(for cryptsleeper)

[miraclewhip]

[ He remembers- maybe about half of what happened last night. A little more, perhaps. He remembers the comments that initiated the fight. Vaguely remembers being dragged back to the inn. Remembers throwing cold water on his face to wake himself up to do the terrible fucking job of stitching himself back up that he found himself with this morning (if there was ever a chance to keep that fucking cut from scarring, well, he's gone and botched it).

And he remembers telling the fucking vampire things that he probably should not have told the fucking vampire. He doesn't remember the specifics but he knows that he said too much. More than he's told anyone in a decade maybe. All for the sake of a petty victory that he doesn't even remember if he achieved.

He's uncharacteristically quiet today, even for being as hungover as he is. He forces the almost-solid porridge down his throat when it's pushed in front of him. He drinks half the water that he was using to wash himself last night and pours the other half over his head to wake himself up after maybe an hour of sleep. He only interrupts Sypha's long, long 'discussion' when she stares at him for an indication that he's still awake. It's after that that he's dismissed to the back of the wagon, either because Sypha can't stand his presence right now or because she doesn't trust him not to fall off and end up tangled under its wheels.

(Can't blame her, being tangled up under the wheels of a wagon sounds better than being in his own head right now, even without the throbbing pain.)

He doesn't sleep, mostly because he's been told not to and he is, even more uncharacteristically, on his best behavior right now. The day is mostly uneventful until sometime in the afternoon, when a particularly foolish highwayman sees a wagon driven by a single speaker woman and tries to take advantage of the situation. He's driven off within moments, of course, harmlessly to both them and himself, and the worst that happens is that the horses are startled by Sypha's display and the wagon lurches to one side, knocking Trevor onto his side against the wooden floor. It's only after everything has been confirmed okay, once the horses are calm and they're moving again, that he places a hand to his lower chest. ]

Fuck.

[ It's warm. And damp. He's gone and opened his shitty stitches, hasn't he? ]

Comments

[cryptsleeper]

[After Trevor's night adventure, sleep was just not happening. Not out of a sense that anyone else was going to head out in the middle of the night, but more out of a concern that say, someone was going to start bleeding out again and there would be a much greater problem to deal with. It also left Alucard far too much time to parse every piece of drunken attempts at provoking a fight, and all the screaming revelations contained within.

Alucard also knew he shouldn't have responded to any of the attempts, not out of a sense of being better or smarter, just...just knowing enough of the world to not engage with someone who has no business picking an argument in the first place. Trevor wasn't wrong of course, finding him nearly dead in the street had made Alucard far too worried about the fate of stopping Wallachia's total destruction. And this, that, and all the tiny litte points beside.

Not sleeping meant there was food in the morning with no need to ask for it, and being able to endure Sypha's all too correct takedown of both of their actions. Alucard's look of shame on the topic was real, and when Sypha insisted on being the one to drive the wagon for the day, he wasn't about to protest. Something said that driving the horses was chance to clear out her remaining anger at the two of them.

It also meant he was forced on Trevor duty, which was to say making sure that Trevor wasn't falling asleep. Easily done with the occassional nudge of the foot in the back of the wagon. Otherwise, silence seemed to reign for the day, all up until the carriage seemed to move the wrong way.

His eyes go to Trevor, then downwards where he knows the wound is.]

Did it open...?

[Please for the love of whatever, say no.]

[miraclewhip]

[ Just by looking, it's probably hard to tell. Mostly because there's not yet been a good chance for him to wash and repair his shirt and so any new bloodstains are hidden by the old ones. But his hand comes away red. ]

Shit. Yes.

[ He breathes in deeply and slowly through his teeth, staring up at the top of the wagon in what appears to be an attempt to control himself. And also says something that, while barely intelligible, is definitely another curse under his breath, bringing the total amount of words he's said in a row to three. Which is the most he's said all day. ]

Meanwhile before this other thread

[cryptsleeper]

From a very passing reference

--

[There was a designated part of the castle for them not too long after Trevor and Sypha came back the first time. Much of the reason for it was due to the number of unsafe areas that still existed at the time, everyone's excellent reflexes not an acceptable reason to wander the maze that Dracula had built. The rest of it was because it had things the rest of the castle lacked. Heated floors, for one, an old thing taken from the Romans. Proximity to the kitchen was another, as prior to the arrival of Lisa on the front door of the castle, there was zero point in bothering.

The heated flooring doesn't fix the problems of winter cold though. The accusations of being a heat sink notwithstanding, the circulation is still in need of readjustment, and there's something far less intimate about discussion of amenities versus the option to pile into bed with a few extra blankets and furs (the cloak is not allowed).

