In ceremonies of the horsemen, even the pawn must hold a grudge. - Bob Dylan
It took far too long for Jasper to become aware of what was happening around him. Houseman and his little affinity for a torture he couldn't possibly begin to understand was draining, and none of them seemed to know just how much blood Jasper needed to survive if he was going to keep opening his veins like this. He didn't tell them how he purposely failed to turn all of these people, but time crept on, and he knew they were eventually going to realize that he was fucking it up on purpose. They were starving him now, maybe out of punishment, maybe they were giving up and leaving him to rot; either way, Jasper couldn't remember the last time he had been fed.
That was the excuse he was using mentally to justify his reaction. There was the sense of someone with a heartbeat coming into his cell. They felt familiar, but Jasper assumed it was one of the many guards or agents he had interacted with over the last few weeks. That was the only type of familiarity here, which meant they were disposable, the enemy, and if they stuck their neck out in the wrong place, Jasper was just giving in to his own nature. The human was saying something, but he couldn't place the words, and they didn't matter. For some reason, this idiot had a death wish, and they unlocked his chains as if it were an afterthought. They were hardly paying attention when the lock clicked open, and Jasper moved on instinct.
The blood hit like a drug, somehow more potent in a way he hadn't experienced despite being starved before. The thought was there and gone before he could pay much attention to it. It didn't matter; what mattered was the life he was in the process of ending, and how their struggle was going to make it all the sweeter. They were screaming, calling out his name, begging, and the sound was beautiful.
The sound was in his mind, and Jasper's awareness continued to return.
It took everything in him to pull away from this neck, and he told himself that looking into the eyes of his victim was fine; he was a predator, he was allowed, but the eyes that looked back at him were ones he knew too well. The blood was clearing his mind; it made everything sharper, and Jasper realized he was holding the body of Guy Anatole in his arms. He was deathly white, and there was a wound on his neck from Jasper's teeth, which was still freely flowing. The voice, Guy's voice, in his head was merely a whisper, and Jasper watched as those blue eyes rolled back and he went silent in his head.
Guy's heart was beating, but it was too much; he needed help, or he was going to die.
The door to his cell was open, there was the key to his chains discarded on the floor, and he realized that he'd nearly drained the human that had come to free him. Jasper bit his own hand and pressed it to the bleeding wound, but vampire blood could knit skin together; it couldn't heal this.
Another heartbeat was suddenly close, and Jasper looked up too late to see Houseman standing in the doorway. He expected the man to be furious, amused, but instead, he looked hungry in a way that turned Jasper's stomach because Houseman was looking only at Guy.
"Attacking the one trying to free you, Jasper, seems rather ungrateful to me," Houseman said, and he didn't even react to Jasper bearing his teeth at him. "Mr. Anatole is very close to death, Jasper; he needs a blood transfusion and medical care."
"If you're smart, you will get out of my way," Jasper threatened, but Houseman didn't seem phased.
"You can't save him, but we can," Houseman said, and he finally looked at Jasper. "You leave him with us, and I'll end our little arrangement. You can walk out of here, and no one will stop you." Jasper froze. He was still weak despite feeding from Guy, and he didn't know how hard he would have to fight to get out of here. He remembered the sick feeling that came when Guy betrayed him. He remembered the fire and how it felt knowing he had put even a little trust into that human brat, that he wasn't entirely sure if Guy would even be alive if that witch hadn't intervened.
The body in his arms was dying, and all he needed to do was put Guy down and leave him to the wolves the way he once left Jasper. Houseman was doing a poor job of concealing his thoughts. He was giddy at the idea of getting his hands on Guy. He was already thinking about when they could crack his skull open and take the first sample of his brain. Houseman was so happy that he had the knowledge that humans could live with so much of their brain missing because there was so much he wanted to see of Guy's mind.
