I couldn't even sleep because this story had been on my mind since I started watching Castlevania, the Netflix animated series. Like, I literally couldn't sleep because of it. Since I wanna focus on my other stories and not lose my goddamn mind with this baby tap dancing through my skull every five minutes, I decided to write it down in a style similar to fairy tail dragon slayer's stories: short and sweet.

01. Oh! You're a Vampire!

They were on the run. Lenore was injured. Blasted vampire magic! They'd pierced her shoulder and the bleeding hasn't stopped since. Whatever curse or latent magic on that spear was stopping her from regenerating. It was either that or starvation was setting in.

Carmilla wasn't much better off. She had been the one who fought against the majority of the old guard of her former master. Cruel, old bastard that he was, he was also cunning. Upon his death, whatever binding magic he had on the servants of the castle turned them against her and her sisters.

So, they ran. Away from the old castle, a symbol of their capture and servitude, away from the other monsters that hunted them. At some point, they'd lost one another. They were separated from Morana and Striga several hours ago by some vampire contingent.

Relentless bastards.

"Come on, Lenore!"

Neither of them could transform. They'd tried to fly away, but their magic wasn't responding to them the way it should. Every time they tried to cast a spell, it would backfire, forcing them onto their knees in pain.

So, they trudged onward. Through the driving snowstorm and across the mountainous terrain, they ran. Unfortunately, they were running out of time.

"There!" Carmilla yelled over the howling wind.

A spot of light twinkled in the virtual white-out. A fire? No! No fire could survive out in this weather. That meant-

"A h-house?" Lenore managed, her strength waning by the second.

"Anything to get out of this storm!"

Just a few more meters, and they slammed, shoulder-first, right into the door. Carmilla was back on her feet in a split-second, slamming the door shut to block out the wind and chill. When she thought she would catch a breather, she finally realized they weren't alone.

"Are you alright?" A young man - a human, judging by his teeth - pushed forward, his face twisted in concern.

"Blood!" the vampire in her sang. Her thirst returned ten-fold. She needed blood. Lenore needed blood.

"Whoa!"

She must've lost a lot more blood than she realized to miss a human within arm's reach. He ducked backwards, away from her swiping hands.

"Just hold still!"

Over and over again, he moved out of the way. When her fear and frustration got the better of her, she lunged, overextending in hopes of killing the human.

"Okay, that's enough of that!"

Her world flipped. Her nausea worsened. Even when her body stopped moving, the world still seemed to spin. She couldn't fight it when the human pinned her arms above her head.

Click!

Handcuffs, normally, wouldn't be able to stop a vampire. If anything, it just pissed them off more. In her state, Carmilla could do nothing but try to buck the hips of the young man straddling her on what she assumed to be a cot.

"Will you- Will you just- Goddamn it!" he cursed.

As weak and lethargic as she felt, it didn't stop her from hissing at him, fangs bared for all the world to see.

"Oh! You're a vampire! So that must mean-"

"C-Carmilla."

Fear set in once more. She locked eyes with Lenore, who had been too weak to even get up from her position on the floor.

Carmilla knew what humans would do to pretty young girls. She had witnessed it countless times. It was the last thing she wanted to happen to Lenore.

"Lenore! Run!"

Despite her words, her sister couldn't even muster the strength to sit up. What little weight she put on her uninjured shoulder only managed to unevenly turn her torso.

"Hey hey hey. Shhh. It's okay. It's okay."

There was nothing she could do to stop what was happening to them. This was all her fault! Fear and anger became self-loathing. It was her actions that led them to this situation. It was her fault that Leonra was…

She bit her lip, her fang tearing straight through her lower lip. She couldn't even bear to finish the thought.

To her credit, Lenore fought back against the young man, swiping at him with her claws. Surprise turned into fear when she realized that, not only had he been fast enough to catch her wrist mid-flight, he was strong enough to stop her, even in this weakened state.

"I'm trying to help you," he whispered. "So let me help you."

He threw her arm over his shoulder, pulling her to her feet and practically dragging the shorter girl to the same bed her sister was cuffed to.

"Lenore," Carmilla whispered.

She could only fear for the life of her sister in all but blood. So focused on her, she hadn't noticed when the human who had subdued them both left and returned. She only paid him attention when the bastard held a knife up to her sister's breast.

"No!" She thrashed against his restraints to no avail.

She thought she was going to lose her sister, staked by some human boy who hasn't even seen twenty winters yet. She continued to thrash and hiss even as the knife slashed through her sister's clothes rather than through her flesh, revealing the young womans' chest and shoulders.

"Will you quit thrashing?! I'm trying to help your friend!"

"Liar!" she spat.

"I could've killed the both of you already! So just sit still and let me help you!"

Accept the help of a human?! Never! They-

"Damn it." The young man got into Lenore's face, his fingers prying her eyes open to get a quick glimpse of her eyes. "When was the last time she had blood to drink?"

What? Why-

"When?!" he demanded.

"T-Two days ago."

"Shit."

She couldn't believe her own eyes when he turned the blade on himself, leaving a shallow wound on the underside of his forearm. Gingerly, he propped Lenore up against him, holding out the bleeding arm to the weakened, nearly unconscious woman.

"Drink," he whispered softly.

Weakly, Lenore complied. Carmilla couldn't believe it herself, watching slack-jawed as this human - someone they'd never even met before - fed his lifeblood to her dying friend.

"Her wound's not sealing," he said, frustrated. "What caused the wound?"

