He was such an idiot. Things had been going well at first - it had taken straining and effort, but she had pulled it out - and then he realized that she was in crippling pain, her body shaking, her tail curled tight against her body as her hand trembled, fingers fighting not to release the dark red goop. Because he had asked her to.

She had stopped though when he finally realized what was happening and cried out for her to stop. She fell, her body limp, and he dove to catch her, cradling her in his arms as they hit the ground.

“Please...smile again.” Soft, desperate pleading. Nevin looked down to see her staring at him - staring at his mouth. He clenched his eyes shut and plastered a smile onto his face, only taking a moment to put the false expression in place.

“You did good Eteri, you did very good. I'm proud of you. Eteri - it was smaller.” His voice trembled slightly, and if he hadn't had so much practice smiling while irritated or bored with customers, he wouldn't have been able to keep the mask in place. But for her, now, he could. She had tried so hard to make him happy. It wasn't her fault he was a damn fool who didn't know what was going on.

He rolled over onto his side and used his threads to lever the two of them off the ground, clutching Eteri closely to his chest. “How about we go take a rest, Eteri.” He opened r his eyes slowly focusing his gaze on the door to the bedroom. Praying she wouldn't see that the he smile didn't quite reach them.

“Eteri want to...uh…” She pushed herself up so she could steady herself better. “Eteri want to make sure Nevin is safe but happy.” Despite himself, his eyes slipped to hers and softened.

“Safe I don't care about, Eteri. I'm happiest when I'm with you. We scared Ezra, you know. Before you, she had never heard me laugh.” A slow step, careful not to jostle her. Slowly and steadily he carried her back to bed, opening the door with his threads.

She muttered her distaste for going back to bed until she was sure he was fully healed and not feeling any pain, but those protests were weak and tired. What she did...had taken a lot out of her it seems. Nevin placed her gentely on his...no on their bed.

As he looked upon the sleeping woman he saw just how deeply affected she had been by the trials of the last few days. Her skin was still sore and blistered, dark circles lined her eyes, and it looked as though she hadn’t slept in days. Even in a heap of exhaustion her body twitched. Sweat dripped from her forehead and her lips were dry and cracked. Her usually pristine fingernails had blood and dirt caked underneath them...her hair was matted….

With a deep breath, he began stripping her peeling the grimy clothes off of her body. She curled up and shivered a bit, mumbling a protest at the cold. Nevin went and got a bucket and filled it with warm water, then grabbed a clean sponge. With tender movements he slowly cleaned her, wiping away the sweat , blood, and dirt that clung to her. As he worked, he connected threads to her and slowly, so slowly, pushed life force into her, a gentle slow stream instead of the waves he normally did.

He had figured out that him doing this upset her - so he stopped when he started to feel woozy. He would help her in slow, steady increments. It took a little searching, but he found a brush that she had left here, and after climbing into the bed and pulling her sleeping form into a sprawl across his lap, he began brushing out her tail and hair.