Chapter Text
London, 1908
The old man had questioned him at length. Then prodded at him. Taken his temperature. His blood pressure. Listened to his heartbeat (did he have a heartbeat?). Plucked at his skin.
“Fascinating,” the physician muttered after a long, long silence. “The answer is, to the best of my understanding: you don’t need to feed. There is no real way it is keeping you alive. Because you’re not alive.”
“You say… I can choose not to feed?” Ethan asked, wanting to make sure he understood correctly.
The man gave him a frank look from under heavy glasses. “Right. That is what I am saying, yes.”
It went against everything Ethan felt. It was a need. An imperative stronger than anything he remembered feeling as a human. Not that those memories were more than a twinkle in the twilight of the past that stretched out endlessly behind him.
The physician softly cleared his throat.
Ethan looked up.
“Can I offer you a meal?” The man pulled up his shirt sleeve, bared his lower arm, looked at Ethan expectantly. “Will this work?”
He had questioned Ethan enough to know Ethan wouldn’t kill him.
Still, the offer felt like a sly one. A test of character.
I could choose not to feed.
But he was hungry.
If Ethan felt like he was being studied like a lab animal while the old physician’s weak, warm blood filled his mouth, he knew that was on him - he had pretty much asked for this.
He leaned back long before he’d had his fill. This was an old man. He didn’t want to cause accidental harm.
“Could there be something else that makes it necessary for me to feed?” Ethan asked a bit breathlessly, wiping his mouth and attempting to compose himself. “Something… not related to being alive?”
The physician finally took his eyes off Ethan for just a moment as he brushed his fingers over the two spots of broken skin on his lower arm. They came away stained a bright red.
The man looked back up at Ethan. “Like what? Magic?” He paused, as if a new thought had occurred to him. “The devil?” He shook his head and got up from his chair. “My boy, if you want an answer to that question, you’ve come to the wrong person.”
Ethan gave a nod and briefly closed his eyes. After a moment, he got up, then left the room, left the practice. It had been worth a shot.
Sometimes he felt like he would spend eternity not understanding anything.
Except for how he wanted more blood.