"Make her scream."

He spoke softly as a tear escaped the well of his eye and trailed slowly down his face. Josef clasped his Master's hand in both of his and nodded that yes he would indeed make the vampire huntress pay now that his Lord's plan had gone awry and Jayne had proven to be less than receptive to Dracula's seduction strategies.

For a long moment Alexander sat near motionless upon that wall, he watched as Cervenka left Carfax and headed out into the darkness in the direction of Lady Wetherby's home. It was difficult to say goodbye after so many centuries. Hard to say farewell to the man that had once been his right hand, his second, his most trusted friend and ally. But this was a war and in war soldiers; even valued ones, was casualties suffered to attain a final victory. Moments later Alexander donned his great cloak and slipped out into the night far enough behind Josef that he would not be spotted but close enough to arrive at Jayne's at the very precise moment he required to enact his charade.

Jayne awoke to the crash of a body slammed into the wall beside the archway at the entrance to her bedchamber. Alexander stabbed the beast three times and was slammed into the paneled walls leading into her antechamber thrice before the pair of them crashed through the glass doors and the vampire threw Grayson away from him. Although aghast at the sight of two men fighting in her most private quarters the huntress still rose swiftly and made for her sword as the vampire lifted Grayson around the waist and sent him crashing into the round table in her boudoir. The table broke under the strength of the blow and the remnants of her evening's previous entertainment lay scattered upon the floor around the prone and vulnerable figure of her unconscious lover. The vampire turned back to the woman he had come to kill just in time to meet the arc of her blade. She beheaded him neatly and the ancient scattered into a hail of ash and rough gravel like dust that pelted her and covered Alexander where he lay.

Her breath hitched in her chest and she swiftly stashed her blade under the cushion of the settee in the room and then rushed to the side of her fallen paramour. Grayson played the role of her fallen protector to absolute perfection. He forced breath to pass into out of his lungs and remained nonsensical to her touch and ministrations for as long as he possibly dared before she realized his heart did not beat nor was there a pulse in his throat. Only then did his eyelids flutter and he coughed fitfully in her embrace as his hands clutched weakly but desperately upon her arms as he passed from the daze of the blows he had suffered into a state of wakefulness.

"Oh my God! I thought you were dead; your heart…

She moaned as she gently lifted him from the floor and gathered him into her embrace.

"There was a man…"

Alexander gasped and turned away from her nearly in a panic as if danger would reappear at any moment. With a feigned wince he blinked back the remaining fog of his unconsciousness and looked up to her as she soothed him with a gentle hand in his hair followed by the wrap of arms around him.

"He's gone. He's gone, he's gone…"

She muttered as she caressed his cheeks with her soothing fingertips and held him against her chest until his breathing calmed and she became more assured that he was relatively unharmed.

"You scared him away…you saved my life."

Jayne cradled him in her arms, her own body shaking at the enormity of what he had done for her. Tears threatened, brimming in her eyes as she considered words he had spoken to her earlier that night.

"Someday Madame you will realize I was never playing."

"Are you alright? My God I woke to you crashing through the glass…I saw him…"

Her hands trailed over his hair and face as she pushed him back ever so slightly in order to check him for injuries and he just as gently pressed her hands away and shook his head slightly.

"I'm alright, just dazed a bit I think…and…dusty…"

He coughed a bit more and his hand rose to brush at her cheek and came away covered in the gray ash of the destroyed ancient that covered them both and most of the room as well.

"Some kind of soot, a powder…he threw it up and into my face…some sort of trickery to mask his escape."

She shook her head as she quickly made up what sounded like incredible but plausible excuses on the spur of the moment.

"Can you stand?"

She pulled away, but kept an arm about him as she shifted to her knees and lent her support to getting him to his feet. Again Grayson played the part he had scripted for himself well, and he rose slowly, leaning on her only enough for balance but certainly seeming to need the assistance as he wavered slightly on his feet once they were both standing.

"No worse for the wear I'm certain."

He forced a smile and shook his head with thoughts of assuaging her concern but instead he groaned as if the motion made his senses reel.

"Perhaps a bit dazed, not as hard headed as I thought."

"Stubborn as all American's…"

She forced a smile and laughed lightly as he draped an arm over her shoulders and allowed her to escort him with an arm about his waist toward her sumptuous bathing chamber.