It was a place on the very verge, where civilization clashed with the freed expanse of nature. There were a few old buildings, mostly houses, whose backyards were literally surrounded by trees, and it was around these old-fashioned fences that Charlotte dipped and wandered, gliding parallel to the old street just on the other side of the smoky-roofed abodes. The ground was bathed in unclean silver filtering through pine and bark and smoke. The stars glinted with a fragile, dull appeal, so distant and so boring to watch this close to the city.

She was neither hunting nor wandering aimlessly. Caught somewhere in between desires, Charlotte's senses were completely open to the thrill of something new, something entertaining that would nibble at the corners of this most uneventful night. The scent of children sleeping in their beds drifted from the cracked windows of the houses. She could easily sneak into one such place, steal one of those precious, little lambs away without so much as stirring their eyelashes. But where would be the fun in that?

The breeze stirred her pale hair and shifted, as restless as she felt. She wanted to run as fast as her muscles could take her, feel her body strain and falter from exertion. She wanted to lock eyes with a dangerous stranger, forcing her will on the other until both broke like glass shattering on the ground...

She smiled faintly, her eyes roaming hungrily from the endless black of the forest on her right to the open expanse of street on her left.

Benedict had never been less pleased with his existance. The lives he took for no reason, the monstrous things he did for the sheer fun of tormenting others. He hated himself. And rightfully so.

On this night of most conscious self-hatred Ben wore a plan black long sleeve shirt and a pair of black pants that were torn at the knees, and a studded belt to hold them firmly in place as he walked the streets muttering angrily to himself. His short black hair was uncovered and matted like he'd just woken from a good sleep - his hat was at his prefered residence. His checkered sneakers made no sound on the pavement as he moved.

He took another turn, then another, and another until he was only a block from the convergance with the forested areas of Demaitre. His silent sanctuary - a place of calm that was not only good for hunting, but surprisingly for hiding from oneself. A few more steps and deep breathe conveyed to his senses the pressence of a female. One of his fellow night keepers.

At first he thought it might be Helen but soon realized it was not the scent that he'd known Helen to behold. This was another. Someone new.

Interested in the stranger, he took to the roof of a nearby building and scoped out the border of the trees until he noticed her. A beautiful specimen. "Ello." He whispered to himself as he crawled down the side of the building with a quick silence that ended his position only 20 yards away from hers. He slunked in the shadows, watching her with his vibrant blue eyes.

No more than a breath, really. Less audible than the snap of a twig. Less audible, even, then the sound of a wingbeat. Somewhere near in the night lurked a shadow, only this one was completely tangible. She need only find it. But again, where was the fun in confronting the mystery straight-on? So much more could be had by...why, by playing.

Her course altered, twisting away from the distraction of the road and the houses and the headlights. The path was chosen: she took to the trees as suddenly as if prompted by the wind to turn and vanish amongst the branches. Her steps were quick, but she did not run. She waded into the darkness until the light filtering through from above was pure, untainted by the garish glow of electricity. Creatures breathed all around, underground and up in the trees. The echo of one thousand insects in constant cacaphony trilled like a dissonant note.

Like a siren, she twisted just out of vampiric sight--for a vampire it certainly was; its scent was strong and sickly-sweet, a mingled taste of cold breath and warm blood--and slowed, rather curious to see if her mysterious shadow decided to follow. A thrill of anticipation played through her like a cold current. Indeed, she hoped she had become the prey, at least for the moment.

Benedict saw her take to the trees quickly and decided to wait. Wait for her to gain some ground. Then, as silently as he'd found her, he followed. Fast as he physically could, making a blur of shadow as he went along the earth's grassed surface, he would find her. He'd only been moving a few seconds when again he caught her scent, which he'd already cataloged into his memory for reference.

Ben saw her. She was moving quicker than a human could at a fast walk but still slower than a full out fun. This was about to become a wonderful game of cat and mouse. Inside he could sense the woman's anticipation of his following, and he too felt the shrill excitement of the chase. But what for? To insue terror? No, that wasn't it... Or was it?

He flitted roughly 10 yards ahead of her and stopped directly near her path. He stood smuggly against a tree a watched with delight as she passed him by. He watched her movements, knowing that if it became physical, he could take her down no problem. But not yet, he told himself. I'll make her work for that. Again he picked up her trail only slower this time. He passed her then fell back, and repeated this, letting her pick up glimpses of him leaning against a tree or kneeling on the ground smirking at her.

Everywhere, her shadow manifested himself in glimpses. Yes, he indeed. His slightly mocking grin flitted across her eyes again and again as they dodged through the trees, losing and gaining ground. When she caught sight of him again, she smiled crookedly and winked, silently daring him to catch her. If you can, that is...

She spun and vanished, her muscles pulling taut and releasing a surge of sheer and wonderful energy as she broke into an all-out run. The wind whipped across her face like knives, cutting into her skin with delicious abandon. Branches reached out with angry, crooked claws to snag at her, but they could not touch her. Where they would have eagerly torn into her skin, they merely brushed at her sleeve as she slipped past them, a pale blur in the gloom, and he no more than a whisper in the darkness.

Charlotte could not suppress an intimate laugh of sheer delight. Yes, this was exactly it. This game was what her heart had been beating itself against its cage for, a bird dashing its own life out with its overwhelming desire to run. His scent filled her senses, the glimpses of his pale eyes clouded her thoughts. The feeling of being pursued like a helpless thing saturated every sinew in her body with intoxicating pleasure. And when she felt as though she could run no faster, she raced faster still until even the moonlight could not touch her...