It's the best part about winter. Sypha's the furnace between all three of them for the obvious reasons, and that means she always gets squished in the middle. Alucard takes one of the extra furs for himself to help reinforce the little heated circle, and Trevor is on the other end. Where limbs end up changes by the season. In the summer it just looks like a deeply drunk monk trying to start a new page of an illuminated manuscript every time. In the winter, it's just a big inkblot, all three curled around each other.

Alucard still sleeps closest to the door, and he still doesn't have the whole normal human schedule down yet. He doesn't mind, because what he gets to see is far more important than sleep anyway. The three of them huddled up is worth any number of hours in unconsciousness.

It also means that if either of the other two are up, he is as well. He'll lie with his eyes closed in case it's a fluke, but he can guess if it is or isn't after a few moments.

Tonight, he's pretty sure it isn't a fluke. There's movement on Trevor's side of the bed, and Alucard isn't certain that Trevor has fallen asleep at all. His head moves, no longer buried in Sypha's hair, quietly assessing the situation.]

[miraclewhip]

[ He's quiet, since they came back to the castle. Quiet like he used to be - ready enough to pick petty fights or to make semi-witty comebacks, but not really willing to talk. Communicating exclusively in insults and self-deprecation. He's been keeping his distance as well, even on that sacred first day home, always somewhere in the hold or in what remains of the Belmont house.

(He'd toyed with the idea of rebuilding it. He hasn't done so. There's no need- they all have a home. This ruin can just remain a ruin, be a monument to the old Belmonts the way that the deeper parts of the castle are a monument to their oldest foe. There will be flowers growing from the ashes there in spring. All sorts of them. In winter, it's only those dark climbing things, the ones that always made it look like bats were crawling over the walls.)

Now, now that they've managed to get him into the same space as them, he's staring at Sypha, expression unreadable, and it takes him a moment to notice Alucard's movement. ]

Shouldn't you be pretending to sleep?

RUDE TOWN: carmilla captures the castle edition

[cryptsleeper]

[Time didn't work right anymore. It hadn't since the damned game of numbers left Alucard outmatched on his own doorstep. An entire army from Styria and only him in the castle. Trevor and Sypha meant to meet up with allies for reconnaissance on the exact topic. A misinformation campaign, and he never picked up on it. Carmilla was consolidating but more likely to spread into Hungary instead. Those were the Austrian's potential allies in the years to come.

Stupid. Foolish. Sloppy.

The mirror was the last thing he attended to before taking sword in hand to defend his home and the Hold it now guarded. A short message, and then he would go. We are misinformed. Our doors are breached. Return carefully.

Then Alucard put it aside, tucked under their mattress, and went to see how long it would take until the numbers finally overwhelmed him. He had his skills and training for this, but beyond that he had that horrid Tepes rage that was always kept at bay for fear of what it might do. His home, his life, everything that had been rebuilt being attacked earned that rage. It sustained him, propeled him forward, let him cut a bloody swath through the horrible vampire army for what felt like hours until something wrapped around him and seared into his flesh.

The worst pain of the moment wasn't the silver burning every nerve in his body. It was that he had catalogged this net not two months ago, when Trevor and Sypha were home. He needed a human pair of hands to move it, and now it was used to ensnare him. Carmilla had human allies. Who were in the hold. Looking at a well organized index for a family of vampire killers.

Everything else was the stupid, pettiness of full blown vampires who while given the wisdom of ages, could be even pettier than humans because there were centuries left to stew. Carmilla's rage was fresh, but so was her ambition. There was nothing but land for her to take, and besides, the castle was a loose end. As was Alucard.

As was Trevor. As was Sypha. And that was the other part that stung, beyond all the horrid things grabbed from the Hold and applied just for the sake of cruelty. To waste time for the other two to get home and meet their own ends, so that Dracula's fate could never befall the new leader of the vampire order.

There were no kind thoughts in Alucard's head as time passed by in fits in spurts deep in the castle's belly. It wasn't a surprise that his father had dungeons down there, just like it wasn't a surprise that the Belmonts had silver chains that could burn a vampire's flesh but not eat through it in full. Passing out from the agony of it helped only in that it allowed for time to go by just a little bit quicker. Then he'd be roused to experiment with some other newly found toy, and Alucard's mind drifted to his mother instead. What she endured, how she managed, what her thoughts might have focused on rather than cry out to give the Church satisfaction.

There's noise above him. He's lucid, just barely, but there's nothing familiar there. Just the normal yelling of a new court trying to establish itself.]

[miraclewhip]

[ Silver dust suspended in chrism, to be drunk or put into an open wound, to sap the strength and stop the healing of those vampires it was not fatal to. Developed for use against Dracula himself, in his prime.

Sypha works herself to the bone even miles away. While he drives the horses forward, she sets about teaching herself how to use their shard of a distance mirror for its original purpose. While he gathers salt, begs (Belmonts do not beg, except apparently sometimes they do) priests for assistance in securing holy water and blessed wine she gathers what little intelligence they can get.

