For the lovely Flowermiko, who is celebrating her birthday soon and is one of the most awesome Van/Cardia fangirls I know. If you haven't checked out her tumblr blog (at flowermiko-dot-tumblr-dot-com), I really recommend you do so. She puts up so many gorgeous scans of Code: Realize artwork that it's ridiculous.

In any case, darling, I hope you enjoy the fluffy, sexy smut to come!

Eros & Erotica

A Van Helsing/Cardia Post-Game Story About Love & Literature

The man who many knew as Saint Germain had always considered himself quite knowledgeable about the passions that raged in the hearts of men.

Of course, it was hard not to be, after almost a millennium in the world. It would be a paltry immortal indeed who could not learn much about the human mind and body after so many years walking among generations of both descendents and ancestors. Over the last thousand years or so, Saint Germain had resided in mud-huts and mansions alike, supped with kings and watched queens be beheaded, helped peasants revolt and aided in countless resurrections. His life over the last few centuries had been busy indeed, and the violence he had both witnessed and taken part felt as though it permanently resided in him – for the better and the worse alike.

That said, his life was strangely peaceful now – if 'peaceful' was indeed the word that could be chosen when he continued to share a mansion with a strangely ethical "gentleman thief," a master alchemist still haunted by his own grief, a rather crazed (if caring) vampire engineer, a trigger-happy vampire-slayer-turned-savior, and a lovely young lady whose body might eventually lead to the overturning of all the natural laws of the world.

If fate were crueler, he might have been asked to dispose of all of the above people – even if the last remnants of his once-human heart knew they were the closest things he had ever had to 'friends' for the last few centuries or so. But fate was, in its own way, kind… and after the unpleasant events of the last few months (the disposal of the unfortunate Finis, the disbanding of Twilight, and the death of the sinister Aleister Crawley), all had become well in its turn. Lupin had returned to and from France to find traces of his lost mentor again, Victor had come to a strange accord with the Queen, Impey continued to find a path to the moon however improbable it may seem, and even St. Germain had found that his organization gave him no more directives other than to monitor the current situation quietly.

And as for the two love-birds that had emerged from the ashes of their strange victory…

For now, at least, all seemed well with them.

After Crawley's manipulations had been uncovered and the man disposed of, Van Helsing had begun to work with the remaining vampire lords to make up for all the blood he had previously shed. As he often said, after almost annihilating their entire kingdom, he owed them a great debt that he would given his life to rectify, if they had asked. And since they had shown him more mercy than even he swore he deserved, he did anything they might ask of him – even take on arduous trips across the continent with Delacroix the Younger as the new head of English Vampires sought out more kin throughout the land.

Cardia also had kept herself busy, dedicating herself to the pursuit of scientific inquiry – as well as a cure to her poison that still eluded her. After a suitable period of wrangling with her dear father's papers, Cardia had found at least a partial cure– a chemical compound that would, for a few days at a time, render her poison inert. So while her lover was away, Cardia continued to work both on new cures for herself and on creating medicines that might help other unfortunates in the world.

And while her lover was near…

St. Germain could not help the fond smile that came to his face, like an older uncle chuckling over the shenanigans of younger people.

Well, while her trigger-happy lover was near, his dear Cardia had formed a habit of going at her lover with all the decorum of a monkey in heat. And while St. Germain did not much care about what they did (after all, one didn't live a millennium without having much experience with human passion or human forms), the effect on his other companions was most amusing.

Then again, how could St. Germain not laugh inside at anything that made poor Impey turn green with envy, made Lupin's sophisticated brow twitch with abject fear and frightened little Victor into a stupor? From the way these three reacted, they clearly would have been more comfortable with Van and Cardia launching bombs, bullets, and anything but their genitals at one another.

Then again, even St. Germain sometimes startled at how much passion icy Van Helsing and gentle, kind Cardia had apparently had to offer each other. And occasionally, even he got annoyed by hearing their passionate cries erupt from the garden while he sat in his library, amicably sipping a cup of tea and toying with the idea of creating a small rebellion in a neighboring county.

(Even an immortal had to have hobbies, after all).

St. Germain knew and actually felt a little sorry that the two lovers had so little personal time with one another, given how often Van Helsing's body-guard duties pulled him away from his ardent young lover. But destroy the sanctity of afternoon tea was a blasphemy even to an immortal like St. Germain!

It didn't help that those two kept leaving a slime trail all over the antiques.

Still, for all of their inventiveness in finding ways to defile various rooms and scenic overlooks in his mansion, St. Germain felt that the two lovers lacked a certain amount of… sophistication. They spent much of their limited time together wrapped in each other's arms… but St. Germain rather worried that they might eventually get tired of trotting out the same positions over and over again. It would not be hard for them not to exhaust their repertoire, given how little experience Cardia had with any sort of touch and how many suspicions Impey had about Van's "purity" previous to Cardia entering the gun-smith's life.

Not to mention, while St. Germain tried to be subtle in his manipulations, he simply couldn't resist meddling just a little. Life – even human life – could be very long, and love and passion could unfortunately be very short. And given the happy event St. Germain knew Van planned to present soon, St. Germain rather worried that after a few years of bliss, the couple might end up a little bored by one another's company. After all, they had met and fallen in love while chasing her mad brother and his even madder mentor. Wouldn't these two get quite bored of even physical passion if they kept to the same rituals and positions, over and over again?

So what, St. Germain piously thought, could help these two sweet fools more in their love life and their eventual future than a thorough education… and a widened view of what their bodies could do?

(And this of course was something he wanted to offer out of the goodness of his heart and not because he wanted to see what interesting bits of depravity they would go to next…)

So when he planted several illustrated, annotated and exquisitely perverse copies of erotica in the section of his library that Cardia most constantly frequented, he did so with a peaceful little smile.

After all, St. Germain always did want to help his precious friends.

And then he walked away laughing softly at all the mischief he knew he had just managed.

Author's Note: Reviews get porn written faster. Just saying... ;)

In any case, thanks for reading and enjoying, my dear hearts. This is shaping up to be at least a 3-chapter story (yes, when I write smut, I commit) and I hope to have the next chapter up with in the next 2 weeks. I'll likely be jumping around between Van and Cardia's POV in the next few chapters, now that St. Germain is done spreading his mischief. After all, I'm sure they'll both have their own thoughts on what Cardia will soon be reading...!