Ben smiled deliciously to himself as he kept up with her extroadinary pace. He got within a feet of her running frame, but kept ensueing with a back and forth pace that allowed her still only glimpses of him. He let out a malicious laugh before running up behind her and letting his hand brush gently within her pale hair and grabbed. He pulled downward, knocking her to the ground, then let go and kept running.

"Come on my sweet." He whispered into the breeze as he took to a nearby tree, keeping her fallen body in sight. This game was making Ben experience an anticipation that he'd missed out on for so long. He'd become so engulfed in the chase he'd all but forgotten why he was angry only minutes before.

He walked elegantly along a branch and crouched near the base of the tree, his blue eyes as wide with thrill as the smile on his face. "Play with me." Again he whispered.

For the fraction of a moment when his hand touched her hair, her entire body trembled with an overpowering sense of fierce ecstasy. It was a sort of fear, an imagined fear from an imagined threat, though she had no doubt that the danger had potential enough to become truly dangerous. But it was more than just the fear. It was the exhiliration of the game, the feel of being thrown off balance...the feel of falling...

Her pale eyes glinted with a ferocity born of neither anger nor malice. It was something new, and it was powerful. Flexing her arms, Charlotte rolled onto her back and tilted her head backwards until she could see him, upside down as he was, standing upon his branch like a ravenous predator ready to pounce. Smiling, she touched her fingers to the corner of her lips, and her fingertips were stained red with blood. Another laugh, low and hoarse and wild. She licked the blood away with great pleasure and rolled to her feet, shaking from her hair the debris that had woven into it.

She walked steadily forward, passing under the branch on which he stood and turning to walk backwards so that she might watch him.

"Very good," she crooned gently, her voice like a silvery song, weaving up and down through the night.

And she was gone again, vanishing soundlessly. The night blurred by again at dizzying speeds, the terrain growing harsher and deeper and more dangerous as the forest thickened and twisted into dense, ugly stretches of pure blackness, sweet tension.

As Ben watched her move beneath the branch, speak, then take off again - a fire built up in the bit of his stomach. Passion. He found her to be wonderfully like a woman that your mother warns you about and a vampiress your sire wants you to find. He took off after her, leaping gracefully from one tree to the next, keeping in-toe with her pace but a few steps behind.

He continued to examine how she moved, and how she seemed to find exstacy in running flat-out. He loved it. The strong body-to-mind relationship that this sort of chase gave to both participants. It was like a game that only those of the night could truely appreciate.

The furthur they got into the woodlands, the more intracate their paths became in the forest, the more his mind ran rapidly with scenerios of outcome of this game. All involving the capture of the mouse.

After whole minutes of there intense chase, he lept to the ground mid-run and met her path with ease. Ben moved ahead just enough to block her current path and stopped. Smirking, he took out a cigarette from his pocket, lit it and stood there smoking as she approached at her great velocity.

The trees shook above, just rustling with the hidden weight of the most perfected hunter to every walk the forest.

Cut off again. Something like anger--but without the malice behind it--pooled somewhere beneath her heart. It was the frustration of the prey who cannot escape, the sense of dismal and inevitable defeat without the implication of sudden death. With no connotation, it was an immense feeling. Without connotation, it was simply more ecstasy.

Charlotte came to an abrupt halt perhaps two feet in front of him, just able to stop in time. She drew a long, cool breath into her lungs, felt her insides expand in a vain attempt to contain the rising conflict. Her hair and skin windblown and quite wild, she smiled and took a step back, her arm twisting about the trunk of a tree as she allowed the dizziness of her sudden stop to flood through her. The smell of smoke was like an anchor. Its acrid scent kept her feet planted on the ground when she felt as though she might very well vanish altogether.

After a moment, she laughed gently and edged closer to him. Her eyes locked on his with the intensity of another hunter, of an equal. Charlotte had quite forgotten who was stalking who, and who was the victim. Moving slow enough to be clear she was not threatening, she plucked the cigarette from his lips and placed it between her own, her pale eyes glinting as the dark smoke clutched her lungs.

"How does one so young run so very fast?" She asked--her voice roughened just slightly by the same passion that heated her eyes--and handed back his cigarette as though they were the closest of acquaintances.

He did not falter when she took his cig, but merely smiled and took it in stride. "When one so young had a very old sire." He cocked an eyebrow at her. The emotions reflecting from her wonderfully colored eyes made his insides burn. He again took a drag from his cig and smiled at her.

"How does one feel when followed to intently by one so young?" He continued to use the old monolague-type tone and let his own voice become husky with each word he spoke.

Ben shifted his weight from one left to the other, shimmering smoke from his cigarette swirled gractiously in the darkness as the moonlight pushed through the thick tree tops of the woodlands. It almost reminded him of home.

She smiled at his answer, the pale light playing across her insipid gaze.

"Ah, fair enough," she murmured, drawing imperceptively closer. "I will admit that at first I was startled, even frustrated. I am not used to being outrun," for an instant she sounded nearly dangerous, nearly threatening, but the dark glint in her eye went far beyond such a simple, petty response as anger. "But then I found I rather enjoyed it. After all, it isn't every night that I am allowed to look through the eyes of the hunted, through the more desperate perspective."

