Disclaimer: same as part one. Unofficial soundtrack: "Zero Hour", "Silent Pain" (Noir OST)
Chapter Four
"Night's candles are all burnt out."
--Romeo and Juliet, Act Three, Scene Five
Vergil woke with the rare disconnect of not knowing where he had slept. Some sort of coarsely-woven cloth lay over his face. Panic flared, brief, but razor-sharp. He suppressed it, trying to take stock of his surroundings. The fabric was too light to be canvas, he could see a smoky light through the weave. He was not, somehow, being buried alive at sea.
He lay on something lumpy but too soft to be dirt. Listening, he heard only traffic sounds, muffled by walls and distance. He could sense no other presence nearby—or at least, not close enough to be of consequence. Yamato was near, and that was enough.
Reaching up, he touched damp terrycloth and realized he was still wearing his sunglasses. Why was there a damp handtowel over his face? He sat up slowly, and a warm softness fell away from him. A blanket, he realized. He'd been lying in a bed.
Quite naked.
A moment later, the pain crashed down.
He actually gasped, one hand flying to the back of his head. He expected to feel blood, splintered fragments of bone. But he touched only his own hair, slightly damp from sweat. His blood moved like sludge through his veins, carrying one slow roll of pain after another. Pain like this sapped one's strength instead of building it. As an insult to the injury, there was no-one to take this pain. His strength was being wasted.
He tried to think past the pain, to orient himself in time and space. There was a gap in his memory, as if someone had physically scooped out the portion of his mind where those memories were stored. He shuddered. This was a break in a memory chain that reeled back to the womb. Even when asleep, he could account for time. It never folded in on itself like this.
A human thing, to forget, to be unaware. With a snarl, he threw the blanket aside. If he could drain the human from his blood, he'd open his veins right then and there. It was intolerable that he should be as vulnerable to these petty frailties as any mortal.
Ignoring the pain in his head as best he could, he swung his legs over the side of the mattress. Dizziness surged, chasing the line of bile rising in his throat. Moving with great care, Vergil leaned forward, cradling his head in his hands.
Concentrate. I do not know where I am... so where have I been? The last thing he remembered with any clarity was arriving in Capulet City and sensing the Hellgate. Summoning his patience, he waited out the first wave of uncertainty. Gradually, bits and pieces began to surface.
He remembered meeting Enzo, going to the Cellar. There had been...a fight. The knuckles of his right hand flared with phantom pain. Had he been involved? What had happened that he would resort to using his fists instead of his sword?
His boots lay in a clumsy X on the matted shag carpet, not set neatly side-by-side as he would have done. So he had not removed his own clothing. He had not come here alone.
"Impossible," he hissed.
No enemy would have brought him to shelter, left him tucked warm in bed, with his sword close to hand. He had no allies here, no servants bound to his will. Who, in this god-forsaken shithole of a city, would have helped him?
Toni.
The name conjured memory, an image of the construct shaped from his brother's blood and bone. He licked his lips, but they were dry and chapped, carrying no trace of the blood he'd so briefly tasted. She had as little cause to aid him as anyone else in the city. For a mirror-doll, following the master's dictates was the highest priority. Why would that wretched thief want Vergil kept alive? Unless...
Unless the thief was a collector, looking for more additions to his zoo. Vergil raised his head. A glint of blue caught his eye. There seemed to be something...glowing...on the cheap nightstand. Frowning, he picked it up.
The starfish-shaped crystal fit snugly into the palm of his hand. At first, it felt icy cold, but warmed quickly. Glints of silver shone deep in the heart of the blue crystal. He stared, fascinated, as the tiny lights shone brighter. With a soundless 'pop', the crystal burst and sent a shimmering wave of light over him.
The light swept away the pain, the heaviness in his limbs. It soothed the rawness in his throat, eased the dry achiness behind his eyes. It did not, however, restore his memory. It seemed there were things even a Holy Star could not repair.
