I was standing at a bar, watching a man that seemed to emanate evil. The quality of this dream meant it must be a vision, but it didn't have that sense of inevitability about it. It was more like a replay than streaming video. I was watching the man waver, excitement and fear evident on his face. I could clearly make out only one unvoiced word: 'martyrdom'. One word, then the sound cut out. I lunged forward as he pulled a stake out of this suit jacket, catching him before he could hurt anyone. We struggled as a frenzy of motion buzzed around us. We (she) struggled, but he cheated by switching hands, shoving the stake into my medium's side. I covered the wound with my hand as I was dragged to the ground. A tall man, muscular, with strong Nordic features, leaned over me, saying something I couldn't hear. My (her) eyes closed, and suddenly, I was in a car, the same man smoothing out my clothes, talking to me. Again, I couldn't hear him. The video/vision skipped, and now I was being carried up a regal flight of stairs and arranged on a bed. The vision was cutting in and out, more like a slide show than a video. Luckily, I didn't feel any of it as pain; I only felt a sick sense of determination. I didn't feel any pain, that is, until the stake was yanked out of my side.

I shot upright, gasping for air. "Mac?" Moose asked as he sat by the bed holding my hand. I tore my hand free and lifted the side of my now rumpled sweater. The skin where the stake had been was was neither pierced nor torn. I ran my fingers over the spot, just to make sure that the wound was a figment of my imagination. My skin was really smooth, unmarred. "Are you OK?"

I laid back down in the bed and dabbed the sweat from my forehead. "Yea, just a bad dream," I lied. Or vision. Can you still call it a vision, even if it is of the past? Or is there another name for that? Moose assumed my dream had been Simon related, and I wasn't going to tell him otherwise. He nodded before rubbing my arm again, grim look on his face. Instead of looking back at Moose, I looked at the clock; it was noon. With a groan, I rolled toward Moose and out of bed, making my way to the bathroom and closing the door before I splashed cold water on my face. I needed Sydney, I needed to know what was going on. My gift, as David called it, was growing too much. too fast. I needed everything to slow down. What's more, I couldn't understand why I was getting someone's past. Surely there was nothing I could do for them now, right? So why was I seeing it? Such a gruesome past, too.

Moose was right outside the door. "Sure you're OK?" he said through the door.

I opened the door after toweling off my face. "I'm fine, really," I said into my towel. "Sorry you had to see that last night." He looked down to his feet, unable to look me in the eye. "Syd home yet?" I asked; I needed to talk to her. I needed her to help me make sense of it.

"No, she was going to try to be home early, though," he replied. Moose was hovering just a little too close, like my condition might revert, and I'd collapse from the pressure. He was weighing every emotion that flickered across my face.

I glared at him momentarily. "Alright, well, I need to teach today. I assume you're coming?"

He watched my face for just a split second too long before answering. "Yea, I'm coming. Sure you're OK to teach?"

This was getting annoying. I was not frail, breakable, little Sloane McIntosh. I could handle myself. "Fine, Moose. I'm fine." He must have heard the aggravation in my voice, because he let up with the questions and simply followed me out of my room.

My computer, which was in my backpack, was still in my car from yesterday. I slid on a pair of Sydney's sneakers that she had left by the door, grabbed my coat and my purse, and headed out the door. Moose, who had changed his clothes at some point when I was asleep, hurried behind me. "Forgot your cell phone," he said, iPhone in hand. I snatched the machine from him and shoved into my back pocket again.

We were waiting at a red light when another vision came. It was more like a continuation of the dream I had just hours before, only clearer. I knew what my medium was thinking as she woke up in a large canopied bed next to the same blond vampire who had helped her before. I could feel his cold hand on her stomach, right next to the burning heat of a healing wound. In her thoughts, she called him 'Eric'.

"Mac, you there? It's green," Moose said as he poked me in the shoulder. My mind struggled to swing back into reality. Indeed, the light in front of me was green, and the cars behind me we honking angrily.

"Yea, sorry. I zoned out there for a second," I replied absentmindedly. I pressed on the gas, making sure to take it slow. I managed to make it all the way to campus without having another episode. Of course, Moose eyed me suspiciously the entire time. I parked my car as close to the building as possible and hurried in. Last night I had just about as much of the cold weather as I could take, and it wasn't even Thanksgiving yet.