He was enthralling, this close. He had been enthralling from a good distance away, of course, but such a view hardly did him justice. She could hear the lethargic murmur of his heart, young but immensely strong, unyielding, eternal. It was a beautiful clamor in his chest, one that twisted up through his veins and filled his body with undying music. It was a song that inspired a great hunger for bloodshed.

"But desperate," she whispered, her eyes consumed by this sudden, venomous hunger, "is not necessarily a bad thing."

Ben looked at her - she was beautiful, and dangerous. The way she moved, and the way she spoke. It all accumulated into a wonderful creature. He could tell she was examining his features as much as he was doing to hers. The way that his senses seemed to high as he watched hers at work was like the shock of a drug to his nervous system. It'd been so long since he'd been near enough to another exhilerated vampire, he'd almost forgotten the exstacy that was their senses clashing beautifully.

Desperation, I know it all too well. Desperate to hide from oneself is the greatest game of chase there is, and you always lose... Benedict's blue eyes stayed clear as he thought to himself but if one looked close they could see his contemplation. When he returned to the moment with her he realized he'd all but finished his cigarette. One last drag and it was done. He threw it aside with the glamour of someone who did that very action quite often.

"Being desperate. Being on the recieving end. It can put a few things inta' perspection when you are the hunter. Ca' it a blessin in disguise, if ya like." His husky voice's accent seeped through the more he spoke. It was sadening to hear his own accent when he was so home sick for the first time.

"Wat's your name?" He crossed his arms over his chest, and quickly kicked his head to the side in an effort to get his hair to shift to the side he was most comfortable with. He looked at her intently, with the glint of a predator in his eyes.

Her eyes narrowed with subdued delight as she listened closely to the pleasant lilt of his accent. The simple sound of his voice, the way it played roughly with each syllable, was quite beautiful. Yet it was tainted by the slightest touch of sadness, of hurt. But of course that was the case. That was always the case with their kind. There was never a happy story, and so few had learned to truly value the beauty of forgetting.

"Maybe," she replied, her melodic voice considerably gentler. "But if you're not careful, your blessing might draw you into something you never wanted to realize to begin with."

She tilted her head slightly, her hazy eyes turning into the forest in response to some quiet sound of inhuman pain--perhaps the sound of a creature stirring to life, or perhaps one submitting to death at the jaws of another. Whatever it was, it ceased as abruptly as it started, resolved in an instant without excessive conflict, just the way things should be.

"For what it's worth, there is a beauty in being able to see from either perspective. But there's far less conflict in taking on neither," she smiled distantly, refocusing her gaze on her hunter, her prey, and gave her name. "Charlotte. Charlotte Rose. And the rest is just history, does not matter."

Again with the hidden realizations. Ben thought to himself but continued to watch his prey as she in turn watched and replied to him. Images of his last feeding attempt and the gorey mess he'd made for no reason, flashed in his mind and he faltered momentarily. Not now, Benedict. For once in your pathetic vampiric exsistance try and enjoy yourself! A war broke out in his mind between wanting to have his fun and wanting to wage war on the things that made him most unstabble. The warrior in favor of having momentary fun won the battle. For now...

"Charlotte. Charlotte Rose. And the rest is just history, does not matter."

After she'd said her name an array of replies came to mind. Most consisting of questions concerning why history didn't matter. But he faught back the urge. His mind however, going at lightening speed, mustered up things from his own past he wasn't proud of and he found himself agreeing with Charlotte's comment.

"Too right." It was barely audible, and it was carried by the wind, but he was sure she'd heard it. His facial expression was one of a mixture. Mostly of pleasurably malice and inner-disdain(sp?)

"Benedict. But call me Ben."

"Ben," she repeated thoughtfully, a ripple of renewed energy streaking through her glassy eyes.

There were so many things reflected back at her in his own gaze that for a moment it was difficult to tell where her thoughts ended and his began. She watched the thoughts gather and cloud his eyes, watched memories play behind them again and again with painful precision. So tempting it was to simply reach out and read his thoughts for herself, but of course such a personal violation would trouble him.

"What's the matter, hunter?" She inquired gently, donning a distant, mirthless smile. "You are hurting, but you run from it. You let it prey on you. Why? Or perhaps more importantly, what must I do to force you to forget...if only for just awhile."

This the smile had some weight to it, a bit of real laughter glinting mischievously in her eyes. She turned away, her feet moving soundlessly over the forest floor as she drifted off into the trees through a patch of untainted moonlight, glancing back only once as if daring him to follow her.

Ben smiled when she repeated his name. For a reason unknown to him, he liked when other's said his name, especially in the way. It was a form of recognition, of appreciation and equality of understanding. His smile faltered when he noticed her watching him, realizing that he was only half with the moment.

"What's the matter, hunter?" She inquired gently, donning a distant, mirthless smile. "You are hurting, but you run from it. You let it prey on you. Why? Or perhaps more importantly, what must I do to force you to forget...if only for just awhile."

When she asked him those questions, a chill of hatred spread over his frame, and something else... excitement. So, not only was she beautiful but she could appreciate an inner-struggle. How quant.

He watched her take to the trees and turn back. A glance that could only mean one thing, 'follow if you want to forget'. At least that was what it meant to Benedict, and wanting nothing more than to forget for a moment, he took up the chase again. The blood pumping through him beat against his senses and gave a hightened sense of things to the exhileration of chasing. Of being in control, and not worrying about losing it. He was hunting but he wasn't. He was enjoying himself.

