Finding Your Inner Demons... with Elflady

Still looking at her sideways, he sneered at her questions briefly, giving her a laugh that was more of a huff than anything else. "Please. You think I haven't tried that? I can't even drink something as lowly as a human or a shifter, let alone an animal." He grinned at her, turning slightly towards her, and in the blink of an eye he was in her face again, using his body to press her up against the wall he had pinned her to earlier in the conversation. His hands were on either side of her against the wall. The grin he was giving her was a wicked one, showing all four of his very sharp fangs. She should not think she was safe from him just because he could not drink her blood. He could still just kill her for fun, if he wanted to. "I'm too high on the food chain for that, love." He leaned in close to her ear, as though he was telling her a secret. In a way, it was. He hadn't ever really told someone this before - not that he'd had the opportunity to. "I drink vampire blood. I am above my former kin, they are food to me."

But just as abruptly as he had pinned her there, he pushed himself back, away from the wall and her. Without actually answering her second question from before, which he had ignored until now, he held up his hand. He let all of the faint shadows in the room dance around, moving as though of their own accord out of the positions they should have been in. "Vampires do not do this. Shadows are deceptive beings." He said simply, his face stoic again, and his voice bland. He found the particular skill pretty boring, in all honesty. Sure, it was something he could do that other vampires could not. But he preferred his ability to play with memories over that. Speaking of..

His hand dropped and the shadows returned to their rightful places. He had just remembered messing with her head earlier, and thought back to what he had seen there. "Enough about boring old me. Why don't you tell me about yourself, shapeshifter?" He gave her a cold smile, lips closed. "What happened to that lovely little family of yours?"
 
Despite hating the feeling of being trapped with an unstable man with decidedly low morals, if he had any at all Erin was still curious enough to not try and shift into something strong enough to break out of the house, for now at least. But his sudden movement that pinned her against the wall again almost made her change her mind, those sharp fangs were not something she wanted to be overly close to, especially since there were too many of them. His quick shifts between moods and what he chose to talk about didn't give Erin time to answer before he proceeded to give an example of his clearly non vampire skill. She watched him move the shadows with ease and despite the situation she found herself a little bit, just a little bit, jealous of his powers. As a shifter she had no special powers or cool ability like so many other creatures had, sure she could shift into any animal and she loved that skill but she had no special ability beyond what an animal could do. But to control an element, manipulate mind and matter or gain super human abilities that had always been her wish as a child and still that held an appeal to her even if she was quite satisfied with what her race allowed her to do.

Such thoughts quickly evaporated when he mentioned her family however, freezing up Erin glowered at him as memories faught to rise to the surface, this time without any outside manipulation. "Normally I wouldn't want to infuse someone's ego like this but I'd prefer to talk about you." She said, her voice icy, earlier she would never have dreamed of saying such a thing to him, but she didn't care now, only wanting to get his mind off its current track. "My life's nothing that interesting anyway, no one has died any gruesome death, been kidnapped or having been tortured and needs revenge." Perhaps not strictly true, but then again for all she knew he could still be alive so her words could really be true, the details of it all she didn't want to share with a stranger though, not herself either but that wasn't a choice of course.

"So if you know what food you can keep down then why are you holed up in here starving?" She asked sharply, trying to mask the tendrils of fear that had bloomed in her again mixed with the discomfort brought by his question aimed at her past, wishing he was as easily distracted as he had been before he tasted her blood. Although she was curious to what had happened that made him more than a vampire, unless his ego was just big referring to himself as such, but he certainly had skills, and problems, no vampire usually had. "If you are desperate enough to try and feed on something that makes you sick shouldn't you spend some time finding food you can eat instead?"
 
He laughed at her defensive response, a harsh bitter laugh. "Oh, sure. Nothing bad, right." He grinned at her still, and the look was predatory. She may not have to fear his feeding on her but he had never been a morally sound character, even in life. His family's best hope had been to try to marry him off, but even that had ended... well, that's an entirely different story right there.

