So...it's been awhile huh?

But hey guess what, I got a job right after I finished school!

And now they're working me into the ground. I'm really sorry it's taken me such a long time to update but it's hard to find time to write when you're working 60 hour weeks. But I'm going to try to push through despite the ridiculously long hours I'm working. I promise to try. That's the best I can do.

Thanks so much to all of you that wrote reviews and sent me private messages during my long absence! You've motivated me to keep going. I picture this story having three parts and now comes part three.

Disclaimer: I make my own money now! So I'm not trying to make it off of this story.

From the edge of the cliff there was a 400 foot drop. A waterfall gushed over the edge before crashing into the dense mist below. The river that followed had wedged a valley that extended for miles, creating a silver line that disappeared into the dark shadows of the mountains.

It could have been a beautiful scene, if it weren't for the disgusting scent of every dirty creature that scurried the forest. Still, jumping over the edge would be an impressive thrill.

Zero wondered if he would survive the drop.

One step forward, or a small jump. He'd turn his back to the water below and watch the sky disappear. The cold water would stop his heart, and then there would be silence.

"Boss, there's no sign of them here!"

Zero stopped himself from sneering at the man who'd had to shout over the sound of rushing water. The two following humans watched Zero tensely, as if afraid of his next move. Dressed in black, they looked more like FBI agents and were far too clean-cut for any self-respecting vampire hunter by Zero's standards.

"We've been over this place a thousand times. If there was something here we would have found it by now." The other one, who went by Slade, chimed in. He was thinner with a sweep of neatly groomed dark hair. While he may have appeared more refined, he had a few nasty habits and some seriously twisted fetishes. "When we find this bitch I'm going to teach her a lesson."

Case in point.

Zero leveled his gaze on the two of them. He didn't have to raise his voice to be heard. "If you want to go back to picking Level E's off the streets, then be good little rats and run off. I'm not going to stop you." Shit, he'd maybe even smile and wave.

It was a stupid move on the Vampire Hunter Association's part, sending these two to be his guards. And that is what they were. Sent to watch over him as if he were a misbehaving child. Zero may have been the best hunter in the ranks but the Vampire Hunter Society called him unstable.

Zero spit over the edge of the cliff. Carrying these two along was degrading.

"Your informant must have been off by several miles." The first one obtusely repeated an opinion he'd pointed out a hundred times already. What was his name again? Hines? He was a big man with no brains, sporting a mop of blond hair that somehow made him look like a choir boy despite his obvious attempts to act the thug. "Who did you say the informant was again?"

Zero gritted his teeth. "I didn't."

The beefy man looked like he wanted to say something else but took one look at Zero's glare and did the smartest thing he'd done in a week. He shut up.

In a brief glance, Zero took in his "assistants" appearances. Bags sagged under their eyes. Suits that had once been impeccable were now weighted down with mud and sweat. They were tired. Maybe it had something to do with the fact that Zero had only allowed them one night of sleep in the past seven days.

Whatever. It wasn't his problem. Somebody should have told these humans that they wouldn't be able to keep up with a vampire, even an ex-human.

But lunkhead had a point. They hadn't been getting anywhere close. They had been given the run around for a full month now, following one false lead after another, until they ended up back here. This new information had seemed like a light at the end of the tunnel. And still, after spending a week covering a ten square mile radius around this exact spot, they had nothing.

Betrayal had a bitter taste, even if it was deserved.

With a nod, Zero signaled it was time to move on. The two vampire hunters dragged their feet in the dirt ahead of him, not waiting for Zero to take the lead. These two were newly assigned, after the last two agents had taken out a young vampire at some dumpy gas station forty miles east. The hunter society didn't look highly upon the slaying of so-called innocent vampires.

Last time, it had been a low class vampire who's death had so far gone unnoticed. This time, their orders were clear. Any more unwarranted deaths and they'd all be relieved of duty.

Hence the unwanted henchmen. Apparently, and rightly so, the hunter society thought Zero untrustworthy.

A chill wind blew. Grey clouds roamed over the skies. There was a shift in the breeze.

Zero paused to let the others move ahead. Something was off.

At a sharp pang of thirst, he grabbed a small tin out of his pocket and threw back two or twenty tablets. He chewed them methodically, his mouth near burning from their acidic taste.