She did not run far. The whistle of the biting, crisp wind against her face was soothing--enough to goad her to run on forever--but the scenery called for pause.

It was a wide, nearly circular clearing, marred only by the old scent of people long gone and forgotten. No one had stepped foot in this place for many years. The moonlight poured in, strong and silver like blood, to illuminate the clearing like it might the water of a lake. The ground looked soft, the thin layer of pine needles an inviting bedding to anyone willing. Too beautiful to ignore, almost too beautiful to even touch, it waited in silence like a scene from a dream or a painting.

Charlotte dared to interrupt it. She ceased to run and instead walked, crossing to the middle of the clearing in silence, tilting her head back slightly to allow the moonlight to caress her pale face. She waited, glancing about thoughtfully for the signs of her pursuer. Her fingers smoothed the tiny wrinkles in her skirt, composed each little detail with the careful attention of a creature perfectly at ease.

"Come, hunter, tell me," she spoke to the silence, knowing full well that he would hear her, "what do you fear above all else? And what do you want?"

Ben followed in close puruist until he realized that she'd stopped, and began to walk through a clearing, he took to the trees surrounding it. The scene was that of pure astonishing beauty, the way that you see a graveyard a beautiful before you realize what's it's for and feel regret at finding it so wonderful. But this place was moer than that... a forgotten place of wonder and delight. All of the natural beauty mixed with that of the huntress making her way through it with an air of relaxation and enjoyement.

He watched the way the moon lit up her soft face and smiled to himself. She is beautiful.

"Come, hunter, tell me," she spoke to the silence, knowing full well that he would hear her, "what do you fear above all else? And what do you want?"

Ben thought of his answer but didn't do it out loud. I fear myself the most, if you want the truth. He kept his eyes on her but inwardly sighed, hating himself and the question. What do I want? He himself was not quite sure as to the purpose of the chase, but he in turn would ask her the same.

He flitted down right behind Charlotte standing a few feet off. "What is that you fear, dear Charlotte?"

Charlotte smiled crookedly at the question and turned her head to lay eyes on the handsome hunter now lingering on the ground like a lost bird. She studied him for a moment, taking in the sinister way in which he walked: graceful and measured, so very much like a predator.

"As unwise as it may sound, I don't think there are many things I fear anymore," she replied calmly. "Does that make me brave, or just foolish?"

He was very close, now. She could hear the lethargic beat of his deadened heart in his chest, even and smooth and unfaltering. The spines of the terrible hunger prickled deep inside of her, begging her to step closer at her own risk and take what was so close. Did blood taken forcefully from the body taste better than blood willingly given? Of course, he was faster than her. And he was probably stronger as well. Did it matter, though? Let him cut her. Let him tear her apart.

She suppressed a shudder of delight at the thought. Sick. That was what she was. Very sick. But she basked in it, embraced it. Her eyes flared to new brightness, pulsed with hungry vigor as she stared the other vampire in the eyes.

"As unwise as it may sound, I don't think there are many things I fear anymore," she replied calmly. "Does that make me brave, or just foolish?"

Benedict smirked evily, even she realized how naive it sounded but for vampires it was a natural truth. Aside from the simple things that could destroy them such as sunlight - there really was very little that a vampire should fear. Aside from maybe him/herself.

He stared blankly at her for a second longer then went for a test ride to see how far he could push her. He sped, quicker than the naked eye could catch, and stood behind her. He bent her neck to the side, moving her hair away, exposing her neck and baring his teeth. But he didn't bite her.

Ben brushed his teeth gently across the surface of her beautiful and delicate skin. His heart stayed calm but his stomach lurched, he wanted to take her, to lose control. It was like fighting a battle with crack withdrawl every time he got that lurch. The urge to lose control was almost overpowering, but wanting to test this vampiress was more teasing that the thought of bathing in her blood.

"It is both, foolish and brave to make such a boast."

"Then I shall be both," she whispered, her heart trilling with lovely fear as his cold fangs brushed across her equally frozen skin. The clash of two such unyielding surfaces sent shivers across her body. "It does not matter..."

Her hazy eyes closed of their own volition, and her spidery fingers crept up to touch the side of his face, to feel the unbreakable structure beneath the impassive, marbled skin. She twisted her head just a degree or two to the side, but the movement itself was enough. Two small, narrow gashes flushed an angry red against her porcelain skin, and two twin beads of crimson formed and distended into oblong droplets threatening to burst and fall.

"What will the hunter do, I wonder, when the prey chooses to willingly bleed?" Her bright voice slipped easily into a rough, twisted whisper. "Use me. If you hunger, take my blood. If you are angry, make me bruise and bleed."

She twisted away from him quickly, and her dim eyes were no longer distant, but were blazing. Her fingers crept to her reddened throat, and with a quick flick of her nails, the two small wounds doubled in length.

"Or," she continued, her eyes scorching with cold passion, "if you are tired of hurting, perhaps you want to know what it feels like to bleed as well."

And though she tilted her head slightly to the side as a gift, an offering, her eyes remained locked with his.

A cold rush of longing came over Benedict when he saw the blood only a tongue's length away. The monster inside him purred with anticipation but he silenced it by turning his head and smelling her soft hair, he would control himself even if only for a few moments longer.

"What will the hunter do, I wonder, when the prey chooses to willingly bleed?"

