I wasn't expecting the second chapter to be finished quite as fast as it was, but here it is. And the third chapter hopefully won't be long behind it.
One of my reviewers expressed a concern that this would be a story where the vampires angst over what they are and moan about being a monster and trying to fight their nature, all common pit traps of vampire stories. I aim to avoid that, mostly because I don't think Eirika is the type to do that, nor would she have her whole nature changed with her body. I also aim to play around with some of the conceptions about vampires and how society reacts to what is essentially a predator made from them, only stronger, faster and more dangerous. So we shall see how this plays out...
Out of all the things Seth could have said in his life that would have shocked those who knew him, and caused those who didn't to accuse him of being mad or trying to jest by going straight into the ridiculous, the fact that he had a vampire hiding in his basement had to be at the top of the list, if not off it entirely due to being simply that impossible.
Nevertheless, it was completely true. He had gotten her to return with him before sunrise, with the offer of having a place where she didn't have to hide from the daylight, and she'd gone into the basement shortly before dawn. All he'd done was make sure that his door was locked before he'd gone to sleep off the interesting night for most of the day.
Now he was sitting in his small kitchen with a printed book, reading about the Renais royal family to see if he could find out just exactly when Eirika had vanished and occasionally casting glances at the basement door, shut tightly with no light seeping under the crack. It had never occurred to him before to wonder if vampires slept, since they all hid so securely from any traces of sunlight that finding them was rather like finding the lost continent of Tellius. If she was asleep, it certainly wasn't his right to disturb her.
He turned another of the crisp pages, enjoying the rare relaxation that was reading, the only reason he hadn't reached the chapters about the princess was that he didn't quite want the moment to end. The late afternoon sunlight streamed in through his window, coloring it red and gold. Outside the open window, he could hear talking and laughter, a complete contrast from the absolute silence after sunset. Though even now he could hear the way that people were on edge, aware that their safety was running out.
Turning another page, he glanced over to the door again, something that he'd been doing every few moments so much since he'd woken up that it was unconscious now. He knew the rough history that had been passed down by his family of what had happened, a foe they thought had long since been killed had risen again and snuck into the castle the day before the princess's coronation and stolen her away, and now it was confirmed that he had changed her as well. His ancestor, the one he was named after, had ridden out to find her, but disappeared as well and his body was found later, laid in repose and drained of blood. At the time, it had been presumed that whatever had kidnapped the princess had killed him as well, but there had never been an explanation for the way that he was found. When the princess's body never reappeared, but others began to be changed, only those who were out after dark, some began to suspect that she had become a creature of the night.
It seemed that all of their suspicions were correct. She had been unable to cross his threshold till he invited her in, and in the weak candlelight in his home, her eyes had been the color of drying blood, dark and tepid.
Seth returned to his book, looking on the tale of her grandfather, who had ended a war for succession by arranging the diplomatic meetings that arrived at a conclusion that while not what either party had started out wanting, were willing to agree to. He had heard that she was much like him, preferring words to weapons, and if their encounter with the voice she had called Valter was anything to go by, it wasn't entirely untrue.
The sunlight sank away quickly, a sign of the oncoming winter when night was longest. The voices outside died away and turned into the sound of doors locking and windows shuttering. Tonight, the sky was clear. He preferred clear nights the most to hunt by, even if the lamps went out and the moon was veiled, he could still see by the stars.
It was just as the sun sank completely under the horizon when he heard sounds in the basement. He thought that it might have been the princess making sure that he knew she was awake, since vampires usually only made sound while fighting or dying. He shut the book carefully, putting it on the shelf with the two others he allowed himself to have as a distraction from his work, and waited for her.
The door creaked open slowly, and he saw the hem of her dress first, still covered in dried mud. "Seth?" she said softly, looking out, her hair braided loosely, looking bedraggled. "Seth?"
He nodded to her from where he stood by his kitchen table, having decided to be close enough that she could see him when she exited without being a threat. "Your highness."
She sighed and shut the door. "I'm no longer a princess," she admonished him again in that soft voice, "I stopped being one when this happened." Despite the weight of the words, she said them as if they were no more than a simple fact, not a loss of the life she had been born and raised into. "I am what I am, no more."
He inclined his head, "yes, your highness." He answered, not allowing himself the intimacy of her name.
It was small and didn't last long, but her lips curved in a smile for a moment. Her lips moved as if she meant to say something else, but he couldn't hear if she actually vocalized what she was thinking. A moment later, she answered loud enough for him to hear, "will you hunt them tonight?" with a furtive glance at the silver lance mounted on the wall near his door.
"Yes," he said without hesitation. "It is my duty."
That drew another small smile from her, just as fleeting as the first. "Do you always hunt alone?" she asked, reaching up to touch the shaft with an air of fondness, her red eyes soft. Again, he had that sense of remembering something he'd never known, that she'd always admired his skill with a lance. "Most don't anymore."
He walked over to take the lance off the wall, the silver untarnished from all of the vampires he'd killed with it. "Most aren't brave enough to fight at all." he said, and he could feel a chill in the air standing so close to her. "Those who are...use guns now. I prefer this."
