Prophecy
Disclaimer: The count isn't mine, although my name is Sara he has never called out to me yet so I'm still busy hoping. Other mentioned characters aren't mine either. Roman Polanski's.
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The night was dark, even for a Transylvanian winter, and no one dared to venture outside. In the village, little candle lights twinkled behind the dirty windows and from Chagal's Inn came the sounds of laughter. The guests threw long shadows onto the pavement outside. Not a soul noticed the figure hidden in the shades, boots buried in the fresh snow that had fallen only hours earlier.
A long back cape was draped over the man's straight shoulders but in the dim light his eyes seemed to shine like stars. Had anyone seen him in the broad daylight they would all have agreed that he was particularly handsome. A prince charming whom girls fell in love with at first sight.
His face was pale, almost translucent , and flawless. All his features spoke of wealth and high standard. His hair was raven black, soft as if spun by fairies and long without a single lock out of place. He was strong and manly.
But his was also a look of sadness as he watched the villagers. An aura of loneliness surrounded him and he looked truly cut off from the life around him. Everything passed him by like a gust of wind.
A silver tear, glistening in the moonlight, rolled down his cheek, leaving a salty trace on his marble skin. Humourlessly he grinned to himself. He wasn't supposed to behave like this, as a count he was expected to be strong and not to show his emotions, but now, seeing how his life could have been, he was overwhelmed by the pain. Friends to talk to and discuss with, children running around on little feet. And a wife, a beautiful woman standing by his side trough everything. Someone to hold close without having to be afraid of hurting or losing her.
He hated who... what he had become. All of those things he wished for were forever out of his reach – had been for hundreds of years. Of course he had his son, who meant the world to him, but he knew in his heart that he would give up everything to be human and walk in the sunlight. His power, his wealth; it meant nothing when you felt like your life was a sham. An empty shell in which you could scream and cry forever without anyone hearing you. It meant nothing when the things that really mattered in life weren't yours. When you couldn't die.
His eye fell on the young girl inside the house, dancing trough her father's Inn and singing at the top of her lungs while her red brown curls bobbed up and down. Even a fool could see that she'd be a beauty one day, when the chubbiness of childhood faded and her body took on the forms of a woman.
Count Breda von Krolock saw the woman she'd become and desired the thing he prophesized. In a few years time she'd be his, driving away the loneliness like she now chased away the sadness with her cheerful song. For the first in a long time the count felt a sparkle of hope inside his chest. Hope for a new beginning, for a glimpse of happiness. He had tasted now what it would be like to be happy and he wouldn't give it up again. And maybe then, one day, he'd be free. Not free from the shackles of desire for blood, he knew that that was an impossible dream, but free from himself. If he could just hold on to this one girl, it would all be alright.
Sarah. Her name whispered in the night was a promise and a prayer at the same time. A promise for her, a better life in which she could also be free to be the girl she longed to be. And a prayer for his own lost soul. She was what soothed him and turned the night into spring – almost warm. She made him forget for a moment that he wasn't like her, wasn't mortal.
He wanted her to be his, but knew that he was hers too. Undeniably and unchangeably hers. For eternity.
