reposing | reincarnation vampire lord

reincarnation vampire lord | miraclewhip

Ultimately, what ends up being the most logical choice is the one he hates the most, but there have been many people vying for the power vacuum that Dracula had left. The greedy, the pompous, self-righteous -- too many have tried to claim the empty throne in his father's castle, and all have fallen. But the courts will never be happy to leave it vacant, and he's tired of the fighting.

So he takes it himself, crushing anyone that tries to overthrow him. Otherwise, he prefers to be merciful and benevolent, even if he loathes the politics and having to outright police the rest of the creatures of the night.

It isn't the most ideal. He sees Trevor and Sypha less than he'd prefer, wanting instead to be with them, watch their children grow, to love them. And he does, but just not as much as he'd like.

"They will die one day, my lord," one of the other vampires warn. "Would you fall into the same cycle as your father before you?"

It is a thought. Alucard knows what the intention is: to turn them into vampires like him. But he could never throw them into his world, a world of night and never having daylight. To survive as does. To truly force a Belmont into what they've hunted after all this time? Unacceptable. So he lets them live as they are, human and wonderful, until their last dying day.

And it is on that day that Alucard locks himself away from the rest of the world, deep in the earth with the crypt of his mother and father. To sleep, now that there is nothing else waiting for him alive.

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Ah. He looks away, trying to answer that in a way that isn’t completely incompehensible to a vampire who presumably has no interest in human affairs.

“Her caravan took me in, about ten years ago. And I thought she was a boy, and she thought that Katalin was a girl’s name, and so- everyone was very confused.” Is what he settles on, because really there’s no need to discuss why he needed taking in in the first place. ”After they took me to the Belmont house, we’d see each other again each winter. Travel’s hard in winter, so they’d stop there until the snows melted.”

"Caravan. Are they Speakers? Presuming the tribes still exist." He does sound sincerely interested, his smile warm. "Though I am told looking like a boy is safer to travel as, to her credit."

The kitchens are... somewhat stocked. A few levels above, perhaps, prison food, at least in the way there isn't any apparent mold in anything, but vampires don't have much reason to keep a stock. Alucard grumbles to himself, but he does manage to find an apple, stale bread, and a bit of dried meat to set for Katalin.

"Hardly a meal, but I'll aim to find something more substantial when I'm able," Alucard says flatly, more annoyed at the situation than he is directing it at the boy. For himself, he's taking one of the stores of blood to feed himself with, rubbing his eyes as if to chase away the lingering sleep. "Why is the Belmont home no longer viable for you?"

“They are. And they are infuriating. She wouldn’t need to dress like that if they would only let her defend herself against anyone who thought to attack a woman on the road. It would hardly be a great loss.”

He huffs for a moment, making it more than clear what he thinks of the speakers’ vows of nonviolence. But then there is food, and he has to pause to practically inhale it. He has been fed, if not well, but he has also been fed from. The meat, especially, is more than apprectiated.

It occurs to him that he has never seen a sleepy vampire before. It’s a little entertaining, watching one be so human at him, guard entirely down. It’s the oinly reason he’s willing to answer that question honestly.

“I don’t know that vampires care much for human affairs, but- in short, the country is occupied. House Belmont is bound to host the soldiers when they ask it. I don’t get along with the soldiers.”

"I see the newer generation leans very favorably for pacifism. Not a surprise." Alucard chuckles softly. "I wonder how she feels."

It's a bit endearing to see Katalin so worked up about it. Trevor would be the same, he thinks, and Sypha was never one to let others dictate how she'd present herself. How curious.

"Depends on the vampire, but most don't, I suppose. I've been away for awhile yet." Alucard pauses, then scowls. "Occupied? By who? I loathe to think that House Belmont is occupied by anyone unworthy of it."

He tears at the meat just a little more angrily.

“I should have to write a fucking list, at this point. The Hungarians, to the north. The Ottomans, in Wallachia proper. They each want each other’s lands, and Wallachia and Transylvania are between them.” He grows more and more aggressive toward the poor peice of dried meat as he speaks, until it seems almost like the tearing it apart is more important to him than the eating (and the eating seems terribly, terribly important to him). “The law of the land is that all households must host the soldiers when asked. It’s why Sophie and her people can’t come back to the Belmont House in winter anymore, because they wouldn’t treat the Speakers well, and the Speakers won’t fucking defend themselves if anything goes wrong.”