I made my way through the rest of the day in a haze. I taught my class as required and answered direct questions, but I just existed at all other times. I was using all available brain power to figure out what was happening to me.

Moose grabbed the keys from me and drove me home while I continued to brood. I was relieved to see that Sydney was home, her car in the drive. "Hey, thanks for driving," I said as I attempted to let myself out of my car. "Are you going home?"

"Not until I know you are OK. And you are doing a poor job of convincing me of that." His brow was furrowed in worry as he watched me struggle to unbuckle my seat belt.

I was far from OK. "Fine, but can you give Sydney and me some privacy for a while, please? I need to talk to her... girl stuff."

His eyes widened and he grabbed each of my shoulders, pulling me into his hot chest. "Oh, Mac. Last night, did they…touch you? Is that what you need to talk to her for?"

I was having a hard time understanding what he was talking about, but I automatically returned his hug. I'd told him the whole story, and he knew that they touched me. It's hard to torture someone without touching them. Finally, understanding came. He didn't mean 'touch' in the literal sense. "Oh, no, nothing like that." I shivered slightly as I remembered what they had done. "I just need her advice on something."

He studied my face until he deemed me telling the truth. "OK, I'll just wait out here. Come get me as soon as you are done."

"Thanks. Oh, and if David shows up, run interference for me?" It was getting close to sunset, and I had no idea what his plans for tonight were. If he had felt any of what I went through this morning, he would be here as soon as he woke. I didn't want him eavesdropping on this particular conversation.

"Sure, I'll try." He closed my car door and leaned against the hood.

I wasn't even in the door before Sydney pulled me into a hug. It was a day for hugs. "Oh, Sloane! Moose told me what happened, I'm so sorry! Are you OK?" She held me at arm's length, looking me over for any obvious marks.

"I'm fine, but I need some advice. Do you have your cards?" She just nodded and led me up into her room. As modern and utilitarian as my room was, hers was whimsical and child-like. I sat down on the green and pink flowered bedspread and hugged a flower-shaped pillow for support. "Secret-secret, right? Don't tell anyone, not even David until I say it's OK." She nodded her head again, this time more enthusiastically, and mimicked my pose. "My quirk is changing. Fast."

"How so?" She had stopped trying to convince me it was a gift long ago. She passed me the deck to shuffle, worry in her eyes.

"I summoned visions. Not only visions, but specific visions. I needed to know where you'd hidden your key, and I just kind of sent out a general query. And it came, fairly quickly. And, I think I'm seeing someone's past. Someone I don't know. The same woman a couple of times now."

"How do you know it's the past?"

I fidgeted with the cards. "They just feel like memories. Like replays."

"OK, one thing at a time. First, center your mind on being able to summon visions." I focused on the one problem and shuffled the cards before I handed them back to her. I picked at a cuticle as she analyzed the display. "You are getting stronger, but it's natural. It's most likely going to continue, too." I sighed. That was the last thing I wanted. Couldn't it get weaker? Or disappear all together?

She picked all the cards back up and handed me the full deck again. "Next problem." I shuffled again, just as edgy as before. I didn't think I could handle anything more coming at me; I might actually have a meltdown from all the anxiety, a real one. I handed the deck back and she laid her pattern on the bed. She shook her head in dismay. "I'm not getting much that makes sense this time, sorry."

That was almost worse than knowing the shit was about to hit the fan. "That makes two of us," I mumbled.

"There's an odd reference to understanding? And necessity?" She was deep in concentration.

I took a deep breath. "Thanks for trying." I was about to leave her be in her room as she gathered up the cards again and set them aside, but before I could even make it off the bed she was pulling me into a hug. I leaned in to her warmth; it felt like home.

"I can't decide if I should feel grateful for him making you so happy, or hate him for dragging you into all this," Sydney said of David as she rearranged the pillows that were holding both of us up.

"You said yourself he's not behind the changes," I said, being willfully obtuse. "You said it's natural."

"That's not what I was talking about and you know it," she chided. I did know it. My shoulder rubbed against her arm as I shrugged. I didn't blame David, I blame fate.

