Victoria could hardly believe what she was hearing from Anna once she returned home. The worrying part was the fact that she had brought a man back with her. The man was handsome, Victoria could not deny that. He wore a long leather coat and his face had a small beard alongside dark hair that sat in unruly waves coming down to his shoulders. It was only when he removed his hat when Victoria's eyes widened and she shook her head. It could not be.

She placed her hands over her mouth before stepping backwards and Anna wondered what had gotten into her. It took her a moment before she noticed Victoria's eyes were rimmed with tears. The man looked to Victoria and Anna looked between both of them.

"Victoria," Anna whispered her name as they stood in the dining room.

"Get him out!" Victoria roared, pointing at the man she had brought back with her, not bothering to give his companion a second thought. Moving a hand to her stomach, she felt the upmost need to protect the babe now. "Get him out!"

"What…" the man began to trail off and Victoria shook her head and Anna wondered if she had ever seen her look so volatile. Instead of recoiling from him, Victoria launched herself at him, grabbing hold of him by the shoulders and shaking him roughly.

"How could you?" Victoria roared. "How dare you? Get out, you murderer! You murdered him! You did this!"

"Victoria, calm down," Anna demanded, grabbing hold of her and pulling her from him. "This is Van Helsing…he's here to help us."

"No!" Victoria roared, voice high pitched and full of rage. "I know who he is…Gabriel," she hissed his name. "I know who he is and what he did. He murdered Vlad…he was the one who made him what he is…he did this to him…he ruined everything!"

Van Helsing looked genuinely confused as Anna took hold of Victoria, forcing the young woman to look to her before she shook her head at her. "What has gotten into you? This is Van Helsing. He is here to help. How can you know him, Victoria?"

"The same way Vlad knows me," Victoria said with haste. "I know who he is, Anna. I know who he is and I know what he did."

Van Helsing shook his head then. "Look, I have no idea what you are talking of. I do not know any of you, nor do I know of any Vlad."

Victoria glowered over to him.

"Perhaps he looks like someone from your past?" Anna wondered from her, wanting to keep her calm for the sake of the babe growing inside of her stomach. She kept her gaze on her and held onto her shoulders tightly. "Listen to me, Victoria, you are not thinking rationally and you know that."

"No," Victoria said, shrugging Anna from her. "I know who he is and I know what he did."

Without another word, Victoria swept from the room. There was no use in attacking him again. She would never be able to do any damage, regardless. She could not harm him. She remained silent as she left for the library, opening the door and wandering into the room. Closing the door behind her, she sank down on the chaise longue, her skirts pooled around her as she closed her eyes and buried her head.

Gabriel Van Helsing had done nothing but make her life a misery. She detested him. The sight of him in the dining room had done nothing but bring back bad memories. Victoria was well aware that what she and Vlad had done wrong. Their affair had been illicit and gone against the Holy Order, but they had vowed to run away together. Why could that not have been enough?

Victoria didn't know how long she had been brooding for before she heard the door open. Looking up, she was shocked to see Van Helsing stood in the doorway. He glanced over to her and she instantly glared at him, anger coursing through her veins.

"What do you want?" she demanded from him.

"To know what you know," Van Helsing informed of her.

"Really?" she arched a brow.

"Everything in my life…before a certain point…is a blur," he informed her in a low voice. "I was found on the steps of the Vatican almost dead…I do not know how I got there or what I had been doing. All I know is that my memories were taken from me."

Victoria scoffed. "You mean to inform me you have been alive for four hundred years roaming this earth until this exact moment?"

"Just as you have been reincarnated?" he enquired back, brow arched as he folded his arms over his chest and Victoria looked away from him, huffing gently. "These things are entirely possible and we all know that now."

"So what?" Victoria demanded. "Your memories have been wiped?"

"Apparently so," Van Helsing responded and Victoria almost balked once more, but remained silent. She didn't entirely know if she should believe him. He had done nothing but bring misery. "So I want to know the truth. What did I do?"

Victoria sighed and watched as he sat in the chair in the corner, leaning forwards and listening with intent. She folded her hands into her lap and told him all that she knew and could remember.

"You were a member of the Holy Order," she informed him.

"Still have dealings with them," he declared and she frowned, not entirely certain if that made her feel even more uneasy.

"You were friends with Vlad," she whispered. "He…he thought that you were his friend, but you lied…either you lied or you really do believe in nothing but the rules. You ruined everything. Vlad and I were in love. We had met and fallen in love. We spent months running and hiding from everyone and we were going to elope."

She took a deep breath.