He sniffed the air again.

"Stop." He gave the command, and allowed himself a moment to distinguish the inhuman scent brought on by the shifting winds. The hunters stilled simultaneously and turned to await orders.

Zero put the tin back in his ankle-length duster then took a deep breath before releasing a luxurious sigh. Humans slept deepest in the hours just before dawn. Now, Zero didn't know for sure since he'd never been one to get much sleep, but he was guessing that Vampires would be deep in their day sleep at dusk.

"Looks like you boys are moving up in the world." Zero felt the corner of his lips lift in a twisted grin. "Nobles are on the menu tonight."

The pounding of her own heart woke her up. Or at least, that's what Ruka thought at first. Even while she blinked groggily and tried to get her bearings, she felt the relentless beating against her ribs.

Something heavy had fallen on her chest, suffocating her as she tried to suck in sharp breaths. Icy seeds of panic sunk into her skin. In a rush of fear, she shoved the heavy weight off of her. The sound of a masculine grunt of pain caused a scream to lodge itself in her throat.

"What the hell." The sleepy male voice came from the edge of the bed.

In a flood of erotic images, realization hit her. She was in her room in the hide out. In bed.

With Akatsuki.

He hadn't been suffocating her. He had been holding her in her sleep, and she was a messed up psychopath who woke up shoving him off of her in a fit of panic.

"Oh!" She exclaimed, seeing that she had knocked him completely off the mattress. "I'm sorry. I didn't realize it was you."

Still on the floor, Akatsuki's brown eyes met hers wearily over the edge of the bed. "You thought I was someone else?"

"N-no. I mean yes. I mean..." Ruka shook off the annoying fear that must have been caused by a nightmare she couldn't remember. "I had forgotten about last night."

Mindless of his nakedness, Kain brought himself to his feet, showing off lean muscle from head to toe. He turned his head to run a hand through his hair, making it stand in a bed-ridden mess. "That's not much better."

Ruka tried to keep her eyes above the level of his shoulders and think about what he meant. She really did.

But God.

There wasn't a single inch of fat on his body. Standing before her, he could have been posing for a sculpture. The lines defining each muscle were perfect to be etched in stone. Her skin flushed as her eyes wandered lower. Ruka had heard that males often awoke in a not-so-relaxed state. Kain also wasn't...relaxed.

Licking dry lips she murmured, "Maybe you should remind me."

With heat in his gaze, he took a step towards her. Then stilled.

She heard it too. A scratching sound, not quite animal, coming from outside the sliding glass door.

"Get dressed. Now." Kain whispered the order, throwing a shirt at her from the floor. He grabbed the closest thing next to it, the jeans he had on the night before, and shoved his legs into them.

They had been discovered. In half a second they had both realized it. Her heart began its heavy pounding again, her every muscle tensing into knots. Ruka forced her shaking hands to move, and yanked the white T-Shirt over her head. Her lungs tightened and she had to force in each breath, but there was no time to panic, only action. So she moved.

She had just scrambled off the bed when the floor shook. One second she had been moving to the closet, in the next an arm had grabbed her around the waist with bruising force.

There was glass everywhere, sparkling over the messed sheets on the bed. Jagged edges had ripped into the carpet. Shock made her brain slow like thick sludge, and in a haze she realized the sliding glass doors had been shattered.

Kain had her against his chest, the heat from his body clashing against the freezing wind sweeping into the room. He was carrying her to the door leading to the hallway, probably moving faster than the human eye could see. Two dark figures emerged from outside, the dusk light framing their shadow sillhouettes. Black objects were in their hands.

Guns.

But they wouldn't be just any guns. Those would be weapons meticulously designed to slay vampires.

Kain moved at mind blowing speed, carrying her with one arm around her waist as if she weighed no more than a few pounds. Their surroundings became a blur, the momentum causing the air to fly over her skin in a vacuum. Through the hall, past the living room sofa, the sheer speed at which they were moving seemed to cause the whole house to shake.

They were at the exit to the underground tunnel. At the corner of the room, one of the vampire hunters lifted his weapon and aimed.

God, they weren't going to make it.

