Chapter Five

Nowhere else I'd rather be

Around an hour or so later, Warren and Magnus exited the office. Karou had heard their heated argument despite the barrage of the solid wood door; she assumed that they'd exchanged words in Russian so that she couldn't be privy to their topic of dispute, although Karou could've guessed easy enough. When Magnus arrived back in the lounge, it was clear that he meant to leave straight away when he bid Karou goodbye and kissed her cheek as he passed on his way to the door. She smiled up at him warmly from her seat on the sofa and said her goodbyes just as briefly. Karou felt Warren's presence behind her before she looked in his direction; it was as though a cool breeze chilled the back of her neck. He stood pouring himself a scotch well before the clock struck five.

"We should talk." He opened, tensely.

"Whatever it is, I've done to make you angry; I'm sorry."

"If you don't know why I'm upset, your apology lacks substance, don't you think?"

"I didn't go out of my way to upset y-..."

"You shouldn't have been talking to Magnus about things that ought to remain between us, Karou."

"I'm sorry. I thought I was confiding in a friend. I'm sorry that I overstepped, but you shouldn't have been listening in. That's sneaky."

"I had to interrupt because he was filling your head with bullshit." Warren downed his scotch quickly. He'd begun pacing the back of the sofa, between the lounge and the kitchen where a long slim console table sat; that was the home of his scotch decanter. Every so often, he combed his fingers back through his hair, something Karou had noticed he did when he was wound up.

"What did he say that was wrong?" Karou sat up to rest back on her heels on the couch and face him.

"About my capacity to feel love..." Warren uttered quietly. There had been a dark, tumultuous time in Warren's past that Karou already knew some about. What she didn't know was why it'd hurt so much and how it'd affected him. The death of their love affair had devastated him and had been the birth of his icy façade. "I loved her, Karou. I could never have her to myself, but I fell deeply in love with her between her other numerous lovers and my engagement to Camille. I'm not proud of it, but mine and Ellis' affair wasn't just about sex, at least not on my part. I-… I don't want sympathy. I just need you to know that that is why it hurt so much. That's why I understand how she feels betrayed by me. We've been loving, hating, and betraying each other for over eighty years. I will never... allow myself to be that vulnerable again. I can never give that much of myself anyone ever again." The whole time he spoke, he stared at the floor, unable to meet her eyes. Warren cleared his throat and regained some composure. "You need to know that because you're looking for something in the way I fucked you that isn't there."

Karou flinched when he used to F word to describe what they had done, it was so harsh. "Even though I've realised now that it was your motive for every you said last night that it was only me that insisted it meant nothing... you said it like it didn't to you."

"What? What motive?" Warren snapped.

"When you sired me, you said it would've been a waste. You meant that it would've been a waste to kill me without fucking me first, right?"

"No, that isn't what I meant, but I also said you shouldn't over analyse it, Karou. I meant that. Just because it meant something doesn't mean it meant everything. I promise you, you haven't tricked me or coerced me into doing anything I didn't want to, but don't ever try and pull my strings in the hope that I'll fall for you because there is absolutely no possibility of that happening," This time he glared at her the entire time he spoke. Still, as soon as he fell silent, he poured himself another generous glass of scotch and tore his eyes away.

It took Karou a moment to process what he'd said. He sounded so stern, but that only meant that she got the message loud and clear. Still, it didn't make it hurt any less when he'd forced her back into line yet again.

"Is it because there's something wrong with me?"

Warren downed another glass before he answered. "No, Karou, aren't you fucking listening to me? That isn't the point I'm making at all. I'm telling you there is something wrong with me. Whatever damage Ellis has done, to my head, my psyche, I'm just not the person I used to be. You can't fix me." His anger disappeared entirely, his breath caught in his throat for a moment, and he squeezed his eyes closed. "Please just hear me out..." When he opened his eyes, he found her stood before him. Of all the expressions she could've been making, she was smiling at him. She'd moved from the sofa as he spoke. At last, Warren had opened up to her, and despite what he was saying, it'd made her happy. Finally, maybe she could understand him.

Karou simply said, "Okay," but privately, she thought, I feel silly for thinking your intentions were so wicked - that you just wanted to use me. Deep down, you're not cruel. You're just damaged and frightened. Mostly, you're scared of letting someone else in.

"Okay?" Warren's face screwed up in bewilderment.