Whatever has taken the castle knows that they are watching, and they have far more skill with the mirrors than Sypha. Whenever they look, they only see Alucard.

Tiny silver needles, carved with impossibly minute runes. Intended to be placed below the skin as a defense against turning. Later used briefly in the same manner as a means of interrogation. Forbidden by a Curtis Belmont some 200 years past, because they would not become a family of torturers for any cause.

Sypha continues to look, as if she could help somehow by doing so. Trevor looks once, confirms that the man is still alive, and goes about his work. When they finally near the castle, Sypha almost storms the gates immediately. Trevor is the one to stop her, to have to make the case for waiting and resting and letting Alucard suffer for one more night so that they might stand a better chance.

(this is a trap. of course this is a trap. he knows full well this is a trap. But - and for once this is genuine - he doesn't fucking care)

A pomander of iron and myrrh upon an iron chain, worn about the neck. To muddle the thoughts of dark things that breathed in the perfumed air, to make aggression near-impossible. Worn willingly by those creatures that wished to treat with the Belmonts, as a sign of peace. The chain has been replaced with a silver one.

Sypha, of course, does not rest and wait. As soon as she thinks Trevor is asleep she storms the castle alone. It's only the nightmares that wake him in time to fight at her side. The noise fades, eventually, replaced by heavy breathing, heavy footfalls. And some hushed cursing.

She's on Trevor's back now as he enters the dungeons unsteadily, still but breathing. He lays her down when he finally spots Alucard, taking the time even now to prop her carefully against a wall. ]

She's not hurt. Not badly. [ He says, even as he tries to work the silver cuffs open with a dagger. Because he knows Alucard. He knows exactly what his first concern here is going to be. ] Vampire compulsion. She'll be fine once she wakes.

[miraclewhip]

Appreciate it.

[ That's in Turkish. He's learning. The last few days have been somehow both hellish and incredibly, incredibly boring. He's spent a few nights playing dice games with the crew, but most of his time has been spent watching over a sleeping Alucard. One who is very rarely awake to be entertaining.

But right now he has work to do. Two bottles of communion wine and a container of boiling water from the ship's kitchen. Usually that would be Sypha's job, but she's been up on deck most of today. The lantern light in the infirmary isn't good for reading, and the weather up on deck is bright and as try as it can be.

And then, as he turns away, the sailor says something else to him in the broken mixture of languages they use to communicate.

Your friend. She will return before evening, yes? We wish to leave port tonight.

And he almost drops those precious bottles. He nods in stupefied silence and then leans back against the door, sliding down to the floor. Alucard sleeps like the dead when he's this exhausted, so surely there's not much harm in an exclamation of- ]

Shit. Shit. Fuck.

[cryptsleeper]

[The ocean makes resting easier. Yes, they's so very vulnerable if someone tries something, but there was strategy in using this as the place and the need to recover with precious little incident was a major factor. It is not Gresit. But it will have to do.

He's only stirred twice since the first horrible hour or so of being awake. The first was to confirm that Sypha was just as alive as Trevor (the embrace had been painful but so very worth it) and take actual food. The second time had been to actually speak to the Captain (surprise, surprise, Alucard's Turkish is good), offer apologies and learn of the planned route, how long it shall take, and where the boat goes on from Istanbul. (It will dock and wait a week for it's next journey, and Alucard haggles from his exhausted seat for that week to be theirs. Floating in the water, and he has the Captain's assurance that this strange request can be met.)

The third time is because he hears Trevor's swearing, and he turns his head towards where he knows the voice is coming from. He doesn't know how long they've been docked for, but he knows what those words in that order means.]

What's happened?

[miraclewhip]

[ He'd rather have done this while Alucard was still asleep. It's hard. And it's made harder by the fact that he can't expect Alucard or Sypha to understand. There's nothing to understand, it makes no sense at all. At best, they'll not see what's so difficult. At worst-

-at worst, a small part of him wonders if Alucard will find joy in this. In the profaning of something that hurt him and his so badly, no matter what it means to him. He couldn't blame him if he did. ]

There'll be blood.

[ But he needs to be honest. Because he's using blood to desecrate the wine, and because blood is- a fraught topic, as of the last few days. Even if it is only a few drops, he has to tell him. If he learned later - at best, he wouldn't forgive Trevor. At worst he wouldn't forgive himself. ]

A few drops for each bottle. No more.

[cryptsleeper]

Is that how it works?

[Maybe it's better that Alucard does watch (not his usual M.O.), if for no other reason than it is a total distraction from the situation, from the throbs of pain that are still everywhere within him, and from the fact that they're still six days out of Istanbul and they've all been getting restless.

The question isn't mildly curious either. It's genuine, because sometimes it's hard to remember that Alucard is also a fucking nerd.]