We had been sitting there, wrapped in a hug for several minutes before David practically broke down the door. Sydney jumped, but I could feel him coming. "Do you ever knock?" Sydney hissed. So Sydney wasn't as friendly toward him as she once was.

David's eyes never left mine. They were searching mine for signs of trouble. "Generally not."

Sydney whispered in my ear, "Can I un-invite him from my room? Would that work?"

I shrugged again, smile on my face. "What am I? Psychic?" I could feel her body shake as she laughed to herself. I had to giggle, too. "Try it out." Moose appeared behind David, apologetic look on his face.

Sydney couldn't help herself. "David, I un-invite from my room."

David looked shocked for a split second before looking incredibly angry. He was walking backwards out the door. He stopped just outside the bedroom door, glaring at Sydney, fangs out. "Alright, you two,"
I said as I freed myself from Sydney's arms. "Be nice." I kissed Sydney on her cheek and stood. "Thanks, hun." I turned to David, who was looking positively blank. He had retracted his fangs, but that was as friendly as he was going to get at this point. I walked over and slid my arms around his waist. He wrapped his arms around me in turn, touching my hair. "Hi."

He looked down at me, just the beginning of a smile touching his lips. "Hello," he replied. He turned toward Moose, who was standing next to us at this point, and said, "Thank you, shifter. You may go."

Moose looked at me, questions in his eyes. "Mac?"

I nodded, confirming David's edict. "I'm fine. Go home." He deserved some time of his own.

He nodded and turned to go. "You have my number," he called over his back.

David shot one more glare at Sydney, who was grinning from ear to ear, then led me into my own room, bumping the door closed. He set me down on the end of the bed and knelt before me. My eyebrows furrowed as he wrapped both of my hands in one of his and cupped my face with the other. I could see worry creasing his face. Only I could give someone whose face hasn't changed in over a century permanent worry lines. He was just watching me, studying my face. "I felt your pain this morning," he explained. "What caused such heartbreaking pain?"

I dropped my gaze to our intertwined hands. "Nothing," I mumbled. I was a horrible liar, and the bond was making it even more difficult.

He lifted my chin, forcing me to look him in the eye. "How did I lose your trust?" he asked, pain filling his eyes.

Did I ever really trust him? Sure, when I'm beaten and bloody, I'm pretty certain I could count on him to come get me. But at what point does my 'gift' get too tempting? At what point do I stop being his girlfriend and become his asset? Merely an acquisition? "I trust you," I finally answered. Vague enough. It was a moot point anyway. I wasn't hiding something because I didn't trust him; I just didn't want to hurt him.

Pain morphed to anger; his grip on my hands tightened ever so slightly. "Then why will you not tell me?" he asked. My heart started juddering in my chest, my body remembering the last time his eyes flashed in fury. I winced as he raised his other hand to my face and held my cheeks, tracing my cheekbones with his thumbs. His eyes softened when he saw my reaction. He opened his mouth as if to say something, but then his lips pressed together as it died in his throat. I had to close my eyes; I couldn't stand seeing his pain. This was exactly why I couldn't tell him. His pain would kill me, too. His hands fell from my face. "So you do not trust me."

My eyes popped open. "Of course I do!" I cried as I wrapped my arms around his neck, the rest of my body tumbling in a heap against him. He didn't return my embrace; he just let me hang there. "I trusted you with my life last night," I whispered into his ear. He didn't answer. I couldn't even be sure he heard me. There was absolutely no reaction what-so-ever from him. I slowly relaxed my grip and slid down his torso until my knees hit the floor next to his. I rocked back onto my heels, my heart in my throat. I needed him to do something: cry, scream, maybe throw something. Instead, he just stood and moved to my desk chair, his eyes fixed on me as he sat. He had erased every speck of emotion from his face. I slumped against the side of the bed. My voice dropped to a whisper, but I knew he could hear me. "I'm sorry, don't be mad at me. I just don't want to hurt you. I can't stand to look into your eyes when I've hurt you."

"Nor I yours," he replied, his expression thawing slightly but still chill and distant.