She nodded, her limp braid swaying slightly. "It suits you." she said with the sense that she was thinking of someone else. "Guns are faster, but they don't affect us the same way."
The way she talked was raising questions he wasn't going to ask her. She stepped back from him, and the chill in the air faded. It was like she was drinking in the heat and releasing none of her own. She wasn't wearing her cloak anymore, so he could see that the condition of her dress was as bad everywhere else as the hem was. He quickly turned his attention back to putting the lance away so that he could get his armor on. "Why do you ask, your highness?" he asked as he turned away from her to shrug on the leather vest with silver chain in between the lining and the outside. While silver wasn't exactly a vampire's bane, it tended to hold up better against attacks than most other metals.
"I thought I might go with you," she said neutrally, and he turned his head to look at her as he adjusted his vest so that it sat right. She was looking at his lance again and she'd pulled her hood up. "My...gift might be useful to you. Valter has left, so the others will be back again."
Should he? He had to admit, the idea of directly hunting them down rather than relying on his status as human to act as a lure so that he could kill them was tempting. Perhaps they would work well together, though there was no way to know without trying. And it felt oddly right, the idea of fighting at her side. Like he had done it before. He was having a lot of moments of what could be considered odd around her.
Seth let the silence wait between them as he finished suiting up. Outside, the only lights came from the half moon and the streetlamps burning away the night. Eirika waited for his answer, standing so still he might have thought her a statue. Her red eyes were sharp and clear under her hood, and he had no idea what she was thinking at all. "Very well," he said, the words not feeling quite right, but they were what came to mind. "There's no reason you can't."
The vampire smiled her soft smile, and she followed him like a silent shadow out the door. He could almost forget she was there but for the chill in the air and the prickle on the back of his neck warning him.
They stopped at a cross street, and he looked to her. Under the hood, he could see her eyes start to glow, a beacon to whomever bothered to look. Her lips were slightly parted and her nostrils flared as if she was trying to smell their prey. "Three streets down...two across.." she murmured, her voice barely loud enough to carry. "She is young..."
He didn't even have to ask her which way to go, Eirika turned on her heel and ran silently like a deer, her feet barely seeming to touch the stones as she lifted her dress out up to run faster. He followed behind her as quickly as he could, and he knew that she was slowing down for him.
Turning a corner, he could see their quarry under a lamp, sucking the blood and life from a stray dog that hadn't been lucky. Eirika stood in the very center of the street, her eyes burning bright red as she stared at the other vampire. He couldn't tell what she was doing, but he didn't waste the time she'd given him, centering his grip on his lance as he started to walk down towards the woman.
She had to be young like Eirika said, she didn't look up from her dog till he was close enough to scratch her with the silver tip, and she had gore smeared on her face when she looked up at him, hissing in anger before dropping the dog and springing up at him.
He smacked her in the face with the end of the lance, sending her sprawling on the stones as he neatly sidestepped her. She turned to hiss again, black hair hanging over her face messily. Behind her, he could see the flicker of a blue dress from the shadows and a strange glimmer of silver as well, though he didn't have time to look closer before the vampire was attacking again.
This time, Seth had to sidestep her quickly, he didn't have time to attack. The woman caught herself on a building edge and leaped at him again. Her hiss of anger turned to a screech of agony as Eirika quite literally appeared from the shadows, kneeling on the ground as the vampire turned to dust over her. Seth lowered his lance as she stood up and dropped her hood, her eyes no longer glowing. But that wasn't as distracting as the long silver sword she held expertly in her hand that she'd just used to impale the vampire.
Eirika smiled at him as she brushed some of the dust off of her shoulder, balancing the point of her sword on the tip of her shoe like she knew it wouldn't pierce the leather. "Did you think I fought with teeth and nails as well?" she asked with the first hint of humor he'd heard since he'd met her, delicately sheathing her sword in a scabbard he hadn't seen under her cloak before.
And Seth had to admit that it did make sense that she would still fight with her rapier.
'It hurts...it hurts' was all that rang through her mind as she curled up on the floor in the remains of her dress. The bite on her breast burned icy cold like iron in the height of winter. Blood stained the floor and her legs and the smell wouldn't go away.
She knew he was still there, watching her like a cat watches an injured mouse, too amused to put it out of its misery. The very thought of him made her want to vomit and run away and curl up, but she couldn't move. Everything hurt...her body...her soul.
"Don't fight it," her nightmare crooned, making her convulse on the floor. "It only hurts for so long. Then you'll be perfect, my woman of the night."
She stifled a sob of panic, every part of her violently rejecting whatever he'd done to her. Memories, unbidden, sprang to mind, of being helpless and ripped apart while he cackled over her. She wanted to die to escape from them.
The bite on her chest flared into sharp agony and she screamed as something inside poisoned her and changed her into something never meant to be. Somewhere in the endless darkness, she heard Valter laughing madly, gloating over his destruction of her.
It may take a little longer for the next chapter to come out, if only because real life is finally starting to work out.