A lurch of his stomach, tiny goosebumps formed at the roots of every hair on his body. Willingly bleed... But she spun away and he watched her intently as though he was scared she would scurry away. She clawed herself and more blood ran. A spasm in his groin made his heart flicker with lust for Charlotte. Not for her body but for the sustainence coursing through her gorgeos frame. An image came to him of both of them covered in each other's blood their pale skin stained from the crimson sin.

"Or," she continued, her eyes scorching with cold passion, "if you are tired of hurting, perhaps you want to know what it feels like to bleed as well."

Ben took a step forward coming within only inches of Charlotte. He put his hand on the wounds on her neck, smearing her blood and looking at the beautiful liquid as it ran down his hand towards his wrist. "So beautiful is the hunger."

Charlotte inhaled sharply as his cold fingers pressed at the wounds and dispersed the long, flowing tendrils of her blood. The proximity of his freezing presence was like a catalyst in her blood urging her to blossom like a nightflower, and she did. She bent her head just slightly to the side, her body rising in an offering of her most secret gift. Her thoughts reached out and tasted his, and she could feel the intensity of his pulse--strong and eternal--matching hers.

She turned her head again, and she reached out to draw his bloodied fingers closer, gently wrapping her long fingers about his wrist. With a slowness measured out carefully to counter the rising rage that enflamed her thoughts with cold hunger, she pressed her lips to his crimson wrist and tasted her blood there. Her kiss moved up slowly to the palm of his hand, and without so much as a faint hesitation, she ran her tongue over her own blood.

Her lips parted only just, and the tips of her fangs danced over the skin of his hand, but she did not break the surface. Every fiber in her ached to, it was nearly impossible not to...but not yet. Instead, she pressed her thumb to his wrist and felt his pulse echo through her body, a twin and deadly rhythm that might very soon bring them closer.

Ben watched her, eyes full of excitement, as she licked his palm. Feeling her fangs on his flesh made it dance yet again with longing for such brutal contact. To bleed at another's bite, the intoxicating thought made him smile. The monster in him dared not reach out yet but he let it toy with him, his lust for blood crying like an inphant for the taste of her blood. Reach out and take it, Benendict. Take her. His thoughts rang in his mind, seducing him with more gorey images of what the monster wanted to come about.

Their eyes met, he stared blankly into hers. He touched her face with his clean hand and gently, but with enough power to do so, pushed her to the ground but kept her from falling hard. He lay on top of her, still staring into her eyes. He wanted her blood and he wanted her to have his.

Straddling her but sitting up slightly his bit deep into the wrist that was also covered in her blood. Their blood mixed on his wrist and he felt the surge of wanting flow through him even stronger at the sight. "Take me."

Cornered at last. She exhaled gently, her breath a strained hiss of potent desire. The weight of his hard body crushed her against the ground, but the feeling was anything but negative. Her teeth clenched slightly against the rising struggle in her chest. She did not intend to win, but denying it could only make it grow. And grow it did. It was all she could do to keep from forgetting everything in favor of tearing deeper still into the marvelous wounds that now adorned his pale wrist.

And then he spoke. For a moment she could only stare, not precisely in disbelief. Her eyes were vacant, emptied of all trace of humanity or petty shame. They were eyes so very like his--the eyes of a predator. The words seemed to reverberate around their desolate clearing, and they destroyed all other thoughts in her head completely.

Her hands nearly trembled with fierce hunger as she slowly wrapped them about his bleeding wrist and drew it near. For a moment she traced the blood with her fingers and tasted it--it was his blood, but it was also hers. The result of their combining was maddening, and the leash was broken. She brought her lips to the wounds quickly, her savage fangs matching the breaks he had made perfectly, and tasted of him. Her eyes sparked with angry red, flooding with absolute ecstasy as his blood, and hers, ran over her tongue. She arched against him compulsively, flooded by the potency of primal, secret exchange.

Charlotte had done it, broken the seal of want and gone for it, Ben wanted to too. He smiled as she began to pull his blood urgently from his wrist, a feeling he'd all but forgotten. It was like being in control of reliquishing that control to another who was in the same perdicament.

As she continued to feed from his wrist, Ben pulled away the clothing from her shoulder near his face and made a gently but wanting wound in her skin where her neck and shoulder met. Her blood was cold, as he was sure his was, but it was still as salty and lively as the blood of a human. She arched against him and he moaned. The entire experience was something completely new to him and he had not been in such control for many years. He felt like he was almost himself again.

You want her don't you, Ben? His conscious spoke to him as he fed, You want to take her. All of her. Kill her. At the last words Ben broke away from Charlotte, blood covering his lips and staining his teeth. His eyes changed from their vibrant blue to an astonishing green and then back. He watched her feed on his wrist and the monster inside him purred, Just take her now, Benedict. She is more than willing to let you kill her. Take her now!

Frightened by what was going on in his head, Ben yanked his wrist away from Charlotte, causing the wounds to triple in size and his blood sprayed across her beautiful face. He stood and began to slowly back away, ignoring the numbing pain in his wrist, and fell to the ground holding his head. "Stop this. I don't want to kill her." He whispered to himself. He wanted to have this moment with Charlotte but his control was slipping and though he told himself he didn't want to kill her - the monster's words rang in his ears and sounded more and more reasonable with every passing second.

She gasped quietly, eagerly as he bit down into the soft skin of her neck, lifting her shoulder slightly in a silent urge for him to continue, to take her harder. But no more than a few moments later, she felt the flicker of anger and revulsion cut through him, and then he was drawing away, staggering to his feet and moving away from her. The flush of red in her eyes drained, leaving her pale gaze looking paler still, deadened. His blood decorated her cold face in violent twists, and the scent of it, so close now that it felt a part of her, was maddening.

