miraclewhip | (for cryptsleeper)

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(for cryptsleeper)

[ 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? ]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ It takes the corpse a little while to get onto that topic themselves. They probably meant for it to come up earlier, but there is a tangent about how strange it is to be thinking without a full brain. Another one about this place being disappointingly normal. At least three about the electric lights. It'd be wasting time, but the corpse talks at a mile a minute now and without needing to stop for breath.

(It's been a week or so of pretending to be a mindless doll, she has a lot to talk about.) ]

I can do it myself, if it would be easier. I would have anyway, once I was done.

[Through it, Alucard listens. Leads the three of them out of the wing that has truly become home, because at least there is that much. From time to time, his sight goes to the dog (he never got a name) to make sure that Carmilla is not there.

And there's a small luxury in this. Trevor's family has cast a long shadow over them all, but it's always been his own perspective. Actually talking to one of them that isn't just colored by biased memories is. It's nice. In a horrible, but still.

At the words I can do it, he perks in his wolf form. Nudges her gently. The question's unsaid.

Would you rather...?]

I don't think that I am supposed to. It's meant to be an awful sin. But I think the rules are different, circumstances being what they are. And I was only a librarian, not a hunter, so I'm not going to go about complaining because something other than a vampire did me in.

[ The corpse has followed, only occasionally pausing to scratch Alucard's ears or to give attention to the skeletal dog. It's only now that she hangs back a little and solemnly- ]

...take me somewhere I won't be found until this is done.

[Alucard's pretty sure that being excommunicated shouldn't have an impact on this particular decision but...no, no. Suicide is damned on entry, not something that can in theory be reversed. There's a wolfish sigh at that realization, and he keeps walking.

It's weird when she scratches behind his ears too, but that's mostly because while Alucard is so very used to cold dead flesh, burnt dead flesh is a strange sensation indeed.

Where. Their God he hates that he knows where, because that's the part of the castle the two have always respected the request to never enter. And maybe it's better there. Two horrifying deaths, all the better to keep the rest of the house from this misery. The wolf whines softly and nuzzles at the corpse's hand.

I'm sorry. He won't see this. I'm sorry.

They're at the main nexus of the place, all dead vampire soldiers and a sea of blood. All Alucard. He wades through it all, and goes to another seemingly ordinary doorway. He's always left it unlocked. He trusts them.

The door opens without a sound.]

[ The corpse lifts her skirts a little to avoid dragging them through the blood. It's something of a pointless gesture, when the dress is already burned away and ruined by smoke. ]

Goodness. Well, I suppose it isn't my job to maintain the lists of active vampires anymore. This would be a month's work.

[ Apparently joking about shit that should not be joked about is a family trait. The smaller, bonier dog stays back, whining. But driven by purpose now, the corpse of Enid Belmont takes no notice. ]

I expected more- skeletons, I suppose. In the castle. There was a report about cooked meat being hidden in walls, but I think our great Uncle was just hungry-

[ The corpse pauses, staring into what is definitely a child's room. And at what is definitely Carmilla, trying a ring on one long finger. And without missing a beat, she pulls one of the long pins that were used to tie her hair back from her hair.

And yes, she is trying to stake Carmilla with a hairpin. Because even a librarian Belmont is still a Belmont. And Carmilla swats her effortlessly across the room, because even a forged human is still a human. ]

[Alucard misses the whine. He's too caught up in his own head about how to do this (he's called the sword to him, it floats over head. It's waiting. It hanging over them both. It is so very sharp.

And as Enid keeps walking keeps talking, and then there is Carmilla and everything is red again.

It takes a precious moment to shift back into human form. In that second, there's a Belmont trying to stab Carmilla with a fucking pin, he's realized the dog knew what was going on, and Carmilla is touching his father's ashes that ring was set in the lid and there is that godless bellow of anger from dreams.

The sword is in Alucard's hands without a second's effort. His hands are claws again, and they have found purchase in Carmilla's flesh, and she is laughing, laughing, laughing even as Alucard flings her out of the bedroom door because he will have that death be in his father's hallways, not this room.'