None of this was Jasper's problem. He had the opportunity to get away, and he couldn't let some boy he barely knew get in the way. So he gently laid Guy's dying body on the ground and stood. Houseman smiled and nodded, saying something about Jasper making the right decision, and let him walk away. He ignored the way Houseman reached down to push the hair from Guy's face; he ignored the ideas of endless experiments that the boy was going to have to endure.
When Houseman thought about how they would eventually turn Guy, and they would have to find someone powerful enough to be worthy of it, that was when the last of Jasper's self-control snapped. No one was turning his boy except for him. Houseman didn't see him coming, none of them did, because Guy's slowing heartbeat in his arms was the burst of adrenaline Jasper needed to get them out.
+++
Running off into the night while covered in blood and holding someone who was in the process of actively dying was not exactly the smartest decision, but Jasper didn't exactly have a lot of time to think all of this over. He still felt a little out of his own mind, but it got even worse every time he heard Guy's slow heartbeat and was unsure if it was going to be the last one. The smart thing would have been to get as far away as possible and then get him help, but Jasper was all too familiar with what the human body felt like when it was about to die, and there wasn't time.
He managed to find enough clothing to make himself look presentable and hesitated as he approached the hospital. Someone bleeding out was not uncommon, but someone bleeding out with no injuries would take time to explain. Jasper told himself it was to make admission easier, and he didn't take any gratification in cutting Guy's wrists. He used his own blood to make the wounds look worse than they were and vowed to heal them as soon as he was alone with the boy.
The panic on his face must have been real enough for the hospital staff because they rushed Guy back without asking too many questions. Jasper suggested to them that he stay close, even though that was against policy. He said how he found Guy unconscious and bleeding out from the wounds on his wrists.
"And what is he to you?" one of the doctors asked as they hooked up the first of what was likely going to be a few blood transfusions.
"He's mine," Jasper replied without thinking. If anyone in the room decided that was worth questioning, they wisely kept it to themselves. There weren't any drugs in Guy's system, so he had managed to kick that habit those Talamasca fucks were stringing him. It made Jasper's teeth itch as he watched these unskilled and unworthy hands stitch up the cuts on Guy's wrists. It didn't take much for Jasper to suggest they leave the room and only come back when it was time to start the next transfusion. As soon as they were gone, he healed the cuts, but kept the bandages on because it was easier.
"You idiot boy," Jasper muttered, "open your eyes so I can tell you how reckless it was to release a starving vampire." Guy's eyes didn't open, but his consciousness was in the room, his powers, and that was how Jasper knew that he wasn't beyond saving. While it wouldn't completely heal his blood loss, Jasper got up and did something he hadn't done in a very long time; he cut his wrist and fed Guy a little of his blood. Within hours of meeting this boy, he used his blood to heal a superficial wound, but blood sharing was going to entangle them in a very new way.
Even unconscious, Guy's body reacted. His heart rate spiked, more color returned to his skin, and that lingering sense in the back of Jasper's mind became stronger. He was still starving, but he couldn't risk anyone in this hospital looking at Guy too closely. There was no way his brain activity would look normal if he were hooked up to a machine, and he was nearly bled dry with no wound. So despite feeling desperate to take that blood bag for himself, Jasper crossed his arms and waited.
They were nearly done with the third transfusion when the awareness became sharp, and Jasper absolutely did not rush over to Guy's bedside. Two blue eyes, which he wasn't sure he would ever see again, slowly opened and looked up at him. Despite the fact that Jasper had been the one to nearly drain him, Guy's heartbeat didn't stutter. He wasn't afraid or even startled to see Jasper standing over him, as if he had expected it, which was infuriating and something he was going to yell at Guy about at another time.
"Did we get out?" Guy asked softly, and that was a fair question. Houseman's little medical room wouldn't have looked that different from this one.
"Yes, though you weren't much help after the beginning," Jasper replied, and Guy actually laughed a little. "Was that your plan? Let me drain you and see where we went from there?"
"I didn't have a plan beyond getting to you," Guy replied, and if he wasn't in a hospital bed half dead by Jasper's own hand, he might have strangled him. He must not have done a good job of keeping that thought to himself, or the blood had connected them more than Jasper thought, because Guy shook his head.
