Note: Tarot is in no shape or form related to devil worship or satanic beliefs. The same goes for witch craft (Wicca). If you don't wish to take my word for it and keep your original thought, please leave and don't bother commenting. For those of you that don't care or are not bothered by this, please, continue on and enjoy reading.
EDIT!: I still have people saying that they are indeed linked to Satanism. So for all of you here, I have the actual definitions from an unabridged dictionary.
Tarot: Any set of usually 78 playing cards including 22 depicting vices, virtues, and elemental forces used in frotunetelling.
Wicca: A polytheistic Neo-Pagan nature religion inspired by various pre-Christian beliefs, whose central deity is a mother goddess and which inclueds the use of herbal magic anf benign witchcraft.
Hopefully that is enough to point out the differences for every one.
Disclaimer: Don't own Vampire Knights... SAD!!!!!!
Well I'm back! Now some things are going to be rather different for vampiric rules in this so bear with me! please! this is an AU! Also! Zero and Yuki are like siblings in this! I dedicate this to my good friend, who is the inspiration for this story, Ann! YAY!!!!!!! cheers So! on with the show!
The Higher Arcana
All that is blood... is not life. Blood often, and more than any other time, corresponds with death. You cut yourself, you bleed, and you kill thousands of cells. This is a daily cycle we go through so often we no longer acknowledge it as a form of murder. But when you finally risk everything... and still you fail...you start thinking... you start wondering... you start... hating. You begin to feel caged by the cruelty of the world, almost suffocated by it's claws, ever stretching out in the light only to strangle the last dying breaths away from you in the darkness... alone.
Chapter 1: The Fool
((Beginnings...))
"Shit!" hissed, a silver haired hunter as he dodged a large claw sweeping by him. "Yuki! Now would be a good time to work some of that magic you pride your self on!" He growled before dropping down once more and sweeping his feet at the ankles of the vampire before him. Not once, out of all the years he'd been working with the young witch, had he had issues with a vampire and suddenly this one was giving him a hell of a fight.
The witch in question, a stuttering brunette, flinched and counted on her fingers, mouthing the numbers silently.
"Um... let's see.. there's... um... oh!" she said, pointing a finger up before muttering a few words and facing her hand at the vampire, palm outwards. A ray of sunlight burst through the canopy of the trees causing the vampire to howl in pain before bursting into dust. Zero dropped to the ground, his back scraping against the rough bark of the tree he'd just been pressed against.
Blood dripped slowly down his neck from where the sharp claws had pierced the skin, ruining the smooth texture of his tanned neck. Once again in the same fight, he'd been near suffocation. He was beginning to hate his line of work. Shifting his slate gaze to the girl he now called his charge, however sad it seemed, he frowned.
"Next time use that damn spell book you insist on carrying with you every where..." He growled, still rubbing at his now bruising neck. Yuki flinched.
"I'm sorry, Zero! I didn't try to!" Yuki whined, looking for all the world like a forlorn puppy. Zero sighed. There was no way he could remain angry at the girl. She was too much like a loyal little sister it was almost disturbing.
"You know... for an aristocrat... you're not exactly squeamish..." He comment, looking at the blood now glittering on the ground around them. He flinched just to think that every last drop of it was his. As A vampire hunter, he had been hired to clear out the vicinity around Yuki's parent's house. There the young girl had become fascinated by his career and begged that he teach her. He gave in, of course, after her parents had offered a good fee in exchange. The transaction was kept off the record though, to keep both parties from looking criminal or scheming. Pathetic was what it really was when you came down to it. But that was Zero's life. Take what you can and give nothing back.
"after working with you for what? Three years?" Yuki started.
"Four..." He interrupted.
"Whatever.. you think I'd be used to it by now..." she said with a shrug. Zero snorted and stood, walking over and picking up his pack of weapons. Slipping the trade mark gunner's hat on his head, he tilted it down at an angle so it covered his eyes in shadow. He tilted his head and looked over his shoulder at Yuki.
"Coming? We have a bounty to collect..." He trailed off, smirking as he did so. Yuki yelped and hurried over to his side, falling into pace with his slow, long stride.
The city that they found themselves in was quaint. A few wanted posters filled the windows of a few local shops. Zero let his gaze drift lazily over each one as he continued with his steady pace. He stopped only briefly to gaze at a reward poster for a vampire. He chuckled before motioning for Yuki to stay there and walking into the tavern they were to meet their newest employer in.
Sighing to herself, Yuki leaned her back against the brick of the building and pulled out her large encyclopedia of spells.
"Time for a touch of light reading...' she said before burying herself in the pages of the book.
"Well... you see... You're working with the teenage brain their kiddo..." Amy said as she stood and walked over to the kitchen door and over to the noisily singing fridge. "Damn I need to get this thing fixed..." she muttered before opening it up.
"So are you saying it's hormones?" Ann asked, the other blond following her into the kitchen. Amy snorted.
"Hormones? Heck, girl. That kid of yours is gonna be a thorn in your ass for years to come..." Came the chuckling reply as the shorter of the two turned around only to come face to face with a pair of crimson eyes.
"Hello ladies..." purred a velvety voice.
People passing by late that night would be able to hear screams coming from the house as the call of a vampire rumbled through the halls of the newly converted tomb.
Yuki looked up from the ant she had taken to watching as a couple walked by. They were smiling, laughing, and whispering sweet nothings into one another's ear as they walked by. Yuki sighed, letting her head hang once again only to look up at a man walked by.
The presence he carried with him was commanding yet mysterious. He walked with an air of confidence and a sort of... proper stiffness to his back. A smear of something red was barely visible at the corner of his mouth. Red eyes gazed out at the world with a coolness that no human could muster as his lithe fingers brushed brown, almost black hair from his eyes.
He passed by easy enough, drawing Yuki's watchful gaze with him. Suddenly, her boredom of waiting for Zero was gone from her mind as she stood and followed him. A vampire out in the sun light was not a good thing. This needed to be taken care of it didn't have time to wait for Zero.
Running down the street after having lost sight of her vampire, Yuki gulped down air, breathing deeply and evenly as Zero had taught her. Being a vampire hunter required a lot of running, something Yuki excelled at.
She reached a turn in the street, weaving between people. She managed to avoid them by staying close to the walls of buildings. A hand suddenly shot out and pinned her to a strong chest. She could feel the fangs grazing her neck.
"Hello... hunter..."
"YUKI!" Zero called, racing through the crowded streets. He'd left the tavern in time to see the young witch toddling after a vampire. Damn, he hated those beasts. That's why he followed in his families tradition. Not because he wanted to, but because then he could finally get his taste of revenge.
Zero only came back to the real world when he ran into some one. Stopping, he looked up into a pair of disturbingly red eyes. He frowned.
"Vampire..." He growled just as a scream resounded through out the street. Breaking the gaze Zero held with the vampire, he looked towards the source before swearing and tearing off towards it. Right now he could care less about a dead bastard that was recently reanimated. He needed to save Yuki.
People. People. There were too many people in the streets, forcing him to wind and weave through bodies and the sea of limbs. Was Zero listening he might have heard the pair of footsteps following his.
In seconds he'd loaded the .357, cocking it back and aiming at the vamp holding the struggling Yuki. Before he could pull the trigger, however, another person came into view, the vampire he'd run into. Snapping the other's neck, Yuki was released. Allowing her to run back to her guardian.
"Zero!" she cried, tears streaming down her face. It was then that the vampire turned to look at them.
"Are you alright?"