AN: Oh dear... Aro you dick!

LIGHT RELIEF?

"Where's Caius?" Aro demanded the moment Athenodora opened her chamber door.

"Aro!" she said, startled by his gruff attitude. "He's in the dungeons, I believe. Why?"

Aro smiled. "Perfect. No cause for alarm." With that, he left Athenodora guessing at the door.

Aro could hear Caius chuntering to himself long before he reached the bottom step of the dungeons.

"Brother!" he called out. Taking the lamp from the bottom of the stairwell, he sought out his co-master.

"Aro ... is all well?" Caius asked, running through in his mind whether he had done anything to have caused any trouble recently.

He was still expecting some rebuttal from Basileus after Aro had set his nose straight. Caius had stayed out of public view but he wasn't stupid - he knew Basileus would know that he'd defied him.

"Everything is better now I am out of my quarters," Aro said in frustration. He was pig sick of fighting with Sulpicia.

"Family life getting you down?" Caius asked with a crooked smirk.

His nose was still healing and when they finally came face to face, Aro could tell his bones were uneven.

"I can fix that for you, brother," he said to Caius who winced in response. "Better to do it now than after its healed, Caius."

"And, what will your father say?" Caius asked, dreading the answer.

"He already knows I fixed your face, he did say to tell you he would make good on his threat ... whatever that meant."

Aro knew what it meant - Basileus would whip Caius if he was caught abusing the guards again. He wasn't so cruel to mention it though, as Caius had already paled hearing Aro's message from the creator. Caius eventually nodded and tightlet closed his eyes. With a simple twist and crack, Caius' nose was in the right place again. Not that Caius could appreciate it right away and he fell to his knees and cupped his face in anguish.

"Man up, Caius," Aro sang out happily as he passed his covenmate. "Come, I think we are both in need of some light relief."

Caius followed him, calling him a cunt on the way.

"We won't find any light relief in here, Aro," Caius said as they entered his playroom. "I have no inmates to torture."

Aro laughed lightly as he made his way across the pristine playroom floor towards the back where a few barrels were stored.

Caius caught on pretty quickly when he saw the direction Aro was heading. "We haven't done that for a long time, brother," he said gleefully.

Aro looked over his shoulder to Caius. "Are you game?"

Caius flashed to the barrels, getting ahead of Aro, and took two small glasses from the shelf above. Wiping each out with the hem of his shirt, he knelt before the barrel and flicked the tap. Dark red blood, so dark it was almost black, glooped out of the spout and he half-filled each glass - just enough to knock down in one gulp. Caius held out a glass to Aro, but didn't release it when his brother-in-arms tried to take it from him.

"Are you sure 'Daddy' will allow this, Aro?"

Aro smirked despite himself, knowing exactly what Basileus would have to say about him drinking dungeon blood - none of it good.

The last time Basileus had caught Caius and Aro partying on the potent liquid he had decided enough was enough and that's how they ended up with Eleazar, and a damn good hiding, Aro remembered.

"How about we don't tell him, just to be safe."

Caius laughed as he chinked his glass against Aro's. "I will drink to that."

"What has brought you down to this level, Aro?" Caius asked, after their second glass.

They were already sitting on the playroom floor, feeling giddy with the effects of the dirty vampire blood.

"Sulpicia is raging at me over this whole Demetri and Lucy thing. If I listened to anymore I would have smashed my quarters ... or her."

Caius whistled. He knew the situation with Lucy was precarious for him, but hadn't appreciated that it would be for Aro, too.

"What's wrong with Demetri?" he asked. He had been told by Freyr of Lucy's loss of emotions and general state of ill health, but he'd heard nothing about Demetri being in the same state.

"He is overloaded with emotions, totally off the scale, very volatile," Aro told him.

Caius shrugged. "And, this is unusual?" he asked in genuine wonderment.

"My point exactly, Caius!" Aro replied. He had been worried, very worried, when he saw Demetri thrashing about in his bed that afternoon, but now he was only pissed off. "That boy is playing on his mother's concerns and winding me up for fun. The cocky brat mouthed off and when I slapped him Sulpicia raged me!"

"I would have knocked him out! Her too!"

One look at Aro's face told Caius he'd said the wrong thing, but with the effects of the vampire blood, the pair fell about laughing.