[cryptsleeper]

[He had rested. Real deep rest, the kind that supplemented all the wine and the miracle of it. The sort of rest that made the next time he woke up (and it had been a day and a half later) something to be relieved about. Not for the length of time spent in the arms of blessed dreamless sleep, but for the fact that he sat up under his own strength, stood on two steady feet, and stretched with only a few winces of pain.

To be whole and perfect needed more time. But he could function. He could walk the length of the sick bay, and Alucard could insist on going above deck for an hour. (No one was stopping him. It had been weeks since daylight.) He didn't do much there, he just sat on a spare seat and spoke with the captain again, whatever transpiring between them nothing of importance. None of it was important save for movement.

Then he remained in the sun and planned. Not the blood red vengeance on Carmilla, but what they would need brought to them for a week while they loitered in the bay of Istanbul. Food. He needed new boots. Extra blankets. Fresh water. As he thought, Alucard fussed with his hair, aware of what a disaster it was. The frayed pieces of cloth that were not wine soaked, that he had used to muffle his screams from a day and a half ago, he tore at them. Used them to tie his hair back as his mother wore it, because he needed that steady, quiet reminder of how to behave right now. Something to counterbalance anger.

When night came he went back below deck, aware that just these simple actions were a great tax. He'd eat and rest and then it'd be fine in the morning. Like always.]

[miraclewhip]

[ He bled himself while Alucard was out of the room. It was more pleasant that way, now that it was an option. There was a separation between the blood and the human that it had been part of that- maybe it would help. Let it just be blood, and not part of Trevor. ]

You're up and walking. Here. Before you eat.

[ That was the deal. Half a pint the first day. Another once Trevor had eaten and rested and could spare more. And a third once Alucard was walking around, because of course he was going to do this, to push the limits of what he was physically capable of the moment he could get up and walk about, and his body would need what little support it could be given.

He places the bottle down next to Alucard, as casually as if it were only water or medicine. ]

My hand slipped a lot and there

[cryptsleeper]

[Sypha finds them not too long after. She sits on the floor with them, and no one sleeps until dawn. There's so few words said, everything is through touch. Tender and worried and so goddamn scared that this will be how three becomes two. There's no point in trying to be more comforting because Trevor has his terrors and knows the grim reality if what will have to be done if this bullshited surgery has failed, and the other two have their terrors of loss.

Dawn comes. Alucard spends ten minutes just staring beyond Trevor, clawing for that horrid connection that he caught in the last light of the sun just several hours ago. There is nothing. This terror is passed. Trevor needs to eat or Alucard's going to shove food into his mouth until he swallows or chokes, but that's about the only other thing that can be said. Everything else dies away in exhausted relief.

Water carries the ship ever towards Istanbul. The boat docks, unloads it's supplies, and then Alucard speaks with the Captain for a few moments more. They have their agreement, and they need supplies. There's a spot in the Golden Horn that is used for these kinds of stay-overs, and that is where the three shall remain for a week.

It is in waiting for the delivery of supplies that Alucard sits and explains how this connection has come to be. We met in Braila, my mother had treated him once there and my hair reminded him of her. His son-in-law is a doctor, his daughter helps. They correspond with me about their practice and I consult my mother's notes. They've become successful for it, and what they don't need they give in alms, as their own religion requires. So there is trust that I shall repay the debts we've incurred.

The supplies come. Fresh water. Clean clothes. Food. Boots for Alucard because his had long been taken from him. Permission to use the captain's quarters for a week rather than stay in the miserable trio of cots down below deck, for what's the point in being sequestered with no one else on board? The bed is tiny, it barely fits two, but they can all pile into it if they try hard enough. And they do.

Being afloat between Asia and Europe means all kinds of things. Salted air, the cry of gulls at all hours, and the calls to prayer that echo from the city's minarets. Alucard rises in the morning when he hears them, not for any reason of religion but because they signal the dawn. Every sunrise is precious now, and he stands on the deck to watch the light spread over the city of domes and spires. Then he returns to bed for a few precious hours more, either sleeping or watching the other two rest, pressing soft kisses to whatever parts he can reach. (This may be the last time they ever get to be so tender again, he won't let the opportunity pass by. Even if it wakes them.)

Normalacy doesn't return exactly. There's few books to read. Alucard's doing the cooking again but the kitchen is tiny and there's so much goddamn fish. There's only so much boat to walk and pace, and there is still so much rest required.

There's a point, halfway through their week, that Alucard has to request sleep spells to force faster healing. He wants to, needs to be up and active because he has been forbidden the pleasure of such a simple act for so long. But it's not the best move, and so from noon until dinner time, the spell is put into place. Then there is food and evenings huddled close, and then more sleep.

In the spell there is a side-effect of over use. Dreams don't stay in his head, they reach out, invite other dreamers to enter that last inch of oneself that can be called private.

