It takes longer than Dean expects for you to wake up, and for a moment, he is afraid that he would have to watch you slip into death anyways. He Turned you so that would not happen. What kind of a failure would it make him if he made the choice to spare you, and it was too late?

But he hears before he sees how you stir back to life in front of him. As close to life as death could be, that was. When your heart stopped in your chest, and then beat harshly for a solitary moment, and slipped away once more.

You were here. Born anew. His fifth sired, and this time, Dean promises to himself once more, the final one. He would do right by you. He would not mess up as he had so many times before.

It is with that experience of others, though, that he knows to pin your wrist when you shoot toward him, teeth bared in your desperate, aching hunger. He has had four others in his long, endless lifetime that, too, have tried to drain him like you have.

"Gentle," he says, voice low and soothing ─ anything to keep your elevated emotions from spiraling into terror and panic-driven desperation. "I know you are hungry."

With that same gentleness, as if you are glass and not meant at all for his rough hands, Dean brushes the hair out of your face with the same hand that he then offers to you, hardly flinching at all when you sink your teeth in.

It has been a while since someone depended on him. Since someone wanted him, in any sort of way, even if you only wanted him for the blood in his veins. The blood of the one who Turned you was always sweeter than anything else.

Dean would have to be careful with you. Would be careful. You were not going to be doomed to a life of living hell like his first sired, even if this was not a lifestyle that many consented to falling into.

"Enough." He hates to see the frustrated desperation in your blood-stained lips, but he has to limit you. It is such a slippery slope as is, trying to foster a healthy sire bond. "I do apologize for my cruelty." He means it in more ways than one.