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CHAPTER 31: A man in the shadow
Shin Ryu had just opened her mouth to pronounce the verdict, but someone else beat her to it.
"I vote for the boy's trust"
Everyone, spectators, council members, and defendants turned towards the voice that had pronounced those words: Dracula, who himself had turned to the Queen of Dragons with a calm expression on his face.
"What does it mean?" Exclaimed the chief judge.
"As a member of the Order of the Dragon, I cast my vote." The Count replied evenly.
"You have no right to vote on this judgment!" The Dragoness Countered.
"I was not entitled to it during the charges involving me and my castle, but we're now judging Jonathan and my daughter." He pointed out.
"I SAID NO!" Shin Ryu shouted, standing up and slamming both hands on the desk. This behavior triggered the public's indignation, who began to whistle and rail against her, including the many who were not in favor of mixed relationships but who were fed up with the dictatorial control of the Dragons. Many of the Councilors looked annoyed as well. As usual, the Dragoness had acted on instinct, in a completely authoritarian way, without hearing the opinion of other judges. Furthermore, Dracula was right: since he was not the one on trial, he had the right to vote like any other counselor.
Nessie got up and whispered something into her Queen's ear, who glanced quickly at the other Counselors, and then both went back to their seats.
"Order in the court!" Drac roared to silence public protests. Certainly, if the request had been made by Shin Ryu it would not obtained the same result this time.
The Dragoness sighed nervously and, after a short pause, "Given the equality of votes, judgment on the legality of the couple Mavis Dracula and Jonathan Fockers will be postponed until after the outcome of universal vote on mixed couples."
It was done.
At least for the moment, but a victory is a victory, however temporary.
The audience's reactions were varied: on the one hand, the euphoria of monsters who had the opportunity to get to know the boy from before; on the other hand, the dissatisfaction of the conservatives who still mistrusted the human. They all maintained appropriate behavior, though.
"The defendants can leave the courtroom." Shin Ryu went on, angrily, "If I didn't go against you like I should have, it's just because you handed Hal over to us." She continued, turning towards Drac.
The three remained standing, as satisfied as they were exhausted, too much to even hug each other. Mavis simply rested her head on Jonathan's shoulder, who gently stroked her hair.
"Before I leave, I have an important announcement to make" Dracula exclaimed, drawing the attention of all present, "Given the courage, the help, the loyalty, and the sincere friendship shown for me, for my daughter and for Hotel Transylvania, I would like to repay you with a gift, Johnathan." The Count turned to the boy and motioned for him to come closer.
The human obeyed and joined the old vampire by standing beside him, facing the audience.
The Count held out his empty hand to the human, and from a beam of blue and violet light appeared an old, rusty iron key, about a dozen inches long, which hovered slowly a few inches from his hand. Given the size, it had to open a very imposing door. The boy took it, despite how heavy the object was.
"This is the master key to Hotel Transylvania. You told me your family moves so often that you haven't ever had a place to call home, so I would be honored if this castle became your home"
These words melted the hearts of many monsters who applauded, moved by the actions of the Count, while those who had no sympathy for humans grimaced disapprovingly, yet uttered no word on the matter. Obviously, the Queen of Dragons was one of those who listened to the vampire's words with a disgusted look. Jay Ci, on the other hand, seemed to be the happiest about Dracula's decision, smiling at the young human and waving him goodbye before going out with everyone else.
The human was unable to respond because of the strong emotions he felt, so instead he jumped on Dracula, hugging him tightly with both arms and legs.
"Easy boy, easy!" Exclaimed the stifled vampire, "You are strangling me!" But the human did not seem to want to detach himself from the vampire; he had clung really well, to the point that Drac had to use magic to free himself. "Now go and rest." The old Count said lovingly, "I'll take care of the reporters."
The two lovers took each other's hands and walked out of the room while the din of comments grew louder behind them. The reporters let them pass without uttering a single question, but their eyes were fixed on them, with mouths eager to ask questions that no one had the courage to ask, given the vampire's reaction before the last session.
In order to avoid the hundreds of curious that waited beyond the Council Room, the couple took a secret passage, hidden by a tapestry that represented the newly built Hotel Transylvania -even though it already seemed old and partially ruined-.
Finally, Jonathan and Mavis found themselves alone, the barking of the monsters seemingly very far away through those thick stone walls.
In company of nothing but themselves and the musty, damp smell and the complete darkness, Jonathan had to walk behind Mavis with one hand on her shoulder. They didn't say a word to each other for the whole length of the narrow corridor, except for the girl's various warnings when there was a patch of uneven floor, or some piece of stone protruding from the wall, thanks to her ability to see in the dark perfectly well. They continued for a few minutes until they reached a wooden door, and immediately beyond that... another wooden door. They arrived inside a wardrobe of the third floor corridor, which had before been used to store the flying brooms of the cleaning witches, but was now kept empty to facilitate the way out in case of emergency.
The couple reached Mavis' room and sighed, happy that no one had found or followed them.