[ Enid stumbles to her feet, fractured but whole and apparently unhurt. Being animated by magic has some advantages, even if it doesn't lend any extra inherent strength. And she stares, one scorched hand still wrapped tightly around the hairpin. At Alucard, not at Carmilla, as if trying to place something she's forgotten. The skeletal dog barks furiously, but it's drowned out by Alucard's wail. ]

-

[ In the main hall, efforts to get the prisoners out safely have met far more resistance than anticipated. There are far more night creatures than he could have guessed, based upon their intelligence - one forgemaster should not be able to maintain so many, not without immense amounts of strain. The prisoners take priority, followed by the soldiers who have deserted and placed themselves under Trevor's command. So far, they have only lost one of the latter. Walls of flame make a pathway through the hall, the Morning Star catching anything that dares to try move through it.

It's as the last of the prisoners leaves upon the back of the last of the soldiers that they hear the bellow. The night creatures can wait, there's nothing left here for them to harm but stone and metal and wood. Trevor runs for the stairs but Sypha grabs his hand and the two of them leap up with the wind beneath them, running into the blood-flooded hallway. ]

[Carmilla's in the hallway. That's the goal. That's the only thing that matters. Alucard has just enough sense in him to slam the door behind him shut and pray that the force behind it has jammed the whole damn thing. What he should have done with have that sword come down in the hallway and then moved the body.

Too late now, and he'll sit at Trevor's feet and beg forgiveness for this failure when they're done with this task. Carmilla is in the air with all her terrifying vampiric grace, and Alucard is up there in a flash too.

Bat fights move at a speed too fast to track but in glimpses. The hallway's arch does little to help, and the two have already slammed into the rafters. What Trevor and Sypha witness upon entering is Alucard slamming Carmilla down from that great height, and when she hits the floor the impact shatters the stone underneath.]

[ There are a lot of things happening all at once.

The first thing he sees is the Fourth Dog, who he has not seen since he was maybe nine years old. And then there are a pair of squabbling bats. And then there is his sister, standing dead still with a hairpin in one hand. And there is blood and there are corpses and much of that isn't anything new and then one of the bats slams the other into the ground, and then the bats are Carmilla and Alucard and shit none of this is going to plan.

The stake is in the hand within the second, the whip in his other. Everything else- everything else can be dealt with later. For now there is a vampire here, he doesn't want a vampire to be here, and he knows what to do about that.

Carmilla vanishes into mist to avoid the worst of the impact. When she rematerialises, it is behind Enid, claws at her neck, as if meaning to take a hostage.

And Trevor does not slow. The stake goes through Enid, through her and into Carmilla. ]

[From where Alucard is, it happens in slow motion. He lands into a pile of mist. There's an open door because of course he didn't cause it to jam, and the one thing he wanted to spare the two of them from happens.

All these things repeat, don't they? The same events. Different people. Same horrible endings. Alucard's picking himself up off the floor to lunge at Carmilla's now shrieking form anyway, because he must be sure she is dead but.

But then there's the dog at Carmilla's throat, ripping out whatever it can. Smart and quick and so fucking loyal that Alucard's able to stop raw instinct.]

A stake really does work for just about anything, doesn't it?

[ He's on the ground. He's on the ground watching a vampire fade into ashes as the Fourth Dog tears at its neck. There is a weight above him, draped over him. Enid is cold and bony and burnt skin flakes off her as she moves her arms to rub his back. But she isn't in pain. She's forged, damage to her body matters little compared to disrupting the magic animating her. There's a shift, she looks up for a moment at Alucard. ]

Mathias' blood, yes? Thank you.

[ The flesh - forged flesh, because there had never been anything left but bone - is dissolving now. With no muscle to support them, bones clatter to the ground. She shakes with laughter, and the movement only speeds the process. ]

Chin up, Trey. No moping, else I shall tell Leontine that you are sleeping with a vampire.

[ And, because sometimes the world is stupid, that is where it ends. She is bones and a dress and a pair of hairpins. Trevor doesn't move. Doesn't acknowledge the skeletal dog sniffing at the bones and whining. He just trembles. He'd resigned himself to this. He'd known it would happen. He'd been willing to do it himself, were it anyone who might pose a true danger to Alucard. That doesn't make it easier. ]

[The question of Mathias is one that shall come much, much later on. A half-remembered detail whose truth will send Alucard into that terrible silence he's so good at summoning, this time wondering if my father fell into madness once, perhaps I... then cutting the thought off. As it is, his eyes remain red-rimmed in that vampiric way that is taking too long to shrug off.

