"And on that note, I'll leave the two of you alone and go back to my patrol. Peace."
As soon as Ash vanished, Bride sat on the edge of the bed, beside Vane.
It was rather strange to see him with the birthmark on his face. She touched it with her hand.
"Did I scare you?" he asked.
"A little," she answered honestly. "But those creatures scared me a lot more.
Are they always like that?"
He nodded.
"Dear God, Vane, you live in a very scary world."
"I know."
Bride sat there in silence as various scenarios of how this night could have turned out played through her head. After the way Vane had saved her in the past, she had thought he was impervious to anything.
Now she found out he had a very real, and very dangerous, Achilles' heel.
"How bad a shock does it have to be to do this to you?" she asked. "I mean, will static electricity do it?"
"It won't cause me to change forms, but it's not comfortable. The main thing we have to avoid are shocks from outlets, or any other manmade power sources, and lightning. Some batteries have enough power to change us."
"And it renders you incapacitated?"
He nodded.
Bride closed her eyes as a new fear went through her. This was terrifying since the people who were after him knew exactly what it would take to kill him.
And if they bonded, it would kill her, too.
What if she and Vane had kids one day and this happened? What if Valerius hadn't come along when he did?
Or worse, what if the cops or someone else had seen Vane changing forms like that? They would both be arrested and taken who knew where to be studied and cut up. She'd seen enough episodes of The X-Files to know the government didn't take kindly to weirdos in their midst.
"I'm sorry we didn't get to go dancing," Vane said quietly.
Bride ran her hand over his arm comfortingly. "Don't think about it."
However, she couldn't help but think about what had happened tonight.
Did she really want to be a part of his world, where people wielded magic as if it were nothing? Where they popped in and out of rooms, buildings, and such? She would be a human surrounded by
She was terrified of the thought. "Vane? Will our children be like you or like me?"
"Were-Hunter genes are stronger and usually dominant. I just don't know if our children will be Katagaria or Arcadian."
That scared her even more. "So you're essentially telling me I might birth puppies?"
He looked away.
Bride got up as that thought went through her mind. Puppies. Not children.
Puppies.
Granted, she knew people who thought of their animals as children. Her parents did, but this required a lot more thought before she committed herself.