It took over half an hour before either of them could look at one another without cracking up again for no apparent reason – such was the effect of dungeon blood. When they were a little more resolved, Caius suggested resurrecting one of their other former habits.

"Do you remember what we used to do down here brother?"

Aro smiled to himself as a thousand nights of drugs, blood, and debauchery floated before his eyes.

"Shall I fetch Heidi?" Caius prompted.

"I really shouldn't, Caius," Aro replied, though Caius could tell he was already wondering what she would be like.

"She's very good, Aro. Up for anything."

Aro sighed. God, I want to, I really want to.

"We could share her ... it's not cheating if you are sharing, surely." Caius pushed a little harder with the sort of logic Felix would be proud of, such was his inhibited state.

"Fetch her," Aro relented. "If anything happens, well, she's a siren, I am powerless."

Caius smiled broadly as he crawled to his feet using the central fireplace as a brace.

...

"Master," Heidi greeted Aro as she came through the panelled door.

Aro was still half splayed out on the floor, leaning against a large wooden chest to support his upper body. He'd had two more shots of dungeon blood since Caius left and he was enjoying the high.

"Heidi, please, sit," he offered, gesturing to the floor. "I must apologise for the lack of a seat," he said, giggling with the drug effects of the blood.

Caius stumbled back into view and closed the door with a thud before throwing some more wood on the fire.

"Caius, fetch us all a shot," Aro called out, waiving his glass at his covenmate.

"Are your legs broken?" Caius asked sarcastically, giving Aro's shin a kick as he passed. Aro couldn't feel it - they weren't broken, just jellied from his high.

"What is this, master?" Heidi asked curiously as she sniffed the thick dark liquid

"Vampire blood, my dear," Caius told her with a rather sinister smile.

Heidi had indeed been game for anything whilst he'd had her in his chambers, but Caius couldn't help but wonder where his drug of choice would take the coven siren.

"Is this allowed?" she asked generally, before gulping down the shot in one.

The effects were almost immediate. Heidi felt like she had been hit in the head as the room began to spin. She felt hot from the inside out - an effect she had never before experienced as a vampire. Holding a hand up to her face, she couldn't quite make it out and as her eyes tried to focus all she could see was the blurred outline.

Aro laughed at seeing the drug take its effect on the young woman. "I am the king of vampires, if I say it is allowed, it is allowed. Though it must be kept private, my dear."

Heidi turned to Aro and tried to judge where he was. Before she'd taken the drink he was only sat a foot away from her, now he seemed to be across the room. He wasn't, of course, he hadn't moved an inch, in fact, as Heidi found out when she lunged towards him. Landing in his lap, Aro scooped her into his arms.

"Ah, ah. You don't need to do that," he said without conviction as he felt Heidi undressing him.

"I want to, master," she ensured him, and as Aro wasn't exactly fighting her off, she continued to undress him.

"Oh, you are making this very hard," Aro said, knowing he was ready to succumb.

Caius burst out laughing as he drew himself another shot. "What would that be then, brother?"

Aro laughed, too, before turning his attention back to Heidi.

"I have seen to master Caius' needs, even his lady has enjoyed my pleasures," she told him as she tried to focus on his face. Everything was moving beyond her control, she couldn't use her gift to tempt Aro, but she soon realised that she didn't need to.

"Fuck, that's tempting," Aro exclaimed.

"Athenodora?!" Caius questioned in surprise.

"No, you fool. Sully ... she would never go for it, though."

Aro was reminded of what Sulpicia would say if she found out he fucked Heidi ... adding in the offer to make it a three way would likely see her removing his testicles with a spoon!

"Then we can leave her out of it, master," Heidi told him, taking his attention from his thoughts.

"I am the vampire king, my dear. Expectations on my head are different to those of Caius. He can get away with more than I," he said sadly, though his body appeared to be working against his word as he pushed Heidi down.

"Your commitment to your job is very attractive, master," she said finally before taking his cock into her mouth.

Aro leaned into the wooden chest and let it support his weight as his head fell back. "Oh, I do love being king."

…

"Atia!" Caius exclaimed as he fell back ... and 'out' of Heidi.

"My lady." Heidi scrambled to her feet, though it was difficult breaking Aro's hold on her.