To Ruka's panicked mind, the order of events were unclear. The jerk in Kain's body seemed to come before the booming sound of the shot. Then there was a blood-curdling scream that must have come from her raw throat. Suddenly they were in the pitch black tunnel.

While maintaining a break-neck speed, Kain switched her to the other arm. Ruka saw the light at the end of the tunnel. It seemed to be coming at them. Closer and closer. They were almost there.

In a woosh, Kain propelled them out of the cave. Outside, a blizzard had hit the peak of it's storm. The forest was covered in a wall of pure white. Thick flakes made her hair cold and damp as harsh freezing winds stung her cheeks.

Something warm and wet was soaking the front of her shirt. The sweet scent of blood permeated the air. She should have had a feeling of elation at the thought of escape, but all Ruka could feel was sharp cutting fear at the way Kain's blood dripped into the snow. Frantically, her hands searched over his chest for the source. Her fingers ran over slippery skin, finding the hole in his shoulder. God there was so much blood!

She hardly noticed that Kain had come to a dead stop. "Akatsuki put me down! We have to stop the bleeding!" Her voice shook with panic.

"He'll live." Another deep voice came over the howling winds. "Lucky for him he's not the one we're here for. Unfortunately, Ruka Souen, I can't say the same for you."

The strength seemed to leave Kain's body and his arm loosened. Her bare feet sank into the bed of wet snow. Ruka's muscles tightened in horror as her nose picked up a scent she recognized. A choked cry escaped her lips.

The hunter society had sent Zero. She was already dead.

Everything from the harsh snow to the leafless trees had turned to deep shades of red, and Kain knew that meant that his eyes were even darker. The blood oozing out of his shoulder to the snow on the ground appeared black through his hazy vision. His body was being drained while his instincts were screaming to kill any threat to the woman in his arms.

The tall white haired figure seemed to blur and move side to side. As his eyes struggled to focus on the vampire in front of him, Kain knew something was off. Even with the loss of blood he shouldn't have been this disoriented.

He heard the sounds of boots pounding on stone before the two humans appeared from the cave opening. With his adrenaline raging and his eyesight gone feral, Kain reacted with a surge of power, attacking the man who had his weapon aimed at Ruka.

Kain hardly felt his own feet move before he had a human wrist in his hand. Bones crunched under the the strength of his fist and the gun fell into soft snow.

The human let out a falsetto scream. Out of the corner of his eye, Kain saw the other one launch himself at Ruka. She was quick, ducking from the brunt of the blow by turning on nimble feet. But the man managed to grab a handful of her hair and she let out a cry of pain as he yanked her head back.

A roar came from Kain's chest as he launched himself towards her only to have a fist deliver a powerful blow to his stomach.

His diaphram spasmed, his stomach clenching as his knees threatened to give. The trees around him began to spin, the ground seemed to tilt back and forth underneath his feet. An attack of nausea made bile rise in his throat.

He saw the dark haired human take Ruka down. She hit the snow face forward. The human's knee jammed into the small of her back as she struggled. Kain only caught their movements in slow motion while seering hot rage ran through his veins.

Jesus, No!

The sound of his own heart, thudding in deep slow beats, roared in his ears. His vision went black at the edges. Deep rooted vampire instincts kept him upright and fighting, refusing to let his body shut itself down.

With the clumsiness of a tranquilized beast, Kain grabbed a fistful of Zero's jacket throwing him to the side so he could reach Ruka. His limbs felt like they were moving through sludge as he pushed himself forward. The bastard managed to wrench Ruka's arm behind her back and aimed his gun at the back of her head.

Kain's heart stopped, his mind screaming in terror. "No!" His desperate denial came out in a roar.

He only made it two steps before the gunshot rang out.

Kain saw nothing. Heard nothing. Only felt the tearing despair that ripped through his chest.

Not even the sudden burning in his thigh broke through the deep inner pain. His body didn't seem to be his own as he collapsed, his legs buckling underneath his own heavy weight. His knee caps hit the ground with a crack.

Still standing, Zero's boots crunched in the snow as he approached Kain's profile. "You nobles make me sick."

At the sound of a female scream, Kain's eyes shot open in search of Ruka, only to have sharp pain shoot through his head as Zero pistol whipped him with the butt of the Bloody Rose. As throbbing pounded behind his eyes, Kain saw Ruka's figure still moving has she fought for her life.

