Violence Virgin

Proteus stepped into the sanctuary, careful as much as he could to not make noises: in one hand he was keeping the knife, and the other one was ready to run to the salt that was in his pocket, if needed. He had no idea if he and Miriam would have actually found there a demon, or even if they would have found a bunch of demons and would have died in their hands... but for the first time he was actually going there to fight, he was far from ready, but he was going to di his best...

Miriam went out after him, rolling her eyes at how slowly he was walking. Quickly looking around revealed they were all alone, and his hesitation was only increasing the chance of someone catching them. The longer they stayed in sight, the longer they would be in danger.
"C'mon," she said under her breath as she grabbed his arm and pulled him towards a corner, which would give them a far better view.
"Give me your knife," she told him quietly croached down towards a small pile of rubble by the corner, looking up at him waiting.

He was a bit surprised when she grabbed his arm, but he said nothing following her toward the corner, and when she asked for his knife he looked at her, curious, but gave it to her without hesitating.
"What do you want to do?"

She didn't answer him, feeling it was unnecessarry to tell him when he would see for himself in a second.
Without hesitation she took the knife to her palm where the last cut wound had just healed over, and cut herself, letting the blood pump out of her wound as she used her other hand to soak in the blood and draw the devil trap on the floor in front of them.
It took less time than earlier as she was now getting used to it, but still it took a while and she was scared she would not be able to spot dangers before she was done. If a demon were to see them now they would be easy prey.
"Stand guard," she whispered to him while she continued, not even looking up.

When he noticed her cutting her hand he immediatly understood what she was going to do: he followed her movements, his glance captured by the blood and by how she was using it. He had already seen it a couple of time, but it didn't stop to have a little effect on him... he was sure to can re-do it if needed, he had understood easily what to paint and how, but his glance couldn't leave Miriam's movements, and when she whispered him to be careful he just didn't listen her

As he was taking a quiet pause imagining the many ways to kidnap the human called Miriam, the perfect opportunity revealed itself as he noticed a couple, the woman looking an awful lot like the description Rin had given him.
In an instant he followed the shadows along the wall, careful not to be seen until they were both looking away from his direction. At that moment he grabbed a piece of wood from the rubble beside him and smashed it sideways into the man's head, having him fall to the floor in an instant. By then the woman had noticed him, and so he spent no time hesitating before he grabbed her by her throat, pushing her up against the wall making it hard for her to breathe.
"Miriam, I suppose?" he asked with a smug smile, knowing he had gotten his prey.

She choked under his grasp, having serious problems breathing as she gasped for air, she could only answer him when he loosened his grip slightly, but not enough to stop hurting her, and she was desperatly clawing at his hands still, struggling to get out of his grasp.
"Who's asking?" she asked, more to defy him than actually caring. She could not care less of the names of such bastards.
Quickly she glanced over at Proteus on the floor. He was not unconcious, but he looked badly hurt and bewildered, bleeding from his head. It would take him a while to recover, and so she did not expect any help from him. The words she had told him only moments earlier resounded in her head, and she realized now how true they really were.

He was still looking at Miriam's movements when suddenly he felt a strong pain on his head and everything went black for a few seconds. When he woke uo he felt confused and the head hurted like hell: he listened someone's voice and then Miriam's voice... what was happening? He was still too confused and even if he wanted with all himself raise up and do something, his body simply didn't want to react

He smiled, realizing he had been right by her responce, letting the hand he did not use for choking her stroke her cheek gently.
"Rin didn't tell me how beautiful you were," he mocked, only mentioning his name to get a reaction from the girl. She was, of course, not at all beautiful. Her skin was rough, her hair was a mess and he could hardly say the wounds and bruises were at all appealing.

