He's born in a split-second that feels like an eternity—dust set alight and taking form, particles bound by lightning, bone and sinew knit with dark magic. He presses his brand-new hands against the walls closing him in, gasps his first breath. There's awful knowledge carved into his soul: who he's meant to be, what he's meant to do, the legacy he's meant to uphold. His gut twists and he dry-heaves, acidic revulsion coiling up his esophagus.

The panel in front of him swings open, and he stumbles forward, knees buckling under him. Aged but iron hands grip him, steadying him. "Careful, milord," says a deep, monotone voice.

Adagio Dazzle (he knows that's his name, just as he knows he's the seventh who's had it) looks at the old vulture holding him upright. "Aria Blaze," he rasps, the austere face at once familiar and unfamiliar.

Something akin to relief smooths some of the wrinkles in Aria Blaze's expression. "So milord does remember me. I had feared, with the ritual gone awry- Ah, never mind. I'm sure milord is hungry."

Almost on cue, Adagio Dazzle's stomach grumbles, and the corners of Aria Blaze's beak turn up in a mirthless smile. "Excellent," Aria Blaze says. "I've taken the liberty of bringing you a meal." He gestures across the stone, dimly-lit chamber to where a young woman is shackled to the wall. There's a gag over her beak, and her tears shine in the candlelight.

Nausea crashes over Adagio Dazzle once more. He doesn't have any of his predecessor's memories, but he can still hear their wordless voices, and he knows what he's supposed to do next. His joints lock and his head spins, and he turns to Aria Blaze (trusted butler). "N-no," he manages.

Aria Blaze arches an eyebrow. "No, sir?"

Aria Blaze understands. Aria Blaze helps. "Not this," Adagio Dazzle says. There are so many thoughts he wants to convey with those two words—she's not food, it's not right, something's off—but he can't untangle them.

Comprehension dawns on Aria Blaze's face, and Adagio Dazzle feels hope. Then Aria Blaze says, "Ah, I see, your tastes have changed. Not to worry, milord. I'll fetch someone more suitable from the village."

"No!" Adagio Dazzle blurts out, grasping after Aria Blaze as the butler begins to move away. He's ungainly, still getting the hang of his limbs and extremities, but it's enough to stop Aria Blaze.

"No, sir?" Aria Blaze asks again, something new and chilling his tone.

Panic grips Adagio Dazzle's chest. Why doesn't Aria Blaze understand? Why isn't Aria Blaze helping? He twists his fingers in his hair. Everything is too much, every tiny sound echoes around the chamber and clangs in his head, he's still buzzing with the leftover energy from the ritual-

The ritual. "Aria Blaze," Adagio Dazzle croaks. His tongue feels foreign in his beak. "What went wrong?"

Aria Blaze shifts uncomfortably. "There was, ah, a slight mix-up with the ingredients, milord. Nothing to worry about, I'm sure." He mostly seems to be trying to convince himself, as he eyes his employer.

Adagio Dazzle takes a couple of breaths, trying to clear his head, but it's no use. He looks at the woman, in desperate search of something to anchor himself to in the turbulent seas of his own uncertainty. She looks back at him, terror writ large in her eyes and fresh tears streaming down her face.

He finds his first certainty.

"Let her go, Aria Blaze," he says, the first words he's spoken without a hint of tremor.

"But, sir!" Aria Blaze says, aghast. "Surely you jest!"

Adagio Dazzle keeps his spine straight. If he wavers, Aria Blaze won't listen, and he's found his next certainty: Aria Blaze doesn't understand, and Aria Blaze won't help. Not unless Adagio Dazzle makes him. "Aria Blaze," he says, eyes narrowed. "Let. Her go."

The silence that follows is thick enough to slice with a knife. There are only a few feet between them, but it feels like miles. Just when it seems like he's not going to, Aria Blaze gives a stiff half-bow. "As you wish, milord."

Adagio Dazzle watches, making sure his expression stays stern, as Aria Blaze begrudgingly unchains the woman and leads her away. It's not until Aria Blaze has left the room that Adagio Dazzle finally sags.

A large hand comes down on his shoulder from behind, nearly knocking him to the floor, and his heart leaps into his throat. "Oh, Master Duckuler!" says a voice that he's never heard before, and yet it's strangely comforting. "Thank goodness you let that poor girl go. She looked as if her 'eart was about to give out!"