"I nearly drained you," Jasper said, but Guy held his gaze.
"But you didn't," he replied, like it was that easy. Guy frowned, looking a little confused. "He asked you to leave me behind? Why would he do that? The Talamasca already had me. Why would they need me half dead in Amsterdam?"
"You've always been dangerous, boy, even if you're unable to see it," Jasper replied and was silently thankful that Guy didn't acknowledge how Jasper contemplated leaving him behind. Guy looked like he was going to continue this conversation, and Jasper was very done. The last transfusion was finished, and he could handle any other healing from here. Guy's eyes widened a little as Jasper pulled the IV out and picked him up like he weighed nothing. Guy was still in his regular clothes, another reason he gave the staff a little push. "It's not safe here." Guy was close enough that Jasper could see the slight color variation of blues in his eyes, how good he felt in Jasper's arms, how Guy's now steady heartbeat was enough to calm his frayed nerves, but he ignored all of that in favor of getting them both somewhere safer.
+++
They only had so much time to travel before the sun began to rise, and they needed to find somewhere to bunk down for the night. Guy had stolen a car, and Jasper spent the rest of the night driving just fast enough that no one would try to pull them over for speeding. Guy dozed in the seat next to him, still recovering from the blood loss, which Jasper was trying not to be angry about. Apparently, he was doing a bad job of keeping those feelings to himself because Guy confronted him about this anger after a couple of hours.
"You're angry at me," Guy said.
"Yes," Jasper replied.
"I'm sorry about everything that happened in London," Guy said, which was not what Jasper was expecting to hear. The anger from everything that had happened before was so far gone that it didn't even register for him anymore. "Even after it all, I shouldn't have left you like that. It was cruel, and I try not to be cruel, even though I knew lying to you was going to be the thing you hated the most. I just didn't know how to tell you everything once the ball got rolling. I thought that if I admitted to one lie, you'd tear my throat out, which just made the lying worse, and then everything happened.
"When I heard what they were doing to you, I knew I had to do something," Guy continued, and now he sounded angry. "I hated the idea of being stuck there, so I just acted to get you out as soon as possible. I figured if I got you free, you could take care of the rest; you just needed someone to unlock the door."
"For all you knew, I wanted to kill you," Jasper said, but Guy shrugged like that didn't really matter. "I almost killed you."
"Yeah, you did, but you didn't, so it doesn't matter," he said. Jasper wanted to smack this idiot for having so little belief in his own life or any sense of self-preservation because no one should be this blase about their life. He was about to lecture Guy about being an idiot, but when Jasper looked, Guy was asleep, and waking him up to yell at him right now didn't seem right. So he kept driving until he found one of his old safehouses out in Antwerp. Guy slept a lot for the first two days and was really seeming like himself by the third. There was still an unspoken thing lingering between them, but neither of them seemed ready to broach it, so they just orbited each other, much like they did when they first met.
Jasper was older, but he did need to feed, and he ventured off into the city to find victims so he could recover as well. He'd left Guy in the sitting room of the safehouse, reading one of the many first-edition books he had lying around. This version of Guy, one that wasn't trying to live a double life or carry the weight of anything on his shoulders, was fascinating. Jasper realized that he was seeing the real Guy, without any walls or barriers between them, and it somehow made him even more alluring. He caught himself staring at this human who had wormed his way into his life and stayed.
They were both nearly recovered, and that meant they would have to figure out the next steps soon. Did he want to ask Guy to stay? The idea that he would be the one to ask seemed ludicrous, yet considering their dynamic, he didn't believe that Guy believed he was wanted enough to even ask. Now that Jasper had drunk Guy's blood, his mind was so much more open, and the stray thoughts he could catch seemed to say that Guy was very much waiting to get kicked out onto the street and would deal with his wanted status afterward. The Talamasca clearly wanted to sink their claws into the boy; now that they knew they couldn't control him as an agent, they wanted him as a specimen, and that was revolting. Jasper didn't think that was a fate he could bestow on someone he hated, let alone someone who got under his skin like a shard of glass.