But he moves. Moves to take those reforged bones from collapsing on Trevor in full. They had spared Alucard that in the past. It took no effort to do it now with all the gentleness he can manage. The burnt skin hurts to touch, not for reasons of fire or blessings, but because there is a horrible memory that was not. If things had changed even slightly, he would have stolen under cover of night to do this for his mother's remains. (There was never anything left, of course. The portrait was the thing he venerated instead. Sat under to write all that medical correspondence, as sure as another man might go into a church to light a votive candle.) There's enough fine linens in the house for a shroud. That will be the first thing they do.

The hold, after all, is yet to be cleared.]

[ The bone of an arm falls to the ground, a few runes carved shallowly into it, previously hidden by forged flesh, matching the ones drawn onto one of the dog's ribs. Because this is how Belmonts are. Stupid and paranoid enough that their librarian must have drawn spells onto her own bones to protect herself from control.

This is what his family is. Men and women who chased horrible things long enough that they all became a little mad, each in their own ways. Librarians who only talk freely to dogs and soldiers who throw rice into the dark. Screaming boys with eyes welded shut with blood growing into bitter drunks.

(The church had never bothered to search for evidence. But if they had, they would have found that there was little doubt that Enid Belmont, at least, was absolutely a witch. A harmless one, one who only ever meant to do her part in protecting the people of Wallachia, but a witch nonetheless.)

It's Sypha's arms that are around him now. Trevor pulls free from them, retreats into strategy. They will bear this later. They will bear all of this once it is safe to. Alucard's half of the mirrors lies on the ground - Carmilla must have been holding it, when Alucard drew her out of that room. Displaying a trophy of Dracula's to allies, demanding immediate support using his authority. Trevor stumbles over to it, lifts it, and offers it to Alucard. ]

The mirror in the hold. Let me speak through it. I'll negotiate the terms of their surrender.

Mm.

[Before the mirror is picked up, a smaller item is slipped onto Alucard's finger. The ring (wedding ring, simple white gold, no inscriptions, no jems, an irony given his parent's dramatics) carries such weight, and it's a bitter irony Carmilla thought it some symbol of power or authority.

It takes no time to activate it. The Hold, from what can be seen from the mirror's corner, is in tact if not a little messy, and there are the noises of those trying to press up against the ice by sword or by their own fire, only to be met with Sypha's fierce resistence.

Alucard takes care to position himself in a way that blocks Enid's bones. He knows what he'll do, should the Hold be deemed too dangerous. He'll attend to the one dead who matters in all this chaos, and then begin the magic he had to develop for removing blood of this volume.

His eyes remain fixed on Trevor though. The memory of...of before, he can't put that act into words, he remembers how he himself shook in those first moments. If that's there, then there will be a hand. If it is not, then eyes shall still be upon him.]

[ He is still. Consumed by purpose, in the same way he was when profaning the wine, the same way he was when he first set food on land again, the same his sister was as she walked toward the old bedroom. The same way he was when he first fled his home, so many years ago now. He has something to channel all of this into, and the shaking can begin later.

'Negotiate', he had said. There is no negotiation. There are demands, and there are consequences for those demands not being met. ]

The vampire Carmilla is dead.

[ He pauses for a moment, waiting to see the fallout of that. There is some- the noises stop. A few of the soldiers look ready to turn upon each other. ]

The Hold will be opened. Those of you who wish to leave will leave one at a time, and then you will flee Belmont lands and not return. Those who still wish to fight may do so, one at a time. [ His hand falls to the Morning Star as he says that. Flames gather between Sypha's fingers. ] You will take nothing. You will give your word to take anything you have learned to your graves, else you will lose your tongue and hands to keep you from telling secrets. At dusk, we will open the hold once more for those who cannot leave by day.

The executions of those who remain will begin at dawn tomorrow.

[ And he nods to Alucard to signal that he is done. Once the mirror is off, his shoulders sink. He lets out a breath. When he breathes in, he just looks tired. ]

Fucking Belmonts, always die in this fucking castle. [ He says, and there's no conviction behind it but he's at least present enough for an attempt at self-deprecation. ] Once this is done-

[ -A lot of things will happen once this is done. He'll decide whether to place her in the family crypt where this will never happen again or to bury her where she was, in the ruins of the house, with her lover and her dogs. He'll mourn. He'll see if her notebooks have survived in the hold, because those are her more than any bones ever were. And then everything else that ought already happen after this. The healing. The rebuilding.

Once this is done. All of it, once this is done. ]

One prisoner remains. Human, in your father's livery. The forgemaster, we believe. He is- [ Ill and injured and sick. A monster, for all he has done. A coward who chose this over death. As much a prisoner as anyone else in those cells. ] -fucking pathetic.

