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The Fool On The Hill

A. Cooper needed to get out more. This was quite apparent to him as word reached him of Millicent’s latest plans. Letting her vamps run wild seemed like a bad, bad idea to him. He knew a thing or two about losing control and knew none of it ever came to any good. There was no fool like an old fool. Not that Cooper would ever say such words aloud where they could get back to Miss High ‘n Mighty. He liked living, thank you very much. There was nothing to do but go for a ride. He dusted off one of his motorcycles and took off into the night.

After a few blocks, any worries he had seemed to be far away. The only one he currently had was avoiding the suicidal public, who seemed determined to walk in the middle of the road. He yelled out in annoyance at the latest person to get in his way. “Hey! Get your head outta your arse and move it!” When would he learn to keep his mouth shut? Probably never.

B. Leaving the bike behind, he hit the local pubs. It occurred to Cooper that he was a bit peckish. Seeing as how he was out of contact with his usual blood donor, he was going to need someone else to bite into. It didn’t take long for his eyes to land on someone who looked like they might be up for being used as a blood bag. He sidled on up to them and crossed his fingers there were no overzealous hunters working in this part of town.

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Nancy's happy to let him rest his head on her, and even snakes a hand up to his neck to gently play with his hair. She likes being close to someone, physically. Likes the mundane little platonic things like this. Her job, there really only are cuddles if it's someone like Cooper. And then it's always after feeding. Sometimes she just wants to sit with someone on the couch and drink, while being near them.

"Thank you." To what statement, she doesn't clarify. But she is becoming that friend for two vampires now, it seems. Cooper, and Kenzi.

His eyes close as her hand plays with the short strands of his hair. It looks like things are going to be alright between the two of them. That takes a worry off of his mind. He'll ask her later on if he can feed off of her, but not right now. That might spoil things again between them and Cooper feels that he so rarely gets nice things in his life.

This is nice. Calming, relaxing- gosh, she hasn't felt this relaxed in a long time, she realizes, and wonders if it's the fact that Cooper's back and safe. She shouldn't feel this way, Nancy knows. He's her friend, he's a client and if she's going to keep her job she can't exactly go about falling in love wth clients.

"Oh, I have something for you," she says, sitting up straight. "I managed to hide it, before Norrell's men would have found it and took it from me." Her slave ring had been completely depowered, as had the wand her mother had used. Just a fancy piece of wood, now.

If they had just kept their relationship professional, things would be a lot different between the two of them. But their personalities had just meshed together so well and the intimate act of feeding had brought them close together.

"Oh?" Cooper perks up. "Something for me?" He's completely forgotten how they had discussed getting him a daylight ring the last time they had been together. Being an Earl didn't make it a necessity. Still, having one would make things a bit easier for doing his duties.

If only.

"Yes. Give me a moment, let me find it." Nancy disappears into her bedroom, and the sounds of rummaging can be found. A minute or two later, she reappears in the doorway with a small box.

"Here, catch." She knows what it looks like and she can't exactly properly give it to him, because then she's giving him a ring and there's a ceremony there that she doesn't want to touch on. Nope.

Cooper catches the box with both hands and opens it up. He stares at the ring inside for a long moment, tracing one of his fingers over the bright blue lapis lazuli stone set in the middle of the metal. Then he takes it out and puts it on the ring finger of his right hand. It's a perfect fit.

He looks up at Nancy with a grateful smile on his face. "You shouldn't have, sweet-pea."

"You asked," she told him with a sly smile as she came to sit next to him.

"It's the least I can do. What do you say tomorrow we go for a walk in the park, maybe?" She doesn't want to guess how long it's been since Cooper's been in the sun, but she wants to be there for him, when he steps into it again.

"It's the first I've ever made- no doubt Kenzi will ask for one, next."

"I'd say that sounds like a very good idea. Granted, you'll have t'keep prodding me awake. Noon is like the middle of the night for me." He laughs. Sleep deprivation is a small price to pay for once again being able to walk in the sun.

"Kenzi?" He wears a puzzled expression on his face. "That little witch? What happened to her?"

"We'll get you copious amounts of coffee or something. Maybe go to bed early tonight?" She shrugged. "Or we could go later in the day. Whatever works for you." She likes the way he laughs.

Nancy purses her lips. "She, ah- it's my fault, really." She gestures vaguely. "After I was cursed, she started looking for the people who did it, and got in too deep. I told her to stop, but it was too late. She was dying..." It's still hard to talk about, and she doesn't really want to. Yes, Kenzi was still here, but she'd still watched her best friend die. Her best friend feed off of her in order to finish the transformation. She loved her dearly, and she was so happy she was around. But that didn't mean it was easy to have watched her die, even knowing she'd come back.

Cooper winces. He knows better than anyone the agonizing process of being turned into a vampire. He can only hope her death was quick. Not like his own, a noose around his neck, strangling slowly from being too small to properly have his neck snapped. He shudders at the memory and pushes it away, not wanting to face it when he was previously in such a good mood.

"Who was her sire? Did they stick around?" Newborn vamps required at least some supervision, lest they run wild.

She's thankful, really, that he doesn't press it. Not tonight. Not sober, though she's quickly reaching for her gin and having a drink. She needs it, because she can still feel Kenzi's blood on her hands.

"Yeah, some guy named JC?" Nancy rolls her eyes. "He owns Guilty Pleasures.. Kenzi likes him, but I can't stand the guy." She needed someone to blame that wasn't herself, so she had JC. JC and Faolan.