The gun shot had been for him, not her.

Thank God. She was still alive.

But his hope was short lived as Zero took control of the scene. "Hines stop laying there like a pussy and grab your weapon."

Hines, who had apparently been the one who's Kain's wrist had just broken, was laying on his side and cradling his arm.

"He fucking crushed my bone!" The big man moaned, as he attempted to bring himself to his knees.

"I'm not going to tell you twice, you stupid oaf." Zero's teeth audibly ground together. "Grab your weapon, point it at his head, and don't move unless I order you to. Got it?"

Hines weakly brought himself to his feet, grabbing the weapon out of the snow. Then aimed it shakily at Kain, his eyes bloodshot and watering.

Kain hardly registered their interactions, he had his eyes on Ruka, who had managed to launch the other hunter off of her. The hunter grabbed her shirt dragging her with him, he barely managed to get on top of her as she went for his eyes, scratching marks into his face.

Kain tensed to spring to his feet, but his muscles refused. With icy cold fear, he realized the dizziness of his mind had exponentially worsened. His gut clenched as he struggled to fight it.

"Slade! This isn't a fucking gang rape! " Zero barked orders. "Get off of her and bring her over here."

As soon as the man brought Ruka to her feet, she stopped struggling, her eyes falling to Kain in horror. "Oh Akatsuki." She all but sobbed, her gaze taking in his blood soaked leg.

Wearing nothing but a large shirt that came to her mid-thigh, her body was shivering in the bitter cold, but she didn't seem to notice. Her pupils were dialated, her bare feet dragged in the snow as the hunter who had her arms behind her back brought her close enough to see Kain kneeling on the ground with a gun pointed at the back of his head, the hunter behind him ready to complete an execution.

Something was wrong with them. Ruka was struggling to support herself and the asshole who had taken her down was now the only thing stopping her from collapsing. Her slender legs wobbled underneath her.

Now that she was nearer Kain could see the syringe sticking out of her upper arm.

"You drugged us." Kain's tongue stumbled over the words. No wonder she hadn't been able to fight off the man who had her.

Ruka flinched as Zero yanked the needle out of her arm. "Just now figured that out did you?" He threw the needle into the snow, as if he wanted no part of it. "You'd be amazed at how difficult it is to create a drug strong enough to effect vampires. Took the guys in the lab three years to perfect it."

Kain didn't speak. He wasn't even sure if his lips would function. He kept his eyes glued to the man with his filthy hands on Ruka. She was half naked and freezing, her long legs exposed. Kain was on the ground, in only a pair of jeans and coated in his own blood. What they had been doing inside was obvious. Then they had been so quickly flushed out and subdued. If Zero's goal had been humiliation then he had succeeded.

"Feels like hell, doesn't it?" With a disturbingly blank expression, Zero leaned over to look at Kain's shoulder, as if inspecting the results of their surprise weapon. "I should know. They tested the shit out on me first. Hard to find vampires to experiment on, unless your willing to experiment on ex-humans until they go level-E. I'm not."

Letting his eyes trail away from Ruka, Kain narrowed in on the lethal vampire hunter's face. It swayed back and forth, going double and single and back again.

Still casually perusing Kain'swounds, Zero jerked his head towards the man barely maintaining his hold on his weapon. "Hines over here is using a prototype. Silver bullets coated in chemicals. Seems it took two shots to take a big guy like you down." His brows drew together. "Actually, you shouldn't even be conscious right now."

Apparently finished assessing Kain's condition, Zero straightened. "It has some nasty side effects by the way. Makes tablets almost completely ineffective." As if to punctuate his words, he took a tin out of his pocket, pouring out a handful before throwing them into his mouth and crunching them between his teeth like candy.

"You planned this." As Ruka swayed forward, the man holding her wrenched her arms behind her back and jerked her upright. Her voice was raw and scratchy from screaming. "Drugging me that night, getting us out of Kaname's protection. You were behind all of it."

As if insulted, Zero had the grace to grimace at her accusation. "Actually, the human who drugged you that night had been a problem for a long time. Perverts like that deserve what's coming to them." He twirled the bloody rose in his hand then pointed it towards the ground in front of him as if checking the scope. "If you hadn't finished him off, I would have. Gladly."