He's been calling them night terrors only in his own head, and he has woken up from them only once since the first. It's pride that makes him duck his head through it all, and the opening thing starts off muted. The thread being sewn into his legs to keep him pinned, and more of it wrapped around because the silver chains at his ankles are not enough. Carmilla's watching it, and whatever she says, it can't be heard.]

[miraclewhip]

[ The first night is spent trying to make touch normal again. He doesn't flinch away from Sypha like he does from Alucard, once the initial embrace is broken. And so at first the places her warm hands upon his and Alucard puts his onto hers and she acts as a buffer, safe and bright and warm enough to burn away the initial terror.

(The terror comes whether or not he trusts Alucard, whether or not he knows with all his being that he would never hurt him. It's stupid and irrational, just like every fucking cell in his being. Just like the fear that had stripped both of them of family in the first place.)

By the end of the night, he can manage Alucard's touch as long as it is Sypha's hand that pushes the vampire's down onto him. And that- that will have to do for now. They will have to repair all of the things that have been broken, one shard at a time. And they do. Alucard cooks again. Sypha washes his hair and chides him for all of the errant fibres that have become tangled in it from using the ripped fabric to tie it back and Alucard relents and cuts a proper strip of cloth and sews seams into it to keep it from fraying and uses that instead. Trevor carves scrap wood into stakes meant for Carmilla and her soldiers, carefully copying the runes carved into the one that he tugged out of Alucard. He sets those tiny silver needles into their points. They have more wine, and he reconsecrates the Morning Star after using it for his experiments. He washes the fading bite marks on his arm with it, and the newer stitches on his thigh. They work together to console Sypha, to convince her that her Caravan must still be safe - because Carmilla still has that mirror as a means to contact them, and if she had captured the Speakers then she would certainly let them know.

(Warning the speakers, keeping them safe, will come before any attempt to reclaim the castle and the hold. Homes can be rebuilt. Collections can be replaced, even if it takes centuries. People cannot be brought back.)

Healing begins. Sypha is in the middle now, insofar as there is a middle at all. There isn't quite enough room for a middle. Trevor sleeps on one side. Alcard on the other, head resting against Trevor's chest. And then Sypha sleeps sprawled on top of the two of them, her head on the other side of his chest but her arms and legs twined around Alucard. It's how they used to sleep before, back before they had a bed that was actually the right size for the amount of people in it. And it's nice, to be back at the start. He needs it right now, to relearn how not to flinch when Alucard's hands are colder than someone's ought to be, how to not get quiet and sulky when a fang accidentally grazes his lip.

And then he wakes up, and the worst has happened.

They're back in the feeding cells. Something- something holds his hands above his head. He doesn't remember how this happened. A lantern glows a little way away, and in the light of it-

-Alucard. Alucard and two figures. One washes the skin down with what he knows must be holy water from the hissing. The other- the other sews? And it takes a moment for him to realize what that means. The holy water makes it easier to break the skin. And the twine-

Shit. Shit. He looks around desperately for Sypha, but she isn't here. Or she isn't visible, at least.

He tugs at whatever binds his wrists. Rope. Only rope. He can get free of it with enough struggling and time. ]

Let him go. Let him the fuck go.

[miraclewhip]

[ The mirror came up to the captain's quarters. Nobody wanted it to, but they have little choice. Even if communication is all on Carmilla's terms. Even if they can only know what she wants them to know. Even if it's just to hurt them- it's the only way they have of knowing that the Speakers are safe from her, because of course she would waste no time in letting them know about that. It behaves itself. It doesn't show images of Alucard's torment, as long as it isn't used. They cover it with a cloth so that they can forget that it's there.

Alucard is alone in the room when it speaks, asleep while Trevor and Sypha wash clothes and blankets and bandages out on the deck, taking advantage of warm and dry weather to get bloodstains out of everything they can. ]

Trey? Trey? ...Trevor, are you there?

[cryptsleeper]

[The dreams haven't gotten...better, exactly. They've shifted. And Alucard's strength is almost at the point where it ought to be again. Tomorrow there will be a new ship to take them back the way they came. A few port stops. (Not Varna.) Then into Wallachia, and homeward bound, victory or else the dire consequences of loss threaded through all their heads. Like before, they are sewn up together, hunter, scholar, soldier, but they are even stronger and fiercer for it.

He's slept through the mirror's noises before. Carmilla's asshole enough, and he wants to send the mirror back with the half-chair from his father's study just to throw Carmilla off their scent. It'd be good strategy to. But the fear for Sypha's people is greater than any strategy, so the mirror stays.

But this is a new noise. Different. And...

she had a forgemaster didn't she?

Alucard sits up in bed, and with unsteady legs, retrieves the mirror. It has been locked up in the trunk at the foot of the bed, then wrapped in soft cloth to make sure the noise is muted as possible.]

