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Chapter Text

Flanked by two hulking demons of his own design, Isaac keeps his hood up as he peruses the vendors at this particular night market. In his hand he holds a list, although he's practically memorized it by now. A list of ingredients in his master's careful black script; some far-flung herbs or potions in places too delicate to land the castle, or too difficult or annoying or costly to gather himself. His master's wife, Lisa, is busy setting up her doctor's office and needs all manner of things, some of which can only be found here in this wretched corner of the country.

Isaac is not an unfamiliar sight here, for which he is grateful. He knows his species' penchant for cruelty by now, and humans traditionally have been unwelcome at the night market. It took a lot of effort, both on Isaac's and on his master's part, to allow him to walk unmolested through a crowd of hungry vampires, but the effort is well worth it. His gift is flourishing: in the last year he's been able to forge his own dagger rather than use something borrowed that doesn't work half as well, and the two tall, winged creatures next to him as his bodyguards are a walking testament.

Of course, practicing his gift means a steady stream of human bodies, and Lisa forbade them from the simplest solution of acquiring Isaac's raw ingredients themselves. Privately, the 17-year-old Isaac doesn't understand why she holds such sway over this part of her husband's life or why the acquiring method even matters, but Dracula's warm, acquiescent smile and nod to his beloved sealed that for them long ago. Isaac will have to find his ingredients elsewhere. Hence, being sent to the night market.

He looks at the list again. The ingredients, Dracula stresses, must be both exacting and fresh. Later they'll have time to practice on the more rotting, the less pure. But with Isaac's gift still in its infancy, Dracula wishes for him to pull from the freshest dead without distraction. At the bottom of the list in an entirely different script are the words;

And a PUPPY please!

Which can only belong to the master's son. With Lisa moving back and forth between her office and the castle, Adrian was becoming bored and restless without his mother to entertain him. But that wasn't Isaac's concern; he ignores the last of the list and begins his grim work of sorting through the mess.

And it is a mess. The night market smells terrible. Blood, shit, fear, sweat, and piss are all distinct aromas, coming from the piles of corpses behind the stalls. He's in the worst thick of it now, arguing with a tall bird-like demon over the manner by which she acquired her 'goods'.

"You dug up a plague pit." Isaac accuses in his light, dismissive tone, stepping back away from the sickness lest he catch it too.

"Didn't! Didn't!" She caws back, loud and screeching, her eyes hidden by a bandage wrapped around her head. "Only fresh for you, Forgemaster!" She jerks her hand out for him to see, clutching a human arm that might have once belonged to a young woman. He stares at it, and then at her, unimpressed.

"And what am I meant to do with that?" He asks, inclining his head. "It's sickly. All the muscle wasted away. Don't bother me with such things." The bird demon sneers in response but takes the arm back. Rather than stick around arguing, Isaac opts to try another stall, further up the way.

The night market this evening is inside part of a cave system in the Carpathians, shielded from the light of day and humans both. It makes the place smell godawful, but it also means that there will likely be fresher goods uphill towards the top of the 'road'. The distance mirror had dropped him at the bottom for this reason: Dracula wants Isaac to use his senses and determine good from bad: sometimes the vendors will stuff their goods with aromas and spices to try tricking the unwary into buying spoiled meat. Isaac isn't going to be someone else's fool, especially not on his master's coin. Unlike some, he takes his responsibilities seriously.

As Isaac nears the crest of the hill, he's able to breathe a bit easier. The meat here is better tended to; the blood and bones separated properly, packed in snow or ice, not dumped haphazard into piles. Even the vendors are more reputable, for a given value of it; less of the kind of carrion demon likely to pick apart another's kill and more the kind to do the killing themselves. He's frustrated that he has to use a middle man rather than source his own goods properly, but knows better than to disobey a direct order from his master. Here too are some of the things on the list for Lisa: nightshade, aloe, myrrh, and poppy. Vampires are immune to such effects, but Isaac finds one selling them anyway, mainly to witches and sorcerers who have at least a bit of human in them. The tall vampire sneers at Isaac, but one of his night creatures tightens his grip on his lance and the young Forgemaster is left alone. He pays without issue, handing the bundle of herbs to one of his attendants, and continues on his way without incident.

Finally, Isaac finds what he's looking for; a suit of armor, enchanted, and employed as a butcher by its unseen master. Isaac's been here before, though he's yet to meet the host of this stall in particular. Some kind of enchanter or vampire, hidden away, who sends his servants to do his bidding instead. The suit of armor turns with unseeing 'eyes' when Isaac approaches and stills its knife from the chopping block. Blood stains the dented armor red. And it may have been his imagination, but Isaac felt sure he hadn't seen some of those dents prior to the last time they met.

"Who approaches?" A voice, strange and ethereal, echoes from the hollows of the armor. Isaac bows his head to show reverence in response.

"Isaac Laforeze. I come on behalf of my master."

The armor doesn't move, but the voice inside takes on a more amiable air.

"Ah, the Dark Prince's Forgemaster." There's two of them now, but Isaac doesn't bother to correct him. "What brings you to my stall?"

Isaac smiles, straightening up. He's unclear of how much the armor can 'see' him, but it never hurts to be polite when dealing with unknown night creatures when at the behest of Dracula. "I am in need of fresh meat. All this carrion I've seen thus far is useless for my purposes."

The armor's voice laughs, and finally the empty shell deigns to move. It cleans itself up first, snatching a damp rag from the canopy above to wipe its gauntlets down. "Then I implore you to come and see for yourself what I have on offer." The voice croons, and the armor pulls a drape back to the caravan attached to the stall. Isaac signals for his attendants to stand guard - he's polite but he's not naive - and walks behind the Butcher's counter to investigate.

Inside the caravan, he finds perfection. Heads and hands in pickled jars collected shortly after death; flayed skins hanging up to dry; whole bodies packed in ice, stacked neatly, and labeled, thank the Night, with what they expired of and how long ago. Isaac immediately starts perusing the racks, and takes the labels of those unfortunates he wishes to purchase. He hums, giving a light smile for the first time since arriving here. He's sure that Dracula will be pleased.

From the back of the caravan comes a muffled grunt.

He glances up, and then over to the Butcher with a meaningful tilt of his head. It's not uncommon to have live prey at the night market, but he's never seen this vendor in particular carry them. Live animals are freshest but they're also the most difficult to handle. Isaac remembers the first time he accompanied Hector to his very first night market slaughter, where the human pens were emptied and drained. Hector was so shaken he buried himself in his room and wouldn't come out for days, only encouraged to come out to eat by the combined efforts of Dracula and Lisa. From that moment, Isaac always came alone. He had no patience for weak stomachs.

Still, it's not yet full moon when the slaughter is set to take place, so it's strange to see the Butcher caring for what Isaac's ears are telling him belong to a human. He's about to ask, when the enchanted armor answers before he can. It bustles by him, uncovering the cage and setting the burlap sheet on top of it.

"I normally would not show just anyone this beauty," The voice intones, "But I think your master may find a special interest in this one, Isaac Laforeze." The Butcher beckons him to come closer. Isaac does, more out of morbid curiosity than any sincere belief Dracula would have cause to care about one human among many.

Inside the cage sits a boy, around twelve or thirteen, pale, either naturally or from blood loss. His arms are locked behind his back, chained together outside of the cage so that he can't move around the tiny space even if he wanted to. A nasty scar curls around one piercing blue eye, the other hidden from view by long, shaggy hair that could have been chestnut brown in the right light. He's not dressed for the cold weather of the mountains, barefoot and in linen trousers, toes beginning to turn blue. Isaac can see where the muffled sounds were coming from; a leather bit is wrapped around the boy's face.

"You have him gagged. Why?" He asks, eyes roving to take in the full picture. There's a crest on the boy's shirt, but that's not unusual; plenty of night creatures recycle clothing if their goods are in danger of freezing to death before getting them home again. Perhaps the most unusual thing in Isaac's eyes, however, is that the boy stares back at him without fear. Quite the contrary: he's furious, panting heavily, straining against the chains binding him to his cage. It's a good effort, Isaac has to give him that, but a waste of strength. All he's doing is injuring himself, the metal binding his wrists digging bruises into him.

"He spits. And he bites." The armor intones. Isaac smiles; the boy snarls, cursing at them both, voice garbled through his gag. It's a shame he's not permitted to take home live meat: this boy would have made a fine vessel for a night creature. It wasn't just the state of the rot or lack thereof: Dracula had also indicated that the body still holds some traces of its former life after death, lending strength to whatever force of Hell comes to occupy its body. And this one is strong. Isaac stands up, the boy's eyes following him, twisted up with hatred at the sight of a human working in league with the monsters who captured him.

"He's in fine condition, but I'm afraid my master forbids me from live prey." Isaac explains, setting a hand on the top of the cage to address the Butcher.

"It is not for your purposes I show him to you, Forgemaster." The Butcher says, with the hint of a smile in his echoed voice. "I found him hiding on the grounds of the old Belmont estate."

Isaac's hand stills on top of the cage, and the boy noticeably falls silent in his efforts to escape or attack.

"And so what?" He asks, voice betraying nothing. "He could be anyone. A farmer's boy, a son of a servant. Where you found him proves nothing."

The Butcher's armor nods once, and reaches up to retrieve a box above his head. Out of the corner of his eye, Isaac watches the boy inside the cage. He's transfixed by whatever lies inside, having gone quiet so he can watch.

"He had this on him." The armor intones, opening it up to show Isaac. The forgemaster leans in to examine a whip. It's well-made, oiled and taken good care of, but nothing special to his eyes. He resists the urge to sigh; he likes this vendor, and he's going to need to tread carefully so as not to offend him by accusing him of fraud.

"If this is all the proof you have, I will take what I've already purchased and leave you to sell him elsewhere."

The box is shut and put away. "You don't believe me."

Isaac shakes his head once; "A whip, even a consecrated whip, is no proof. You could have a young graverobber for all I am aware." At that accusation, the boy jerks once, chains rattling, before he settles back down.

Interesting.

"Would his blood serve as proof?" The Butcher asks. Both Isaac and the boy still. He turns to look at the supposed Belmont; the boy is trembling, again with rage, potentially disguising fear. If it's an act, it's a good one.

Finally, Isaac nods.

"Yes, I believe that would be enough to convince my master."

The Butcher has no face, but Isaac gets the impression that he's smiling anyway. With the armor's enormous strength, he turns the cage around so that the two of them have a clear view of the boy's forearms. Here Isaac can get a better view of what he already suspected; the boy has twisted his arms so much and so fiercely that dark purple bruises outline his wrists. He suspects this is where the new dents in the armor may have come from.

"Hold him down against the bars." Isaac does as asked, reaching through the bars to wrap a strong arm around the caged boy's shoulders. At the sudden touch of another, the brat goes wild, wriggling and screaming threats. Isaac finds he has to concentrate just to hold the boy still; he's no stranger to unwilling participants but the boy is reacting with the strength of a man grown. But it's two against one, and the 'Belmont' is only human, whatever else he is. The Butcher moves fast; a quick slice from one of his knives at his waist, and the boy's forearm begins to bleed sluggishly.

Isaac reaches for an offered handkerchief, dabbing at the blood to get enough of it. He won't know how to tell one human from another by scent, but Dracula certainly will. They stand, the armor and the forgemaster, leaving the boy to clot and struggle in the back of the caravan.

"If he is what you say he is, I may return tomorrow evening." says Isaac, carefully folding the handkerchief and placing it in his breast pocket. "For now, I will take the three bodies you have stored next to him, and be on my way."

The Butcher nods, and reaches a gauntlet out to shake Isaac's hand, leaving bloody stains over it.

"Always a pleasure, Forgemaster."

Chapter Text

Stupid! Trevor thinks, fierce and angrily at himself. He rests his head against the bars of the cage, trying to calm down.

When he heard another human, he thought maybe, just this once, someone might give a shit. Six months of living in utter hell, shouldn't he have been due for some good luck for once? Should have known it was some kind of evil magician, in service to some patron devil or whatever-the-fuck he worked for. There was nothing human in the way the tattooed stranger stared down at Trevor; not even hatred, which would have at least made sense.

He stared at him like he was evaluating which part of Trevor he was going to cut up and eat.

God hates him. That's the only explanation his bitterness can come up with.

He shuts his eyes, working on his breathing first. If escape is going to come, he's going to have to rely on himself and he's going to need a clear head to do it. Think, Trevor! His internal monologue commands, sounding very similar to his dad's gruff voice. Trevor's thoughts start to drift back, unbidden. He slams that door closed, focusing on the present. The ache in his forearm where the blade got him should help. He twists his wrists up, trying to scratch at it, make the wound bleed a little more. His fingernails catch and open up the wound from where it had been scabbing, and despite the pain beating in time with his heart, Trevor gives a rough smile.

He works on turning his thumbs in the manacles with the aid of his own damn blood as lubricant.

No waiting around to be a witch's supper here.

~~~

"A successful journey, Isaac?"

Isaac pauses at the door to Dracula's private library. The stink of the night market is still on him, but reporting in before anything else is more important. He bows his head in acknowledgement to Dracula, who sits writing at his desk. The two of them are alone; Lisa is sleeping overnight in her office, Hector working in the dungeons. Adrian likely asleep at this hour, or bothering the residents of Castlevania to play with him. Despite it being close to morning, Dracula always appears awake to greet Isaac on his return journey home. The great vampire turns in his seat to address his forgemaster properly.

"I have accomplished all you have set me out to do." Isaac answers, in his stiff, formal way of speaking. Some might make fun of him. But this is one of many ways he shows deference to the one who gave him everything.

Dracula nods patiently, sensing something more. Isaac hesitates, but withdraws the handkerchief from his breast pocket. At the vampire's beckoning, he walks over and lays it in Dracula's waiting hand.

The vampire unfolds it, holding it to his nose. His brow furrows slightly, attempting to place the familiar-and-yet-not scent. Holy blood has its distinct qualities, enticing and sweet, but this smells younger than most priests. A hint of something nostalgic, a buried memory brought forth from the earth. He knows this blood. What have you brought me, Isaac? The Forgemaster thankfully doesn't believe in wasting his master's time;

"While at the night market, I came across the Butcher's caravan. He had a child with him; a boy he was calling a Belmont."

There: out with it. Silence greets him, as Dracula muses on these words, evaluates them. Isaac would never lie, but he could have been misinformed or tricked by someone foolish enough to try luring Vlad Dracula Tepes into some place far beneath his notice.

"The Butcher is a bottom-feeder of the lowest sort. A liar." Dracula says, but he doesn't appear angry. Rather, an air of interest permeates the room. Isaac takes this as his cue to continue;

"I believe so too. But blood does not lie. Is it so strange to believe that one escaped the purge?"

Across Wallachia, the story of the disgraced Belmont name had delighted many a dark hearth. None gossip so much as the immortal with nothing better to do, and Dracula would have had to be deaf and blind not to notice the eagerness with which his subjects took to the news. For the residents of Castlevania, if they were hoping for either a satisfied master or a raging outburst that he should have been the one to kill them all, they were sorely disappointed. Dracula had merely nodded at the demon bringing the news to his court, as if he already knew. Maybe he reacted in a larger way in private: Isaac wasn't presumptuous enough to guess.

"It's strange that if one did, it would be as pathetic a sorcerer as that to get their hands on him. Or, if he is a Belmont, he is weak enough to be of no consequence." Dracula turns back to his writing desk, but doesn't dismiss Isaac outright. So Isaac stays, and waits.

"...Do you know, Isaac, it has been seventy years since one of their kind dared to grace my doorstep with their corpse?" Dracula smiles slightly, almost - if Isaac is reading his mood correctly - wistfully, caught up in a memory of blood. "I doubt if any survived, there would be none in living memory who could attest to seeing me and living. The Belmonts are all dead. Or if not, they soon will be. Let the Butcher ply his tricks; I've no interest if it's true or not."

Isaac blinks, caught off-guard. He would never think to question Dracula's motives, but...

"I sense you disagree." Dracula holds up one long, clawed hand to calm Isaac's protests. "Let us say that a Belmont did live. What would you have me do with this knowledge? I could kill him. I could imprison him in the lowest dungeons of Castlevania. I could extract my vengeance on his body until he begged me for death." Dracula stares at Isaac - through Isaac - and gives a meaningful glance upwards, to a portrait of the lady of the castle.

"But that is not what would bring me true satisfaction. I have all that I could ask for, and the Belmont will be dead by another's hand shortly. I hardly need to prove my power against one insignificant boy."

"Boys grow into men." Isaac urges, allowing some slight frustration into his voice. "And what if he escapes? Or what if your enemies turn him into a weapon?"

"Do you fear him, Isaac, this boy? Or is it something else?" Dracula intones with a smile. "Remind me, please, where it was that I found you?"

Isaac feels his face grow hot and takes pains to calm himself. He knows where this question is headed. "I was being hunted by brigand magicians. Eager to bleed me, to cut me up for potions. You saved me."

"The Belmont faces the same fate. And yet I hear no pity in your voice."

"They were human. He is human. How many of his family would hesitate to spare either one of us?"

Dracula nods, relaxing in his chair, the glimmer of sharp teeth shining in the last stretches of moonlight. "Say what you wish me to do, Isaac."

"I wish for you to end this line of hunters that have plagued you for centuries." Isaac says, but doesn't let his voice rise again. "I wish for you to be safe."

"And am I not safe now?"

He had no answer for that. At last, Dracula seems to take pity on him, and ends the silence;

"You have done well, Isaac. Truly, you are the best of your people. Go to the night market tomorrow; do not say you are interested, but observe who is, from a distance. I would use this rare opportunity to discern who among my subjects are opportunists, and who would seek to be a threat to my reign."

Isaac nods, and turns to leave after bidding Dracula good night. Time for a long bath and a review of the night's catch.

From the shadow of the tall ceilings outside the library, a small white bat lifts its sleepy head from underneath a wing.

~~~ 

Two others come to stare at the captured Belmont child during the first night; a witch looking for a zombified thrall to do her bidding, and a wealthy vampire with a grudge. Both had left satisfied and with greed in their eyes. Word's beginning to spread, just as the Butcher had hoped. More interest means more buyers; he's likely to have a bidding war on his hands. There's hardly a clan or coven in Wallachia that hasn't wanted to give the Belmont family their due, even on a pup barely weaned from its bitch's teat.

The Butcher paused in his packing for the daylight hours to listen; from the back he could hear a shuffling and muffled, angry cursing. In a moment he'd have to give him some water, but from the sound of it the Belmont still had some fight in him. Better to wait another day before solid foods, just in case.

Really, it was a spot of dumb luck that allowed him to snatch the boy at all. His servants had ventured to the burned Belmont estate under cover of night a few days ago. He'd sent them to dig up the family plots, especially the newest ones, if wild animals hadn't gotten to them first. The blood would have all run into the earth by now, of course, and there was no chance in recovering anything from the famed vault. But there was plenty more wealth to be had now that the wards guarding the home had all died with the head of the family. He had directed his small legion to collect skulls, trinkets, weaponry, even some cheaper bones buried in the back of the old estate. All things that lesser vampires could hoard and brag about as if they had contributed to the kill instead of scavenging the dead.

He had expected a few wolves, maybe a human graverobber or two. No word had reached his ear of the possibility of a survivor.

His armored servant was in the middle of digging up the first of a half-dozen fresh burial plots when a shriek of rage and pain from behind interrupted him. The tail end of a whip fired right in the suit of armor's eye, followed by two more successive strikes to the face and chest. It was knocked into the grave, disoriented, and the Butcher from the safety of his own keep had to rely on his other, lesser creatures to keep the attacker at bay. By the time he was able to get control of the suit of armor enough to climb out of the grave, the fight was mostly over. All of his servants - undead thralls, mainly, but one or two lesser vampires - lay strewn about the graveyard in pieces or on fire. An injured human boy was standing before him, listing slightly to one side, his hand clutching a whip.

"Get the fuck away!" He howled at the armor, voice choked with grief. "You tell whatever sent you, there are still Belmonts here! Get away from them! I'll fucking tear you apart!" A snap of the whip for emphasis, the boy apparently trying to keep him from desecrating the graves of his recently dead family.

The Butcher had churned with surprise and delight.

The Belmonts famously guarded their brood as fierce as any grizzly bear, well aware that their lone children would have been picked off in a heartbeat by an enterprising foe. Only when they were of age and capable of fighting back would the world of night be fatally introduced to the latest spawn of the line. And yet here was the last of them; a half-grown boy, already injured, using words he hoped would drive the creature away. Clearly, he had no idea those same words would make him all the more desirable, or why would he not have hidden? Who among the monsters of Wallachia hadn't feared this family, hadn't wanted to conduct bloody revenge against them only to be beaten out by humans, of all creatures?

The Belmont child had unleashed his whip again, but the Butcher's armor was no mere vampire. It could dent, and with enough direct hits would have been defeated eventually. But unless the boy knew to reach into the chest cavity where the unholy words were scrawled and scratch them out, the Butcher could keep coming. And despite his brave front, his legacy, and his holy weapon, the boy was only human. He tired eventually.

And the Butcher had swept in and punched the whelp against a tree, knocking him out.

From there it had been two full nights of hell dragging him back home. He'd had to forego any further looting because the Belmont had murdered all his servants save the one who could carry him. The child fought him at every turn: kicking the helmet off, screaming, punching new dents and doing his best to topple over the armor to get at the family whip carefully boxed up and placed inside. He thought he'd have to break the boy's legs to stop his escaping, but fortunately for the Butcher's bottom line, humans peter out when they aren't fed for several days. Each night the boy became easier to handle, if not more compliant. In the days he bound the boys hands and feet to one of his armor's gauntlets so that he could rest; at night he settled him over one shoulder to walk the rest of the way.

But it would all be worth it. He's laid the foundation for some of the most gossipy creatures to spread the word of a real prize. The Butcher won't give up the Belmont - probably the last one ever - until he has enough money to replenish what the boy had cost him and much more. Perhaps enough to gain some real power, instead of relying on hocking goods and digging up graves for his suppers.

All he has to do is entice the right buyer.

Chapter Text

Isaac doesn't take his creations with him the next time he returns. He draws too much attention, preferring stealth over a show of strength and power. Dracula's idea may be confusing and not entirely clear to him, but it's not his place to question it. 

He stands far enough away from the caravan to not signify his interest and pretends to take a liking to a knife from a nearby purveyor of cursed items. In this way, he's keeping a watchful eye on who goes in and who stays a second night. Courts of immortals are forever scheming to curry favor or impress or terrorize one another: having a prize like a Belmont would no doubt ignite jealousy and ire in whatever rivals these vampires had with one another. 