The bastard seemed to be enjoying his time on the soap box, but Kain had stopped listening. His unfocused gaze had jerked back to Ruka, or more specifically, the man who had her slender wrists grasped in a tight grip.

The human wrenched her arms higher against her back. Then took a good look over her shoulder at the way the shirt had pulled against her chest, outlining her breasts and making her nipples press dusky indents into the fabric. Kain's shoulders went taught, his every muscle tensing despite the way it caused more blood to ooze from his wounds. His fingers dug into his palms as his hands clenched into fists.

Ruka's head had slightly fallen forward from fatigue, but she was alert enough to grasp her vulnerability. Kain's heart sped as she lifted her gaze to his. Her lips were a thin line, her expression somber. Behind her fear there was a shattering resolve, as if she was resolved to her fate, expecting this to end in her violation.

"Want me to finish off where your vampire lover began, baby?" The man sneered in her ear.

A low growl emerged from Kain's throat. He couldn't control the sound, not while hot rage boiled through his veins. That human was going to die. Kain would kill him. He would rip his fucking head off.

"Jesus, Slade, have you even been listening to a word I've been saying?" Zero asked in disgust.

The human straightened, cleared his throat. "Yes, boss." After a wide eyed look at Kain, he took a small step back from Ruka, still holding her arms but putting some distance between their bodies. It was the only reason he still lived.

I won't let him touch you, Ruka. Kain tried to make promises with a look in his eyes. God I don't know how, but I'll get you out of this.

There was a reason they weren't dead yet. Kain didn't care what it was. He'd give anything to keep Ruka breathing and untouched. He forced himself to stay conscious by focusing on the burning pain in his leg and shoulder. "She's not the one you want. It was me. I was the one who killed the human that night."

"Akatsuki what are you doing?" Ruka whispered in shock.

"Very noble of you." Zero said, almost reverently, as if it was something he could respect. "But you don't honestly think that's going to work do you?"

The world spun upside down, but Kain managed to stay upright. He wouldn't give these assholes the satisfaction of seeing him go down under their fucking bio-weapons. "Look at her." He managed a gesture towards Ruka by jerking his head, ignoring the way the movement caused another wave of dizziness to make his head pound. "She couldn't hurt a fly."

"So, you kill a human against the pureplood's moral code and Kuran decides to kick her out of his faction? Does that pretty much sum it up?" Zero let out a caustic laugh, the sharp sound causing both humans to jerk as if expecting him to lose it. "I don't think so."

Despite their situation, Ruka stood taller, becoming more confident now that she wasn't being groped and admired by the asshole who'd grabbed her. "You'll have to do better than that. I've been following Kaname-sama since childhood. He would never do something like that. Not to me."

Zero gave her a disbelieving look, then spoke under his breath. "Pathetic. She has no idea. Have they been keeping you in the dark all this time?" Still skeptical, he glanced at Kain. "If his advisor doesn't even have this much information, he'll be of little use to us."

Swallowing a lump of regret, Kain tried not to slur his speech. "I knew of it. She didn't."

"You've both lost your minds." Ruka said, stubbornly holding on to the belief that this was all a farce. "Kaname didn't kick me out of his faction. We've been...close our entire lives. You just don't want to admit that by killing either of us you'll be at fault for instigating a war."

Zero ignored her, scratching his chin as if reassessing his strategy. Kain couldn't bring himself to speak.

Ruka looked from Kain to Zero and back again. "It's an obvious lie."

Snow fell to the ground silently. The whistle of the wind was her only response.

"It isn't true." She tried again, her voice growing softer. Her eyes settled on Kain, searching for truth. "Is it?"

Kain's throat constricted, the tightness in his chest made it difficult to breath. Knowing that he had failed her, no betrayed her, by letting her find out like this, he didn't allow himself to shift his gaze. He just let his honesty reveal itself in his unchanged expression and made himself watch as the painful truth made Ruka's features twist in despair.

A silent tear slipped down her cheek. Her shoulders deflated. The hurt of betrayal in those rose colored eyes was something that he would never forget. The image would etch itself into his mind, haunt him for the rest of his short life.

I'm sorry, Ruka.

