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With the crack of his knuckles, the tilt of his head, and the soft click of a door unlocking, Tommy was off.
Movement, after sitting dormant for so long, was a jarring experience. The press of his bare feet against cold tile felt like knives been stabbed through his soles– the cool temperature a foreign feeling after years of being in the nest– and the rush of wind through his hair amplified with every step forward. Even though his running was silent, he could still hear every ghostly noise he made circulate through his head, like a phantom of his time as a human.
But he couldn’t stop running. No, he needed– had to– keep going, keep sprinting, keep praying to the deities above that his coven wouldn’t think to check the nest for at least another few hours. Even though he was far from weak, he knew that ancient vampires would have no trouble tracking him down and dragging from screaming and kicking back to his home for another decade.
He couldn’t go back there. He never wanted to be there in the first place, and especially didn’t now.
But there was always the part of his mind that wanted to get caught. That longed for his sire to wrap their arms around him and press a kiss to his head, murmuring reassurances and empty promises that he would be able to roam free soon.
“Just another few months,” he always said, a deep purr rumbling in their chest all the while. Tommy had only been able to sink further into their hold, allowing the warmth and those vampiric instincts screaming in his mind to take full control. “Then those pesky human instincts will be gone and you’ll be able to see the rest of the coven. Doesn’t that sound nice?”
And it did sound nice. Very, very nice.
He was nothing but a fledgling; just a year past being a nestling, but still far too small and sensitive to the world to dare venturing outside by more than a few feet. Just a month ago, he hadn’t minded the idea. He had been content to stay warm and swathed in blankets, half-conscious in the nest as Wilbur ran a hand through his hair and his sire coaxed him to drink from his wrist. Gaze foggy and dazed as he was held close to a still chest– heart long ago fallen silent– and cooed at like he was a helpless child.
But now he was awake.
The human side of him was awake– the sliver of logical mind that was yet to be consumed by the bloodlust and urge to kill and conform to his coven’s wishes– and it was angry .
Waking up with his head tucked against his sire’s neck had felt like a death sentence. This was a predator he was trusting, someone with the ability to rip his throat out with nothing but a slash of their claws. He was paralyzed in their hold; part of him wanting nothing more than to stay, while the other screamed in terror.
In the end, the human side had won.
So Tommy ran. Down the hall, arm glancing off of the wall with the smallest bump, through doorframes and slipping in halfway-open doors. Practically leaping down the stairs– no matter how he stumbled, unadjusted to the unnatural speed he was moving at– and to the front door.
It was almost painfully easy to unlock it.
Fresh night air felt like a slap in the face as Tommy stepped outside onto the porch, a long dirt road lying in front of him, surrounded on all sides with towering emerald trees and a glowing moon.
And the human part of him–
The human part of him almost cried at the sight.
Tommy didn’t hesitate to take a deep breath, allowing the crisp air to flow into his lungs, reviving the dormant emotions that had been trapped inside for so long, overshadowed by an instinctual loyalty to his coven, and stepped into the treeline.
Gone from sight.
Gone from the vampires that had stolen him away; gone from the chains of instincts they had kept him trapped him.
And his human side was free.
***
“There’s nothing to worry about, Toms,” Wilbur grinned at him, arm resting lazily around his shoulders. “Those human instincts will disappear soon enough, just like you always wanted.”
Tommy sat completely still– breaths small and measured, almost going lightheaded from the lack of oxygen– as he was pressed against the vampire’s side. His mind stilted, overrun with an animalistic terror that screamed at him to play dead.
All he could think was that maybe if he made himself small enough, maybe if he could calm his heartbeat, then his blood wouldn’t be so appetising to the vampire. Maybe he wouldn’t turn him. Maybe he would get to stay human .
Maybe it would be the same as it had always been with the family. Before he knew that they were secretly bloodthristly creatures, slowly gaining his trust so that they could make him join their ranks and stoop to their murderous level.
He knew it wouldn’t work.
