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Adrian followed his father into the woods with aww.
His father was hunting, but not for meat or blood. Dracula was hunting vampires.
Every time they moved the castle Dracula would don his armour and leave to eliminate the local vampire populace. Adrian had never understood why Dracula did this, but he had always wanted to go with him.
Adrian knew his father was a fearsome warrior, he’d heard many stories, but there was a difference between hearing a story and seeing Dracula in armour leaving to kill. It was impossible for a child not to be impressed, to not want to be part of that.
At age ten, Dracula had relented, but it was only when Adrian reached age twelve that Lisa had also finally relented.
Adrian followed behind his father, who was a solid shadow in his black armour. The metal made Dracula look even bigger and made Adrian feel very small. The metal also looked heavy, but Dracula moved smoothly. Adrian’s own light leather armour, despite being well worn from the energetic sparing sessions his father had insisted upon, felt stiff and restricting.
He felt small in his father’s shadow, small and feeble, in need of protection. Suddenly this didn’t feel exciting anymore, it felt frightening. He was going to be facing vampires, creatures like his father who were stronger and faster than he was. His father was going to try and keep him safe but even Dracula couldn’t be everywhere. He heard his father sniff the air, Dracula turned to look at him and Adrian felt heat rise in his face as shame coiled in his gut. Dracula stopped and turned to face him. Adrian kept his eyes on the ground.
“We can go home, if you want to.” Dracula knelt before his child and reached out, his hand dwarfing Adrian’s shoulder. He wore no armour on his hands, to keep his claws free. Adrian swallowed the lump in his throat and tried to speak.
“I…” his word came out as a squeak and he coughed to regain his voice. “I don’t know.”
“You’re afraid.”
“No, I’m not!” Adrian finally looked at his father’s face. The scorn he’d expected to see was absent, instead his father looked neutral, somehow that was worse.
“Don’t lie. It is natural to be afraid during a hunt.”
“I hunt with you all the time.” Adrian tried to sound confident, but his voice quivered. “I’m not afraid.”
“This is a different kind of hunt. A more dangerous one. Your prey will outmatch you.”
“I’m not afraid.” Adrian insisted. “At least not of them, but, but what if I’m in the way?” Dracula scoffed and smiled at his son. “Don’t laugh, what if I get in your way and someone hurts you because of me? What if they are faster than you?”
“You are a strange child,” Dracula stood back up, regaining his full height. “Don’t worry.” He leaned down and picked Adrian up easily. Lifting the boy well over his head to place him on his shoulders. Adrian wobbled; he’d not been carried like this since he was seven. “Nothing will get past me to you. You’re always safe with me.” Adrian said nothing, but, much as he had when he was seven, he took hold of his father’s hair and held on tight. The words felt true. Nothing could hurt him while his father carried him. Dracula resumed his advance towards the nearby village.
“Father,” Adrian said after some time. Dracula ‘hummed’ in acknowledgment.
“Why do you hunt other vampires?”
“Is it not enough that they hurt humans?”
“No.” Adrian tugged at his father’s hair. “You don’t care about that. Unless you’re doing this for mother?”
“In a way I am.” Dracula stooped as they passed under a low branch. They were almost at the village. “I do not hunt all the vampires in any given place, simply the young and the foolish.”
“Seems mean.”
“I do it because young, foolish vampires, often those made by accident and thus without the proper instruction of a sire, will draw attention.”
“And the castle doesn’t?”
“Imagine, you are a villager and several of your daughters are killed by vampires. Where is the first place you are going to point your mob at?”
“The big spooky vampire castle.”
“Exactly. Now imagine you are a lone vampire fledgling and you see a big spooky vampire castle in the distance, how might that make you feel?”
“I’d run like hell.”
“Only because you know what I do, imagine you didn’t.”
“I suppose I might feel safer? There’s another bigger, stronger vampire around, maybe they’d be my friend? Keep me safe.”
“Some do, you remember the young man in Gresit?”
“I liked him; he was nice.”
“He was also smart; he came to me directly and asked boldly for aid and instruction. I admire such boldness. Other kinds of boldness not so much. Many fledglings will see the castle and feel emboldened to act as they please, assuming I will come to aid them should the humans rally. They bring mobs to my door. However, peasants are less likely to act on their objections to my presence without cause.”
“What does that mean?”
“Simple.” Dracula slowed as they reached the village.
Adrian tightened his grip as his father tensed and leapt upwards, easily clearing several of the small homes. They sailed through the air, Dracula’s cape reaching out like wings to carry them. They collided roughly with the small local church spire. The brickwork crunched as Dracula dug his claws in to hold fast.
“The peasants are afraid of the castle; they won’t attack it unless they feel they have a good reason to. Fear keeps them at bay. But if the local vampire populace starts wiping out villagers, emboldened by my presence, the villagers will come to my door.”