He wasn't going to let this go. I shifted position, bringing my knees to my chest and rocking my forehead on my bony kneecaps. My hair fell in an auburn curtain around my face like another layer of protection. I pulled my knees close to my chest, making myself as small and secure as possible. I was fairly sure that as long as I kept my voice steady, he wouldn't be able to tell I was falling apart. I shut the bond down hard, locking it away. "I gave up. He said he would break me, and he did." So far so good. Tears started to fall, but my eyes were pressed into my knees so hard he wouldn't be able to tell. My voice held strong.

His voice was so void of emotion it was almost monotone. "You gave up on what?"

"Everything. Emma, you, life in general." My voice broke, giving me away. At this point, I had nothing to lose. I may as well get it all out. "I had convinced myself that you weren't coming for me, that he was going to torture me until I gave in. I could feel how he was going to lock me away and force me to do what he wanted, use me until I was empty, then he would kill me. I was talking to Moose, and the…hopelessness, the desperation of it all, it just flooded in, crushing me." I was sobbing again, my chest struggling to suck in oxygen between sobs. I hugged my knees harder to try and temper the shaking. I was becoming quite a pathetic excuse for a woman.

Suddenly, his hand was gently rubbing my hair, which made me jump. "I will always come for you, you are under my protection. No one will ever force you into anything." He tried to unfold my arms, but I resisted with all my strength. "Look at me."

The sobbing had quieted, displaced by something stronger, so at least I could breathe. "I can't." The vision hit more like a lucid dream. I could hear, understand, react with the world that was actually around me, but there was another world playing in front of my eyes. I was back to the woman I couldn't get out of my head. I pushed the rest of my hysterical outburst behind me and concentrated on the vision.

His voice came stronger, almost reproachful. "You are stronger than this, Sloane."

I lifted my head. "No, I mean, I can't see you." I watched as the room she was in shook. Lying in front of her were two sleeping vampires, one male and one female. My heart was pounding for her.

"You cannot see?" I could feel his hands on either side of my face again. It must have been daytime, because the male vampire in the vision struggled to pull himself out of bed.

"Not you. I'm not sure what I'm seeing." The video continued to play. A window shattered, flooding sunlight into the room. We were sliding—no, flying down the side of a building I recognized. I racked my brain, where had I seen it? I remembered—it had been on the news a while back. The vampire hotel had been bombed during some sort of annual vampire meeting.

"Describe it," he demanded. Uh oh. If I told him the truth, he would know I could see the past. I'm sure he would remember the news coverage, there had been a call for vampire tolerance for months after it happened. He might have even been there.

The video stopped abruptly before rewinding quickly. It rewound back to before the bombs started exploding. She was standing in an abandoned hallway with two vampires. The blonde male from several of these visions (what did she call him again?) licked his bloody lips, then cut himself with a knife. I dropped my head back to my knees, nausea overcoming me. "Oh, gross." Reluctantly, she licked the blood from the wound. "Oh, I think I'm going to puke." I fell to the side, away from the sound of David's voice and heaved. Luckily, I hadn't eaten anything in a while. A long while. Nothing came up. I dry heaved again. David lifted me back to a sitting position, holding my face again. Another man, too tan to be a vampire, burst angrily through the door just before the vision faded.

Slowly, I could see again. I blinked as my eyes focused on David's face. "What did you see?"

I was trying to breathe normally, but I couldn't get the disgusting vision out of my head. I figured I could probably tell him the second part of the vision, there was less of a chance he knew about that. "Two vampires, one tall and blonde, the other shorter and brunette. The blonde one bit the woman, the one whose perspective I shared, then cut himself with a knife. She sucked the blood from the wound." I turned and dry heaved again before lying my cheek against the wood floor.

"A bonding," David replied.

My chest hurt from the sobbing, then the heaving. "Like us?" He raised me back into a seated position just as I remembered the blonde vampire's name: Eric. I repeated it mentally to commit it to memory.

"Yes," he replied, "only intentional."

Oh, wow. I couldn't imagine being consciously forced into this like she was. "She was forced." I couldn't get the look of his blood out of my head. It was almost black and sluggish, like syrup.

"Was?"

Oh shit. I scrambled. "Yea, in the vision, she was forced into it." I stood shakily. I always felt less-than-stable after interactions with blood. "I need to shower." I made my way to the bathroom.

"You need to eat." He followed close behind me, grabbing my arm just before I closed the bathroom door.

