Draculin Bride

Scene Two

Waking up in the early morning, my eyes cracked open with visible difficulty. I swallowed with a dry throat and tried to remember how the night went.

It hadn't gone well. It went fast downhill after meeting Elizabeth and I think even Jacob got wired from my own frantic energy.

I sat up slowly, my heel hitting something soft but hard at the same time. Jacob was laying horizontally across the end of my bed, his feet sticking out, one of them feebly kicking as he suddenly whimpered. A very dog-ish sound, I noted to myself.

I carefully maneuvered my feet over his frame and stepped carefully on the floor. I got up as silently as I could and snuck out of my room. I closed the door gingerly, turned and nearly had a heart attack. Frank stood close enough for my nose to be only an inch away.

"What are you doing?" I asked in a harsh whisper.

Frank's eyes were bright as he stared over my head. "I can't find Jacob."

"He's in there," I said weakly, waving my hand. Seeing the look on his face, I continued hurriedly. "I wouldn't want him in but I was so tired, I really didn't care and.."

"Honey, it's all right. It's none of my business…"

I groaned. "NOTHING happened!" I practically wailed. "God! Just jump to conclusions!" I stomped around him as the door opened.

"Hey, loverly, where ya going?" He leaned on the door with a very smug smile.

I favored him with a dark glare that made that look disappear in five seconds. "Go. Fuck. Off."

"Ouch.. What'd I do?" He asked Frank. Frank rolled his eyes.

I took a long, hot shower, trying to scrub my worries off of me. Elizabeth stuck in my mind, and a scene replayed in my memory, one that I wished I could piece together. But it had been such a long time and I hadn't even known what happened afterwards, I had just assumed like I always did.

I could remember him though. None of his minions save for his brides stuck but he came in with a precise lining. Sultry eyes of dark red embers, a elongated face that looked like his features had been chiseled. While he wasn't considered handsome, there was something there that was beautiful and frightening at the same time. He wore his black hair in a long tail that streamed across his back.

Lord Dracula. My archenemy. And one of my greatest nightmares. I knew what he wanted from me. Like the brides spread before him, he wanted me as a bride. Not just ONE of them but THE one. Apparently, there was something from he wanted and I was in no mood to let him get that close to me again.

And yet, while my mind analyzed all of these thoughts, my will was fighting against that blasted curse. In thinking I had him beaten and turned to dust, I was neglecting of my own curse to the point that while I controlled it best when trying to not hurt others, I didn't know I could be summoned.

"Must be clean. Must be clean.." I scrubbed all the more harder, grunting with the effort.

A hesitant knock had me snarling. "Beat it!"

Frank's voice, disembodied, came out gently. "You've been in there for a long time."

"Fine. Leave me alone." I kept rubbing my skin feverishly. I certainly wasn't expecting to have him enter. "Frank!"

"Jacob told me about Elizabeth," he smiled gently. "You look a little raw there."

"Don't stare!" I wove the shower curtain around me, staring him down but he only stepped up closer. "Frank, please!"

I nearly screamed with frustration when Jacob loped in. "NO! One of you is bad enough. If I knew how much you guys wanted a peepshow, I'd have given you Polaroids!"

"Yell all you like and I think you're clean enough. That skin is so damn raw.." Jacob had the gall to pull the curtain aside. Well, he attempted to but I shoved him aside. "HEY!"

"I'm naked. Does that mean nothing to you?" I snarled.

"Well, I'm not at liberty to discuss that at the moment. When you get back from being Miss Bitchy, I'll answer that."

I glared at him. "No, you won't."

"That's not the point here," Frank butted in.

"No, the point is I'm naked with two men in the bathroom who gives no regard whatsoever!"

"Well, here," Jacob handed me a hand towel.

"Oh, yea, that'll cover me," I glowered.

Frank handed me a regular sized towel. I disappeared for a second behind the curtain then climbed out, feeling more than a little self-conscious.

"Oh la la," Jacob whistled. I winced at the high pitch.

Frank was already studying my skin. "Well, clearly something is bothering you. You rub raw when you're highly stressed."

"Yea, learning that the person who turned you is alive, in a way, kind of puts a keel on things," Jacob noted.

"Not just that," Frank finished his looking and gently forced me to look at his eyes. "What's wrong?"