He wanted to clear his head a little, so Jasper purposely went further into town and away from the safehouse so he could try to get his head on straight. He had just finished draining an American tourist when a sudden sense of panic that was not his washed over him.
Jasper, it was Guy's voice in his head, and he didn't have time to be proud of just how far his boy could project now because he sounded terrified. They found us. The anger was so immediate that Jasper was sure he could see red, but Guy's voice was still in his head. They know you're here, they are setting a trap for you, they know you'll come--
Guy's voice suddenly went silent in Jasper's head, but he was always already halfway across the city. He didn't want to think about how that sentence ended because he wasn't about to let those people get their hands on what was his again. Jasper didn't care about any trap because whatever they were planning, he wasn't going to give them enough time to set it up. He wasn't going to give them enough time to catch him again.
Jasper barely had time to take in the scene as he burst into the room. There were half a dozen armed agents in his living room. The furniture was smashed, and there was the smell of blood in the air, and Jasper knew that someone had drawn blood from Guy. He was struggling against two agents trying to drag him from the room. He was bloodied, his knuckles cut and bruised, and it looked like he'd landed more than a few hits. The thing that truly sent Jasper over the edge was the arm locked around Guy's throat, cutting off his air, and that would not stand.
He killed efficiently; Jasper didn't want there to be time for them to call for backup, so he killed them all as quickly as possible. While he ached with the idea of making them hurt, he had other priorities. The one who was attempting to strangle Guy ended up nearly throwing him to the floor as Jasper sank his teeth into his neck. They were all gone, and he was about to say something about them being safe when he realized something wasn't right.
Guy was still on the floor, his eyes half rolled into the back of his head, muttering incoherently and twitching like he was about to have a seizure. Jasper dropped to the ground and took Guy's face into his hands.
"What's wrong? Tell me, tell me what's wrong so I can fix it." Jasper ignored that he sounded desperate, but Guy's heart was racing, and it was scaring the shit out of him.
"I was trying to read them when they died," Guy managed to say. "They were going to use me, they were going to use me, as bait, I was the bait. They wanted me, but they also want you, and they knew that if they took me, you'd come the same way I came for you. They were all so happy, so giddy, because they know how to control you. They saw how you didn't leave me behind when they asked you to, they know, they know I was stupid enough to go in there without a plan because I couldn't leave you."
"Guy, Guy, you need to stop, your heart sounds like it's going to burst," Jasper said, ignoring every word that Guy just said because that wasn't what he could deal with right now. Guy's eyes were far away, as if he was seeing and hearing things that Jasper couldn't, and he had no idea how to pull this kid out of this spiral. He was about to ask Guy what the hell he was supposed to do when Guy closed the distance between them and practically yanked Jasper into a kiss.
Whatever he was expecting, it wasn't that, and for half a second, Jasper didn't even know how to react. When he thought about this, he pictured something else, like shoving Guy against a wall and kissing him hard enough that it left a bruise. He pictured himself as the one to initiate, yet this remarkable and insane human was the one to kiss a vampire who had just murdered a room full of men. He was getting blood on Guy's clothing, but none of it mattered because Jasper couldn't remember the last time touching anyone had felt this good.
When Guy broke the kiss, he stayed close enough that Jasper could feel his breath, and everything about him was calm. "I knew it," Guy whispered, and he was touching Jasper as if he were made of something precious, something that could break. "I knew you'd be the one who could make it quiet."
+++
It was damn near comical that there wasn't enough time to even talk about this. Or in Jasper's case, there wasn't enough time to kiss this infuriating human into incoherency because several Talamasca bodies surrounded them. There was blood drying into the carpet, there was no telling if backup was nearby, and it sounded like someone had made the connection that Jasper might be a tad obsessed with Guy and might be willing to spill a lot of blood to keep him to himself.