Charlotte rose to her feet slowly, her head reeling with dark pleasure, and gently stroked the blood on her face with her pale fingertips as if stunned by it. It tasted like him.

"Ben?" She murmured, and her voice sounded distant, like that of a somnambulist. She could feel the pulse of his heart, wretched as he struggled with himself.

She could hear the echo of his thoughts, vague, but she understood their general meaning. His violence made him no less appealing--quite the contrary. The most masochistic part of her urged her to allow his wishes to come true, let him tear her apart, but of course the idea was ridiculous. Her fingers brushed the wounds he had made at her throat--already she could feel the flesh tingling as it urged itself to rebuild.

She took one step closer, her eyes locked intently on his tortured form.

Benedict pulled at his hair as hard as he could without pulling it all out, he wanted to rip the monster from him and make the madness stop. He had struggled for so long with this horrible mind and now he wished nothing more than for it to be gone. And though he was angry with himself and on the verge of tears because of his mind's continual whispers - his body still longed to commit the horrible acts the monster suggested.

"Ben?" She murmured, and her voice sounded distant, like that of a somnambulist.

He was hunched over on the ground, leaning over his knees. He extended an arm out behind him to ward her off. "Don't come any closer. Please." His voice was a growl and he didn't mean it to be but he was loosing control. His wrist had all but healed and he stopped pulling on his hair.

"Just take her, Benedict. Take her." The voice urged him and he broke. He slowly stood with a feline elegance and turned to face her. His face was contorted with the hideousness of the monster pressing through. Ben's mind had shattered. He could see himself as if he were a bystander and he couldn't control himself.

Leaping forward he knocked Charlotte to the ground again only this time violently. He grabbed her around the throat and grinned evilly, "You want pain?" He squeezed her neck and slammed her head against the ground a few times then stopped and looked at her again. "Is this what you want!?" He yelled.

Inside the real Ben was screaming for the horrible acts to stop but he could do nothing. The anger of having no control at all at that moment was reflected even more in his distorted face. His eyes were bright green almost to the point of potent yellow.

When he spoke again, she froze, her statue's face staring and interested only in a distant way. Her sleeve still halfway pulled down her shoulder, her marble skin still stained with blood, she watched him as he rose and heart leapt in its dull, deadened way with some sick kind of detached fear for her own life. It took no more than a moment, and yet she watched each muscle tense and define itself beneath his skin the instant he moved. And then she was crushed against the ground and he was on top of her, smashing her against the earth until her pale eyes glassed over with something hideous, but something that might allow her to survive.

Her gaze focused in, no longer distorted, completely clear. She gnashed her teeth together as she stared into his sickly-tinted eyes and dug her nails into his strong shoulders. The muscles in her arms flexed as she pushed him just enough away from her to drag her would-be claws down the front of his chest. The sharp scent of blood swelled anew as her nails dug long trenches into his skin through his clothing.

She writhed beneath him, struggling to turn her head away from him, to break from his fierce grip. "Benedict," she hissed through her clenched teeth, and her eyes locked with his again as her nails found new targets: the cold hands that surrounded her throat, and soon after the side of his crazed, moonlit face. Small beads of red appeared under her nails, breaking like tiny blossoms against the white, staining every surface they touched.

Benedict realized she was attacking back and felt the pain but shrugged it off as if the wounds were mere slivers. He didn't release his grip on her throat but instead strengthened it, pressing his own nails into her soft flesh. "I thought you were willing. Too bad." He used his hand that wasn't wrapped around her throat to hold her hands together, then turned her head to the side and launched his fangs violently into the exposed flesh of her shoulder.

He bit her three times. Deep and harshly, ripping the flesh more each time. Her blood was like an accelerant for his actions and he covered the wounds with his mouth. Pulling her blood hoarsly from her.

He pulled away after a few moments of feeding and smiled monstrously at her doll-like face. "No, no, no. We'll not kill you yet." He licked the side of her face, tasting his own blood mixed with hers, a trail of blood the width of his tongue left on her face.

Her breath was a ragged whisper as he bound her fast. The fight sank from her eyes for a moment--she was not able to maintain it for long, never had been--and she became a lifeless thing, reverting to previous experience without meaning to. But the pain! She shrieked with agony as his fangs tore into her throat, but her own scream was stifled by the sound of blood as she tasted her own life on her lips. Her entire body trembled with pain, with pleasure, with the terrible high of being shamelessly helpless.

Her heart fluttered lethargically beneath her breast, like that of a dying animal. She twisted feebly, her hands clenching and unclenching with less force each time she struggled. She turned her head very slightly as he bent to taunt her, and a cold glint of something like hatred turned her soft face to stone. Her lips curled back from her teeth, and she bit hard into the side of his face, the only part of him she could reach. Pain shot through her neck as the gaping wounds twisted violently, contorting into ugly, black tears in her skin. She snarled against him, her jaw tensing as she pushed her fangs harder into his flesh, and the words flashed through her mind like hot silver, clear enough for him to hear at last:

You will not kill me.

She twisted her head a little farther, and the two small wounds became two hideous ones. Her blood and his blood flowed freely like a sacrificial wine, staining them both and turning her crystalline eyes an ominous, deep crimson.