Adagio Dazzle looks up and realizes that he knows this brick house of a hen, in the same distant way he knows everything else. "Starlight Glimmer," he sighs, leaning into her. "I didn't see you there."

"Well, I didn't want to get in the way," Starlight Glimmer replies. "Mister Aria Blaze was already cross with me for givin' him the ketchup instead of the blood, and I didn't want to make him any crosser, did I?"

"No," Adagio Dazzle murmurs. "I think I've gone and done that for you."

"Don't you worry, Master Duckuler," Starlight Glimmer says, giving his shoulder a kindly squeeze that grinds his bones together. "Mister Aria Blaze never can stay mad at you for long."

"I doubt he's ever had a reason to before. Now, though…" He buries his face in her apron. It makes him feel like a child, but he was just born barely ten minutes ago. He can be forgiven this, at least. "I don't want to be a vampire, Starlight Glimmer."

"Ooh, that's all right, dear," Starlight Glimmer says, wrapping her arm around him. "If you don't want to eats people or none of that, that's up to you. You can be wotever you wants to be."

Adagio Dazzle sniffs, and surreptitiously wipes his eyes on the edge of her apron. "Thanks, Starlight Glimmer," he says. "I… I am hungry, though."

Starlight Glimmer smiles down at him. "Let's see wot we can find in the pantry, then, shall we?"

The pulsing in his head is finally fading, and he smiles back at her. "That sounds lovely, Starlight Glimmer," he says.

The first thing he does is clean out a third of the pantry's vegetable stock. The second thing he does is start exploring the castle. He gets odd flashes of familiarity as he moves from room to room, but as the residual magic from the ritual fades, so does his sense of connection to his past incarnations.

The castle is massive and baffling, and Adagio Dazzle swears the layout changes at random. He can spend days wandering the endless corridors, and he begins to treat the venture like an expedition by filling a satchel with snacks. Sometimes he gets lost, but by the time he runs out of food he somehow always finds himself back at the kitchen. (Infuriatingly, there's nowhere in the castle he can't hear the bats in the clock when they tell their horrible jokes.)

He sets goals for each expedition: find the lowest dungeon, reach the tallest tower, discover the best balcony to watch the sunrise from. It's a good way to pass the time, and he has nothing but time. (If he thinks about this for too long, he wants to scream, so he tries not to think about it at all.) He stumbles across various musical instruments, and on days he doesn't feel like walking, he tries teaching himself to play them; he locates the library, and loses entire afternoons while reading.

Aria Blaze seems to be able to find Adagio Dazzle whenever and wherever, no matter how complicated a path he takes or how deep into the castle he's wandered. Often Aria Blaze appears under the guise of concern, but Adagio Dazzle quickly learns not to trust any food Aria Blaze gives him.

Adagio Dazzle finds his butler uniquely frustrating. Not one conversation between them can go by without it veering towards vampirism, the practice of, like a galleon blown off-course into an unforgiving reef. And yet, Adagio Dazzle doesn't hate talking to him; he's interesting, in his own way. He carries himself with an air of composure that Adagio Dazzle could never hope to achieve, and he has a dry sense of humor that's endearing on the occasions it's not overtly ghoulish. The fact that Aria Blaze's company isn't unbearable, however, only makes his disappointment in Adagio Dazzle sting more.

Aria Blaze might refer to the past incarnations as Adagio Dazzle's father and grandfather and so on, but it's no predecessor who is watching Adagio Dazzle with his beak drawn into a thin, disapproving line. Adagio Dazzle wishes it didn't hurt, wishes he didn't want that approval as badly as he did, wishes there were any other way to get it.

After a few months, worn down by insistences of "just a drop, sir" and "perhaps a nibble, sir," Adagio Dazzle buckles. He doesn't give in completely, but when Aria Blaze suggests stalking the ramparts, Adagio Dazzle figures that sounds harmless enough. He might even be good at it, and then maybe Aria Blaze will ease up on him a little.

Unfortunately, he's not good at it, and both of them walk away from the attempt dissatisfied.

One week later, there's a vampire hunter on his doorstep.

Sonata Dusk is a lot of things—he's resilient, he's determined, and he's powered by a leaping, manic energy that seems to come from a volatile cocktail of caffeine and obsession.

