The Ring Conspiracy
"Let's go -- away from here." Meier's voice was once again velvety-dark and whole, the tears betrayed by the break in his voice only a moment before locked deep in his heart. He gathered Charlotte's still warm but lifeless body into his arms and stood.
"Stop right there, Meier. I'm taking her back, back to her family who loved her." D's tone was flat, final and implacable as he set himself directly in Meier's path.
"She knew I loved her best of all. You can't understand it. You've never loved a human." Meier resisted the urge to smooth Charlotte's hair as he placed her gently on the floor again.
"I love her." Meier stated firmly in his mind.
Surprisingly, a response came. "I know. But I can't let you go."
"I've never killed one either," D replied aloud to Meier's accusation.
"You struggle to resist this nature of ours, but it can't last forever, D. The urge for their blood is stronger."
"If that day comes, another will hunt me. It's as simple as that."
"What difference would it make? She is just as dead to her family either way. If I take her she will not be dead to me," Meier reasoned.
"And that is the problem." D's mental reply was full of adamant resolve.
Meier growled, gathered his strength and power and flew to attack D, though he still maintained both conversations: the verbal one, which he suspected was mostly for the human woman hovering far too near his beloved Charlotte, and the more important mental one with the enigmatic dhampir, the hunter D.
He focused his will into his cloak, forcing it to manifest as his weapon even as he sensed his opponent willing his strength into his own sword. How fitting that their conflict would come to this: weapon against weapon, will against will, ideal against ideal. Though D was merely a dhampir, the half-breed's will seemed to be equal to his. Meier could find no weakness in D's weapon, defenses or resolve. He sought to create the weakness he couldn't find.
"But what matters most to you will not happen now. Two vampires cannot beget."
Meier would have gasped as a sudden ferocity focused D's will even tighter, if it would not have betrayed his surprise.
"I cannot allow Charlotte, all that the woman I love IS, to rot away in the ground just to appease the HUMAN desire to bury their dead. Not when she may yet live -- exist -- at least as much as I do."
Meier wasn't willing to give up on reasoning yet, though he was certain he could kill this dhampir if needed. He'd recently become weary of killing without reason, regretting the death that seemed to surround the doomed love he shared with Charlotte. The rescue party led by Charlotte's brother, the villagers, the Barbaroi, even the hunters who harried them every step of the way to Chaythe.... He shook his head against the futility of it all. Even for one undead, it was too much death to tolerate.
"I cannot allow another vampire to enter this world," D replied.
Meeting D's eyes over the fiery red manifestation of the friction of their wills against each other, Meier found he could pierce the veil of dispassion that seemed to surround this mysterious hunter. The bounties, the battles, the endless traveling, the lonely road and lonelier life this one led flashed subtly behind D's eyes. The reason for it all resided there too, demanding in a quiet way to be recognized.
Meier could teach D nothing about loving humans. D's entire life was his labor of love to protect them from the depravity of his father's people. That love so consumed D that he could not, would not, allow himself to become close to any one human, probably for the very fear that Meier had mentioned before the fight. D didn't want to tempt himself with their blood.
"Agreed." Perhaps reasoning was yet the way out of this for both of them. A way for them to part ways with each one still alive.
"Agreed?" D questioned.
"She won't become a vampire here. She must remain dead as far as this world knows. And, I will depart it too," Meier vowed.
"Go on."
"The ship here at the castle. Allow me to take Charlotte, board the ship, and try to leave this place. We will leave this world behind, one way or another. The ancient ship will either carry us to the stars, where what becomes of my beloved will not matter to this world, or fall, unable to fly. Certainly, a lift-off failure would mean not only Charlotte's permanent end, but mine as well. Would such a pact be acceptable to you?"
D considered, for a long moment, while never once easing his attack, or weakening his defense. "Leila, the other bounty hunter..."
"Surely a human woman is not hard for you to silence... Ah. Forgive me, old habits die hard. Would she realize that Charlotte might yet rise as a vampire?"
"I do not know. But even if she did not; there is her duty. Killing you and bringing Charlotte, or proof of her death, back is the job she accepted as a bounty hunter. That she came here, to Chaythe, shows..."
Meier interrupted to complete D's thought. "...shows that she has pride, determination and high honor. So, you are saying she will not just walk away, knowing that I live."
"No, though the hunter's life is no life for her," D noted, with a hint of sympathy buried deep in his eyes.
"You," Meier fumbled for the word, "care for these humans, even though you will not let yourself..."
The sound of fine metal hitting marble was crisp and pure against the backdrop of the coarser sounds of the castle undergoing its death throes. Both realized what it meant without turning to look as Charlotte's ring bounced, sounding its sweet tone again. Meier took the opportunity, hoping the out-of-place sound would distract D enough to not realize he'd transformed his free hand into a lethal set of claws. No such luck - the dhampir was unfazed as he dodged the new attack. Meier leaped back, using his skill to deflect the light around himself as he sought to gain a better position to renew his attack on his opponent. Somehow, D managed to keep track of him, and hounded him with that cursed sword of his.
"Here! This is the way -- trust me, and do not flinch!" D's mental command was earnest and urgent.
Meier could have flinched. He might possibly have dodged the attack entirely, though he wouldn't claim, even to himself, that he was certain he could have escaped it completely. He stared, in dumfounded surprise, as D launched himself forward, the tip of his sword leading the way. The dhampir's grace seemed to slow everything down into a nearly unbearable intensity. Meier realized that it was D who had managed to lure him off-guard, not the other way around. That sword's tip threaded its way through his defenses, past his protective cloak, through the stiff, formal clothing he wore and into his chest.
It was a lethally rapid stroke, and a mercifully sharp blade, piercing him through so swiftly that he felt the entrance of the blade through his chest and the exit through his back, but pain -- that he did not feel. At least, not yet. And why was the wound so off-target?
"Why -- did you miss -- my heart?" Meier asked, swiftly understanding the opportunity D created.
"Ah, D, you would have been a worthy adversary in reality. Or perhaps, a good friend."
D used the same mercy he'd shown delivering the stroke to release Meier from his blade. A strong, swift pull, exactly in the same track, cleared D's sword from Meier's body without widening the wound in the least. Meier could already feel it regenerating, though he staggered just a bit, for the benefit of their audience of one.
"She is dead. The ring is all I need. I'll take it to her father, as proof."
"I hope you find the City of the Night, and happiness for both of you there." D's mental tone held just a hint of gentleness and warmth as he closed his hand around Charlotte's ring, turned, and deliberately walked away. To one unable to follow their mental conversation, it was a disdainful, final action.
"Really? Thank you for that. Know you, if the ship is sound enough to take us safely from here, I shall cherish Charlotte no less for the fact she is no longer human. You will always have my gratitude, D, and, I am certain, hers as well."
" ... "
"If you happen to survive, do not return to this world again. I should have to kill you," D warned.
"You should have to try." Meier's mental voice contained a trace of mirth. "Farewell, D."
"Farewell, Meier."
end
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Author's notes -
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