I tried hard to not to vent. To speak, cry, or do anything. The tears came on their own agenda as I wailed. "I'm becoming a monster!"

"Oh, no, no!" Frank's arms were snug around my shoulders in seconds. Jacob's arms around my waist made me realize I was now sandwiched between two men, still dripping wet, and clad only in a towel.

"Someone.. Let go, please."

"You let go," Jacob muttered to Frank.

"I'm actually comforting her," Frank and Jacob glared at each other.

"Here, let me.." I attempted to wiggle out and felt the towel drop. "Ah, fuck."

"Now that's a nice piece of a…"

Frank covered the werewolf's mouth as he forced Jacob to look away. "Sorry, honey."

Jacob's muffled protest went unnoticed as I ran out, the towel held loosely around me. My face was flaming red.

"That got too close. Way too close," I told myself as I dressed. I hurriedly dried my hair and then brushed it vigorously.

I decided to check the orphanage. I also decided to check the refugee location, where I took in the homeless until they got on their feet. Normally, I only had one or two there which was always a good thing. It meant that people weren't being left on the streets.

I was moderately surprised to see no one in. The administrator that I left in charge was reading a magazine. He looked up with a polite nod as I headed toward the children's rooms. None of them would be there per say since it was school time. I wandered outside, the snow drifting down as I sat on the lone swing. I pushed myself halfheartedly, toeing the still white snow. The wind was cold but I felt hot under the cool rays of the sun.

"You know what he wants and he knows what you want," I shivered under the implication. In my far younger days, all I had thought was that he wanted me dead, like all the malevolent creatures. He hadn't wanted me dead, not by a long shot.

A voice whispered in my mind, a memory of when we faced. "I have never met your kind before though rumors of such exist. A soldier of light and immortality. It has been long since my attention was so riveted.."

Eyes, cold heartless eyes that shone in a red lust for something more than blood stood out against what could be considered twisted face of rage. "If you do not come willing, I will make you, dear Cardea. I can make you more than you ever dreamed, make you mine.."

That last word was filled with emotion that was said to have never been felt by Dracula before. Normally, he kept pets and prisoners as well as his brides. But he never truly wanted them save to show off his superiority. I never learned what he wanted from me, I never planned on finding out.

Faced against an evil I thought I could handle, I was proven wrong and punished for it. I tried to make good of my predicament and I thought I was safe.

Well, obviously, I wasn't if the sun was bothering me. I looked up at the sun, a pale cloud covering it slightly.

I sighed and shoved myself off the swing. I wandered back inside and went to the kitchen.

Frank was following a cookbook to make something or other.

Jacob was going through the fridge. "I don't see where you put the leftovers," he called out before noticing me. "Hey! It's breakfast time!"

I rubbed at my face and was startled to see my skin dark. "What the.."

"How long were you in the sun for?" Frank asked, staring at the tan. But as we watched, it faded to normal.

"Ten minutes, tops," I felt all the blood drain from my face. "What am I going to do?"

"Simple, dear Watson. We go to the central problem and solve it," Jacob spoke firmly.

"Defeat Dracula and you will still be you," Frank agreed. "But getting there will be difficult."

"Good thing you have us," Jacob winked.

"How about asking me what I want?" I stared them both down.

"What do you want?" They asked simultaneously.

I opened my mouth and then shut it. They were right but I was terrified. I looked down at my feet, chewing my lip.

"Fear is natural," Jacob spoke with surprising gentleness. "But you're stronger than he knows and thinks. Besides, would I truly let you be hurt?"

"I think Frank would be better," I offered as my opinion. Jacob grinned wider.

"We'll both go," Frank spoke firmly.

"No, someone has to stay here. Someone who can run the place. We cannot abandon the children!"

"That's why we have hired hands."

"Jacob, you stay."

"Nope."

"Damnit!" I stamped my foot. "You…"

"Am a fighter, well practiced, with a great sense of smell and speed enough to against even most vampires, let alone other things. So if you don't mind, which you won't by the way, I'm GOING."

"But.."

Jacob groaned. "Frankie, make her stop!"

Frank raised an eyebrow slowly. "Don't call me that."

"Just make her stop!"

I rolled my eyes.

