Thank you everyone for the reviews! I'm going to try to get another one out this weekend, fingers crossed. Enjoy! :)
Veil woke up, and it took her a second to realize she did so with her back up against a tree. What the hell had just happened? Oh right, the fight. She passed out. Shit. She blinked, and lifted her head with a 'nnh' noise, as she tried to figure out where she was. It was the same place she had fought the vampire. She was sitting on dirt, leaves,and pine needles, resting against large maple tree. The sun hadn't finished setting - she hadn't been out long. Maybe a minute or two at most. It took her a split second to realize she wasn't alone.
The vampire was sitting across from her, on a fallen tree - just… watching her, with those golden eyes. Her two steel batons were at his feet on the ground. The stern look on his face almost screamed come and get them if you want to try this again.
Veil gritted her teeth, and tensed for him to attack. Nothing happened. He was just… sitting there. She waited to see what he would do, to see what he'd say - but as the seconds ticked by, it was clear that he was waiting for her. Veil was tempted to get up, snatch her weapons away, and try to start the fight again. But the keyword was try. What good would that do? He'd already won. She was too tired and too cold right now to fight and expect any different kind of outcome. So instead, she pushed herself up to standing, taking her time, leaning against the tree for support.
The vampire stood as well, lifting her batons from the ground as he did. He walked towards her - and she moved to take a defensive stance, but didn't retreat. He simply held her weapons out to her - both in one hand. And waited.
It was a long moment that lingered there, with him holding her batons outstretched. Her, unwilling to trust him and take them from his hand. But someone had to give. And he clearly was not going to be the one to break first.
Tentatively, she reached out and took the two steel batons from him - waiting for him to change his mind, and take her head off with a swing of a blade. But he did no such thing, and simply opened his palm as she received his offer, and lowered his hand back to his sides.
A long tense moment hung in space as they keenly watched each other - waiting for the other to strike. Waiting to see what the other would do. He was waiting to see if she would throw his silent offer of 'truce' in his face and try decking him with the steel rod. She was waiting to see if he'd now take the chance to rip her face off.
Why wasn't he attacking her, anyway? He could have torn her apart while she was out cold. He could have dragged her back to the castle, if he was working for Dracula. He could have done a lot of things. But instead, he had propped her body up against a tree, and had sat there and waited for her to wake up. … Maybe he wasn't full of shit. Maybe he wasn't lying.
Could this seriously be Alucard? The Alucard? The one written about in the Belmont journals? Richard would be geeking out right now, blathering a list of questions a mile long at the stern vampire. He'd probably ask for an autograph. The mental image of Richard going fanboy all over the golden-eyed man in front of her made her snicker.
A thin eyebrow arched up in response, confused by her defensive stance, ready to attack him - but laughing to herself at a joke he was not aware of. "Are we intending to start again?" His voice was almost velvety in a weird way. But with an edge that almost gave it a foreboding quality. Foreboding, maybe - but not quite sinister.
Veil debated the idea for a moment. The proverbial ball had been put in her court. With a reluctant, heavy sigh, and swearing at herself in her head for being an idiot - she slid the batons back into the sheaths on the outside of her calves. He'd won the fight, after all. He'd do it again, in a tenth of the time as the first fight, if she started it again.
"I'm not stupid," she muttered as she leaned back against the tree and relaxed her stance. More for her own good, than his. "You'll win a second time if I try it right now." One of his thin, blond eyebrow moved upwards in a slight arch. She cracked her back, and her shoulder, hearing them audibly pop. She hissed in pain and rubbed the offending joint. "So no. I don't think so. You also didn't attack me while I was out cold. That counts for something."
"Hm," came the simple response.
"Are you lying to me? Are you actually - seriously - Alucard…?" she asked, the words sounding ridiculous coming out of her mouth.
"I am he. Nor do I believe it to be so great a benefit that another would seek to wear such a mantle under false pretenses." His golden eyes were scrutinizing her, again - and she hated feeling under a lens. "You yourself, said the histories were forgotten."
"Well," Veil said with another small laugh. "If I had to get my ass handed to me in a fight, I'm glad it was by you. Makes me feel a little less stupid." Veil tilted her head thoughtfully as something occurred to her. "What made you stop? What made you believe me?"
"Conviction to your cause, in the face of defeat. To accept that it is better to… 'die trying,' than to let the evil persist." His lips curled in a vaguely sarcastic smile. "Although, perhaps you are not troubled by such a concern."
Veil chewed on her blue painted lip. Two times today, she had to come back from the dead. And two times, it seemed like she'd have to explain it. She had done both things more today than she had done in the past ten years. "Yeah. About that. … I don't stay dead."
"So I see."
Veil wasn't in the habit of volunteering more information than was asked. It went down a pretty muddy road, pretty damn quickly if she did. So she did her best to change the subject. "I'm intending on going up that hill and doing my best to stop any more blood being spilt. There are two priests from the Order who are planning on doing the same - we have a rondevu scheduled in…" She fished her phone out of her pocket (which was one of those rugged nextel phones. She didn't take her iPhone into fights anymore - they didn't last twenty minutes.) "Half an hour."
