[ He smells the blood an instant before he tastes it, and that instant seems like it's been stretched out infinitely. This, he's experienced before. The journey here hasn't been bloodless, not by any stretch of the imagination. From the cuts and bruises from Sypha's attempt to fight him when they first met to the injuries of the road, every time has made time seem wrong. Has made his body seem like nothing but an engine made to consume, and his companions nothing more than fuel. Has reduced the world to a conflict between what he knows in his blood - that the world has made him stronger than both of them, that it's given him the right to take and take and take and take - and the humanity that Leon tried so hard to force upon him with magic and blood and words and kindness.
In truth, that is as much a reason why he needs this as the clumsiness of hunger. It's foolish to assume that the battle they face will be won without injury, much as he'd like to be able to protect them both from the worst of it. There will be blood. Without this, it will be a distraction. Maybe even a danger.
He withdraws his fangs to let the blood flow freely. It touches his tongue and the agonisingly long instant is over. He can taste it. He can taste it and his body sings with the tasting of it, his heart beating so quick and hard that he can swear he hears it pealing like church bells against his ribs. He laps at the cuts with his tongue messily before remembering that he can't waste a drop and using his lips to form a seal over the cuts. It's a kiss. It's so much a kiss and he knows but he can't bring himself to care.
His senses sharpen, almost too much. He can't hear Alucard counting. Not over the hiss of air as Sypha turns pages and the skittering of rats' feet in the ruins of the house above them and the settling of ancient dust. He can hear sunlight hitting the earth overhead. He can hear as new leaves tear out of medicinal herbs in little pots at another corner of the hold. His eyes are closed, but he can see the sound reflecting off Alucard's body before him. Every plane of his face. Every tiny little beautiful imperfection left by a lifetime of fragile humanity. He can smell metal in the blood, but he can smell the mixture of mint and rose oil that Sypha uses to ward off evil, too. He can smell the oil from a thousand fingertips on every book. The hold is full of life, life that only he can sense, four centuries of history condensed into a matter of seconds. And he can taste blood. He can taste blood and there is nothing else.
He hears twenty, as the initial overwhelming high of it starts to fade and he can finally catch Alucard's voice over all the noise again. Twenty seconds, and that feels wrong in both directions. It's felt so much longer. It's felt so much shorter. He can't have time left. This can't be two-thirds over.
He feels Alucard's hand in his hair next. Stroking. Slowly managing to ground him no matter how little he wants to be grounded. Anchoring him in the present. The present where (twenty three) he has to acknowledge that this is- intimate. That he's kissing and licking at Alucard's wrist almost in worship, like a profane prayer spoken in disgusting noises. That instead of just holding Alucard's arm, his fingers have coiled around his sometime in that last twenty (twenty five) seconds. That his face is flushed from ear to pointed ear, lips swollen and eyes blown wide. Breath coming out in gasps and whines.
He doesn't stop. The feeling of disgust with himself sinks in around twenty eight, but he doesn't stop. Not until thirty. This can never happen again, and so he can't waste a second. ]
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In truth, that is as much a reason why he needs this as the clumsiness of hunger. It's foolish to assume that the battle they face will be won without injury, much as he'd like to be able to protect them both from the worst of it. There will be blood. Without this, it will be a distraction. Maybe even a danger.
He withdraws his fangs to let the blood flow freely. It touches his tongue and the agonisingly long instant is over. He can taste it. He can taste it and his body sings with the tasting of it, his heart beating so quick and hard that he can swear he hears it pealing like church bells against his ribs. He laps at the cuts with his tongue messily before remembering that he can't waste a drop and using his lips to form a seal over the cuts. It's a kiss. It's so much a kiss and he knows but he can't bring himself to care.
His senses sharpen, almost too much. He can't hear Alucard counting. Not over the hiss of air as Sypha turns pages and the skittering of rats' feet in the ruins of the house above them and the settling of ancient dust. He can hear sunlight hitting the earth overhead. He can hear as new leaves tear out of medicinal herbs in little pots at another corner of the hold. His eyes are closed, but he can see the sound reflecting off Alucard's body before him. Every plane of his face. Every tiny little beautiful imperfection left by a lifetime of fragile humanity. He can smell metal in the blood, but he can smell the mixture of mint and rose oil that Sypha uses to ward off evil, too. He can smell the oil from a thousand fingertips on every book. The hold is full of life, life that only he can sense, four centuries of history condensed into a matter of seconds. And he can taste blood. He can taste blood and there is nothing else.
He hears twenty, as the initial overwhelming high of it starts to fade and he can finally catch Alucard's voice over all the noise again. Twenty seconds, and that feels wrong in both directions. It's felt so much longer. It's felt so much shorter. He can't have time left. This can't be two-thirds over.
He feels Alucard's hand in his hair next. Stroking. Slowly managing to ground him no matter how little he wants to be grounded. Anchoring him in the present. The present where (twenty three) he has to acknowledge that this is- intimate. That he's kissing and licking at Alucard's wrist almost in worship, like a profane prayer spoken in disgusting noises. That instead of just holding Alucard's arm, his fingers have coiled around his sometime in that last twenty (twenty five) seconds. That his face is flushed from ear to pointed ear, lips swollen and eyes blown wide. Breath coming out in gasps and whines.
He doesn't stop. The feeling of disgust with himself sinks in around twenty eight, but he doesn't stop. Not until thirty. This can never happen again, and so he can't waste a second. ]