Jonathan dropped himself on the bed, heavy with exhaustion.
Mavis also had a strange feeling, similar to tiredness, where she had no more energy but was not really sleepy.
The boy patted the bed by his side to call the vampiress next to him, but she remained motionless. The girl had a strange, oppressive feeling looming over her, as if she was forgetting something important, but what it was, she couldn't put her finger on it.
She turned to Johnathan who had fallen asleep. She smiled, but it was only a half smile; her mind was confused, and she didn't understand what was it that made her feel so strange.
The thought that she had to go into the next room suddenly popped into her mind. She didn't know why, nor the reason why such an idea had occurred to her: that room was as empty, as all the other rooms on that floor were since her father didn't want strangers next to his daughter at that particular time.
The vampiress came out of her room and headed for the first door on the right. The shrunken head on the handle was motionless and showed no signs of life, strange, considering how much they normally liked to chat. The girl touched the door, finding it open.
It was dark inside, and she couldn't see much, the only light in the room plowing through the door. It was strange; since -until very recently- she had no problem walking through the unlit corridor, but it was probably just a result of her tiredness.
She went into the room, passing the anteroom and arriving a short distance away from the bed. And it was precisely on the bed, wrapped in darkness, that her attention was focused. There was someone sleeping. But there wasn't supposed to be anyone in there. It looked like a girl, she could make out the pale face, but the black hair and clothes made the rest of the figure indistinguishable, so she snapped her fingers to make the lanterns ignite, yet nothing happened. Only then, she remembered she could turn on the electric lights, but she was not yet accustomed to the new system which, by the way, she wasn't normally using anyway -since she had always relied on her powers- but by now the switch was all the way back at the entrance, and she couldn't see the one by the bedside.
"Who are you?" Mavis asked, hoping to wake her up, but the only answer she got was the echo of her words, an unnatural echo in a furnished room. Perhaps also this was a symptom of her tiredness? After all, she had been awake all day, and had to face Shin Ryu, who wanted to shut down the hotel at all costs, condemn her father, and destroy her relationship with Jonathan. Not exactly a relaxing day. But first, she wanted to know who that girl was.
She took a few steps towards her, but then stopped, remembering the past experience with Lord Ruthven and Erzebeth Bathory. She could not trust strangers.
So she instead decided to approach the window, and, reaching the heavy curtains that completely covered the moonlight, opened them wide. It was very cloudy outside, however, and the room did not light up as much as she had hoped.
She turned towards the bed, anyway, but her attention was drawn to something beyond that. There was a reflection, something shiny and metallic was stretching in the shadow, a shadow that hid a threatening dark figure.
Whoever he was, he was not a friend.
Mavis gritted her teeth. She could call for help, but the whole floor was empty, and Jonathan was such a heavy sleeper that even Wayne and Wanda's children couldn't wake him up. Her father was still in the crowd at ground floor, too. Fighting was out of the question, if she was too tired to can't see in the dark, she had little hope in actual combat. Even running away was not a solution: she was near the window, but she wasn't sure she could turn into a bat, and the risk of crashing on the ground was too high.
The Vampiress didn't know what to do; even if the man had not yet attacked her, that shinny sword was certainly not a good sign.
"Don't complicate things." The man said, "It will hurt, but it will pass." He continued in a calm voice, which did nothing but make him even more disturbing.
Mavis clenched her fists, gathered her last remaining strength, and tried to run towards the door.
The black figure made a quick snap and took the girl by the wrist, but she reacted by dematerializing her arm for an imperceptible fraction of time, sufficient enough to free herself from that strong grip. Unfortunately, she hadn't considered that using that little bit of magic would cloud her vision so much.
Mavis staggered and the man took her by the shirt, bringing her back. She screamed for help, but only a faint whisper came out of her throat. Despite her condition, the girl reacted by striking her assailant's nose with her head, causing him to lose his grip again and fall backwards.
Mavis only had this chance to try to get out of the room; wasting no time, she started running towards the light that filtered from all around the door, barely grazing the door handle when her feet rose from the ground. She was then falling backwards into the dark room, as if gravity had inverted for her. There was nothing grabbing and dragging her towards the attacker, she was just falling towards him.
The stranger she had mistaken for a hunter had the appearance of a man, but given his magical abilities, he was almost certainly not human.
The vampire clenched her fists in anger, seeing that door surrounded by light escaping from her hands and become more and more distant and unreachable. She tried to improvise a new escape plan, but her mind abruptly returned to reality when she heard the sharp hiss of air being cut at high speed by the sword. She saw only a silver flash between her shoulders and her head before her vision completely clouded, and pain like an electric shock ran through her entire body. She screamed in an instinctive response, but not a breath of air came from her mouth.
She heard the thud of her body slamming on the stone floor just before she hit her head. Only then did all that pain vanish, as did fear, anger... all of herself.
Who the hell is that man anw what the hell he did to Mavis? right now that they could celebrate victory in court?
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