as much as it could to maintain its presence. But as it found its source being sucked dry, so too did it find its source of power dwindling. It spasmed again, turning palm up as fingers and thumbs pushed her mouth as wide as it could force it to.
Her hand going slack drove David nearly to madness. The thought of losing her, and to his damned dead father of all unholy things, goaded him on. He reached for his sister, his hands wrapping tight around her pale, cold arms, as though he might pour his newfound faith into her by touch alone. His voice grew ragged and harsh, so impassioned were his prayers. His eyes did not leave her tortured face. He carved every facet of her expression into his memory; he would not forget this. He would not fail her again. His fingertips dug into her skin hard enough to bruise even her vampiric form. His prayers burrowed into her and her unwanted possessor, rooting out the cause of her suffering.
The hand convulsed, pushing her jaws apart as they closed unconsciously, the muscles stretched too taut from its escape attempts. Slowly, it began to recede down her throat, the sanguine fingers seemingly dissipating into the dark cavern of her mouth. Em's eyes remained white, her form shuddering as her spirit seemed to find the strength to push back at the monster that had attempted to gain control of her. Another moment passed, and her trembling slowed, though did not abate completely. Her eyes closed, followed by her mouth. Her hands on the table fell into her lap, and suddenly she then exploded into activity. Her eyes flew open, her mouth wide with sobs as tears found their way down her face.
"David?" Her shoulders rolled, trying to loose herself from his grip as she sought some kind of reassurance. "Oh my God!" She pushed forward, burying her face in David's shirt as she cried.
David wrapped his arms around her, pulling her close. The words came before he could stop them, before he truly realized what he was saying. "I'm sorry, Em," he said. "I'm so sorry." He kissed her forehead, tasting his own vitae on her skin. "You're okay. You're alright." He pressed a kiss to the damp dark of her hair. "I'm here, and it's over."
She sobbed into the cloth of his robes, her hands grasping to hold fistfuls of his cassock. "I don't ever want to do that again!" Her voice was muffled by his clothing, hiccups and sobs breaking apart each word. She pulled back enough to look him in the face.
"Do not tell Camille what happened here. Or Nathalie. Don't tell anyone." Her voice rasped through her torn throat. "I will never do that again. Promise me you won't tell. Please."
In that moment David would have promised her anything. But even later, when the moment had passed and he had time to process what had occurred, he would look upon this promise and know beyond a shadow of doubt that it was the right one to make. "Of course," he said. His gaze met hers beneath his furrowed brow. He pressed his forehead to hers. His hands flexed against her back, touching her gently, reassuring himself of her presence. "Never again, Em. I swear."
A tension seemed to flood out of her as soon as she had his word. Emmeline sank back into her brother's embrace, her eyes closed as her face touched his, grasping hands holding to his shoulders. His solid presence reassured her that she was in fact real and alive, and on the physical plane -- not trapped in some limbo between this world and the next. She had slipped so closely to the other side, more so than ever before. Whatever new abilities her vampirism had gifted her would go undeveloped, trapped behind a door in her mind that she would never seek to open again.
Her hands tightened on his shoulders as her face realigned to bring her mouth to his; there was little warmth there beside what he stole from the living, but it was enough to remind her that she was more than just a spirit. A hand clung to the nape of his neck as she sought more than simple reassurance from him.
David pressed himself into her embrace. He had not been the one to suffer, but he had borne witness to it, and that had been more than enough. He tasted blood on her lips. His mind readily conjured up the image of his father's spirit crawling from her mouth, red fingers pressing over his own tongue. He choked, but covered the sound as best he could with a low, pleading moan. His fingers hitched at the fabric of her clothes. He forced his father from his thoughts and his tongue over hers, drinking her in so greedily it seemed he meant to consume her.