"Yeah, it's okay. I'm not entirely un-fucked up either."

"But what you want, I can't give you. Your parent's neglect has made you pine for somewhere to belong and for someone to love you, and I... I can't provide that. You're asking for too much. I'm really trying to be straight with you."

"You sired me, and now I'm a vampire too, so the Compound is where I belong, and I'm safe here. Everything I need is here; you've provided everything you needed to for me to carry on living. We can be friends, can't we? Let me know you? So it'll be easier to live together that way."

"You just want to be friends? Are you sure you can forget that I've kissed you everywhere? That I've touched you everywhere? That I've seen every inch of you? You're my fledgeling; you're in my head, and you know I won't forget. Could you ever let me bite you again without imagining or wanting more?" Warren's gaze intensified as he stood before her and leant toward her, invading her personal space.

Karou blushed, and Warren grinned. "What else is there?" She asked feebly. The way his words had left his lips made her want to reach for him.

"Benefits... We could still play with each other?"

"I-… I think that might work out better for you than for me." She could feel her skin getting warm, and his eyes looked hungry, so she backed away from him to reestablish a bubble of space around her.

"You're right. That was unfair of me to suggest." He knew first hand that it was easy to fall for someone on the flimsy promise of good sex - that's exactly what had gotten him involved with Ellis in the first place. He already knew that he would struggle even more to live with himself if he allowed Karou to form any unrequited feelings. So he turned away from her entirely and poured himself another drink. He wandered around to sit in his corner of the couch, grabbed the remote and flicked on the TV but didn't bother scanning the menu; instead, he held out the remote to Karou. Their conversation was best to end there, he thought.

"It's only two-thirty. Aren't you going back to work?" Karou asked as she clambered over the back of the couch and into her usual spot. That was when it dawned on her that even though he had locked himself away in his office, he wasn't wearing work clothes - he had on navy-blue jeans and a long-sleeved t-shirt. Reaching over, she took the remote from him and picked a channel.

"I can go back into my office if you want the unit to yourself, but today was supposed to be my day off - the day I spend with you as I agreed to, remember? Magnus scolded me for not keeping my promise." Sipping at his third glass of scotch, Warren relaxed into the leather, facing her as always and ignoring the TV safe for the background noise it provided.

"You don't have to spend your Sundays with me. I'm just going to sit here and read anyhow."

"Karou, unless you directly ask me to leave, I'm going to stay." He wanted to tell her that even though he couldn't give her everything she wanted, he'd still try and give her everything he felt possible.

"I suppose bad company is better than no company." She smirked, attempting to make a joke at Warren's expense. "I don't get to see many people anymore. I thought being sired would free me, but it turns out it's housebound me, ironic, huh?" Karou felt more than a little pathetic and sighed. "Where did you go earlier?"

"I went to see Ellis in the cells. She's calmed down now. We talked. You could say we've reconciled."

Karou sensed a deeper meaning in how he said they'd reconciled. You shoot her, and then go have sex with her and then come back here and look at me like you did a second ago - Unbelievable! It made her skin itch uncomfortably.

"I didn't have sex with her."

"Ugh, I'm already sick of you being in my head all the damn time..."

"I didn't hear you were thinking it; it was written all over your face." Warren chuckled. "You don't hear everything I think. If you don't want me in your head, I can teach you how to block me out. We all need some space in our own mind; otherwise, we'd go mad."

"Yeah, that'd be good. I'm sorry, I assumed that you'd... y'know."

"I have to admit that I thought about it when I was down there with her, but probably only because she planted the idea. Even though she agreed that I had the right to choose sire you independently, she still wasn't happy about some of the things she dug up in my head. She'll get over it; I guess I have to too."

"Dare I ask what she dug up?" Karou dared to ask.

"She was mostly upset about my opinion on your scent... She's convinced that in every other way, she can compete with you, but she'll never smell like you. The fact that she thinks there is even a competition just shows how irrational her jealousy is." Warren waved his hand nonchalantly.

Karou stood up from the couch as if she were late for something and hurried to Warren's bedroom. He leaned over the back of the couch to watch what she was doing. Frantically, she stripped all the sheets from his bed and came wandering down the hall with them piled in her arms. "That reminded me; I should get these washed."