Speaking of, he keeps his mind occupied by memorizing the sigils and colors of the upper ranks. Word appears to be picking up; there are more faces here than Isaac's used to seeing in one place. The most powerful would never deign to show themselves at this establishment, so they send their servants to collect information. All told, by the end of the second night Isaac has a list of fourteen different creatures who look threatening and rich enough to make a play for power. Some arrive via dark versions of teleportation; some via demon horses; some with the few distance mirrors left in the world. He discounts those with regular horses, not bothering with the scraps and dregs who couldn't muster enough force to be a real threat to Dracula's seat of power. Tomorrow is the full moon and last night of the night market; tonight was simply a measuring of who has the most to gain by obtaining the last Belmont in existence.

He doesn't go into the caravan himself, as instructed by his lord, but instead turns and heads back down the road to the distance mirror waiting to take him back to Castlevania. Guarded by two vampires cloaked in red and black, they allow Isaac to pass before entering behind him, the three vanishing with the mirror. It's a method of travel he's still growing used to; when anyone leaves the castle, the mirror is positioned on the other side in such a way that it doesn't compromise the rest of it. So when Isaac returns, he expects to find himself in a side room, heavily guarded to make sure that nothing unauthorized comes through to invade.

He does not expect to see a nine-year-old Adrian Tepes glaring accusingly up at him.

"Where is it?" The boy demands in what he probably thinks is a commanding tone. Isaac stares down at him, before removing his cloak and handing it to one of the vampires, who bows and goes to hang it up.

"Where is what?" 

Adrian strains to look behind Isaac, but the portal has already closed, leaving only them and the two vampiric guards who are hurriedly leaving the room already. Smart of them, Isaac thinks enviously.

"My puppy. I told you I wanted a puppy, I wrote it down and everything. You never go back a second night in a row, so where is it?" 

Isaac swallows the bubbling amount of impatience he has for Dracula's young son. At Adrian's age, Isaac was already in the unwilling service of invading crusaders, and he would have never dreamed to talk so impertinently towards his elders. Here is a child who has only known love and never cruelty, and it's spoiled him. He's not sure what he's meant to call him or even what rank Adrian is: any attempts of addressing the matter with either Lord Dracula or his wife only lead to terms of informality - "Just call him Adrian" - or worse, jokes about Isaac's insecurity. He would just like to know if he's meant to address the boy as Lord Adrian or not!

Isaac decides that ignoring him is better than hitting him, and turns to brush right by him. Adrian's mouth hangs open like a guppy's, clearly not used to indifference when he's acting like a brat. He scrambles after Isaac, rushing to keep in pace with Isaac's longer gait.

"Hey! Isaac!"

"I haven't the time for such games." Isaac says, eyes staring straight ahead as he walks to Dracula's study, despite Adrian's desire to force him to look down at him. "I must report to your father first and foremost."

"And then I'll get my puppy?" Adrian's voice turns from the demanding, arrogant tone he adopted earlier to a pleading, more hopeful lilt. Isaac stops at the correct door, turning to raise an eyebrow at Adrian's grinning face. 

"Hector is more in the business of procuring pets than I am. Ask him." 

Adrian's face screws up in a caricature of disgust. "I have. All he has are undead dogs. They smell gross and their insides stain the bed sheets and they're cold. I want a living one. Something I can sleep next to and teach tricks and grow up with."

Isaac bends down so that he's at an eye level with Adrian. "And you believed I would get you this animal." He waits, letting the moment between them simmer, before abruptly standing back up and knocking at the door;

"If you want anything in this world, my word to you is not to rely on others, but to find a way to obtain it yourself." At Dracula's call to enter, Isaac pushes open the door and leaves Adrian with the only practical advice he's able to give him. Adrian is left standing outside his father's study, a stubborn but contemplative look on his face. 

~~~

Dracula stands at a round table in the room, a map positioned on it with heavy weights to keep it from curling up. Behind him sits a wheeled cabinet Isaac's never seen before; inside are a hundred or so delicate painted figurines, each of them different. At the beckoning of Dracula's long fingers, Isaac comes up to stand across from him, hands clasped behind his back.

"How many?" 

"Fourteen of note." Isaac answers promptly. Dracula nods, and unlocks the cabinet with a wave of his hand, walking over to it. Isaac takes a breath, before listing off one by one;

"Two gold dragon on a white hill."

Dracula's hand peruses one of the shelves before coming back with a tiny figurine of the same sigil Isaac saw the vampire wear. He settles the piece in the middle of Moldova. 

"Lord Lauden, of Kishinev. Likely wants the Belmont to add to his treasure vault. Irritating cockroach of a vampire. Next?"

"A silver wolf on a black background, with-"

"Sable." Dracula interrupts, while looking for the piece. Isaac blinks, confused;

"My lord?"

"When it is on a crest, the heraldric term is sable. Not black." Dracula replies, not harshly; rather like a teacher to a student, eager to help him learn. He sets the piece down for Isaac's approval.

Isaac takes a breath, reminds himself that Dracula is nothing like his old masters. He will not be struck. "..On a sable background." This earns him a smile from the vampire, who moves the piece southwest of the forest where Castlevania currently sits. 

"The Maggard clan. Werewolves, looking to feast on the boy through some ritualistic belief that his flesh will give them strength. Next?"

They continue like this, with Dracula dismissing the pieces on the board through one reason or another. At the end of Isaac's report, fourteen pieces sit in scattered places throughout the greater part of Eastern Europe. Dracula contemplates the map and immediately removes ten of the pieces, with the eleventh held in his hand.

"Lady Riskel is an unknown. She may want the Belmont to offer as a gift to me or other, more powerful lords than herself to trade for protection, or she may want him for herself. My spies report her sorcerers are hard at work to deliver her an heir; this child may be a vessel for more unnatural means towards getting one. The three remaining are large enough threats to be taken seriously and have the means to turn the Belmont into a formidable weapon: House Cain, Prince Burebista of old Dacia, and the coven of uylaks on the Turkish border. Well done, Isaac."

At last, Isaac can relax. He allows himself a brief second to bask in Dracula's praise before helping him to wrap up the map and place it away.

"Am I to understand you still have no desire to obtain him for yourself?"

Dracula chuckles, closing and locking the cabinet up. "You assume correctly. A Belmont who gets himself captured by the Butcher is no threat. He's a useful pawn to draw out other, more interesting pieces. Were his family alive, I might have taken more of an interest to lure them out of hiding. But a Belmont child alone, without the benefit of his vault of tricks or magic weapons or a clan of hunters hell bent on rescuing him is little better than a trophy. I have enough trophies, Isaac. And I am at a point in my immortal life where my happiness lies elsewhere than in spilling the blood of old enemies."

Isaac still thinks it would be better to kill the boy himself, but he bows, accepting this as wisdom from an ancient creature with far more knowledge of the world than him.

"Go to the night market tomorrow and observe who buys him." Dracula orders, directing the cabinet back into place in his study. "Then return here and we can begin the plans against our new rival. I will keep my guards behind, so that no one recognizes you as my agent. Do not be seen."

Nodding, Isaac straightens to take his leave. We. His heart sings at being included. "As you command, Lord Dracula."

~~~~

Sweat drips down Trevor's forehead and onto his collar.

He works with a single-minded focus, squeezing his unhappy wrist through a too-tight hole. Trevor twists his wrists blindly but methodically, ignoring the strain in his shoulders, back, and hands. There's no other choice apart from becoming a vampire's meal, and, frankly, fuck that option. It's been an exhausting day, despite doing nothing but sit in this cage like a pretty pet and be taunted by every bloodsucking leech who wanders in to mock the Belmont name. At least there's the physical pain to distract him from worse sights, both in this caravan and in his head.

He's been here long enough to memorize the day-to-night pattern now. The night market starts at sunset when the lamps are lit; he can catch a glimpse of the eerie green glow reflecting off the floor of the caravan. The stirring of the creature that guards him is his next warning: he doesn't know why armor apparently needs to sleep, but it does, and 'awakens' with a groaning of metal on metal. It comes to check on him, then leaves to procure stale-tasting water and whatever horrible, insect-ridden meal he's procured for the day. The first day, it had been some ground up chickpeas that were both mushy and hard enough to crack Trevor's teeth: he suspected it had gone through a miller who hadn't particularly cared about consistency. In the evening it had been the stalks of some kind of bitter-tasting plant, the sort of thing he would feed to the goats back home, when there were goats. And a home.

Trevor knew: it was livestock feed. As if he needed digestive problems on top of an already shit time.

He'd be taken out back to piss, the armor keeping him tied to the caravan the entire time via a chain around his neck. No exits there: the caravan abutted against solid cave wall on three sides. He'd take the time to look around, stretch a bit, get blood flowing back to his sore limbs by walking in small circles and rotating his shoulders. That would only last as long as the evil fucker holding him hostage became impatient, and Trevor would summarily be thumped in the head and told to 'get on with it'. Then he'd be dragged back by the neck, dropped into the cage, and the leeches would begin trickling in.

They weren't all vampires - he caught a glimpse of a few witches, a few lesser demons, one gargoyle - but the majority were. They never showed up in a group, too territorial for that, but he was counting in the back of his mind, memorizing faces both high and low born and making up insults in his head to stop from going mad with anxiety and frustration. The ones who would come would all ask or demand certain things; smell his blood, pluck a hair from his head, check his eyes for clarity and intelligence. All weird tests that somehow 'proved' he was what the armor claimed he was. Trevor didn't get it, but he had a perversely delightful time making his keeper's efforts to obtain his relics as difficult as possible. He fought back as viciously as he could, to the point where it was clear his presence was a fucking frustration to the armor despite the amounts of money changing hands. Strangely, there were no humans present aside from the one that showed up early in the first day of Trevor's ordeal. He guesses it may be that most vampires don't easily tolerate his kind as competitive buyers.

After the Belmont-baiting was over, always taking far too long for Trevor's liking, he'd be fed and watered with the same shit from before, his bonds and the cage integrity would be checked, the lamps would be dimmed, and then the armor would walk off to go shut itself down. Two long, distressing nights had passed this way.

He leans his head back against the bars of his cage, wrists and shoulders both aching from the hell he's putting his body through, to take a breath. If he can just break out, he won't have to think about the jeers from the fuckers who want to adorn their walls with the last Belmont. It won't matter what these evil fucks say to him now: he'll be gone. Twice he's come close, forced to back down when the pain became too much to bear. But he's so damn close. Trevor has no idea why he hasn't been sold off yet; maybe the prices the Butcher is demanding aren't high enough yet to entice him. Maybe he's decided he can get more by selling him piecemeal by the pint. Maybe he just delights in owning a Belmont, like a demented collector of curiosities or a particularly mouthy statue. Trevor's a rare piece these days, he notes with bitterness.

He begins again.

Pain radiates up his arm as he twists in the manacles, forced to work blind as he lubricates the metal with his own damn blood. His right arm beats in time with his heart, the wound from that fucking armor creature rubbed raw. His left hand works overtime as Trevor catches the manacle and pulls it down. Twist, pull, twist, pull, pray you don't twist your whole arm off. He grinds his molars against the leather bit in his mouth, oddly grateful for the way it muffles his moans of distress. He wipes the sweat as best he can, ducking his head down and his shoulder up, and pulls again, pushing away the pain.

A sickly but audible click followed by a too-loud clang of metal-against-metal. With a gasp and a roil of his protesting stomach at the sudden onslaught of pain, Trevor is free.

He takes a moment to pause, breathing in slow and deep to settle his stomach and his nerves. Whatever sounds he made seem to have gone unnoticed; he can't hear any commotion or movement outside the caravan. Good. All right. Next steps.

He slides his arms through the bars, settling his hands in his lap to examine them and struggling to ignore the soreness of his shoulders. The left arm is bruised up but functional, if slightly hindered by the manacles still encasing his wrist. The right is more of a problem: Trevor doesn't want to try moving the thumb, hanging at an odd angle and sparking sharp jolts whenever he so much as shifts his arm. The forearm cut feels worse than it looks; an angry red wound all puffy from his work on it. This was the worst part of getting free, but it's no use dislocating his thumb if he can't complete the next steps. Getting out of the cage isn't a problem; it's not locked, probably for easier access if he's going to be pulled from it night and day. Trevor first checks for the market's start, squinting his eyes to catch a glimpse of any green light.

And maybe there is a god up there who likes him, because the lamps haven't been lit yet. Which means he can spend a few precious minutes massaging his thumb back into its socket.

Another deep breath; he decides to leave the gag in, not trusting himself just yet to be able to get it back into place in time or accidentally make too much noise. No turning back now. He grasps his hurt thumb with his other hand, whimpering as the shock of it washes over him and then settles down to a more manageable level. Then he gets to work, gently guiding it over and over back into its socket. His eyes drift to the box that holds his family's whip, currently out of reach but not for much longer. Better to focus on that than let his imagination run wild with all the shit that could go wrong from here on out.

A click back into place, and despite his eyes watering from the suffering he's making his poor hand endure, Trevor gives a grim, feral smile in the darkness.

~~~

As the night market lights up for the third and final night, the Butcher stirs his armored thrall. He's eager now, moving around at a quickened pace to get set up in time. Despite the difficulties the Belmont boy had brought to him, he's had multiple serious buyers come calling yesterday, including the servants of lords, ladies, and princes. No word from the most powerful in the region, but the Butcher hopes he'll be watching. Perhaps he can even use the boy as leverage to earn a spot at court for himself.

Speaking of, he hasn't heard much from the back of the caravan in all this time he's been working. A dead Belmont can still garner a price, but he'd rather not have to explain how the boy expired to those who deal in fresher meat. Tinged with frustration, he gets a bucket and a stale bit of bread and goes to wake the boy up.

The cabin is dark and quiet, with the trap thrown on top of the cage where he'd left it before. The armor kicks the cage, but no sound emits from it. Strange and worrisome; that should have jostled him out of sleep. With a scowl, he leans down and pulls the tarp off the cage, clutching the bucket in the other.

"Rise, you lazy piece of-"

The cage is empty. 

The Butcher starts forward, shock hitting him first. He at first wonders if his armor isn't communicating vision correctly across the distance between them. He has the armor shake the cage but there's nothing in there to speak of; no manacles, no gag, no Belmont. It's like the boy simply vanished. 

He turns to hurry out of the caravan, and that's when a knife impales the armor directly into the cursed words on the inside of his chest. He stumbles back, blinking stupidly at the handle; he recognizes it as one of his own butcher knives.

The Belmont drops from the ceiling, kicking the knife further into him as he goes and landing on top of the Butcher. The boy's arm is wrapped tightly in his shirt to muffle the manacle he still hadn't managed to free himself with. But his other hand is free to twist the knife further as he scowls down into the eyes of the armor, scratching the words up beyond recognition. The Butcher from a hundred miles away can feel himself losing control; he attempts to grab the boy off him and only succeeds in flailing the bucket, missing him completely. The legs are unresponsive; the vision he has is spotty and growing worse. 

"Told you I'd kill you." The Belmont hisses, the shine of grim victory on his face as he drags the knife back and forth to slice through the words entirely. When the last of the script is destroyed, the Butcher's servant ceases to be; the armor crumbles to the floor in pieces, no longer held together by magic. 

From his keep, the sorcerer screams his defeat and rushes from the scrying room. 

Chapter Text

Something's wrong.

Isaac stands at the edge of a gathering group of increasingly irate vampires. He wears his hood up again, hiding any trace of identity that could tie him back to Dracula: instead, Isaac stands alone. He's left his guards behind, and only his weapons and the scent of him could feasibly out him for how dangerous he truly is. Luckily, no one pays him mind and he doesn't need to defend himself tonight.

But as he watches the half dozen or so people begin to grow impatient with one another, jostling for position to be first in line to bid, he can't help but wonder what the Butcher's playing at. Surely he's not such a self-important fool as to keep them all waiting? Isaac scrutinizes the door: the lights have been lit for the third night and the caravan remains closed up.

He considers whether it would be worth the trouble to go knock on the creature's closed caravan door when a voice, so soft, so whiny, makes itself known in his ear;

"I'm bored. What are we waiting for?"

His hand halfway to his dagger, Isaac is overcome by a profound and unwelcome sense of irritation. Instead of pulling the blade, he reaches into his hood and snatches out a tiny, furry creature, bringing it out into the light of the caves.

Adrian - for it could be no one but him - squirms in Isaac's grip. He's in his bat form but still retains most of his coloring, pale-furred and with practically see-through wings and ears. The tiny creature glares at the older boy holding him, so delicate in Isaac's strong, calloused hand. Isaac grits his teeth, controlling his annoyance, but refuses to let him go despite Adrian's struggles. Instead, he takes a few steps back into an out-of-the-way section of the cave: he doesn't want to be seen having this argument in public. Adrian bites at his fingers in protest until Isaac stops walking, assured they're out of immediate earshot.

"What are you doing here?" He demands of the young, spoiled prince, holding him up to eye level. Adrian doesn't even have the decency to look ashamed of himself, jutting his tiny chin up in the air, ears flattening like a displeased cat.

"To get my puppy. You were the one who said I had to go after what I want." Adrian twists in Isaac's unrelenting grip, unused to being held with his wings pinned to his body. It's clear he wants to be let go to fly off, but Isaac's hardly going to take chances with his Lord's son. His grip is firm, but he's careful not to hurt the brat.

"You are interfering with your father's assignments. Go home." Isaac isn't about to get into an argument with Dracula's nine year old son when he has work to do.

Adrian has the audacity to glower up at Isaac in a way that is not adorable, however much he'd like to pretend it is. That endearing pout that works so well on Lisa isn't about to go anywhere with Isaac, especially when he's been sent for reconnaissance. Isaac on his missions is famously single-minded and won't let himself get distracted by a squeaking animal who should be at home, safe, in his bedroom.

"How am I supposed to do that?" The bat settles down once it's clear he's not about to be squished, but still maintains that impressive five-ounce glare. His tone reeks of satisfaction and an unearned sense of cleverness

Which.....shit. He's right.

Isaac casts his gaze around, hoping to find a trace of the portal left. Alas, he can find none; one of the caveats of coming in disguise was to cut off the portal to Castlevania. As Isaac stews in silence, trying to think of how best to safeguard the prince until the hour the portal will open again, Adrian twists his head around, sniffing and making a clear face of disgust.

"It's smelly in here."

"You should have thought of that before you stowed away." Isaac has no sympathy to offer. He's frustrated. Any moment now, the Butcher will open his caravan and start the bidding on the Belmont. Isaac needs to be there to watch. But signalling to Dracula that his son is here with him will likely cause a scene, something that Isaac was expressly forbidden to do. He has a distance mirror in a pouch in his pocket; he could manage it here. But it would require someone coming to collect the boy and Isaac is out of time. Already he can hear voices picking up, indicating a fight may soon break out. He should be there to watch and record the goings-on of the lesser lords, not playing babysitter in this smelly hole in the wall.

Break his cover and risk his lord's anger at losing the opportunity he was sent here to observe, or keep Adrian with him and risk his anger at potentially putting his son in the line of fire? Another, more terrifying thought occurs: what if Adrian is hurt? What if some enterprising vampire recognizes a young, blonde dhampir for the literal royalty he is? Most wouldn't dare be stupid enough to harm Adrian...but not all.

Does he even have authority to order Adrian to return home? This is precisely why Isaac asked for a written hierarchy detailing Adrian's place in Castlevania! What if he's overstepping his boundaries? What if Dracula is going to banish him for this, or worse? It hardly matters if he swore he wouldn't. This could spell the end of every bit of freedom he's enjoyed-

"Isaac?"

A slightly nervous-sounding squeak sounds from the bat. Isaac comes back to himself, giving off harsh pants, eyes blown wide. He'd gotten lost in his own head again. That...hadn't happened in some time.

"I apologize." He mutters, clipped short. How much time did they have, did he waste on this useless panic attack? Isaac pulls his hood back up: he has to get back out there, no question about it.

He lifts up Adrian, whose little furry face is screwed up in doubt and shock.

"Adrian." The informality with which Isaac has to greet Dracula's child grates at him. In response, Adrian stops squirming and pays attention, especially with the grave tone the Forgemaster is using to address him. "This place is dangerous. It preys on the unsuspecting. Given half the chance, the creatures here will do their best to harm you, son of Dracula or no."

Thankfully, Adrian seems to at last take this all seriously, or seriously enough that he calms down from his sputtering about Isaac's need to keep him safe. Isaac continues, keeping an ear open for any activity outside their private meeting;

"I am working with your father to secure information and I cannot keep you safe and complete my mission at the same time. If we cannot return you home, you must promise to be silent and to obey me. My life is tied to yours now. If you are hurt, I die." Adrian's eyes widen: finally, some recognition about how dire their situation is.

"Father wouldn't."

Isaac resists the urge to chuckle, already feeling the claws piercing his throat.

"For you, young prince? I think he would turn the oceans red with blood if any harm came to you."

"I would make him stop."

"The way to make him stop is to prevent him needing to begin. Stay hidden in my hood, for both our sakes?"

At last, he gets the obedience he was hoping for. Adrian nods, rapid fire, his little head rocking, too big for his tiny body. At last, Isaac lets him go. Adrian, cowed from the fear Isaac had to put in him, crawls up his arm and back into his hood. No wonder Isaac hadn't noticed him until Adrian spoke up: he's so small that the weight of him practically disappears when he clings, upside down, to the part of the hood closest to Isaac's head.

"Don't worry." Comes the solemn promise of the prince. "I won't let Father hurt you."

"Then stay close and hidden, and listen when I tell you things." Isaac says, finally able to breathe properly since this whole side adventure began. Thankfully, there's no more discussion of Adrian's demand for a dog; Isaac is able to rejoin the crowd without incident. He keeps his hood up and notes the people beginning to gather. Here are the servants of minor nobility he was told specifically to watch, at least one of them baring fangs at the unexpected delay. Still, no one seems to be leaving at this clear mark of disrespect. No one knows when this chance at acquiring such a prestigious trophy as the last Belmont child will come again.

Apparently in the time they were gone, an uneasy consensus had been reached; an enchantress steps from the small but irate crowd to spell the door open. As she works her magic, Isaac privately reflects the foolishness of everyone here. The Butcher is an idiot to keep a crowd of this magnitude waiting; the enchantress is an idiot for volunteering to open the locked door of a known trap-setter; the rest of the crowd are idiots to show their livery here where Isaac can get a clear headcount of the ones who would insult Dracula by claiming his prize from underneath their noses, never mind his reluctance to pick it for himself. Even the Belmont child is an idiot for his capture in the first pl-

"The Butcher is dead! The Belmont's escaped!" a cry cuts through the crowd.

Ah. Shit.

From inside his hood, Isaac hears a tiny, shocked whisper;

"There's a Belmont here?"

Shit.