Benedict growled as she bit his face, but the pain subsided after a few seconds. Then she did it. She tore his face leaving horrible wounds where her fangs had caught hold. He shrieked and released her hands, holding the wounds as his blood again splattered everywhere. Angry he used the hand around her throat to bang her head on the ground again. Only this time he didn't stop, he bashed her head probably seven times before he stopped.

"You will die, Charlotte." The voice was not Benedict's but a monstrous and demon-like voice instead. "Will you kill Ben to survive? Or let him destroy you?" The demon went from taking control of Ben to taunting Charlotte. Inside his ravaged mind he was screaming for control.

After speaking he forced a rough kiss onto her delicate lips before again launching his own fangs back into the gaping wounds on her neck. More blood gushed and the demon purred. "More." He growled into her neck and resank his fangs deeper into her wounds increasing their size and severity.

She bared her teeth in a silent scream as the monster tore into her wounds again. Her eyes filled with red tears that spilled over and seemed across the few remaining patches of clean skin. Her head lulled to the side as the muscles in her neck withdrew from what attacked them. She shuddered bitterly as her blood seeped from her lips and throat and eyes, staining the ground beneath her head.

Ben, her eyes roamed slowly through the crimson fog that clouded them, blearily looking for him and finding someone else, something else completely, why kill me?

She did not understand. She did not even know if her thoughts made sense anymore, or even if he could hear them. She gnashed her teeth together, shut her eyes in retaliation as she felt his vicious grip gnawing deeper into her flesh. What a lonely place to die...

She moved again, sacrificing yet more blood to his monstrous hold as she turned her head enough to sink her fangs into his soft wrist. So long as she could keep his blood on her lips, she would continue to survive. And so long as she had left her own gorey marks across his pale body, perhaps...

Her hands were free again. One was pinned at an awkward angle, twisted and immobile. The other wrapped around the back of his neck and dug deep into the wounds she had created herself.

Benedict only smiled into the vicious biting he was doing on her neck as she began to feed from his wrist. even masochists like to live... pathetic The monster taunted Ben within his mind. We're going to kill her Benedict. You're going to kill Charlotte. Such fear she has for dying alone here. The real Ben was screaming inside the tormented fragments of his mind and faught for control as he watched himself destroy Charlotte.

She continued to attack the wounds she'd inflicted on Ben's neck. Pain. It shot through his spine like a cancer. Ben felt some of his control come back, slowly.

No! Benedict, I'm in control! You watch like a good little puppet! The monster ignored the pain Charlotte inflicted and tore yet deeper into her neck which now resembled a horribly cut up roast of bloody beef. Benedict opened his eyes and saw the mess.

He began to cry. Small tears of crimson that mixed and his body jolted. He was gaining more control with ever bit of anger and pain the monster felt. "NO!" The real Benedict pressed through and broke away from Charlotte's neck and rolled away from her. He wept into the blood stained grass inches from Charlotte's bleeding frame. Heavy weeping of hatred, sadness, shame and most of all guilt.

"I'm sorry." He cried into the ground.

She jolted painfully as he tore himself from her. Her entire frame shuddered once and was still, her fingers curling into the healing earth, the sweet ground that sipped up all the spilled blood and hid it away from sight. Her head spun until simply opening her eyes made her too sick to even breathe--she closed them and wished the taste of her blood, and his, would vanish from her lips.

Sorry? The simplicity of the word seared into her thoughts, piercing all other sensation like a physical blow. Sorry? She wanted to run, and this time she wanted not to be followed, to run alone. She wanted to scratch the one word in his face with her own nails.

No, she did not. The anger slipped off of her, hardly touched her. It lingered in her thoughts for a moment and then vanished almost completely. She flattened her fingers against the ground--they were sticky with blood. Her thoughts were flooded once again with the prevalent numbness she bathed in. The solitary key to survival. At least, that was what she had believed to be true.

Too many thoughts. She ushered them from her mind and focused hard on the deep, gory wounds that littered her body. Her fingers trembled, clicking infinitesimally against the earth. She did not answer--she could not speak, not yet. Instead, she lay perfectly still like a wounded animal, something birthed from the forest, something clean, and she listened to the sound of her own heart as it flooded relief through each broken blood vessel. Let me create...let me rebuild...

Her blue eyes opened, and they found Benedict.

Ben's wounds healed, for they weren't that great. But winthin in his tears he remembered the unwarranted damage he'd done to Charlotte. Though crying, and shamed by his actions Ben leaned up and lay next to Chalotte on the ground. She need blood if she were to truely heal. He again cut open his blood stained wrist and raised it to her silent lips. Tears still falling from his face.

"Please. F-forgive me." He clenched and unclenched his fist creating a constant dropping of blood onto herlips. "Drink. I wish to repair the damage I've done."

He waited, he didn't want to force blood on her if she didn't want it. She was strong and he knew it, he waited for a signal on her part before forcing his blood onto her.

She closed her eyes again at the sound of his approach, her lips curling just slightly with a feeble attempt at renewed ferocity. But the tiny resistance drained away as he drew near only to cut open his wrist once more. The scent of his bleeding, ingrained quite firmly in her memory now, turned the air bittersweet again. At first she only turned her head away the tiniest degree, disgusted by the scent, the taste, perhaps even the gesture itself. But she knew that if she wanted to leave this now damned clearing anytime soon before the sun inevitably returned, she would need the strength.