She pulled her skirt up, sliding forward from her chair into his lap as she brought their bodies closer. Her tongue slid over his, nails on his neck spreading into his hair as her other hand grabbed at his and brought it to her chest. Every movement was quick, grasping, begging for touch and feeling that she might not slip away into what had happened. She quickly undid the buttons on the front of her plain dress, pulling the shoulders down so the cloth pooled around her elbows, baring her breasts. One hand went to cup his jaw, the other back to his nape, then over his shoulders as her hips rolled on his.
With every touch it became easier to put the terrible ritual behind him. He squeezed her breast too tightly, brushed his thumb too roughly over the taut peak of her nipple. His free hand moved to the buttons of his robe, unfastening them with a quick and practiced hand. Beneath heavy black cloth he wore only a white shirt and collar; these, too, he removed without pulling away from her, without parting his mouth from hers more than an instant a time. He raised her up, turning her back toward the table, sweeping lit candles aside as he lay her atop it. Then he bent over her, his clothes falling away from him to pool on the floor, and brought his lips and the sharp edges of his teeth to her throat. She bent her head back, her legs spreading as his hips pressed into her.
She raked nails down his back, drawing red furrows through his pale flesh. A leg hooked around his backside, her body trembling beneath his touch. Moans that broke from her lips were jagged, her voice still healing itself from the damage done to it.
He canted his head against her throat, listening intently to every sound she made. It was her again, his Emmeline, and no other. He bit at her flesh, pressed his fingers to her hips, holding her to him as his body fitted to hers. Desperation overtook him; he pushed into her in one hard, deep stroke, his back bowed beneath the press of her nails. Impaled, Emmeline's brow knitted as a louder moan escaped from her throat. Her nails came back to his shoulders, pressing deep crescents into the skin and muscle beneath, drawing up more blood. She was pale beneath his touch, stark white against the dark wood of the tabletop they lay conjoined on, the candles flickering over their forms. But she felt something in the hard press of his cock, the solidity of his body atop her as her hips rolled against his.
"God, David, please," her voice grated, scouring away the rest of her fear. "Fuck me hard; make me feel alive."
He nuzzled hard into her neck, breathing deeply of her heady, familiar scent. He drove into her, the table rocking beneath them. One hand lifted from her hip to circle low around her throat. His thumb pressed into the hollow there; his fingers slipped around the column of her neck, closing tight as a noose. His hips bucked into her. He felt bruises well on his thighs where they struck the table's edge: a waste of stolen blood, but a sacrifice he gladly made. His teeth skimmed her clavicle; he breathed her name and pushed into her again.
Emmeline bucked underneath him, the vise around her throat muting whatever screams she might have made. Her body was a twilight of pain and pleasure, her eyes rolling back in her head once again, but this time of her own doing. She clung to her brother like an anchor, nails turned claws cutting deep into his back as he stoked the diversion in her that she craved from the earlier terror that had possessed her. Her head struck the table as it jostled, creating explosions in the darkness that her eyes saw.
David moved to watch her face as he fucked into her. His fingers traced her skin as they moved from her throat to her hair. They wrapped tightly in her damp locks, pulling her head down as he thrust deeply into her again. His mouth hovered over hers, a breath away. His lips brushed hers when he spoke.
"Louder," he said. "Scream for me."
Her head hit the table again, but the sound that broke on her lips was a combination of pain and lust, her body wrung thoroughly for every drop of gratification that it could offer. Her nails scored him again, his back a tapestry of flagellation, as her hips rolled to gorge themselves on his thrusts. Her voice resonated in the small room, a mix of guttural sounds with his name and other words that were nearly indecipherable.
His eyes drifted nearly shut as he listened to her, as he drank in every sound she and their violently joining bodies made. He sucked in a sharp breath as chill air slipped over the wounds at his back, reminding him of every mark she carved in him. He wished they would not heal, that he might see them in the nights to come and bask in their beauty and meaning. He felt himself drawn closer to the edge, his pleasure mirroring hers, reflecting and heightening it with every hard stroke.