Mainly, he's a pest. He always has some new vampire-destroying invention, the ultimate fate of which is to fail spectacularly. Even when he defaults to the relative reliability of his stake-shooting rifle, his aim is atrocious. The same fervor that drives him back to Castle Adagio Dazzle again and again also makes him jumpy and scatterbrained, and he can never seem to steady his hands well enough.

He refuses to believe that Adagio Dazzle doesn't mean any harm, and eventually Adagio Dazzle gives up on trying to explain. Sonata Dusk is only ever accidentally a real threat to anyone's safety (including his own), and the attempts on Adagio Dazzle's unlife at least break up the monotony of castle existence.

As weeks turn to months to years, Sonata Dusk kind of grows on Adagio Dazzle. Maybe he's just getting used to Sonata Dusk being around, but his exasperation with the doctor's antics becomes tinged with just a bit of fondness. It would be nice if Sonata Dusk wasn't constantly trying to kill him, but Adagio Dazzle understands why it would be hard for a hunter to believe in the existence of a vegetarian vampire. He can forgive Sonata Dusk his stubbornness.

And so, this is how he lives: he does his best to limit Aria Blaze's body count, he dodges Sonata Dusk's stakes, he ducks out of Starlight Glimmer's all-encompassing hugs when they become too much, he takes the castle on far-flung if short-lived adventures. It's long stretches of boredom punctuated by bursts of activity, and he's not happy, but he's not unhappy. Sure, sometimes the castle feels more like prison than home, and no one in his social circle actually listens to him, each in their own ways. But it's not so bad, really. Things could be worse.

He's just about resigned himself to the fact nothing will ever change, when he gets the brilliant idea to rewrite history.

"Don't forget to put the cat out!" chirps the bat in the cage, and Adagio Dazzle's veins turn to ice. He watches in horror as the cheery paintings revert to their dismal selves. There'd been one of him as a child, he could've had a childhood, but it's all gone now. Slipped through his fingers, like he'd been grasping at nothing but fog.

"There, you see?" Aria Blaze says, smugly satisfied. "No point in trying to change the past, milord."

There's anger in him somewhere, but he hasn't accessed it yet. "Leave me alone," Adagio Dazzle says numbly. The cage falls from his hand, clattering upright on the floor, and the bat chatters in alarm. Later, he'll feel bad about being so careless with the cage, when he starts properly feeling things again.

"Come now, milord." The satisfaction in Aria Blaze's voice turns to mild irritation. "Your father would never act so-"

"My father?" Adagio Dazzle turns to face Aria Blaze, eyes wide and wild. "My father this, my father that." And, yes, there's the anger. "You're my father, Aria Blaze!" he screams. "You made me! You made me into a monster hundreds of years ago, and you made me into whatever I am now!" Years of frustration, of hurt, of not being listened to power him as he advances on his butler. "I am sick and tired of trying to take responsibility for all the awful things you do!" He clutches the front of his shirt with one hand and jabs Aria Blaze in the chest with the other. "Don't you think it's high time you took responsibility for me?"

Aria Blaze opens his beak as if to speak, but no words come out. His expression is unreadable. Behind him, Starlight Glimmer has a hand to her cheek, her brow creased with worry.

Adagio Dazzle staggers back a step. He's spinning through a roulette wheel of emotions now, with no idea where he'll land next. "I need- I need air," he says, turning away. "Don't follow me." He sprints out of the hall of portraits, slamming the door behind himself.

As soon as he's gone, Starlight Glimmer smacks the back of Aria Blaze's head.

Adagio Dazzle makes his way up to his favorite balcony and sags against the stone railing. The sun is just cresting over the distant mountain range, slowly flooding the valley below with light. Dawn is usually his favorite time, the sky and clouds painted in such vibrant hues, but now he just stares vacantly out over the landscape.

Above him, there's the faint sound of someone scrambling over the roof. Shoe slips against slate, then Adagio Dazzle hears a thud and rapidly approaching cries of, "Nein, nein, nein!"

Sonata Dusk hits the patio hard behind Adagio Dazzle and lets out a long groan.

Adagio Dazzle doesn't bother turning around. He doesn't need to; he can already picture Sonata Dusk leaping to his feet, shaken but undeterred, and brandishing some new vampire-hunting contraption.

"I've got you now, you fiend!" Sonata Dusk declares with his usual enthusiasm.

"Not in the mood, Sonata Dusk," Adagio Dazzle says dully.