But he couldn’t help but give himself that sliver of hope.
A cold, dead hand grazed near his throat, directly over his pulse, tracing that one spot almost absentmindedly. He ignored the urge to try to bat it away; that would only risk making the man angry.
He couldn’t afford to die. He didn’t want to die.
Wilbur sighed, clearly noticing his terror, his hand momentarily halting in its track. “Relax, dear. It’s not going to hurt when you turn. You’re human side will simply…rebel at first, maybe try to convince you that you’re unhappy, even while your true instincts want to stay with us,” he paused for a moment, ruffling Tommy’s hair in what would’ve normally been a reassuring movement, but now only made him flinch. “But those thoughts will go away easily in a few years. We’ll make sure of it.”
Tommy swallowed nervously, taking in a shaking breath. His heart felt like it was beating in his ears.
But maybe he could delay the inevitable. Maybe he could make Wilbur hesitate.
Maybe, maybe, maybe.
Tommy bit back a shiver, his voice cracking and weak as he struggled to speak. “What…instincts?”
A kiss was pressed into his hair, and Tommy could feel the vampire smile, a thing of love and pride as though he wasn’t intentionally scaring Tommy to death. “The ones that come with being one of us, of course. Venom doesn’t just kill the human heart, darling. It kills your soul.”
Tommy couldn’t stop the choked sob that escaped his mouth at those words. Wilbur immediately shushed him, gently running his hand through his hair, untangling the knots and smoothing the curls down before dragging him into his chest. Tommy immediately froze, his skin feeling like it had been doused in water and turned into ice, his heart only beating faster, and he could practically feel the blood running through his veins.
“Vampire venom, it takes over your mind, Toms,” Wilbur said, his tone light, as though he wasn’t planning to turn Tommy into a monster. His hand just continued running through his hair, pressing his chin into his head and humming contently. “It makes you better . It makes you above all of those silly human fears, just like the ones you’re feeling right now. The human mind is something that wants to fight change, so naturally it rebels. It’s natural. But it’s also something we can kill .”
Fresh tears ran down Tommy’s face.
“It might be strange the first decade or so. You’ll be able to hear and see things from both a vampire’s and a… human’s perspective. But I’ll help you through it. Before you know it, you’ll be a God, Tommy,” Wilbur’s arms circled around his stomach, trapping him close, as though he would attempt to escape. “Wouldn’t you like that? Not to ever feel fear or pain again?”
And it did. Not feeling fear or pain sounded amazing.
But he couldn’t die. He couldn’t be trapped in an eternity as a puppet to his instincts, no matter how nice the warmth Wilbur was giving him felt as he was forced to relax, exhausted from shaking in pure terror.
Another cry left his lips at the realization that no matter what he did– how much he tried to stop his heart from beating so loud, no matter what he said, no matter how much he shook and cried– nothing would be able to stop a vampire .
Not even from becoming one.
“Wilbur,” Tommy sobbed, his brother’s grip tightening. “I- please, not now, I can’t-”
“There’s never a good time, Toms. I know it’s scary– fuck, I was terrified when Phil first turned me. But it’s okay . You’ll be okay ,” Wilbur soothed, one of his arms moving to tilt Tommy’s head to the side, baring his unprotected throat. “It won’t hurt a bit. Just let your human side go .”
Tommy fell completely, utterly still, not even breathing. A last ditch effort to plead for what he couldn’t voice.
Wilbur didn’t listen.
“This is for your own benefit, darling. Trust me .”
It wasn’t a question; it was a demand.
Tommy didn’t have a moment to brace himself before Wilbur pressed his fangs into the pulse of his throat and bit down.
***
The woods were quiet in the dead of night.
At least, they were to the human in him. To the human mind– the aspect that was still valiantly fighting against the creature trying to take full control, to leave him empty of free will– couldn’t hear the pitter of animal footsteps over bramble, nor the rustling of bugs over leaves, nor the lightest whistle of wind; no, only the heightened vampire senses could pick up on such miniscule noises, made to use them to their own advantage to kill.