Every movement pushed her toward climax, her body responding animalistically to its harsh treatment. Finally she grabbed at his back, nails entrenched in the skin, cutting deep. She bucked against him again, spine and limbs growing taut, brow knitting at the delirium that spread throughout her form. Emmeline shuddered, her voice raw and broken to whispering his name as she descended from her high. Blood-sweat drenched her arms and legs, marring the table, wetting her hair. A sense of peace pervaded her, a dull pain throbbing between her legs that she basked in, still holding tight to the man pressed down over her.
David came as she fell, licking the fine sheen of blood from the hard angle of her jaw. He quieted his cry with a press of his teeth to her skin, though its echoes vibrated through both their bodies. He buried himself in her and went still, shivering beneath her sharp claws. "Oh, Emmeline," he sighed, when at last words returned to him. His hands softened in her hair and on her hip, smoothing over flesh he had so recently hurt. Slowly he slid out of her, then into her again, savoring these last moments before they parted.
Even when he withdrew from her, he did not pull entirely away. He gathered her close, pulling her up from the table and into his lap as he sat. He stroked her back, the curve of her backside, consoling them both in the wake of everything. She wrapped her arms around his shoulders, burying her face in his neck. The smell, the feel, the taste of him was tied into the calm she felt. Exhaustion lined her bones, and she felt that she might have drifted off to sleep there and then if a gnawing hunger hadn't awoken in her belly. She had lost so much blood in this simple trial that part of her wondered if she hadn't gone mad. Her mouth worked against his throat, then remembered who she was sitting on.
"I need to eat," she murmured, pulling away from him and feeling dizzy in the same motion. "I've lost too much blood." For a moment she felt as though she might cry, thinking how far off the blood dolls and vitae were kept. Someone would see her, someone would ask questions. Someone would know. She pulled her arms away from him and started piecing her clothing back together. Em met David's eyes with a pleading look.
"Can you bring someone to me? I don't...I don't want anyone to see."
He watched her for a moment, not wanting to comply. But she needed him now, and her weakness was entirely his doing. Slowly he nodded, then lifted her from him as he rose to stand. He gathered his robes and dressed, sucking her blood from his fingertips once the last button was done. He smoothed a clean but damp hand over his cassock, but that alone would not rid it of the stains and wrinkles it bore. The blood dolls would not care.
"I'll be back in a moment," he said. "Don't leave, Emmeline. I'll take care of you." Then he left before she could contradict him or cut him in any of the ways she knew so well. The door closed heavy behind him. She watched him go, her eyes watching the door, disliking having to wait. Part of her wondered if he'd come back in the end, but she distracted herself by buttoning her dress closed, splotches of blood marring the cloth. Left alone, she surveyed the room, wondering what spirits she had been left with. A candle flickered, pulling her eyes back and forth across the room as her anxiety rose. Soon she was as clothed as she had been upon entering, but far more alone. She pulled mental barriers down, wrapping herself in a cocoon of tension that interrupted the calm she'd felt only moments before. Time seemed to stretch on and on, and she wondered where David was lingering, if he had abandoned her entirely.
At last the door creaked open and the priest returned, two blood dolls in tow. They were naked but sober, conscious and willing victims to whatever hunger gripped their masters. They watched the bloodstained woman with fear plain in their eyes, but their willingness to please overcame all else. David released them and they moved to stand before Emmeline, patiently waiting with their arms at their sides.
Their appearance ratcheted up the hunger in her gut, and Emmeline immediately caught the gaze of one. She rose from her seat, the woman coming to stand before her willingly. Em dispensed with any pretense, pushing the woman's hair to one side and simultaneously using the movement to pull the woman's head down, baring her neck. The woman's hands went to Em's hips, steadying herself as the kindred's mouth opened wide and sharp teeth plunged into the blood doll's neck. Vitae poured down her throat, her face a picture of ravenous hunger turning to ecstasy as she filled herself by leeching the life away from another. The woman moaned, hands gripping Emmeline tighter, as she was drained nearly to death.