So there wasn't any time to do anything other than pack up the meager belongings they had managed to gather in the last several days and run as fast as possible. However, Guy hesitated when Jasper went for the car.
"We should split up," Guy said, and for a smart boy, that was one of the dumbest fucking things he had ever said. "Moving me around at your pace isn't going to go well for either of us, and we need to cover more ground. I keep going during the day, and you catch up."
"They just caught up with us, and you want to go off on your own? Are you out of your fucking mind?" Jasper asked. Maybe he was about to start yelling because Guy had cuts and bruises from the Talamasca again; they hadn't discussed healing them yet, and there was a bruise beginning to darken around Guy's throat because that agent was going to nearly strangle him. Jasper stalked forward so he was in Guy's space, and before everything happened, Guy would have probably taken at least a few steps back to get away from the very obviously furious vampire. Now he stood there and let Jasper glare at him because somewhere along the line, he stopped being scared that Jasper would actually hurt him.
"What we're doing right now isn't going to work either. You're holding yourself back because of me, and I can only go so far because of you unless you're willing to spend daylight in the trunk of a car," Guy replied. The idea of spending the day in the trunk of a car was appalling, but the splitting up was worse.
"Let's find something with a bigger trunk," Jasper said, and Guy looked genuinely surprised, like he didn't think Jasper would debase himself to the point of sleeping in the trunk of a car. Jasper didn't wait for Guy to say anything; he grabbed his arm and dragged Guy into the city as they looked for a car with a bigger trunk that was still out of the sun's reach.
That was how Jasper found himself dozing in the back of a car as Guy continued to drive them across Europe. They needed to get off the continent, maybe into America, but Jasper didn't have access to his reserves at the moment, and they would need a little help. He slept a little, but mostly he idly touched Guy's mind just because it was there and it called to him like a siren. Guy mentioned that he was the thing that made it quiet. Jasper had a lot of practice with the mind gift; he knew all about blocking others out, and shields seemed to be one of the things that Guy struggled with when a lot was going on. When they kissed, he reached out to Guy mentally without thinking about it. He was panicking, frantic, and Jasper put up a wall between them and the rest of the world. It evidently was enough to quiet the noise.
As soon as the sun set, Jasper insisted that Guy pull over. If he didn't do it right now, Jasper was going to pop the trunk and get out himself.
"All right, all right, I'm pulling over, you don't need to be a bitch about it," Guy said as the car came to a stop. The trunk popped up, and Guy was looking down at him, exhausted but also annoyed. Jasper climbed out of the trunk and watched as Guy rubbed his temples. The headache had been brewing since earlier in the day, but he wasn't doing anything about it. "I was trying to think if I had anyone we could call a favor into, but I really don't have anyone out there that I'd trust with knowledge of your whereabouts, so I'm not quite sure what the next step should--"
Whatever the next thing Guy was going to say didn't matter because Jasper closed the few steps of space between them and kissed him. While it was infuriating that Guy didn't seem to have any regard for his own safety and the fact that the Talamasca were clearly looking for him, Jasper could not remember the last time his well-being was someone's top priority. He was the strong one here; he was the powerful one; he should be taking care of both of them, yet this man with less than three decades on this planet was keeping him safe. Guy practically melted in his arms and let himself get pushed back into the car.
A car rushing by was the only reason Jasper didn't drag Guy into the backseat of the car to have his wicked way with him, and the way that Guy chased after his lips seemed to say that he wouldn't be against this idea.
"We, you beautiful boy, need to get out of Europe," Jasper said with an emphasis on the word 'we.' Guy blinked like he didn't quite understand why Jasper was saying it that way, but he nodded. "Now, even though I commandeered the motherhouse as my own, I do have stashes of money around, so we just need to get to the next one and we'll have enough to get much further away."
