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Luna was carefully bustling about the kitchen, grumbling to herself.

"Have I said thank you?" Victor said in a quiet voice. She jumped, and turned, staring at him.

"I don't think I'd gotten to that," he muttered uncomfortably, rubbing a hand across the back of his neck. "So, I wanted to thank you for all the help you'd given."

"It's all right," Rosethorn said, recovering from the shock. "I'm just not used to seeing you moving and talking is all." She grinned. "I'm used to you being a comatose body."

"Do you like me better this way?" he asked, quirking a small smile, and crossing his arms across his chest. "Because I could lie on the floor and twitch if it would make you feel better."

"No, that's all right. You should probably stand."

"Thanks." He stretched his shoulders a little, and abandoned all subtlety. "You have my mother's journal?" he asked.

"Uhm. Yeah. She came through here and helped my grandmother. Sort of adopted her into the family. That's how she's my aunt. My uncle was really pissed that she got adopted in. Had a crush on her. Heh." Rosethorn focused on what she was cooking and not looking at Victor's face. "But no, she left her journal in my keeping when I was little and left. Said something about not wanting to bring us danger."

"Oh," Victor said quietly.

Shaper dug in his own personal bag and selected a fresh outfit, washing up before wiggling like a dancing worm to get into it. He then scooted into the kitchen to make sure that Victor wasn't bullying Rosethorn. Instead he found them sitting next to each other, talking quietly, with cups of coffee.

"So... Uhm... did I miss breakfast? Or am I cooking for everyone?"

Luna looked up and choked back a giggle.

"Nope. You didn't miss it, and after that thing with your chicken, I don't think I want you cooking again."

"But I can bake, I've only messed that up once," he chuckled.

"Yes, but that once cost us our security deposit," Victor snorted, and poured Shaper a cup of coffee.

"I said I was sorry," Shaper muttered sullenly. "I thought it was yeast."

"Drink your coffee."

Shaper sat down to do that, and saw under Victor's elbow was a little leather bound book.

"Anyhow," Rosethorn said, as if continuing a previous conversation. "I think you should rest a couple days before moving on."

"Thanks for the offer, but I think that would be worse for you," Victor declined. "I think there's gonna be an uproar in the next few days, and I want to be well out of it."

"I don't want to get splashed," Luna admitted, "but I don't think you should start anything strenuous."

"Don't worry," quipped Shaper. "We'll keep him from bringing down any covens of rot vampires for at least a fortnight."

Rosethorn looked at him with an odd expression on her face.

"Well that's what he considers strenuous."

"No, that's what I consider a pain in the ass," snorted Victor into his coffee.

"Well, then at LEAST take it a little easier... ok? I had a hard enough time getting you back on your feet. I'd hate to see you knocked off them so soon."

"Get off my back Shaper," snarled Victor. "Stop worrying about me, it's stupid."

"It is not stupid!" retorted Shaper. "I'm really worried. I never thought you could be taken out by anything, then a little dart and you're down for a week."

"So I'll be more careful," Victor spat out between gritted teeth. "Back off."

Shaper hissed, and roughly sat his mug on the table. "Maybe," he snarled. "MAYBE I will. But think on this. If I had 'backed off' while you were out... you would NOT be here right now, enjoying that cup of coffee over nice polite breakfast conversation."

Then he turned, and stepped out of the room, as if afraid he couldn't say anything polite anymore.

"I think he's in love with you," Rosethorn half-joked.

Victor looked up and his eyes were brown and cold.

"I'm sorry, I must not have heard that right, what was it?"

Feeling a shiver down her spine, Luna drew back.

"I'll... just... uh... go and see if he needs anything."

Victor raised his eyebrows silently, and went back to his coffee.

"Yeah," muttered Rosethorn to herself, "I think I preferred it when he wasn't in residence. What a creepy bastard." She walked through her apartment, looking for Shaper, or signs he'd passed through. The bedroom door was swinging as if someone had run through it, and she stilled it with one hand, bare feet moving silently across the old wooden floor.

"Shaper?" she called, sticking her head into the lavender painted room. One of the windows was open, and white lace curtains fluttering in the breeze. She moved across to it, and stuck her head out. "Shaper?"

"Go away." Like a vinyl-clad gargoyle he was perched on the rooftree above the window.

"Aw c'mon," she said encouragingly, tucking her bathrobe around herself and perching on the windowsill.

"Why? I nearly died to bring him back... or whatever it is I do when I get poisoned... and he just gripes and complains and grumps around like some crotchety old sea captain. I pulled his fat out of the fire just this once... and I don't even get any thanks for it." He sighed, and pulled his knees up to his chest, wrapping his arms about them. "And neither, it seems, does Amy and she did help too." He sighed, and looked out with lambent green eyes into the sunlight flashing off other rooftops. "Sometimes he makes me feel so... so..." He stopped, and went back to staring.

