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Twisted Pizza wasn’t what one would call fancy. It was just a hole-in-the-wall establishment, and it didn’t advertise itself as anything else. Half the patrons were either random people that got intrigued by the unique name or drunks, looking for a decently priced meal. Despite this fact, Dante still found Twisted Pizza to be a special haven in its own way.
If he could pick a word to describe it, he’d say it was ‘cozy.’ The ambiance was surprisingly quiet and nice. Very rarely were patrons too loud and rowdy, and if they were, they would be dealt with by Hugo.
But that was beside the point.
Everything was pleasant to the senses in Twisted Pizza as well. The walls of the restaurant were velvet-red. The lights were dimmed enough that the candlelight by the tables illuminated everything slightly. Italian music played softly in the background. The smell of garlic, butter, and pizza hung in the air. It was nice, it was comfortable. Familiar, even, to Dante at least.
But he couldn’t focus on any of that at the moment. No, he was distracted by something, or someone, to be exact. That someone being Prince Raveena of the Camarilla, who was sitting right across from him.
He still wasn’t sure how this was happening. He couldn’t remember the events leading up to this moment: working up the nerve to ask her out, actually asking her out, or even getting here. He couldn’t even remember her agreeing, which is something he was sure he would remember because he’d be over the moon. But his apparent amnesia of the events leading up to this didn’t matter at the moment to him.
No, what did matter was Prince Raveena was here. She didn’t even have William with her, something he was thankful for. While Raveena was enough to make any moment pleasant, this nice moment would be somewhat tainted by having that Malkavian glaring at him the whole time.
Why was Prince Raveena without her trusty advisor, who she never seemed to be without? Once again, it was something that didn’t quite add up about this scene. Was William, who was loyal to a fault, really okay with Prince Raveena wandering around by herself, with just Dante as her company?
Perhaps he should ask her. She was right there. But did he really care? He was glad William wasn’t there. He was glad that Raveena apparently trusted him enough to go with him alone. He was glad that, finally, he had some alone time with Raveena.
So why ruin that with pesky questions? As an unofficial spy and informant for the Camarilla, his job wasn’t to ask questions. It was to provide answers, which he’d happily do if that was what Raveena was wanting. But that didn’t seem to be the case tonight. Raveena wasn’t looking at him imploringly like she usually did whenever he was around. No, instead she looked peaceful, like she was comfortable.
It was hard not to miss how beautiful she was. With long, wavy chestnut hair and beautiful green eyes that reminded Dante of emeralds. She had plump red lips, creamy skin, and a heart-shaped face, which were all complimented by her sharp dressing style. It was hard not to look at Raveena as anything other than an ethereal force.
Swallowing and trying not to let nerves get to him, he racked his mind for conversational topics. What was a good conversation starter? After a few seconds of floundering, he noticed the few bites she’d taken out of her food and got excited.
“I didn’t know you could eat food too, Prince Raveena,” Dante said, his eyes lighting up.
Raveena let out a delicate laugh that made his heart flutter, “I wouldn’t have agreed to come with you to a restaurant if I couldn’t eat, silly.”
Dante flushed and rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly. Duh! He was such an idiot. “R-Right, I knew that...”
Luckily, Raveena didn’t seem bothered by his awkwardness. In fact, she seemed pleasantly amused, her eyes twinkling, a smile on her painted lips. “It’s okay. We all make silly mistakes every now and then.”
Dante blinked at her in surprise. He certainly didn’t expect someone from the Camarilla to say that. Daring to make a half-joke, he said, “William certainly wouldn’t agree with that sentiment.” As far as Dante knew, making a silly mistake in front of him would result in his organs being exposed to the night air. He shuddered at the gruesome thought.
Raveena suddenly placed her cold hand over his and squeezed it lightly. Both of their eyes on their connected hands, she murmured, “Good thing William isn’t here then, hm?”
Dante’s eyes widened. He honestly had no idea what was going on. None of this made sense. But he found that fact excited him more than it scared him. He felt like he was glimpsing something special. That special thing being realness.
As much as the Camarilla meant to him, there was a certain level of fakeness to it all. It was a fakeness he was well-acquainted with as it controlled every aspect of Giovanni social life. It was something he deemed “forced cordiality.” It required all persons involved to talk in level, polite terms. If someone had a demand, they had to do it in a roundabout, borderline passive-aggressive way. It forced smiles that no one meant, words with no real truth to them. All in an attempt to lull everyone into a false sense of security.
Dante admittedly wasn’t the smartest guy, but even he could see through it all. Even dear Raveena was guilty of it. In fact, being the Prince of the Camarilla put the pressure on her to be even faker than the rest. He’d attended his fair share of Camarilla meetings, and he’d seen things. He’d seen the way she would smile with people she would later confess she hated. He’d seen her enjoy glasses of blood with vampires she’d later tell William to have executed. He’d seen her fake laugh at jokes even he knew she disapproved of. All of this to maintain the fragile illusion of professionalism.
Politics was rough. Politics took over lives. Politics was a game one always had to play, once involved. All of that was a part of why he had originally distanced himself from his family. He didn’t want to be part of that life.
Well, he obviously failed at that. Sure, he wasn’t at dull Giovanni meetings, discussing an unlikely future where the Giovannis rise back to their original power, but now he was playing informant for the Camarilla, an enemy of his family and the Anarchs. Like a fly in a spiderweb, he was tied into politics whether he liked it or not.