~~~

Clear across the night market on the other side of the cave, Trevor squelches around in homemade shoes and a stolen cloak, smelling like death incarnate.

He hadn't wanted to delay his escape! But two seconds outside the caravan, walking in snow and ice and sharp rocks told him that it was either get some shoes or leave bloody footprints for every bloodsucker in the area to track him down. His boots were the first things taken from him when he was knocked unconscious, clearly to prevent him running at the first opportunity. Unfortunately, the thing that kidnapped him also apparently forewent the need for adequate footwear: Trevor had looked in every single box he could find in that shitty caravan without luck. And taking the Butcher's own shoes was a non-starter; the metal was all fused together, heavy, and loud as hell. 

Instead, Trevor had had to get creative, his least-favorite thing to be in a rolling box of body parts. He had his pick of flayed skins, choosing the shade that looked the least human: a pale green, hairless thing that Trevor hoped belonged to an unlucky night creature and not a particularly sick child. Using his stolen knife and a thin braided rope, he was able to fashion what looked like big lettuce cups around the soles of his feet. They were the ugliest things he'd ever made in his life.

But they seemed to get the job done; the leather was tough and silent, the two things Trevor needed to be able to go long distances. 

The hood was clearly built for a much taller creature, but Trevor sawing at it with a blade enough times cut it down to the appropriate size. It was frayed and uneven, but that just added to the overall effect he was going for. Trevor hunched his back, shuffled his gait, and just like that became a dime-a-dozen Flea Man. As long as anyone didn't get too close to check his face, at least.

That was where the third part of Trevor's disguise came into effect: vampires were amazing at sniffing out their food. Blood called to them like a siren; he needed to make sure he was as unappetizing as possible. Fortunately, there were all manner of unseemly, disgusting-smelling chemicals stacked throughout the shelves. He'd selected two jars, one labeled embalming fluid and the other sealed up with clear, rotting fish. Instant cadaverine - the stink of death. 

Holding his breath, Trevor poured both over his head. 

All of these things led to this moment, when he needs to put his disguise to the test. In front of Trevor is the mouth of the cave, currently being guarded by a pair of vampires with heavy-looking halberds. Past them, he can glimpse the night sky and fallen snow, followed by dark mountains. None of it looks recognizable - he'd been blindfolded for the last leg of the journey up here - but the first smell of fresh air in days has Trevor's heart pounding. Those mountains might as well be heaven for all he cares. And even better; he can hear the whinny of horses and pull of wheels over snow from outside. Fucking salvation at last!

Like a reverse Dante, Trevor ventures from the mouth of Hell, inching his way closer to the only clear exit. The vampires at the front take brief note of him. As he shuffles closer, forcing himself to not hurry along, one of them curls their lip at the stink wafting from him. But they don't stop him and Trevor walks through their rows of teeth, holding his breath the whole way. They let him pass with nothing more than an insulting look to each other.

One minute he's trapped in a cave with an untold number of bloodsuckers and the next minute, Trevor Belmont is walking out of his own coffin.

He breathes in and keeps walking at his meandering pace. Trevor's heard one too many bedtime horror stories of hunters caught out because they celebrated too early. He chances his head up and looks around for an easy ride to steal. Nothing undead, nothing too closely guarded, nothing showy enough to be immediately missed. He looks for just one regular goddamn horse, and instead finds guards and carriages and...fuck him, is that a chained up werewolf peeking out of the back of one? He forces himself to keep going, sparing a glance back over his shoulder. Far too many creatures clustered around for his liking, and he doubts he can get away with a full carriage without someone raising the alarm.

Finally he catches sight of the stables on the more uneven terrain, where carriages would have more difficulty treading. He grimaces and starts up the hill, tromping through the snow.

When he arrives at the barn doors, Trevor finds the stables somewhat lacking in vampire hospitality. Horses shiver in their stalls, mud and snow and shit cake their hooves and legs. Part of the thatched roof had caved in but no one seems to have cared, letting the snow pile up in one of the stalls. The feed is the same shit he'd been eating, so good to know he was right about the food not being fit for an animal.

At the other end of the entrance are another pair of doors, cracked and bent inwards. There sits a creature in armor that went out of fashion a hundred years ago. It's slumped in its 'seat', an overturned barrel rotting at the edges. 

He inches closer, clutching his whip in one hand. The monster at the other end stirs and lifts its head. Its sunken gaze pierces Trevor and it shuffles to its feet, jaw cracking but making no noise. 

Against all odds, Trevor feels relief. Zombies are strong and can get away with killing a few unwary peasants, but he's been dispatching these for a few years now. He gives a feral grin to match the zombie's decayed lips, and pulls back his arm, striking the creature in the face with the family whip. The head pops off, the body staggering in the other direction before collapsing into a stall. Trevor waits in silence, before settling his arm back down and reattaching the whip to his belt when no cry is raised. 

All right. Time to get the fuck out of here. 

He picks a brown, sturdy horse at random, ignoring how she shies away from him from the stink wafting off of him. These are vampire-trained horses: he can't smell that bad compared to those undead! Taking her by the reins, he coaxes her out with a soft touch to her nose and finds to his relief that she's still saddled up. Setting his foot in the stirrup, Trevor pulls himself to a sitting position, taking a moment to marvel at getting this far. His body is beginning to ache - his thumb the worst of it - so the adrenaline that's been keeping him going is starting to wane. Better head out quick.

He turns the horse, and in doing so, catches sight of the second pair of doors. From this height he can see where the top portion of them had broken outward, too high to see normally in and out from the ground. There's a penned-in yard, and..

Trevor freezes.

A human face peers back at him. 

He stares back, watching the person. He's in shock to see someone else still alive here, but the man - a thirty-something man, bearded, wearing a smock and a peasant's hat - seems more curious than anything. He's not moving; he's simply watching Trevor like he's a dog about to do an interesting trick. 

Then Trevor blinks, and the man wanders off to stand to the side, staring at the pen's wall instead.

He inches closer on his horse. More faces turn to look at him; there must be two dozen people standing around in a pen barely able to hold itself together! Old, young, men, women, children, some wearing crosses, some with their hair pulled back under caps like the Turks wear. All of them silent as the grave, and remaining sitting or standing in one place. They look at Trevor without comprehension, then look away. No one groups up, no one makes conversation or huddles over food or does anything human other than stare off into space.

It's eerie. 

There are calls in the distance, amplified by the cave. The Butcher's body's been discovered. He has to run.

He can't run.

Trevor climbs down from the horse, clutching the reins as he nears the door. It's barred from the outside, but not very well: three or four people working together could probably break it apart from the inside. He uses his shoulder and hoists the beam up out of the way, shoving open first the one door and then the other.

Twenty-five humans stare back at him. 

"Run!" He demands, pointing out the open doors. None of them move. They eye his hand, then back to his face as one collective unit, voiceless and brainless.

He can only take being stared at for so long. Trevor shakes his head and goes for the nearest person, picking the man he saw first. The Wallachian peasant makes no objection when Trevor pulls him down to face him, staring into his eyes, examining his head. The man, thankfully, hasn't had his brains cut out, but he's been enthralled. Probably told to stay put no matter what, to make it easier to lead him to the slaughter.

Fuckshit - no small wonder no one is moving to escape. He grits his teeth, struggling to remember the various things that would break a vampire's hold on an enthralled human. He knows a lot about breaking himself out of trances, but nothing that could both get everyone out at once and be secretive enough to not alert every creature in the area. The more he thinks about it, the more Trevor realizes the unfortunate truth: He's going to have to break these enchantments person by person.

Grimacing, he guides the man to lie on the ground, and sits on top of him to hold him down with his body weight. Trevor takes his dagger, covers the man's mouth, and stabs him about an inch into the shoulder. 

The effect is instantaneous. The man shouts and starts fighting like mad, eyes wide with the fear of his last few minutes of consciousness before the enthrallment had taken hold of him. Trevor clings to him, glaring at him, and pulls his dagger free as he uses the whole of his body weight to pin a man twice his size to the ground.

"Shut up! You want to live?" He hisses, well aware that he's running out of time and has so many more still to go. No time to be nice and polite about it. The man, thankfully, seems to recognize Trevor's lack of fangs, though his nose does wrinkle at the stench of him, the bastard. He stops trying to throw Trevor off of him, his eyes darting around frantically.

Trevor gives a short nod to the horse already set to go. There aren't enough to go around for the people here, but when was life ever about easy choices? 

"Take that and go. Run for the forests, the rivers. Go, now." No time to check whether the man is obeying him, Trevor gets up off of him and heads for the next person he can reach. A little girl, about ten years old with her hair under a kerchief, is led to the wall next to her so that Trevor can work his own magic. He wipes the dagger clean on his pant leg and-

"Hey!"

He winces, glaring death at the first man, and resists the urge to swear at him. Can't he see what's happening here? 

The man balks, but stays his ground, hands clutching the reins. He gives a short nod to another woman, standing far off and aimless. Her hair is black and braided over one shoulder; she plays with the tail end of it, staring at the ground.

"M-my wife.."

Fucking christ. Trevor grunts an affirmative. "Bring her here."

He turns back to the girl and pricks his dagger into her arm, holding her mouth shut. 

~~~

Inside the caravan, Isaac examines the empty remains of the Butcher's servant, stuffed inside the cage to prolong the time before inevitable discovery.

The Belmont appeared more clever than he let on; he seemed to have broken into every bit of space that could contain something useful for a human going on a long, fraught journey. From the ceiling, Adrian swings back and forth, still in his bat form. Isaac refused to let him change back.

"Shh." Isaac says, before Adrian has a chance to whine again.

"I didn't say anything!" 

"You were about to." He sniffs the air, wrinkling his nose. The crowds had dispersed, searching the market for the boy. It promised to be a frenzy: Isaac had no love for hunters but even he didn't envy the Belmont when his fate caught up with him. Whatever form that might take. 

Adrian is silent for a few more blissful seconds before blurting out;

"We should be doing something."

"We are not here to do anything. I was instructed by your father to observe, not to intervene. Now I am gathering useful supplies for my trade, and then we will go home." He picks up a bottle, shakes it, and sets it aside.

Adrian scoffs, clearly irritated. "There's a night creature hunter out there. And you don't want to fight him? I would!"

"You vastly overestimate your skills."

The little bat sputters, almost falling off the wall from sheer audacity. He recovers, perching right-side up on a bookshelf. 

"Did you get a good look at him before? What was he like?" 

Isaac pauses, wondering just where all of this insatiable curiosity was coming from. Was Adrian truly that bored that he would endanger his life to find answers? Isaac didn't want to find out.

"He was short. A scar over one eye. A rude little creature much like yourself." 

Adrian's face screws up, trying to imagine it.  "Did he have a beard? Arms like tree trunks? An overbite?"

Isaac laughs, despite himself. "You are picturing a man. The Belmont is a child."

All too quickly, he's realized his mistake. 

Adrian's face turns hopeful...and then immediately falls into despair. "He's my age? Isaac!"

Shit. 

"He is not a playmate." Isaac retorts sharply, standing up. "A Belmont is not going to do anything but kill you in your sleep. They hunt for a living." Adrian opens his mouth again, clearly going to argue, when screams interrupt the building argument. Adrian and Isaac fall silent to listen, Adrian's ears turning to catch the noise.

It's too far away to determine whether the screaming was from a human or a vampire, but they seem to be growing in number and volume, and coming from outside. Isaac's sharp eyes find Adrian starting to huddle against the shelving, and reaches up his palm. The dhampir flies down to him, as Isaac thinks of what he should do. 

First things first; get Adrian out of harm's way. 

He has a distance mirror to call for aid, but while it's too big for him to step through, Adrian could use it to go straight home. He settles down on the floor alongside Adrian, instructing him with a sharp, clear voice that brokers no argument:

"Go for help." The box is opened; Adrian hesitates, but flies inside it when the shouts and cries of a slaughter start up again. Closing the box once he's sure Adrian has gone back to the castle, Isaac straightens up and turns his attention to the situation at hand. 

The Butcher wasn't a friend of his, exactly, but he was a colleague. Leave it to a Belmont not to escape peacefully, and instead to destroy everything in his wake. Isaac takes out his dagger and his own studded whip, and heads outside in the direction of the screams. 

~~~

Six people.

Trevor only managed to rescue six fucking people, and on the seventh one he's discovered. 

Bodies and blood litter the human pen. He can't think about how far those six managed to get, if any of them actually made it before being set upon. Right now, all he can concentrate on is staying alive as demon after demon throw themselves at him and his whip. 

Vampire and human innards alike are strewn all across the freezing ground, as Trevor battles his way out of the stables. He tried, goddamn it, he just didn't have enough time to free everyone quietly. One of the humans didn't speak his language, started to scream and Trevor couldn't calm him down fast enough. From there, it was a quick alert to the guards at the carriages, and now he's just fighting to stay alive. 

One pathetically good thing his brain can think of; he can free the rest in one go. Likely they'll be rounded up and killed, but goddamn it, at least he can give them a shot at freedom. The horses are all long gone, either stolen or fled when the first alarms started up. He punches a fledgling vampire in the face, knocks it down with a boot to the gut and lights it on fire. It screams, high-pitched enough to shatter the illusion the rest of the poor souls inside are under.

From there on, it's fucking chaos.

He's jostled from behind by a mad stampede of escaping humans, funneling through the stables to a waiting collection of vampires and god knows what else. Trevor swears, climbing up onto one of the stalls and then through the hole in the roof, determined to keep the focus on himself. He waves his torch, shouting at the night creatures down below;

"Oy! Ugly fucks, up here!" He screams, and lights the thatched roof on fire. Leaping down into the crowd of escaping humans and demonic creatures, Trevor throws himself into action. He stays close to the stables themselves, figuring a burning wall is better than being completely surrounded on all sides, and plays defense with his whip. He watches one of the people rush through the horde only to get picked up from behind; though he slashes at the creature's wings, it bites into the woman it's holding anyway, and he swears as he watches them both fall to their deaths. Others run in different directions; some to chase escaping people, some to get away from Trevor's chaotic whip-swinging. He can't keep this up for much longer, his arms aching, his hits getting less precise over time.

Trevor takes a second to gasp and breathe, pulling the whip back for another shot. At least he wasn't going to die in a cave; he can die here, out in the fresh night air underneath the stars. That's something; it's more than most of his family got, and maybe it'll be quick..

God, what a fucking thought. 

He's alone now, the humans all fled or dead. And he's tiring; Trevor did his best, but he's three days without enough food or water, in terrible footwear, in freezing weather and with a partially dislocated thumb affecting his ability to handle his weapons. His shots are going wide; he's missing more than he's hitting. And now he's getting the distinct sense he's being played with, penned in himself. No one is going for a direct kill shot the way they did the rest of the poor souls he wasn't able to save. Probably something to do with bullshit vampire hierarchies, he can't think about it now with his head and arms aching- 

"Belmont! Care to match my whip against yours?" 

That fucking Forgemaster is coming through the crowd now. Trevor grimaces when he catches sight of him, panting heavily. Isaac emerges, holding out a deadly-looking dagger and a fucking flail. Just his luck. 

"Seems a little unfair, don't you think?" he calls back, to stall for time but also because fuck this Forgemaster in particular, he towers over the half-grown Trevor and he looks well-fed, if those muscles are anything to go off of. Said Forgemaster chuckles and in answer, rushes Trevor with the knife.

From then on it's mostly a blur of Trevor trying to both dodge and watch his footing, and Isaac slashing and stabbing at him in close quarters so as to render his whip useless. Trevor has his daggers which save him from getting knifed in the eye, but the flail catches him at a glance more than once and he's losing blood by the teaspoon. Death by a thousand fucking cuts. 

At least he doesn't have to worry about being attacked from behind; he's already killed the bravest and most arrogant of the creatures surrounding them, leaving only the cowards and the interested observers. Trevor's under no illusion, he's going to die tonight, knows it in his guts. But fuck him, he really wants to take this bastard out with him. 

They fight, and Isaac presses his advantage against the Belmont. He's surprised and impressed the boy lasted this long, but he's underfed and lacking in basic discipline, slipping in the blood-drenched snow. He keeps a sharp eye out for tricks, snapping the whip from Trevor's hand and sending it skidding when the boy tries to get enough distance between them to use it. 

He's nearly got him up against the barn door when a sharp, familiar cry of a woman sounds just outside his periphery;

"Get your hand off me!"

And too late did Isaac remember that when he told Adrian to get help, he didn't say which parent he should get help from. Adrian thought the world of both his parents, thought either could do anything; of course he would rather get his kind-hearted, human mother to help with a human problem, never stopping to think that there was a reason Lisa had never come herself to these dark market places. They were both human, Isaac and Lisa, but Isaac was a risk worth expending: Lisa was not. She shouldn't be here! What the hell was Adrian, was Lisa thinking by coming here-

Trevor's fist smashes into Isaac's nose and he's shoved out of the way.

Trevor, meanwhile, had made his peace with God that he was going to see his family today. Much as he would have liked to curse the Almighty, he was content to be coming home again. Hell, he even managed to (hopefully) rescue a few people from being bled to death. 

Speaking of, his eyes dart towards the woman who'd been caught earlier. A vampire has her wrist in his claw, sniffing her, going in for a bite even as she reaches for a weapon from her satchel. Smart lady. Was she there in the pen and he'd just missed her on accident? As she sweeps a blade across the vampire's neck, two more made to leap up behind her. He takes off running, ignoring his screaming wounds to leap onto one of the vampires from behind, stabbing it in the back like the Flea Man he had been pretending to be. The vampire screams; Trevor turns to attack the second but finds the woman already holding up some kind of sigil, causing the vampire to flee backwards. What the fuck?

Before he can get a closer look, pain erupts in his right arm. The Forgemaster's flail had caught around him on the spiked side, and as Trevor tries to process this, the whip is torn away, taking most of the skin from his arm with it. Is that his bone he's staring at? 

He staggers to his knees, vision blurring. The pain pulsing from his arm is overwhelming; he tries to stay conscious, wanting to see what symbol the woman held, wanting to tell the Forgemaster to go fuck himself one last time..

Trevor slumps forward, face in the snow. 

Chapter Text

Few individuals in Castlevania could burst through the study of Vlad Dracula Tepes and not be immediately eviscerated for it.

Fortunately, one of those people is his son. He hears him coming from a floor away, his little bat heart pounding as he overcompensates his body, putting speed over endurance. No one else flies so recklessly through his castle.

Vlad glances up with a questioning eyebrow as Adrian, first a bat and changing mid-air into a boy to run the rest of the way, kicks his door open. Where on Earth did he learn such manners?

He draws himself to his great height as a wide-eyed Adrian gasps out; "Mother asks that you move the transmission mirror to her medical study!"

Ah. From Lisa.

This wouldn't be the first time Lisa had let their son play messenger between parents inside the castle, nor would it be the first time she needed to use the mirror to travel back and forth between Castlevania and her doctor's office. Vlad offers a hand to his son, which Adrian takes. Was that a nervous stutter he heard in his boy's heart just now?

"Fine, yes. But you will explain to me why you feel the need to exhaust yourself as we do so." He says, already feeling a bit of a headache coming on from a future lecture. Adrian has that anxious look in his eye when he knows he's broken one of the few rules his parents set down for him. Vlad moves with the patience and grace of one who has lived for centuries and found nothing that could surprise him any longer. Adrian moves in sharp contrast, pulling at his father's arm like the impatient child he is, frustrated that Vlad won't immediately do as he's asked. The two make an odd pair, Adrian rushing ahead through the hallway, turning around to find that Vlad has only come a few steps, and running back to tug at his cloak. Wasn't he supposed to have outgrown this sense of urgency already? He's acting like a child half his age.

Or at least he assumes so. Was it normal for human children to dart needlessly back and forth? Lisa assures him this is perfectly within the bounds of his age group, but Vlad doubts it. He eyes Adrian with all the consternation of a father and keeps walking at his calm, purposeful gait.

But Adrian doesn't seem to be taking the hint. Nor does he feel inclined to start talking first, mouth stubbornly buttoned up. Vlad represses a sigh at his emotional boy, so like his mother. One of the many reasons to adore him, though it occasionally leads to moments of confusion and miscommunication like this.

He walks past the two vampires standing guard at the door to the empty storeroom, where the mirror is being kept until Isaac returns from the night market. No matter there; Vlad is sure his Forgemaster will understand the need to temporarily move the mirror's placement. Isaac will still be able to come through, just at the incorrect end destination. And Vlad will be there to ensure that nothing else follows Isaac while his wife is working.

Opening the door, Vlad expects to find a waiting transmission mirror, devoid of all but his and his son's reflections. Instead, the mirror is active, showing a deranged, pitched battle taking place. Humans fleeing, vampires chasing after them, stampeding horses in the background, the howl of a werewolf, whips cracking, a stable on fire-?!

Immediately Vlad puts an arm out in front of his son, claws out to protect him as his eyes dart around, taking in the scene. He knows he closed the mirror from his side! Someone must have opened it up again to its previous destination.

He raises his free claw to turn the mirror about, searching for the culprit as Adrian hovers close to his elbow, fearful of the screams coming out of the mirror. In the chaos they're watching from afar, no one yet takes notice of his dark shadow cutting a shimmering hole in reality. This is the night market, that much is obvious, but there's no sign of Isaac. His eyes search the poorly lit crowd for a hint of his Forgemaster, but land on someone else instead.