"Aro," Caius warned as he pulled Heidi out of his arms. Grinding out again, "ARO!", he turned his co-master's face to see his mother was in the room.

It took Aro a moment to focus, he'd had much more dungeon blood than Caius. "Oh fuck," he sighed upon realising who had interrupted them.

"Well I must say, when Athenodora said I would find you three down here, I didn't expect this!" Atia sounded shrill, and somewhat dangerous, to Caius and Heidi - Aro appeared to barely register his mother's voice.

"We don't need to stop, she will leave."

Caius laughed at Aro's foolishness, the blood clearly making him brave, but he pulled Heidi away and redressed himself quickly. Heidi did the same.

"She?" Atia repeated, venomously.

"Why are you here?" Aro asked, sounding bored.

"Your father and I were worried about you," she stated plainly as she went around the room retrieving items of forgotten clothing. "You should think yourself lucky I am the one to have found you and not him."

Aro went to retake his glass to lick the last remnants of dungeon blood from the cup before Caius took it from his grasp, shaking his head sadly.

Aro scoffed at the gesture, not realising Caius was trying to save him from revealing exactly what they had been up to down in his playroom.

"That's lovely," he told his mother with no sincerity. "Thank you for your concern ... but as you can see, I am a little busy."

Atia stepped over her half-dressed son and took Heidi the cape she had found discarded by the door.

"Heidi, dear, it is time for you to leave."

Heidi accepted the cape gratefully with shame-filled eyes fixed to the floor..

"I am the king of this castle, Atia, not you," Aro butted in, pulling himself up the chest to sit. "Heidi, stay."

Atia turned eyes of fire on her boy. "How dare you command Heidi as though she were a dog!"

Aro simply shrugged. "Like I said, I'm the King ... " he said theatrically giving a (seated) mock bow.

"And I am the king's mother, married to the king's father, the creator and I have caught you mid-coitus with your fellow master and his ward! Who do you think holds more sway in this situation?" Atia replied.

Heidi didn't need to hear anything else. "Good night, masters," she called over her shoulder as she scurried from the room.

"Get dressed before you embarrass yourself further," Atia spat to her son as she dropped his shirt in his lap.

It was then that Aro realised he had conducted all conversation to that point completely exposed - he wasn't wearing anything. As the mild embarrassment pulled at the fraying edges of his drugged-up mind, he could feel his high retreating. No, not yet, be thought and he silently tried to keep the high alive in his mind.

Atia huffed to the sad state Aro was in, he still looked blank! "Caius, can you find your way back to your quarters without assistance or should I call for Basileus."

"Good god, no!" Caius said to himself. "You're on your own, brother," he told Aro as he passed.

"Thanks, Caius, thanks a lot," Aro called after him, thoroughly pissed off that not only Caius, but also his high, was shooting out the door.

"Get up," Atia commanded as soon as Caius shut the door.

Aro tried to do as he was bid, the reality of the situation coming crushing down to greet him as he did had him fall back on his bare ass.

Basileus is going to break my legs, he thought. He was right, too.

Aro and Caius had shared a penchant for vampire blood and in the early years they would drink from the source of captured enemy vampires.

Basileus had let their games go unchecked until Felix arrived in the coven. When Aro chose to take the boy into his own chambers he felt uncomfortable with his son on the high of vampire blood and called time on their fun.

Caius, at Aro's request, discovered a way of preserving vampire blood with wine, creating the thick tar like quality of dungeon blood and the resulting potent effects of the drug. When Aro and Caius started their games again, their drugged-up orgies found new heights. Basileus had been apoplectic when he found out, mainly because of the way he found out - Aro, still off his face on the fermented blood, had smashed up his chambers, and Sully, and then Basileus ... it didn't end well for Aro.

The coven king had sensibly quit his habit, or so Basileus believed, as he only took the odd couple of glasses at a time with far less regularity than he once had.

The last time Basileus caught him had been the worst. Aro dived new depths of depravity in his fathers mind when Aro's high guard, (as they were then) had witnessed the coven king sexually assaulting his mate. Both Felix and Alec had become embroiled in defending the queen of Volterra. Basileus beat Aro bloody for breaking his word in such a disgustingly low way, and then set out to expand his family to break Caius' hold on Aro ... that's how they ended up turning Eleazar.

