I dedicate this fanfiction to my girlfriend and all my readers, reviewers and the beta reader wallaceb.
CHAPTER 28 - Her origins
"You got a plan?" Victoria asked the vampire.
"No." Dracula replied, sadly, "But I'll need all the help possible to stop her and make her see reason. Should I call the other monsters of hotel?"
"Hotel?" The puzzled woman asked, raising an eyebrow.
"Yes, I manage a hotel for monsters, a place to find a bit of serenity and peace from humans like you."
Victoria bowed her head in shame.
"I'll take a flight to the hotel, you wait here ... you can try to run away if you want, but remember I can feel the smell of your blood even from miles away." Dracula said before turning into a bat, but after the flash of blue light, he immediately fell to the ground wiggling his wings with pain.
"Aaaaaargh!" Screamed the bat, "I'm burning! What the hell did you to me, bastard?!"
"Oh, damn, it must be the silver nitrate from the arrow, even if the tip had come out of your body, part of the poison has entered your blood stream, too small to hurt you in human form, but enough to damage a small bat."
The vampire turned human and stood up still sore.
"We will have a long walk..."
" Drac complained. Time was not on their side and he knew that getting back to the castle in this condition would have wasted enough.
"Dracula..." She said in a low voice, the vampire turned curiously toward her, who continued:
"I'm sorry for what I did to you, to your daughter and to the boy. I did not know there were also good monsters ... "
Dracula looked at the girl in her green eyes full of regret, but then he looked away without answering, she knew she would never be forgiven.
Immediately after the count began to walk towards the castle Drac said "Hurry, we have no time to waste." He said it in a serious tone, almost annoyed.
Victoria hurried to retrieve the few yards of distance between them and reached the vampire.
"Human, allow my curiosity, who are you really?"
The strange question left Victoria puzzled, so the vampire tried to express better:
"In combat you seemed like another person, now you want me to feel pity for you?"
"I don't want anyone to feel pity for me; I accepted my fate, now I have no fear. After all, I deserve it, for all the wrong I have done... I would not be an evil person, but if I want to survive in this job I have to be ruthless like all the other hunters. If only I had listened to the boy when I had time..."
"The damage is done and you'll pay for this, but what made you choose this life? Would it not have been easier to have fun, fall in love and start a family as both monsters and humans do?" Dracula was calm, as if he spoke with any person, or monster. Perhaps he wanted to avoid unnecessary tension with her, or the sincere repentance of the huntress reminded him that, like him, she also should have the right to a second chance, but she had hurt his daughter, his beloved daughter and for that he would never forgive her, ever.
Victoria sighed thoughtfully, and then she began to speak. She had a low tone of voice and kept looking at the ground:
"But I should have..."
These words caught the attention of the vampire, and then Victoria looked up and continued:
"My father and my brother Simon were hunters, while I have been entrusted to my mother to stay out of trouble, but in the end the trouble reached us.
When I was twelve, a vampire killed my mother for revenge in front of my eyes. My father and brother were able to shoot it down before he could hurt me and from that day on, I had to follow them in their travels to be defended.
With them I learned the various tactics to defeat the monsters even if they never took me to fight.
Unfortunately, eight years ago, when I was almost eighteen, we discovered a series of suspicious disappearances of newborns in Greece. The night before my birthday Simon and my father came out of the abandoned mill where we were staying and returned the next morning. They were full of wounds, but they did not bleed and their eyes were empty and lifeless. I understood immediately that someone had killed them and turned them into zombies to get them back to base to kill their mates. They tried to attack me so I shot them in the head with the old revolver lucky charm of my father, who no longer brought it to hunt because it was too unreliable." She finished pulling
out of her holster an old Colt, but kept polished.
"What a terrible story..." Commented the vampire "Did you ever find out who it was?"
Victoria took a moment for reflection, and then replied:
"Yes, lamias."
Dracula stood for a moment speechless with astonishment and concern, before he could answer:
"Lamie, the snake women, they are as powerful as ancient monsters, evil. It was said that they had become extinct long ago. I have been immortalized by their magic and I, like them, need blood to live, but not even when I was a bloodthirsty monster would I have been cruel enough to devour a newborn.
It is since then you have taken the identity of your brother? "
"Yes, my brother and I looked alike. Like all Van Helsings, red curly hair, tall and athletic, and an innate gift to hunt and shoot down monsters.
When the word spread the only thing that was communicated over our radio was the despair and sadness of the fall of the Van Helsing. Two weeks passed and no one bothered me, nobody cared how I was or what I did, so I decided that I had to start to protect myself, I dressed like Simon and I acted like him. I managed to convince everyone that only my father and Victoria had been killed, and do you know what they told me? "Thank goodness, we thought you were dead instead of your sister"."