"Sounds like a plan," Guy replied, but it took an extra moment or two for them to move away from each other and get back in the car. They were within driving distance of one of his reserves, and by the time the sun was coming back up, they had a private plane from a company that was supposedly owned by a vampire and featured planes that were safely protected from the sun.
"I've never even flown business class," Guy said as he looked around the plane. The circles under his eyes betrayed just how tired he was, and Jasper also wanted to sleep without worry for the day. There was a single bedroom at the back of the plane, and Guy hesitated as he walked back. He looked like he was about to say something stupid as he would sleep in one of the chairs, so Jasper yanked him in the last few steps, closed the door, and locked it. Between one breath and the next, Guy was on his back in the middle of the bed with Jasper leaning over him, not quite pinning him down, but making it rather obvious that moving was probably not the best idea. It was a strange mirror to the garage, only this time Jasper wasn't so angry that he couldn't see straight, and Guy wasn't terrified and begging for his life.
"Are you going to yell at me again?" Guy asked.
"I should, and you'd deserve it," Jasper replied. "I haven't had the chance to yell at you for being so reckless and stupid that you'd walk into a room with a starving vampire and free him with no ability or attempt to protect yourself. Not only that, pretty sure I threatened to kill you the last time we saw each other, kid, so I'd love to hear how you decided that little rescue mission was in any way a good idea." Guy looked a little taken aback, like that wasn't the thing he was expecting Jasper to yell at him about.
"I guess I thought getting you out was the first priority," Guy said carefully. "I didn't really think much beyond that because I didn't know how starved you actually were. When I walked in, you seemed pretty coherent, so I figured I was rolling the dice on how mad you were about the lying and the fire. I knew there was a chance you'd need to feed, but you couldn't get out of there without blood, so it needed to happen one way or another. If you were going to kill me, you were going to find a way regardless of how I went about breaking you out. I guess I didn't really consider that you might kill me by accident. That was a stupid mistake on my part."
"If I fed on you for a minute longer, you'd be a corpse right now, that's how close it was," Jasper said. "So now I was left half out of my mind with you unconscious on the floor, did you have any plans about that?"
"No, but the agents we saw a few days ago mentioned something." Guy moved so he was leaning back on his elbows, and they were somehow even closer. "I already know they wanted to keep me; we talked about that night in the hospital, but they were saying how funny it was that you almost left me behind. Houseman said something to change your mind, to make you come back for me. What was it?"
"That animal said he was going to crack your skull open and see how many pieces from your brain he could get away with removing, but when he said that they would have to eventually find a vampire worthy to turn you, I went back." Jasper slid one hand into Guy's maddeningly hair and tilted his head to the side, exposing his neck, the same position he had been in that night in the bathroom. When he pressed his lips to Guy's ear, his entire body trembled. "No vampire gets to touch you. I couldn't allow it, and that's what made me go back. Not the threat of torture for you, not your captivity, but the mere implication that another vampire might someday attempt to turn you."
No one else gets to have me? Guy's voice said in Jasper's mind. How exactly are you planning on pulling that off? Are you going to turn me? The question made Jasper pause because when he thought about possessing Guy, he didn't actually think about turning him. It was about no other vampire feeding from him, and no other vampire blood could touch those lips. Ah, now it becomes clear, Guy said, and despite the precarious position their bodies were in, he seemed to relax a little.
"You gave me a little vampire blood in the hospital, didn't you?" Guy said as Jasper left, with bites and bruises from human teeth in the neck, he nearly tore open. "You felt different when I woke up. I'm assuming sharing blood strengthens the bond between vampire and whoever he is feeding from, making that stronger seems like a good way to keep both of us safe." It was enough permission to sink his fangs into that tempting neck, but this time, it wasn't frantic. Guy gasped from the pain, but he also pulled Jasper closer so there wasn't any space left between them.
The last time Jasper got the chance to drink from Guy, he was too out of his mind to realize what he was having. Despite his many years, Jasper hadn't drained many telepaths, and it added almost electricity to Guy's blood that, if someone else found out about it, was going to make him extremely wanted in the vampire community. Every drop also made Guy's mind feel even clearer, closer, maybe even brighter. That self-control was even harder to find with a warm body beneath him and whispered swearing about how fucking good it felt.