"Why the hell are we stalling?" The one with his gun shakily aimed at Kain shifted on his feet, barely managing to keep his voice below a squeak as he spoke through the pain of his shattered bone. "We know she's the one who did it. Let's take her in."

Kain tore his eyes from Ruka as his drugged mind began to wrap around those words. If it hadn't been for the drugs he would have realized it sooner. They weren't here to simply murder. Their goal was to capture and interrogate first, then execute.

He grasped at his last chance to save her, forcing his sluggish tongue to form words. "She can't give you anything. Kaname kept her under his roof but never trusted her more than a servant."

"Your grasping at threads, vampire." Zero dismissed him.

"I've been advising him for years. You've seen it yourself. In all of our meetings, who stands at his side? Who speaks in his ear?" As he watched Zero's back stiffen, Kain became more sure of himself. Kaname had kept a tight lid on any information they had obtained about the vampire hunter's agenda, and Kain was one of the few who had access to it. "The hunter association will never believe that it took two vampires to kill one weak human. They'll know this is about your personal vendetta, not justice. Kill us both, and you can kiss your promotion to president goodbye."

Zero turned and stared at Kain with something akin to shock in his expression.

That's right. Kain thought, letting the meaning behind his words sink in. I'm the one you want. Keep Ruka out of it.

Seeming to hold onto his sanity by a thread, Zero's left eye twitched. Then he exploded. "Goddamn it!"

The two lackeys jerked again. Hines shifted on his feet, appearing as if he thought he had his weapon aimed at the wrong person.

Now pacing, his boots crunching in the snow, Zero ranted. "That pureblood bastard set us up. Kicking her out of his faction – the one that doesn't know a goddamn thing. Now everyone and their mother thinks she did it. Meanwhile, we have his advisor. His fucking personal advisor. And I can't even shoot him!"

The soon to be dead man holding Ruka's arm watched Zero wearily. "Boss, our orders were clear."

"She's got to have something." Zero ignored his henchman, his white hair blowing wildly in the wind. "She's a Souen for Christ's sake."

"Not anymore." Kain's throat felt raw as he spoke. Closing his eyes against a surge of emotion, he made himself finish. "They disowned her."

As an awful sobbing sound came from Ruka, Zero stopped in his tracks. "Shit. He's right." Stunned, he stood still, staring at her as the wind whipped his coat around his legs. "She's completely useless."

With her head bent forward, her chestnut hair blowing over her face, Kain couldn't see her eyes – wasn't sure if he wanted to – but his heart ached with the need to go to her. At that moment, he would have given anything to be able to hold her, to tell her that he would make everything alright, that she didn't need Kaname or her parents, that he could take care of her for the rest of their lives.

But it would have been a lie, because his life expectancy had just been reduced from an eternity to mere days. And that's if he was lucky.

"Kaname lost my loyalty when he abandoned her." Kain's resolve deepened. "I've been close to him, standing next to his side since we enrolled at the Academy. Whoever's been informing you so far knows nothing compared to me. I can give you names, places, secret doors."

Despite the shock of having her entire life turned upside down in an instant, Ruka managed to lift her head. Her voice was hoarse. "Don't do this, Akatsuki."

Keeping his eyes trained on the back of Zero's head, Kain ignored the daggers that came from the look in her eyes. "I'll take the stand and say that I did it. That I killed the human while enraged by what he did to Ruka." It was what he wished had been true. "Whether or not I did it doesn't matter. I'll make them believe it was me. You'll get your information and you'll get your murderer."

With a turn, Zero leveled a cold violet stare at Kain. "You will confess and you will confess and you will confess again." Zero said, his voice going lower with each word. "Until the day you die."

Their eyes met in understanding. Kain gave a nod of assent.

Without looking, Zero tossed something in Ruka's direction. "Give her enough to knock her out."

Slade caught it from the air, and Kain's gut clenched as he realized they intended to give her more of that god-fosaken drug.

Ruka let out a sharp cry as she caught sight of the syringe and her weak struggles began anew. Pure fire shot through Kain's every pore, as the man jerked her by the arm, grabbing her violently enough to bruise. Slade tore the cap off the syringe with his teeth, digging his fingers into her soft pale skin. Kain felt his lips lift from his teeth in a snarl. His vision went red, his wounds forgotten. A soft whimpering sound came from between Ruka's lips as the needle jammed into her arm.