The kindred dropped the woman at her feet, landing in a bundle of pale flesh dotted with streaks and spots of red. Blood marred Emmeline's chin as she beckoned to the second blood doll, ignoring David's presence entirely. The man obediently approached, even having seen the fate that awaited him. David moved next to him, resting a hand on his naked shoulder.
"Go on, my son," he said. "Find pleasure in obedience."
The man drew a deep breath. Nodding, he stepped closer to Emmeline. He canted his throat, better exposing the thick vein there.
This time, Emmeline moved more slowly; she hooked one hand around the man's nape, rising up nearly on tiptoe to draw a line down the vein. Feeling him shudder beneath her, she pressed a soft kiss to his skin, and then bit down, tasting the blood well into her mouth. The blood doll groaned, and she could feel his erection against her as she drank, but there their desires diverged; Emmeline pulled him down closer to her, nails biting into his skin as she filled herself. All too soon he joined the other doll on the floor, and Emmeline wiped at her face with the back of her hand. She glanced up from the mess to David, licking at her fingers as she wiped away the gore.
David bent and retrieved the fallen woman's body. There was life in her yet, and it could be restored with significant help. For the time being, she was still an asset worth caring for.
She walked toward her brother, the unconscious blood doll askew in his arms, and put a hand to his shoulder. "You can handle this, right? I need to go change." Em planted a kiss on the side of David's mouth, her hand trailing up and over his arm as she passed him and moved toward the exit of the room. "Thank you, David."
He gritted his teeth as her footsteps receded. He looked down at the man's body, limp and already fading. He turned toward Emmeline, staring at the soft square of her shoulders. "I certainly can," he said. "Perhaps I should have one of Nathalie's favorites come and fetch him. Or do you think they might gossip about the state you were in when they arrived? You know how they talk."
Emmeline stopped, turning on her heel. "Cattiness doesn't become you, brother. They saw little, other than us in this room. Or are you planning on giving them more details? I didn't take you for a tattle-tale. I can get a ghoul to assist you, if you fear your delicate hands aren't up to the task."
His jaw tightened. He dropped the blood doll from her precarious place in his arms. The sound of bone breaking as she struck the hard floor echoed off the walls. Emmeline flinched, her eyes caught on the blood doll's body before tracking up to his face. "I cleaned up one of your messes tonight," he said. "I suppose it was too much to hope it would be appreciated. Let Nathalie herself find their corpses for all I care. She can ask you how they came to be here." He glided past her with a smoothness he certainly did not feel, pulling open the door with a hard tug of his hand.
"Considering that everyone saw you take them from their rooms and I wasn't to be seen, I can't imagine why she'd ask me why their bodies are here," Em replied, her expression holding none of the innocence that her voice did. "But if you're going to be a brat about fixing the mess that you created, fine. I'll get a ghoul myself and clean this up. Just because you want to pout doesn't mean their lives have to be wasted."
"Pout?" David stopped just outside the threshold, his hand still on the door. "I'm pouting? After you fail to manage your own abilities, then send me to hide your shame, you have the gall to say such things?" He sneered. "Run your own errands. I have work to attend."
"I only asked one simple thing of you, David. You don't have to have a hissy fit about it." She waved her hand in his direction, encouraging him to go as she looked distastefully down at the bodies. "Never mind that you said you'd take care of me. I guess that promise only goes so far."
"It certainly does," he snapped. He shook his head and turned away from her with a sigh. He pulled the door shut behind him more roughly than he meant. It fell with a hard slam, setting small flames dancing on their candles' wicks.
Emmeline realized she was pouting only after the room began to calm. She huffed once at the door, then looked down to the mess she'd made of the blood dolls at her feet. They weren't going to help themselves; with a sigh, she followed after David's exit, looking for assistance to bring the blood dolls back to their quarters where they could receive their due medical care.