Lisa-!

~~~

Lisa looks up as the air shimmers in front of her, kneeling in the snow, her hands covered in the blood of the boy she's doing her best to save. There they are - her boys, both looking absolutely horrified to see her in the middle of this. Well, that's one thing settled; good for Adrian, flying so fast to his father. That's their exit right there. She finishes tying off the tourniquet around the boy's arm, keeping an eye on his breathing. Still unconscious, but alive, thank god.

"Here - help me lift him?" She directs her question towards Isaac, who stands guard at her shoulder. He has his whip and his dagger out, giving threatening looks to anyone who comes near Lisa. It's a very sweet gesture, but right now there's a boy bleeding out in the snow who's going to need her. She can't do anything for the poor souls all strewn about the snow and yard, but this child - the target of multiple creatures, for all the work Isaac is doing to keep them at bay - is still breathing. She'd like to keep it that way.

Isaac scowls, but his obedience to Vlad - and by extension, to her - foregoes everything. He sheathes his dagger and bends down to pick up the boy, nostrils flaring in the disgust he won't voice aloud. Lisa, grateful for the help, grabs up the rest of her supplies before standing and hurrying towards the waiting portal. She has her own blade out, keeping a watchful eye to protect Isaac's back. But there's no need: the night creatures attacking Isaac previously seem to have caught onto the dark, cold shadow in the rip in reality, growing angrier by the second.

Oh, hell.

Lisa puts on her most determined and focused gaze as she steps through the portal, anticipating she'll need to keep her cool if she wants to soothe tempers and bad attitudes. Between Isaac trying not to even look at her patient in his arms and Vlad fuming and ready to step in and wreak havoc, Lisa sees she has her work cut out for her. The two - three, technically - of them make it through the portal unscathed. She's surprised but a little annoyed to be landing back in the storeroom she came from. She's already had to rush up three floors to get here, and rushing back down to see to her patient before he bleeds out is going to be a struggle.

Lisa adopts her no-nonsense tone of voice as she walks in, tracking blood and snow into the storeroom;

"Adrian, run down to the surgery and boil some water for sterilization. Isaac, here, let me help you carry him, we'll need to secure his arm and wash the area first."

As Adrian turns to obey his mother, Vlad stops him with a cold claw on his shoulder. The screams from behind them abate as he swiftly closes the portal before anything else can get through, which Lisa is grateful for. But her husband's great form hasn't moved from the doorway as he glares; first to Isaac, then to the unconscious boy, then to her.

She takes a breath, and steps closer. If he's going to shout, best to get it over with so she can attend to her patient. She loves her husband, but he can frankly be ridiculous about her sometimes. It's only worry, but that worry comes out as anger far too much for her liking. Before she can get the chance, Vlad's free hand - claw, really - makes a small but pointed motion, and the door behind him flies open with a force that looks like it might have splintered the wood. Outside, Lisa can see two unlucky vampire guards, anonymous under their hoods, shift uneasily. Poor souls.

She, as lady of the castle, had the right to move about freely but she doesn't want anyone to be blamed for her actions. Vlad's temper tends to flare and consume everything in its wake; she'll have to be clear with him that no one else is to shoulder the blame. Adrian looks stricken at his father's side, so Lisa tries for a fond smile to her son to calm him. She can count on one hand the number of times she's seen Vlad this angry, but it's always worked itself out. No reason yet to think this won't end the same way.

"Take that to my wife's surgery." Vlad directs with a soft yet scathing voice, indicating the child in Isaac's arms. While Isaac seems all too ready to hand the boy over, Lisa steps forward to instruct the guards, interrupting;

"He might lose his arm if we don't hurry. If you would just let me-" She's cut off by her husband raising his hand over the boy's pained face and muttering some vampire magic under his breath. All these years, and she still catches her breath a little in worry when magic gets involved, but all that happens is a small stasis spell. She's seen him use it before on occasion: a useful cantrip for keeping patients in the state they arrived when Lisa for one reason or another couldn't administer a sedative. Her shoulders relax as the boy, slightly glowing underneath a see-through veil of red light, stops bleeding, breathing, and moving in general. Were it not for the diamond of red light hovering over his forehead, one could almost mistake him for dead. Good; that should keep him for a few hours, a day at most. Good. That's something, at least.

"Adrian, Isaac. Attend me." Vlad growls, as Lisa steps aside to let Isaac hand her patient over to the waiting guardsman. "I will speak with all of you in private." He inclines his chin towards Lisa, who meets his gaze with a steady, unblinking look. She won't be commanded like a child or a vassal: she thought they were past this by now.

Ancient and powerful and full of knowledge, Vlad still had his moments where he neglected to treat others as equals. Frankly, even Lisa was ready to admit most weren't, but it had been a consistent push-pull in their marriage. Lisa would take on something a little out of her depth like an unruly, mad patient or traveling to a dangerous location to retrieve an antidote. Vlad would perceive this as too risk-taking and make some sort of angry speech or gesture. Lisa would soothe him and remind him that the biggest risk was walking up to his door in the first place and demanding a known vampire teach her his skills. What good was that if she never put it to use for the people who truly needed it?

Yes, she could play it safe, keep close to home and only look after those people who were brave or desperate enough to venture from their doors to hers. But it would be neglecting so many others, the ones too ill or too encumbered to reach her safely. The child Isaac passes over to be carried out of the room isn't even the first she's brought from a battleground. She knows the risk: she does it anyway. Vlad can't protect her from everything, try as he might. This is what comes of being shut away in a castle for years and years; safety, yes, but losing so much of yourself in the process. 

"Lisa." 

An unspoken conversation travels from a husband to his wife, even in his fits of anger; Please. For me.

He extends his arm to her, and when Lisa feels assured the boy isn't going to disappear down into some dungeon or be staked outside the castle, reaches out for him. This isn't the place to argue, they both know that. Together they walk out of the storeroom and up the stairs towards Vlad's study, Adrian and Isaac trailing behind. Lisa spares a glance for the boy she and Isaac pulled from the night market, but his face is pressed against the arm of the guardsman carrying him down to her surgery, safely locked in stasis. Hopefully he'll wake up to a far happier outcome, once she can put him back together again and stay her husband's hand. 

Though, as she looks up at Vlad, listening to his molars nearly crack against each other, she should probably be more worried about his teeth. 

~~~

In his study, Vlad Tepes sits in his high-backed chair and props his head up with a hand, gaze flickering to each individual in the room in front of him. Here is Lisa, his beloved wife, fearless and angry, her hand impatiently poised on her hip, a striking difference from the more demure smile she had for him in her portrait behind her. Here is Isaac, his young forgemaster with his gift still in its infancy, desperately trying to blend into the background by standing as still as possible next to a shadowed bookcase. Here is Adrian, his sweet son, nervous eyes darting from his father to his mother and back again, fidgeting. 

He scowls, and sits up, deciding to focus first on Adrian. As Vlad opens his mouth, Adrian breaks before he can ask a question, blurting out;

"Don't kill Isaac, Father! He didn't know I was there!"

Vlad and Lisa both startle: bad enough that Lisa was running around the night market. To learn that his sweet, honest child was so close to danger without him even knowing about it has Vlad's teeth on edge. He growls, anger born from sheer gut-wrenching terror, sitting up to examine his son. From his locked position in the shadow of the room, Isaac's heart speeds up but he otherwise doesn't move.  

Luckily, Lisa is there to calm things down, though she too looks surprised and upset. She coaxes Adrian over to her for a hug, settling warm hands on his face, his shoulders. 

"No one is killing anyone." She tells him, with a meaningful look to Vlad over Adrian's head. "We're only...surprised, love. What happened? You came into my office so quickly, I thought Isaac only contacted you through the mirror." 

Adrian shakes his head miserably, though he melts easily into his mother's arms. "I snuck out of the castle as a bat, nobody knew. Mother, I'm sorry, I won't do it again, I promise. Don't hurt Isaac, please." Hell, Adrian sounds as though he fully expects his father to tear Isaac's head off in the middle of his study!

Lisa gives him a pointed look with a message attached; reassure them, please? Adrian looks close to tears and Isaac is standing stricken like a stone statue. Vlad grimaces, but addresses the room in his soft, deep tone, taking pains to word what he wants to say carefully, lest they be misconstrued by upset children.

"I would not think to harm one of my only forgemasters in this world, after I have offered him sanctuary here." It hurts him to call Isaac little more than a useful tool, but from trial and error, Vlad's discovered this is the language the boy responds best to. He's becoming so much more than that, but Vlad knows that any words of affection this early could be taken as disingenuous. "Especially over a matter that was not his fault."

Isaac's heart beat slowly lowers from its rabbit-fast pace, as Vlad puts up a clawed hand to still any additional demands from Adrian.

"But I would hear the truth of the matter from him, first. Isaac, step forward. Tell me why we have a Belmont in the castle when I sent you there to observe, only." At the very least, Isaac is skilled at giving reports and cutting straight to the point. The young forgemaster finally detaches himself from the shadows to address the lord and lady of the castle. His back is rigid and straight; his arms are set behind him in a well-practiced pose of deference. 

"I arrived at the night market as you instructed, Lord Dracula. It was not long before.." Isaac trails off, seemingly deciding that throwing Adrian under the carriage wheel would not go over very well with Dracula or Lisa, and reevaluates the words he was planning to use. 

"...Before Adrian made himself known to me. But by then it was too late to turn back without abandoning the mission you sent me on. I felt as though the mission could still be saved and so I instructed Adrian to hide himself."

"What mission, Isaac?" Lisa asks politely, but Vlad knows his wife better. She's not looking at the forgemaster. She's looking at him, with a pointed eyebrow raise, even as she hugs Adrian to her side. Isaac hesitates to answer, but Vlad comes to his rescue. 

"I told Isaac to return to the night market to see which of my subjects would undermine me by purchasing the Belmont boy." He waves a hand to Isaac. "Continue."

The forgemaster bows his head and keeps at it, relief evident on his face that he won't have to get between this husband and wife. "But when we arrived, the Belmont had killed the Butcher's servant and escaped. I felt it prudent to let others chase after him when I had your son with me, and instead went into the caravan he was being held in to find any useful supplies and bring them back to the castle. But a few moments later, we heard screaming. I sent Adrian through the mirror and went to investigate alone." 

"That was when I found you, Mother!" Adrian declares, hugging onto Lisa's arm. She gives a strained smile, but Vlad senses she's disturbed by at least a few things Isaac reported. He nods, a gesture for him to continue his report. Isaac takes another breath, clearly doing his best to be as diplomatic as possible. It's an admirable effort, especially in one so young, but Vlad needs to know how much of a disaster this night is going to prove to be. 

"I found the Belmont near the human pen, setting them free, killing the vampires set to claim them, and setting the out buildings on fire. I sensed I could put an end to the chaos he was wreaking. I challenged him. He was in poorer condition to fight than I expected." There's no quirk of a smile, no acknowledging tilt to Isaac's head: he was merely stating fact instead of brandishing his ego. Vlad could sense no lie in his forgemaster, not that he expected to. 

"And then?"

Isaac's eyes dart once to Lisa, before continuing; "He broke free to attack Lady Lisa."

"He wasn't attacking me, I should know." Lisa cuts Isaac off, before Vlad has a chance to process this and vanish from the room to tear the Belmont's throat out. "I arrived in the middle of a vampire-on-human attack and one of them must have thought I was escaping. The boy was helping me. Why would he attack me? He has no idea who I am." She sets her jaw, directing her ire towards Vlad. "Who any of us are. He's a scared and injured boy, I don't see why we can't simply heal him and ask him where he was before all this night market nonsense. Which I also plan to discuss with you, so don't think I'm going to forget it just because we have something more pressing to see to."

Isaac looks ready to flee, so Vlad does the kindest thing he can imagine in the moment and dismisses both him and Adrian. "You are excused, Isaac, go in peace. Take my son with you. He and I will have a discussion later about his own activities this evening." He raises an eyebrow in a look that would cower all but the most stoic of his subjects, but Adrian only sniffs and lets his mother go to follow after Isaac.

When the two children have left, he turns to his lovely, wonderful wife.

"Are you out of your mind?"

~~~

Adrian presses his ear against the door to his father's study. "Father is yelling at Mother." He remarks solemnly to Isaac, who stands nearby. "He's upset. Worse than when I ran outside to play with the pixies during the daylight hours. He says we could have both been killed."

Isaac takes a steadying breath, then another. He feels as if he just escaped out from under the executioner's ax. He has to calm himself; he cannot serve Dracula as he is now, and if he cannot serve, he's as good as dead.

At the door, Adrian frowns, his half-vampire senses able to pick up noise that Isaac would never be able to hear. "Now Mother is yelling at Father. She's mad about the night market and the human pens, I think. She wants Father to stop it."

He's only half paying attention. Night market or no, Isaac needs to prove his worthiness. He cannot afford to make mistakes; not again. He should have just turned around and demanded Adrian leave at once, Belmont or no. Then Lisa would never have been in danger to begin with. He was the elder; he knew the risks where Adrian did not. Half of Isaac expects Dracula to emerge from his study to kill him anyway, promises or no. 

"Father says stopping it will cause unrest with his kind. That the people who use the night market will instead start raiding villages for their bodies."

His hand brushes against his whip, already imagining the feel of it beneath his own skin. 

"Now he's yelling about the Belmont again. Bringing him here was a mistake...better to let him die...oh, now Mother's very mad at him." 

Death might be a well-deserved rest at this point. It had always sounded peaceful to him. He removes himself from the wall and walks away, despite Adrian calling after him. He thinks he hears the boy shout an apology towards him, but brushes it off like rain. He has penance to do. 

~~~

The heavy, high-pitched ping of the hammer rings steadily throughout Hector's tower. He works long hours into the night, hammering his merry, one-note song. In front of him is an eviscerated rabbit, one of half a dozen babies torn to shreds by a fox. He works to mend their flesh back together, careful and systematic, at peace with himself.

He raises his hammer again, only to be interrupted by the sound of a whip smacking against flesh. 

Hector winces, listening. The smack continues, again, and again, matching his previous pace with his hammer. Nothing to be done about it, god knows he's tried and almost had an eye removed for his troubles.

He turns back to his work with the dead, and struggles to put the living out of his mind.

Chapter Text

The fight dissipates, as all feuds eventually do between Vlad and Lisa; their tempers cool off, their shouting dies down to a comfortable silence between them. The two sit close beside each other instead of confronting one another; Vlad sitting up on one end of a long sofa in a side parlor, with Lisa's knees arched in an 'A' over his lap. The doors are shut and the castle remains silent; even Vlad can't hear Adrian's heartbeat at their door any longer, indicating their nosy son has given up trying to eavesdrop and gone off elsewhere. Lisa from her position reaches behind her and pours two glasses of wine, handing one to Vlad.

"So." She says, and takes a sip.

"So?" He answers, raising an eyebrow and waits for her to finish.

"Explain to me again. How does bringing one half-dead boy into your big magical castle full of creatures who could tear him apart somehow mean the end to all vampirekind?" Lisa's voice drips with irony, Vlad notes with some unhappiness. "Not to mention why Vlad Dracula Tepes himself, fully capable of defending his own keep seems to be terrified of the damage one unconscious, injured, half-grown human can do?"

"I am not terrified." He has the decency to make his voice sound soft instead of cross. It's been a long, unpleasant night; Vlad is tired of being irritated at his wife. Who now is poking at him in the shoulder. 

"You were angry. When you're angry, it's always when something's out of your control. Men fear what they can't control."

"Is this the conversation you want to be having?"

Lisa pauses, then takes a deeper sip of her wine and replies; "No. But I really am curious. Even if he is from a family of vampire hunters, I don't see why we can't just keep Adrian and all the rest away from him. You don't even need to wake him up; we could heal him, set him down far enough away from the castle, near a town or a village where his own people could look after him, and be on our way before he even knew who we were."

"It's more complicated than that."

"So you said." Her voice has a lilt on the end, indicating prompting, and earnest curiosity of the same that led her to his door in the first place. 

Vlad leans his head against the back of the sofa, his free hand settling on Lisa's knees, tapping out a small rhythm with his thumb. He searches the endless darkness above their heads, and as usual finds no answer there. Where to begin?

"You know the Belmonts."

"I know of them." Lisa teases, gentle. "But I'm afraid I've never met one until tonight." 

"What do you know of them, apart from what you've gleaned from my court these last ten years?" 

Lisa hums to herself, staring at her reflection in the wine glass she holds. "I know they hunt vampires. I know they have a particular grudge against you for reasons I'm still not sure about but I imagine involves you staking a number of people outside your door. Very little apart from that, I'm afraid."

"They had a grudge against me. Some months ago, I received word through my court that humans had killed them all." He takes care to note Lisa's reaction; her smile dims into one of understanding, but she's listening, face open and free of judgement. Vlad continues; "I visited the ruined remains of their estate and confirmed it myself. I suppose there may have been one or two missed in the slaughter, but the wards were down; the head of the family was cut into multiple pieces, most of the rest lying as burnt corpses scattered around the lawn." He takes Lisa's hand, kissing the back of it as she shivers, imagining the scene. 

"When you were a girl growing up in Lupu, I imagine you were told stories to protect you from danger. 'Don't go into the woods or a wolf will eat you', or 'don't drink from strange wells, a witch will put a curse on your head'. Peasant stories meant to mask darker truths for children."

Lisa nods.

"Vampires rarely have children. We don't need them to carry on our legacy; we do that ourselves through our undying lives, and we jealously guard our territories from other immortals. But on occasion some of my people take fledglings, and we teach them the same stories. 'Don't venture to this part of the Carpathians, it's Belmont territory.' 'My sire and all her sisters were murdered by the Belmonts a hundred years ago, staked in their coffins while they slept.' 'One of the local werewolves seized a Belmont for a snack and the whole family came to burn him and his pups out of their den.' One of the few things that keeps most of my court lying awake in their coffins is sleeping off a wound in your office downstairs. Even if he is half-grown, even if you were to erase his mind and memory of any trace of his family, it would hardly matter. His face has been marked. Many of my subjects - I would dare say most of them - would pick him off as soon as we drop him off anywhere in Wallachia. Our grudges go back centuries, and there's very little most of my kind fear more than a premature death. And if we were to set him outside the borders of the country, where he doesn't know the language? That boy is as good as dead, by my people or his." Which is why I said it would probably be kinder to let him die now, he wisely chooses not to say in order to avoid starting another argument.

"Well, that explains the frankly fanatical nature all those creatures were displaying when trying to kill us." Lisa muses, her tone taking on a more scholarly atmosphere. "But surely you could command them to leave him be? Tell him you've placed a spell of protection on him, give him your sigil? I know you may not want to, but if I could convince him..?"

He chuckles, enjoying Lisa's optimism. "I doubt that boy wants anything except to drive a stake through my heart." His hand reaches over to touch that part of his chest, laying his palm there. "The last time a Belmont came to my door, nearly seven decades ago, I..treated him rather poorly. His death was slow, drawn out."

Vlad loses himself in the memory of it: the sobbing, the rending of flesh and rattling of chains and wheezing of the young man's dying breaths as he fought to survive long enough for a rescue that came far too late...

He blinks, and comes back to himself, and to Lisa, his loving, wonderful wife. He kisses her hand again and gives her a quiet smile, acknowledging the past as past. "I delivered to his family a mutilated corpse, intent on sending them a message that I would not tolerate their intrusion into my affairs. Evidently the message was received, or they were simply too weak or cowardly to make another attempt, because that was the last time I was bothered by them." 

"Or they moved on." Lisa says without judgement, either on the Belmonts or her loving but bloodthirsty husband. He frowns, prompting her to explain her theory further; 

"Well, you did. I don't see you attacking villages or staking humans outside your doors for slights against you any longer, which you said had stopped far before I showed up at your door. Who's to say the Belmonts didn't decide to calm down when you did? You say that vampires keep long grudges, but humans...I don't know. I find it hard to believe that this violent hatred for you, specifically, is enough to keep throwing their children and grandchildren at your door to be murdered."

"The last one was fairly strong." Vlad is off-foot, feeling the strange need to defend his enduring foes, both from the indignity that they would simply forgive him for his crimes against their family and from the strange idea that one of them eventually would have, given the right circumstances, finished him off. Lisa laughs, and Vlad's growing mood evaporates as she sits up and leans her head against his shoulder.

"I've never seen you so much like a cat with its fur rubbed the wrong way. All right. All right. So clearly even a child from this legendary vampire-hunting clan is at risk, because every night creature in your whole domain wants his head on their mantle for the crime of being born to the wrong family. That's a puzzle for another day, and one he'll need to be awake for, because I want to hear his side too. I'm curious what he's been told about you, and whether you're the big, terrible monster in all of his bedtime stories."  

"Probably." Vlad responds, mollified. 

"But what's stopping you from declaring one of my patients off-limits? Even if we figure out where he's meant to go after being healed, I don't want him taking two steps outside this castle and immediately running into something else threatening to undo all my hard work."

"Well. That interesting question of yours falls right into one of your favorite topics."

Lisa groans theatrically, already massaging her temple like she can feel a headache coming on. "Don't tell me. Vampire politics."

At Vlad's chuckle, she scoffs; "Honestly, you would think I'd grown used to it after being married to you all these years. But I still can't quite get over it all. You're a king, but your domain and army travel with you, but you have all these generals all over the world who answer to you in times of war, but they all govern themselves and their territories independently and pay no taxes, but visiting them isn't encouraged because you could step on someone's cape and...Oh, stop laughing, you insufferable creature!"

He restrains himself, eyes bright with love. "I wasn't laughing."

"You looked like you were about to."

"I'm sorry. But...yes, I'll try to keep the explanations to a minimum. You were mostly right, as it were. Vampires take a long view of ruling, because every vampire plans on living forever. They have to be careful about their food supplies, have to be friendly with their neighbors but not let themselves grow compliant and naive. Treaties are carved and broken, each ruling vampire looking to secure their lands for another decade, another century, always wary of a stronger foe coming to take it from them. I rule Wallachia in particular because it is my chosen seat of power, and I rule the night because I am the most powerful and formidable. Were I to move the castle to a spot in the world held by another, that native vampire would grow very nervous very quickly; they defer to me because they are afraid of me, but they're also afraid of looking weak. I could be seen as an invading force, and even a powerful foe as I can be taken down by the machinations of the many."

He looks to Lisa for understanding; she nods her head in acknowledgement, so he continues,

"I allow my subjects their autonomy. They understand I will not interfere unless they seek to challenge my reign, so whatever plots and schemes they might hatch are localized to their specific regions. I simply don't care for the squabbling of this lord or that prince, or which ruling family member is on the throne of some tiny fiefdom, so long as they stay where they are and don't try to inch across the borders of my own domain. I've made some enemies through this, but in my experience, it's simply the quietest method of getting things done."

"I was about to say that you don't so much rule as sit." Lisa jokes, sliding her arm around Vlad's and hugging him to her. He exhales, not even denying it. 

"Every so often, however, some ambitious upstart gets it into his head that he's going to rule the world through some magical weapon or powerful tribute or whatever other nonsense you could name, and tries to challenge me personally. And the Belmont is both of these things to most who would call themselves my subjects. He was found at the night market, a neutral territory, as the property of a sorcerer who was running a bid on his head. There were a handful of these annoying upstarts present tonight who wished to buy him. One of them would have gained a key advantage over the others in the region, and depending on whether they knew to leverage that advantage wisely, would have either made him into a weapon or made themselves into a political target by a handful of their enemies, inside and outside their realm. There might have been some squabbling, some heads removed from power, and things would have settled down eventually without my needing to get involved."

