He held my changed self through the night. He ran his hands over my pale skin and kissed my dark hair. He bore the look of my golden eyes and did not flinch. I loved him for it. The transformation of body was harder to accept than transformation of mind, because it left no room for pretending nothing had changed.
Asgardians did not take it so well.
"What have you done?", Thor looked horrified when he saw me.
Seeing his reaction made me flinch and I took a tentative step backwards, closer to Victor.
"I made my choice.", I said, finding my strength, a voice of the queen. "It is not your place to judge."
"You don't understand it.", Thor said, shaking his head. "You had the only gift in the universe, your human life span, and you threw it away, like a foolish child."
"For once, I agree with you, brother.", Loki said.
"I did not!", I hissed. "You put me in this road, and now you are complaining of results? You, with all your talk about ants and boots? For a so-called god, you still don't grasp the results of your actions. My humanity is mine to keep or throw away, and it never belonged to you."
"I regret this for you.", Loki whispered. "More than you'll ever know." He turned and ran away. I didn't understand. Victor's face was enigmatic, and I felt the cold satisfaction radiating from him. He knew what was wrong with Loki, but I doubted he would tell me.
I spent the rest of the day with baby. Thor told me that Loki had left without goodbyes, and he needed to follow him. I was happy to see him go. Although I liked him, I felt him staring at me and it was making me annoyed. They behaved like I had done a huge, mortifying mistake, and I couldn't understand why.
"Asgardians do not get it.", I told Sophie who was nesting against my chest. "They don't read enough comics. Superheroes' girlfriends do not have any other role than be captured, and eventually they die. Or they decide to marry a normal human and live some years unhappily because they are still secretly in love with the hero. Look at Hulk's Betty Ross or Spiderman's Mary Jane or Gwen Stacy. Just pain, sorrow, fear, death and loneliness day after day. I'm done with it."
The baby opened her blue eyes and looked at me. Her face was surprised.
"Yes, my lovely, we are done with it.", I crooned. "You will be safe forever now." I let the golden light encompass us and smiled at my baby, petting her downy brown hair. We were safe and sound in our own force field. No flickering lights, no race against time, no vampires. It would stay up as long as I willed it so. I took a deep breath and closed my eyes to enjoy the moment. No matter what Victor would do with his reward, this was worth it.
Two weeks later Latveria was free of vampires, and I had good understanding of my new talents. I was better at manipulating golden light, and mine had grown into white fire. Something like Asgardians had. I could extend the light around me at will. It worked as a shield and ignited those who tried to harm. And I was starting to develop some kind of consciousness of things around me. When I shifted to etheral dimension, I could feel the golden lights around me, and also the empty spots. Vampires felt like black holes in the fabric of reality. It made hunting them much easier, because it compensated the lack of hearing.
My transformation had caused some practical problems. Growing 25 centimeters had left all my dresses too short, and moving was really awkward at first. I kept making mistakes with depth perception. Longer torso inevitably means longer arms and legs, and acrobatics were hard until I got hang on how my new body worked. I kept hitting my head everywhere. Luckily Victor was still a bit taller, so we had higher doorways than old castles commonly do. The castle had been destroyed thrice during his reign, so historical accuracy was gone anyway.
My face in the mirror was hardest part to get used to.
"I look like a Twilight vampire.", I said to Victor gloomily. We were on our way to New York. "It's true. Golden eyes and perfect pale skin."
"What is a Twilight vampire?", Victor asked. He sounded absent-minded. He was reading a book to Sophie in the armchair.
"You don't know? Let me show you. You are really lucky, because someone has saved you from mind-bleaching effect of watching all five movies and put them together in 10-minute trailer.", I said and handed him the spider-phone.
"That was one of the most shameless displays of mind manipulation I've ever seen.", Victor said. "It was simply disgusting." He pushed the button on his right gauntlet and opened a line to command center. "Instructions to law department: Twilight books, movies and everything related to series are banned in Latveria from this moment on. Search the houses and burn anything you find. Doom does not allow promoting suicidal tendencies in Latveria's young female population. My subjects do not beg vampires to kill them."'
After giving the orders, he looked at me appraisingly.
"Do I look like a Twilight vampire?", I asked. "You are honest. You have to tell me."
"If you start sparkling, I might have to burn you."
My lower lip started to tremble.
"I was joking, my dear. Your eyes are golden like metal. They have cheap amber contacts. And your face hasn't really changed so much. It's still the same, but with a touch of outer realms. A true connoisseur will never mistake you for a Twilight vampire, although common idiots might.", Victor comforted me. "Now, do you have other problems to present to my husbandly expertise, or can we continue this book?"
"What are you reading to her?"