She was still clawing at his hands, which were now more than just bloody. He couldn't feel the pain, but he surely must not have wanted his hands red and soaked with blood. The mere vision was disgusting to her, and yet she kept clawing, desperate for him to let go.
At the mention of Rin her heart skipped a beat and her eyes widened. But.. he had kept her alive, he had let her go, he had even helped her escape. She saw no reason why he would order for her to get killed, or how he had ordered someone to do so at all. He was obviously not a powerful, high-ranked demon, and the idea of this red-eyed bastard working for him was absurd. And yet it was the only logical answer...

Proteus had to wait another couple of minutes that in his mind seemed eternals before to be able to move again his body according to his will. When he finally managed to move, he did it as quietly as he could, rasing up. He looked at the demon, that was focused on Miriam and so most likely wasn't even noticing him. He silently and slowly moved to recover the knife from the ground...

He let the hand which was stroking her cheek fall to his side bored by her lack of responce. The only reaction he had gotten was the normal, panicked expression all humans gave him, and frankly it was getting tiresome. He had expected something more amusing from a demon's pet.
"Didn't tell me you were quite so boring though," he said as he frowned at her.

Miriam held back tears as she realized she had only been fooling herself when she told herself there was a reason Rin wanted her alive. Of course he did not want her alive, he had only been doing her a favor to re-pay her for giving him the knife. And now he had changed his mind.
She closed her eyes, trying to calm herself as she awaited the inevitable death this demon was sure to give her, but as she opened them again, her mindset had turned, and a smirk played on her lips. Proteus had regained control, and as he picked up the knife she was sure of his next actions. She wouldn't die today, and somehow, though it wasn't because of herself, it brought more smugness to her face.
"Give him a message for me, will you? Tell him he should never forget how difficult it is to kill me," she mocked as she spit him in the face.

As he had recovered the knife, still silently, approached the demon from behind and finally stabbed him in the right hip with all the strenght that he had.

He frowned at her, unsure of where her sudden smugness had come from, but it only grew to great annoyance as she spit him in the face, and while one hand was busy wiping away the saliva, the other hand was tightening its grip around her throat, having her let out gagging sounds as he stopped her airsupply completely. He wouldn't kill her, but he could still have fun giving her great pain.
He only let go of her as a great pain in his hip suddenly made him let go of her and jump to the side, yelling loudly.
"Fuck!" he yelled as he saw Proteus had gotten to his feet holding the knife with his blood dripping from it. The bastard had stabbed him, and he realized his mistake now, spending far too much time talking to the girl other than just dragging her away to Cali. He would not make that mistake next time, he made a mental note of that as he glared the girl down, before turning around and limping away, figuring the man would not be stupid enough to take him on alone now that he was aware of him, and still Calcifer did not like the idea of fighting with a man with an iron knife. The pain was far too agonicing, and with every step he took he swore a new profanity.

As he let her go she instantly fell to the floor coughing and gasping for air. It was amazing how red and warm her face had turned in the matter of seconds, but she felt like she would pass out for the lack of oxygen. Tears of pain welled up in her eyes as she struggled on the floor, but she would not let anyone see her cry. Even in her blurred vision she could see Proteus and the demon, and knew they could see her.
As the crossroads demon limped away she turned her focus to Proteus, but it only lasted a split second before her vision went black. She was dangerously close to passing out, and she desperatly tried to focus on her breathing without luck.

Proteus didn't have way nor time to stop the demon from running away, all he could do was instead focus his attention on Miriam that really needed help.
"Miriam, Miriam! Look at me, Miriam stay focused, breath..." he told her, keeping her face in his hands, looking at her with a worried expression: there wasn't a lot that he could do, but there was also no time to waiste, the demon could come back with company... Even if he had wished to have time to give Miriam the time to recover, he prefered take her in his arms and move fastly toward the rectory

Her vision was slowly getting better, though it was still blurry, and all she could see was a man above her yelling words she could not make out. She wasn't sure where she was going, or what had just happened, and all she could do was wait for her to slowly regain conciousness as she gasped deep breaths of air.