She shoved it back into her pocket without reading the three text messages all from Richard. She'd text him back in when she didn't have the Alucard standing in front of her, to let him know she was alright. "I'm not going to lie… we could use all the help we can get."
"Priests of the holy rank do not like to sully themselves with vile monsters such as I… But if they have agreed to travel with you, perhaps their views have changed."
"I'm not a vile monster," Veil retorted, not enjoying the insult. She moved to walk past him - not liking being stuck between him and the tree. She didn't like being scrutinized either, even less than being cornered. A hand snapped around her upper arm, and kept her from her goal of walking away from him. She turned to look at him, and narrowed her eyes - making it very clear that she was unhappy with his gesture.
He ignored her disapproval, and also did not release her arm from his grasp. It wasn't a painful one - but firm enough to keep his purpose clear. "Your body and soul are severed from each other, yet both remain intact. You are a living soul, despite the repeated death of your body. You fight with the skill of someone many years past your age, your blood smells mortal - and yet you clearly are not. All this is impossible. And yet - here you stand. What manner of magic made you, is none that I have never seen nor heard of…"
Veil shook her head, and went to move again - but his hand around her upper arm pulled her back. She glared up at him - now angry that he was actively keeping her from walking away. She could 'phase out' and get away from him, if she weren't already trying to regain her stamina from the rest of the day. If she did it again, she'd probably pass out… again.
"If you seek my assistance in battling the castle and the creatures within - you will be straightforward with me. I will not fight beside someone whose nature is unclear to me."
"Listen, Skippy - you have until the count of three to let go of my arm," she threatened. It's not like she could fight him again and win, but that wouldn't stop her from trying - especially when she was being manhandled. "One…"
He released her arm without any more fuss, as he was apparently satisfied that his point had been made. He simply stood, stern-faced, and waited to see if her pride and discomfort would outweigh the obvious benefit his help would bring.
Veil ran both of her hands through her long blue hair and let out another disgruntled sigh. "A cult that served the fallen archangel Asmodeus, made me what I am. How exactly they made me, I don't know. I wasn't really awake during the ritual." That last part was a lie - but a practiced one. And besides - whatever, he didn't need to know the details. "When I woke up, I was the way I am now. I killed as many of them as I could before I fled. I want no part in being anybody's slave. And I stop them, and and anyone like them at every chance I get. Which is why I'm here. Good enough for you?"
It was like talking to a statue. She'd never met a vampire before. Or half vampire, or whatever he was - the journals left behind by the Belmont clan weren't exactly specific on the details. The way he could stand.. perfectly still… was a little unnerving. And he felt as judgemental as the statues of angels he resembled. But, finally, he seemed to acquiesce. "For now."
He turned, then - 'done' with the conversation, and headed off into the woods towards the road.
"Great Good talk." Veil followed after him. God, she was tired. Hopefully they'd march for a while and then take a nap, or something. She pulled her coat around herself. Even though the night was warm, she obviously felt freezing.
"Should I call you Alucard? Or what?"
"You may call me Adrian."
Veil walked after him in silence for a moment. He made no noise as he walked - and she did. It made her feel like a lumbering beast, cracking the occasional stick beneath her feet. She wondered if he expected to return the favor - give him her 'real' name.
There wasn't a 'real' name to give him, not as far as she was concerned. The only people who had ever called her anything other than Veil - weren't worth their weight in rat shit, in her opinion. She didn't even want him to know it was a possibility to call her anything other than what she chose to call herself. So she remained silent.
Well, on that subject at least. "So you can walk in daylight? That's cool. Is it just you, or all vampires?"
"All vampires. We are weaker in the day, nothing more." And nothing else. No explanation of why, or where the legend came from… great. Adrian was not a chatty man, it seemed. They walked in silence for some time before she spoke up. "Did I at least hurt you a little in the fight?"
"... Perhaps."
Veil laughed at that, grinning at the back of his head. She couldn't tell if he was trying to be humorous in his own, clearly barely-there way - or if he honestly thought that didn't give away the fact she had at least put a dent or two in him.
Either way, she'd take that.
'A mystery that deepened,' was a phrase that summed her up nicely. The woman - Veil, as she wished to be called - was not telling him the whole story. And to be truthful, Adrian could not blame her. A darkness had killed the playful shine in her eyes the moment she mentioned those who made her. It was a painful topic of conversation, and he felt no more need to pry. He learned what he needed to know. Indeed he had done so more from her reactions than from her words.
She did not seek to be this way. This was not her choice to straddle the barrier between life and death. And now, she sought to carry out what she believed to be her duty. A duty to right the wrongs caused by those that gave her such a burden.
Adrian could find no fault in that, lest he accuse a mirror.
