Into Madness (John/Delgar/Donvyn)

Upon his release from house arrest, John went looking for his friends. His newly dyed armor and the returned weight of his weapons was comforting. The memory of the Clan Mother's warnings as she released him from imprisonment and the understanding in her expression still fresh in his mind, he avoided most of the clan members. He wasn't ready to answer their questions just yet.

He'd done a lot of watching while holed up in Sylvaswift's home. The door holding Donvyn inside the Friend House was locked from the outside. John wasn't surprised, and flipped the lock with a heavy click before slipping inside.

Curtains drawn, the interior of the building was shrouded in shadows. Tiny beams of daylight fintered in through cracks in the walls and under the door. John stood for a long minute, letting his eyes adjust to the darkness. His heart beat quickly in his chest; he rubbed his thumb and forefinger together in a nervous gesture. "Donvyn. It's John."

In the darkness, two orbs of red glowed and flashed, returning the little light that streamed through the cracks of the windows like twin mirrors. The pair of eyes seemed to glance at John for a moment, but kept on glancing around the room, as if John were no more interesting than the bookshelf or a vase. Despite their luminous quality, the vampire's eyes were dull and unfocused, looking for something leagues away.

The elf sat huddled in a corner, his arms drawn around himself as if he felt chilly. He didn't appear to hear John's entrance. Donvyn appeared tired, the usual bruises around his eyes seemingly darker than usual. His cheeks were hollow and drawn, bleached and pale with raised veins curling themselves over his cheekbones beneath the skin. Someone had the good sense to give the starved vampire a worn leather glove, which he idly chewed on.

John swallowed. It was all too easy to imagine the worst had happened to his friend, and Donvyn had slipped into insanity and gone feral. He certainly wasn't himself.

His boots sounded hollowly against the floorboards, occasionally a loose one creaked or groaned under his weight as he moved closer. He knew there was a candle on the nightstand...ah, there. He lit it, and sat down on the edge of one of the beds. Warm light flickered and danced on the wick, casting deep shadows against the walls and into the corners of the room. "I wish I knew what happened to you," he said. "You helped me, and you didn't even know me. I wish...but wishes are cheap."

John's thumb worried a small circle against the side of his forefinger. He talked, for the sake of talking. How crazy was he, to keep a crazy vampire company? "They let me out, today. Barred me from returning to the Guard, though. I'm not sure what to do with myself. I liked that job."

Donvyn blinked at the flame, his eyes flashing orange in the candlelight. He seemed to shy away from the flame, basic survival instinct still strong and prevalent despite the vampire's altered state. Depressingly enough, Donvyn's self-preservation seemed better now that he was lost in a fog.

The elf backed his way into the corner of the room. He must have felt safe there, for he resumed chewing on his leather glove. He stared at the candle intensely, as if the flame held the secrets of an Elder Scroll's prophecy. John's idle words seemed to float over his head, unheard and ignored.

As he stared at the flame, he turned his hands in his lap, resting them on his knees with his palms facing the ceiling. Beneath his gloves, his palms glowed with violet light in the faint shape of runes, obscured by the fabric. Donvyn seemed to imitate the candle flame. He surged the light forth, a purple glow filling the hollows of his cheeks, then ebbed it away to the center of his palms.

Quite suddenly, the light shorted out, a crackling noise breaking the silence as tendrils of violet light sparked and leapt over Donvyn's palms. The vampire whimpered, closing his hands into fists.

The ranger could track the most elusive of creatures out in the wood. That said, finding John was a casual thing which he never had to think much about doing. He just did it.

Delgar hesitated at the stoop, not knowing what went on inside, or who he might find huddled up in there today. Or, what they might be doing. “No, you stay there,” he told the anorexic looking fox beneath the stair. Then Delgar braved the front door, silently opening it with a crack of flooded light before he slipped inside and allowed his eyes to adjust.

Donvyn whined again as light flooded the room, a burst of sunlight that momentarily blinded him. He blinked rapidly, trying to banish the spots from his eyes. Delgar received the same treatment as John - no more deserving of interest than a sack of potatoes. However, the vampire appeared to scent the air. Woodlands, earth, foxes, and a strange, ethereal scent of magic wafted from the ranger.

The vampire seemed to remember his hands. He rubbed them together, agitated, and spots of stagnant, congealed blood bloomed from some concealed wound beneath his gloves.

John twisted, squinting back at the door as it opened. Expecting Hunts-With-Magic, seeing Delgar was a surprise. He smiled. "Hey," he said, softly.

The ranger's eyes adjusted swiftly, and set upon the vampire with a little frown, though his words were to John. "Hey. I... ah... hope I'm not interrupting anything." His gaze flickered to John, though were never long away from the vampire.