"But before we could elope you told the Holy Order of what he had done. He was not to take a wife nor was he to act as he did, but he loved me and I loved him. I wanted to run with him. The Holy Order never permitted it and my parents exiled me, but…but there was a fight before I left…a fight and I was shot."

Van Helsing remained intrigued by what he was hearing. He watched as she told her story with such emotion he had not seen before. She looked traumatised. She looked bereft.

"Vlad took my body somewhere before anyone could stop him…he…I don't know what he did, but he wanted to bring me back. It didn't work entirely because you arrived and killed him. You murdered him and he made a deal with the devil to come back in the hope that I had returned to him…he…he had to wait over four hundred years for me to come back and now…now I hardly want anything to do with him."

Gulping at what he heard, Van Helsing looked to her stomach, noting the protruding bump he had not yet had chance to question. Victoria caught his gaze and looked down to the swell. She shook her head at him slowly.

"It is not his child," she said. "Don't worry."

"It is quite worrying," he responded. "You have a new generation of Valerious inside of you. If Dracula is not killed-"

"-I know," Victoria said, moving to her feet and finding herself unable to look to Van Helsing. "I know all of this, but I do not want to discuss it. Vlad…he…"

"Do you love him?" Van Helsing asked her. "Even after you have seen what he has become?"

Victoria glowered to him then, turning her gaze back onto him as she spoke. "A part of me will always love the man I knew," Victoria said. "But he is not that man. You made sure of that. You snatched him away from me once and now you are here to do it again, are you not?"

Van Helsing also stood to his feet and took his turn to glare at her.

"You know exactly what he is," he responded. "You know who he is and what he has done. He is not a good man."

"No, you took the good man away from him," she said and Van Helsing moved to stop her from leaving the room, grabbing hold of her by the wrist, halting her in her tracks.

"He sent three of his wives to the town," Van Helsing snarled at her. "He had them go and murder people. If you even think that there is any shred of goodness inside of him then you are deluded. Whatever happened four hundred years ago is in the past and if I did what you said I did then I do not remember. It is in the past. It is behind us and we need to look ahead."

"How can I do that?" Victoria asked. "You want me to help you kill him? I can't kill him."

"So you are going to do what?" Van Helsing demanded.

"I do not know!" she snapped out to him.

"Sit on the fence?" he continued to push her. "If Dracula lives then that child inside of you will have no life. It will follow in its father's footsteps. Velkan, isn't it? Spending the rest of its days trying to kill a creature its mother is in love with."

"Stop it!" Victoria finally roared at him, the fear inside of her taking over as she glowered with intensity at him, shaking her head back and forth as she pushed him from her. "What do you want me to say? Do you want me to tell you that I will help you? Do you want me to help you kill him? I cannot do it. I cannot make that promise!"

"Then you leave your child nothing but a life of damnation and an afterlife of the same," Van Helsing responded to her, his voice gruff.

"And Vlad?" Victoria demanded. "What would I leave him to? I might have moved on from him, but I will not have his blood on my hands."

"So you leave it to others to be smeared in the blood for you," Van Helsing spoke as if it were that simple.

It was another moment before Victoria moved away, her eyes wide and full of hurt at his words. She suspected she was only hurt because she knew that he was telling the truth. He was being honest and there was nothing she could say or do about it. Instead she ran, like she ran from everything else. She just didn't know if she could keep running.

…

"Why did you bring him here?"

Victoria had been terse all during dinner and it was only afterwards when she was wandering the castle with Anna did she ask her the question.

"Because he killed one of Dracula's wives," Anna said and Victoria shook her head.

"He will not be happy."

"We did not kill the important one," Anna said and Victoria ground her teeth together, standing still as Anna took a few more steps and then stood.

"I am not his wife."

"You act more like his wife than Velkan's wife," Anna replied. "Do not tell me that is not true. We know it to be a fact, Victoria."

"It is not true," Victoria responded. "I care for Velkan. You know that I do. I want him back."

"Honestly, Victoria, I do not know what to think," Anna shrugged.

Before Victoria could even respond, there was a sudden noise in the distance. Anna moved to pull out her gun as the clattering echoed throughout the corridor and the candles blew out. Victoria followed her hesitantly before seeing an open window flailing in the wind. Both women sighed in relief before going to shut it. It was only when they turned around did they see him stood there, his body covered in cuts and bruises, his hair straggly and his clothes ripped, sweat pooling down him.

Gasping in shock, Victoria could only whisper his name as he looked between the two women.

"Velkan."

…

A/N: Do let me know what you think!