Instantly, Warren understood her course of action; she'd slept in his bed the night before, and so the sheets smelled of her, no doubt. You're not even going to allow small pleasures. "Right. Leave them by the door; I'll take them to the laundry room later. I have spare sheets for tonight."

She stood before the door with the sheets in her arms; she dumped them with an exasperated sigh. Duh! Of course, I can't go out.

"No, not even to the laundry room," Warren replied and watched her as she lingered between the couch and the front door. Karou suddenly looked somewhat lost. "Something wrong?"

"I think... I'm going to head to bed." She announced.

"It's barely four in the afternoon."

"Yeah, I know, but I didn't sleep well last night. I guess I was wound up about the whole Ellis thing, and then my back started to hurt." Karou looked down to the floor; the time had come to tell him how many pills she'd been taking. "Uh- About the medication, you left for me in the bathroom cabinet... Well, it's all gone."

"What do you mean they're all gone?"

"I didn't realise until this morning, but I probably wake up maybe five out of seven nights a week these days. The pain, it's getting worse."

"Karou there not meant to be taken that often..." Warren sat up from the couch, alarmed.

"I know, I know... I'll call the doctor to come to see me tomorrow. I... I lied when I said I'd already been to see him. I was scared that he would just tell me there's something else wrong with me. I thought this would all go away once I was sired, but it hasn't."

With Karou gone to bed, Warren finished his scotch and returned to his office; he had no desire to spend the rest of his afternoon in his own company. Work brought distraction until it was time for bed. He made it up in fresh sheets and reluctantly found sleep; his mind was plagued by how honest he'd been with Karou earlier in the day. He knew he hadn't lied but had come to realise that what he'd said all sounded exceptionally cruel.

Still, the next few days passed ordinarily, and Karou had kept her promise and plucked up the courage to call the doctor. He made a house call and examined her back, but he couldn't give her any concrete answers after only physically evaluating her issue. The doctor, a fellow vampire, concluded that she looked to be in perfect health and was particularly impressed by how well she had adjusted to fledgelinghood.

Although the visit had been kept a secret from Warren, Karou knew she would eventually have to tell him because the doctor requested that she attend his office for further tests. She needed to perform and have blood tests run if he was going to find any answers. Karou had explained that Warren currently wasn't allowing her to roam freely around the Compound, which the doctor understood and empathised with; as always, Warren lived up to his reputation of being responsible. Ultimately, the doctor suggested that Warren escort her to his office after hours when the Compound was quiet if need be. In the meantime, she'd been given some more medication to ease her bouts of pain.

Some days later, in the middle of the night, Karou's violent scream filled the unit. Hours earlier, she'd gone to bed feeling a little off, with a fever that was highly unusual for a vampire, but she was sure some rest could fix it. Crouched beside her bed; she'd tried to get up, but the pain had brought her to her knees. With the sheets grasped between her balled fists, she screamed into her mattress again.

Her second scream had barely left her lips when Warren arrived in her bedroom. Her cry of agony had woken him, and instantly he came to her aid. "Karou, what's wrong?" Warren asked as he flung open the door to find Karou clinging to the side of her bed. He looked flustered, having been stirred from the bed so quickly, but not nearly as much as Karou, who had tears streaming down her face.

"My back... It feels like it's going to-..." Karou attempted to explain, but a wave of fresh pain took her breath away. Warren's eyes widened to see that under the camisole she'd worn to bed, something was happening that would soon become visible on the surface. Something was moving beneath her flesh and trying to get out. "-tear open..." Karou whimpered into the sheets and didn't manage to string any more words together before the crescendo.

Warren crouched down behind her when he noticed the strange movements. Just in time, he grabbed her top and tore it open with his bare hands. Over her shoulder blades, her skin opened up. Mortified, Warren watched as two long slits parted her flesh, and with one final, agonising scream, Karou's wings birthed from her back. The bony appendages made their way into the world lightly covered in sticky pale blue plumage. Though they needed time to dry out, they were unmistakeably wings.

"Oh my God," Warren mumbled in disbelief, flinching away so that he wasn't hit in the face by the bony protrusions. He took hold of Karou's waist to steady her when she'd lolled to the side as if she might faint. Given what had just happened, frankly, he couldn't blame her.

Warren was left completely stunned, yet so many things now fell into place. Karou had never been mortal, she was always something else, and now she'd finally become it - a winged creature, but what she was, he didn't know.