Veil had taken out a strange contraption from her pocket again - some little technological device he was unfamiliar with. She was pushing buttons on it quickly, with a somewhat alarming dexterity. Then, a pause. A few seconds later, and it would beep, and she would begin typing again. Much like a morse code machine, he observed. It must be some manner of communication.
"Poor Richie," he heard her say quietly through a laugh. Even though he did not acknowledge that she had spoken, she still felt the need to explain. "Richard's my good friend. We've done a lot of 'cult hunting' together. He's a nerd." She paused as she realized he had no idea what she meant. "A bookworm. A scholar. I told him who I'd found, and he's losing his mind-" she said with another laugh. "He's insanely jealous."
Adrian assumed that this 'Richard' was likely unwieldy in a fight. He was glad that he would not need to worry about a mortal unable to defend themselves. Adrian preferred to fight alone, although it was not unheard of for him to join ranks with like-minded hunters.
They reached the edge where the forest met the road. The path up the mountain quickly became shrouded in darkness. The line of the castle's corruption. They had emerged from the forest at a spot that was well out of sight of the military barricade.
Adrian could sense the two men - smell their blood upon the air, before he saw them. They had hidden themselves behind a pair of trees - wisely staying off the road. As he and Veil had exited the woods, they stepped out.
One of the priests with reddish hair had his hands on the grips of two guns, holstered one at each side. He had not drawn them yet - but he was strongly considering it. The other seemed unarmed - but Adrian knew better than to believe such a thing. Those who did not carry weapons of a physical nature, often carried ones of a magical one instead.
"Who's this?" the redheaded priest asked with a thick Irish accent, refusing to take his eyes off of Adrian. The vampire kept himself similarly prepared. It would not be the first time he had come to blows with of the holy order.
"Uh. This is the guy who the military took as a prisoner last night. This is Adrian Tepes… This is Alucard."
The other priest who carried no weapons stopped walking. "You must certainly be joking," he said with his own accent, Italian this time.
"I know, it's nuts. I called bullshit on him already, and… uh, well, we punched it out, and I believe him now." Veil walked into the center of the street towards them. By the way she moved, they were not old friends. These were not people she knew well. Associates by a common need.
"I missed a fight?!" The Irishman sounded incredibly disappointed.
"I'm sure there'll be more," she replied with a smirk, and then looked back at him. "Adrian, this is Gabriel, and Conrad." At the mention of their names, the two priests nodded once in turn.
The Italian was still keenly looking at Adrian. "I dislike that neither have time nor opportunity to question this. We have no reason to trust him, but on your word. And to be blut," he trailed off.
"We barely have any reason to trust you, Blue," the Irishman finished.
"I know, I know…" She shook her head and shrugged. "I don't know how to fix that. We all don't trust anyone else, but we don't have a choice if we're going to stand a chance against that." She pointed up the hill at the looming darkness that had no business being there. "Can't we all just promise not to stab anybody while we're sleeping and move on?"
"Works for me," the Irishman removed his hands from his guns, and started walking up the road. He was clearly impatient and had little desire to be involved in 'petty issues.' He unshouldered a pack from one arm as he walked past Veil, and tossed it to her. She caught it, slung it over her own back, and followed after him.
She had made it a handful of steps before looking back at him, and smiled mischievously back at him. Her eyes shone with the levity and playfulness that seemed to come to her so readily. "You've already stabbed me once anyway. Isn't that right?"
Adrian had to smile, faintly, at the ease in which she shrugged off what had happened, and joked about it so lightly. He began to walk after them. He was committed to see the castle fall once more - and he would be a fool to turn away assistance.
"Well! Now we have to let Gabe kill you, to complete the set, huh?" Conrad said with a grin in their direction, him having turned to walk backwards as he spoke for the moment. "Shot once, stabbed once - how about a fireball?"
"No. No fire," Veil turned back forward, and although she was joining in the facetious conversation, he could tell she was also not entirely joking. "Fire is second worst, beaten out only by drowning."
"Drowning? Why drowning?" Irishman asked, curiously. "Doesn't seem terrible, out of all the options."
"For most people, sure. But think about it. The water doesn't just go away. I just keep drowning." Veil shuddered dramatically.
"Oh.. Oh God," Conrad made a face, and blanched as he tried to picture it. "That's a livin' nightmare, huh?"
"You have no idea."
"No drowning. Got it." And from there, the conversation trailed thankfully into silence, as the four of them made their way up the road and into the darkness that had been painted on the world like the work of a landscape artist.
They had walked for hours in silence. Veil was burning with questions to pester Adrian with - questions about his past, his family - the Belmonts. What it must be like. Was he a full vampire? Half vampire? How did that really work exactly? But she kept her mouth shut. First, he didn't seem like the 'small talk' type. Second, if she asked him questions, that meant he could ask her questions.
They had walked out of the 'normal' darkness of the night into this weird… reddish-grey, 'wrong' darkness. The castle's corruption even seemed to be changing the trees and animals. Everything looked like a darker, twisted version of its normal self. No birds or animals could be heard in the trees. In fact, nothing except their footsteps on the pavement. The sky had a haze at the edges, revealing only hints of the stars beyond.
