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"He blames himself," Ferros said. "He always blames himself, whether it is his fault or not." He turned and padded towards the door.

Ferros turned, looking at Rep. "I shield him. I fight with him. I heal him," he replied. "I can't change him. I don't want to change him. He is my human and my Hunter and my partner, and if I changed him, he would not be who he is, and he would not be the other part of me." He lowered his head, his shoulders hunching in almost submissively. "You are his mate," he said. "Please. Don't hurt him."

He flicked a haunted look at Rep, then slipped out into the hall, closing the door quietly behind him.

It wasn't too long before Jordan returned, a towel draped over his shoulders, the red stone of Ferros's ring lit from within again, indicating that the weapon had returned to his totem form. Jordan slipped into the room, closed the door, and headed over to the tiny kitchen area to start the coffee machine. Then he turned around, leaned on the counter, and studied Rep. "What happened?" he asked.

"He's pretty upset," Jordan said quietly. "I got him to let me look at his memory, so I know his side of it." His tone stayed neutral, though the ring flickered erratically.

"I'd imagine Tracey is pretty upset too," Jordan said. He was ignoring the glasses for the time being. He paused, and a slight frown gathered between his eyebrows. "You should know," he offered, "if it bothers you that much. Ferros and I haven't been distinctly separate people for longer than you've known me."

He turned long enough to pause the coffee machine and get himself a cup, taking what had already brewed before letting it continue, watching Rep's expression. There was a tension in the line of his shoulders that hadn't been there for some time.

Jordan's shoulders hunched slightly. "I think what happened to Sasha had more to do with the Horsemen than with her weapon," he said, and took a mouthful of coffee, pushing away the memory of that conversation, the one in which both of them had acknowledged, barely, that terrible things had been done to them. Ferros rumbled worriedly, distracted temporarily from his own concerns; Jordan laid his thumb against the band of the ring.

"He's your partner, not your kid," he pointed out after he'd had a moment to compose himself. He looked away briefly, feeling a sense of vague guilt. "I don't know, maybe it's the other way around, me affecting Ferros - he didn't have the capacity to understand the physical part of a relationship until he felt what it's like for a human."

"They are people," Jordan said. "I think that's one of the reasons that the process leaves them able to think and feel and communicate. To remind us that we're not fighting mindless, soulless things." He wrapped his hands around his cup, taking some small comfort from the warmth of the porcelain. "It'd be a hell of a lot easier if we were. As it is, the ones we fight, the ones we hunt down - they've chosen to become the kind of things that need killing."