"What... What's happening?" Karou asked, seeming both panicked and out of it.

"Karou, you have wings." Warren watched them flex, getting used to being out in the open air, they seemed to have a mind of their own, but surely Karou was aware of their movements, he thought.

"Wings?" Karou asked sceptically, wondering if she'd heard him correctly. She was tired, exhausted even, but tried to peer over her shoulder at him, and that was when she saw them with her own eyes. "Oh my God! What the-? Why are they there? How?" Quickfire questions of panic spewed from her lips; her eyes filled with confused tears.

"Yes, wings, like a bird, they're feathered..." Warren said, and although he hadn't touched her in days, at that moment, neither of them seemed to care when his hands slid about her body as she turned about. Was she just turning around to get a better look at her new limbs? He thought so, but he was wrong. The moment Karou faced him, she dropped her forehead to his chest and cried into him. She was in shock. "Karou? Does it still hurt?"

"No... They just ache; like they've been squished. I can feel them. They're like... extra arms or something. Oh God, this is so weird." Karou tried to explain but didn't remove her face from his chest. She just needed comfort, and so far, he hadn't flinched away. He was kind enough to hold her. It felt so nice to be in his arms.

"At least the pain is gone now. Do you maybe want to take a look in the mirror? They're really something." Despite the strangeness of the turn of events, Warren couldn't deny how her new appendages suited her; they were beautiful.

"I don't want to move just yet," Karou mumbled.

"Oh, come on, don't be a spoilsport; I want to see your face when you really see them." With all thoughts of personal space or the unspoken rules they'd been adhering to out of the window, Warren stood up, and as he did, he hoisted Karou into his arms. Cradling her rear with his forearm, he gave her no choice but to wind her legs and arms around him tighter as he carried her out into the hall. Quickly, he grabbed his pedestal shaving mirror from the bathroom and passed it to Karou. Stood before the floor-length mirror in the hallway and purposefully with her back to it, Karou could hold up the smaller mirror in her hand to view the reflection of her back. "See?"

Karou was speechless... The thin pale blue plumage had started to dry out and fluff up over the surface of her new wings. They stretched down her back and looked as if they'd be longer than her arms when stretched out - now she was wondering how glorious and impressive her wingspan might look, but it was all too new and strange to leave her in awe. How they'd managed to hide in her back without her knowing she couldn't fathom. Would the doctor have been able to see the bones in them if she had gotten around to the scans? When her parents had cut open her back, was this what they had been looking for? Did they know she was - whatever she was - all along? Could she fly now? Once she'd had a good look at herself, she altered the angle of the mirror so that she could see the look on Warren's face. He was peering over her shoulder at the reflection too. "You're smiling?"

"I'm just glad there's nothing actually wrong with you. The pain was for a reason, after all, it seems."

"You don't think there is anything wrong with me?" Karou lowered the mirror and turned her head to look at him directly; being in his arms meant that his face was close to hers. She knew she looked a wreck; her cheeks were tear-stained and her eyes still bloodshot; God only knew the state of her hair.

"No. There's never been anything wrong with you." Warren said calmly, but when his eyes met Karou's through the mirror, they shared a moment basking in the powerful emotions his words had created. Clearing his throat to disturb the tension, he said, "In the grand scheme of things, this has turned out quite favourably, don't you think? Your pain wasn't due to any debilitating illness, just growing pains, I suppose, your body preparing your new editions."

Karou didn't say anything for a moment. His evasion hadn't worked on her; she reached up one of her hands to lay it over the side of his face as she looked at him more closely and deeply. She knew she probably shouldn't have been doing it, but she could put it down to being overly emotional, in shock, or something. "You're so kind sometimes."

She didn't realise but floating around the peripheries of her mind; she was imagining kissing him and how he might kiss her back.

"I try, but don't look at me like that." Warren pulled her hand from his face and began to carry her back to her bedroom.

"Like what?"

"Like you want to kiss me, you know we're not doing that anymore." Warren sat her down on the edge of her bed and finally let go of her.

"I'm sorry... I wasn't going to."

"Will you stop apologising? It starts to mean less the more you say it. Just stop making it hard for me to do what I know I should and not what I want."

"I'm still struggling with... boundaries." Karou set her feet up onto her bed and wrapped her arms around them. Once her head rested on her knees, she looked up at him through her lashes. There was no seductive intention in her body language; she was just disheartened. "It's hard to track backward."

