Disclaimer: I do not own Cirque Du Freak or any Darren Shan works.
Revamped: May 30, 2017
A Vampire General
Larten Crepsley and his unit of vampires were hidden in the dark folds of the cloak of night. He sat perched like a great crow on the ledge of a hotel. His sharp green eyes cut through the city, searching for his prey. The wind was strong and had he not possessed the strength and durability of a vampire it would have knocked him down six stories to his death. As such, all that the wind could do was sting his face in a joint attack with the cold air. This, he ignored.
He could sense it. The Vampaneze and their Lord were out there. It was his mission to find them and to bring the princes whatever information he could find, if not their heads. This was war, a terrible event that Larten knew all too well. And he would do all that was within his powers to end the War of Scars before any more lives were lost.
Gavner. Arra. Almost Darren.
The princes were counting on him. He had a duty and an honor to serve them once more. He was particularly committed to the interest of one prince. The youngest.
Darren Shan, the young man Mr. Crepsley had made his assistant several years ago had risen to the ultimate position of power and respect in such a short time. The orange haired vampire grinned with pride, his scar making his mouth seem as if it stretched up the side of his pale face.
Young Master Shan had protested Mr. Crepsley's leaving. He had also asked to accompany him, though for a mission like this it was too dangerous to bring a vampire lacking in combat skills into the field. Larten had had to stress his duty to the clan and remind the young prince that to die in battle is the upmost honor for a vampire, especially dying in the interests of the clan. Not that Larten intended to die. No, he would strive to return home, to his spider, his people, his princes, and to the young man who had once been his assistant.
"Will you come back soon?" Darren had asked. His eyes, orbs of pain and hurt, starred up at the scarred vampire. And in that moment, Mr. Crepsley remembered that the half-vampire prince before him was still in many ways just a boy. It was also the moment that Mr. Crepsley realized that this would be the first time in their many years together that they had spent for more than a night apart. An emotion can could be closest related to sadness but hinged on the side of concern flooded through Larten's bloodstream at the thought of leaving the boy.
"Do you doubt my abilities Master Shan? You forget I have done this before, many years ago," Mr. Crepsley responded in his teasing way. However, he intended for his words to provide some small shred of comfort. He did not know when it had happened, and he suspected that he would never find out, but he had grown to truly loved this boy, this young man, with all his heart. He was the closest thing that Larten would ever have as a son, though he would never do his biological father the disrespect by saying so.
He could not promise a safe return on a mission such as this, so he did not. But, by the black blood of Honan Oar, he would do his best.
He was rewarded. Darren's expression lightened a bit.
"Besides," Larten continued, trying to lighten the mood, "someone has to teach you how to be a somewhat respectable vampire."
Though in many ways he was out of touch with human morality and emotion, he knew that a child should not be so weighed with stress of life and death. And though he also knew that Darren was older in mind and spirit than his body showed, he was still frozen in a body that displayed the early years of his life. It had been a mistake to blood him the first place, and it was one that Larten was sorry for. He had stollen the life of a child that he had grown to love. He would have given anything to make him human once more. But the past is not something one can change, so he chased these thoughts from his head.
Darren smirked at that, and then told Larten something he would never forget. Something that broke through the cold exterior of vampire that found its way deep into the small veins of humanity that still ran under the cold shell.
"You're the best mentor I could've asked for. I'm going to miss you, Mr. Crepsley. I'll try to carry myself in a way that honors your name while you're gone."
Mr. Crepsley reacted strongly to what he knew was possibly a goodbye. He stepped forward and pulled the boy against him and into his red cloak. He tried to soak up every ounce of love, respect, and humanity that this boy, his son, had just offered him. For the first time in his life as a vampire, he would have given just about anything for five more minutes of time.
After a moment, the vampire found words for his prince.
"I will be back before you notice my absence," he whispered. With that, he turned and walked away. He would have flitted had it been permitted, but it was not. And so he left his heart with the boy. He would not need it where he was going.
Now the predator remained. He was not a mentor or a father. Now, until the completion of the mission, he was a Vampire General. In short, he was a killer. his was the true monster of the movies. This was the creature that would scare Darren. The one that he would never let the young man see.
Vampire Generals were well trained. Trained how to fight honorably, how to attack the weakest points, how to die with respect. These are the qualifications necessary to sever in army of the undead.
Suddenly, Larten's eyes caught sight of his prey. This was it. The one he had been searching for. The one who he had left Darren a year ago to hunt and kill. He could smell it in the air. The blood of the Vampaneze.
Two fingers with sharp nails pointed where he commanded his unit to strike. The vampires descended without hesitation, where they attacked the small group of Vampaneze in a dark street corner. It was the definition of a blood bath. Mostly their killer cousins died, but some vampires fell to the nobility of death in combat on that night. Larten himself removed a blade from where it was embedded in his shoulder to finish the owner of the weapon off when he saw him. It was him. He felt it in his blood. The Lord of the Vampaneze.
The surprise of finding him in the open delayed the vampire's actions. Besides a flash of white hair, there was no time safe for that for a breath of air between his spying the Lord and that of the next moment in which the ruler of the Vampaneze flitted away.
"That was it. That was all that he could do. A plethora of Vampaneze lay dead and now they had seen their Lord with their own eyes. The war would rage on. But he had finished his part in it for now. Mr. Crepsley turned towards the survivors and together they started the trek to Vampire Mountain.
Back to his new prince. Back to Darren. Back to his son. Back to home.