Kain snapped.

His muscles screamed in protest as he sprung forward, the throbbing in his head causing his ears to roar. The hunter looked up, face twisting in horror.

Flames were already flickering over Kain's skin as he took hold of the beady eyed man by the throat. Calling forth every raging fiber of his body, Kain pushed the building heat out his palm. The inferno had been storing itself in his body since the ordeal began, and it came out with enough force to explode.

The scent of burning flesh mixed with the sound of blood curdling screams in a satisfying symphony of torture until the scorched body went limp in his hand. It fell to the ground with a thud, and became nothing more than black lump of flesh in wet snow.

"Holy Christ!" Hines lost it. Fear making the pitch of his voice rise even higher. "Did you fucking see that? He just burned him alive!"

There were sounds of a scuffle as Zero brought his lackey under control, but Kain hardly noticed. Staring at the body in horror, Ruka took a step back, her whole body trembling. A sliver of blood, contrasting sharply with her white skin, dripped down the side of her arm. In shock, her eyes drooped. She swayed backwards.

Kain caught her before she collapsed, gathering her freezing body in his arms. She was so cold! His heart wrenched as she sagged against him, one cold cheek resting on his heated skin. He ran his hands over her arms and shoulders, trying to keep her blood flowing. Her skin felt like ice under his palms.

"Why?" The word came from her lips in a whisper, and Kain was shocked to discover she was still conscious. Teeth chattering, her breath blew icy chills over his skin. "You don't have to do this. I didn't ask for a hero."

How could she even ask him this? Wasn't it obvious? When it came to her life and his, there was no choice, no second thoughts. His entire life, she was all that had ever mattered. Whether or not she'd asked for it had no bearing. His undying love simply was.

"There's no other option, sweetheart." Pressing his fingers into her scalp, her hair wet and heavy with snow, he held her tightly against him, crushed that he couldn't give her more than the heat from his body. "Stay here for a few nights, wait for Seiren. If she doesn't come then go to my parents house, tell my mother I sent you. Try to get in contact with Hanabusa. He'll help you get on your feet."

"They'll kill you."

Yes. They would. There were no words of consolation. No matter how much he had withheld from her in the past month, he couldn't tell her a lie.

"Don't ever think that this is your fault." He said instead. "Promise me you'll remember that I chose this. I chose to die for you."

Her head pulled back so she could look up at him, her eyes now barely open. "I don't want you to die for me Akatsuki. I want you to live for me."

God.

She'd finally asked for something that he wasn't sure he could give. A burning sensation pressed at his eyes, a well of emotion causing wetness to form under his lids.

Her body went slack. The beating of her heart slowed to a weak but steady rhythm as she went under the effects of the drug. Kain lifted her in his arms. Her weight was next to nothing, but his body felt like a thousand tons.

With legs of lead, he trudged towards the cave opening only stopping once to give the hunters a murderous glare. Zero stood unaffected, but Hines cowered and took two steps back, eyes fixed on Kain as if he was some kind of fire-breathing monster.

Scaring the human probably wasn't the smartest move, but Kain wasn't feeling particularly amenable toward vampire hunters at the moment - especially the human variety.

He made it a few steps into the cave. The walls blocked the wind but the temperature was still below freezing. Her lips were blue, her full lashes dark against pale cheeks.

God, he couldn't leave her like this. He'd fight them here before letting her freeze to death.

There was a gentle nudge at his shoulder. Kain saw the dark jacket extended from an arm attached to Zero. The white-haired hunter was standing quietly, his eyes averted as if not wanting to acknowledge his own actions.

Fine. Let the hunter freeze in his shirt.

Kain took the jacket, set Ruka down and draped her in the heavy cloth. Her last words echoed in his mind.

I want you to live for me.

Death would be the surest way to protect her, but Goddamn it, it was what she wanted. And he was going to try his hardest to give it to her.

hmmmm, my interpretation of Zero may be a little off, but if you thought he was way ooc, don't worry. I won't be adding him into the story too much except to explain some motivations.

As with every other fanfiction author, I love reviews. So feel free to drop me a line. If you can't think of anything good to say, don't let that stop you. Tell me what you really think!