"Stay inside, both of you," said Zyphre.
"Absolutely not," replied Lydia. "I'm not letting you go out there alone. And I never really paid him back for taking Lucian."
Zyphre let out a frustrated growl low in his throat, but nodded.
"What about me?" piped up Lucian.
"Stay here!" shouted his parents in unison.
Lucian flattened his ears and hopped off his father's shoulders. Zyphre grabbed Burning Madness, which had lately been spending a lot of time propped up against the kitchen wall, and buckled it back on before running to join Lydia waiting in the doorway.
He had just made it to the doorway when Lucian called after him, "Wait!"
"What is it?" asked Zyphre harshly.
"How do I change back?" asked Lucian blankly, gesturing to his bat body.
"I don't know; how did you get into that form? Just do that again!"
"You don't know?" asked Lydia curiously.
"No, I don't," said Zyphre. "It's been second nature to me for something like eight thousand years; how do you set your hand on fire every time you're pissed off? Ha, can't answer, can you? Exactly. We'll figure it out when we get back, now just stay put!"
Lydia rolled her eyes at Zyphre's back. "Mature to the end, your father," she said. "Stay here."
She caught up with Zyphre standing outside the house, looking around. "What I don't get," he said as soon as she joined him, "is why he's here now. It's evening, not nighttime. He's got to have a very good reason, because he's going to be badly burned when he gets here."
"Maybe he's hurt," said Lydia.
"If he wasn't before, he is now," said Zyphre. "Idiot."
They knew he was nearby, but he did not show himself. After a few minutes, Zyphre transformed in order to check that his scent was still nearby. It hadn't moved. The sun had set when his scent moved closer to them, finally coming into view.
True to Zyphre's word, he was covered in angry burns from the sunlight. He was out of breath and bleeding from a wound in his side.
"Draesen, are you okay?" asked Lydia despite herself, and even Zyphre's angry glare flickered when he saw his old friend's wounds.
"I'll live," he said. "My lady." He tried to bow respectfully but stumbled.
"Why don't you come in," said Lydia without thinking. Zyphre groaned and facepalmed.
"Lydia," he said, running the hand he had just facepalmed with through his hair. "Haven't I taught you anything? You never say that to a vampire, now he can come and go whenever he pleases – hold it, you."
He grabbed the doorframe, blocking Draesen's path with his arm. "Come on, Zyphre, the lady invited me in," he smirked. "You know the rules, even if you choose to ignore them."
Zyphre glared. "Slip of the tongue may give you the ability," he said, "but if you enter my house I'll slit open your other side."
"Zyphre, he's hurt," scolded Lydia gently. When he didn't move, Lydia took his arm and lowered it for him. "Honestly, I thought you two were supposed to be best friends forever or some other such nonsense."
Zyphre grudgingly moved aside, but the second Draesen had crossed the threshold there was a flash of claws. Draesen cried out in pain and grabbed at his other side.
"Zyphre!" cried Lydia, shocked.
"What?" said Zyphre. "I'm a man of my word. I told him I would slit open his other side if he entered my house. I always keep my word."
"You didn't keep your word last night when you told me I wouldn't be able to walk this morning," retorted Lydia smoothly.
Zyphre stared at her, looking rather hurt, as if he couldn't quite believe that she had actually said that. Draesen laughed. "In defense of Zyphre's pride, that was way below the belt," he said, smirking.
"Shut up, Draesen," said Zyphre. "I don't need you to defend me."
"Touchy, touchy," said Draesen. "What are you angry about anyway?"
"Let's think," said Zyphre. "The last time we met, you stole my son and tried to kill him. Then you went and told my mother, whom I hate, about him, prompting her to show up here and cause a nice little scene. I think I have the right to be a little miffed."
Draesen shrugged. Then, with a grimace, he tightened his hold on the side that had previously been injured.
"Do you want me to look at it?" asked Lydia hesitantly.
"Have you suddenly forgotten everything you know about vampires?" asked Zyphre. "He'll be fine in an hour."
"Actually," said Draesen, "yes, that could be very helpful."
Zyphre gave him a confused look as Lydia led him to the kitchen. Lucian appeared to have vacated the room at some point while they were waiting for Draesen, as he was nowhere to be seen. Draesen lowered himself into a chair, undoing his cloak and pulling his shirt over his head. The burns from the sunlight were fading and the wound Zyphre inflicted was already closing. The other wound was still wide open and bleeding.
"What…?" said Zyphre upon seeing the wound. "What did that?"
"Nerull's sickle," spat Lydia, staring at the wound. "What other weapon could do that?"
"Is she right?" Zyphre asked Draesen. "Did Nerull do this?"
"Yeah," said Draesen. "He's not too happy with me at the moment."