Her question made his grin disappear, and it almost turned into a grimace. He opened his mouth to retort, but scowled instead, closing it again. He gave her all of his teeth in the most forced smile he could manage, stepping a couple of feet closer to her with his arms crossed over his bare chest. "Oh, such a naive little dove." He practically spat. She was lucky it was only his blood that burned and that he wasn't actually venomous. His voice came out in a snarl. "Did you hear me before? I feed on vampires. Nothing feeds on a vampire." His teeth were nearly grinding in his rage. But he turned his back on her a moment later, heaving a breath he didn't need. "What do you think they would do to me, if they knew that? If they knew that there was something out there that was going to eat them. I would be destroyed in a heartbeat." He laughed suddenly, sharply, as though he had just made a joke. "A heartbeat we don't even have." He muttered mostly to himself, and a strange giggle escaped him. Obviously he wasn't doing the best job hanging on to that little bit of sanity she had given him only a few moments ago. His mood was swinging to and fro like a pendulum, from vicious rage to lighthearted giggling.

Ravier looked at her over his shoulder, a sudden thought coming to his mind. "What is your name?" He intoned solemnly, his face blank of emotions.
 
Erin was relieved the focus was off her past but the rage that followed her question was frightening and almost made her wish she had chosen another subject but there wasn't much to do about it now. "Well you can either stay here and starve or try to drink a few drops here and there which doesn't seem to work all that great," she said after overcoming an instinct that saidit was better to run than tempt fate. "Or you could go out and grab a vampire or two for dinner and then leave the city or just keep away for a while. "Vampires aren't invincible right, they can't be impossible to beat, isn't there someway to outsmart them? You are in a pretty bad spot either way." Even with his sudden clarity now however maybe he didn't have that much sanity overall to pull that off but whether he fed of vampires and got killed or he starved to death by not eating he would die either way so to Erin it would be worth a shot.

Another sudden change in mood earned him a suspicious stare as Erin pondered over whether to give her name or not but in the end she couldn't see anything really bad about it. "Erin," he'd have to be satisfied with only her first name since she wasn't about to reveal anything more, not that there would be much of a reason to do so now anyway.

"Do you have a name or should I continue to think of you as the strange man who used to be a vampire but isn't anymore? It does feel a bit long to use and just 'hey you' would get annoying after awhile I imagine."
 
The half crazed vampire eyed her, rolling her name around in his mind a bit before he responded. "None of your business." He turned back around to face her, folding his arms over his chest to look slightly indignant. He hesitated, as though thinking about what he should say in response to her question before, but instead he ignored it in favor of giving her useless facts. "He was born in the year 1872 to a family of wealth and driven to his death by boredom." He sneered, remembering the night as though it had just happened. "Literally." He knew the only reason he was still talking to her now was the same reason now: boredom. Because, loath as he was to admit it, she had a point. What was he doing sitting here in the dark, talking to shadows of his past, when he could be out there picking off vampires and then running for his pathetic not-life from town to town? Oh wait.

"Now, it's Ravier." He mumbled darkly, his mind obviously elsewhere as his eyes began to glaze over again. "And you're right, I'd love to get out of this place. But my options are a tad limited. Maybe if I had thought ahead and turned someone, I could have called on them to fucking feed me like a vampire blood slave but now I can't even do that." He was pretty sure that if he tried to turn someone he'd just end up killing them as they tried to drink his blood and have it burn through their intestines instead. Maybe someone with a very strong will to not die could handle it, but he highly doubted many humans actually fell into that category. "So what would you suggest, princess?" He narrowed his eyes at her. "Or are you just hoping in your heart of hearts that either way it gets you out of here alive?" His voice dripped with sarcasm, and he was obviously losing his small grasp on sanity very quickly, which may or may not be in her favor at this moment. His dark blue lips curled up into a smirk, and his look was not a pleasant one.
 
That at least gave her some insight, even if his tone sparked her temper beneath the fear, but now she had something to call him even if it might not be his real name. But the short glimpse into his past, and the rather stupid incident of ending up dead, or undead rather, becasue of boredom, just made her more curious about him, it was none of her business and the least of her worries at the moment but Erin could never fully supress her curiosity. Maybe it was something to work on considering where she had ended up, if she got a chance to improve that part of her personality of course. Then again she didn't exactly have much to lose here, she might be able to escape if she shifted form but he was still very fast and strong despite being crazy and it was not certan that she would succeed if she tried.

"Well, I'll just have to see it from the positive side, if you kill me then I at least wont die alone," she said, her voice gaining a sharper tone as she spoke, she was growing bolder the more time went by, although if the correct description was bravery or stupidity was up for debate. "If you continue to hide away in this dump then you will starve so I guess we'll both die then." It might not be the best idea to piss of this more or less crazy man but while she rarely got really angry he kept pushing her buttons and helped overshadow her fear by doing so. "Just hiding away in the woods like this instead of not even trying to get some food what does that say about your survival instinct?"