It was quickly giving Tommy a headache. Unsurprisingly, having the two halves of his mind warring against one another for control of what he could perceive was not a pleasant experience.
And, truth be told, be was tired .
The last few years of sitting in a nest, not a single thought other than pure adoration, had weakened him. Yet another thing the vampires had stolen from him.
Tommy collapsed into the side of a tree, pressing the palms of his hands into his eyes in an attempt to soothe the growing pounding of his head. Every blink was a war between pure, humanly-flawed eyesight and the heightened vampiric sight that could spot every particle of dust of the air. Like a switch of lenses at the eye doctor that left you struggling to differentiate left from right.
It didn’t help that he was fucking freezing . Every second he spent outside felt like a leech sucking the warmth from his body, leaving him as a lifeless husk, too exhausted to move despite being stronger. All he could do was ungracefully fall down into the solid dirt, leaning against the rough bark that stung him through his tee-shirt and pray the coven didn’t come after him until he had more rest.
He didn’t know how long it had been since he first ran. The moon was further across the sky, now a flicker of light between treetops and gradually pressing closer to the horizon, but it couldn’t have been more than a few hours.
He only hoped he’d gotten far enough away.
All he needed was to rest. If he got just and hour’s worth of sleep, then he would keep moving far away from this place. Back into the city, back to the life that he deep down knew he could never return to; life before meeting the Crafts.
And just as his eyes were falling shut, just as he allowed his senses to relax, both human and vampire to stopping being hyperaware of the slightest noise, he heard the snap of a twig.
Tommy jolted up, blinking rapidly as his vision briefly failed, peering into the darkness around him. His hands were clenched into white-knuckeld fists, breaths halting entirely.
A shadowed figure stood in front of him.
Large wings stretched behind him, an inky black admist the blue-tinted moonlight, that surrounded a familiar pale face and white collared shirt like some demented halo. A entirely too foreboding emerald necklace hung next to his heart.
His covenmate’s head was tilted to the side as he looked over Tommy–silently checking for injuries, as though he had already managed to hurt himself–and his darkened talons lengthening. Razor sharp, inherently crafted to kill and maim. Claws that Tommy had inherited from his sire.
Tommy swallowed, pressing closer to the tree, the human in him screaming bloody murder. His limbs felt locked up in terror, as though he’d been bound and paralyzed with venom like ice through his veins. The ghost of Wilbur’s arms around him all those years ago that felt like yesterday.
But the vampire- the one lurking in the back of his mind, waiting for this moment, this person-
It couldn’t have been happier.
Covenmate , it screamed.
Tommy’s wrapped his arms around himself to stop the suddenly overwhelming temptation to leap into his covenmate’s hold. No- no, not his covenmate. His kidnapper.
But the memory of him carefully wrapping Tommy in blankets, rubbing his back through the pain of growing in his fangs, said otherwise. The comfort in laying against his chest, surrounded by the rest of his family; the constant knowledge that they would do anything to protect him.
He wanted that.
But the human could only see this vampire as a predator stalking his prey.
“Tommy,” the elder creature greeted, his smile exposing long fangs that seemed to glow in the dim light. The sight was menacing– should have been terrifying, had been terrifying so long ago when he’d first come face to face with their hidden vampiric features– but only served as a reassurance to his instincts. “There you are, son. We were so worried.”
His blonde hair, twin to Tommy’s own, was ruffled and messy, like he had just woken up in a panic. Tommy didn’t want to think about what their monstrous faces looked like when they realized he was missing. How angry they must have been.
He said nothing as the vampire stepped closer, not bothering to quiet his footsteps in the dead silence. He didn’t stop even as Tommy cringed backward, his arms squeezing tighter around his chest as though it would protect him against those deadly claws. But the man showed no mercy in his eyes, only glittering with an emotion that Tommy couldn’t place– worry? Concern?
Fear?