Her shock, confusion and whatever adrenaline she had left in her answered before her mind could catch up to her mouth.

"A-A spear."

"Have either of you been able to use magic?"

"N-No."

He looked ready to ask something else, but movement from Lenore pulled him away. "No no. Lenore, right? Keep drinking." It only took a little nudge for her to latch on again.

This time, when Lenore stopped drinking, he pulled away, leaving her to lean against the headboard, the same one she was cuffed to, disappearing to what she assumed to be the kitchen. He returned a split second later with a bone needle, what she assumed to be catgut, a cup and a pot of boiling water.

"W-Why are you helping us?" she heard herself ask.

"Because it's the right thing to do."

x-x-x-x-x

With her belly full of blood and whatever he made her drink, Lenore could feel some modicum of strength returning. Green eyes fluttered as she tried to sit up, to no avail.

"Oi. Don't you dare tear open that wound again. I just stitched you up, goddamn it."

She looked over at her saviour. Blond hair. Blue eyes. Whiskered cheeks. He was feeding Carmilla the same way he'd fed her. Where she only had the strength to drink what dripped onto her tongue, Carmilla was lapping at the wound like it was the last drink she would ever have in her life.

Given what they'd just gone through, that didn't sound too far-fetched.

"At least your wound didn't go all the way through."

She thought he was talking about the one on her shoulder. A second look told her otherwise. With the same knife that he'd used on her, leaving her virtually topless, he'd done the same to Carmilla's blood-red dress. A similar spear-tip wound was on the white-haired vampire's abdomen.

"You're damn lucky it didn't puncture anything vital. But you're still losing a lot of blood."

Speaking of which, how much blood did this human have? How was he able to feed two starving vampires and not look any worse for wear?

"How are you feeling, Lenore?"

"A lot better," she sighed and smiled at Carmilla, whose eyes had not left her since she started feeding on their saviour. "Thank you."

"You're welcome."

She kept her eyes on him as he gave Carmilla the same treatment he gave her. Stitch up the wound. Feed. Some kind of bitter herbal tea chaser.

"Damned corpse blood," she heard him curse. "Wouldn't have to stitch you up if you weren't poisoned with that stuff."

"Corpse blood?"

"The blood of a rotten corpse will poison any vampire, either through feeding or through an open wound. It keeps you from regenerating and saps your strength."

So that was why he fed her first, but stitched up Carmilla first. He hadn't known until she didn't start healing after feeding.

"Now that I've stitched you up and fed you, will you stop trying to rip out my jugular?"

"Carmilla?" Lenore prompted.

"... fine."

"Good enough for me."

Cautiously, she broached the question that was on her - and likely Carmilla's mind as well - regarding the young man before them.

"Are you not afraid of us?"

"Afraid? Of two pretty girls bleeding out in my home?" He gave her a teasing smile.

"But we're vampires."

"Doesn't mean I have to fear you." He pulled his arm away from Carmilla and wiped her chin with a cloth, much to her annoyance. "Now: should I expect someone banging on my door looking for you two?"

"Yes," Lenore nodded.

"Your friends or the ones who poisoned you?"

"Both."

"How many friends and how many assholes?"

She told him. She didn't know why, but she did. What could a single human, no matter how knowledgeable or accepting of the supernatural, be against the contingent of vampires hunting for them?

x-x-x-x-x

"What do you mean you 'took care of it?'"

Lenore shared her sister's sentiment. Did he-

Clang!

A bloody silver helmet was dropped onto the dinner table.

"I took care of it," he repeated.

"W-What? How?"

She had fought alongside Carmilla against the coven of knights and they barely escaped with their lives. How in the hell did this lone human do it without a scratch?

"Trade secret." Cheeky bastard. "I'll cook us some lunch; you must be starving!"

She didn't even question what he'd said until he'd already disappeared into the kitchen. How did he know they could consume human foods? How did he know about corpse blood? How did he kill off the vampires pursuing them?

"Let me- ah!"

"No no no." He rushed over to her side, keeping her down on the bed. "You're my guests. Mom would come back from the afterlife and tan my hide if she ever found out I made my guests make lunch."

"But-"

"You can help me make lunch and dinner after you've recovered. Deal?"

"Deal."

x-x-x-x-x

A week had passed like that. They ate, talk. He checked their wounds, fed them his own blood.

It took three days for them to ask him his name. Naruto. Naruto Uzumaki. A strange human to be sure, but he was, by far, the best human they'd ever met. They could hardly hunt for themselves given how weak they were from the corpse blood that was still in their system and they couldn't very well kill him.

He catered to their needs, but Carmilla couldn't consider him a servant of any kind.

"You think we could convince him to come with us once we've healed?" Lenore whispered. Naruto was out hunting, but she didn't want to risk him coming back and overhearing them.

"I would hope so." Carmilla winced as she gingerly pressed a finger against the wound on her side. "Anyone who could take out that many vampire knights and come back alive has to be kept close and on our side, no matter what."

"It's more than just that. His blood!"

Neither of them had ever tasted anything like it. Every time they fed from him, they could feel themselves getting stronger, a temporary boost for more potent than the high of drinking regular blood. Beyond that, he seemed to have an endless supply of the stuff running through his veins. He'd fed both of them twice every meal, three meals a day for a week now, yet he didn't seem any paler than when they started.

Knock knock!

"I'm back! And I brought company!"

Neither of them could contain the shock of the situation at hand.

"Morana?! Striga?!"