"Ha! Justice won't wait for you to be in the mood to… to be facing… it." Sonata Dusk trails off. An awkward silence stretches out before he asks, "Did- did something happen?"

Adagio Dazzle turns around to give Sonata Dusk an incredulous look. "Huh?"

Sonata Dusk's feathers fluff in discomfort, and he fiddles with his stake-shooting rifle—his latest invention must have blown up in his face. "It is just… usually you are huffing or rolling your eyes at me when I am threatening you." He scratches the back of his neck, his expression souring a little. "I do not deny it is annoying when you treat me like no more than a nuisance, but today you seem, ah… lebensmüde."

"Gesundheit," Adagio Dazzle replies on reflex, some part of him hoping he'll at least get a kick out of riling the hunter up.

Sure enough, Sonata Dusk looks ready to kill him again. "Never mind," he spits, but rather than take aim, he slings the rifle over his shoulder. He looks upward, like he's calculating how to get back to his airship.

Adagio Dazzle doesn't feel any satisfaction. In fact, he feels the opposite. "You're leaving?" he asks, then mentally slaps himself over how plaintive he sounds. He'd thought he wanted to be alone, but now he realizes he just wanted away from Aria Blaze and Starlight Glimmer. He doesn't want to be alone. He wants that life he'd caught a glimpse of on the wall of the portrait gallery. He wants to love and to be loved in turn.

He wants to be alive, not just a shallow mockery of the living.

Sonata Dusk glares at him. "I am not one to be kicking a man when he is down," he says. "Your destruction can wait until tomorrow."

"What'll you do the day after tomorrow, then?" Adagio Dazzle hears himself ask.

Sonata Dusk is taken aback at this, and it's clear he's never given it much thought. "I. Um." He quickly pulls himself together. "I will get a decent night of sleep, for once."

Adagio Dazzle looks at the bags that have been under Sonata Dusk's eyes since the very first day they met, and he somehow doubts it. "Don't you have a family you can finally go back to?"

"That is none of your business," Sonata Dusk says, his affront almost as comical as usual. But there's something about the way his posture stiffens, and Adagio Dazzle knows that, for one reason or another, the answer is no.

It's crushing, the idea that one can be a real person and still not have all the comforts that opportunity should afford—to be living, but still alone. Perhaps he and Sonata Dusk aren't so different, just two lost souls approaching the same problem from opposite directions.

Maybe someday they'll meet in the middle.

Adagio Dazzle smiles faintly. "I'll see you tomorrow, Sonata Dusk," he says, turning to face the rising sun once more. There's no doubt in his mind that Sonata Dusk will be back. He could set his watch by the hunter, or even the castle clock. Hell, he has more faith in Sonata Dusk's reliability than in the turning of the planet.

"Uh. Yes." There's another moment of silence before footsteps head towards the balcony door. "Tomorrow," Sonata Dusk murmurs, and then he's gone.

Adagio Dazzle closes his eyes, and listens to the world coming to life.

For a few days, Adagio Dazzle does his very best to avoid Aria Blaze as much as possible. Just looking at his butler starts boiling a deep fury in his gut, and he doesn't entirely know how to handle it. Starlight Glimmer, surprisingly, doesn't say anything. She just shoots him apprehensive looks whenever he passes her in the halls.

He's grateful for the space she's giving him, because he doesn't think he could handle her usual smothering brand of concern without lashing out at her. It's Aria Blaze he's angry with, and he doesn't want Starlight Glimmer to get caught in the crossfire.

(Sonata Dusk only makes his one promised appearance, and his attempt on Adagio Dazzle's life is halfhearted. Adagio Dazzle wonders if their conversation on the balcony had gotten to him.)

On the fourth day, things come to a head when Aria Blaze corners Adagio Dazzle in an east wing hallway. Adagio Dazzle tries to side-step him, pointedly staring at the space over Aria Blaze's shoulder. Aria Blaze mirrors the movement, blocking him.

"Milord, you cannot keep sulking," Aria Blaze says.

Adagio Dazzle freezes. "You really think I'm just sulking?"

Aria Blaze's face is infuriatingly expressionless. "What else would you have me call it?"

"Don't call it anything." Adagio Dazzle's voice is brittle. "I don't want to hear anything you have to say." He turns and walks back the way he came. As he reaches for the door at the end of the hall, Aria Blaze's hand shoots past the side of his face and holds the door shut. Adagio Dazzle bites back a surprised yelp—he hadn't even heard Aria Blaze following him.