Donvyn's gaze lingered on his hands as he stopped rubbing them together. He whimpered at them plaintively, frowning, his face finally shifting to something more expressive than the vacant look he usually wore lately.

He spat out his leather bracer and started to chew at his own gloves, tearing them from his hands with a ripping noise. The stained fabric drooped to the floor, exposing his hands - rather, what was on his hands.

Tattooed runes swirled over his fingers, occasionally crackling with a faint, violet glow in the half-light. The Oblivion gate rune etched into the center of his palm was marred by a deep, raw fissure that seemed to have split his skin like cracked pottery. The gash bled sluggishly; the wound was red and raw from Donvyn's agitated hand-wringing. He whined at his hands, seeming to quietly lament their state, and set to licking them like a wounded senche.

John moved over on the edge of the mattress, the second bed between himself and Donvyn. It was as close as he dared get to the whimpering creature. "No, you're not. I'm just keeping him company."

He turned to glance at Donvyn, making a slightly disgusted face at what he was doing. "Not that he cares much. He's safe to be around...I think. I caught him outside a day or two ago, eating crocodiles. There's still enough of him in there that he's not hunting people."

Delgar frowned at what he saw of the vampire. Severely. When John reassured him, he just brushed the smooth blue stone that hung from his leather collar. He lowered his hand and drifted closer to John, familiar enough to touch his finely cropped hair. "Dangerous, still. Quite so. What happened to him?" There was no doubt in looking at the creature that he was only hearing tones and intentions, not words themselves.

John welcomed the touch. Delgar being one of the select few he would allow such easy intimacy from, he leaned into it. "I'm not sure of the details, but it has to do with that crap on his hands. There was an attack, and his boyfriend, life-mate, whatever...was hurt. The healers lost him for a while. Donvyn snapped.

"Now he just chews on things, and cowers in here. Unless someone says the Argonian's name. If you want his attention, that's the only way to get it."

Donvyn looked up from his licking, the tattoos on his palms briefly crackling with light.

His eyes tracked over John at the mention of "Argonian." The word seemed to register past the haze Donvyn was dwelling in, though the elf seemed hesitant to react. Argonian. His Argonian? Where had his Argonian gone?

Delgar seemed to find comfort in feeling the texture of John’s hair rubbed backward. The ranger frowned softly to hear the story, and asked quietly, “and turned to you for comfort?”

He saw the vampire react, even if it was faint. Delgar wasn’t one to miss much.

John shook his head, scooting closer to Delgar. "No. He's been like this since then. I just keep him company, not that it helps. He helped me when I came back and he didn't have any reason to. He did all this research to find out what was wrong with me, and then when he did, in finding Sky Shards. Locations, rumors, drawings. Anything to help me find them, so I could live.

"He's a friend. Only a friend. He told me he hates what he is. We even traveled to Rawl'kha to find a cure, but it didn't work."

Donvyn dropped his eyes back to his hands, the words traded between the men no longer registering. The awareness dimmed from his eyes, and he settled back into fussing with his palms. The fissures had stopped bleeding, but the violet glow continued to pulse gently from the wounds, magicka leaking from the severed spell.

Delgar turned to rubbing the back of his husband’s neck gently when he moved closer to him. Delgar was thinking, mossy-green eyes distant as he turned inward a moment. He frowned softly before he cleared his throat and raised his gaze to John’s. “It is likely a sickness in the spirit.”

“Do you want me to help him?” he asked, though he had little reason to offer such a thing of Donvyn. “For you, I would do it.”

John slipped an arm around Delgar's hips, holding him loosely and leaning his head in the slight curve of the ranger's waist. When Delgar offered John looked up at him, all at once hopeful and guilty for that hope. He glanced briefly at Donvyn.

"I know what it means. What he is. I...if I could, I would." John took a breath, looking over at the pathetic creature his friend had become. He closed his eyes, leaning his forehead against Delgar. "Please? Help him?"

In a gesture that seemingly ventured past the fog Donvyn was trapped in, the Dunmer stretched out his hand toward Delgar. His palm faced the ceiling, appearing to beckon to the ranger.

The violet light flickering from his palms trailed in a spiral, sparking at the Oblivion Gate in the center.

Help me.

Delgar straightened a little as he looked across and saw the magic seared into Donvyn's hand. His lips pressed into a thin line while he mentally prepared himself.

He looked down at John then, and nodded his answer. "Todd is outside. Let him in while I get ready?" He sighs and thinks again. "If I am gone too long... I will listen for you. Call my elvish name - you remember it? I will consider him lost, and surface."

John looked up at Delgar. "I'd never forget it." At Delgar's instruction, he stood and crossed the room. He opened the door, just a crack, to allow the tattered scrapper of a fox inside. "How long is too long?"