"Thus the problem, and I take it you're a man who doesn't appreciate their authority." Alucard sighs, nursing his glass of blood. It's far from fresh, left in cold storage for who knows how many days, but it'll perk him up more than nothing. "Bit of a mess that I've woken to. Some things really don't change."

A finger taps on the table. "The Belmont Estate. I wonder if it's still... hm." He frowns. "I don't suppose it's moved in the past three centuries to your knowledge?"

He tops off the glass, then refills it. Might as well, no one else is going to, since he's chased out the other vampires.

“I- shouldn’t think so. I suppose it means little if you can move castles, but I can’t think how anyone might go about moving a great hole in the ground.” He’s confused enough even trying to get his head around the concept to calm him a little, and so when he goes on it’s more subdued. Softer.

“There was a rebellion, a decade ago. It failed, and they punished innocent people for it. That’s why the Speakers had to take me in. I know why they aren’t refusing, because they aren’t the ones who’ll be punished if they do. I still fucking hate it.”

For a moment, Alucard is quiet. Honestly, he doesn't think that he could fix this cleanly, not in a way that would be quick and satisfying. He isn't eager to become involved in anyone's problems... but then, that'd been the debate between his parents, hadn't it? If one has power to make a change, then one should try.

"So I suppose if I went up to the Belmont Estate and demanded their leave, it would not be taken too well. It is, technically, my property." Even if he'd more or less granted it back to the Belmonts; through the travels Sypha and Trevor had done, he worked himself to make them a home to return to. It was their home, more than the castle could be for Alucard. He'd watched them grow old there. Watched their children grow under that roof.

It doesn't belong to anyone else.

"Let's say we pay the Belmonts a visit and I throw out a few invaders. What would they do, Katalin? Return with pitchforks and torches and anger?" Alucard speaks mildly, thinking. "No, maybe more like swords and spears."

“It was muskets and abus guns, when they came to my home.” He mumbles bitterly. “And it wasn’t the people who fought back that they returned to.”

He’s not well positioned to understand the irony of it, how Wallachia was saved from Dracula only for it to be humans who came to tear it apart. It’s harder to appreciate when it happens over 300 years.

“This must be a lot to fucking wake up to. I’m sorry.”

Guns. The closest he can think are... the weapons that the East would have. He remembers as a child watching the fireworks of Cho's domain, what people were capable of inventing. He supposes it was inevitable that humans over in Wallachia and the rest of Europe would want to learn the projectiles, but he doesn't know the terms very well.

He sighs and closes his eyes, leaning his head back, trying to think.

"A dangerous time, for humans and monsters alike," Alucard murmurs. "No, it's fine. Perhaps I'm the one who left this country to fend for itself. I thought the worst we had to worry for was over. I was naive."

Humans. It's always--

No. It's not always, it's just people. People capable of greed and vying for power, no different than vampires.

"Then it sounds to be quite the mess to attempt to wrench the house back from such occupation, and I've no taste to slaughter men even when I am slighted." Alucard rises from his seat. "Fine, then. We locate your Speaker friend. We ensure her and her family are safe. Then we decide what is safest for you."

His eyes lower. "And then I return to sleep."

“You- return to sleep.”

He can’t blame him, not really. If it was an option to sleep and wait for a happier time, perhaps he would do the same. He can’t do it, and it’s still tempting. But it’s sad, at the same time. If he’d gone to sleep when all of this began, just given up and waited for things to become better, Sophie and her family would never have found him. Things had been good, sometimes, even n the country’s occupation.

“When will you wake?”

"Never, ideally."

Alucard's voice is soft and distant. He wonders a little if there is anything to what Trevisan said -- that Trevor's soul, having been excommunicated, will be reborn time and again. Did God really scorn him so, and the same to be said for the Speakers?

But in truth, Katalin doesn't know him. There are similarities, but there is only that.