They crossed more wrecked vehicles on the road. One looked like it had been thrown - through several dozen trees by a creature of some enormous size.
Another mile up the road, and it ceased to be pavement. Now it was dirt and gravel. She wondered if that was because of the castle's corruption, or just because the road turned to gravel anyway? It was hard to tell. This part of the country probably looked remarkably similar and unchanged over several hundreds of years.
The four of them pulled up to a slow halt as the road finally entered into a town. Really, it was more of a village. A collection of four or five houses, centered around a well. The houses were rickety and old, bent and unpainted. They were built by people without the means or intention of making them last. The thatched roofs looked uncared for, and punched in by the weather. No one had been up there to repair them in some time. This was not a village of modern - or even nearly modern construction. It looked like a window into the past. And if she hadn't known better - abandoned.
The full moon cast the village in a sickening red light. The line of the forest beyond was a black cutout against the faintly glowing sky. And in the distance, the outline of the castle. Black jagged fingernails against a red sky.
But they had a more immediate concern.
The village was littered with corpses. Torn to shreds or lying where they were tossed and discarded like children's toys. Smears of blood against the walls were dried and it was hard to tell how old the marks were. Torches burned in sconces on the walls or on posts in the roadways between the homes. But while the torches burned as if they were recently lit - the bodies were old and decayed, dried and desiccated. They had been dead a very long time.
That said… they might be dead… but they were moving.
Veil couldn't help but laugh, and pulled her two iron rods out of their sheaths, and twirled them, stretching her wrists. "Zombies. Honest-to-God motherfucking zombies." Veil looked to Adrian with a grin. "While I'm thinking about it - are werewolves real?"
"... Yes."
"This is awesome." she said, her grin still broad as she looked at the zombies shambling about in front of them. "We get to kill zombies."
Adrian looked down at her with a raised eyebrow and a bemused twist of his lips. He then gestured a hand towards them, palm up. As if he were a gentleman at court, inviting a courtier to pass through a door before him. "Ladies first."
She didn't need to hear it twice. With a laugh - she dashed her soul at one of the zombies and let her body follow suit - using the inertia to wind up for a swing. She hit the head of a zombie with such force that it bent backwards a hundred and eighty degrees at the neck. It snapped back like the head of a toy with a sickening crunch of bone, as the bone crumbled under the blow. It slumped lifelessly to the ground, its thin knees snapping as it crumbled to the ground as a pile of dust, detriment and bits of bone.
The other corpses around her all swiveled to look at her and began to lurch in her direction, arms outstretched, ready to kill - and she couldn't keep the grin off her face. This was going to be fun. She took on several of them without having to use her power to dodge or to take swings at them. They crumbled easily under the swing of a steel rod.
They were faster moving than the zombies of an old Romero film, but not quite the pop culture 'running zombies' either. A dash at another zombie - and she popped its head clean off with the impact, sending it rolling up the street, coming to a stop a few feet in front of the three men.
The three of them watched it cease its approach, winding up with one cheek down on the road, decayed empty sockets sightlessly staring ahead and its jaw, now shattered from the blow, hanging off one part of its face by a thin stretch of skin.
"You boys going to do anything useful or just stand around there and watch? You're really going to let me have-" she ducked under the arm of one of the zombies and jammed her steel rod through the brittle skull and out the other side. "-all the fun?" She pulled the rod out of the head of the zombie, and looked at the steel - still decorated with a few pieces of rotting flesh. "Eeeewuh." She flicked it, sending the bits of skin to the ground. "Ew, ew, ew."
The three stepped forward to help clear out the rest of the town. Gabriel's powers seemed to be that of the elements. Roots grew from the ground to crush the ribcage of a few of them. Then, he froze a zombie with a gesture and a rush of cold air - another burst into flame. (Although fire seemed to quickly be a bad idea, as it set a nearby overturned cart on fire.) Conrad was taking his time, picking them off, one gunshot at a time.
Meanwhile, Adrian looked like a trained dancer. Veil stopped to watch, in awe, as the man elegantly moved through the forray, his long, thin blade whirling around him and rendering everything it touched to dust. Nothing seemed to slow him down - and certainly nothing touched him.
He might as well have been breathing air or walking across a room, so simple and easy he made it look. It was so natural to him. These creatures were not worth his time - this was a walk to get the morning paper from the front lawn, not a fight with unholy monsters. When she had been fighting him, she had been too busy trying not to lose and get stabbed, to really watch him. And now that she had the chance, she couldn't really look away.
The fight was over quickly - the animated corpses now lying as piles of dust and pieces of bone strewn about. He sheathed his sword with a quick and simple gesture. As their eyes met - he raised an eyebrow at her once again, as if to ask what she was staring at. Veil realized she must have been watching him, agog, and she coughed, and shook her head. "Nice moves, Twinkletoes," she quipped sarcastically in hopes of covering her fascination as she slipped her weapons back into their sheaths.
