Beth banned everyone from the infirmary, save for Alistair, who worked beside her with a grim determination and never said a word. By the time Beth emerged, wiping her hands on her apron, the little girl was clean and soundly asleep in Tall’s arms. The little thing hadn’t released her death grip on his neck since he had picked her up. She had not said a word, and her distress was palpable. I found that I could not stay too close to her. Even as a creature that fed on emotions, there was a sharp painful edge to her grief that could not be stomached. It felt almost as if I would have fallen into her grief had I tried to sip from it, and drowned in the depth of it. It was the sort of gaping, yawning abyss of feeling that could easily send you mad and I was astounded she was still functioning at all. I shuddered to think what sort of trauma could cause a child so much mental pain.

The gnawing pain that hit me like a physical slap in the face when Annie pulled me into the infirmary for moral support was almost a welcome reprieve from the intensity of the feeling downstairs. Even unconscious, pain ruled the tiny woman on the bed’s world. It was hard to see much, Beth had gone to work with bandages and magic, and most of her form was covered with blankets. A large patch across half her neck seeped red even after the witch’s expert ministrations and she seemed uncomfortably lumpy beneath the covers.

Watching as Annie fretted over the woman’s prone form, I could only think how? How had this woman, this human woman, survive such catastrophic damage? Beth’s magic was fairly rudimentary from what I understood, helping clot wounds and stem bleeding. Annie had said that she could feel where broken bones were, with a sense that approached sight to help her when setting them, or fixing dislocations. Aside from stemming the bleeding, and stitching the gaping wounds I had glimpsed in the doorway, I couldn’t comprehend how she had done much to help. And yet, Six’s chest rose and fell.

That she was living still showed she was a tenacious little thing indeed. Annie was on the verge of a full blown meltdown, so overwhelmed that she couldn’t even bring herself to lay hands on her friend. Instead her hands fluttered like birds over the surface of the blanket, birds that exploded into overdrive every time the woman omitted a little “oh” as she came to a new lumpy indicator of damage beneath.

Her emotion was strong enough that it made my teeth ache. I laid a hand on her shoulder, and it intensified. Her mind was a manic hamster wheel of fear and sadness and anger. Gently, I let my power leech out, and touched the edge of her angst like I had extended a single fingertip. Careful not to draw too much, I sucked and a little of the emotion subsided. Annie let out a breath in a huge whoosh of air, and then half turned to me, puzzled.

“Oh? That was you, wasn’t it?”

I was a little ashamed she had caught on so quickly, and nodded with some hesitation. I half expected to be hit, or at least chewed out for my audacity. I was taken aback by the radiant smile she presented instead as she snagged my hand in hers.

“That must come in handy. Thank you for that, I was getting a bit worked up.” She squeezed my hand gently and smiled.

Annie was a never-ending source of surprise to me. She should have been terrified. Meeting one of the Nightfolk was one thing - I couldn’t even comprehend how she could manage that with such aplomb - but it was another thing entirely to know that you had been subjected to the power of one. Again, thank you Witchfinders. They had spread a lot of propaganda to really hammer home just how terrifying it was to be at the metaphysical mercy of an Other. Vampires had gotten it the worst, their method of ‘suggestion’ had been very much the topic of the hour at the time. They had some small measure of mind-control, a type of waking hypnosis that they could and would use on human victims. They needed to be able to catch a person’s gaze to do it. Normal humans usually wouldn’t look you in the eye anymore if they so much as suspected you might be a supernatural.

“Do you think it would work on Six?” Her voice was tiny and hesitant, and she flushed a little as she voiced it. “I hate to even ask, but she must be in so much pain. Don’t say yes though if it would hurt you. I would hate to impose that on you. I don’t even know if what you do works that way, I think I’m being stupid, please tell me if I am being stupid even asking.”

Her voice got quicker and higher the longer she spoke and her hands went to work twisting together like tiny snakes. After rushing through her little speech she let out her breath in a whoosh and proceeded to look incredibly embarrassed. The corners of my lips twitched and I had to physically bite down to stop myself from cracking a smile at the look on her face.

“I’ll see what I can do,”

Her face flushed with relief and she plopped down into a chair with a massive sigh. I schooled my face into impassiveness. I really did not want my expression to give anything away, but my heart hammered at the thought of touching the tiny woman before us again. I could still recall the rush of emotion that had washed over me the last time I had touched her, when she helped me escape the bar and the Witchfinders. It had been so powerful that it almost felt like burning, and that had just been touching. I couldn’t imagine the strength of it to taste. She was by far the most “charged” human I had ever come in contact with, in a way that I would have sworn bordered on supernatural if I didn’t know better. There were a great deal of Nightfolk that weren’t half so tasty to the sorts of creatures that fed on things as nebulous as emotion. That had puzzled me, the first time I had felt it, and had been something I had dwelled on a lot in the intervening days.

It was probably a good idea to sit. I’d hate to embarrass myself by falling down if the strength of her emotion floored me as much as I expected it to. With hesitant fingers I reached out towards the prone, injured woman.

I had made the right choice.

I wasn’t new to the concept of feeding this way. Over the years as I had been summoned and dismissed from various contracts I had the opportunity to feed on many people, from all walks of life. Some people “tasted” stronger than others, or sweeter. Nightfolk were like supercharged versions of plainfolk, though feeding on them was a lot harder, especially if you attempted to do it without their knowledge or consent. It was generally easy to know the ones you should exercise caution with though. If they were supernatural, and there was any sort of ‘shield’ between you and dinner, it was probably going to be a mouthful.

I’d never been rolled by a vampire before; supernaturals tended to be immune to that sort of thing. But I imagine that this is what it probably felt like. This wasn’t a surge of emotion, it was a fucking freight train with no hope of stopping. I must have made some sort of noise because Annie, still on edge, grabbed my hand instinctively. It was probably the worst thing she could have done in that moment.

My power didn’t usually extend to others. It was usually a one way street, a conduit between myself and my “meal”. There was so much excess in this though that it felt like it flowed in all directions, including Annie’s. If I had been able to think straight I would have berated myself for touching her while she was unconscious. I just hadn’t anticipated it being this bad. With no control, Six’s feelings were like wildfire.

There was a fine line between feeling and remembering. I’d never tried to feed from a sleeping person before, had never considered that I could feed on the emotions tied to a dream. I had also never anticipated that I might then be subjected to those dreams, in vivid technicolour.

Shit.

Annie whimpered beside me, and I couldn’t blame her.

Together, we dreamed of dying.