But if it was for Raveena, he supposed he was fine with being sucked in. He agreed with her overall core values. She and the rest of the Camarilla had taught him how important order was. He’d seen what a lack of order brought: idiots like Switchblade in power, horrid vampires like Valeriu running wild, fucking “Bloodbaths” which involved devouring humans like dogs would a rabbit. He’d never considered himself much of a rule follower before, but even he knew rules existed for a reason.
Sure, he didn’t agree with every law imposed by the Camarilla, but he never agreed with every law imposed by human society either. Plus, unlike human society, Dante fully believed that Raveena and at least most of the Camarilla, had every vampire’s best interest at heart.
So if he had to play a part in this political game for Raveena’s sake, he would. If running a functioning society meant they both had to be fake, then so be it.
But this moment felt different. Perhaps in the privacy of Twisted Pizza, with only him as witness, maybe Raveena felt uninhibited. Maybe what he was seeing was a more genuine side of her. The idea of that thrilled him. The idea that he was trustworthy - even special - enough to see a more real side of her was one that touched his heart.
He hoped he wouldn’t make Raveena regret it.
The two of them talked for a little while. At first, Dante didn’t stray away from politics. He made fun of Switchblade, shook his head at how split the vampire community in Vegas was, and even discussed future plans with her.
But eventually, he got bolder. He started talking about different, more casual things. Subjects included his groupies, his family, and even about various stunts he had done in the past. Raveena listened to all of his stories with an amused expression on her face, her chin resting on her hand.
Eventually, he got even braver. He stopped talking about himself and began asking more personal questions.
They started small: What’s your favorite food? “Spaghetti.” What is your favorite area of Vegas? “The Venetian area.” What are your hobbies? “I enjoy reading and practicing calligraphy on the side.”
But as he kept going, the questions got a little deeper, more personal.
How does it feel to be the Prince of the Camarilla? “Rewarding.” (said with a smile. Fake? He didn’t know.) Did she ever feel pressured, knowing so many Kindred looked up to her? “Sometimes, but mostly it makes me feel important.” Was she ever scared of a revolt? “Any revolt that would dare to rise up against me, I would squash.”
Finally, so drunk on the power of all the answers he was getting, he asked a question that had been on the forefront of his mind.
“Prince Raveena…”
“Hm?”
“Do you care for me… like as a person?” Dante asked, staring down at his plate of food. He was surprised at the lack of fear in his question. Under any other circumstances, those words would’ve never left his lips. But so far tonight, he’d faced no consequences for his actions and he was drunk on that power. “Am I important to you? Am I genuinely helpful?”
He frowned. He had a feeling he knew the answer to those questions, if he was being perfectly honest with himself. After all, who cared for Dante Giovanni?
Oh, he had people who liked him, sure. Some names and faces flashed in his mind: his mother, Isabella, Willow, his groupies, and maybe even Chance, Phoenix, and Gary. He considered each and every one of them his friends and he was grateful for their company. But he felt like he failed each of them, at least in some aspect.
Each of them had their own lives, their own goals, and all of them didn’t seem to involve Dante within them. Take his mother for example. While he had no doubt she loved him deeply, she still chose his family in Italy over him.
Or Willow. Willow was his close and dear friend, but despite that, he still felt like he barely knew anything about her. He knew he was being selfish. She had her reasons for being so private, for fighting her battles on her own. Despite that, he couldn’t help but think he could help her… if she allowed him too. Sure he could be immature and stupid, but he was her friend. Surely that had to mean something? But for whatever reason, she held him at an arm’s length at all times, and that meant he had to only sit and watch as she clearly suffered. How could one not feel useless in that situation?
His groupies cared for him so long as he entertained them, but he couldn’t help but fear one day they would find someone new and more interesting and eventually replace him. That’s what Phoenix did. He frowned at the thought of them.
The more and more he thought, the more replaceable he figured he was in their minds. He might be all of their friends, but for how long? And how good of a friend could he be if none of them even trusted him enough to tell him anything or were willing to be even in the same country as him?
But in the Camarilla, it was different. Here, he was trusted. Here he had a purpose. Here he had a role. Here he had an impact on vampires’ lives.
It was a place where he could truly say he belonged and at the center of it all, was Raveena. The vampire who gave him his purpose. The vampire who saw potential in him when no one else could. The vampire who trusted him, at least to a degree.
How could he not appreciate that?
So, as desperate and pathetic as his questions made him, he had to know for sure. He had to get an answer out of her. Even a fake one, he didn’t care.
He flinched when suddenly he felt a hand touching his cheek. Shooting his gaze up, he looked at her and was shocked by the tenderness she held in her gaze. His breath quickened as she leaned closer to him, to the point where their noses were practically brushing.
“Oh you poor thing,” she cooed. “Of course I care. Why would you think otherwise?”
His heart soared at the sound of those words, blood welling in his eyes. Could it be fake? Sure it could. As established before, Raveena was an expert liar. But it didn’t sound like a lie, and it was everything he wanted to hear. Why ruin that with pesky over-analyzation?
The blood welling in his eyes split, as he felt her soft lips press against his, his whole body feeling lighter and lighter.
He moved to press the kiss deeper, when suddenly a knocking noise jarred him.
He flinched and suddenly, was lying on his back, his eyes staring at the ceiling of his room. He blinked for a moment, before hearing the knock on his door again and hearing Gary’s tentative voice saying, “Dante, are you awake? Do you want to practice katana techniques?”
Dante sighed, and rubbed at his face with both of his hands, trying to shake away all the emotions playing in his chest.
He should’ve known. Some things were just too good to be true.
Then, putting on a fake smile, just like Raveena would, he stood up and called out, “Meet you there in a second, Gary.”