[The only satisfaction in all of this is Carmilla is dead. They ring in the ears like pleasant bells, but then the rest is an ice coldness that this work demands of them all. And Alucard holds the mirror with a rock steadiness, not daring to try and look in to see what else there is. (In fariness, it'd look fucking weird.)

The Hold and what lies within is his decision, as rightly as anything else in this fiasco is Trevor's decision. Vaguely, Alucard hopes that there will not be a third run of all this, the weight of all the terrible decisions on Sypha's shoulders instead of his own or Trevor's.

He makes quite notes to ensure that another vacuum does not take hold in Styria, allowing for some other nightmare to appear instead. He has learned the lesson in the hardest way possible, the price unbearable.

Then the terms are set, the mirror is off, and Alucard cannot bring any light in his eyes as Trevor returns into self-depreciation mode. It'd be darkly funny in a few years. Maybe a decade.

Tension has hardly shed from Alucard when the forgemaster is mentioned, and speaking of coldness and ice, there is a purpose that requires all of it.]

Your decision or mine to make with regards to his life?

Yours. He styles himself as one of your father's men.

[ Not that he likely had that much of a choice in what he's wearing, but- it's as good a reason as any. More pertinent is that Trevor cannot be trusted to make choices about this and he knows it. But- there is no need to bring that up, not while the reason that he cannot be trusted to make those choices lies on the ground still. ]

If you'd rather not, he gets the same choice as any other soldier here, save for that I'll take his hands to keep him from working again before freeing him.

Loose ends. [The word is breathed out with a little pinch to Alucard's nose. He hates the term, but...that is what this is. Loose ends. Or else a poor fucking inheritance from his father. The first is preferable.

Sypha and Trevor manage the Hold. It is a thing agreed upon if only because there is a risk that some idiot might try something on Alucard with a piece of silver or something else equally dumb, and then the entire Hold is liable to drown in blood. Trevor's set his terms. It is...irresponsible to risk it.

The study when you're both done. I expect I shall be there for a while.

But after the two depart, Alucard lingers in the hallway. Mutters a few words to at least clear out the sea of blood, and does the only kindness he thinks himself capable of right now. He finds enough linen for a shroud, and he wraps Enid's bones in it as carefully as he can. (So much is burnt. So much is brittle. So much crumbles away.) He'll do this because he failed so horribly otherwise. And because it is right.

And then he goes back into that horrible little room of his, picks up the obsidan black jar that holds the precious few ashes of his father, and goes to the study. Hector is brought up along the way, and there is no doubt about Trevor's assessment. Pathetic.

Within the study, the half a chair is still there. (They both have to take a moment to deal with that weirdness.) Nothing else. Alucard does not go to find a chair, and Hector does not sit. There is no natural light in this place, but Alucard keeps the door open so that when Trevor and Sypha return, they know they are welcome in this place.

This part is so very deliberate, because right now Alucard knows he treads a razor thin edge of patience, of mercy, of rage, of all the contradictory impulses that make up his core. He places his father's ashes underneath his mother's portrait (unburnt, untouched, and maybe this is the more correct set up), then turns to Hector. He is still soaked red with blood. He is still wearing his hair as his mother once did. He is legacy made flesh in every way it could ever be made flesh, and Alucard knows it.

And with that, he begins. (He sees that dog peak around the corner. And trot over to Hector. And isn't that a fine detail?)

Let me be very clear in this moment, Hector, he intones. Any sympathy that I might have had for your situation is outweighed by what has been visited upon me and mine. You know my father's approach to these things. So you will tell me exactly how we have come to this point, and then I will decide what is to be done.

There's no water offered, no time to pause, there is only the bare naked truth of it. How Carmilla dominated his father's own war council, how she obtained a forgemaster (and in that moment Alucard knows that his father's anger was the cause of one thing, and Hector's blind trust is the cause of this situation), and all other things that have unfolded since. There are so many things clarified from the evidence left behind at the Castle that Alucard can piece together a decent timeline of what happened between his father's striking him down to the moment the three re-entered the castle, but...

...but this man is the cause of so many things. Trevor's agony. Sypha's endless worry. His own torture, because there is no way that Carmilla could have brought an army forth like that without this man.

And then it is done. The story is told. And Alucard stands there in terrible, perfect silence, weight of judgement on his shoulders. (Even his mother's infinite love of humanity might waver, just a bit. Just because of what was done to him.)]