Lisa purses her lips, having a guess at what Vlad's about to imply next. "And instead they found Isaac and me taking him away from them, presumably under your orders. Oh...dear. I think I've made things difficult for you, haven't I?"

"Only if you consider a small international vampire war 'difficult.'"

She's silent for a moment, staring out into the middle distance in thought. Finally, Lisa replies, after a time;

"I'm sorry. I'm not sorry for rescuing that boy, I'd do it again even knowing all that. But I'm sorry for the headache I seem to have brought to our door. If there were another way to resolve this that didn't involve delivering him up for the slaughter..." She trails off, brow furrowed in thought.

He nods, acknowledging and accepting Lisa's apology. "I apologize as well. I should have kept a closer eye on Isaac and Adrian. Perhaps I should have looked a little harder the evening I went to the Belmont estate, resolved this before the child became a visible target. I expect I'll start getting messages soon; angry letters, perhaps, or reports from spies of my enemies using this insult as a convenient excuse to join forces and try to seize power."

She looks up at him, stunned; "Surely removing one boy from harm, even a Belmont, isn't worth attempting to overthrow you?"

"No. But few reasons to go to war are righteous, and it's a lot easier to gather allies by blowing up an injury and pretending you're the hurt party. Less so the reason of 'I'm an ambitious little monster who wants more power than I rightfully deserve'." He scoffs.

The wine in both glasses are gone by now. Lisa takes Vlad's empty glass and stands up to go place them at the table. She turns to him with a complicated gaze, affecting sympathy, understanding, and resolve to do her best by her patients. He watches her, this human who captured his heart, fascinated by the determination she fixes him with. 

"I'm a doctor. You made me a damn good one. I saw a hurt boy who needed my help; not a Belmont, not a prize or a slave. Just a boy bleeding out in the snow. In the morning after I've had a hot bath and some sleep, I'll tend to him, but then I'm going to help you solve this mess. You're a king, supposedly, even if you hardly act like one. Use that brilliant brain of yours and together we'll figure out a solution. One that doesn't involve handing him over to something that wants to take a bite out of him or you." 

He smiles, and stands up slowly, admiring Lisa's fearlessness, her determination to see this through to the end. "I suppose, given the nature of your entry into my castle, it was only a matter of time before you demanded that I rewrite the unspoken rules governing the whole of my kind for centuries." Vlad checks the time and inclines his head, extending a hand. "I need to reinforce the stasis charm on the boy. Come with me and then we'll head to bed?"

She nods, reaching for his arm. "I really do feel bad for apparently causing a war, you know." Lisa leans up to kiss him; Vlad lowers his head to let her do so. "But as the king of night, I think you need to start liking your own people again, too."

Vlad shakes his head in amusement as he leads Lisa from the room. "I know my people far too well for that."

~~~

Adrian's been to his mother's office in the castle hundreds of times, but he can't remember when it's been so quiet.

It's positioned strategically, close enough to the ground floor to easily move desperately ill patients in from the front door, yet also near enough to Father's study so that he can listen for any sign of danger and be there in an instant. Sturdy wooden slabs with hinges that can double for examination beds or autopsy tables are located close to the wall on one side; bookshelves carefully labeled with medical texts take up another wall. Lisa's medical tools are kept in pristine condition in a locked wheeling cabinet, after Adrian's curiosity got to be too much even for her to put up with. Medical posters and devices are placed about the room at their appropriate stations, set back into place after Lisa's work finished for the day. The room is tall enough to fit two of Father, and often Adrian delights in watching his mother work from the rafters, secure in the knowledge that any noise he makes will be swallowed by the height of the room before it reaches human ears below.

Tonight he sits here in those same rafters, a boy instead of a bat, hardly daring to breathe. Below him, the office is devoid of most lights apart from one dim lamp in the corner for safety reasons and the blood red diamond illuminating the Belmont's face. Both give off an eerie quality to a normally comforting room, especially because thanks to the stasis spell, he can't listen to the breathing or hear the heartbeat of the other boy below. He frowns at the unfamiliar face, doing his best not to breathe in the stench of him. The human reeks, Adrian has no idea what of, but it's definitely in his top five worst smells of all time. When was the last time the Belmont had a bath?

After determining that lying motionless isn't some elaborate prank to lure him closer and stake him, Adrian floats carefully down until he's hovering close to the Belmont's face, his shirt pulled up over his own nose to stymie the smell. He hasn't had a chance to meet any boy his age; the closest he's come to is Hector, who's a good six years older and not exactly a fun playmate besides. But even Hector's pets don't smell as bad as this one, lying as if dead in his mother's study. The other boy being a Belmont gives him pause, which is why he's sneaking around after hours. Adrian recalls too many a lecture on the Belmont crest, what it looks like, how to alert his father if he comes across someone wearing it in the castle. But all those warnings were under the assumption that it would be a grown monster hunter who'd one day come knocking.

Adrian thinks this one must be the runt of the litter.

He can't be sure of the other's age, but Adrian's strange growth and the Belmont's starved form make them a match in height and weight. He's fairly sure that means he can take him if it came down to brute strength. Emboldened by this, his eyes rove around the other, taking in more details. The shoes, or lack thereof, give him a puzzled pause before he decides they must be some human fashion he's not privy to. In contrast, the family crest Adrian's been taught to fear sits in a place of honor over the other boy's heart. There are belts that must have once held weapons, now lying as empty vessels, mere decorative holders. He's not bad-looking, just...different, his face screwed up in the ghostly emotion of his last painful sensations before being frozen. Adrian inches forward by degrees, and eventually grows bold enough (or bored enough) to trace a finger over the Belmont's scarred, closed eye.

"You're not so scary." He whispers. When the other makes no response - not like he expected him to, but maybe Belmonts could break his father's stasis curses? - Adrian continues in a lower growl, showing fangs;

"I'm not afraid of you."  Again, no response. Disappointed, he walks around the table. 

"Mother's going to heal you." He tells him, despite the fact that the Belmont is incapable of hearing him or replying back. It makes Adrian feel less alone, even talking to what's essentially one step above a corpse. "I heard her yelling at Father about it. She always gets her way, even if it's Father's castle. And he wants to kill you because you're a Belmont, and Belmonts hunt us. But you don't look like you could hunt anyone."  

He hops up onto the table near the Belmont's side, kicking his legs slowly back and forth. "I'm Adrian. I'm going to be ten in a few months. Does that matter to you, Belmont? Or would you try to kill me even if I've never done anything to any human? Most vampires already think I'm weird and won't talk to me. I don't know enough humans to know if they're the same."

Adrian pretends to wait for an answer. None come, but he leans in to whisper hopefully all the same;

"Maybe you're weird too?"

"Adrian!"

Shock and guilt have him immediately fleeing from the table, as he turns to face both of his parents. Mother and Father are at the doorway, Father with that twisted expression that means Adrian's broken another rule; Mother already moving to sweep him up in her arms. He lets her, sparing one last glance behind him at the motionless Belmont before allowing himself to be moved away from the table. 

"Adrian, you know better than to come here when I'm not around!" Mother scolds him, then spares a glance towards Father to tell him;

"I'll put him to bed."

Father nods, with a scowl to Adrian that has him shrinking with shame against Mother's arm. Right, fine, maybe it was foolish to stare at this patient of Mother's in particular. But the stasis charm held, didn't it? He wasn't really in danger!

"Make sure he stays there this time." Father rumbles, leaning forward to place his hand on Adrian's forehead. "Good night, son." He mutters with meaningful finality. Adrian nods meekly, and the hand is dropped away. He allows Mother to lead him from the room, but takes the walk as his opportunity to drill her on what they've decided to do with the Belmont. 

~~~

Trevor is....dead? Dreaming?

He's not sure. He's not sure if he's alive, he's not even sure if he's in heaven or hell.

He's curled up in a dark hole, rough bark all around him. His tree at home. He hides here when he's in trouble, or when he doesn't want to come out to wash up for dinner. Voices call his name, and one of them sounds like his father. He goes to climb up to the boughs, hissing as he puts his weight on the wrong hand. There's light at the top of the tree where he can poke his head out, but as he goes to reach for a known hand-hold, all he feels is ice.

That can't be right.

Trevor shivers, struggling to see his way up in the fading evening sun. Dark smoke blots out the brief patches of sky above him, casting more shadows. He tries to scramble up from his tree but the bark is all smooth and cold, entombing him in a coffin standing on end.

The ground cracks and opens up beneath him. Ice-cold hands slither out and seize his ankles. He reaches for weapons that aren't there, screams for help that won't come. Outside the tree, other screams accompany his own, no longer shouting his name, growing in pitch and panic.

He's dragged under the earth, cold dirt filling his mouth and eyes, and is swallowed up by darkness.

~~~

In Lisa's dark office, Vlad hardly needs any light to perform his own examinations on the lone patient lying still on the center table. His eyes reflect the red glow of the charm as he raises a hand over the child's face.

The boy is in remarkably pitiful shape. Besides his most recent duel with Vlad's own forgemaster - which left him with cuts all over his body from glances with Isaac's whip - the boy doesn't appear to be in fighting shape to begin with. He hadn't had much of a chance to look him over himself, too worried with making sure Lisa made it through the portal intact. Now he can see what he neglected the first time.

Bruises on his face and forearms, and a broken thumb, the manacles he broke free from still attached to his other wrist. There are the beginning stages of frostbite near his ankles and toes, some red, some splotchy white that could turn into cold blisters if not treated. He's thinner than he should be; these clothes he wears were made to fit, and he'd lost some considerable weight in the time between then and now. Likely the malnutrition's stunted his growth some; that will take the longest to get him back to full strength, Vlad notes with some irritation. By far, the worst injury he can see is the arm stripped of flesh, looking more like an angry red snake wrapped twice around the boy's forearm. The stasis charm keeps the blood intact, but even now, droplets hover in mid-air, threatening to splatter as soon as Vlad lifts the spell.

Physical injuries calculated and a mental list prepared for what Lisa will need for tomorrow, Vlad turns to the boy's face. He studies him, attempting to see the resemblance in every Belmont who's ever had the misfortune of meeting him. The last one he killed especially looks like this boy; they have the same hair color, the same brow, the same pained frown in their sleep, but this one's paler, like the shade of one who Vlad had skinned almost two hundred years ago to bind a book of spells with. Likely this one will grow to be just as irritating as every one of his ancestors; Vlad's killed eight of them by his own count, and another three fell to other Castlevania residents before they could even reach his study.

His hand glides to the boy's throat, considering ending the line here, wondering if he's a fool to let this baby snake into his protective nest where his own son sleeps. Claws tap at his jugular, feeling the veins underneath. It would be so easy to open him up, like peeling an apple..

Lisa would be upset. And there were still his subjects to placate, stupid and power-hungry but who would want their pound of flesh as well, and it would be easier to deal with them if he had a living bargaining chip. How in the hell had one Belmont caused a rift in both Vlad's marriage and threaten his absolute power and throne without even so much as raising a whip?

"Congratulations, Belmont." Vlad dryly remarks, withdrawing his hand and finishing the reinforcement of his stasis charm over the boy. "You have officially become worthy of my notice."

For better or for worse.

Chapter Text

Hector's hammer stills on the anvil when he hears a knock at his door. He wipes his brow, still getting used to the weight and swing of his necrotic instrument, his teenage muscles sore but growing. 

"Come in!" He calls, knowing that if it were Dracula himself, he'd simply appear without knocking. Anyone else would be bearing a message or a corpse for him. 

He's surprised when he turns and sees the lady of Castlevania herself in his tower.

Lisa steps inside, a carefully neutral expression on her face as she walks past the offal of Hector's art and stops at his anvil. He hastily wipes his hands clean and sets the hammer down, going to meet her. In the short few months he's been privileged to live here, Hector can't recall a time she's ever approached him. His craft and hers are opposite sides of the same coin; making the living and the dead whole again. 

"Lady Lisa. What brings you to my tower?" He asks, dreading the answer. He's new enough that the unexpected privilege of Dracula's hospitality doesn't feel real, like a dream come true. He half expects to be kicked out of the castle at any moment, for any reason. 

"It's all right, Hector." She tells him, and Hector feels he must look as wound up as a kicked cat. He chuckles nervously, forcing his shoulders to relax. Lisa continues; "You heard about the horrible business with the night market?"

He nods; it would be difficult not to, what with the way the creatures of Castlevania liked to gossip. The last person to show before Lisa was a harpy bringing in a corpse she'd dug up along the roadside, squawking nonstop about how Isaac had snatched up the last true-blooded Belmont and dragged his body back to the castle for their lord and king. The rest was mostly hearsay: Hector had heard every rumor he thought imaginable: from how Dracula planned to gift the Belmont as a prize to those who proved most loyal and creative, to how his blood and bones would be used to decorate a new dining room purely for entertaining the aristocracy. It was difficult to separate fact from fiction.

"I heard there was a fight, and that a Belmont was somehow involved. I know that Isaac's been in a poor mood and won't show his face." An understatement, but it's all that Hector could glean. Lisa gives a pitying click of her tongue, eyes drifting towards the door that leads to Isaac's section of the castle before turning back to Hector. There's a determination in her gaze that Hector's come to learn means an order's about to be issued. He straightens his back. 

"Yes; I'm afraid most of that was my doing. Isaac thought he was defending me and attacked the poor boy. That misunderstanding is sorted now, but the Belmont child's hurt, and I'm going to heal him. I'd like to ask your help for that." Lisa's eyes drift to the pile of bodies, held under the same stasis charm that Dracula's used for the Belmont. Hector's suddenly aware of his mouth open; he closes it, and swallows. In the past, he was impressed by Lisa making swift, unilateral decisions about Dracula's affairs, and finds himself in awe yet again. Who else would dare heal a vampire hunter in this castle in particular?

He watches as she walks to the freshest of them, crouching down and touching the most intact of the bodies. 

"Saw the arm off at the elbow and bring it to my surgery. We're going to need it."

~~~

"Stop."

Vlad's commanding tone, gentle yet reprimanding, echoes inside his study. He isn't facing the door, but his acute hearing picks up his son trying to sneak out yet again. Adrian scowls, but drops his hand from the handle and goes back to his chair. Once satisfied his son isn't going to move from the study, Vlad sorts through the evening's letters at his desk. Quite a lot of them this evening; not that he's surprised, with what lies bleeding three floors below them. He picks up the first of many, a black one embossed with gold leaf, and delicately slices through the seal with a claw.

"I'm bored." Comes the inevitable whine from his son, who's kicking his legs back and forth. "When can I leave?" 

"When I am assured that you won't try breaking into your mother's surgery again." Adrian crosses his arms but doesn't deny his intentions, sinking into the chair in an undignified pout. Vlad turns his attention to the letter at hand, plucking it delicately from its envelope and beginning to read. 

To my most esteemed Dread Lord and King,

It is with extreme reluctance I write to you in regards to the ugly business that occurred last night on September the 28th. During one of the Carpathian night markets a brawl occurred that left several of my servants dead. I am to understand it was a Belmont responsible; I further understand that he is in your possession. I humbly request the right of blood payment from him, or, barring that, from you. Please understand I do this as a matter of courtesy, not a demand-

Vlad snorts, growing tired of the overly flowery language. 'Matter of courtesy', really? He skips around the letter, bored by it, and takes note only of the price being asked (far above what the boy was worth, in his opinion), the number of beings the Belmont supposedly destroyed, and the letter writer's name. Some minor vampire boyar from the border between Hungary and Wallachia, evidently. He sets the letter aside, already annoyed by the creature, and picks up the next envelope from the pile. This one is filthy where the other was clean and pressed, dirt-encrusted and blood-stained. His lip curls a little as he slices it open, displeased with how he has to concentrate to make out the words from poor penmanship and spelling;

Yur Grase,

Want the boy, Will gif best huntrs cach in trade. best fur, best food, what you want?? writ back plees. my clan hungrs for belmont flesh

yurs,

Radu of Răut

Despite the pathetic show of spelling, Vlad's surprised to find he remembers this one. Radu is one of the stronger werewolf clan leaders, if he wasn't mistaken, from a trade-controlling river of Eastern Europe. He sets the letter to the side, irritated at all of his subjects clamoring at him. All of them are politely worded, of course - anything else would be an open declaration of treachery - but most have a sense of impatience or urgency in their phrasing. All these pathetic, noisy insects killing themselves over a crumb.

From behind him, he hears Adrian get down from his chair and walk over to him. Without looking, he reaches for his son and picks him up to settle him on the arm of his chair, another letter in his opposite hand.

"What's that?"

"A letter from Lithuania. A vampire there is offering me half his land for the Belmont." 

Wide, startled eyes catch Vlad off-guard, as Adrian tugs on his cloak to get his attention. "But you're not going to do it!"

"Not for so low a price." He snorts, setting the letter aside to pick up another. This activity reminds him oddly of the aristocratic practice of entertaining marriage proposals. Property, night creatures, cursed or valuable objects; all on offer for the unconscious boy in his castle. Were he interested in such base things, he might actually find this all amusing. Now, it's mostly a headache to determine if he should give the unfortunate Belmont offspring to one of the squabbling masses or enact his tyrannical right to kill the boy himself.

"Father, you can't!" Adrian screws up his face, trying out his best impression of his father's imperious look. Vlad raises him a skeptical eyebrow, crumpling up the letter and tossing it into the fire after the writer proves to be a waste of his time. His child seems to be searching for a reason to argue; Vlad waits patiently until Adrian declares: "Mother wouldn't want that!"

"Your mother has a kind heart and I will indulge her her pet projects for now. But I will not suffer a Belmont to live; I am merely entertaining  some of the least objectionable outcomes." Vlad goes to draw Adrian into a one-armed embrace. "Of all my subjects who would stake a claim to him, I will choose one who will grant him a swift end without drawing out his suffering. If none are found, I'll do it myself to keep the peace. That should satisfy you and your mother, and it's far more than the Belmont deserves." 

Adrian pulls away from him, dropping back down to the ground. He's looking hurt, horrified even.

"He's my age." He insists, as if the brat's destiny isn't already preordained. As if that will matter to Vlad, or to the Belmont if Adrian got in his way. 

"I do this for you, son." Vlad growls, no longer in an indulgent mood. "Any Belmont that lives is a threat to you. Until you can defend yourself properly against trained hunters, I will do it for you. To that family, you are nothing more than a prize trophy."

Already the inklings of regret are climbing their unfamiliar way up Vlad's spine, as Adrian's eyes fill with fear. Father and son stare at each other, the only sound being the crackling of fire over the burnt letters. 

"What if you're wrong?" 

"I am not."

"What if you are?"

Vlad does his best to keep his temper. "It is not up for discussion." The Belmont will die. Vlad will let Lisa learn her craft on his body; when she's done practicing, he'll remove the child and give him a merciful execution. He made a mistake once before in allowing a single Belmont to live; the line propagated and tormented him and his subjects for centuries after. Isaac had it right the first time, Vlad decides, as he settles his hand on the stack of letters. The only option to truly safeguard his son from the stench of humanity is to kill the boy before he becomes a threat. All Vlad has left to decide is who best to gift the last Belmont to, so that squabbling night creatures don't start a war in his front yard.

Well. That, and explain it to Lisa. She won't be pleased, but this bloody feud existed long before she came into his life. Old feelings of possessiveness and the fear of losing his loved ones have him reaching again for Adrian. Though his face is flushed with unshed tears, Adrian obediently comes back to his father after a beat, hugging him around the neck. He clutches him tightly to him, whispering an apology for frightening him in his ear.

He would fight all of Hell itself before he let a Belmont harm his wife and son.

~~~

"Get out." Lisa commands, her bloodied hands on her hips as she stares down Dracula's two armored soldiers. They glance at each other, caught between the orders of superiors. Lisa doesn't move from her position, frowning up at them when they don't do immediately as asked.

Hector sits in the chair next to the Belmont, suppressing a yawn. It was a long evening's surgery, and his back aches from leaning over the body. Lisa had given him a sponge and a bottle, instructing him to douse one with the other and hold it over the boy's face whenever it looked like he might rouse. While Hector kept a close watch on the boy's movements and listened to his breathing, Lisa had worked quickly to tie a tourniquet around the offending area and start using the corpse's arm to replace the patches of skin torn off by Isaac's whip. These were swiftly bandaged, though there were a few times the Belmont came close to waking up and Hector had to practically throw himself on the boy to reach his nose and mouth. He asked only once why Lisa couldn't ask Dracula for assistance: she told him,

"He may not always be around when I have patients to tend to. Here, Hector, watch the line on the bottle, if you give him too much he may never wake up."

Now they were mostly finished, Hector tired with his arms and back aching, Lisa with her hands bloodied from the grim job of grafting skin to skin. It was a good lesson in anatomy, although a very strange one; Hector never had to worry about pain management with his patients. He still sits by the Belmont's side, ready with the sponge just in case, but the boy was still for the moment. Lisa stands with her back to them both, glaring at the two silent vampires who had stood guard at the door from the beginning.

"When that boy wakes up, he's going to be confused and disoriented," She explains, the tinges of frustration in her voice. "The last thing I want him to see when he comes to are vampires. Hector and I can handle him from here."

Hector has his doubts - the boy was strong, even under heavy opium sedation, and nearly bucked Hector off him a few times - but he keeps silent.

"We've orders, Mistress." One of the vampires finally admits. "The Belmont is to be placed under heavy guard at all times."

Lisa scoffs, directing a hand behind her at the unconscious boy. "Then guard him from outside the door, and if you hear something you don't like, then you may come in. But I won't have you scaring the wits out of him before I can explain to him where he is."

The two guards look to each other, before finally accepting this as a reasonable substitution. The one who spoke - Hector's still getting used to the names here, and can't see who it is - leads the way out and shuts the door behind him. That leaves Hector and Lisa alone in the surgery with the Belmont.

Who, as it turned out, is not as intimidating up close as Hector might have been led to believe. He stands up to help Lisa disinfect the table, taking it in turns to help lift the boy up so that the other could slide new, clean sheets underneath. Lisa lays the boy's head down on a pillow, taking care to keep his airway clear, and listens briefly to his breathing and heartbeat. Satisfied, she starts putting her tools away and takes the bottle and sponge from Hector.

Hector remains seated, feeling strangely...content. He'd never felt welcome in most places, and the best thing he had let himself hope for was to feel useful. Here, Lisa Tepes freely gave compliments, something that Hector never received from his own mother. Moreover, she was an excellent teacher, narrating what she was doing as she was doing it, and checking to see if Hector was following along. He could ask questions - encouraged to, even - and never made to feel wrong or stupid or evil. It was...nice.

His thoughts are interrupted by the boy beginning to stir. Hector looks to Lisa, biting at his lip, and at her direction he moves back to let her take over. He retreats to the bookshelves, holding his elbows as he watches Lisa's impeccable bedside manner at work, the strange feeling of hope and anticipation fluttering in his chest.

