Why had Jane come again? Phillip and Anna had warned her countless times of how dangerous it was to approach Rassa when he was like this, let alone the penalties she'd face should the Knights catch her. She'd spent over a week worrying about whether or not she should believe that Rassa wasn't a monster. His parents insisted, but Jane had thought she was closer to Rassa. She'd even...kissed him.

It seemed silly now for her to have done something like that. No doubt Rassa had had bigger problems to deal with than her feelings. But no matter how Jane tried to rationalise Rassa's condition, the fact was still quite clear. He'd lied to her.

And so, after she spent time thinking about every possibility as to why that would be the case, Jane finally decided she needed to talk to someone who was closer to the truth. If not Rassa, than his parents.

Jane listened. She learned. And then she was told to go home. As if she could just go home after learning all of that about her best friend. The one person outside of her parents who had never looked at her with anything but kindness, even after he'd changed.

To Jane, this, seeing him, was a simple decision. She just needed to make sure he was okay.

Nobody but the knights and the doctor had seen him in days, and they refused to give any information regarding his condition, apart from the fact to 'reassure' everyone he was not drinking blood, animal or otherwise. But after what Phillip said...not drinking blood seemed to have a more concerning outcome than him drinking it. They had no idea the extent to which Rassa would go to satiate himself if he let the hunger take over. When he had been arrested by hunger in the past he'd been able to take care of it, and had been able to act normal in the interim. So normal that no one had noticed his changed state for three years!

So, calming her racing heart, Jane took a deep breath, and crept forward through the forest to the cage. As she crept closer, Jane notice how fragile Rassa looked. He was curled into a ball on the floor of the cage, his body still covered in grime and filth. He looked, quite plainly, as if he were dead. Jane's eyes widened, and she stepped forward in concern, only to see the slightest twitch of muscle. She stopped, then whispered loudly.

"Rassa?"

There was no response. Not even an acknowledgement of her presence. She gave a quick glance to where the guards sat to ensure she hadn't been heard, then tried again.

"Rassa? Can you hear me?" asked Jane.

...

Of course Rassa could hear her. He'd heard her as she stood nearly a kilometre away, pacing back and forth as she deliberated on her next move. He'd smelt her sweat and nervousness as she approached. But most of all, he'd smelt her blood...

Rassa had never thought that something could be so divine and so horrible at the same time. He had no energy left, the only thing he was capable of doing, was trying to hold himself back. He'd tried tuning out the world, focusing on the smells of the rotting food that still covered him instead of the blood of the guards mere metres away, but it wasn't working. Worse still, Red Eyes was starting to make sense.

He was hungry, of course he should feed. They were all prey, it didn't matter the source, so long as the aches went away. So long as he could feel himself again.

'No, please, no'.

His protests had diminished from a command to a plead. If anyone were to hear the conversation inside his head, he was sure they would think him pitiful. What kind of monster argues with itself over the condition of its next meal? Rassa was truly a conundrum, one that Red Eyes was officially sick of.

'You have held back long enough child, any longer and you will begin to decompose. Then only a blood sacrifice will save you'.

'A what?' Rassa asked, shocked at this new piece of information.

'It is our nature' Red Eyes elaborated, 'We can survive without blood for months of course, but that is only after we have been unsealed, only after we have trained ourselves for countless years to resist the hunger, to suppress it. You are a sealed child, barely three years old. In the life span of a being that can live for tens or even hundreds of thousands of years without any problems, you are nothing more than an infant. Your will power might be stronger than any other your age, but you cannot prevent yourself from the sub-death that will come upon you when the sun rises in seven hours. You are foolish to wait this long, now I have no choice but to teach you a hard lesson, one I hope you will learn from diligently'.

'What are you talking about? What lesson?' asked Rassa, suddenly terrified. He could hear the dark tone of Red Eye's voice. The warning in it.

'Learn well boy, watch while I take care of your hunger, and handle a few trivial matters while I'm at it'.

Rassa filled with dread as he suddenly felt his Life Lines, no his very soul, unleash something he had no control over. He flinched, tightening his muscles.

'No. Please, no!'

There was only a dark chuckle, 'This will be fun'.

...

There was no movement seen by Jane as she called out to Rassa, no sign of true life. She lowered her head.

"I'm sorry, Rassa," Jane spoke softly, "I had no intention of turning my back on you, not ever. I promised you I wouldn't, didn't I? So, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry I doubted you. Sorry I thought you were the monster they all said you were. Sorry I...I understand if you don't want to forgive me. But please Rassa, don't prove them right. Stay strong. Please".

Jane looked up with teary eyes at Rassa's body, only to find him squatting inside the cage, staring at her with the most bored un-Rassa-like expression she'd ever seen. But worse still, and the thing that caused her to fall back into the tree behind her in shock and terror, was the bright red glow of his eyes.

"It was a pretty speech, little girl, I'm sure your Rassa would be tickled pink hearing your faith in him," Rassa spoke, but to Jane, one thing was very clear. That was NOT Rassa.

His words were loud enough to attract the attention of the guards. They drew their swords as they stood, surprised to see the boy who had been practically lifeless for two days suddenly up and about. The Rassa-who-was-not-Rassa titled his head as he sighed regretfully, "However, Rassa isn't around right now, he was a little naive in thinking he could hold his hunger back long enough for his father to get enough Anthrite to contain him. Perhaps if they had acted just a few minutes sooner they would have succeeded, I can hear the incessant ringing of that infernal metal from here".

The boy leaned forward, clutching the metal bars of the cage delicately as his fingernails extended into sharp points nearly an inch from the tip of his finger. They resembled lethal claws, and Jane drew back further in fear as she watched fangs extend down from two of Rassa's top teeth, his smile looking murderous.

"Run along now little girl, this monster is rather hungry".

Jane didn't need to be told twice, she turned and stumbled as she dove into the woods, just in time to miss the detection of the guards who approached the cage arrogantly, swinging their swords with no skill or grace whatsoever.

"Oi! Pike down you, or we'll have to do more than just starve yo-"

The Guard didn't even have time to finish his threat. Throughout the camp, a shriek of metal rung out with such clarity, that it sent a chill down the spine of everyone who heard it. It was barely a split-second later that the Guard was decapitated by his own sword. So quick and clean was the cut, that the guard even had a second to register his own demise before he fell to the ground, his head rolling away. The Red-Eyed Rassa turned towards the other guard, who had soiled himself in fear as he dropped his weapon and shook so fiercely that he lost his balance.

"Pathetic".

A second head rolled.