"That's a pity, sir," Aria Blaze says drily. "Unfortunately, we do live in the same castle. You'll have to speak to me again eventually."

Adagio Dazzle keeps his eyes fixed on the grain of the wooden door. He doesn't say anything.

Aria Blaze doesn't say anything either, for minutes that drag on like centuries. At last, he begins haltingly, "Do you-"

"Shut up," Adagio Dazzle says, finally looking at Aria Blaze for the first time since they'd returned from the past. He feels so, so cold. "You're always trying to get me to give in to a nature I just don't have. You keep trying, and you don't listen. I already know I'm made wrong. I can feel it written into me, and I don't need you to keep shoving it in my face. Especially not when it's your fault. And- and it's been your fault all along." He's shaking, and his cheeks are wet. He doesn't care. "You know what I don't get? If you're so disappointed with how I turned out, why don't you just kill me and try again next century?"

Aria Blaze looks like Adagio Dazzle might as well have punched him in the gut. "Milord, I would never raise a hand to harm you."

"You'd never raise a hand, no," Adagio Dazzle retorts, and he yanks the door open.

Aria Blaze lets him go.

Adagio Dazzle makes his way up to the top of the tallest spire, his feet taking him on autopilot. It would have been easier to just teleport, but he can't stomach the thought of using any of his powers right now. By the time he gets there, he's completely winded and all cried out, so he just collapses on the dusty wooden chest by the window. He hasn't been up here since the first time he made an effort at exploring the castle, but there's still something comforting about it.

He stays there long enough that the sky outside begins to darken. Just as the first few stars are coming out, the door creaks open and Aria Blaze steps into the room.

Adagio Dazzle turns his face to the window.

"I thought I might find you here, milord," Aria Blaze says softly. "The First came here often." He pauses, then adds, "Before I… well."

This admission, though half of one, is enough to startle Adagio Dazzle into giving Aria Blaze his attention.

"He was a gentle soul," Aria Blaze continues. "Had a deep love of the written word, poetry especially. He liked this room for the view of the valley it provided, said it cleared his head and made it easier to write." He rubs his chin. "To be frank, I'm not entirely sure exactly how all the dark magics that reside here work—I'm as much at their mercy as I am their arbiter. But while you are a different person in each incarnation, I see common themes. Similar quirks and habits and… tastes. Until you."

"I know," Adagio Dazzle mutters. "I'm a mistake."

"No," Aria Blaze replies. "You are true."

Adagio Dazzle's chest constricts. "What?"

"You are the one who is most like the First, as he was meant to be," Aria Blaze says, an odd tightness in his words. "But you are singularly unlike him, as well. You are new. You are yourself."

For a moment, Adagio Dazzle forgets how to breathe. He'd thought he couldn't cry anymore, but finds fresh tears welling up in his eyes. "Why are you telling me this?"

Aria Blaze takes a tentative step forward, and seems unsure of what he should be doing with his hands. "Do you-" he starts, again. Adagio Dazzle had been too angry to hear it in the hallway, but he hears it now.

Vulnerability.

Aria Blaze asks, "Do you really think of me as your father?"

Adagio Dazzle pulls his knees up to his chest, wrapping his arms around them. "Yeah," he mumbles.

"I," Aria Blaze says, and his voice catches. He clears his throat. "I haven't been an especially good one."

Adagio Dazzle shakes his head.

Aria Blaze swallows. "I didn't care much for the First, when he moved into the castle. But I c- You-" He stops, his face twisting like he'd bit into something foul. His throat works a couple of times before he falls back on the safety of the familiar. "My apologies, milord. I am not skilled at expressing… emotions." He says the last word in the same way someone else might say, "It's a dead rat."

The corners of Adagio Dazzle's beak tug up in a smile, and he pats the space on the chest next to him. "We'll take baby steps," he says.

"Very good, sir," Aria Blaze replies, back to being cool and detached. Still, he crosses the room and sits stiffly beside Adagio Dazzle.

Adagio Dazzle hesitates, then leans against Aria Blaze's side. After a moment, Aria Blaze puts an awkward arm over Adagio Dazzle's shoulders.

It's not quite enough, not yet—maybe not ever. There's a lot of ground left to cover, a lot of time to make up for, and a lot of old habits will die hard.

But it's a start.