...Carmilla.

[He'll address the mastermind before he acknowledges this new attack.]

[cryptsleeper]

[The return to Wallachia is one set with not a grim look to the work that lies ahead, but a barely contained fury for the work. There is nothing left for Carmilla to touch. The mirror is stuffed away, cursed for what it's become (it used to bring such joy, that mirror), and there is the tense silence that consumes all three.

They plan, of course. All three know the castle well enough by now that all it's turns and twists can be taken advantage of. Doors can be closed to corral and force Carmilla's army right into where they ought to be, and all the fire and ice in the world can destroy what is in there. (Alucard doesn't object to the fire, he speakas of it with an eerie calmness.)

There will be night creatures on the road, and their deaths shall inform Carmilla of the path they take to get to the castle and the hold. So be it. There can be no sign of overkill, for that will put her on higher alert.

The wagon is purchased. The road is long, and supplies accumulate in the back. Sleep is done in shift at all hours of the day and night, so that none of them are resting at the same time. It is a change from being adrift so long in the waters of Istanbul, needing to rest and recover and reassemble all the broken things. And so much is broken, there's still so many sharp edges, and they are about to prove that death would have been the smarter option if Carmilla was serious about what she really wanted in her life.

Dawn.

It will be at dawn, for that is when weakness sets in. All the strategy has been put in Trevor's hands beyond that, for this is vampire slaying and that is his birthright, so much as reclaiming this land is.

An hour before the sun rises, Alucard slips into his wolf form to see what awaits them on the front lawn. A few night creatures, a small garrison of Carmilla's vampire soldiers. Enough to make noise upon their slaughter. He cannot go closer to the castle without rousing suspicion. He brings back the news with a cold fury that sets his eyes red, even as he sits making sure that his hair is in the spitting image of his mother.]

We have 10 minutes left.

[miraclewhip]

[ There's a cruel irony to the sleeping in shifts. After the mirror, all he wanted was to sleep alone. He locked himself in the sick bay and slept in one of the few cots that neither Alucard nor Sypha had used and it wasn't comforting but it felt right. Now, now that there are things to do, now that he can actually tire himself out so that he has a heavy, empty enough head for their normal ways to be wonderful again, now they all have to sleep alone.

They have intelligence now. The livestock pens of the castle are in use again, and with that use comes escapees. The Speakers gave shelter to one, and they are all too eager to share what they know of the castle. They share something else, as well - the blade that they snatched to defend themselves during their escape. Alucard is reunited with his sword.

The Speakers are very good at spreading rumours, and the hold is so full of things that just about anything is believable. That Dracula ever possessed a 'philosopher's stone' is ridiculous, let alone that the Belmonts would ever have stolen it. But someone took the bait. One night ago, a pair of Carmilla's soldiers stabbed three of their fellow guards in the back and tried to seek out out for their own. The bulk of Carmilla's army are in there, now, and there is only one way to the surface. One way that, in ten minutes, will be covered with a thick layer of ice. Those, they can pick off later once they are lost and confused without their leader.

He places a hand on Alucard's as he finishes tying the ribbon. Softly. Cautiously. As if he were doing it for the first time. ]

Whatever happens- [ Whatever he has to do. Whichever graves Carmilla has defiled, and whatever Alucard must return to dust. ] -you will still be a Belmont when this is over. This will still be our home.

[ I will still love you. Even if he's been a little shitty at proving it lately. ]

[miraclewhip]

[ Releasing the vampires from the hold doesn't go quite as smoothly. For some reason, the idea of a Belmont releasing them with their lives doesn't seem half as convincing to them as it did to the human soldiers. Or maybe they are simply more loyal to Carmilla than the humans were. One vanishes into mist only to be frozen by Sypha and shattered by the Morning Star. Another launches themselves at Sypha only to find themselves impaled upon Alucard's sword. The worst is when a supernaturally strong fist slams into the ice from above now with force it could have never used from below, shattering it, and five spring out at once. They are dispatched quickly and brutally, so much so that none try again afterward, but the attack leaves Trevor with a long cut along his arm.

He leaves it, while they work, more than content to wave fresh blood about in front of Carmilla's vampire soldiers, daring them to try him. This display of mercy is only that, a display, and he's more than content to kill any of them for what they've been part of.

Eventually, it is done. The hold is closed again for the night. The forgemaster is locked in a spare room, rather than a cell. A room with no metal in it, and under the effects of the kind of sleeping spell that Sypha used upon Alucard, unlikely to wake within the next day. Sypha retreats to a bath, having been forced to walk around in blood-saturated robes for a full day now. Trevor washes the wound he took with holy water, just in case, and then with plain water to avoid harming Alucard. He then tosses a familiar leather roll full of tools at Alucard's chest. The sewing kit, with every piece of silver removed from it over the course of the last three years.