"Nerull's sickle prevents fast healing," said Lydia. "You remember? You've still got the scar on your back." Without waiting for Zyphre's answer, Lydia left the room, presumably to get the med kit she had buried somewhere, untouched.
"What did you do?" asked Zyphre.
"I kept your secret," said Draesen.
"You…?"
"Kept my mouth shut, yeah," said Draesen. "See, Nerull doesn't know a thing, but he suspects. He thinks you two have eloped. And seeing as you've been on your 'mission' for almost a decade and never said a word to him, he's right to think that."
"It was only a matter of time," said Lydia sadly, reentering the room with a med kit. She kneeled down next to Draesen and began to clean his wound. "Nerull's sickle stops the fast tissue restoration vampires have, so you're going to have to heal this naturally. It'll scar."
"I don't care about that," said Draesen, wincing slightly.
"Oh, stop crying; you're a man, aren't you?" said Lydia as she started to bandage him up.
"You know, it's perfectly alright to hurt him a little," said Zyphre leadingly.
"Be quiet," said Lydia. "So? What does he know? Does he know where we are? I'd assume not or else he'd be here already."
"No," groaned Draesen. "No, he doesn't know where you are. He doesn't know anything for certain, and it's really pissing him o – ah! Careful! – off. He's used to knowing everything, being a god and all. He thinks I know where you are and started interrogating me. I refused to tell him anything. So he struck me with his sickle."
Lydia rolled her eyes at nothing in particular. "He has the worst temper," she said angrily. "And he wonders why I could have possibly have left him."
"Why did you come during the day?" asked Zyphre.
"I didn't want to," said Draesen. "I was hurt and couldn't move very fast. The sun rose before I could make it here and I had to dive into a stupid cave!"
"You idiot!" said Zyphre. "Why did you have to run out like that if you didn't think you would make it here in time?"
"Because maybe I wanted to make sure you knew that Nerull was trying to find you so that you'd be on your guard!"
A ringing silence met Draesen's words. Zyphre seemed at a loss for words, and looked away instead of answering. Lydia broke the silence by pulling tightly on the bandages, causing Draesen to cry out, and saying cheerfully, "There you go! I've put something on it to help slow the bleeding and ease the pain. They should kick in and stop stinging soon."
"Ahg…thanks, Lydia," said Draesen. He grabbed his shirt from the table where he had thrown it and pulled it back over his head. "You're a lifesaver."
"Not really," she said. "I just know my ex-husband's work."
"Come to think of it, why do we even have that?" asked Zyphre, nodding to the med kit that Lydia was packing up. "We don't need it."
"Excuse me, Lucian heals slower than you do, and I don't heal quickly at all," she said.
Lucian poked his head around the doorframe, humanoid again. "I heard my name," he said. He saw Draesen and withdrew slightly.
"He looks even more like you than he did the last time I saw him," said Draesen to Zyphre. "You must be so proud."
"Lay off, Draesen," growled Zyphre.
Lucian hesitantly entered the room and darted behind his father, peeking around at Draesen. He could not have remembered the incident itself, but he'd been told by his father exactly what had happened more than once.
"Hi," he said awkwardly.
"Hello," replied Draesen. "My name is Draesen. Your name is Lucian, correct?"
Lucian nodded while Zyphre looked between the two of them, looking very much like he wanted to separate them. Lydia rolled her eyes and clapped her hands together once, loudly, drawing the attention of everyone in the room.
"Well," she said, standing up with the first aid kit. "Draesen has earned my trust again, and if he hasn't proven himself enough to you then I think you have a deeply ingrained trust issue. Lucian, honey, it's time for bed. Let's leave daddy and Draesen alone so they can make up without an embarrassing audience."
"Oh, come on, Lydia…!"
"Oh, you don't have to…!"
"That's not fair…!"
"Hey, come back…!"
But she had already left, leading Lucian by the hand. Zyphre and Draesen both looked after her with identical expressions of disbelief that she would leave them alone and despair that she did. The two glanced at each other, their eyes meeting. They quickly looked away.
"You still haven't earned my trust back," said Zyphre. "For all I know, you told Nerull all about us and let him hurt you just so you could come and lower our guard."
"I didn't," said Draesen. "I was a dick last time we met, I know that, I just…Zyphre…you're my best friend, and I love Lydia like a sister. I wouldn't ever betray you two. I kept all your trysts secret back then, so why don't you trust me to keep this?"
"Ah…"
They exchanged another awkward glance, Zyphre looking away first. A very awkward silence penetrated the air between them. It was Zyphre who broke the silence over a minute later.
"So…"
"So…"
Not another word was spoken, and Lydia returned to see the two of them looking determinedly in opposite corners with the occasional awkward glance at each other. She gave an amused smile, knowing that the two of them were on good terms again.
Herpderp I had all of the writer's block on this chapter and I ended it before I should have. Next chapter will conclude act II.