"Your life does not need me," Alucard says quietly. "If anything, I've only made it more difficult for you for resembling someone I loved centuries ago. But you aren't... him. And it would be selfish to want that out of anyone, to pressure them into something they are not.

"I will help you find a place to be. I will ensure Sophie and her people are safe. That, I will give you, for my inconvenience."

“Isn’t that just dying?”

His voice is small. That, that he doesn’t like at all. It’s distressing, enough to make him put down the bread that he’s now in the process of tearing through. He thinks it over, or at least stares at Alucard and tries to think about anything other than how wrong that seems.

“I ought to find Sophie on my own, then. It would- she would hate it, I’m sure. It’s best she’d never have to know.”

Ah.

There are two ways, evidently, a Ţepeş will manage to deal with the deaths of their loved ones: genocide, or rolling over and going to sleep. Either way, it is a cry for the end of something, a suicide in its way.

It seems, he realizes darkly, he is not so different from his father.

"I suppose it is," Alucard says softly with no argument. And yet, he thinks to himself, what else is there?

He rises from where he sits, standing tall, becoming more recluse, his face calm and impassive.

Better to be the Sleeping Soldier, then.

"As you wish it. For now, I suggest you rest. It appears I have some research to do and some doors to unlock. I very much doubt Trevisan was able to bypass my wards."

His rescuer freezes over, almost. He was not warm before, but it had at least seemed the possibility for it might exist in him. Now- now that seems less the case.

(He hates this. He hates this so much. Some part of him that is older than him considers this a betrayal, and he can’t put his finger on why but he knows that he hates it. That he has to stop it.)

“Wait.” And then, almost unbidden, and it seems like a terribly rude thing to say even for him. Even if he has terrible ideas about what constitutes appropriate naptimes, his host has still been kinder to him than anyone save for the Speakers and his family. “Don’t you fucking walk off, you sulky half-vampire bastard.”

He claps his hand over his mouth for only a second, not sure where that phrasing came from.

“What is it, that would be so selfish to ask? Would it be enough to stay awake for?”

For a moment, Alucard is genuinely frozen in his tracks, staring at Katalin, his brows knitted as if he wasn't entirely certain of what he'd heard. For a moment, he swears, Trevor--

The dhampir closes his eyes, the moment of cold quickly gone as it came. No, Trevor and Sypha were the ones that reminded him of his humanity, that kept him from withdrawing from everything. His grounding points, his roots; as soon as they were gone, he felt lost, and felt like he'd done enough for the world. So he withdrew, dreaming of better joyful days and wretched nightmares alike.

"To not be alone," Alucard answers quietly. "A childish wish, isn't it. I suppose I could have stayed awake and gave guidance to others. Instead, every minute I stayed awake without them, I realized how alone I was. How incomplete I felt. I couldn't... bear that feeling. So I slept, to dream of them. Of better days. Days I felt alive."

"That's fucking stupid." He huffs, and he doesn't know why he's so certain that they would hate that, but he is. It's taking a lot to not just punch his rescuer in the face, because every part of him is screaming that this is the opposite of what he wanted, you dramatic mosquito.

(He remembers how it feels to be the last of something important, even if he never knew that feeling in this life. He fucking hated it. He never wanted to be irreplaceable again. How fucking dare-)

He takes Adrian's hand instead, his own hands shaking with something (rage? upset? horror?).

"You'd like her. She doesn't let people be alone. Even insufferable shits."

Even though Katalin is being-- obnoxious and rude, Adrian can't help but smile a little, because it does honestly sound like him. Like Trevor, rough around the edges, good in his intentions.

Some might be offended. Adrian can't help but smile a little fondly.

"Oh, insufferable shits like you?" Adrian prods curiously.

"That's how I know." He says, and the admission takes some of the anger out of him. Some of it.

('Let it be my grave' he said. Like a fucking idiot. Like that was preferable to a life spent with them. Like his mother's people were worth saving only, not living among.)

"Give her a chance, at least? She's- she's worth living for."

Sypha reaches into him and pulls him out of himself. Over and over again. Some things never change, not even over lifetimes.