It was an emotion that should not belong to the predator that his human side told him the vampire was. Much less one that was directed at him .
His covenmate finally stopped when he was just a foot away from him, crouching down to meet his slumped height. Tommy bit back a cry as their cold hand cupped his cheek, peering down at him with glowing red. Nothing like the bright blue his own irises had turned to, swirls of red within growing and dying with every screech of the two instincts battling in his head.
A talon wiped away one of the tears from his eye, cooing at him gently as Tommy couldn’t help but lean into the touch. He was shaking almost violently, back numb to the rough tree bark digging into his spine.
“It’s okay, treasure, you’re safe now,” the eldest vampire cautiously said. “Those human feelings aren’t very fun, now are they? You’re terrified .”
Tommy nodded, even more tears running down his cheeks as his headache picked up in volume. It felt deafening, the constant screaming for him to run, play dead, or fucking attack , only staunched by the hand holding the side of his face.
He bit back another sob that shook his body, his own nails leaving deep imprints in his arms.
“I’m so sorry, Toms. I had no idea that your human instincts were still alive, but coming back to the nest with me will fix them soon enough. Then you’ll never have to deal with those pesky emotions, okay?”
Tommy nodded again, still unable to move, hands trembling and breaths shaken and uneven.
Phil gently removed his hand from Tommy’s cheek, instead choosing to wrap his arms around his son’s shaking body, overrun by too many human emotions at once, trying to survive the venom in one last-ditch effort. The feelings always reached an influx before they were permanently buried.
“Come here, dear,” his covenmate cooed, an instinctual call buried within the words.
Tommy didn’t have the heart to resist listening.
The fledgling sobbed in relief–even while the fading human senses screamed at him to escape–and slumped in Phil’s hold, allowing those dark wings to wrap around them both, shielding them from the nature that he so desperately wanted to run into. It was unbelievably warm in his arms, allowing his father to tuck him into his chest and press his face into his throat, silently encouraging him to take what the vampire wanted. What his instincts falled for, what they always wanted, but his human mind was disgusted by.
He hated it. But he also couldn’t resist falling into the instinctual comfort that came with nothing but Phil’s presence.
Tommy felt his fangs retract from his gums as his arms tightened around his father’s side, and he bit.
The sweet, familiar taste of blood instantly flooded over his tongue, making his mind go hazy as he bit in harder and his hold tightened, craving more and more even while the crimson flowed in a constant stream. A steady purr started up in his chest, growing in strength as he tasted more and more of that delicious blood, Phil’s hand gently holding the back of his head to his neck and running his finger over the front of his throat, attempting to help him swallow as he greedily gulped.
It felt perfect. Being safely held with his covenmate, no threats nearby, drinking his fill. Why had he ever wanted to leave this? Why would he possibly think that he didn’t want this?
Being away from the nest–away from his coven, his family – had made him unbelievably hungry. For both their blood, and their love.
It was nothing that his human emotions could counter.
It was only then that Tommy realized the human part of his mind had fallen silent, almost as though it had been drowned with every swallow of blood, ever purr of his chest as he sank into the gentle touch, every cheer his instinct-muddied brain gave as Phil murmured reassurements while he was too out-of-it to understand.
Like it had disappeared.
Tommy didn’t mind. Not when all it had given him was pain and horrifying, sharp fear.
Here, he had family.
Eventually, his head lolled to the side, having drinken all the blood while his eyes drifted shut. The exhaustion of the day was hitting him like a hammer, combined with the instincts to coax him to sleep and wake back up in the nest with his sire and two covenmates. To bask in their affection and never leave.
He felt Phil’s chest rumble with a laugh as they stood up, one of his arms looping to hold Tommy tightly against him, cooing as he let out a whine of complaint.
“It’s alright, mate, we’ll be back home in just a minute,” he whispered, kissing his forehead. Tommy’s eyes fell shut as he shifted in his hold, hiding his face away entirely.
It didn’t take long for the lulling sway to soothe him asleep.