He's long lost the habit of sewing these things himself, after all. ]

[cryptsleeper]

[In all of this work (there is so much work), Alucard checked other things throughout the day. The food supply (nearly out, he excused himself during the afternoon to quite literally grab a boar so they could have some kind of dinner). Water supply. (Just fine.) Status of rooms (mostly fine, the name Vlad Dracula Tepes inspires enough fear still. Bloodiness of certain main points of entry. (Quickly done.)

And then it had come to clear out the last of the hold and vampires proved themselves idiots. In a way, perhaps it was understandable. That Hold, for all the other things there, was still mostly dedicated to the eradication of them all. It was fair to go a little mad being in there all day, especially in the high days of summer when dark did not fall until so very late.

The kitchen is where Alucard finds himself again, taking one of the boar's legs and beginning the process of curing it. There is enough leftover salt from their wagon supply that it is an easy thing to do, and in going through the normal tasks of home (and this is normal), there's just. A flow to it. Sypha's in the bath, Trevor's loitering, and he's taking care of the food because he's the one best at it.

The leather roll actually bounces off his shoulder (he's absorbed in the work) and lands on the floor.]

I was wondering how long you'd let that go on for.

[It was a hell of a power move out with the other vampires. Ballsy. A bit dumb. Not a bad summation of Trevor. So Alucard stops rubbing the salt into the giant hunk of beast, washes his hands, and picks up the toolkit again.]

Over here at the sink, we may as well scrub it out first.

[cryptsleeper]

[There is too much work. Alucard has never been so relieved for it in his life.

Not for love of the work itself (he finds little slights every day. The first full day of being back in the kitchen there is a cry of you must be joking only to reveal that their unwanted houseguests have stolen all of the spices he kept on hand. And then he reveals how much all of that cost, and the anger is slightly justified) but for what it brings. Purpose. Focus. Distraction.

Because those things were what kept the memories of imprisonment at bay. In preparing to reclaim home, there had been terrible purpose and weight, the need to keep eyes ahead at all times lest this feeling of total loss swallow them whole. Swallow him whole, the second time being so much harder to escape than the first. Without that, recollection snuck in at inopportune moments.

He had been here before, of course. Patricide and then staying in the house had a way of doing that. But those moments were tied up with grief for family lost, the worst of it weathered in solitude. Now there was not solitude, nor was there grief. There was anger and there was shame and there was still that feeling of helplessness (the worst of the three) that blossomed at the worst times. Nor was Alucard alone now, and it was unfair to give Sypha and Trevor even more to worry about. They had had their full of it before he was freed. The event would no longer darken their minds.

So the feelings came out in spurts. Alone foraging, taking more time than strictly needed. At night, when it took him too long to come to bed. (He slept so little now. He claimed repair work and that he had had his fill of rest on the boat.) In the morning when he rose before everyone else, barely paying attention to any dampness from tears that might have slipped out during his few hours of sleep. Down below with the books of the Hold when he stared at the same spot for a minute or two, before shaking himself loose from some invisible compulsion.

And it was noticed, he knew it was noticed, but that didn't matter. This thing he went through didn't matter because there was Sypha and there was Trevor and they needed to be taken care of too. Easier to do that. Better to do that.

Sypha's caravan was on the grounds today. There was more cooking to do than normal (a protest had been raised against going over the top, but they are guests and I owe them much meant everyone else was overruled.) Somewhere in all the work, Alucard had stopped in front of the fire, looking down at the venison as it turned on the spit. (Automated, of course, his father's house was still his father's house in all the small and miraculous ways.)

Fire hadn't been used as such. But it had been such a threat because oh it would be poetic, wouldn't it? and too many fears had piled into one.

Brooding by the fire. What a damn stereotype.]

[miraclewhip]

[ He's been back in the kitchen gardens again. For happier reasons, this time, armed with an illustrated guide to the herbs of the region, with a list of what Alucard needed. Some of the plants have suffered for going uncared for for so long. Many have thrived.

The old house may as well be something more than a graveyard. And if that thing is a garden, then so be it.

(the last son of Belmont, going about with a basket full of herbs for the meal and wildflowers for the table) ]

Think these are the right ones. They look about right-

[ He begins, putting down the basket. Alucard doesn't turn, which in itself would not be much cause for concern - he's busy. But he's... fairly sure that pots should not bubble so much that the contents of them burst out from underneath the lid. That doesn't seem correct, anyway. ]

Alucard, the pot. Should I- [ What do you do with an angry pot that wants to spit its contents all about the place? ] move it? Away from the heat?