"Tell me, Alucard…" Gabriel began, the fire that had appeared between his fingers snuffing out with a small woosh. "You fight like one of them. You move like one of them."
"I was trained by them," Adrian replied, darkly. He turned to face the priest, his face stern, assuming the stance of a man accustomed to verbal and physical confrontations over 'his nature.'
"That is not what I mean. Are you vampire? I must know. The histories were not clear," Gabriel was cautious - ready.
"He's got fangs," Conrad pointed out. "What're they for, if not to use them?"
"I seek to stop the evil, same as you." Adrian's hand went to the hilt of his sword. But he did not draw it. "It does not matter."
"It matters if you decide you're up for a snack," Conrad hadn't replaced his guns into his holsters. Lowered, but at the ready. It was a standoff now, between Adrian and the priests. A cold war.
"You think me so base? I have not drank the blood of a human in hundreds of years. And never have I done so, from one who is unwilling," Adrian scoffed, not realizing he was walking into a trap.
"Hah! So you do drink blood!" Conrad raised his guns to point them at the vampire. "That settles it."
"Put your goddamn guns down, Darby O'Gill," Veil snapped and stepped forward, into the line of the bullets. "He's on our side."
"He's a vampire." Conrad pointed out again. "And these bullets'll go straight through you, Blue - so don't think you'll stop me by getting in the way."
"How is he any different than me?! I'm a freak, trying to fight against evil. He's part vampire, part human. I'm part living, and part dead! And you're alright with me, but not him?!"
"We do not know in what ratio he is vampire or human. And most importantly, the difference is that you do not feed off the living," Gabriel reminded her.
"He doesn't either! He said so - hasn't in hundreds of years. Probably not since he told his dad to fuck off."
"He could be lying."
Veil threw her hands up in frustration. "We could all be lying! We've been through that. You could be lying to me, I could be lying to you, he could be lying to us. We have to just take each other at our word for once! We could stand here and play pokerface for weeks while that thing just kills more and more people. We've agreed to work together. What more do you want?!" Veil stepped closer to Conrad, closer to the two guns he held aloft. It was true, the bullets would go straight through her like air - but she was making a point, goddamnit. "He's going to give us the best damn chance we have of stopping this thing from unleashing hell on earth."
Conrad wavered, but didn't lower his gun. Veil kept ranting. "If I have to pick which set of you assholes I'm going with, I'm going with him-" she pointed at Adrian without turning. "Why? Because he's the only one of us who's actually fucking done it before!"
Conrad's jaw was twitching, and Gabriel now stood beside his brother in arms. Gabriel reached out a hand and put it on Conrad's arm, and Conrad lowered his weapons. "You speak… sense, if not sensibly," Gabriel said, uncomfortably. "Although I am not happy about this."
"None of us are," Veil pointed out as she turned to walk. "Now let's get out of here before I'm the one that loses control - over the urge to smack one of you."
Several more hours of walking, and they had to stop and rest. Adrian could have kept plodding along, but his human companions needed to sit for a time. Honestly, he didn't mind. They found a small clearing close to the road, but far enough out of sight of any marauding creatures using the roads for their own needs.
They didn't dare light a fire. And they would not be here for more than an hour's time.
Gabriel sat upon a fallen log, and Conrad had sat down on the ground, his back against a rock. Veil was lying on the ground near the other edge of the clearing, her coat balled up under her head. She was looking up at the stars faintly visible through the reddish haze, but her eyes kept drifting shut. Her dark blue hair was pooled around her head, and looked nearly black in the reddish light of the sky. Only from time to time, when she moved her head, would it catch the light and reveal its true color.
Adrian, meanwhile, had taken his post by one of the trees, leaning against it, searching the darkness with a sight that the humans did not share. His vision in the darkness was far sharper, far brighter than they could ever hope to achieve.
Adrian could not help but glance back at the young woman lying on the ground. "You did not need to defend me," he said, his voice quiet enough for her to hear, but not the two men across the way. His words were not for them.
"I know. But your version of 'defending yourself' comes with less words, more stabbing." She turned her head to look up at him, smiling again with her jesting of him. She was quick to laugh, and even quicker to smile. Such natural mirth was foreign to him, and he found himself almost jealous of it.
It was that brief moment of envy that lead him to change his intention in the conversation. "You called us one and the same. You are mistaken. I fear you do not know of what you speak." Adrian looked off into the darkness, the cold feeling that came with thoughts of the nature of his existence settling upon him, reminding him of the truth of his world. They were not the same - if they were, she would not look up on the world so gleefully.
He had seen her with the zombies - laughing and enjoying the fight. It came naturally to her, with or without her gifts that made her far more formidable than a normal mortal. It looked as though she was having fun. No one in this world was akin to he - and if they were, they would not view the world through such a lens as Veil possessed.
"Maybe I don't. But maybe I do."