"We shall see, won't we? Perhaps both of you are."

And perhaps that'll be enough. If nothing else, he can remain awake to ensure their safety throughout their life. No other vampires attempting some ridiculous scheme to put Adrian under their control.

As if they could.

Adrian reaches out, resting a hand to Katalin's neck. Not to grab, but to touch, his pulse feeling right.

"Sleep, for now. I will be here, and awake. I've tools and proper meals for both of us to obtain." Quietly, he adds, "You are safe tonight. That I can promise you."

He flinches when Adrian’s hand touches his neck. Bad vampire experiences over the last few months. But he catches himself afterward, forcing himself to relax. Adrian isn’t hurting him.

(Trevor would have snapped rather than flinching. Trevor would probably have actually gone through with punching the vampire for the three century nap. Katalin is softer, maybe a little more sensible, in that much. He’s not good at this, but he’s actually had human contact at all in the last decade.)

“-thanks. For all of this. It’s a fuck of a lot to take in, but- any day that ends with you not being stuck in a dungeon’s a good day, right?”

The flinch is noticed. Though Adrian doesn't remove his hand, he frowns to himself, reminding himself to be aware that Katalin had just suffered who knows how long being a prisoner to vampires. Lightly, he rolls his thumb over his neck, a quiet comfort offered.

"Usually that's the idea," Adrian answers. "We both... have much to take in and think about."

His hand slips away, but he holds it out in offering to Katalin. "Come with me. I'll take you to one of the guest rooms. Assuming it hasn't been fucked around with while I was gone, in any case."

He only hesitates for a moment before taking Adrian’s hand again. It’s a strange sort of thing to do, but he was the one who did it first. And- he’s trying. He’s trying as best he can. This is a vampire, yes, but one who saved him. One who offered to make war on his enemies at barely a word. One who he remembers, somehow, even if it’s infuriating.

(He had told him to move on, when the time came and age and years of alcohol began to addle his mind. The first time he forgot who the vampire in his arms was and then remembered only after putting a knife to him. He had demanded it. He had threatened to knock him out of his mourning with the fucking Vampire Killer if he wallowed in it.)

“They must have slept somewhere.” He reasons, and then thinks back before shaking his head. “I never learned much about this place. There’s information, in the archives, but I never really thought I’d need it. It hadn’t been in use for so long.”

Adrian worries, quietly, about projecting onto Katalin. But he sees pieces of Trevor in him, even more now than when he first glanced at him. Even his hand fits right, warm, somewhat callused.

"Most vampires don't sleep often, but I suppose you have a point." Adrian glances over his shoulder at him. "The castle was not intended to be used particularly much after I left it. Its most important parts were locked away by myself -- and the castle only heeds one master."

And after Dracula, it was but a building until Adrian took it years ago when he stepped into his father's place at last.

True to his words, there are many sealed doors. He can see scratches and scorches, likely attempts to unbind them, but ultimately without the will of the castle's master they could not be forced apart. The guests rooms he didn't bother with, and fortunately they don't seem like much of a mess.

He pushes the door open. "I'll see about replacing your clothing, if you'd like. Down the hall should still be one of the bathrooms." Adrian hesitates. "Do you... need anything else?"

He doesn’t. How could he possibly need anything else? It’s been only two hours, maybe, since he woke up chained to the walls of this place for something like the eightieth time after passing out from being fed upon. And now he is free, and a guest here, fed and soon to be clean and free to sleep in a bed for the first time in far, far too long. Whatever he feels about all of this other than gratitude and rage at this man’s apparent plan to die, he can feel it in the morning.

“Clothes-“ He hasn’t thought to consider that until now. The ones he was wearing then he came here are gone somewhere, along with every weapon and lockpick and silver thread hidden in them. He’s been bathed and had his clothing changed a few times since he came here, always in his sleep, but everything he’s put in tends to look alive after a while. Worn around the shoulders from being rubbed against the stone wall at his back. Stiff and grey with dirt. Spotted with dried blood in places. “-please. I didn’t think I was the type to care about clean clothes, but this is a little much even for me.”

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