Consciousness returns in pieces. First, awareness of warmth. Not my own–I'm still cold, still shaking–but external heat pressed against my back. Arms around me, holding me close.
Is this real? Or another fever dream, another trick of a mind that's lost its grip on what's possible?
The warmth shifts, and I feel breath against my neck. Steady, even breathing that suggests sleep.
Someone is holding me.
The realization should terrify me. Should trigger every defense mechanism I've developed over twelve years of learning that touch means pain, that closeness means control. But the fever has stripped away my ability to react, leaving me floating in a strange space between awareness and unconsciousness.
The arms tighten slightly. Someone has found me. Brought me... somewhere. Is holding me while I burn with fever.
But who?
Why?
The questions follow me back down into darkness.
When I wake again, the fever has broken enough for actual thought. I'm lying on something warm in a space that smells of old stone and baked goods gone stale. The warmth against my back is gone, but I can feel the ghost of it. I think I can remember being held through the worst of the fever. Being kept warm when my body couldn't generate heat. But was it real?
Then I feel gentle fingers working through my long, black hair. The sensation is so alien, so completely outside my realm of experience, that for a moment I think I'm still dreaming. My fever dreams have been strange and vivid, full of illusory kindness to comfort my mind when I desperately needed it. This must be another one.
But the fingers continue their careful work, patient and methodical, untangling knots with a gentleness I've never known. And slowly, reluctantly, I surface into full consciousness.
Reagan sits beside me, carefully working tangles from my hair with his fingers. His touch is impossibly soft, pausing whenever he encounters a particularly stubborn knot, working at it slowly rather than yanking it free.
I tense instinctively, and his hands still immediately.
"Sorry," he says quietly. "Did I hurt you?"
Hurt me? The question is absurd. I've been beaten, shackled, starved, and displayed like an animal. This boy's gentle fingers couldn't hurt me if he tried.
But that's not what makes the question absurd. What makes it absurd is that he asks and apologizes.
He looks exhausted, with dark circles under his eyes and new hollowness to his cheeks, but seems relieved that I'm awake.
"Xaveon." He's reaching for my forehead to check the temperature. "How do you feel?"
I catch his wrist before he can touch me, holding it away with what little strength I have. "Don't."
He freezes, then slowly pulls his hand back. "Sorry." he says again "I just wanted to check if your fever broke."
"It broke." My voice comes out rough, raw from days of disuse. "How long?"
"Three days. I found you in that warehouse, burning up with fever." He settles back slightly, giving me space. "Brought you here. It's safe here, and I couldn't risk–"
"You held me." The words come out flat, accusatory. I'm sure of it now, that he did, and even though I didn't hate it, I won't allow this boy to do as he pleases. "While I was sick. You were... touching me."
Something shifts in his expression. Guilt, maybe, or shame. "You were hypothermic and burning up at the same time. Shaking so hard I thought you'd hurt yourself. I just... I thought body heat might help stabilize your temperature."
"You had no right."
"I know." He doesn't argue, doesn't defend himself. Just accepts the accusation. "I'm sorry. I should have found another way."
The apology deflates my anger before it can fully form. How can I rage at someone who admits fault so readily? Who looks genuinely remorseful for trying to keep me alive? He wasn't exactly in the wrong for that.
"Did it work?" I ask instead. "The body heat."
"I think so. Your shivering stopped, and your fever stabilized enough that I could focus on hydration instead of just trying to keep you from freezing and burning simultaneously."
I process this information slowly, trying to reconcile the clinical explanation with the fuzzy memory of warmth and arms and feeling safer than I've ever felt while unconscious.
"It won't happen again," he adds quickly. "Now that you're awake, recovering properly, I'll keep my distance."
Part of me wants to accept that. Wants to reestablish the boundaries that keep me safe from the dangerous comfort of human touch.
But another small, traitorous part mourns the loss of something I barely got to experience.
I push the feeling down and focus on immediate concerns.
"I need to hunt," I announce, attempting to sit up. The world tilts, and I have to brace myself against the wall.
"You're too weak," Reagan protests. "Give it another day or two–"
"I'm starving." The admission comes out sharper than I intend. "Not hungry. Starving. My body is eating itself trying to recover from the fever, and if I don't feed soon, I'll be too weak to hunt at all. You said you gave me water?"
"Yes, I had to keep you alive."
"That's fine. Blood is in a large part water, so I can pass it, but consuming human food would be like eating dirt for you. The only thing that I need to survive and can survive on is human blood."
"Then take some from me. Just a little, enough to–"
"No." The word cracks like a whip. "I won't feed on you."
"Why not? I'm offering freely, and–"
"I said no!" I'm breathing hard now, anger and desperation warring in my chest. "You don't understand. When I'm this hungry, this weak, I might not be able to stop. I might drain you dry without meaning to."
The confession hangs in the air. Reagan stares at me, and I can see him processing this new information–that I'm not just refusing out of pride, but out of genuine fear of what I might do to him.
"Okay," he says finally. "Then we find you someone else."
"That's what I was doing when we first met, scouting kids like you. Someone whose death won't matter."
Maybe it's a bit cruel but it's better to tell him this so coldly, so technically, if he wants to actually help me. Best for him to say he won't do it now, then later, when it's happening.
"Alright."
The simple agreement, without judgment or revulsion, catches me off guard. He's really going to help me hunt. Going to help me kill someone so I can feed. He acts like our fight at the rooftop didn't happen at all. Like I didn't scream at him to stay away. I don't mention it, because I'm grateful he didn't now, but… this boy is so confusing.
"Why?" I ask, the question slipping out before I can stop it. "Why do you keep helping me?"
"Because you'd do the same for me."
"No, I wouldn't."
"Yes, you would." He says it with such certainty that I can't immediately argue. "You've already done it. Multiple times."
"That was different. That was–"
"What? Maintaining a useful asset?" He shakes his head. "Keep telling yourself whatever you want if it makes you feel safer. But in case you don't remember, I was there when you risked your life for me. Twice. I know what I saw."
"You saw what you wanted to see, boy."
"Maybe. Or maybe you're lying to yourself about what you're capable of feeling."
I glare at him. This boy is very annoying. I change the subject with deliberate harshness.
"I'm going to hunt. Now."
He studies me for a moment, then nods. "Then let's do it properly. Scout locations, find appropriate prey, make sure you can actually get back here safely afterward."
"I don't need–"
"You can barely sit up without swaying. How exactly do you plan to hunt, kill, feed, and return without collapsing somewhere between here and wherever you find prey?"
I hate that he's right. I hate that I need his help even for something as fundamental as feeding. But pride won't sustain me, and stubbornness won't make me stronger.
"Fine," I concede. "Help me up."
He does, carefully, supporting my weight when my legs threaten to give out. Together, we make our way toward the cellar exit, and I try not to think about how natural it feels to lean on him.
How dangerous that feeling is.