He had never succeeded in creating a Holy Star. Either his alchemical knowledge was incomplete, or something essential to the power found him repellent. Demon blood carried some flaws with it, inborn weaknesses to certain magics or elements. He'd assumed that on some level, he'd absorbed the foolish human propaganda about his father's kind and thus could not easily work 'blessed' artifacts.
But whoever had brought him here knew how to make them, or had ready access to them. And, judging by the white square set carefully beside the lamp, had used it as a paperweight. To use such a valuable artifact for such a mundane purpose could only be meant to mock him. Someone in this city knew exactly what he was, and wanted him cognizant of that.
The paper bore a blurry logo, declaring it the property of the 'Royal Court Motor Inn,' apparently his current address. He snorted softly at the name. The handwriting looked familiar, a rounder version of Dante's childhood scrawl. Something tightened low in his gut. She even wrote like his brother.
Gilver, it began,
Hope you're alive to read this! Sorry about your stuff, man, but I don't make the rules, I just break 'em. I set the clock for you. Try to get outta there by noon, ok? The room isn't exactly paid for—but you owe me $50 for the rest.
See ya when I see ya!
Toni.
Well, he thought numbly, at least she didn't put a little heart over the 'i'--though a female Dante might've done precisely that, just to needle him. But this wasn't Dante, what he would have done should not impact the spell-wrought creature made from him.
'$50 for the rest'. What was that supposed to mean? The rest of what? And what time was it? He cast back through the dim void in his memory. Only fragments came to his frantic grasp. The mirror-doll's alluring scent, adding depth and texture to the darkness... the soft murmur of a voice... She had been the one to tend him during the nightmare. The Holy Star had been hers.
Had she left it to taunt him? Or was she merely obeying her master's orders?
"This is absurd," he said through clenched teeth, but his body did not seem to care. It wanted to return to the darkness, to the promised warmth. As if...
No... he could not have lain with her and come away with no change to himself. High-caste demons knew the power in blood and mating, and carefully governed their use of both. Toni was a construct designed to tempt him—and a very potent temptation she was, he had to admit—but her stolen blood must obey the same mandates as his own.
Females were more immune to the biological dictums than males with demon blood. If a mating did not result in issue, they were free to abandon their partner. For males... Well, Vergil had always thought it was due to the number of female demons that consumed their partners after a successful conception. Once one chose their death, it was almost an insult to be denied it.
But even without progeny, females had a...partiality...for the ones they'd chosen, a partiality any intelligent male exploited. After all, one of the first things a male did after a successful breeding was to kill all of his consort's previous paramours. If he had succumbed to Toni, he doubted he would have let her leave, no matter his condition.
The compulsion of blood.
His father had spoken of that in the dreamweaving. Vergil had never heard the term before, not with the intent he'd sensed behind it. From the way his father had spoken of it, it seemed a thing one simply knew. In the Underworld, anyway. He and Dante had lived their entire lives in the mortal world. Genetic knowledge that would have been stimulated there might lie dormant for years here.
But that did not mean a sorcerer could not know of it. Indeed, they were well known for ferreting out knowledge they should not possess. Vergil rubbed his forehead, trying to restore order to his thoughts.
The sudden blare of an electronic alarm clock shattered his reverie. Turning with a snarl, he brought his fist down on the clock. Plastic shards flew everywhere, and the annoying 'brap' cut off with a sheep-like bleat.
Well. Now he knew what time it was.
Time. The dreamweaving. The Living Books.
He had not thought of them in years. Could the sorcerer who'd created Toni somehow have discovered one of the dead copies? One that had reflected Sparda's bloodline? Or... was it one of the Dark Emperor's servants, feeding knowledge to a human agent in order to extinguish the last of the Dark Knight's bloodline? Another unwelcome possibility, but one that he must consider. He had not survived this long by underestimating his demon kin.
He needed more information, data he was not likely to get sitting here. His skin itched, reminding him of his urgent need to bathe. The facilities of a place that called itself the 'Royal Court Motor Inn' would not be lavish, but so long as the water (eventually) ran clear, it would served. He would simply add it to the account, to be settled at a time and in a way of his choosing. Glancing around, he noticed a very important detail that should have registered before this: he did not see his clothes anywhere.