He turned his head to look at her then - her voice had lost its lustre. Its playful, sarcastic shine. It was the darkness that he had seen dull her eyes when she had spoke of her past. She had turned her attention back to the stars above, not looking at him. He suspected she was not focused upon the stars truly, either - but a darker thing inside her own mind. Her face had fallen into an expression that he was far more familiar with - a morose kind of suffering.
There was more to her story - he could feel its presence on the edges of the conversation. It was weighing on her like a tangible force. What did she mean by her words? He was at the disadvantage - she knew his tale, but he did not know hers. Not fully - only the barest outline she wished to furnish him. The pained expression on her face, coupled with the darkness that had overtaken her, lead him to believe that there might be something about his own life, indeed, that she may share. "I-"
"Don't." she cut him off, shutting her eyes. Her voice was barely above a whisper, as he begged him not to continue. "Just don't. Please."
He could demand answers. He could press the subject, and find a means of extracting her tale from her. Threaten to leave this haphazard 'party' and go his own way, if she did not tell him.
But it would pain her greatly - and he found he suddenly did not enjoy this crestfallen version of her. And he was to blame for it. Adrian was not one to care about the past of others - not one to wish to hear their stories. He reminded himself of that as he urged himself not to be so curious about hers.
"Thank you for what you did," he finally said after the long pause - which was why he had sought out the conversation in the first place. An expression of gratitude, not to start a tense discussion about how her history may-or-may-not be parallel with his. Adrian was not skilled in the art of conversation, and often times he found it running away from him like a cart without a horse down a steep hill. It was a large part of the reason he chose to largely abstain from the hobby.
"You're welcome," she said with a smile, her eyes still shut. "Besides, I couldn't let Conrad ruin your lovely coat." And so quickly, her levity returned, the strife so easily forgotten.
"Well, that's not fucking creepy or anything," Veil grumbled as they stood at the bottom of a hill. A hill that lead up to a slowly spinning windmill.
Two more hours of walking through the mountainous landscape, and they had come upon this structure, far removed from anything else.
The windmill was a decrepit thing - the fabric of the sails long since hanging in tattered, ripped strings from the frame. As it slowly rotated, dutifully going about its job with no mind to the fact that it had no real means of doing so - the fabric twisted, and blew in the wind. It looked like a skeleton of its former self, worn and broken.
It was a dark outline against the reddish-grey, feverish haze of the sky. The sound of wood straining, creaking on itself as the slow rotation of the blades went about its business was the only sound breaking the silence.
It stood in the center of a field on a hill - the grass was long, and uncut. It blew in the breeze like waves - flattening and straightening, reflecting the glint of the sky overhead. You never really get a chance to see the wind and how it moves - to really take a moment to think about it. Watching the long grass flatten in waves like the ocean, it gave her that opportunity for a moment. It reached up past her thighs, and had not seen any care in many decades. The moment was gone as soon as it came, and it was time to move on. As they walked through it, they found themselves with Adrian leading - then Gabriel, then her, then Conrad.
"Bringing up the rear, or just enjoying watching it?" she shot a wink at the Irishman behind her.
He hooted in laughter, and grinned back lopsidedly at her. "Cheeky! Finding humor in a place like this?"
"Richard has a general theory about the universe. There are three universal laws: death, taxes, and Veil'll make her own amusement."
"Eh, it's already bunk. You don't die."
"Best two out of three, then."
"Quiet," came Adrian's voice from the front. And that was enough to set all of them on edge and kill their banter like a lightswitch.
They were approaching the windmill. When the vampire drew his sword, the rest of them drew their own weapons. He approached the door to the mill, standing to one side of it. He pushed it open with a hand… and nothing happened.
The door swung inward, creaking as it moved. The corner dug into the ground somewhere past the halfway mark, and it stopped opening. The group of them took a moment for anything to happen - then made their way inside the structure one by one.
It was incredibly dark inside. The grinding of wood and stone filled the room. It was a repetitive noise of a structure that had made the same motion for a hundred years. A distinctive thumping and grind that it would continue to make for the next hundred, if left to its own devices.
Conrad and Gabriel both produced flashlights, flicking them on to scan the room. Veil could see the energy of the place - see any lurking figures if there were any. It was like seeing a heatscope of a building. Normally, it was overlaid with her 'normal' vision of the world, and she had learned to tune it out largely. But here in the darkness, it took front and center focus.
Adrian apparently needed no light to see either, she assumed for very different reasons. He was walking carefully into the center of the windmill - his steps making no noise on the packed dirt floor. They were all at the ready, each of them preparing for an ambush from any side. But none of it did them any good.
The lights in the windmill burst into flame. A dozen glass lanterns hung on hand-hewn and rough-sawn wood beams, spirling up the center of the windmill up to the top. The flames illuminated the space - casting stark and flickering shadows against the walls of the tall, abandoned structure.
It was not the illumination that was the problem - it was who caused it.
A figure floated in the air over them - tattered robes hanging off thin shoulders, a hood pulled over a skeletal head. A wicked, elaborate scythe was in his hands, made of bone. The scythe was etched and detailed, crafted a long time ago by forces whose names were lost to time.