I turned back toward him, looking him in the eye. "Not a good idea right now." I was just going to throw it back up.

He let me go. I turned the water on hot, as hot as I could coax from my home's seventy-five year old pipes. My shower was perfect. I wasn't used to being around people so much, and the alone time was much needed. Sydney was the only person I was really ever around for long periods of time, even in high school. When our schedules got busy enough to keep us apart, I just got used to being alone.

"God dammit." Another similar flash came, this one horribly inappropriate. The woman, also in the shower at the time, was on the verge of exploding as Eric sucked at her chest. She wiggled against his fingers; I shuddered and braced myself against the shower wall. "Oh, Jesus." This was more than a little awkward. Eric continued to play with her, which was getting me hot, I'm ashamed to say. (Hey, blondes aren't my type, but Eric was Damn Hot with capitals. It was almost like he was playing with me. If I were single, I wouldn't kick him out of my shower, either.)

I reached out to brace myself against the shower wall again and seriously considered lowering myself to the floor before a knee gave out. "You couldn't wait for me?" David asked, his voice just on the other side of the shower curtain. He must have felt my lust through the bond.

"Holy shit," was all I could manage for a second. "It's a vision." He carried her into the bedroom and went right back to kissing her.

"A vision is making you climax," he asked, sounding unconvinced. I could hear David opening the shower curtain as Eric entered my medium.

"Oh my God." My body shuddered. As soon as I could see, I was going to tear the clothes off David and fuck him. "Yes, the same woman and the blonde vampire again."

He sounded amused. "Doing?"

"Jesus Christ." I was panting at this point, flailing my arm out in front of me as I felt for David. "What do you think?" I moaned and threw my head back as he bit her, came to his completion.

The vision faded. David waited for my eyes to focus again before he stepped in the shower with me. He was completely ready for me; fangs down and member hard. "Would you like me to finish what they started?"

"God yes. Again and again." There was no preamble; I didn't need one. Instead, he lifted me onto him, leaning me back slightly for a better angle. I wrapped my legs around his butt and moaned with each thrust.

I reminded myself to scream the right name when I came.

I grabbed a handful of his hair and he let me pull his head back. I started kissing his collarbone slowly licking a trail up to just below his ear. He gasped in pleasure when I nipped his earlobe with my teeth. "Now you've done it, woman," his voice rumbled, husky and deep. In the next second, I was on the bed braced on all fours. I yipped as he shoved into me again, hard.

"Yes, David. More. More." He secured one arm around my waist to hold me in place and leaned over me, aligning his perfect chest with my back. I was moaning his name as he brought me to the very brink. "Now!" I could barely whisper. David grabbed a fistful of my hair and yanked my head to the side, exposing my neck to him. For the first time, I felt pain when he bit, but not nearly enough to dampen the exquisite orgasm I was having.

I trembled underneath him as he lowered me onto my side. Aftershocks rumbled through me. He scribed the arc of my body with his own and pulled the quilt over us. The shower was still running, but I couldn't care at the moment. "How old are you?" I don't know why I said it, it just popped out.

"One hundred and twenty eight. How old are you?" I could hear the smile in his voice.

I smiled back. "Twenty two, smartass. I knew that, I meant, how old were you when you were turned?"

"Twenty," he replied quietly.

Hm. He looked older than that, but he could definitely act like a twenty-year-old at times. "Emma?"

"Eighteen."

Her face also held more than her short eighteen years, but I had yet to see her act her age. She seemed to have matured even after death, where David merely just acted like he had matured. He kissed my shoulder as he traced patterns on my hip. "Lee?"

"We do not know," he said as he kissed the back of my neck. "He was turned the same year as Emma, though."

I think sex made him talkative, and I was going to milk it. "How does he not know?" I asked.

"He was orphaned as a child. No one knew in what year he was born."

I gasped lightly; how horrible. How alone he must have been, no one even taking the time to remember his date of birth. I had thought when I first met them that Lee was Emma's support system, but maybe it was the other way around. Maybe Emma was the one that kept him going with her love.

He pulled the blanket back and scooped me up. "Hey, I was comfortable!" I said as he ripped me out of my contemplative mood. I slapped his arm playfully before wrapping an arm around his neck. "Where are we going?"

"To finish that shower, then to eat."