[miraclewhip]

[ Carmilla's time in the castle had broken things other than them and thier possessions. Other people. Other families. The uneasy trust between the closest villages and whatever things resided in the old Belmont estate. People have been hurt. People who do not know of Carmilla's death, who only know that there is in fact a vampire living at the old Belmont estate, in a castle that can only be seen if you squint your eyes and try to catch the sunlight reflecting off something that shouldn't be there.

There is a stake in Trevor's chest. Which is really rather rude. ]

That's not- fuck. Not actually where the heart is.

[ The boy is only about fifteen, maybe sixteen. Too young to be drafted into Carmilla's army. Old enough to know exactly what manner of creature was responsible for whatever it was that drove him to try this. He seems to realize his mistake instantly. Trevor catches his wrist as he tries to pull the stake back. ]

Not yet. Let me find something to press down on it, before I bleed all over the place.

[ By the time Alucard returns from his foraging, Trevor is sat down on the lawn with the still-shaken boy, holding an old washcloth to his chest to apply pressure and stop the bleeding, and talking with him. ]

-just used fallen wood for it, didn't you? That won't work. Too fragile. It'll snap if it so much as glances off the ribs, and then you have a vampire with some really fucking annoying splinters and a good reason to kill you. [ He looks up when he sees Alucard, and shoos the boy away. ] Fuck off for now. Come back in a week or so, once this fucking thing's healed, and we can see about teaching you your arse from your elbow.

[cryptsleeper]

[Autumn has begun it's creep. The last hot high days of summer are past, and while the day is still hot, nights bring cooler air and the promise of harvests to come. In the forest, that is felt more keenly than ever. The ravens that know Alucard follow after him, cawing, sometimes just fucking about, and providing company that only the woods can.

It is so very peaceful. A far cry from just a few months ago, when everything was blood and summer sweat, horrors fresh and raw. Things are scabbing over now, and that is the best thing to be said for the time being. All else, all else needs time.

He returns with a bag slung over his back (early apples and pears), along with two baskets (one dedicated just to the remaining blackberries of the season). There's never not a touch of comedy to this, he knows it well, but it's apparently endearing too. Happier moments. With so many more to come.

Being halfway up the road to the castle (to home), he can see another on the lawn. Trevor and someone much smaller. A frown crosses his lips, but there's no immediate action taken. Trevor's calm, so he should be fine.

And then as he comes up the path and actually listens, he sighs. Another one, huh? This one too tender in years.]

What, precisely, have I missed this time around?

[cryptsleeper]

[Autumn's a riot of colors. The winter is warmer than usual, and it's not just because of poetics about having Sypha and Trevor be in the castle for the whole of the season. (Sypha's caravan passes through. She goes with them for a few weeks, which only temporarily satisfies wanderlust. It's a strange thing not having her around. Neither one of them like it.)

And winter means sitting in the Hold, reassessing everything. Some things are consigned to the junk heap in full, for they've been so broken as to no longer be useful, or they're things Carmilla used and then returned. New spells are added to the Crypt for safety's sake. (Alucard still fucking hates the Crypt.)

And in that work there are lists drafted of those things of the night that the Belmonts have always watched over. Out of date now, but a place to begin. Those known to have perished under Carmilla's own command or Dracula's are crossed off, and that action alarms. Those gone, they were the apex. Too many places with potential power struggles now, and some of those were well out of Dracula's reach.

They can focus on Europe. That'll be all they can do.

And in the work, Alucard is weary. Weary because this is what it means to be both so very human and so very much a vampire. There's zero point in arguing that vampires are generally not great based on dietary habits alone. But...they're still a part of who he is, and to not have that die out is important. It is the kind of internal debate the designated Heavy Thinker is best at, and with fewer moments of terror these days, it is easier to consider the whole of it.

His father's reputation made so many of these problems irrelevant, didn't it?

They're using the study now. Not just Alucard alone, but the three of them. When Hector's checked up on (still alive, somehow.) When trying to divine the situation in Styria, only to see uncertain towns just starting to come back to life. When working to confirm which vampires are still alive at all, and where they may be. (The west, mostly, but some now past Istanbul. Cut off point, basically.)

And those that are in the west scowl when they know there are other eyes on them, even if they aren't seen.

Today, they're looking at a burnt corpse. Dead vampire, middle of the Swiss Alps. His father's chair is in the corner. There's three comfier ones now, each claimed.]

Cross Alessandra Martellino off that list.

[miraclewhip]

[ It's Enid's, the most recent list. The records had been her task last. Her wide, easy, meandering handwriting looking far too soft and friendly for the things she wrote on. Her habit of changing languages when one had a word she liked better. Occasional known pets, listed amongst more important notes on station and strength and allies and enemies and recent activity and last known location.

Ink slashes through Alessandra Martellino, Uri. Not known to actively hunt. Suspected to keep community of victims for feeding. Turned in 1289 (estimated) by... in a clean line. ]

Shit, that's- she was the one who was in control of the pass through the Alps. That seems- important.