As his father's very clear warning floated through his mind, Aro felt sick. 'If I catch you on this shit again, I will break your fucking legs!'

Caius still took it regularly, but it didn't seem to have the same effect on Caius ... Caius could easily be an evil cunt on a good day so no one could tell if he was nasty from the drug. It was far more obvious with Aro. Caius also had a little more self-restraint and mainly used the dirty blood to get him through the some of his more arduous duties as coven torturer where as Aro really was hooked on the stuff - one was never enough.

Atia could see Aro was coming around. "How much have you drunk?" she asked, kneeling at his side and taking his wrist.

Using Aro's own gift, Atia could see what Aro had done. "Fermented Vampire blood! You aren't drunk, you're high!"

Atia left Aro and began to pace. "Wonderful, Aro. Absolutely wonderful!" She was livid.

Aro struggled himself into his clothes and onto his feet, managing to stand with some help from the damp dungeon wall. "What does it have to do with you?" he spat in annoyance.

"I am your mother, now. Your state of inebriation has an awful lot to do with me," she said as she rounded on her boy.

"Pft!" Aro scoffed.

Atia retaliated by taking hold of Aro's face. "Look at the state of you!" she said, sounding like she was talking with an errant child. She was, of course. "Aro you have arranged for the major covens to meet in less than two months, you have thrown this coven ... and all its inhabitants ... into a very dangerous situation and everyone is going along with it on your instance that you can bring us through it safely. AND LOOK AT YOU!"

Aro tried to break free, his head already whirling from his retreating dungeon blood high, the last thing he needed was someone shouting in his face.

"I just needed some light relief ... that's all. I'm under a lot of pressure right now," he reasoned, knowing that his words wouldn't wash with Basileus and not really expecting them to wash with Atia either. He was right.

"Yes you are, and you should be dealing with it. You are more than capable," Atia returned in annoyance. "Your family will fall apart if Sulpicia finds out about this," she implored.

Though Aro tried to hide it, Atia saw the panic in his eyes. Getting himself together, he shrugged. "Who needs family? I have the whole vampire race on my shoulders!" he shot back.

CRACK!

Atia slapped him, hard. "It is not the time for self-pity," she said sternly.

I've had enough of this! Aro said to himself as he pushed past his mother to get some space. "It's your fault, you pissed me off in the first place," he accused.

"Excuse me?" Atia asked with dead calm anger. "Forgive me, but did I cause the situation with Demetri? I believe that is why both you and your mate are 'pissed off'."

Atia only ever swore in quotation and Aro usually found it quite funny. Not today - not when he realised she was right.

"Well no," he said, considering where to go next in blaming her for his stupidity.

"If you had managed that boy better in the first place this would never have happened," Atia told her son, hoping to end his argument before he could get it off the ground.

Gotcha! Aro thought. "See! That's what pisses us off! You think you can tell us how to parent and you've only been one for five minutes!"

Atia laughed to herself. Stupid boy, she thought. "No Aro, I am not telling you how to parent - I am offering you an objective view. Demetri is allowed his pick of the guards for his sexual exploits - he was going to fall for one eventually, surely you can see that?!"

Aro folded his arms across his chest, looking sullenly to the floor. "I never expected him to want to mate, actually, no," he muttered to himself, knowing how pathetic it sounded.

Atia watched her boy in wonder. "Someone of your position, someone who prides himself on covering every eventuality - and you didn't see that one coming?" she said slowly, making sure he heard.

"I know I fucked up, okay, I know it, I don't need it rammed down my throat," Aro roared, punching the wall in rage.

Atia remained unperturbed. "Did that help?" she asked, looking at his now bloodied knuckles.

"Not really," Aro said quietly.

"Did it hurt?" Atia asked, making him feel damn stupid.

"Yes," he spat in return.

Aro felt sick. He'd drank too much, he'd fucked too much, and now he was moving too much. Spotting Caius' work bench to the side of the room it looked the perfect place to perch whilst he finished coming around from the blood.

Atia gave him the time he needed to get his head together. She didn't speak until he did.

"Where do we go from here?" he asked, sounding so very childlike in that moment. He knew he'd screwed up and he was asking for help to put it right.

Atia knew that.