~~~

Trevor wasn't expecting to wake up at all, let alone in a world of pain.

He opens his eyes with a gasp and immediately shuts them again, not anticipating how bright it is. How the fuck did that-ow, no, it hurts to think. It hurts to breathe. Hurts to do anything! Trevor tries to sit up, shrieking when he uses his bad arm to push himself up to a sitting position. Nausea is bubbling up, and despite the pain radiating in his arm, he needs to sit up and vomit over the side of his bed - no, it's too tall to be his bed, where the fuck is he, oh god, he's going to fall now-

A woman's arms catch him before he can, heedless of the sick she's getting on her dress. She hugs him to her apron as he tries valiantly to figure out what the fuck happened, feeling hands soothingly press against his back. He can't move his arms, doesn't want to try, and just lets this stranger hold him against her.

He starts to cry like he would do when he was much smaller and the world made more sense.

"Hurts. It hurts, it hurts..." He mutters into the arms of the person cradling him, like a mantra. She calms him through the worst of it, both with her voice making nonsense words and her hand rubbing circles against his back. Trevor feels the agony slowly die down in degrees, breathing in and out, his cries lessening as more air makes it to his brain. He hears her say something to a Hector, asking for mandrake root, and wilts a little more with relief. He knows that herb from his father's books, it's a good way to dull the pain. The lady hugging him hardly has to coax him to open his mouth to gulp down the foul-smelling medicine; anything to numb his arm, which feels more and more like he set it on fire.

Trevor stays like that for a good long minute, half on and half off the table, tasting the remains of the vomit he got all over the floor and the poor woman's dress, fuck him, what a way to thank whoever's hugging him. When he feels like he can sit up without falling over again, he does so, careful not to move his aching arm. The woman who's holding him helps to ease him back, and he's surprised to find that the table has risen up to meet him; he isn't flat on his back anymore, sitting up thanks to whatever mechanism is propping the table partially up. A second glass is held to his mouth, and he cracks open his eyes to stare at the vaguely familiar woman.

"It's only water with some ice in it." She explains, brushing sweaty hair from his forehead. "Don't try to grasp it, I'll pour and you let me know when you've had enough." Unable to do much else, Trevor nods, and drinks. Once the ice hits the back of his throat, he wakes up fully, drinking like a dying man in the desert. He drinks, and drinks, and finally calms down enough to breathe in and look around.

...Where the fuck is he?

He's been to enough surgeons to recognize the trappings of one, with the bottles of plant-and-animal extract lining the walls and the table he's sitting on, but he's never seen one quite like this. To be honest, the brass instruments and the far-too-many books remind him much more of the Hold than any doctor's home, which is a sore fact that makes his heart ache. Determined not to cry twice in two minutes like some infant, Trevor steels himself, swallows, and continues looking around. He sees no instruments of bloodletting, no other patients in the room with him, and the room itself is way, way too big to belong to any peasant. And there aren't any windows, only cool stone, so he's not in someone's home at all. So it must be a lord's castle, someone with money to spare to vault the ceiling, which is stupid in Trevor's opinion; the screams of the dying would echo and disturb the other residents, wouldn't they? The more he sees, the less he likes.

There are two people in the room with him; the woman he was sick on, and a boy not much older than him. The woman feels far too much like his own mom that Trevor can't bear to look at her for long: she doesn't much look like his mom with her blonde hair and shorter demeanor,  but her soothing hand-motions and her commanding tone that gets 'Hector' moving to grab a mop feel very much like Genevieve Belmont. He turns his attention to Hector, who thankfully with his silver hair and odd manner of dress does not resemble anyone from Trevor's past. It's his smell when he moves closer to mop the floor that has Trevor's heart racing.

It's the stench of someone who's touched the souls of Hell. That fucking Forgemaster smelled exactly like this one does.

And there's brass pipework lining the walls. There's only one castle in the whole fucking world that would keep all of this together.

"Oh, fuck me." Trevor rasps under his breath.

Chapter Text

Trevor Belmont cannot believe his shit-fucking-luck. 

His heart is in his gut as he considers the room's occupants and his options with the dread of a man condemned. There's a few things in his favor he can see outright; first, that there's only two people, two humans even. He can take two people out without a problem if he needs to. He's not tied down. He's weaponless but not unarmed; all Belmonts know hand-to-hand combat as soon as they're able and willing, and thankfully his companions here seem more interested in cleaning up Trevor's mess than killing him. His arm might feel like it's on fire, but he can operate just fine with the other. And these people might not know who he is yet. 

But he can't stick around and wait for them to find out; he has to escape, has a limited amount of time to do so. It might be too late already, but Trevor won't let himself feel despair just yet, forcing himself to focus on the here and now. God help him, he's so tired of getting into worse and worse shit than before. Getting knocked out in a brawl with a grudge-holding necromancer and waking up in monster-fucking Castlevania of all places might be the crowning achievement of his shit life. It might also be the end of his life, if he can't find the exit and get out before the master of the castle materializes. 

Even the thought of him makes Trevor's heart clench with dread. If he stood half a chance at killing the so-called King of Night, or even standing on his own two feet without swaying, maybe things would be different. Right now he's just a particularly tasty snack. No matter what else is happening, he needs to leave while he still has the chance: he can figure the rest out when he's clear of the castle.

"Sorry?" Asks the older boy near Trevor, his head lifting up from mopping the floor. Trevor sizes him up; scrawny, hair long enough for grasping hands to yank, and a far more open face full of expression. He guesses this devil forgemaster won't give much trouble than the one who wanted him dead. He spots a bit of apprehension - fear, maybe? - in 'Hector's' eye when he stares him down, and the dread settles deeper, pressing in on all sides.

They know who he is: they have to know, he was an idiot to hope otherwise. After all, he's a walking fucking advertisement for his family, the Belmont crest a target over his heart and back. 

Jesus fucking wept...Right. Escape first, cursing his luck later. 

Trevor leaps down from the table and elbows Hector sharply in the face with his good arm, crunching the cartilage. The devil forgemaster sinks down to his knees with a cry as Trevor seizes the teenager's mop before it has the chance to hit the ground. As he stands before the kneeling Hector, the woman turns around from washing her apron in the sink, and her shout of "No, don't-" calls two vampires into the room. Must have been waiting outside for their master. Trevor grits his teeth and steps away from Hector, doing his best to ignore the dizziness his head is swimming in. 

They're formidably armed with pikes and fangs bared, but they're already making the mistake of huddling together at the door to present a single large target. Trevor hopes that might be a lack of real group combat experience and not that they're trying to fence him in. 

He takes a breath, relieved when more don't appear. He can handle two low-ranking pairs of fangs, even stinking of vomit, half-drugged from his impromptu surgery and one arm completely useless to him. His two combatants smirk to each other, evidently finding the little Belmont lacking. Their second mistake. 

By his feet, Hector staggers backwards as the woman hastily works to get her hands free from her apron and approach him. He listens; if they're not going to attack him from behind, Trevor can address the real threats in front of him blocking the way out. She starts moving like she's about to come in between them, but Hector's cry at the sink when he touches his nose has her attention divided for a split second. She has her hand on Hector's back now, directing her ire and worry at the guards instead of him. Fine; he can work with that. From the way she's taking care of the forgemaster, Trevor hopes it means that she's an accomplice, not a vampire's prisoner. 

He can't snap the mop in half with his mangled, aching arm; instead Trevor steps on the handle and wrenches it up, breaking it in half in a riot of splinters. The two guards stop their smirking and ready their weapons.

"Let's fucking go, leeches!" He screams, and rushes them. 

~~~

In his study, Vlad glances up, sniffing the air. His ears twitch; he smells blood, hears shouting coming from his wife's study. All at once he's abruptly standing, cape swirling around him. 

"Stay here." He commands Adrian, and transforms, flying away in a fast-moving cloud of bats before his son can even grasp what's happening. The bats that make up Dracula scream out in instinct as they hurtle through the halls, eschewing stairs and minions both. The stench of blood is eminent as he reforms at the door to Lisa's surgery. 

Inside and out is utter chaos. One of his soldiers is already dying at the door's threshold, clutching his throat while sitting on the floor. A load of splinters are protruding outwards , as if the Belmont had smashed his fist down the vampire's throat while clutching what Vlad can't even imagine. A sharpened pinecone, perhaps? No matter.

Vlad steps over the creature; his first priority is always Lisa. His ears prick up at her hurried instructions, telling Hector not to worry. At least part of him manages to relax, if only just: she's alive. Woe be to the Belmont if she's not all in one piece. 

He's past the threshold of the door in the blink of an eye: Lisa is kneeling next to the other servant he left here to guard her. The vampire has his eyes shut tight, his jaw clenched: Lisa's hand is clutching part of a broom handle that's been embedded into his shoulder, working to ease it out. Hector is at the sink, his head bowed over it, coughing up blood while clutching one of Lisa's handkerchiefs. 

"Are you hurt? Did he touch you?" Vlad growls, kneeling down to steer Lisa's attention away from insignificant creatures. He has her hand at her side, even as she moves to shake him off.

"I'm fine." She says, breathless. "I'm all right. I didn't think - he moved so fast, I didn't have time to explain anything ." Her eyes, bright with sorrow and apology, look to the vampire already expiring out in the hall. "Hector's got a broken nose, but he'll be all right. This one's worse, I can't pull the wood out. Vlad, I'm sorry-"

There will be time for apologies later, on all sides. Vlad gently takes Lisa's hand from the mop handle, and abruptly wrenches it out of his foot soldier. The pathetic creature screams, but it's of no consequence; he should have guarded his wife better. He stands, guiding Lisa up from the floor. She reeks of vomit and holy blood: Vlad's nose wrinkles as he guides her to sit down in a chair.

Lisa places her head in her hands, exhaling. Then she's up and moving again, ever the doctor; "I'll fix Hector's nose. It's completely my fault." She eases Hector away from the sink with a hand on his shoulder, holding the bloody handkerchief to his nose with care and instructing him to tilt his head back, not forward. 

Vlad stares at Hector, whose teary pain-filled eyes lock briefly before he looks away, clearly afraid of what's to come from this entire night. Behind him, he can sense the soldier who'd been impaled has already limped off out of sight, most likely to lick his wounds and pride and to hide from his master's wrath. The other is dead in the hall, a steaming pile of ash and bone.  

His eyes narrow, threatening red at the edges. Was he not perfectly clear in his instructions? Belmonts, even children, apparently, were dangerous, destructive creatures hellbent on making a mess of his castle and the people inside it. He had allowed himself to get distracted, complacent even, by the pleas of his wife and son. They were soft and hopeful and gentle, and he loved them for it, but they did not have the benefit of centuries of hindsight. Nor did they know the depths to which the entire Belmont clan decried vampires, this latest incarnation included. He should have ended this at the start, and because of his foolish indulgences, now there was a Belmont loose in his castle.

And where in seven Hells was he?

~~~

Several hours earlier...

Much as he would have loved to stay in his self-imposed exile until his shame seemed less raw, hunger eventually forces Isaac's hand. Cursed to obey his fragile human body's needs, he makes his way towards the heavy iron door of his small tower and unbars it. The skin on his back pulls when his arms move the door: he ignores the pain, or rather acknowledges it for what it is and moves on from it. 

Outside Isaac's tower is the usual quiet murmuring of an active castle. As he enters the richly decorated hallway, he passes floating heads, slithering snake creatures and skeletons. None bother him, but he gets a few hungry, annoyed looks from the vampires he passes and has to hide a smile. Good, Isaac thinks, as he walks to the nearest kitchen he knows keeps food for humans. Temptation is good for the soul. He's unclear if vampires have souls, but he finds a strange sort of power in walking the hall with a bloodied back anyway, knowing he's safe.

It's a short walk; Castlevania is enormous but strategic once one gets used to it, and part of living in this specific part of the castle means he has access to specific food. The 'kitchen' is very small; it holds little more than a large icebox with salted meat and fish, a dining table fit for three people (two if they're significantly larger than Isaac) and a bin for root vegetables, replaced every few days. Should he endeavor to dine on finer things, he would have to walk down to where the livestock is kept, or the grain silos, or simply order one of the servants to bring him fruit or vegetables from another part of the castle. But today isn't an extravagant day; quite the opposite. The icebox with its daily rations will do for now. 

Tonight's dinner is a carp caught in the Danube, near where the castle has been resting for at least as long as Isaac has lived here. He finds it already beheaded and deboned; shockingly available and easy to prepare, for a desert-born child. He places it in the empty pan heated by the constantly-lit cooking fire - another extravagance - and empties a bottle of white wine in along with it. 

Isaac settles down to eat, always by himself. Guests and long-time residents of Castlevania tend to keep to their own kind while dining, if they eat at all. Isaac, a human, is rare company here, and has always been solitary. While he has an open invitation to join Dracula and his human family for meals, he has always politely refused. Isaac finds the practice of communal dining with his master intrusive and awkward; he far prefers a lonely table to a potentially unwelcoming one. And he neither knows nor cares where Hector eats, so long as he does it out of sight. 

The wine and fish are only just beginning to sizzle when Isaac spots a familiar face coming down from their shared staircase. Speak of the devil forgemaster...

"Oh! Hello, Isaac." Hector says, holding an array of what look like human limbs, stopping to make small talk with the only other person of his station. Isaac nods once - a polite, perfunctory greeting - but no more. He doesn't wish for any more friends. Isaac's had his fill of people after all he's been through to get here. 

Hector, however, doesn't seem to be taking the hint. He sticks around, giving a quick look around the kitchen and an awkward half-smile. He reminds Isaac of a puppy looking for praise, in all the worst ways. Earnest, annoying, desperate for others to like him. 

"I'm glad to see you up and about. I was - that is, we were worried." 

Well - how likely was that? He has no time for polite platitudes that mean nothing: oftentimes Hector refuses to get to the point, or has none whatsoever. Isaac allows the silence to grow between them - a tense, delicate spider's webbing - before deciding to break it. "There was no need for you to worry over me, Hector. I am capable of managing my emotions." He stresses the 'I' just slightly, just enough to let Hector wonder if he's being passive aggressive. But Hector isn't listening; he smiles, more openly this time. 

"I'm happy to hear. Listen, I'd love to catch up when you have the time. Right now I have to go - Lady Lisa's asking for help, we're going to stitch that Belmont boy back up. That's what all this is for." He waves one of the dismembered arms at Isaac, a little too disrespectfully in his opinion. 

"So I see." So; Hector is repairing what Isaac had broken. How fortunate there are two of them. He doubts Hector sees it that way, if he cares to see at all. Rather than correct him, he allows him to go, eyeing the doorway to the kitchen. "I won't keep you." 

By that last sentence's tone, Hector catches on that he may have taken a misstep in their brief conversation. His smile falters, but he nods and settles himself into a more professional demeanor. "Right. Well. I'll see you after?" He barely waits for a reply before he's ducking back out of the kitchen, a bit faster than when he first approached. Isaac listens to his muted footsteps getting farther away, before he sighs and shakes his head, returning to his dinner. 

Now...

Back in his tower, Isaac is hard at work honing his craft. A body - that of a fifty-year-old man in worn peasant clothing - lies on the slab next to an open book. Isaac doesn't bother with smelling salts or plugging his nose; the rotten stench is masked by candles and burning incense around the room. Not for any ritualistic purpose, he found out to Dracula's amusement when he first asked about them; for the sheer smell of bodies carted in and out. He settles his dagger in both hands above the unfortunate man's sternum and plunges it down.

The body jerks once, then lies still. Isaac, frowning in concentration, musters his will on both his deadly instrument and the cavern he's torn in the heart, inviting any low-ranking demon nearby to make a home inside the empty vessel. When he pulls the dagger out, the body shifts, changes; the demon using Isaac and his hands as a conduit.

Dracula explained it once as if he were ripping a tiny portal into Hell with each stab of his knife. Without an empty body, the portal would quickly close up again, the creature unable to pass until Isaac's will forced a door open again. It was like trying to catch a bar of soap with both hands and tear it apart with only his fingernails, and unfortunately it was one of the few things Dracula was incapable of personally doing. Forgemasters needed to be born, and needed to be human, and needed to survive in a hostile world long enough to be taught their twisted craft. But it was certainly something the first time Isaac at last managed it; he would always fondly remember how proud he was. And how proud Dracula had been of him.

A knock at the door breaks his concentration. Isaac doesn't scowl, but he makes his displeasure known in the swift and cutting way he directs his demonic forces to open the door. One of his creatures - a two-legged humanoid with a mask and long horns - unbars it to reveal a goblin with a hunched back, glaring up at the more polished beasts in the room.

"Orders to search everywhere." It grumbles, hobbling inside. 

This is...unusual. In his year of study, Isaac never has had his tower searched. Let alone by one so...pathetic-looking. He walks from the dais over to the goblin, putting up his hand to stay his creation from stabbing the wretched thing.

"And whose orders are these?" He asks, soft, betraying no emotion. Has he displeased Dracula somehow? What if he's decided that one human forgemaster is enough, and went with the one who didn't cause trouble with his wife? Horrible scenarios play themselves out in his head, but Isaac banishes them as swiftly as they appear. No. He was promised a seat at the table, always. And if he somehow displeased Dracula with the latest 'acquisition', then surely he would be summoned, not searched?

"Whose do you think, Forgemaster?" Sneers the creature, sniffing around Isaac's bunk. He lifts it up, checking underneath. Isaac reminds where he is, his grip tightening on his dagger. At last the humiliation pauses when the creature looks back up, giving Isaac a toothy smile.

"Don't look so sour; you'll have plenty of time for that later." 

Isaac's heart catches in his throat. Still, he remains calm. "Stop these riddles. Why are you searching my rooms?" He demands, doing his best to keep from shouting. The goblin sniggers, dropping the mattress back down and feeling along the stone walls for secret passages. 

"Searching everyone's rooms, Forgemaster. Word's out, the Belmont's killed someone and escaped. Our most benevolent Lord is going to rend him in two. Wouldn't be surprised if he does the same to the one who brought him here in the first place." 

Satisfied that there are no Belmonts hiding in the garderobe, the creature shuts the door and heads back down the way he came.

Shit. Hector. Lisa. 

Isaac snarls suddenly, snatching the goblin up by his arm and pinning him to the wall behind him. He only has a limited amount of time to make things right. He has to get to the bottom of what happened and find the Belmont first.