She didn't outright want to call him a coward, that seemed a bit too stupid even for her, but she still wanted to get him to his senses, most of all because she wanted to survive herself but also because she couldn't understand why someone would ignore a possible chance of survival like this. If he didn't want to die then too bad for him, whatever he choose it could lead to death, one slow and one fast. In her mind it was just a case of choosing the least terrible option and she would have picked the option that gave her a better chance of being strong enough to survive for a long time. "I hope you realize that killing me is pretty much just an excuse, it might improve your mood for awhile but then you'll be back to sulking in the dark, hiding from your problem instead of doing something about it."
 
"Actually, you would die alone." He sneered at her, looking for all the world like a petulant child. "Vampires don't starve to death, and neither will I. I.." He paused mid thought, as though slightly confused on where he was about to go with that sentence. "I just... stop thinking clearly." His tone significantly calmed with that realization, as though he'd never really thought about it before. It made him realize that the confusion and later insanity had gotten the better of him, and he did not like that knowledge one bit. How long had it taken him to go insane, really truly insane? Had he even reached that point yet? Was there a point where he couldn't come back from the brink of total mania?

While he stood there looking completely lost in his thoughts, he heard her continue on with more chatter. He shrugged at her question about his survival instinct. "It's fucked up." He said bluntly, out of nowhere. "It always has been, or perhaps I wouldn't be in my current predicament." Starving was not was not something he was concerned about, had ever been concerned about. What she had eventually hit on was the loneliness, which he particularly disliked, now that he thought about it. His gaze came to her and focused in, as he sidled back up to her, not touching but close enough that he could if he reached out. His eyes looked a little more glazed over again, more like they had when she had first found him but not quite as gone as before. He was still losing the mental battle, but fighting harder now.

"And when did I ever actually say that I was going to kill you, love?" His voice took on a hint of husk as he spoke to her, eyes half closed. His face looked less playful than before, dark intentions in his expression and posture. With lightening reflexes he cupped the back of her head in his hand, but it was a gentle grip, and slowly leaned in.
 
Okay, so she might be the only one to die then, another thing she hadn't known about vampires until now but the alternative didn't seem all that great though. Unable to die no matter how long you went without food might appear like a good thing at first but if the price was loosing your mind, maybe to the point of where it was irreversable then Erin was not so certain that dying was such a bad thing in comparison. "My bad then," she said dryly. "But what I said hasn't really changed, except it's between being sane or not instead of living or dying. Is living here alone and insane really preferable to taking a few risks and be able to hold on to your sanity?" Perhaps insanity would be beneficial in some cituations, she herself could imagine a few things insanity could help her forget or ignore but the price was too high for that simple perk, at least in her eyes.

"Well, you didn't," Erin answered. "But it..." She had been about to say that it had, while not guaranteed, still felt like a possible outcome, very possible at some moments and less likely at others, it all shifted together with his moods. Instead her words left her and she was torn between the impulse of kicking him or ducking away when he placed his hand around the back of her neck, just because it was a gentle, albeit cold, touch didn't mean he couldn't do any harm considering his strength.

On the other hand if it was not intended to harm then Erin wanted to get out of reach even more, never having been one for being physical even with her family she was even less fond of being overly close to a stranger, regardless of the situation. "What are you doing?" She asked, her voice taking on a slightly higher pitch than usual in surprise, rising a hand to take hold of his cold arm and move it while trying to use her shorter stature to duck away. Even if he looked more serious now he had so far done a lot of things to tease or annoy her on purpose which led her to suspect his actions now for yet another way to fluster her, if so it worked. "Remember your little dilema with food, why don't we get back to that?" Her strongest suspicion was that it was yet another way to annoy her but that didn't change the fact that she wanted to get some space and get a conversation back up to keep his mind occupied, and perhaps inching towards some sanity.
 
Though his serious expression might have led her to believe he was leaning in for something far too personal, at her insistent nagging of wanting to get back into the previous conversation and clearly uncomfortable squirming he broke down into laughter mere inches from her face. His breath was tart but surprisingly not acrid like one might expect from something undead that drinks blood. He bit his lip, getting a hold of himself just long enough to push himself back away from her using the wall behind her. "Oh, pet, you are far too easy." Deep down, he was a little disappointed that her reaction hadn't been even the slightest bit more conflicted, but regardless it had been the reaction he was expecting - repulsion and discomfort at the mere idea of such a thing occurring. He expected no less from her now.