The connection between them flared to life, but Jasper wanted more. He barely gave Guy a chance to recover from the bite before Jasper was kissing him, making sure to cut his own tongue on his fangs so his boy could get the benefits of vampire blood. Jasper could feel the moment the blood hit Guy's system because his entire body seemed to come even more alive. He gasped against Jasper's lips, and for the first time in a long time, as a vampire, Jasper felt like he was the one being devoured.
If you don't touch me, I think I'm going to go out of my mind, Guy projected, and maybe Jasper felt a little smug that he reduced this potentially very powerful telepath to someone who was this desperate. His smugness must have come through their connection because Jasper swore he could feel Guy roll his eyes at him.
"When we have time, I'm going to take you apart piece by piece," Jasper whispered against Guy's lips. "I'm going to render you so incoherent that even that noisy brain of yours will be forced into silence."
"Is that a promise or a threat?" Guy could barely get a word in, but of course, he used the few words he managed to say to be a brat. Jasper decided to show a little mercy and slipped his hand into Guy's pants, wrapping it around him with little flourish. He was given the gift, the privilege, of watching every micro expression on Guy's face as he reached the end, and when he came, Jasper wondered if he somehow got even more beautiful. It was ridiculous just how deep this boy managed to sink his claws into his life. The blood was absolutely hitting Guy much harder than it would a normal human, so when he raised a trembling hand out like he was going to take care of Jasper, he swatted it away.
"Next time," he said, confident there would be another time, and Guy nodded in agreement. Jasper grabbed a few tissues from the tiny bathroom and cleaned them both up before settling down on the bed next to Guy.
"I can see why people were willing to pay stupid amounts of money for vampire blood," Guy said after a moment of silence, and Jasper huffed a laugh. "When they found me, I thought they were going to throw me in a car and drive away as fast as possible. Why wait? Then they started making all of these comments about how they knew you'd come out of hiding if they had me, how they knew they had leverage, that I was bait."
"That's what you were talking about when you were overwhelmed," Jasper said.
"Yeah, you brought me out of the spiral. You make everything quiet. They said it obviously worked the other way; I ran into Amsterdam without a plan because I clearly was more preoccupied with getting you out than doing anything safely," Guy said, and he paused. "They're right, if you vanished and Helen called me saying she had you and to get my ass to her location, I'd go without even thinking about it." Guy turned his head so they were looking at each other. "Am I reading all of this completely wrong, or is it the same for you?"
"It's the same," Jasper said without hesitation. There was no denying this giant weak point anymore, as both had it, and pretending it wasn't there wasn't going to make it go away. "I'd tear through all of them to keep you safe. You've buried yourself under my skin like a shard of glass."
"You've infected my mind like a parasite," Guy replied. Neither of them said another word, and Jasper woke up after sleeping for several hours as the sun was coming down. Guy was on his side, facing Jasper, still sleeping soundly. The bite mark on his neck had turned into a bright and wicked bruise that was going to be impossible to hide. He only had so much time with this boy because he legitimately did not know if he could turn Guy after what happened in Amsterdam.
However, Jasper also had another very real and tangible reason to hate the Talamasca. While there weren't enough vampires in the world, there were others that The Talamasca could easily conscript into whatever plans they were laying. Telepaths and those that weren't already under the control of the Talamasca were practically unheard of. They weren't going to give up on getting Guy Anatole back under their thumb, one way or another. Well, Jasper was possessive, and he wasn't willing to give up something he had claimed as his own.
The Talamasca had thrown Guy to him like he was disposable; there was no way they weren't expecting Jasper to kill him, and Guy becoming another reason for Jasper to burn the Talamasca to the ground? Guy shifted in his sleep, and Jasper could feel that bright mind starting to wake up. You and I could have some fun together.