"Killed who?"

~~~

Trevor Belmont is, most unfortunately, fucking lost. 

At first, he only wanted to get as far away from his last known location as possible. He had picked a direction and bolted, bare feet digging into cold stone and rich, gorgeous carpet. As he raced down hallways where he couldn't see or hear anyone coming - or hid in side rooms or behind tapestries when he could - Trevor was struck by the oddness of not coming across anything he couldn't outsmart. As well-populated as Castlevania was rumored to be, and as much as Trevor took advantage of surprise and adrenaline to avoid anything that made noise, he should have been caught by now. 

Now he realizes why his part of the castle seems so utterly deserted; it was on purpose. But not for him: Trevor can't hazard a guess why, but it looks as though the surgery had been situated to be as far from the hub of inhuman activity as possible. Because now that he's clear of the quiet surgery, he's fast running out of places to bolt; each corridor he happens down ends in either a dead end, or a set of clearly-occupied guest quarters (fuck him, he can smell the recently dead), or large meeting areas for demons or witches or who the fuck knew what. Libraries offered no refuge; the ones he passes are clearly being used, and most of the other rooms are one-entrance-only: they might as well be cells for how easily he could get himself trapped in one. He's desperate to find either a staircase to guide his way down or an armory to give him a fighting chance.

But God clearly has it out for him; every staircase he finds is in a frustrating state of disrepair. Hardly much of a challenge for the winged or levitating horde, or even Trevor with Vampire Killer; Trevor alone can only curse at the precipice to another fucking bottomless pit and turn around to try another way. After a while, he gives up on running and settles for approaching each door quietly.

Worse than the staircase issue, he's growing exhausted with each new dead end. Adrenaline can only keep him going for so long. His bad arm aches, getting worse by the minute and his toes are going numb from walking without shoes. His ears are ringing, his head is hurting, and his vision is blurring, sure signs of fever if he ever bothered listening to his dad. At least he's not getting hungry, what with the gut-wrenching fear that he's going to run into his own death every time he rounds a corner. Being certain you're about to die at any second means that every other bodily function gets put on hold.

In the next bedroom, he uses his teeth and good hand to fashion a sling from a pillowcase, figuring this to be the least of the crimes Dracula can kick up a fuss about. Fuck him; if Trevor had time, he'd rip up all the nice linens. Maybe piss on the carpet for good measure. The thought of the great bat having to bend down to clean up after him actually cheers Trevor up a little, enough to stop his heart from beating rabbit-fast. He settles his bad arm into the sling, shuts the door to hide any evidence that he was in there, and moves on.

The funny thing about fearing for your life is that you can only do it for so long before even that starts to get old. And Trevor's been in a relative state of constant fear-run-fight for the last few days. At last, all that seems to be catching up to him. Five days ago he was hiding in the comfort of his tree, living off the remains of his family's old root cellar and figuring out how best to survive the coming winter. When graverobbers inevitably came to dig up parts of the ruined estate, Trevor had acted rather than thought things through: a habit he was cursing himself for right now.

He leans against the wall for support as he walks, suppressing the urge to cough. What did it matter if fucking night creatures had dug up his family's corpses? One more desecration, one more humiliating turn wouldn't have done their bones any harm. They were already dead, and their souls were beyond his or anyone else's reach. If he had kept silent, kept moving, maybe then he wouldn't have lost the family whip, or his shoes, or run afoul of the most evil fucking vampire in existence by pure chance. Was it familial pride that made him march from his tree and start killing the fucking leeches? Or was it the dread of seeing his sister's skull again in person, instead of only in his nightmares, cracked and oozing as he stitched her burial shroud under cover of darkness?

God, can't he just fucking stop? 

Trevor makes it to the end of another suite of guest corridors. There's no outlet; only a stone wall and no other entryway, the tapestry of Dracula's blood-red sigil mocking him. He shuts his eyes, wondering if he has the strength to backtrack and try another way out. He thinks he saw a hidden passage back a ways, but that was ages ago. Plus, the idea of struggling down the same hallways again and again while the forces of Castlevania get ever closer to discovering him makes him want to throw up. 

Fuck it. If they find him, they find him. He's going to get caught anyway if he keeps on going past his breaking point. 

Opening the door nearest to him, Trevor happens on yet another fucking guest bedroom, this one thankfully unused; the sheer amount of them has him wondering if Dracula regularly entertains guests that number in the hundreds. He looks around, finding no windows to guide him as to where he is in this death trap. There's a wardrobe - empty, because of course it is. A bed, without linens on it but still with its mattress. A chest at the foot of the bed, also empty. No candles; when he closes the door, he'll be left in utter darkness save for the bit of light under the door from the hallway.  

Again: fuck it. Trevor crawls underneath the bed, rolling so that his bad arm rests against his stomach. At least this way he'll have some warning noise from anyone trying to stab him in his sleep.

He stares up at the mattress, weary eyes glazing over. Out of nowhere, he gives an abrupt chuckle. 

Here lies Trevor Belmont. A monster hunter, hiding under a monster's bed.

Chapter Text

Adrian, in all fairness, didn't want to disobey his father. In fact, he very rarely set out to do that at all!

It was only that he got bored very easily, and with Mother working hard to set up her own doctor's office, there was no one willing and able to entertain him. His parents adored him, he had no cause for concern there, but he happened to be an extremely energetic child, and he'd just started getting his speed under control. Mother couldn't always keep up with him now, and Father ended the games too quickly by catching him before he had a chance to really get going. Plus, as fun as it might be to race around Mother as a bat, or challenge Father to a sword fight, the fact was that they were both adults with adult responsibilities. And sometimes Adrian, in his secret heart, found them a bit...well, boring . Could anyone blame him if he snooped about where he wasn't allowed? 

Of course, that's what led to sneaking to the night market attached to Isaac's hood, and putting him, Isaac and Mother in very real danger. His heart gives a little hiccup of remorse at that. 

He skims through the papers on his father's desk, ears perking up whenever he hears someone approaching Father's study. But they always move on, usually in a hurry. Father hasn't returned from Mother's surgery yet, which Adrian was expressly forbidden from entering. It wasn't fair to kick him out from even watching, he'd decided. Even if the Belmont was as big a threat as everyone seemed to think - and after staring at the skinny, smelly wretch from yesterday evening, he'd had his private doubts about that - it would hardly matter. Whatever thing could exist to harm Father, he'd never seen it. And no one would hurt his mother when Father was around.

He resigns himself to wait until someone remembers him and returns, picking out one letter at random and settling down in his father's chair to read it. He can't decipher the name, doesn't know the country it's from. Or maybe Württemberg was a city?  He remembers with some guilt he's supposed to be studying Father's maps to better understand the territories. Either way, it's the contents of the letter that catch his eye, not the name or principality.

Whoever-the-Hell of Württemberg was mad at the Belmonts. One of them apparently had interrupted a wedding - what - decades ago, killed someone important to the letter writer, and made off with a special necklace intended to be given to the bride. But for the life of him, Adrian couldn't see what that had to do with the Belmont in his home. The boy didn't have any necklace. He didn't have shoes. How was the Unnamed Noble Vampire of Who Cares, Really supposed to reclaim his property from someone who hadn't even been born when the crime was committed? Was there some kind of treasure horde that the Belmont heir was apparently sitting on? Why would he not have used it already to buy some decent clothing, if there was?

Adrian scoffs, putting it aside for Father to read, and looks at the pile of letters.

Were they all like this? No wonder there were so many. Why were all of Father's vassals so stupid?

He picks up another letter, this one closer to the top. At least this time it was legible, and on very fine paper. He opens it without a thought, catching a whiff of spiced honey in the breaking of the seal.

This one was from the Ottoman Empire , on the opposite side of Wallachia. Even from the feel of the paper, Adrian can tell this is an important person, or at least someone with a lot of money pretending to be important. He reads through it, curiosity overtaking him. At least this letter-writer offered things up first before making demands on his father. Soldiers, money to pay and house them, a position for Dracula's favorites in a high court, and-..

His jaw falls open.

...forty of my best dogs, ones for hunting and ones for companionship, as I understand your wife has a proclivity towards-

Adrian wasn't bothered by being overlooked by this vassal; he knew his existence wasn't well-known on purpose. The world was a dangerous place for dhamphirs, even more so for those still in their childhood. He quickly peruses the letter, eager to learn more about what kinds of dogs the vampire was offering. Could he get a little brown one, small enough to fit in his arms? Or a big one to go hunting with and bring back rabbits for dinner?

A knock at the door. Adrian doesn't bother to look up, calling thoughtlessly over his shoulder;

"Come in!"

Two of Father's creatures - knights in black armor - push open the door, one of them walking backwards. Carried between them is a heavy wooden crate bound in black iron, with an opened lock set on top of it. As they set it down in the middle of the room, Adrian reluctantly sets the letter down to examine the crate.

"What's - oh. Sorry. Did this arrive just now?" Adrian asks, remembering almost too late that these creatures of Father's were only shells, not souls. They could only nod or shake their heads, having no tongues to respond to more complicated questions. The first one who entered gives a decisive nod in response, and both turn to exit, bound to the castle to perform their next set of duties.

Adrian, alone again, stares at the box in silence. It's clearly heavy, if two knights needed to lift it. And it must have already been checked for curses or spells, or else it wouldn't have been brought to Father. The lock on top was opened with a key still inside it.

He runs a hand over the top of the crate, fingers catching on holes poked in it. For air? Could it be someone sent him a dog already? He doesn't hear a heartbeat, nor does he smell rot, so what could it be?

Eager now, he sets the lock down on the floor and lifts the lid up.

"..."

At first, he thinks someone is messing with Father. The majority of the box is made up of hay, padding for corners to prevent valuables from breaking. But hay wouldn't account for the heaviness of the crate.

Using his shoulder, Adrian holds the top open and digs around as far as his arm can reach. His fingers brush against metal. A sword, maybe? Weapons in trade? It certainly wouldn't be the first time Father's people tried to win his favor through gifts like that, but the shape is wrong. With a heave, he pulls the metal loose from the bottom of the crate, bringing it up to the light to examine.

They're manacles.

They're small manacles. A thick pair of them, with a heavy chain to connect to a larger loop that looks like it would fit quite snugly around Adrian's neck. They look freshly forged, judging from the shine of the runes meticulously carved into the black iron. Magic hums from them, indicating spellwork of a sort Adrian's never seen before.

They've got spikes on the inside rings.

Heart pounding, he drops them in a hurry, hearing them clank against the bottom of the crate. From the sound and weight of it, there are more fearsome restraints located inside just underneath the hay. The light from Father's study reflects a note taped to the inside of the lid, that Adrian can just about make out;

For transport.

~~~

Trevor wakes up to the smell of blood and dust in his nostrils.

He cracks open reluctant eyes, sleepy confusion giving way to exasperation. If exasperation were coupled with the dread of knowing you were more fucked than you had ever been in your life. He lies still, staring up at the wooden slats of the bed he stuffed himself under, of the mattress sitting above. He listens, waiting for a telltale noise of discovery, and finds nothing creeping around in the darkness. Everything is quiet in a way it hasn't been in..fuck, a while.

It would have been nice if he had dreamed of a way out of here. Maybe had a conversation with a long-lost relative of all the pitfalls to avoid if you find yourself in the enemy stronghold, or dug up a memory of one of his parents talking to him about the castle's secrets. But Trevor's (bad) luck holds: he'd been so exhausted that he'd just succumbed to a black void of dreamless sleep.

Though, maybe it was better that way. Most of the dreams featuring family members now leave him sullen and with the taste of ash in his mouth all day.

His arm is worse than before, he knows that without needing to peel back the pillowcase he wrapped it in. It throbs angrily and he tries not to imagine his veins underneath turning black, stretching their way back towards his heart. He's just going to have to hope he can take care of it later.

But sleep seems to have done the rest of him some good, because Trevor feels calmer now, able to think and plan in ways that aren't simply reactionary. He's still in the most danger he's ever been in his life and he's probably going to die as soon as he's spotted, but it feels like...a passive danger? Like the feeling of being about to fall but not yet falling. Or of being hunted by a wolf but not yet knowing which direction the teeth are going to come from.

There'll be other times to kill Dracula . He tells himself, pushing out from under the bed. Escape first. Then you can make an actual plan of attack. You can't lift a sword, you don't know where your weapons are, oh, and you're probably in danger of dying from infection anyway. The only way you could kill him would be if he took one look at you and fucking died laughing. It's not cowardly to run.

Maybe if he repeats it enough times, it'll magically become true.

More annoying, he's hungry; thirsty too. Those facts are only going to get worse the longer he stays here. Trevor would rather run while he still has the energy to do so, instead of prolonging his hiding spot. Fuck, it can't be all vampires living in Castlevania, can it? Those people he fled from were both human, unless he dreamed them up in his fevered state. Maybe he can find some food on the way out.

First though: find a weapon. He hadn't been well enough to really look around the empty bedroom before, but now Trevor uses the shoulder of his good arm to hoist the straw mattress up and over against the wall beside it. The bedframe is well-made - fucking pity, that - but he can spot places where the boards are more worn in the middle where they would have bared the most weight. Using his arm for balance, he walks between the slats, lifts one foot up and kicks down as hard as he can.

The wood cracks but doesn't break. Trevor pauses to listen, but the thick walls of the castle actually come in handy for once: he can't hear footsteps running towards him.

He kicks again, and this time the beam splits in half. Satisfied, Trevor rips the rest of the board from its frame. It's not going to be the most effective weapon in the world, and it would be like trying to attack Dracula with a toothpick, but it might give him a half a chance against any lesser creature stalking the halls for his blood. He tucks the first half up against his arm sling for easy access and takes the second half of the busted board as well.

That done, all that was left to do was walk back into the waiting jaws of Castlevania.

Trevor grimaces, listens at the door, and then pushes it open.

The hallway is just as before - empty, richly carpeted, loads of locked bedrooms - but the painting across from his door is different. He might have been hallucinating, but Trevor felt sure it was a landscape of Roman ruins; he remembered it because it was a lot of dark blues and grays, a painting some vampire did at night. Now it's a larger one in a different frame, this time a scene depicting a gory battlefield. Dark red and browns instead of blue.

"What the fuck." He mutters, running a hand over his face to wake himself up. He'd known the castle could move - everyone did - but did the fucking hallways change too? Is that why he can't seem to get out of these corridors?

Well. Fuck this. Trevor is either going to die or he's going to escape; his empty stomach and dizzy vision can account for him there. Fuck this moving castle and the lord of it. If escape proves impossible, he can always light the boards on fire and try to take it all down with him.

He gives the painting, the hallway, and the entirety of Castlevania his middle finger and sets off.

~~~

The castle is hungry with activity. Creatures from the largest demon to the lowest fishman are on the hunt for the missing Belmont, all eager to win their lord's favor. Word spread quickly after Isaac's tower was invaded; he walks downstairs into a large dining hall, awash with the loud, boisterous damned determining where to search next.

Vampires are here, but also every other shade of demon and night creature and skeletal abomination Isaac can remember seeing in his time in this castle. Above their heads, specters float in and out, reporting news and potential sightings from one level to another. At the center of it is a huddle of vampire soldiers, listening to the surviving soldier meant to guard the boy but hissing at anyone else who tries to draw close and listen in.

The vampire - sour and thin-faced, pale both by lack of blood and general composition - has a hand clutching his shoulder, the sight of the impalement if his torn clothes are anything to go by. Apparently a badge of honor, because if Isaac supposes correctly, the blood the vampire is clutching in a wine glass should have healed this minor injury already.

Isaac raises an eyebrow, tilting his head questioningly at the 'wound' the vampire refuses to let anyone look at. The soldier sneers back before turning back to his companions;

"The Belmont moved like lightning! We went to restrain him and he conjured up wooden stakes from inside Ivan's throat! I tried to save him but the little bastard used him as a shield." His circle of admirers appropriately gasp, snarling revenge and asking fawning, rhetorical questions. 

Isaac resists any urge to voice his own opinion; that the fool vastly underestimated his opponent because he was human and half-grown, and already injured from what Isaac had done to him. Getting into bragging arguments with vampires was a waste of his time, especially when the Belmont was still loose in the castle.

Already, he can see the mistakes these stupid, silly creatures are making as he casts his eyes around the hall. There's no cohesive plan, no sweeping from section to section of the castle, no unified point where all information can be gathered or a plan to block off key entrances or establish a better message relay system. What stands before him are a load of arrogant foot soldiers, all hoping to be the one to bring the Belmont down themselves. These creatures are selfish, leaderless except for the one who commands them all, who has left them to their own devices. They're all apex predators, unable to fathom teamwork for the sake of a larger opponent, because they've never had to face down a stronger opponent that wasn't a larger vampire, a stronger demon. Each of them wants the kill, to the detriment of the rest. And no one except Isaac has a clear idea of just what the Belmont boy is capable of.

All this plus Castlevania's sheer size means that the Belmont has a key advantage; he can take down his opponents one by one, saving his strength in the process. Hell, he can steal weapons and supplies off their bodies without alerting the rest of the castle if he's careful about where he picks his fights. Isaac supposes that if he were exceptionally lucky, the Belmont could even avoid enough of the larger monsters and sneak out with only a handful of encounters. It's what his ancestors did in reverse when they attempted their attacks: it's what Isaac would do in his place.

He glances to his silent night creatures flanking him. If anyone had a chance of finding and recapturing the Belmont, it was him. He had the means to command at least a portion of forces in unison, and he knew enough not to underestimate him. He knew his weak arm, knew how he fought and thought and adjusted his tactics in ways most vampires stagnated. He was human; he could think like a human. Isaac could catch the Belmont on his own without the help of Dracula's horde.

No.

If he was going to be a leader some day, grow beyond the circumstances of his birth, he would have to learn. Isaac would not let his own vanity and desire to claim the Belmont for himself lead to the boy's escape. He refused to fail Dracula again.

He motions for the demon on his left to kneel down and place its hands together. Isaac settles a hand on its shoulder, steps into his night creature's hold, and hoists himself up to be seen by the entire group.

"Hear me!" He calls, in a voice that echoes off the stone walls. Some hellspawn quiet down out of mere curiosity rather than respect; others scoff and go back to openly plotting. His words are lost to the cacophony of the hall. He's a nobody; a strange interloping human in a crowd that hunts humans.

Need to get their attention somehow..

Isaac lays an eye on one of the winged devils chattering to its friends in the eves of the ceiling, the Forgemaster's words going entirely ignored. Moving with practiced grace, he reaches for his dagger and hurls it at the creature.

It drops with a piercing scream, shattering glasses where it falls onto the table. The unfortunate demon shrivels up, keening in agony, and dies. With an incline of his head, Isaac directs one of his forged night creatures to retrieve his weapon. All the rest of the room falls silent.

Isaac is determined not to let them regain momentum to challenge him.

"I am Isaac Laforeze, Devil Forgemaster to Lord Dracula." He continues, ignoring the brittle corpse of the winged demon to address the whole of the room. "I have fought the Belmont and won, which is more than any of you. I know the way he thinks. If you try to fight him alone, you will be picked off, one by one, until he's killed all of you like he killed Ivan." Isaac directs a hand towards the second of the vampire soldiers, who grits his teeth but keeps his peace. He takes this as leave to continue;

"If-" He was about to say If you'll allow me , but no; that was too polite. Too much like a servant. He clears his throat, and begins again,

"If you can all stop squabbling like children-" Some of the larger ones make angry noises of protest. Isaac calls out over their heads, not slowing down, "-I have a plan."

"And why should we listen to you, Isaac Forgemaster?" Demands one of the vampires, their face covered with a helmet. Haughty. Arrogant. "You're not one of us."

Isaac nods, prepared for this. "I am not. But we all want one thing: to appease Lord Dracula and capture his enemy. One of you may manage it - eventually - but it will take work and skill that most of you do not have. This is what the enemy is trained for; to take you all down individually. It's unnatural for vampires to work together for long and he knows that . And if the unthinkable should happen - if the Belmont escapes or kills someone Lord Dracula will miss - then all our lives are forfeit."

He waits for the grumbling to die down. The vampire who spoke eventually sits. Isaac waits a beat for silence, and begins.

"We need to barricade the front entrance and station a heavy guard at every staircase. He can't climb down the castle walls on his own, so those protecting the windows should be redirected to the galleries and the chapel. He may double back in already-searched areas. I want groups of three, no less, going through the hallways. If you spot him, the fastest should fly back here to report to me while the strongest delay him until I can pull back the rest and send reinforcements. He has a wounded arm where he's weakest."

Isaac waits, with baited breath. These creatures could tear him apart if they really wanted to, despite Dracula's orders and his own night creatures. He would be powerless in a group this size.

The vampire who had been impaled climbs to his feet. He meets Isaac's eyes over a group of his own adoring followers. This one has more to lose than I do.

Suddenly, he barks, breaking eye contact;

"You heard the fucking Forgemaster! Move it!"

And like a magic all its own, Isaac's orders are carried out. He watches, hardly daring to change his stern expression, as minotaurs pair with skeletons and gremlins in groups of threes and fours, shuffling off in different directions. Harpies take flight and, carrying succubi, disappear to guard the castle's major staircases. Even the vampires follow soon after, though they linger long enough to border on the line of disrespect. Soon, the only creatures left are those too slow or inept to be good at searching: fleamen, ravens, sentient plants and tombstones, and other things of questionable sentience.

Isaac steps down from the night creature he'd been using for a perch and goes to address this group last.

"You will be my messengers. One of you bring me a map to the castle and some chalk. By the time Lord Dracula emerges, we must have a thorough idea of where the Belmont is and what we are doing to capture him."

~~~

With Isaac at the helm, it takes only three hours for word to reach him about the escaped Belmont.

He remains behind in the hall where he first addressed the crowd, only now stretched out before him on one of the tables - and not the one where the dead demon had landed - is a map to Castlevania. He uses a bit of black chalk to cross out sections that he knows for certain have been searched, narrowing down possibilities. The Belmont seemed to be aiming for an outer wall, which was admittedly clever of him; more opportunities for escape or to catch sight of a window and get his bearings.

Over the first hour, various creatures pour in, having been alerted by their brethren of Isaac's plan and coming to volunteer themselves for service. There were some holdouts - always were - but the fact that Isaac was being listened to by someone other than Lord Dracula was immensely gratifying.

That feeling only doubles when a stocky gargoyle hastens over to him on marble-colored wings, grunting out;

"The Belmont's been sighted in the Royal Chapel."

Good. Isaac stands up, picking up his dagger and flail and motioning for his night creatures to follow him.

"Then we shall prepare to greet him. Send word to the others, tell them to block and seal the exits."