[ Two. Two try to attack, near the start of this. Sypha opens a hole in the ice. Room enough for one person to leave at a time. No more. After the first two attacks fail, no more try. The process is slow. Pockets are emptied. Men prove that they are bringing nothing with them. No hands or tongues need to be sliced. A few men ask for leave to remove the corpses of friends killed in the infighting from the hold. Trevor refuses, but Sypha relents. Sypha wins. Sypha always wins. He can't even be angry with her for failing to present a united front when that is so necessary for keeping control of the situation, because she is merciful and kind and right.

They remain at the ice's edge, bound by cuffs of ice, until the rest are gone. Sypha widens the opening and they are permitted to return one at a time to carry the bodies to the surface.

(The bodies have to be searched. It is grim work, but far preferable to allowing some of the things in the hold to fall into the wrong hands.)

The ice is closed again, until dusk, and Sypha and Trevor return to the castle. They enter the study through the normal door, not the secret one in the cells (they could not use that door if they wanted to without Alucard's aid, hidden as it is from mortals).

The forgemaster does not shrink away from them, either because he is too tired now to show fear or because he has nothing left to be afraid of, even as Trevor's eyes narrow with rage. The dog yips happily as he enters the room, but then returns its attention to Hector. He can feel Sypha's hand on his wrist and it may as well be an iron cuff, gentle as her hold is. ]

Have you decided? [ Is all he says, eventually. It's choked with fury. But this is Alucard's choice. ]

[Alucard's eyes meet Trevor's and Sypha's as they re-enter. There is such exhaustion in them, the rage and fury now so very much faded from his person. This is justice, and he cannot have those two things.

But then the dog barks and trots around Hector's feet again, and something in his mind clicks in a chilling and awful way that makes his stomach drop.]

No. Things just became more complicated than I anticipated.

[He looks down to the dog again, expression grim but his eyes huge. Because he gets it. He understands why Enid had anything in her at all to resist beyond being a fucking Belmont, why that thing attacked Carmilla and no one else, and it's right here on four paws, wagging a little skeleton tail.]

You've only ever made one thing loyal unto yourself since this began, haven't you, Hector?

[He gestures to the dog. There is a nod. And Alucard sighs.]

Selfishness saves us all.

[ He looks at the dog, then at Hector, then at Alucard. ]

You're telling me he stole my fucking dog.

[ He doesn't even sound angry at that anymore, just- caught off guard. Slightly bewildered. He can't bring himself to be enraged the way he is about his sister- the Fourth Dog died when he was nine. Of old age. There was no injustice in it, it didn't burn the way his family did. It's an insult, of sorts, but it's just a bizarre one that he can't even quite process it.

Sypha's hand tightens around his wrist, just in case, but he's just confused. Who the fuck steals a dog? ]

I am saying that the dog...kept everyone capable of doing what needed to be done. Just enough.

[Just enough dignity. Just enough to know to carve runes into bones so that there would be time to wreck Carmilla for all she's worth.

Just enough Belmont to resist.]

A very loyal dog.

Of course he's loyal. The dogs're the last line of defense between you and being turned, you treat them like fucking royalty.

[ He said that before, didn't he? Those exact words. And Fourth Dog, Fourth Dog had been spoiled the most out of any of them. He'd been the one to sniff out tainted blood in his eldest sister in time to save her from turning. Every member of the family had snuck him extra food after that. He'd got fat. Been retired from work early to spend his last few years curling up in front of fireplaces and playing with the children and sleeping on Enid's lap in the seat by the window and covering her reading dresses in shed fur. ]

Never thought that 'treating them like royalty' would be quite so literal as to include allowing them to decide what to do with prisoners.

No. That much is not in anyone's domain but ours.

[He says ours because it is the greater truth. Alucard knows he cannot decide. Oh, he has an idea now, but he will not put it into action without the other two's say so. There will be no blood, but the idea he has is...is dark.

So wordlessly he gestures the other three outside, and once they're in the corridor, he closes the door behind him.]

Are there books in the Hold about bone runes?

Bone runes?

[ He thinks on that for a moment, then nods. ]

They won't be under that name, but there ought to be. They don't- usually go on bones. They're protection spells. You carve them into doorways to keep things from entering uninvited, or into items to make them invisible to thieves. Sometimes you carve them into your bedroom door to take away the voice of anyone who goes in without your say-so for a few days.

[ Belmonts. The latter may well be the only reason he's acquainted with them. ]

(for cryptsleeper)

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hell yeah I get trevor back

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