Work Text:
Louis-Cesare De Bourbon was alone and detested books.
Hard backed, dusty tomes, filling shelf after shelf, all in matching leather bindings, cold, impersonal and imposing. As a child they signified the education he wouldn’t really get, instead he was forced to read these books by cut rate tutors who never spoke to each other and taught him the same lifeless information over and over.
As an adult they held no mystery, filling rooms he never stepped into, while he learnt to master the sword and bed attractive women, using his time elsewhere, filling his life with things to hide the empty loss of his mother, learning to survive at the whim of his brother’s mercies.
As a vampire, they spoke of status and the self-satisfaction of others, vampires who never picked up a book, all with the latest trend of elegant libraries filled with matching book series, everything from Shakespeare, Chaucer, Homer, the Greek Philosophers, on and on. Novels brushing shoulders with reference books, all of them pointless, empty knowledge he didn’t need or want.
His first estate, on the outskirts of Paris, had a similar library. His decorator had installed it when he allowed the man to do what he wanted. Louis-Cesare walked the library, picking up random books, hoping to see the appeal in these ancient papers of knowledge and entertainment. His chef loved plays, his second was partial to poetry, none of them held much appeal to him. He never went into the room again after that day, preferring to keep an eye on his new charge, Christine.
He had met his maker twice, once at his turning and again when he was saved from Jonathan’s clutches, he left as soon as he had come both times, and Louis-Cesare had never understood the abandonment. Radu had mumbled something about a time line once, he wasn’t sure he understood and all he felt was bitter anger and resentment at another abandonment. He filled his life with the art of duelling, becoming Anthony’s second gave him a purpose, hope that he had finally found somewhere to belong, long years proved only that he was being used, holding a whole senate in place with the threat of his blade, rather than being the important part of a larger family, his own resentment reflected in the eyes of the European senate.
He started to read a little after Alejandro Stole Christine, after he defeated Tomas but as to hold him as his servant rather than kill him. Tomas drained Louis-Cesare every day, constantly fighting his will, so he took less time to fight, left behind nay interest in women and read instead, to learn new skills, to work out how to get Christine back, his charge, his responsibility, his mistake.
Stretched thin and desperate, he traversed the 20th century to find a way to get her back, she wasn’t powerful, but she was broken. Sent to the edge by Jonathan and his ministrations and he was responsible for her pain, a deep well of guilt and shame pooled inside him and he fed it daily, trying to find a way, pleading with his consul, with Alejandro to get her back. He wouldn’t kill Tomas as requested, the man was noble and did not deserve his death, he hoped to release him soon, but months became years, became decades and still the deadlock persisted.
The call to America was unexpected, but welcome. A new set of senators to work with, and his maker was there, welcoming, loving, like the last three hundred years were all forgotten, like he never left him alone time after time. Radu couldn’t seem to see it, but he hated the feeling of half family that emanated from Mircea, who saw him as useful and powerful and someone he needed on side, but as family? No, he wasn’t convinced that was the case at all.
Radu brought him to his estate, the house was a mix of styles, all loud and clashing. Yet oddly familiar and homely at the same time. The duel with Rasputin never happened and he was invited to remain in America to aid with the war effort, Anthony begrudgingly agreed.
Radu’s library was unusual, in places where most would hold old hardback books of classic authors, Radu filled his with battered, broken spine paperbacks. The genres varied, romance, fantasy, science fiction, crime. It seemed he held a soft spot for vampire novels, as evidenced by a whole case full of the, mostly dark, coloured books.
During a lull in activity following the absconding of Tomas to Faerie, Louis-Cesare found himself wandering into the library, his curiosity piqued and the flood of power from not holding Tomas in thrall was making him anxious and fidgety. The shelves in front of him were so alien to the stuffy rooms of his past and he needed something to distract him, he picked up a novel, seemingly well read, and found a nook built into the shelves. Hours later he finished and found himself reaching for the next.
He loved the adventure, the characters, the depth of world building. He particularly enjoyed the vampire novels too, reading how the human world was interpreting a real world they didn’t know of was fascinating. He read a whole series in a few days, devouring the pages. These books were accessible, interesting and vibrant and they showed him worlds he never dreamed could exist. Radu found his son one afternoon, sleeping in the reading nook, and made a note to buy his son as many of the books as he could.
He met a dhampir; fought against her, with her and eventually for her, falling as in love with her as many of his fictional friends did with their lovers, and he forgot to read. The time was filled with fighting and battling and getting to know Dory and all she was that he lulled on his new hobby. Radu noticed, of course, and part of their wedding present included a basket of novels, all new and shiny, trashy and beautiful and fun. Louis-Cesare spent his honeymoon making love and reading and bathing and being as happy as he could ever remember being with a new life he loved.
Louis-Cesare de Bourbon had a family and loved books.