"You need to be on form, you need your household under control and you need to be ready and able to deal with the fallout of this whole thing with Lucy and Demetri," she said calmly as she perched next to him on the bench.

"What fallout? They will be okay," Aro replied. He wasn't concerned about Demetri and Lucy right now - his worry was for himself.

"It is unlikely Lucy will recover, Aro. I have seen this before," Atia told him as she thought about the soulless shells vampires became without their true mate at their side. She had been shocked to hear Marcus had survived so mentally intact after losing Didyme and he was a relative shell of his former self.

Aro shrugged. "Then we lose Lucy."

Atia tutted and slapped his arm. "Magnus and Freyr have taken her in. Do you think they will be shrugging at the idea of losing Lucy?"

Aro closed his eyes. Atia knew he was thinking hard on her words.

"You need the entire coven on your side before the other covens get here and you are about to fall out with two of your fellow masters."

Hearing that, Aro shook his head. "You don't know that will happen, Atia, its speculation," he said dismissively.

"It's an objective appraisal, Aro. And I am rarely wrong."

Aro sighed deeply. Fuck, he thought. "Fine, I will be prepared."

"Whilst developing an addiction to vampire blood?" she asked curiously.

Aro scoffed. Hardly, he thought. "I'm not addicted, I haven't taken it for years, it's just this one night."

"Basileus told me about your last stint on Vampire Blood."

Aro paled. "You can't tell him, Atia, he will kill me!" He was begging, how he hated begging!

Atia looked her son up and down. "Well, you need to face someone for your severe lack of judgement," she said plainly. "Vampire Blood, having sex with the castle siren, dragging Caius in on the act ... "

"Dragging Caius in?!" Aro scoffed. He wasn't taking the fall for Caius! "Caius needs no dragging from me, he's the bad influence around here!"

Atia raised her eyebrows, looking like a stern matron appraising her charge.

"Yes, your father told me all about what a bad influence Caius has been on you. Well done there for getting him to believe such folly! YOU are the king, Aro, as you so often enjoy telling anyone in hearing distance, and yet you seek to blame Caius for your actions as though you are defenceless against his suggestions. Shameful. Utterly shameful."

Aro had listened to his mother with his mouth hanging open in shock. No one had ever turned around the 'Caius is a bastard and its all his fault' thing before. When she finished, Aro desperately tried to formulate a sentence in his defence. Nothing came. not even a garbled excuse. He groaned as he sank to his knees with his head in his hands feeling like he had been punched in the guts.

Feeling satisfied that she had Aro where she wanted him, Atia pushed him a little further. "Who should we inform first? Your father or Sulpicia?" she asked her boy.

Aro looked up at her from the floor. "Atia, Sulpicia and I are already going through a bad patch ... " he said. Understatement, he added in his head.

"Your father it is, then," Atia said, sounding resolute and making to leave.

Aro grabbed hold of her dress. "Atia, no, you can't. He will crucify me."

"Do you have another suggestion?" she asked.

Aro didn't respond, he felt sick, so sick. He had read this exact situation in Carlisle's thoughts. She's going to make me ask for it.

"I'm waiting Aro," Atia pushed him as she appraised him from above with a stern eye.

"You," he said quietly.

"Sorry?" Atia replied, making him say it louder.

"You," Aro responded in a louder voice, adding "please."

"We both know you won't submit to me, you have made that perfectly clear though your attitude since I arrived," Atia told him, dismissing his request.

Aro could see his saviour backing away. No, if she won't do it Basileus will, he reminded himself. "I will. I will. Please, Atia."

"Do I have your word that there will not be a repeat?"

"You do, yes." Aro felt relieved, but he knew it was premature - he was still going to take a damn good hiding if his reading in Carlisle's thoughts was anything to go by.

Atia gestured for Aro to stand, which he did. "What is this?" she asked taking a long black stick, about half an inch thick, from Caius' workbench.

"It's a cane," Aro said with one eye on the implement.

"I can see that. Will it hold against a vampire?" Atia watched Aro for his response.

"I believe so."

"You believe so ... or you know so?" she pushed.

"I know so. It's one of Caius' creations ... he uses it on his victims in here," Aro huffed. What is the point of questioning me?! I told you it will would for fuck sake, he thought with disgust. He knew how much that cane hurt, Caius had hit him with it, once, to prove it wouldn't break. He had never told Aro what it was made of so he couldn't replicate it.