The Belmont's luck had officially run out.

~~~

Trevor Belmont is swearing in a chapel.

Granted, it's a chapel in motherfucking Castlevania - and isn't that a kick in the teeth? - but it's still, apparently, a chapel. With icons and stained glass and even a fucking confessional. Like Dracula needed to ask a priest's forgiveness for his crimes.

He's going to die in a church. He would have laughed, if he weren't busy enough trying to fend off the fucking hippogryph currently trying to claw his face off.

"Aaaah. Fuck you." Trevor says to no one and nobody in particular, huddled between two pews and trying to stem the scratches the creature dug into his thigh when she tried to lift him up off the ground. At least there's some good news: he managed to kill the vampires who attempted to pin him in, their blood still staining his shirt sleeves.

Sorry, Dad. Could never keep that clean.

The hippogryph screams in frustration, clawing and stomping on the pews, trying to squish her slippery prey. Trevor rolls to a third one, amazed he managed to make it this far. Did dying in a chapel mean dying in a state of grace, or did he have to get un-excommunicated for that? What the fuck was the term, re-communicated? Double-

"Fuck!" He yelps, and scrambles from his hiding spot as the hippogryph smashes the pew he'd been hiding under not two seconds ago. At least he has a sword now, taken from one of the slain vampires. But he needs a ranged weapon if he's going to try taking on something that flies, can't exactly throw a sword very far at all. The parts of the bed he'd been carrying were traded up after they'd been smashed to uselessness. What he wouldn't do for a whip, or a dagger, or...

He's in a chapel.

Stupid, Trevor! Casting his eyes up towards the ceiling, he's relieved to see an enormous brass bell with an intact rope tied to the clapper.

On the other side of the chapel from where he is, his way blocked by one pissed-off monster.

"Oy. Bird-horse." Is that an insult? Can hippogryphs even understand insults? Trevor picks up a bible, mutters an apology to his dead relatives, and hurls it as hard as he can at the creature's eyes. The hippogryph screeches, snatching it out of the air before it has a chance to connect, but it gives Trevor time enough to race for the bell's rope.

He feels the rush of wind against his back, knows he's left it exposed for the monster to grab him by his rib cage and that he only has a few precious seconds to act.  His heart pumps madly in his head, counting the beats in slow motion.

Almost...!

His hand seizes onto the rope. Dropping to the ground to avoid the claws reaching for him, Trevor wraps the rope around the back leg of the monster and rolls quickly out of the way of the stamping feet. She screams at him, going to tear his throat out with her beak, but hasn't yet realized she's been tethered. Her leg jerks her back, and as she pauses to turn at what's got her, Trevor's up and moving.

His fist smashes into her throat, wounding her badly; she flails, the rope she's caught on dragging down and causing the whole chapel to erupt in the ba-gong ing of the bell noise. Seizing his stolen sword, he plunges it quickly into her heart, silencing both her cries and the bell that's making his ears ring.

Fuck.

That...could have been handled with better subtlety. The whole castle is going to be on him in minutes.

Trevor breathes, heart pounding, and tries to pull the sword from the dead creature. He can't quite get purchase on it with one arm, even with all his body weight behind it. Fuck! It was a good sword, too. Damn the Forgemaster who wrecked his arm. If he could only-

A small pale hand sets itself on his shoulder from behind.

"Hello, Belmont. My name is-"

Trevor, hypervigilant and still reeling from his fight with the hippogryph, twists around and punches Adrian Tepes in the face.

Chapter Text

It was like hitting a brick wall.

“Fuck!”

This was from Trevor; pain reverberating up his arm in waves. He gasps, hugging his shoulder and backing away. Breathing through clenched teeth, he rides out the first wave of pain and exhales sharply. Perfect; more bruises to add to his growing list of injuries. Worse, whoever-the-fuck had snuck up behind him didn’t even have the courtesy to look hurt about it!

Instead, the boy in front of him has a look of abject confusion, even shock. He hadn’t moved from where Trevor had hit him, and the older boy knew he had a right hook that could devastate grown men. This strangely dressed, ethereal-looking kid should be on the floor with a broken nose. He’s not hurt: he’s not even bleeding.

Which means supernatural.

Fucking perfect.

“...Ow.” Sniffs the pale boy, who seems to realize he should be reacting a second too late.

Trevor catches a hint of fangs in the boy’s mouth, cementing the supernatural theory in his mind. Vampire kids were rare, but not unheard of - no telling what this one was capable of. He’s keeping one eye trained on the fanged boy, and one eye on his surroundings. His stolen sword’s still stuck in the hippogryph’s throat, but if he’s quick he can probably grab up a broken bit of the wooden pew. He starts moving backwards, slowly.

“That’s….rude. Ow.”

A snort of laughter escapes Trevor before he can rein it back in. Rude. Really? God, he can feel his mind unravelling in this shithole the longer he stays here. Trevor flexes his fingers to make sure nothing’s broken before casually going to bend down and pick up something he can use for a weapon.

“Stop that.” Commands the boy, pointing at Trevor with all the arrogance of young nobility. “I can see what you’re doing. Stop trying to attack me, Belmont.”

“Fuck off, Fangs.” The retort slips out before Trevor can stop it. He knows it’s childish to engage in banter, knows he tends to get distracted in a fight and talking wastes precious breaths. But he’s also twelve, and hurt, and he’s not going to let himself get commanded around by someone who’s half his weight and not even human to boot.

The little vampire in front of him seems to consider that his approach isn’t working. Or maybe his mind control powers haven’t grown in yet. Either way, he changes tactics and tries for a smile. It looks awful to Trevor’s mind, like a portrait someone’s ruined with pointier teeth than needed. When he speaks next, it tastes insincere, as though the vampire’s trying to calm down a feral animal.

“You’re in danger here, Belmont.”

This is rewarded with a snort, as Trevor finally tears his eyes away to really go hunting for a piece of wood long and sharp enough to do the grim deed. Baby Fangs continues to talk at him as he searches the rubble;

“You won’t escape here without help. Luckily for you, I’m willing to-I’m willing to offer my assistance!” Baby Fangs has to shout the last part, as Trevor starts kicking over broken stone, gives up, and starts for his sword.

Trevor’s hand wraps around the hilt, grunting as he attempts to pull it from its most recent foe one-handed. “Doing just fine on my own.” He says, and chances a look over his shoulder. Apparently Baby Fangs doesn’t like being ignored; his face has a sort of infant pout to it that’s equal parts annoying and adorable. God, this night’s been hell if he thinks anything with fangs is cute. He rationalizes it in his mind: anything that isn’t actively killing him is going to be looked at favorably.

“No you aren’t.” Sniffs the boy, who’s given up trying to command Trevor to stop and is instead crossing his arms, not helping the overall impression that he’s pouting. “They’re cornering you as we speak. Your arm’s too hurt for fighting, you’ve probably got an infection…” Here, Baby Fangs gives a triumphant, evil little smirk of his own;

“And you stink.”

This, more than anything, has Trevor turning back to the brat in outrage, finally freeing the sword from the dead monster. Is this little fucker trying to annoy him to death?

“Fuck off!” He says, more out of surprise and irritation than actual anger. “Let’s see you come through half of what I have and smell like a rose.”

“I could!” Baby Fangs sticks his chin out, challenging.

The two stare at each other for a tense moment, Trevor with his sword in his good hand, standing barefoot in gore with part of a pillowcase wrapped around his arm and smelling like Hell on Earth: perfect little Baby Fangs in his cravat, perfectly tailored outfit, and pouting, perfectly angelic expression, looking offended to be breathing the same air.

Trevor thinks he breaks first, but it’s a near thing; he starts to giggle. Much to his shock, so does Baby Fangs, who’s appearing less and less like a threat the longer Trevor sticks around.

“I think I’m losing my mind..” He says, half to himself. He sees the kid vampire open his mouth to agree and puts up a hand to stop him.

“Shh. Shut up before I hit you again. Let me think.” He exhales, looking around the chapel. It’s quiet now, but it won’t be for long. He’s running on an empty stomach already; Trevor needs to rest before he starts down the rest of the long way by himself. He’s not trusting this strange little vampire, not by a long shot, but so long as Baby Fangs keeps his distance and his teeth to himself, Trevor won’t mind a guide.

“You know anything about this castle?” He asks, finally.

Baby Fangs snorts, delighted. “I know everything about this castle. It’s my home.”

Trevor rolls his eyes: this kid thought himself too charming by half. Annoying little shit..

“How do I get out?”

The vampire pauses, and Trevor almost, almost wants to hit him again, before the other boy says tentatively;

“It’ll be hard. I’d have to carry you over some of the places where there’s no ledges, and we’d need to use some of my secret ways, and we’d also need to disguise your scent. Everyone’s looking for you, the whole castle’s gone crazy. Father would be upset I helped you, he wants to skin you alive, probably, and even Mother can’t talk him out of it when he gets into a stink about something.”

At Trevor’s questioning look regarding such banal terms as Father and Mother, the baby vampire brightens, and against all rational thought, bows to him. It’s not a deep bow; more something ingrained in a prince, a slight head-nod and a fist against his chest, but it’s the first time Trevor’s ever even heard of a vampire bowing to a human. A Belmont human, even.

“Sorry! Sorry. Mother says my manners are not…ahem. I am Adrian Tepes. Son of Vlad Dracula Tepes, Lord of Castlevania and King of Vampires.”

Suddenly, Trevor doesn’t feel like laughing any longer.

BOOM

Both boys nearly jump out of their skin, their heads turning towards the chapel doors Trevor had hastily barricaded before all of this madness erupted.

The wood is beginning to crack already; whatever’s coming through there is determined to break in. Probably alerted from all the noise Trevor was making earlier, and it just took this long to find an appropriately-sized battering ram.

“Come on!” Baby Fangs - no, Adrian son-of-Goddamn-it-All-To-Nine-Hells-Dracula Tepes moves to grasp Trevor’s arm. Trevor, however, wriggles away before he can be grabbed. Adrian looks subdued, confused.

“Fuck off, Dracula Junior.” Trevor tells him without much fire, grim. If this wasn’t a trap - if Adrian was honestly trying to get him out of the castle - there was no telling what kind of nightmare Trevor would be in for if he’s seen sniffing anywhere near Dracula’s brood. If he’s going to die in this stupid chapel, fine; better that than a slow, torturous existence for threatening his lineage.

Except-

Oh, fuck. He already punched Dracula Junior in the face. Now he really does feel like laughing.

BOOM

Trevor squares his shoulders and sets himself up for the fight at the chapel door. He picks a spot where the ground is mostly clear and he can swing a sword without clipping it into a stone pillar, and plants his feet. Still unarmored, he notes with some disdain, but at least he can die with a weapon in his hand.

Adrian beside him squawks in outrage and prods Trevor in the shoulder with some urgency. God, when did he become okay with the Prince of Vampires touching him? He really is going insane.

“They’re going to kill you.”

“That’s nothing new.”

Adrian hisses between his teeth, a sure sign of catlike frustration. “Come with me! I’ll protect you.”

Trevor finally does laugh at that, hollow and soft. He doesn’t turn away from the door, despite Adrian’s repeated prodding. There’s no escape for him. Never was, really: he’d been living on borrowed time long before setting foot in this castle. Best he can hope for now is a quick death, which is asking a lot for a Belmont in Castlevania, he knows.

See you in a minute, Dad.

“Hey,” Trevor says, soft, not taking his eyes away from the door. “This has been a really…really messed up last couple of days. Thanks for giving me a last laugh, Baby Fangs. Kindly fuck off now.”

BOOM

The heavy wooden doors are knocked loose from their barricade thanks to a long wooden post held by three enormous monstrous things - night creatures, Trevor’s mind supplies. A voice commands them to guard the entrance.

Which means..

“Good evening, Belmont.”

~~~

Isaac Laforeze steps over the battering ram and inside the chapel, surveying the rather sorry-looking scene before him.

Three dead at the Belmont’s feet: a hippogryph with a slashed throat, her foot tangled in the chapel bell’s rope; two vampires impaled with remnants of a broken pew. The Belmont stands ready with his left arm clutching a stolen sword, looking worse each time Isaac happens upon him. He’s pale, favoring one side of his body, the wounds that Isaac dealt him the last time tucked away in a torn bedsheet of some sort. The hunter-in-training is tired, underfed, and looks more resigned than anything.

“This will be quick.” Isaac promises, unleashing his flail and dagger.

A weary snort is all Isaac gets in response, before his opponent is raising his blade to attack.

Isaac has no desire in drawing this out longer than necessary: Dracula’s orders are paramount above all else. Much as he might like to show the Belmont the superiority of his fighting skills, the most important thing is to get him down without any more loss of life or limb. If the Belmont chooses to surrender, all the better, but Isaac wouldn’t count on it. The boy was likely raised on stories of his ancestors who attempted to kill Isaac’s master and were made to see the error of their ways before the end: each subsequent one will fight to the last breath.

Death by torture is slow, and Isaac’s master knows many ways to draw it out.

The Belmont’s blade aims for Isaac’s neck, but it lacks power and precision. Isaac easily ducks to avoid it, bringing his dagger up over his head to shove it further away from him. He moves closer, attempting to box the Belmont in so that the blade can no longer be of use; the Belmont shifts with his sword instead, moving away.

He’s slower than their previous fight all of two days ago, moving in a wide circle. He appears distracted, too, his eyes darting once to Isaac’s left before returning back to the threat at hand.

“Surrender.” Isaac entreats, his grip flexing on his dagger as he mirrors the Belmont’s movements. That comment earns another slash from the Belmont’s blade, easily blocked.

“Surrender and you can rest. You may even be given food.” Isaac urges, attempting to play on the Belmont’s weakness. A cheap shot, perhaps, but Isaac doesn’t wish to bring his master a corpse after all this trouble. Dracula’s own wife, too, wishes the Belmont to live. A shame the Belmont doesn’t seem to want the same: at Isaac’s entreat, he snorts and kicks aside some pulverized stone and dust at Isaac.

Very well. He promised a swift end to this fight; he will deliver.

Isaac moves with the tenacity and deftness of a man twice his age and experience. His dagger’s unique two-pronged blade is used to capture the sword, twisting it from the Belmont’s grip. It goes skittering off into the darkness of the chapel, well out of reach. Before the Belmont can move to recover it, Isaac’s whip is lashing around the Belmont’s ankle on the unspiked leather side, dragging him to the floor.

Weaponless, his breath momentarily knocked out of him, the Belmont lands hard on his back. He wheezes when Isaac takes the opportunity to sit on the boy’s chest, pinning his arms with knees. Isaac holds his dagger to the boy’s throat to discourage movement.

“You fought well, for a time.” says the young Forgemaster, who would normally not be so complimentary if this fight had drawn longer. “I will ask you a final time; surrender.”

The Belmont’s eyes - blue, one scarred - cast their gaze towards the heavens. He’s refusing to look at Isaac, despite the older fighter holding his life in his hands. Isaac chooses to not comment on this disrespect. Perhaps he is making a prayer to his ancestors or his god.

Silence pounds in Isaac’s ears. He’s about to call for his night creatures to assist when the boy below him speaks;

“All right.” The Belmont heaves, at last. “Fuck it, fine. Help me.”

Help him? Isaac, a quizzical smile on his face, chuckles low, and presses close to the hunter;

“My master will decide what ‘help’ you are afforded, Belmont.” Isaac promises, with deadly malice in his tone.
But whatever curses, threats or pleas the Belmont might say would be lost on Isaac. He hears a sound like a bat’s fluttering wing, then before he can turn, a sudden weight from up above crashes down on his neck and head.

He blacks out.

~~~

Trevor grunts, sitting up slowly. He’s getting tired of jumping from fight to fight; his body keeps refusing to just give up and die. Still, he climbs to his feet, checking first to make sure the Forgemaster’s still breathing with a finger to his neck. Isaac lives, despite the weight of a half-grown vampire slamming fists down on his head from the rafters.

He debates slitting the prick’s throat and ending it, but one look at the tearful, even traumatized expression on Baby Fangs’ face has him dispel that idea instantly. Adrian is twitchy, practically dancing from foot to foot as he stares nervously down at the person he just knocked out.

“...Nice hit.” Trevor compliments, for lack of anything better to say, and goes to retrieve the sword knocked from his grip. As an afterthought, he steals the Forgemaster’s evil-looking magic dagger too, but leaves the flail behind. Both blades find their place on his belt.

Adrian hasn’t moved from where he’s trembling, so Trevor clears his throat and inclines his head.

“C’mon. Don’t be a baby about it, Baby Fangs.”

That, at least, shakes Adrian out from his vacant horror. He glares at Trevor, crossing his arms.

“Stop calling me that. I told you, my name is-”

“I don’t care what your name is.” Trevor cuts him off, if only to hear that delightful squawk of outrage once again. Good: it means he’s coping. He walks back over to Adrian’s side, hesitant to go out either the way he came in, or towards the Forgemaster’s night creatures likely guarding the door.

Isaac’s starting to stir: they’ve got to make their decision fast. No one stays knocked out for long from a hit like that: they either wake up or die.

“Look, you said you had another way out of here, right?” He tries, a bit louder so Adrian will stop looking so mournfully at the asshole sent to kill him and start thinking of a plan.

Adrian blinks up at Trevor, his watery-eyed look finally dissolving into something more resolute and ready. And then past that, to something mischievous, even evil.

“Maybe.”

Trevor stares at him, open-mouthed. But before he can worry about betrayal, or being fed on, or ripped apart, Adrian is seizing him around the middle in a tight hug and he’s up, levitating faster and faster towards the ceiling.

“Fuck! Fuck! FUCK!” He hollers, panicked, as the shit-eating son of Dracula the Dickhead flies him up into the rafters and out of sight.

~~~

It takes Dracula the better part of the day to set right his wife’s surgery again.

First, he had snarled out his orders to his attendants, demanding the Belmont to be found before he had opportunity to lay waste to more of the castle. A brief debate with Lisa had him amend this order to alive, if possible, but there would be opportunity to remedy that later.

Next, there was Hector to look after. The boy was shaken, obviously, but Lisa had not yet met a wounded bird she could not fix. Together, Dracula glaring over her shoulder at nothing in particular and overseeing the process, they set his nose right. While Lisa was fetching ice, Dracula was casting a few cleaning spells to wipe down the contaminated area. The body of the vampire the Belmont had murdered had long been carried off, but there was still his blood and Hector’s to wash away.

He could have had a servant do it, but in the end decided against it. Dracula wished to see all the destruction one Belmont child could do when left unattended. It would make his argument all the more compelling when he needed to discuss with Lisa why the Belmont had to die. Hector’s injury could just as easily have been her’s, or night forbid, Adrian’s.

While Lisa settled Hector into his tower for the night, Dracula took inventory of what was smashed beyond repair and what needed replacing. Broken glass, once vials of ether and other anesthetics, crunched under his boots; medicinal herbs needed to be repotted; steel equipment must be sterilized. Even candles would need to be replaced: some had smashed to the floor in the mad scramble the Belmont had made for the exit, and only by Lisa’s quick thinking had these been smothered before they could set fire to drapes or volatile chemical components.

At last, the surgery is right once more, though Dracula’s irritation has only grown in the waning hours. Lisa returns with a broom and a sorry expression. Someone had died on her watch, even if it was only, to his mind, an irritating sycophant of a servant. Dracula’s concern was more geared towards the mad human child stampeding through the castle.

“I should hunt him myself.” He growls, of two minds about it. Part of him wishes to; the older, bloodthirsty half of him that rankles at the idea of an intruder - a hunter, no matter how small - in his castle! The other more recent part of him wishes to stay close to his family in case Lisa should be that close to danger again. He will not trust her safety to servants any longer.

“You should stay with us.” Lisa corrects quietly, taking Vlad by the hand and leading him from the surgery theater at last. She turns, locking the doors to discourage entry should the Belmont double back. “This whole nightmare scenario is my fault. I should look for him with you.”

“It is the Belmont’s fault.” Snarls Vlad, his fangs itching to drain the last of the wretched family dry. “And mine. I alone know what that wretched family of hunters is capable of. I ought to have stayed, I should have stayed.”

“You would have frightened him, and possibly killed him when he fought back.” His wife reasons, setting her arms around his neck as Vlad bends down to oblige her. “I’m glad you didn’t.”

“I will make him wish he never was born a Belmont.” He murmurs, though it comes out less of a deadly promise than he wishes, underlain with the fear of how close he came to losing everything. To that, Lisa sighs into his shoulder, running her fingers through his thick, black hair.

“Enough. Enough for today. I don’t have the energy to fight about this now.”

He nods, and offers her his arm to lean on. Together they walk up the stairs to their private quarters. He allows himself to relax slightly; here, at least, he knows the Belmont would not dare to tread. He would have fled at the first opportunity: down, not up, very like each of his ancestors before him. Irritating gnats, the lot of them, but studious little villains as well. Belatedly, Vlad realizes that Lisa likely had not stopped to eat or sleep during this entire debacle; no small wonder she had very little fight in her now. He makes a note to ring for a servant to send up a late evening meal for the two of them.

Lisa stops at the dividing staircase between their suite and Adrian’s bedroom.

“I want to bring Adrian into our room to sleep. Just for tonight.” Just until the Belmont was found and recaptured, Vlad knows. He agrees, releasing her arm.

“Bring him. I will join you both in a moment.” First, he has to lock his office up for the day’s end.

Lisa departs from his side to walk up the winding stairs to their son’s room. Vlad watches her go, then turns up the other staircase to disappear to his chambers.

A stack of papers waits for him, and a half-opened crate with the restraints he had ordered Castlevania’s dark blacksmith to hone. Special protective charms were enshrined in the black iron: he had taken notice of how the Belmont slipped his manacles the first time and was less eager to watch the boy try it again.

He sits down at his desk, beginning to work his way through the rest of the letters sent to him and debating throwing the lot into the fireplace when Vlad’s ears catch onto his wife’s thudding heartbeat, racing down to him from their son’s bedroom. Dread curdles unhappily in his dead heart.

He’s at his feet in an instant, meeting her at the door. Lisa’s face is ashen, her eyes a horror;

“I can’t find Adrian!”

~~~

With his most loyal servant lying broken in pieces on the floor of his caravan, the Butcher has to take the unappetizing journey himself to the ruins of the Night Market.

He wraps himself in a cloak and shadow spells to avoid notice, but the cave network has long since been abandoned: there is nothing here but the wind whispering through the Carpathians. He travels in short teleportation jumps, a horse too undignified for a sorcerer of his caliber and a distance mirror too expensive. He mourns and curses the loss of the Belmont boy in equal measure; he had been set to receive money to purchase ten such mirrors, should he wish. But no use crying over spilled blood, as the tasteless joke went.

He surveys the damage at a distance, stopping at the mouth of the cave. Hoof tracks of panicked horses lead from the ruins of a burned-out barn on a neighboring hill. The rotten smell of blood and corpses are distinct in the air, but he does not bother to stop and search to replenish: the kind of creatures occupying the market would have stolen anything for carrion by now. Grimacing, the Butcher steps inside the cave.

It is as to be expected: all are gone, packed up and moved on until the next night market in a month’s time, at another location. Only his caravan sits where his armored servant had placed it, the door broken down, one side listing as some enterprising thief sought to take even the wheels from it. Weaving a spell with his hands, he checks for traps, for eavesdroppers and for trespassers before stepping inside.

Inside is much the same: anything of value has been stolen, anything too bulky or useless to take has been ruined. The Butcher knows his clientele and would have done exactly as they had. Still, he scoffs, angrily grinding his teeth and sets to make a full list of what he has lost. He does not blame his kind for their nature: he blames the Belmont brat, who’s been a thorn in his side since the beginning.

But he will have his revenge: the law is clear. And if there is no vampire law or unspoken agreement that the Lord of Vampires will adhere to, then the chaos that will unfold after can be useful, too.

Snatching up papers from the secretary desk inside the broken caravan, the Butcher begins to write a few missives of his own.

~~~

Far away, hundreds of miles to the west, a letter quite literally appears on Morana’s desk. More intriguingly, it is addressed not to her sire, but to her, specifically.

She sits in the suite she shares with her sister-wives, alone for the moment. The letter is opened with a sharp nail and quickly read. It is from one of Carmilla’s spies in the field; some business about an attack in the night market in Wallachia. Ordinarily beneath her notice, this would not have come to her had it not been important.

There - that is the information she is looking for. A tool worth leveraging her growing influence: Morana quickly commits the letter’s information to memory, then burns it in her fireplace before it can fall into the wrong hands. She must tell her sisters this in person.

Standing gracefully, despite the childish urge to run, Morana exits the suite and begins the long walk from her tower. Lenore is closest, but she is…entertaining the Duke of Styria this evening. Night willing, he will be gentle with the gentlest of his wives, but Lenore is made of sterner stuff than he thinks. Morana quietly skips the doors leading to his private chambers, hearing the awful noises and Lenore’s breathy moans from within.

Striga will be in the courtyard, terrorizing the new guards as she forces them into formation and hones them into a proper army. She cannot be easily led away at this time without causing notice among those whose loyalty has not been fully tested.

That leaves Carmilla.

Carmilla, the youngest and most dangerous of their sisters, and the one who put the Plan in all of their heads. Morana thinks of it carefully as only the Plan, and not what it actually is: treason against their ruler and sire. What was once dismissed as madness is now an actual, working idea many steps in the making. Striga is the muscle; Morana the brain; Lenore the heart.

And Carmilla?

Carmilla is the mad genius that inspires action.

She knocks at the door to the dining room before entering. Carmilla is inside alone, a wine glass in hand, perusing one of the many books from the Duke’s library. He likes his wives to be well-read, and Carmilla is curling her lip at what he has dared to choose for her this evening. She glances up, eyes fluttering closed in relief when she sees Morana.

“Thank the Night. I was about to throw myself from the highest tower out of boredom.” She says, standing to embrace Morana. Morana kisses her, chaste, in case there are others about. As she bends to kiss her, Morana whispers in Carmilla’s ear;

“We have a new ally.”

Drawing back and speaking louder, she chuckles, turning the book to examine the title. It is a history on agricultural returns of the many peasant villages; Morana herself had to read such things when she was new to this castle. The dry writing had been a struggle, and she liked knowing what economic powers were at her disposal; she can only imagine her much more impatient sister desiring to rip the book apart with claws and teeth.

“Come. I have new reading material for you.” She extends her hand, and Carmilla gladly takes it, eager to be free. The wine glass is picked up, but the book is left behind.

Carmilla, eyes alight with the spark that ignited them all those years ago, purrs in delight.

“If it is of interest to you, Morana, I am certain I will enjoy it immensely.”