--

I quietly went through the papers on my desk. Nothing was urgent and I took care of all the current and up to three more months bills. That way, if we were gone for that long, things were still paid for. Besides, I had another stash of cash to use in case we were gone that my hired people would deal with. They were trustworthy.

I still wasn't entirely certain about taking both of the men. Jacob was already planning on making poor Frank the mule. "We'll need this, this, of course, this, and you can carry that too," Jacob added another item to the overburdened arms that was Frank's. In fact, that and his legs were all that I could see as I marched toward them.

"We can carry our fair share," I said evenly. I pulled a cup from somewhere in the middle of the carriage and watched everything tumble. "Whoops."

"See, this is why I was packing, not you," Jacob muttered.

"Should we drive?" Frank asked me.

"I tell you we shouldn't," Jacob retorted. "Especially if we head up north where there's even fewer roads there than here. It's pretty much abandoned country due to such dangerous things."

"He has a point," I conceded.

"Score," Jacob pretended to write on a notepad. "Monster, zero. Werewolf, one."

Frank gave a grim smile. "We should carry as lightly as possible. As long as we have enough money on us, we should be able to be fine for a long while till we get really high north."

"Monster, one. Werewolf, zero," I told Jacob with a sneer. He just rolled his eyes.

It took us the day to pack and while the others wanted to head off that night, I told them, firmly and intently, that we would go the coming morning. Not like we couldn't have gone then but I wanted a while more to just be home and remember that feeling of belonging.

I walked past the orphanage, where the children slept. Outside, the pristine snow was soft hued in silver moonlight. I pulled my cloak around me, moving toward the opposite of town. Old oak trees soon surrounded me. The air changed, subtly, with an old, familiar energy.

Forest sprites, protectors of their own tree. Even if I had just been a soldier, I would've felt them but as a turned creature, sight could give me the ability. I had to be a soldier to do so, so when I saw them dancing, fluttering over the snow as they chased the air particles, I knew that there was no doubt.

I was getting worse. I blew the air forcibly from my lungs, rubbing my face habitually. The sprites, translucent green sparkling strands made into a humanoid figurine, were drawn to me. They swam around me to dance around my head, creating a sort of halo.

My hand reached out, palm faced up as one of them gracefully touched. The fizzle of energy was like static, spreading through me as I smiled at it.

And just like that, they took off to fade into the trees.

"Cardea's Protection, Make Up!" I transformed, feeling my energy gather and double. My senses were drawn out, listening to the winds and earth under my feet. The world was silent as death.

But underneath that silence, deep in my body, a thread of black lined through the land to tie me to Lord Dracula. If I destroyed him, I would lose something of myself. Could I survive being just a human? After over a hundred years of immortality, the novelty had worn off to reveal a sense of being. It wasn't normal to most but for me, it spoke volumes of the right path.

Maybe it was a sense of foreshadowing, I mused to myself. I felt the earth respond to someone coming up from my side. Jacob, still clad in regular clothes without a stitch of any coats to keep him warm, nodded to me. His white gold eyes glowed with the moonlight.

"Full moon is soon," I told him. His grin revealed his canine teeth. "Probably should be resting."

"What's wrong?"

I shrugged. "Nothing, thanks for asking."

I turned and sighed in annoyance. "How is it that you AND Frank can this close to me without noticing?" Jacob was only two inches from my body. The heat coming from him was, not surprisingly, high.

"Easy," He drawled. "You've been practicing ignoring us. You've gotten it down so pat that you can no longer sense us."

"I can still find you!" I pulled away with a frown.

"What are you doing out here if we should be resting?"

"Taking a look around," I waved my hand airily.

"You're not going to die."

I glared at him.

He gave me a bland look. I frowned. It wasn't his usual look with smugness or superiority. I felt it hiding something he didn't want me to know.

"Fine, let's go to bed."

"Great!" A arm wrapped around me.

"Your own bed."

"I don't know, yours is much more bigger. It was fun last time."

"I'll make you sleep on the floor," I promised darkly.

"Oh, harsh." He snickered but he didn't move his arm.

"Jacob, let go of me."

"Nope."

"I said let go of me."

"Make me."

Flipping him gave me some satisfaction. He gave a good line of swearing, looking up at me from on his back. "Feel better?"

"I told you to let go of me," I pointed out.