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The haze of sleep thinned just enough for a few sensations to reach Jonathan’s sluggish brain.
The merry crackling of a log in the fireplace. The heat pressing against his back through a linen shirt, making his skin prickle. His feet cramped inside leather boots he’d neglected to remove.
How many times had he been admonished for falling asleep at his desk?
He was not a child anymore; he was beholden to many responsibilities. To loved ones, and to himself.
Still, despite his uncomfortable position bent over with his forearms resting on a hard wooden surface, exhaustion was pushing him back into the fog.
Whatever needed to be done, he would take care of it in the morning…
… As he teetered on the very precipice of sleep, an unusual sound reached Jonathan’s ears.
Creeaaaak
An ice-cold draft curled round his legs, like an affectionate cat. A vague dread crept into his mind, and all at once he realized that he could not move.
In his mind’s eye, Jonathan saw his study window.
Though no one was near, it lifted a crack. There was a pause in which Jonathan seemed to be holding his breath. Then, with a little shake as though it had been stuck, the window continued steadily to open…
Suddenly long, pale fingers curled up under the frame. They pushed the window open with greater force. The darkness outside seemed a massive black amorphous shape, threatening to spill itself into the room. Jonathan wanted to scream, but the sound was frozen inside his throat, choking him.
CreeeaaAAAAKK
Jonathan awoke with a start, gripping the edge of the desk and rising with such force that it hit the wall opposite with a mighty bang. A pen rolled across the mess of papers and spread-out maps, then clattered to the dusty floor.
It took several moments, gazing around the tiny cabin, for Jonathan to remember where he was. Then the weight returned all at once: the distance he’d travelled from home, his father’s fate, his brother-
“Dio!”
There was no answer.
The two small windows in the cabin were shut firmly, the padlock still drawn across the only door. Yet the atmosphere had shifted in some undeniable way. Jonathan knew that he was alone.
—☆—
The freshly fallen snow was light as powder.
Though the biting wind shaped it continuously into great sloping drifts, the tracks looked clear and fresh.
Bare human feet, passing in a straight line from the cabin door into the woods.
Heavy wool coat in hand, Jonathan ran alongside the tracks. He didn’t dare step on them - somehow he felt that destroying even one would break the spell, and cause them to fade away. At times he waded through drifts up to his thighs, leaving behind a trail in the virgin snow as messy and chaotic as his brother’s was clean.
Jonathan’s breath was a white haze tailing behind him. His throat stung with the cold. But he didn’t dare slow down.
The moon hung in the sky like a porcelain saucer, bathing the ground in a clear blue light. The trees loomed like giants, heavy blankets of snow draped across black limbs, their shadows clawing impotently at Jonathan’s heels as he plowed steadily on.
All at once the trees opened up onto the lakeshore, as though the forest had been trying to block Jonathan’s view until the last possible moment.
The frozen lake stretched on and on, merging with the star-studded sky.
Walking along its surface, bathed in moonlight, was a figure dressed only in a loose white shirt. His back was turned towards Jonathan. He strode, unhurried, towards the horizon. The wind whipped his golden hair into a savage dance, a surreal contrast to his poised demeanor.
Jonathan slid down the short slope on his heels, not taking his eyes off the figure.
“Dio!”
His cry came out hoarse - not loud enough to carry over the wind.
Desperation transmogrified into single-minded determination as his boots thudded on the ice. Jonathan dropped his coat as he broke into a sprint.
“DIO!”
Surely, Jonathan’s roaring voice carried all the way across the lake. His brother didn’t turn, nor slow his pace… Yet Jonathan was growing closer.
CRASH
One boot fell through the ice. His foot numbed instantly as water flooded round it.
When Jonathan tried to pull free, thick ice shards pressed in like a trap.
But Dio had stopped.
The angle of the moonlight made his amber eyes seem to glow. Jonathan called to him again, but there was no sign of recognition.
Like a fox turning to peer at the clamping of hooves along a road, he stared for a long moment, then turned away again.
Jonathan had seen Dio like this before. Since he’d unwillingly tasted that creature’s blood, he’d occasionally fallen, late at night, into a somnambulist-like trance. Though not keen to discuss it afterwards, he’d grudgingly described a sense of unreality, and the impression of his name being called from somewhere distant…
On impulse Jonathan stopped trying to free himself from the ice. Instead he reached for the little pearl-handled pocketknife he kept strapped to his belt.
In a swift motion he drew the blade across his forearm. With the cold, it took an extra moment for the slash to grow red - but soon enough warm blood welled up, fat droplets spilling down his elbow.
Jonathan held his forearm up to the wind, praying that he was near enough still for the scent to carry.
Dio took another step away. His outline was beginning to lose detail in the moon’s glow as he receded.
Then he halted.
In that same animalistic, mindless fashion, he tipped his head to one side.
Then he turned. Jonathan could have sobbed in relief, but he dared not make a sound. Instead he continued to hold his arm up, determined, ignoring the cold spreading rapidly through his body.
When Dio’s hands wrapped delicately under Jonathan’s arm, the touch held no warmth whatsoever. His lips, though soft, were cold as marble. They pressed gently to Jonathan’s bloody skin for a moment before he extended his tongue. Its freezing, slightly rough surface lapped slowly and deliberately along the wound. Dio’s face, proportioned like an ancient statue of a youthful god, betrayed no emotion. His eyes were hazy and unfocused.
With a final mighty effort, Jonathan ripped his leg free of the ice. He gathered Dio’s near-naked body in his arms and stood, tears beginning to sting his cheeks.
“I’m sorry.” He said quietly, to the being who lay quiet and still in his embrace. “It may be selfish of me, but I just can’t lose you too. Somehow, somewhere, we’ll find you a cure.”
The forest seemed brighter than before, as though the reaching shadows had given up the pursuit. Jonathan paused only to pick up his coat, wrapping it round his brother’s shoulders.
As they retreated, amber eyes gazed out over the frozen lake towards something only their owner could perceive.
Murky thoughts travelled sluggishly through an inhuman mind: how much longer could he rely on his brother’s pity to protect him? And would his only ally turn enemy when the truth in its entirety was revealed to him?