'Sorry about your stuff,' Toni had written. He swore, heartfelt and vicious. As if that whole incident had not been humiliating enough! Perhaps Toni had not been the one to bring him here after all—or she had not brought him here alone. He was, Vergil decided, going to kill every man who'd been at the Cellar that night. It would be just recompense for the strength he'd wasted under that poison's influence.
Well, at least he still had his boots and-- He froze.
The amulet.
He'd carried it in a specially tailored pocket in the inside of his jacket. He seldom actually wore the heavy gem, the chain made a perfect noose for anything that could get close enough, and Vergil did not believe in making anything simpler for his enemies. But if they'd taken his clothes, they'd taken the amulet, as well as his only reliable method for scrying out his brother. He'd let himself be duped and poisoned by an idiotic mortal posturing contest, and been robbed of part of his legacy.
Forget the men in the Cellar. He would not leave a stone in this city standing!
The doorknob rattled, and Vergil belatedly realized he was supposed to have left the room by now. The door swung open and a heavy woman in a janitorial smock trundled in, towing a large industrial cart. Apparently, the room was supposed to be empty, because she did not announce herself.
"Get out!" he snarled.
The woman gasped, her dark eyes wide. A hand flew to her throat. He turned, wholly unconscious of his nudity.
"Get. Out." If she did not comply this time, he would turn Yamato on her.
The woman began to back away, bumping into her cart. She began to babble something, wringing her hands together. Her panic clogged her words, until all Vergil could decipher was 'Madre de Dios,' and a number of incoherent appeals to some saint. If she left now, she would likely run wailing to the nearest authority figure. While he had absolute confidence in his ability to manage anything the panderer-operator of these rooms might call on, there was still the rather annoying fact of his lack of clothing. He would have to improvise something.
But he needed to silence the noisy creature to buy himself time. He strode towards her. The woman's eyes bulged, and she backed away until she bumped into her own cart. The cart cut off any route of escape. She opened her mouth to scream.
Vergil drove his fist hard into the woman's fat-padded stomach. She choked and gagged, doubling over. He did not bother to catch her, just stepped aside to let her sprawl on the thin carpet. Rendering someone unconscious without killing them was not so simple as the untrained might think. While the woman retched and gasped, Vergil twisted his fingers into the lank hair. Dragging her up to her knees, he slammed her forehead against the pull-bar of her cart, trying to avoid the thinner parts of the skull. He was not overly concerned with her survival, but Toni had brought him here, and only the lower sort of demon defiled even a female's sanctuary with an unshared kill. His father had raised him better than that.
It took two strikes before the woman went limp. He checked her pulse, listened to her breathing. Her absence would be noted in due time, no doubt in enough time to repair the damage and preserve her life. As a precaution, he stuffed a washcloth into her mouth, then bound her wrists to her ankles with the phone cord. After that it was simply a matter of dragging her heavy body into the closet.
The closet didn't even have a proper door, just a sliding plastic accordion screen that had not seen much attention by Housekeeping. A cheap vinyl garment bag hung inside. Unzipping it, he spread it over the unconscious woman, covering her as much as possible. He shut the closet as best he could, but there was a tell-tale bulge where the woman's bulk rested. It would serve for now.
The cart made a useful barricade against the closet, and the 'do not disturb sign' would buy him some time. Enough time to get clean, at least. Even a tawdry place like this had a 'lost-and-found', usually a cardboard box of cast-off clothing. He could pretend to be an irate customer robbed whilst in the shower. Yamato would settle any question of payment.
He flicked on the bathroom light switch, then froze. In the speckled mirror over the sink, he could see the reflection of something hanging on the back of the bathroom door. Looking behind the door, he saw a crinkly bag of dry cleaner's plastic. A paper ticket was stapled to the front. 'Clean Clock Dry Cleaning! Open 24/7! Rush jobs our specialty!'