It cackled in laughter. "The prodigal child returns!"
"Death," Adrian 'greeted' the spectre. He had taken a defensive stance the moment the lights had flickered on, his long, elegant sword at the ready.
"How low you have sunk, associating yourself with vermin such as this… Tell me, do you still travel upon your foolish, childish crusade? Do you still seek to forsake all that you are? All that you are meant to be?!" The robes of the skeletal monster were blowing in a wind that was not felt in the relatively still air of the windmill. One of his hands - bleached bone that had no business being attached to the rest of his skeletal form, with no tendons to keep them in place, gestured idly at his side as he spoke. The other kept grasp of the handle of the elaborate blade.
"I have had enough of your pointless diatribe," Adrian readied himself for a fight.
"I was not speaking to you, whelp," Death said with a derogatory huff. "Do not waste my time."
"What?!"
Veil had locked solid - her hands gripping her weapons tight enough to turn her knuckles white. She was staring at the creature wide-eyed. Shock, horror, and anger ripping through her all at once. It was the anger that had kept her from speaking this entire time. And to be honest, she was hoping the creature had been talking to Adrian.
But now, Adrian stepped to the side to look at her - without turning his back on Death. He saw the dire look on her face. One that spoke of far more history than there had any business being. Veil felt her heart pound in her chest as adrenaline rushed her system.
Luckily the floating creature didn't have a chance to elaborate on his words. Conrad and Gabriel were tired of the whole exchange - and opened fire. Figuratively, and literally.
The fight was a mad blur of action. Death had begun summoning blades from thin air - small, whirling things that kareened through the air at their intended target. It was a full time job just keeping them deflected.
In bad news for Conrad - his bullets went straight through Death like he wasn't even there. There was no flesh to damage. He managed to land a shot through Death's forehead - exploding a hole through the center and rocking its head backwards. The action paused as they waited to see if that did it - but Death only tilted his head forward again, and laughed. The bone of his head seemed to mend itself like a video of a mirror shattering, played in reverse.
Veil herself managed to get a few good hits - but Death could disappear and reappear at a whim and in the blink of an eye. But, so could she. He caught her once, with the handle of his scythe, and she felt the long handle impact her ribs and send her flying - crashing into a wood beam of the mill. She fell to the ground and couldn't breathe, having the wind knocked out of her. Veil put her hand to her ribs, and tried to fill her lungs again with air. Finally, it worked and she coughed - and heard another crash and the massive sound of wood splintering and caving in. . She looked up to see what the source of the noise had been.
Gabriel had been thrown against, and more importantly - through - a stack of barrels against one wall. The barrels had caved in on him and he was now out of sight, buried under the mass of wood.
"Enough of this!" Death howled. He motioned his hands, and she felt the ground around her feet… tighten, for lack of a better word. Power surged through the space, and she saw the room flicker and dance with the power of dark magic. It shimmered in the version of her vision that saw the spirit world - although it was barely visible in the physical one.
The floor of the mill was now aglow with strange symbols. He had triggered a spell - something laid here before they arrived. A trap. The ceremonial magic writing on the floor was familiar to her. She knew the words written on the floor, and could decipher their cryptic meanings. Veil had grown up raised by cultists, after all. And when you're in the business of stopping them, you learn.
Her limbs felt locked solid - and judging by everyone else - theirs had as well. She couldn't move. If she forced herself to relax - forced herself not to make an aggressive movement, she could… but barely. It was spell meant to pacify. Not restrict. She stood up from the ground, trying to control her urge to fight. Every time she tensed, the spell would react and her body would freeze. Only trying to relax - trying to go 'zen' allowed her to move again.
"Believe it or not, I did not come here to kill you." Death spoke, idly twirling the scythe in his hand. To her, specifically. "You and I both know how much of an utterly pointless waste of time that would be. I only came to say… hello, after all this time. And how thrilled I am you have come here!"
"Bullshit," Veil growled.
Adrian and Conrad didn't know what kind of magic they were up against - and both of them stood, locked still like statues.
"You don't know me," she said with a derisive laugh. "You're full of shit. You aren't Azrael. You're just some half-rate dimestore skeleton who learned how to fly," she snarled her insult him. "Thought you could be some hot shit if you carried a scythe and called yourself 'Death.' You're not fooling me."
Death cackled again, laughing his pitched, sharp laugh. "Such fire will serve you well. Oh, you are such a delight!" he cried as he lowered himself from the height he had been floating at, taking a position ten feet in front of her. "You know as well as I - that I am but one manifestation of the infinitely faceted being that must encompass the whole of death. One of us can not be everywhere at once. We are death, we must be all things, to all people. I am the reaper. You knew the archangel. We are one and the same! Faces of the same gem."
"Shut up and stop lying," she shook her head, but that didn't stop her fear and ner nerves from flipping over in her stomach.