"It's one of my own books. I wrote down all the Romany tales my mother told me when I was young. It was a slow winter and I had nothing else to do. It's better to teach Sophie to find joy of her place in the world than fill her head with crap. I'm still not entirely sure how my goddaughter, Valeria Richards, was able to develop higher than medium intelligence although her misinformed parents let her consume books about Sponge Bob. I saw one once. It is an insult to any child's intelligence."
"No Sponge Bob, no Barbies, no sugary drinks or Twilight. It will be interesting to see what happens when your puritan parenting meets consumer culture."
"If you are foreseeing a clash between those two, you have mistaken my purpose. She is not Amish, and I don't see any advantages in denying knowledge. The trick is to teach her to divide knowledge to useful and useless. I'm not raising a girl whose highest ambition is to become a Prom Queen and marry the linebacker. I'm raising a future monarch, and the means required are as different as are the goals. Sophie will not dress as a ghost and go begging at Halloween, but she will receive adequate training in the nature of undead.", Victor replied.
"I can't really counter that."
"I know.", Victor said smugly and continued his reading.
"I expect you have come to collect your payment.", a man with eye patch said. "I would like to remind you that SHIELD or Fantastic Four will not take part in anything illegal under international law. And I'm not going to even consider any references to Latverian law."
I was standing next to Victor in conference room in underground building of SHIELD. Fantastic Four were there, and I remembered Tony Stark and the captain from Avenger's Tower. Spider Man was obvious. I wore sunglasses and the forest green dress slashed with white I usually used in diplomatic meetings. Sunglasses underground looked odd, but I didn't care to advertise my change.
I had a small, round pebble humming in my pocket. Victor had given it and explained the pebble disturbed scanners so SHIELD could not get any useful readings on my physique or powers.
"Doom is certain you will find his request very reasonable. You will use your resources to attack Dracula's base and personally deliver her to Dracula, unharmed.", Victor gestured towards me. "Then I will consider your debt paid."
"What?", Reed Richards roared. "Victor, you are mad if you think I'm going to help you to kill an innocent woman!"
"She is my subject and will comply to this.", Victor said simply.
"I said we are not going to do anything illegal. Feeding a person to Dracula is a murder. Have you forgotten that?", Fury asked.
"I said nothing about feeding, you deaf worm. Doom only asked you to deliver her to Dracula. I will even accompany you if you are too weak to accomplish this task without my help."
"I'd like her to speak her own mind about this.", Captain America interrupted the argument.
It was my cue to play the part. I called the smallest particles of white fire and let them sparkle on my flawless, pale skin. Then I took of my sunglasses and directed my golden gaze at captain.
"Holy shit!", Tony Stark cried. "She's a vampire. Like Edward! She's sparkling, for god's sake! Somebody say Twilight vampires aren't real!"
Nobody answered Stark's question. They just stared at me. Richards' mouth was hanging grossly open.
"As you can see, Dracula's brutal attack on my wife had long-term consequences.", Victor said. His voice sounded very emotionless, forced. "I assure you there is nothing Dracula can do to harm her now. I owe her this favor, and I'm asking you to deliver. I do not wish to do it."
"You heard my king.", I said. "You all are to blame on this. You were the ones who asked my husband's help, knowing it would provoke Dracula. You knew his country and his family would be in danger. Your success cost fifteen lives, including mine and my mother's. I paid for your war.", my voice took a crisp, sharp edge. "Now it's time you paid back."
"If it is your will, then... we have to agree.", Captain said, sounding ashamed. He should be.
"You are dismissed. We have details to discuss, and your presence is not required any longer. Wait for me outside.", Victor commanded.
I turned around and walked out, donning my sunglasses again. As I stepped through the dark doorway, I let the sparkles die down. I hope they have saved the security camera videos somewhere. Loki would have loved the show.
"They bought it.", Victor said when we had returned at the embassy. "After you left, I told them our true goal was to kill Dracula. I warned them not to touch him or you - Doom needs to erase stain on his honor alone."
"I'm sure you were very haughty and rigid.", I beamed at him.
"We need a capable baby sitter. I recorded the whole thing, so you can use it to lure Loki back. He is good with babies and formidable enough to keep her safe."
"Excellent idea.", I picked up the spider phone and chose Loki's number.
"Hello, Loki. I have a splendid offer for you."
A mere hour later we had our baby sitter settled in the embassy. Loki's strange burst had been forgotten, and he was more than happy to watch after Sophie for few days. We didn't even need to pay him because misleading the whole superhero cadre was simply too fabulous. Loki promised to keep Thor busy elsewhere so he would not ruin our little show. Everything was set.
"Have fun, my dear. You have a real flair for mischief. If you pull this off, I'm going to make you my first disciple.", Loki promised and waved at us departing.