Through the eyes of a king.

The night had been the same as every other weekend evening as Nathan walked out of the tavern, his vision blurred and his manner of walking just a bit crooked. Walking through the village was quite a feat for him as he grabbed onto several things for support, passing once to throw up. It was after doing so that the man straightened up just a bit, only to accidentally stumble into an alleyway as his body had leaned near the buildings to find support. Instead Nathan fell flat on his face, taking a moment to pick himself up. The casual suit he was wearing had been dirtied up quite a bit, a few stains quite visible on the grey clothing.

As he was on his hands and his knees, a feminine voice came to his ears. He couldn't quite hear what the person had said at first, so Nathan looked up - laying his eyes on what had to be the most gorgeous woman he had seen. "Oh, uh hello there." Nathan said in a slurred manner as he moved to stand up. Attempting to straighten himself once more he moved toward the woman, her blonde shoulder length hair seeming to shine in the moonlight. In his drunken haze it was impossible for the man to properly see the woman's pale skin and her blood red lip. "What are you doing out here?" Nathan then asked as he watched the woman close the distance between them - looking deep into his eyes. "Just looking for something to eat."

As Nathan heard the woman's voice clearly, a different sort of haze settled over the man's body. There was something about her eyes, he couldn't quite place it but he felt as though he could fall into these woman's eyes and never want to climb out. As he felt like he was doing so then, the woman wrapped her arms around him and as he attempted to move for a moment - the man soon realized he was paralyzed. Why would he even want to push her away? A strange sort of happiness fell over him then, it didn't matter what the woman was doing. Someone was actually noticing him for once, that was enough for him.

As these thoughts rang through his mind, the vampire sunk her teeth deep into Nathan's jugular. A small bit of blood slipped from the two small wounds that the vampire had created. The bite didn't even process with Nathan up until the moment that she removed her teeth from him, lightly wiping her lip with one finger. Nathan dropped to his knees once more then, looking up at the woman in confusion - the pain among everything else not hitting him quite yet. "My gift to you." The vampire said in a surprisingly melodic tone, leaving just as quickly as she came.

At her absence, the most excruciating amount of pain then echoed through Nathan's body and the man fell to his side - rolling onto his back as several sensations motored through his body like a freight train. Nothing had slowed down yet, instead everything seemed to be going into overdrive and Nathan let out a harsh yell as his body started to writhe in pain.

Kestrel was on one of her late-night runs again, using her excellent night vision as an excuse to enjoy the slightly warmer spring air. Her breathing was even and measured and, for once, her mind was free from commentary from Andy. He'd actually been oddly quiet as of late- ever since her brush with whatever it was that Adrian had tied to himself. From what little Kestrel remembered of the incident, Andy had spoken to something, but she had not been privy to the gist of that exchange, nor had her demon bothered to explain after the fact.

Nights were when she could truly let her guard down though she preferred the sun to the moon. The dark-vision was just too problematic to deal with all of the time- seeing well in the dark meant that all shadows looked similar to regularly-lit places. So depth perception was a thing she continually had to pay attention to, rather than gauge based on instinct. Shadows still existed at night, but it felt more uniform somehow.

This evening, she wore her runner's gear. Black leggings and a form-fitting lime light blue jacket covered her person. Her shoes were light and matched her jacket- Kestrel did have an eye for detail, after all.

Andy and Kestrel both took note of the harsh yell and she abruptly changed course, palming her mace as she darted down a street, then down an alley. She came up short at the sight of who was making the noise. Abruptly, she dropped the can of mace and knelt next to Nathaniel. "Oh my god!" She didn't want to touch him, just in case something was seriously wrong and she only made it worse, so she sort of knelt there with her hands hovering over him ineffectually. "What happened?!"

Nathan could barely process what was happening as what seemed to be some phantom virus was sweeping over his body making his eyes water from the inexplicable pain. As Kestrel had appeared, from where he didn't quite know - his awareness of the things around him were so altered that Nathan barely knew left from right or up from down. "W-W-Woman b-bit," as if almost on cue pain echoed through his body once more causing the man to bring his hands up to his neck in some lame attempt to stop what was happening - as he touched where the wound had been placed another sort of feeling echoed through him at once causing Nathan to let go and his eyes to roll back for just a moment. Things were starting to slow down now, the man's skin slowly becoming pale.

Kestrel's eyes followed Nathan's hands to his neck and she frowned at the brief glimpse of the blood that was there. "A woman... bit? You mean she bit your neck? That's really weird." Andy stirred at this and hissed a warning in the back of her head, but Kestrel ignored him.

She hesitated, then reached out and reached out to put light pressure on his neck with one hand (pausing only to make sure she placed her sleeve between her skin and the wound and remembering whether she had any open cuts- HIV was a thing she'd rather avoid), other hand diving into a pocket for her phone. "Mr. Kandless, I'm going to call an ambulance. We'll get you to the hospital and you can report your assault from there. Do you understand?" She was getting worried about how pale he'd gotten. Could he be going into shock? He was getting too cold for comfort. Her eyes widened. "Mr. Kandless! Please don't die!"

All of her talking seemed to go in one ear and out the other, as his heart started to slow Nathan's canine's started to elongate as well. He didn't know why but he could hear the woman's heart beat so clearly, the sound successfully drowning out her yelling at him to not die. As she placed her hand against his neck, the heartbeat made him feel like he was going insane. With surprising speed, Nathan reached up and grabbed the woman's arm - open his mouth and pulling her wrist toward him so as to sink his teeth into her. Another shot of pain ran through his body once more then and before Nathan got the chance to do any real damage he let go of the woman, crying out once more.

Kestrel hissed and yanked her arm back. In that second, she lost control of the body and, between Andy and a shadowy figure that suddenly loomed over them and grabbed her shoulder, Kestrel's body was forcibly yanked upwards and backwards. She lost some balance and hit the wall of the nearest building with enough force to knock the air out of her lungs.

It started to rain, which always sort of messed with her vision somewhat, but she was finally able to recognize the guy when he spoke. "Get out of here. Avoid alleys at night." Kestrel could only nod, holding her wrist to her chest and sprinting away when she was able to breathe again.

---

Nikolai leaned over and grabbed two handfuls of the man's shirt. With that, he used his own body weight as leverage and slung the fellow over his shoulders in a fireman's carry. The were-dragon thanked his stars that he was used to backbreaking physical labor since this would have been impossible had his life been any more sedentary- he was also carrying his rucksack and a small satchel filled with something he did not want to break.

He grimaced and muttered, "You better not bite me. You won't like the result." With that, he began to jog to the school.