"You work with nice people..." The vampire said, sarcastically.
"That's why I work alone. Who would have thought that my first and only partner would have been just the Count Dracula, blah, blah blah."
"I don't say blah, blah blah! I don't know who has put it in the mind of you humans, and then who is the partner of what with who?" The vampire grumbled, waving his arms.
Victoria giggled, and Dracula noticed that it was very similar to Mavis' laughter and for a moment he seemed to have her close.
"But what are you going to think, I meant that you're my first mate! Although I must admit that I find you interesting, then it seems that you accept mixed couples..."
Dracula suddenly stopped and in a moment he pulled out his rapier from the stick and pointed it at the girl's throat. A drop of blood began to run down the blade.
He said nothing, but his frown was threatening enough to make himself understood even without much explanation.
"Okay, okay..." Said Victoria timidly putting her hands in plain view. "I'll not touch this topic again."
But the vampire continued to look her with an evil glance and to threaten her with the rapier.
"I get it; I won't open my mouth anymore, okay?" the girl continued crossing her arms pouting. Dracula lowered his weapon; he turned and began to walk.
"Hey, human, don't you walk faster?"
Asked the vampire without even looking at her.
"The leg that you hurt me gives me more and more pain..."
"I didn't think it was so serious, why didn't you say it before? We could have stopped before to aid you." Dracula stopped again.
"Let's not waste time, I can even run if I want to!"
"Look, I don't need you if you're dying. Come on, let me see."
Victoria leaned against a tree and undid the buckles of the legs protections that dropped to the ground and then began to unbutton her anti-cut kevlar pants.
Dracula turned away embarrassed, so she began to speak:
"What are you doing? Are you ashamed?" She chuckled while she lowered her pants and she sat on the ground, and then continued to speak, "You are funny... and adorable..." But having said this, her face frowned and she sighed thoughtful and sad. Dracula noticed it, but he pretended to see nothing, and then looked at the wound, it was deep and continued to bleed.
"It is more serious than I imagined... I'm sorry, but my black magic cannot heal the wounds of others. Do you have something to heal yourself?"
"Unfortunately I finished my whole essence of dittany to heal the wounds that..." Victoria paused and looked down, then said, "And still I have not even fully recovered."
Victoria took off her gloves and reached into her thigh pocket, from which she took out a packet of bandages, but before she started to bandage the wound the vampire stopped her, touching her hand with his.
"Don't worry, I'll help you." Dracula said, then pressed a piece of gauze on the wound and wrapped the bandage tightly around the thigh.
"How do you resist the smell of my blood?" The huntress asked. "Usually the vampires go crazy!"
"It is not easy, especially the blood of a young virgin girl... but whenever the desire increases, my mind comes back to the monster that I once was and that I no longer want to be.
That's it! How do you feel?"
The girl waited a moment before answering.
"I feel pain."
"Do you have any painkiller with you?"
Victoria sighed.
"It's not the wound that hurts... there is no cure for remorse... it was so easy to live alone waiving away all of my feelings.
I spent eight years living the life of another person to fight monsters, but only now I realize that the real monster is me, who didn't hesitate to attack a vampiress who had taken no violence and most importantly with an innocent boy on my line of fire." She said in a voice filled with sadness, then smiled slightly and continued:
"But tell me, how are you Drac? Can I call you Drac? "
"Only my friends call me Drac, you can call me Dracula.
Anyway, I'm quite fine, the wound in my shoulder still hurts and doesn't seem to want to recover soon, but I will survive."
"Sorry, I'm wasting your time, we leave immediately." That said Victoria stood up and started walking.
A bit of calm for the odd couple while we discover a few more details about Victoria's past which has led her to be what she is.
Meanwhile, Dracula seems somewhat confused about how to deal with the girl. His goodness comes into conflict with his hatred for the person who has hurt his beloved Mavy wavy.
Unfortunately this walk to the hotel Transylvania will not be a pleasure outing; the time is short and the soul of Mavis could collapse at any moment leaving full freedom to the true monster that she carries inside herself.
IMPORTANT!
But in all of this what happened to Jonathan? You are right, it's been a while that I did not rename him, he is still heavily sedated at the castle while his body is preparing for the transformation into a vampire and he will reappear in about two chapters.
I already have in my mind a draft of the plot in both cases, and this is where you readers come into play, by your reviews you can decide whether if turn Jonathan into a vampire now, or get it back to human and tuning into a vampire in the sequel of this fanfiction. I ask you with a little advance in order to start writing something immediately (now I have already written the chapter 30). I also accept advice on the development of the plot in both ways, and you have until Chapter 30 to vote and suggest, and do not worry if you change your mind, you can change your vote reviewing the next chapter. If you are not registered on fanfiction-net is not a problem, even you you can vote by reviewing the chapter!