Warren sat straddling her desk chair and rested his forearms onto its back as he peered at her. "Hmm, I take responsibility for what you're going through. It's true - feeding has become particularly taxing."

"Uhm, is there a way we could... share without the biting part?"

"Yes, of course, but..." Warren paused, rubbed through his hair, and continued. "Are you going to make me say it?"

"What... That you'd miss biting me?"

"And the rest..." Warren muttered. His gaze grew intense, and as always, it made Karou blush. "Your feathers have all dried out now." He changed the subject.

Peering over her shoulder, Karou could see the fluffy plumage over the arches of her new wings. She thought she would try something, and to her amazement, it worked; she moved them. They fluttered gently against her back, and the air moved through the soft quills. It made her giggle, and suddenly she decided that she liked them. "Warren... What do you think I am?"

"You mean besides what I made you? Uh- I'm no mythical creature encyclopedia, so I've no clue, but we can look into it, maybe check out the library tomorrow?"

"Sure, I'd like to go to the library."

With Karou tucked back into her own bed, Warren lingered a moment in her doorway before he went back to his own room. Unfortunately for him, he hadn't been physically exhausted by what had just happened and foresaw that he had a rough night of overthinking ahead.

The red digital digits flashed 05.59 one last time before a single second bore a new hour: 06.00, and a shrill sound filled the bedroom. His eyes ached; he'd been staring at the clock for the last couple of hours, laying over the sheets, not sleeping. Still, he wasted no time in turning off his alarm.

Wings. That was all he could think about. They were beautiful, for sure, but why the hell did she have wings? Their birth posed more questions than answers, even if now some of Karou's quirks made clear sense.

Flopped onto his back, he stared at the ceiling, but his mind was already too busy to relax.

Sat on the side of his bed, he combed his fingers back through his hair and sighed.

Ultimately, he knew very little about winged mythical creatures. Griffons, pegasus and harpy's remained only in existence in lore. The one's that he'd heard rumours about; Angles, Demon's and the like, well that's what he was struggling to comprehend. He'd met demons before. He remembered how they smelled... Bitter, musky, burnt, unpleasant. But Karou, she smelled sweet, delicious, divine... Logically it made sense that she was the opposite, but the alternative was just too much to comprehend.

His cellphone, which sat on his nightstand, caught his attention. It's too early to call Magnus. He concluded. You know, it's pathetic that you can't get through things like this on your own. Another inner voice retorted, which convinced him he could deal on his own a little longer.

A steaming hot shower didn't relax him. The routine of shaving and the focus it required did nothing to quiet his mind. With a foaming toothbrush in his mouth, he stared hard at the man in the mirror while he continued to reflect. For God's sake, she's only a woman! But she's so damned troublesome; my life was easier without her. But was it better without her? He didn't even dare voice the question in the privacy of his own mind. Just, cool it Warren. You can do this! He thought, peppy thoughts and waved his toothbrush at his reflection.

His resolve fell apart the moment he made it out into the hall and glanced into Karou's room. Oh, this is so fucking far from easy.

With a loose tie draped around his neck, he paced his bedroom. If all else failed, keeping to his usual routine would help maintain some modicum of calm – so he'd gotten dressed for work.

Just like every other morning, he walked purposefully towards his office. He walked right on by the kitchen, though; he was too jittery for coffee. As he'd passed by his scotch decanter, he'd looked at his longingly – but it was much too early to start drinking, and God forbid he appeared to have fallen apart in front of Karou when the night before he'd been swept away by the whole thing and had even felt delighted and relieved for her. The aftermath had knocked him for a loop.

Behind the shield of his office door, he continued to silently lose his mind. Staring at the cellphone, he clenched in his hand; he paced the hardwood and prayed that Magus might feel some change in the auras or atmosphere or something and call him. Who was he kidding? Magnus wasn't a psychic…

With his thumb hovering other the call button, he was still trying to think his way out of his panicked state so that he wouldn't have to give in, but rationality was failing him.

Karou has to know more than she's letting on. Perhaps once we get to the library, something will occur to her? He hoped. But then again, maybe Magnus will have some insight.

You know, it's ridiculous that you're this dependant on him. He is not your father! A stern voice chided, which caused him to fling the cell phone to clatter against the top of his desk.

His ears pricked at another sound; a knock on the door.