"JC?" He thinks for a minute and then snaps his fingers. He wouldn't have been much of an Earl if he didn't keep track of all the vampires in the nest. "Oh, Jean-Claude. No comment there." He likes to get along with most vampires, even if they don't always get along with him. "Least he should keep her from biting everything in sight."

Nancy nods. "Yeah- that's the guy." She wrinkled her nose. "He came to visit me, when I was in the hospital, which was... nice of him, I guess." She hadn't expected it, nor particularly wanted it, either.

Oh, crap, but now Cooper was going to zero in on the hospital thing.

Cue Cooper freaking out over the word 'hospital' in three...two...one... "Hospital? You didn't tell me you were in the hospital!" A note of alarm enters his voice. "When? What happened? How long were you there for?" He's got all sorts of scenarios running through his head, mainly focusing on the dangerous services Nancy could offer. Vampires, of course, were dangerous enough on their own, but even a john could have done something to her if she wasn't able to cast a spell fast enough.

"It wasn't important!" She tries, reaching out to put a hand on his knee. Something to ground him a little. He knew what sort of trouble she could get in- hell, he'd nearly killed her when he was high on fae blood, and Kenzi- Kenzi had nearly killed her twice now. She rubs at her neck.

"Just a few days, I tripped on an icy stair coming down from seeing the boys." It's an easy lie, one she's practiced thousands of times. But she doesn't know how long he still gets the benefits of having drank her blood. Hopefully, he'll believe her. She doesn't want to get into the details of what had really happened.

"Hmmmm." Cooper hums in the back of his throat and the scowl on his face says he's not entirely convinced by Nancy's lie. It just seems a little too convenient that something would happen to her that just so happened to have nothing to do with her involvement in the supernatural community.

"I shoulda been there," he says. Of course he'd blame himself for not being around to protect his friend. If he couldn't do even that, what good was he?

She knows. She knows he's not convinced. No one was, truthfully. Not even Norrell. But coming out and explaining what had happened, what had really happened... That opened up a new can of worms she didn't want to deal with. Besides, as awful as Fagin was, he still raised her. She still owed him something.

"Hey," she turns to look at him. "There was nothing you could have done. You're back now, so the next time I wind up in A&E, you better be there."

"I might never let you out of my sight again," he says, only half-joking. Someone has to be around to protect her. Nancy was in a dangerous business, and while Cooper knew logically that she could protect herself, he felt a responsibility towards her. She was still so very young in some ways.

"This'll teach me t'disappear for longer than a week. I'm out of it for a little bit and all sorts of things happen." A newborn vampire being sired and then Nancy being in the hospital was about all the "good news" he could handle.

"That'd put a damper on business," she remarks, but it's nice to know he cares. Nancy felt so much older than her nineteen years, but she was young. Naive in so many ways, and far too experienced in others.

"Exactly- stick around and life will get back to boring again." Please don't leave her again, Cooper.

"That, I can promise," he says, smiling at Nancy.

He twists the daylight ring around on his finger in an absent-minded fashion. This had gone so much better than he could have ever hoped. He'd expected her to slam the door in his face and tell him never to darken her doorway again. Instead, he's reaffirmed their friendship. For a vampire, that was all he could ask for.

"Good. I'm holding you to it, Cooper."

Nancy was incredibly loyal to her friends. How many times had Kenzi fed off of her, without her permission, and yet she kept her friendship going strong with the girl. When you made a friend of Nancy, you kept a friend until the bitter end.

She works on her gin for a few minutes in silence, enjoying the time just near him. Far more than perhaps she should. It's then that she asks: "You're not hungry, are you?"

Cooper's not especially hungry. He figured that seeing her on an empty stomach might not be the best plan. The term hangry definitely could have been used to explain away how short his temper could be on more than one occasion.

Her question does make him smile, his fangs prominently on display. "Your blood's always been sweet. Tastes like honey." Not exactly a yes or no answer.

"That's not an answer," but she sees the way his teeth glint in the light.

She'd been told her blood was sweet before, but never that it tasted like honey. A smile plays on her lips, and she brushes her hair out of the way of her neck. "If you are-" well, there's the option.

"I think that I will take you up on that offer." His voice was rough with the need inside of him. He had a beautiful young woman offering herself to him and Cooper knew even the most saintly and composed vampires would have trouble turning Nancy away. And Cooper was far from being a saint.

He moved over to where she was sitting, his breath heavy with the smell of alcohol. One arm moved around her waist, centering her as his mouth moved over the curve of her neck. She smelled so good to him. He bit down lightly, his fangs puncturing only a small wound. The hot spurt of blood ran into his mouth and he shuddered just a little bit with how good it tasted. He'd missed this, the sense of intimacy that came from feeding off of someone he knew so well.

She moves as he moves her, tilting her head further to the side to allow him better access, an arm coming up around his shoulders. As he bit down, she let out a small gasp, digging her hands into his shoulder.

She could feel her blood hot, pulsing into his mouth. It hurt, but not in a bad way. As he drank, she closed her eyes, holding on to him, letting him drink his fill. She trusted him- he paid, and he'd come so far from the man she'd had to poison in order to live. He wasn't Kenzi- newborn, inexperienced, lusting for blood.

A small moan escapes between her lips, and she held on tighter. She'd missed him. She'd missed him so much.

The Fool On The Hill

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