Down Under

"Trust me, she will hit you right back."

"Yeah, but I don't fancy Damion finding out."

"She won't tell him, I promise."

"Regardless, I'm not going to smack her just because she had an idiot for a son. It wasn't a complete loss though, encountering the maleficar. It was a fairy."

"Don't see how that could make it any better."

Stefan used the hand not pressed to his neck to reach into his pocket and pulled out something long and shimmering. "She shrieked like a banshee when I ripped it off, but I got a sliver of her wing. Not the whole thing, but enough."

"I'm scared to ask, bt what do you need it for exactly."

"Fairy wings have a shit ton of properties. A wing from a blood fairy is rarer than...I'd say it's rarer even than Prophets. Just an inch of wing could do anything but I have a solid metre and a half here. On the plus side, the thing can't live without both full wings, so it'll collapse at some point and then you get the rest of the wing."

"Oh right." She looked at the door as Rochelle appeared holding Rosalie.

Stefan lifted an eyebrow at seeing her, folding the shimmering piece of wing up slowly so he could tuck it into his pocket. "Are you leaving now?"

"Ive come to ask you if you've heard from Damion, he isn't answering his phone." She looked at Rosalie. "And this one is just too damn cute to put down."

"He came to help, but he avoided the fairy like it was the plague, so I don't know where he went after that...unless he tried to force Kaidan into closing the break, then he's an idiot and I hope he's caught on the other side of the break and dies a horrible death. You do realise he brought Kaidan with him, right?" Stefan suddenly hesitated before his head jerked to the side as he stared at the door, brow furrowed.

"He did what!" Rochelle suddenly tensed so much that Rosalie started whimpering.

"Doubt he was gonna live the kid at home. Damion isn't much of a family man but he tries his best, thought you would've realised th - what the hell is that?!" He jerked his head around to face the door again before he walked over to it.

"What's what?" Crystal and Rochelle asked.

"It's real hard to explain." Stefan opened the door and was immediately crashed into by Kaidan, who knocked Stefan to his feet by accident before scrambling to his feet again, shivering violently. The entire left hand side of his body was almost completely shredded and his eyes were wide with fright as well as glazed with pain.

Stefan had gotten to his feet too, shoving Kaidan behind him and bracing himself in the doorway. "Jesus-fucking-Christ, it isn't even here for us but latched onto Kaidan as the closest thing."

Rochelle looked at Kaiden. "Then if he's here...shouldnt Damion be to?"

"Not necessarily." Stefan was staring at something outside the door. "My guess is that Kaidan ran while it was focused on Damion and then caught Kaidan just before he got here. A family has similar scents and auras, you know. This one is looking for Thane. Have no idea where it dumped Damion."

Kaidan suddenly slumped to his knees and then dropped onto his right side, keeping his injuries from pressing the floor as he shivered and shuddered.

Rochelle walked to Kaiden.

"Why would it go after thane?"

Gotta go

Kaidan cringed away from her before trying to relax, whimpering breathlessly in pain.

"Cause that fairy that he has isn't supposed to be on this side and it's fucking up the balance." Stefan took a half step back from the doorway and the creature on the outside suddenly lunged for his throat, sinking sharp little teeth in before he could get it off. It had wings, like a fairy, except they were bony and jutted out in bloody stumps.

((bye bye))

Rochelle looked at the fairy, and she managed to get it away from Stefan.

The fairy was a little boy, looking victorious since he had snatched the wing fragment from Stefan's pocket, even though his face was now a mess of blood. He waved it around in victory before scrambling to get away from Rochelle.

Stefan pressed his hand to his neck, letting out a serious of gurgled swears as blood poured over his fingers from the wound.

Rochelle made the wing piece disappear.

"Hey! That's Nidawi's!" The little boy complained loudly. "I wanted to give it back to her, give it!" He wriggled his fingers at her. "She's gonna die without it you awful person." His stubby little wings trembled.

Stefan wrinkled his nose. "I was going to use that Rochelle. Give it back, okay?"

"Its gone back to her."