“So, you do kill vampires to keep the villagers safe.”
“Only because its easier than dealing with mobs every six months.”
Adrian looked out over the small village, it was a labyrinth of small houses, stalls and shops, all clustered around a river. No one was out, very few homes showed evidence of life. Almost everyone in the village was asleep.
“How will you find them?” Adrian tried to lean down and around to get a better look at his father’s face. Dracula tipped his head back and smiled.
“That’s the easy part.” He tapped his nose.
“You can smell them?”
“No. But I can smell a fresh kill. There’s one close to the tavern. Shall we go see if it’s a vampire or a thug?”
“Ok.” Adrian tightened his grip again as his father let go of the spire and let them drop.
The kill was a woman, from the look of her clothing and myriad of visible illnesses she was most likely a beggar. Adrian frowned at the corpse, the woman was the same age as his mother, her hair, where it wasn’t grease and dirt encrusted was a similar colour too.
“Can you see how she died?” Dracula knelt down next to the body and waited.
“There’s no wounds.”
“But you can smell the blood.” There was blood on the woman’s ragged dress and on the ground, but there wasn’t a lot of it.
“There’s not a lot.”
“Where is it then?”
“Someone’s belly?”
“Quite probably, though not always, sometimes the castle emboldens not only vampires. Sometimes I have been known to inspire cults, dark wizards, necromancers, forge masters. The sight of the castle can bring them all out into the open on occasion.”
“You’re a bad influence.” Adrian’s mouth tasted like bile, his attempt at humour fell flat.
“Sadly, I can be.” Dracula stood back up. “The assailant hasn’t been gone long, come let us hunt.”
Dracula moved through the village at speed, clearly following a scent or some kind of trail Adrian could not see. They wove through streets and alleyways, eventually slowing and coming to a stop outside an unassuming building by the river.
“Here?” Adrian felt cold.
“You can wait outside if you like.” Dracula looked up at his son, who shook his head and gripped tight.
“Don’t leave me.”
“I won’t.” Dracula kicked the door in.
Suddenly the house was alive with movement and sound. The smell of blood was thick. Adrian closed his eyes and kept his grip. His father moved quickly, but gently and not once did Adrian fear he would fall. The assault was brutal but over in moments. When the sound stopped and Dracula stood still Adrian opened his eyes.
The building was only a single room, and everything was chaos. Broken crates lay shattered next to broken bodies. The floor was blood-soaked. They had not been vampires, at least not all of them, dust moved in thick streams, disturbed by the wind from the broken doorway. Dracula was licking his fingers clean.
“That was fast.” Relief washed through Adrian, making his muscles quiver.
“Maybe next time you might watch, you could learn something.”
“You missed one.” There was a man still alive, cowering in the corner. He was injured enough that his death would be imminent.
“So, I did.” Dracula walked to the man who looked up sobbing, his eyes bloodshot and terrified. Adrian kept his eyes open as Dracula lifted a booted foot and brought it down on the man’s scull.
“Can we go home now?” This wasn’t exciting, or fun. It was frightening and sickening. Dracula reached up and took his son down from his shoulders, moving the boy onto his hip, in a similar way to how his mother had carried him before he got too big.
“We can. This village will be safer now.”
Adrian breathed easier when they were outside and rested his head on his father’s shoulder. They walked in silence until they reached the woods.
“I want to come with you again, next time.”
“Really? You’re not upset? You smell upset.”
“I am upset. It was horrible. I didn’t think it would be like that.”
“You thought it would be glorious battle?”
“Maybe,” Adrian said after a long moment.
“It can never be glorious when I fight children and feeble old men. Hell, it’s never glorious even when I fight those who have half a chance against me. Fighting is always brutal, always unpleasant. But it is something that must be done.”
“I understand. That’s why I want to come with you next time.” Adrian fidgeted causing his father to put him down. He wasn’t a child; he didn’t need to be carried. He started walking again this time beside his father. “You do that to keep us safe. I want to help you keep us safe.” He reached out and took his father’s hand, Dracula smiled at him.
“It will get easier.”
“You’re not saying no?” Adrian snorted. “I half suspected that you brought me with you to scare me. To stop me asking again.”
“I think your mother wanted that. She’d be delighted if you came home in tears and begged never to come with me again. She finds this distasteful.”
“I know why.” Adrian heard his father sigh.
“I don’t want you to revel in the fight. But I also don’t want you to be ill-prepared for it. Fighting will happen, it always happens and fighting real people, be they man or monster, is different to when we spar. I’ve met men who can out fight rings their peers in the ring but the moment they see the true face of killing they fall apart. Skill is not to be dismissed but real experience counts for a lot.”
“You promise it will get easier?”
“It will, but I hope, at least for you, that it never becomes truly easy. That way lies madness and I do not wish that for you.”
“I can’t imagine that could ever be easy.”