The ticket listed one men's suit (jacket and trousers, green worsted wool), one men's dress shirt (white linen, French cuff). It also listed his underclothes. Well, Vergil thought, staring at the ticket, now I know what she meant by 'the rest'. His hat, somewhat worse for wear, sat on the counter beside the sink.
He tore at the thin plastic, uncaring of how the garments tumbled from the flimsy hangers. He was after one thing, and one thing alone.
His wallet was gone, along with some items he'd carried in the pockets of his over coat. He turned his attention to the suit jacket, flipping it open. He'd had a special pocket tailored inside the lining. Inside it, he found the amulet.
The red stone spilled across his fingers, nestling into his palm. The amulet could not have gone through the dry cleaning process. Nor was it likely the dry cleaning attendant had replaced the talisman neatly in the hidden pocket.
Toni had to have removed the amulet, kept it safe in her keeping while he lay insensible. She had brought him to a place of safety, tended him in sickness—then returned his clothes and his amulet.
She had to recognize as twin to her own. She had to. But she had not recognized him, and the tie between himself and any with Dante's blood ran deeper than any bespelled gem. More likely, she'd recognized the gem, but not its significance, and had left him here, intending to inform her master of what she had learned, just as a good mirror-doll should.
He shoved aside the beige plastic curtain and turned on the water. It grew no warmer than tepid, but it would serve. He stepped under the weak spray of water. The Royal Court's facilities were as meager as he'd anticipated: shampoo that smelled like it had been siphoned out of the anti-bacterial soap dispensers of a local clinic, and a palm-sized tablet of yellow soap. While his hands were occupied with the mechanical business of cleaning, his thoughts turned inward.
Even with the Holy Star—with two Holy Stars, if he could trust that hazy memory—last night's indulgence had left its mark. Fortunately, he had a solution available. Closing his eyes as he ducked his head under the meager spray, he reached out for the Hellgate.
It felt farther away than before. He must have wandered a considerable distance in his inebriated state, but he could still touch it. With a little effort, he coaxed the energies from their quiescence, stirring them into vibrancy. This was clearly an artificial gate, one meant to lead into a pocket dimension, a kind of storage area. One of the things sorcerers commonly kept in these places were artifacts—in other words, batteries.
Dante might be held in such a place.
That could explain why all his seeking had availed him naught. The Libellus Phantasmis charted only the past, present, and future of this physical world. Worlds beyond, if there were any maps for such places, would be in wholly other collection.
But for now, he must concentrate on regaining his strength. The Holy Star had cleansed him, the sleep had somewhat restored him, but he needed to replenish himself. The Hellgate had lain dormant for generations; its energies moved sluggishly at his touch. But they moved in answer to his summons.
Vergil closed his eyes and tipped his head back. The energy lost none of its potency over the distance it had to travel, and it washed over him with more intensity than the shower water. It coiled up from his low in his gut, the place known to Eastern mystics as dan tien.
The energy rose in pulses, white-hot at the core, red at the furthest edges, just like the stone of the amulet. He concentrated on drawing in as much of the gate's energies as he could. With his father's warning, with this rogue sorcerer aware of him, he would need all of his strength.
The energy poured into him now, almost as pure and strong as the first time he'd tasted it: the night of his mother's murder. The last night he'd seen his brother alive.
He'd been surrounded, weary, alone. Dante had vanished. He'd felt Eva die. And the enemy...just kept coming. Vergil combed his fingers through his wet hair, assuring himself that all the soap and rinsed clear. Elements of that memory had worked into his nightmare.
What the dream had not contained was the memory of this sweet power cascading through him, the power to summon, to restore the balance between predator and prey. He had defeated those demons because his power had awakened. Now, as then, he was strengthened by the power of his demon blood, restored by exposure to his birth element.
Vergil shut off the water and stepped out onto the bare tile floor. The towels were thin and rough, but he welcomed the rasp against his skin. Capulet City would pay for robbing him, and there was no better time to begin than the present.
-tbc-