"Have you ever used it?" Atia asked, bringing him from his memories.

"Yes," he sighed. Again, point Atia?!

"Then why didn't you say so?" she asked, glaring at him with a whole change of tone.

That put Aro on the back foot. "I, I don't know," he admitted. He wasn't sure why he hadn't just said he knew because he had used it in the first place.

"You do know. It's something you do often, Aro. You distance yourself from your own distasteful behaviour and it allows you to believe yourself to be without blame."

Aro tutted and turned away, neither confirming nor denying Atia's suggestion.

"How else would you explain it?" she pushed.

Aro couldn't come up with anything. He didn't like that she seemed to know him so well. He really didn't like it.

"I will take your silence as your realisation that I speak the truth."

Aro silently nodded, and he felt like a prick.

"Bend over." Atia gestured to the work bench.

As Aro lowered himself down, biting back his pride and wishing some of that damn dungeon blood was still working, he considered facing Basileus instead. It would at least be less of a humiliation, he reasoned.

CRACK

Jesus Christ! He silently screamed, biting deep into his cheek to keep himself quiet.

"Why are you receiving this punishment, Aro?" Atia asked her boy.

"Seriously?!" Aro replied, thinking to question him now was positively audacious.

CRACK

"I think you need to hear yourself say it."

Aro was saying a lot of things on that second strike, but none were in answer to Atia's question.

"Well?" she pushed.

"Because I didn't want to face Basileus or Sulpicia," he posed, wondering what to say.

CRACK

"I am not playing with you. Try again."

Aro gasped for breath as he did his level best not to scream. As he greedily gulped down the air around him, he took down his own venom with it. Coughing and spluttering, he replied, "because I took dungeon blood and fucked Heidi?" He wasn't used to having a conversation mid-discipline, it wasn't how Basileus rolled!

Atia wasn't happy with that.

CRACK

"Not quite but we are getting there. Try again, a little more respectfully, if you please."

She sounded so nonchalant that Aro was impressed, or rather he would have been if she wasn't beating his ass!

"I am receiving this punishment because I am putting my coven, and more importantly, my family, at risk with my reckless behaviour. And if Basileus knew I was taking blood ... "

Atia stopped him. " … again," she added to his statement.

CRACK.

"Again," Aro agreed, "he would break my legs. And if Sulpicia knew I was with another woman ... "

Atia interrupted him a second time. " … again," she added.

CRACK.

Aro punched a hole straight through Caius' work bench in response to his growing pain. "Again. She would want to leave me," he gasped, realising how true that was and what an idiot he had been.

Atia leaned down close to her son's ear. "You would break her heart," she corrected him quietly.

CRACK.

It took a moment for Aro to recover from that strike. Atia was landing blow after blow in the exact same spot and Aro wore a blazing black stripe where the cane had bruised him.

"I would break her heart," he said. That line did it. He broke. He couldn't hold back his tears once he'd admitted what he was doing to his beloved mate.

"Very good," Atia told him kindly, before adding another strike.

CRACK

"Please no more," Aro spluttered, a sobbing mess now.

"Can you focus on your job, now?"

CRACK

Atia waited for Aro to respond. It took a few more minutes until he could be understood.

"Yes. I will focus. I will."

"Get up." Atia placed the cane back on Caius' desk, ensuring to match up the dust marks so Caius wouldn't know it had been used. "Do you give me your word that your infidelity will cease and you will not drink another drop of that disgusting drug?"

Aro's breath hitched in his throat to the point that he couldn't answer. He did nod though.

"So long as you don't go back on your word, I won't go back on mine and this will stay between us," Atia told him gently.

Aro's concentration on his breathing had worked and he could talk again. "Basileus will find out, he will read it in my thoughts," he said, sounding depressed and praying he would finally be permitted use of the 'mother buffer' that his sons, and even Carlisle had used so often to their advantage.

"He probably will, yes, but I will speak with him."

"He won't settle for that, Atia," Aro implored, wanting more of a conformation that she would save his ass.

"He will have no choice, son. You will have to trust me, won't you?"

Aro melted into the bench before the ignited fire in his backside had him springing to his feet again. He did trust her.

"Thank you."