In a sudden shift of moods, by now probably something she was growing accustomed to, he clapped his hands together, looking mildly peeved. "Fine, then." He ran both hands through his purple hair in an obvious sign of frustration. "You are clearly too predictable, and I am far too bored to go back to being alone now." He brought his hands down from his now very mussed hair, peering at her through squinted eyes as though her image was blurring. Perhaps it was. "But if you try to run, I will actually kill you. Have no doubt. I've got your scent, love." He looked around the dank, half destroyed room as though looking for something. Then he shrugged and picked up his heavy, hooded cloak from before. The shirt was ruined, covered in holes from spilling acidic blood on it, and he did not have another. "Now why don't you show me to the nearest pinprick of civilization. I'm feeling a mite parched." With that he began his descent through the barren house, confident that she would follow as he threw his cloak about his shoulders and pulled up the hood. It was fully dark out by now, and he could walk in the comfort of the night air, but he still preferred to cover his blue skin.
 
"Well, excuse me for being predictable," Erin retorted with a scoff and crossed her arms. Considering the situation perhaps not the most important thing to fuss over but she couldn't help it, and it was one way to keep her mind of the ways this could end badly. The thought to just make a run for it did cross her mind, not in her human form of course, that would just be embarrassing. He'd catch up with her so fast it would not even be worth it, a normal human might make that mistake but not someone who knew how fast most creatures were, strange vampires included. But since your scent didn't change entirely just because you took another shape Erin didn't think it would be worth it to test Ravier's tracking skills. "I won't run," she said. "Even if you might need the training after having stayed here for who knows how long." She added, maybe not the best choice of words but she had a tendancy to be spontane at times only thinking things through afterwards.

Following him down the creaking stairs and out the door glad to be out of the rickety house and once more standing in the forest surrounded by fresh scent of nature. Night had already fallen, casting the woods into darkness, although her eyes were quite used to it already thnks to there being no lights inside the house so despite her weak vision she didn't have to walk into a tree on the way. "In that case I hope you like long walks, this house isn't exactly built near civilization, or if it was then that was a very long time ago." She said looking at Ravier, his dark cloak didn't make it easy to see him exactly, and beneath the thick canopies of the trees very little moon light could pass through to aid her human eyesight

"And what had you planned to do in town when we get there?" Erin asked, keeping her hazel eyes on the forest floor to avoid walking into something. "Weren't you so worried over being hunted by the vampires?"
 
Ravier stepped outside and took in the musky night air, looking about himself as though a memory of some forgotten time had surfaced. Though the old house clearly wasn't well-sealed, it had been a long time wince he had stepped out into the clear air. It felt longer than it had really been, especially for someone his age, but his addled mind cleared slightly with the freshness of the night. He didn't bother to look back at her as she complained to him, always a question on her mind.

"I'm going to kill someone, of course." Taking a breath he didn't need only to sigh it out dramatically, Ravier stretched with his arms in the air behind his head, causing his back to pop loudly in protest. "Of course I'm worried about that." Though his voice sounded anything but worried, on the contrary, he seemed almost... nonchalant. "The trick is, don't get caught." He glanced over his shoulder at her with his last words, then started forward through the dense trees. He had no clue where he was going.
 
His sudden shift between not wanting to risk hunting vampires to suddenly being all for the idea shouldn't really be suprising considering his mood swings were unrivaled by anyone she'd ever met. But it still hadn't been on the top of her mind when he decided to leave, which by the way must have been a first for him in awhile judging by his appearance. If it was a good idea to have this crazy vampire, whatever he was, loose in a town, maybe good for him and help ancor what remained of his sanity but it probably wouldn't be as good for the people living there.

Of course he couldn't drink human blood but that was not a guarantee he wouldn't kill anyone if he felt like it. Not that it would be her problem though, unless some vampire found out what Ravier did and that she knew him, sort off, and decided she had to be punished as well. Having to deal with one vampire was more than enough in her opinion.

"If it's the town you want then perhaps we should head a bit more west," she suggested while trying to keep him in sight. His dark cloak doing nothing to help her in that regard. Thankfully her sense of direction was quite good even as a human, perhaps thanks to all her shifts, but it came in handy in places like this where she hadn't been before. "Just a curious thought, how good are you at not getting caught?"