"If I am not Death, answer me this. How is it that I know your darkest secrets? If I am just a common spectre, as you claim - how, precisely," he began, leadingly, enjoying his position of power in the conversation. "-would I know your name?"
"Don't," she warned him. "Don't you fucking dare."
"Ah!" He laughed again, cackling. "Now you believe me!" Death floated closer to her. "Just a moment ago, you said there was no means by which I could know you. Now you do not wish to back your claim! I have called your bluff, as it were. But no matter - you deserve proof that we are one in the same, do you not?"
"Don't-" she threatened again.
"It is so wonderful to see you in the flesh once more, Selina Nephthys Solomon," he said her 'name' with great pride and glee. Enjoying far too much that he was ruining her night. "Or have you forgotten it?"
Veil went to strike him - and felt herself lock up - felt herself freeze in mid-motion, mid-strike. He cackled again in laughter, loving the sight of her losing control. He floated up to her, and put a single bony finger under her chin, knowing by her snarl and her glare how badly she wanted to smash his head apart. It made him only that more amused. "My dear, dear sweet girl… If you're here, I'm am certain 'he' is not far behind you. What a wonderful family reunion, we'll be certain to have! Until then!"
Death floated up, then, into the rafters of the windmill, and in a swirl of black fabric and a laugh that faded into darkness. As he disappeared, his spell did as well. Veil, Adrian and Conrad completed their motions like someone had hit play on a paused tape recorder. She staggered to catch herself.
Rage - unfulfilled anger poured through her like molten metal.
Instead of sheathing her weapons, she turned her rage on a nearby wooden post. With a howl of frustration, she began to beat the ever-loving shit out of the wood post with her steel rods. Her fingers were aching, her arms were burning - she didn't care. She kept smashing at the wood - needing, desperately, to hit something. Her intended target was now gone.
Finally, she tired herself out, and she rested her forearm against the splintered, battered surface. She put her forehead against her arm, and let herself catch her breath.
She heard Conrad pulling Gabriel out of the pile of splintered barrels. She heard the feet on the packed dirt approach her. No. No, fuck this. She couldn't. Shoving the iron rods into the sheaths on her calves, she walked out. No, more aptly, she stormed out of the windmill and into the open air. The cooler air of the field was a relief against her flushed face. She stood there for a moment, a pause - as she tried to figure out where to go.
Hearing more steps behind her, she just started walking in the direction of the castle. Well, she tried.
"Wait." A hand closed around her upper arm, stopping her from moving. She whirled on Adrian - fist raised, intending to sock him in the face. But a hand closed around her fist, stopping its path.
Gold eyes met her dark ones, and she growled in anger, and shoved him. He let himself be pushed back a step, and released her. When she tried to walk away again, he gripped her wrist, stopping her. He was not going to let her get away without an explanation - and she wasn't going to give him one.
She rounded on him with a kick - and he blocked it. She went for another punch, and he deflected it. Letting himself be a recipient of her rage. Now, it was his turn to be on defence only. She a dozen strikes at him, trying to punch or kick him, and each time he deflected them. But never once struck her in return.
Each time she threw a blow - he would block. But never respond. Letting her work through her anger - letting her tire herself out. When she would go to walk away from him - he would grab her by the arm to stop her. She'd try to kick him, punch him - he'd block, deflect. She could neither walk away, nor successfully hit him.
She could phase out to the spirit world and escape - but it would tire her out, more than she already was. Her anger was keeping her from thinking clearly anyway - all she wanted to do was storm away, or punch him in his perfect face and the frustration of not being to do either.
She threw a punch once more, and once more he caught her fist in his hand. She met his gold eyes - passive, stern - almost emotionless. Declaring that she was the problem. That she was being the unreasonable one. She let out a cry of anger and shoved him back again, and he let her. But that was the end of it. The judgement in his eyes was the end of it, and it finally broke down her rage. In the absence of the fire, there was a void. One that caved her inwards and made her unable to keep pointlessly tiring herself out.
Finally, her heart pounding, breath quick in her lungs, limbs exhausted and hurting, she gave up. She walked to the exterior wall of the mill, put her back against it, and slipped to the ground. Resting her elbows on her knees, she rested her head back against the wood wall, and let herself focus on slowing her heart rate down.
"He knew you," Adrian began the conversation, after letting her catch her breath.
She didn't answer. Couldn't. She didn't have a reply worth making. Neither a denial nor a confirmation, and it didn't really matter either way. It hadn't been a question anyway - it was a statement of fact.
"Who is he to you?" Gabriel asked from nearby. He sounded strained from his impact into the barrels - but fine.
"Nobody."
"What role has he played in your life?" Adrian asked, a far better, far more specific question. Gabriel had asked one that was easy to get around without overtly lying. Adrian's was much harder.
Veil opened her eyes finally and looked out across the treetops of the forest nearby. The ruddy hue of the sky, and the stars just barely visible beyond the haze. She took in a long breath, and let it out slowly, mentally preparing herself for the storm that was about to hit.
"He's my father."