"Okay, far be it from me to understand that creepy bastard," Rosethorn said, "but I think he's just worried. From all the stuff you've told me about him, he's never been slowed down that much before, has he?"

"... Not really..."

"Then he's scared."

"He's scared - I had to see him lying there dead!"

"Who knows what was going on in his head, all right? I'm not saying he's not an asshole, okay, because he's sure acting like one, I'm just saying that he may be too scared to thank you right now. Oh, and that he's a total homophobe."

"Yeah," Sighed Shaper.

"Look... whoa!" Shaper reached down without thinking and gabbed her wrist, steadying her and keeping her from falling out the window. "Uh..." she said looking down. "How about we finish this conversation inside?"

"'kay." He stood up, and graceful as a dancer, turned around, and stepped back inside. It was almost like he belonged on edge, perched precariously... like he lived for it, or was simply built for it. It was one thing that seemed the least creepy about him... instead, it made him seem something like a fallen angel to Victor's more heroic version. Maybe that was the real reason he couldn't bear to call Victor by his nickname. They started towards the door, when a soft voice froze them in place.

"...don't understand Amy, why you keep following me. I'm not that great a lover, I'm sure, and I sure as hell ain't that great a guy."

Shaper and Luna looked at each other blinking, and stayed still, listening to the voice on the other side of the door.

"I don't understand either of you. What the hell did I do to make you guys like me enough to risk your godamn lives for me. I mean, shit, you traveling from dark Œtill dark to follow me, who you can't even feed off of, crossing the territories of all sorts of things that'd sooner see you dead then moving past." There was a long pause, and Shaper almost moved to go into the room, when a deep sigh stopped him.

"What happens when they take you instead? What happens when they take Shaper? How am I supposed to deal with that, Amy? How am I supposed to pretend I'm okay with you two putting yourselves in danger?" There was a short bark of laughter. "How am I expecting to get answers talking to a sleeping vampire?"

Luna had the grace to look embarrassed by the eavesdropping but Shaper, he seemed to want Victor to continue.

But Shaper, as much as he wanted to hear Victor say more, didn't feel like making him think he'd been eavesdropping.

"Uhm...Victor? We or rather... you maybe, need to get Damyew out of the stable... he wasn't Uhm... willing to go anyplace last night so, ah well, that bloody thing nearly bit my fingers off when I tried to lead him here."

"Yeah, he can get kind of grumpy at times." Victor sighed and blew through his bangs. "I'll go get him. Get some breakfast in you, and wake Amy up." He pointed at Shaper's mask. "We've got to get going soon."

"Uhm, no, I think I'll go with you, thanks," Shaper said, raising his eyebrows.

"Have it your way." Victor put on his jacket and flipped his hair out of it, the long tendrils casting shadows across his face. "I'm not going to argue. It'll only take a minute anyway."

"Feh. That's only because the damned hay burner likes you better. I'll wake up Amy, and meet you there, 'kay?"

"If we're all going to be there," Victor said quietly, "I'll wait half a minute for Amy to get up and dressed. Then we can head out."

"So soon?" Luna asked shocked.

"Yeah," Victor said. "The sooner the better. Every time I try and settle down, shit happens. Heavy shit. If I keep moving, it's just a bit of trouble."

"Well that's mature," snorted Rosethorn, and disappeared into her bedroom, only to reappear moments later, wearing a pair of leggings under her robe, and getting into a pair of boots. Amy yawned and woke up, as Shaper put the mask on her.

"Come on." Victor helped Amy to her feet, giving her hand an unobtrusive, but clearly affectionate squeeze as he did. He grabbed the saddle bags as he passed.

Not too long later, the small group stood on the road out of town.

"Thank you again for your help," Victor said. "If you need help, just let me know and I'll do my best."

"Thanks," Rosethorn said, brushing a lock of bleached blonde hair out of her eyes. "Just bring this hunk of meat back sometime, so I can win a wrestling match."

"In your dreams," Shaper grinned.

"Heh."

Amy rolled her eyes. "We have a long road. Let's get walking it."

"You know what," Shaper said after a goodbye kiss, from Rosethorn, and a quick trot to catch up to the other two, "we should get a wagon, and hook it up to Damyew."

"No."

"Why not?"

"Because you whine too much."

"And making me wear out another pair of boots is going to keep me from whining how? At least let me ride, once in a while."

Damyew rolled a large brown eye back at Shaper, and snorted.

Shaper did the same thing to the horse.

"Oh you can ride if you want to," Victor said. "I don't mind."

"Great," muttered Shaper, stuffing his hands into his pockets. Amy turned and gave him a sweet smile.

"And just think about all the lovely exercise this is giving your legs," she said with doe-eyed innocence. "Your calves will be so shapely."

"So that's what you like about Victor. Shapely calves."

"Fuckoff," she said cheerily.

Victor chuckled to himself. It might be chaotic and annoying, but it beat the hell out of oblivion.