Chapter Text
Men sneered at Seiji. He didn’t know why.
They hated him. He could almost smell it, it was so strong. Like metal and stale sweat. He didn’t know why they hated him.
Seiji didn’t know anything.
He’d been in bed…and then he’d been scared.
“Cry, little boy,” one of the men sing-songed. Not at all like his private tutor, who sang silly songs. This tune made Seiji want to hide.
“No one to hear you here,” another cackled.
“It’s what your kind deserves. We’ll teach them.”
“Vampires think they’re so high and mighty, but they still bleed.”
Seiji stared wide-eyed at the men, skimming across them, looking for—
There. A woman. Seiji knew enough to recognize her blank expression as his only hope.
“It’s a shame,” she said quietly, noticing his gaze and meeting it as she spoke. “You’re just a pup. But your kind welcomed this when they took our golden son.”
Seiji didn’t know what they were talking about. But he knew he had no help here.
Men started to circle around him, snarling and leering. They hated him. He hadn’t done anything. But they hated him anyway.
“Won’t you cry for us, little whelp?”
Seiji wouldn’t.
He was his father’s son.
He was strong.
He was…
Scared.
But he wouldn’t cry. Wouldn’t give them what they wanted.
They jeered and shouted, said terrible, awful things. Seiji stood strong.
He was a statue.
He was a tree.
He was a mountain so tall he couldn’t be moved.
He was a Katayama and Katayamas didn’t cry or show weakness. Vampires were the strongest, the best. And Seiji was a vampire.
He didn’t cry.
Men turned to wolves before his eyes, terrible and grotesque and still circling. But now they couldn’t shout or laugh. Now, they growled and snarled in earnest, lips peeled back over terrible teeth, sharp and dripping with saliva…
They circled.
And they snapped.
Seiji didn’t move. He didn’t run. He didn’t cry. He couldn’t even if he’d wanted to. He thought maybe if he just stood still enough, he’d disappear, become part of this awful forest of metal and concrete. Maybe he’d really turn to stone. Maybe they wouldn’t be able to hurt him.
He was wrong.
But he didn’t cry.