This time, she turned her head towards him, and a few drops of his precious blood dripped over the deep wounds at her neck. The contact resulted in a faint hiss, like a chemical reaction, or perhaps it was a sound that came from her own raw throat as new slivers of pain tore through her ravaged skin. But the result was almost instantaneous. She could move her head again, and she did, this time to allow his blood to touch her stained lips. She parted them only slightly, drinking as little as she could manage and inwardly convulsing at the familiar taste.

She could not help but look at him. She could not keep herself from staring, glancing his way. And she wondered, could he see the distrust in her eyes, now? Could he feel her entire body trembling with the intrinsic desire to escape before he attacked again?

Yet she could not leave, for more reasons than one.

After some time, she raised a trembling hand and pressed her fingers to the wound on his wrist, gently pushing it away. Her eyes did not leave his face once, and she did not taste the fresh blood on her fingers. She only smeared it across the earth.

Benedict could still feel the anger inside him, churning like a wretched sea - himself the little boat trapped in the storm. But he maintained control. He hated himself as he watched the wounds on Charlotte's neck heal themselves with the assistance of his damned blood. Silent tears of blood fell from his blue eyes which had finally returned to their natural color.

Fear. He could smell it falling off of her like a dark cloud of perfume. She was afraid of him now, when only minutes before they were so close to becoming so tainted with each other's blood. Damn you Benedict. You monster. He damned himself inwardly and his silent tears continued to fall down his now healed and blood stained face.

When she pushed away his wrist and wiped the blood on the ground he knew, from the trembling that accompanied the little gesture - that he'd ruined it. Everything that they had had only moments before. Their lust for one another's blood and touch and bite was now gone.

Ben wanted to apologize and to tell her that he hadn't meant for her to get so badly wounded by the experience. He wanted to admit that he should not have followed her in the first place if nothing more than to save her from the happenings that occured.

Slowly the wound on his wrist rehealed. Realizing the scraps that were left of his shirt he decided to take it off and put the torn material on the ground underneath Charlotte's head. "I'm sorry, Charlotte. Though I realize I can't undo what I've done. I am sorry." His voice did not stammer with his tears but was steady and sure. He could not have meant anything more than what he'd just said to her.

He maintained eye contact. His eyes were not full of monstrous hate or longing anymore but of sorrow and shame. He hated himself, but was only slightly proud that he'd momentarily overcome the monster inside him. He didn't reliquish control completely. Not yet anyway.

What was this? She continued to watch him, her jaw clenched shut and her eyes dim with focused wariness. What kind of haunted creature would come so close to the kill only to stop, and then to comfort its prey? He was more of a masochist than she was. Of course she was still uneasy. His proximity was enough to keep her heart moving quickly in its cage. But her wounds were healing quickly, and her lips parted just a fraction as she found herself quite able to breathe again.

She turned her head slightly. For a split second, her eyes flashed with pain, but the look quickly passed. The pain was good. Where there had been numbness before, she could now feel her muscles again, and she could move. Her eyes flicked over his face with vigilant wariness, but there was something else, something greater than the fear. The fear was only a primitive reaction to danger, a hostile and removable thing she did not enjoy--there was something more.

"What are you?" It was barely more than a whisper, harsh and rough and nothing like herself. The question was cold, like an interrogator staring down an innocent, or perhaps more like the cynic observing something new and inexplicable from behind a wall of glass. But she did not care. She wanted only his answer. "Why--"

Her voice gave again, and she spoke no more, waiting impatiently for her body to reassemble all that had been destroyed. She lifted her hand slowly, and her fingers trembled as they brushed past the soft remnants of his shirt and touched the back of her head. It was cold and sticky with blood, and she closed her eyes for a moment as her stomach wrenched with sickness. How close had she come to being destroyed, reduced to a grotesque pile of limbs and gore? She looked at Benedict once more, her eyes opening like pale blossoms to the moonlight, as if she had spoken the question and was waiting for an answer.

Benedict's heart lurched at the question. "What are you? He paused, looking into her face with a pitiful look of his own, "I-" He thought on it a moment after the stammer and came to no conclusion. He wanted to tell her the story of his sire who'd held the demon in his blood then passed it to Ben unknowningly during his siring.

Ben now realized what Art'd told him - I want you to be a better creature of the night than I, myself have been... Art had not wanted Ben to recieve the evil the lurked in his veins. However, it did not go as he'd planned and the demon surfaced years after Art's death. And there was no one, aside from perhaps Helen, who could give even the slightest amount of guidance.

"I am you." He spoke from what was left of his heart as he glanced at Charlotte with a faraway look in his blue eyes. "All the darkness that every vampire fights with - the hunger." He brushed his hand on her face, his long nails gently scraping her flesh but not hurting it. "I am two. Benedict Ambrose and,... something evil you might say." He still saw the wary look in her eyes and the shiver of her body.

"Think of me as theatre masks. I, Benedict, am the frowning face - alone and tormented by something horrible inside me. And the hunger that accompanies me is the smiling face - the face that I see in my dreams and the face that takes hold and hurts without reason. As you saw tonight."

He could feel it suddenly and sharply, the rise of the devil to every vampire - the sun. The dawn had come to their side of the earth and though the sun was not yet visible - he could feel the approaching heat of it anyway. "Trust me." He leaned forward and kissed her forhead as he slid his hands beneath her shoulders and knees and lifted her from the ground strongly and elegantly. Careful not to agitate her healing wounds.

Once she was secure in his arms he met her gaze for the millionth time that evening, "Have you a haven, Charlotte? Dawn approaches swiftly."