Chapter Ten: Illusions

Night had long since fallen, and an eerie silence cloaked the dark halls. Uneasily, Meier patrolled the empty rooms; having left Charlotte under Dirk's protection with the promise to return soon.

"Dirk had seemed as on edge as I am right now...I wonder..." Meier mused, as he rounded a corner, and came upon a hall that was comprised mainly of marble columns. At first, there was nothing to interest him, then he saw something move...and saw an all-too-familiar figure emerge into the moonlight.

"D." Meier growled, as he changed his hand into a metal-clawed gauntlet. The Hunter before him was unfazed by this development, and even looked him coolly in the eye.

"Listen, Meier. The woman says she wants to go back home." D murmured, as he moved his cloak aside to reveal a weeping Charlotte clinging to him for dear life. Meier stared at them in disbelief; had all Charlotte had said to him earlier been a lie? Had she truly changed her mind?.! Before the stunned vampire could think any more on the subject, D's sword sliced right through him; splitting him right down the middle.

"I don't...believe it..." Meier muttered, as his eyes glazed, and blood oozed thickly from his bisected body. He didn't even get the chance to see D and Charlotte's forms dissolve into thousands of pitch-black bats and flutter away from the gory scene.

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"Something's not right here..." Left's voice murmured, nervously.

"Tell us something we don't know, Leftie." Belladonna grumbled, irritably, as she and D made their way ever deeper inside. They had just gotten within the walls of the haunted castle, and, already, they could sense that something fell was going on.

"Dirk isn't too far away. Stick close, Miss Collins." D said, as he started leading the way towards the spot where Dirk's presence was the strongest.

"Gotcha." Belladonna agreed. She did not want to get lost in this cursed place! But the castle, and its' ghostly inhabitants, had other, more sinister plans in store for them.

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"Okay...This isn't good. I've just lost track of Charlotte, and gotten myself turned around in this place! Where the heck am I?.!" Dirk wondered, as he wandered around, trying to find his way back to the room where Charlotte waited for Meier to return.

"Man, where's a tour guide when you need one? Sheesh! How'd that countess keep everything in order in such a huge place, anyway? I know she was a vampire, but still! This is a little over the top!" the confused quarter-vampire muttered, as he turned into yet another hallway, and found himself awash in red light.

"W-what the...?.!" Dirk yelped, covering his eyes for a moment to protect them from the sudden brightness.

"Dirk?" a woman's voice asked, from just in front of him. Dirk froze.

"No way...There's just no way!" Dirk thought, as he lowered his arm, and stared in shock and the person who now stood just in front of him.

"M-mother...?"

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Elsewhere in the castle, D was also coming upon a similar scene. He was now walking alone through what appeared to be blood (he'd lost track of Belladonna, thanks to the illusion coming down upon them; cutting them off from one another), and waist deep in it, sat a woman. Her back was toward him, so he couldn't see her face; but he knew who it was...or who Carmilla wanted him to think it was, at any rate.

"I know you hate me, D, but please try to understand. I truly loved your father...therefore, what choice did I have?" the woman asked, gently.

"None. My own mother had had no choice...and yet, Doris did. She chose a life of loneliness; raising our son on her own, with Dan and his family's help on the side." D mused, as he silently remembered what the tough, dark-haired beauty had told him, all those years ago.

"Even if you never return, D, I will always love you! Remember that!" Doris had declared, boldly, before he'd ridden away from the Lang Farm forever.

"I always used to wonder why Mother had called me her 'treasure' when I was younger. Now I know." Dirk had quietly said, that day, when it had been revealed to D that he was D's son.

"I have something more than a memory to live for, now. So I don't need this" D silently resolved, as he unsheathed his sword, and swept it through the shadow with deadly grace. Seconds later, the illusion faded into nothing.

"Now to find Dirk and Belladonna...and hopefully the young lady as well." D mused, as he rushed from the room he'd wandered into, and towards the closest sounds; hoping he wouldn't be too late.

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"I don't understand. Mother, what're you doin' here?" Dirk asked, as the woman in front of him smiled gently.

"I thought you might like to join me." Doris replied, airily; her smile and the look in her stormy blue eyes sending the warning bells sounding off in Dirk's mind. The quarter-vampire took a step back.

"In what way?" Dirk asked, warily. Doris smiled again; but this time her eyes were much colder.

"In death." Doris said, her voice deepening slightly, and her eyes taking on a reddish hue, as she advanced on the younger Hunter. With an inhuman leap, the false Doris attacked Dirk; swiping at him with claws that were only just becoming visible to the Werewolf Hunter.

"This thing isn't a werewolf...and it's way too fast to be a normal mutant. Is it a hybrid?" Dirk wondered, as he unsheathed his sword.

"Marv! Any idea where Charlotte is? Can you sense her anywhere?" Dirk asked, as he dodged the creature's blows, shook himself free of the rest of the illusion, and started running.

"Yes! Directly below us!" Marv replied.

"Then show me the way, then! If I'm getting attacked by illusions, then they are too!" Dirk shouted, as he flew down the hallway as fast as his legs could carry him.

"Please! Don't let me be too late!"

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Belladonna could only stare in horror at what was before her. She'd been following closely at D's side when they had first entered the castle proper, but now found herself separated from him, and in her hometown's cemetery. Her father, and the rest of her family, were gathered around what appeared to be a tombstone; weeping pitifully and mourning the loss of the one who was now buried beneath it.

"You foolish girl! Why did you go with that damned dunpeal and his son? Why?" her father asked, sorrowfully.

"But I'm right here! Father! Everybody! I'm alive! Can't you see me?" Belladonna shouted. But she continued to go unheard.

"What's worse is the fact that she'd even ended up getting turned into a vampire! And those Hunters had had to kill her! Oh, our poor, poor Belladonna! What a cruel fate to befall you!" one of her aunts moaned, as windswept rain whipped around them.

"I'm here! I'm here! Don't leave me!" Belladonna cried, as she started to run after the disappearing figures, as they left the graveside. Before she could get very far, she felt a hand grab her wrist and pull her back. With a yelp, she landed almost head-on into someone; the illusion melting rapidly away like the bad dream it was. It was further dissolved by the loud crash of a crystal chandelier hitting the floor right where Belladonna would have run, had the hand not stopped her.

"It was just an illusion. Carmilla is toying with us." D's voice growled, from in front of her; all of them looking up when laughter came to their ears and starting a bit when they saw the ghost of Carmilla herself standing on the ballroom ceiling.

"Excellent! What fun! You're all doing well, very well indeed!" Carmilla sneered; noticing, with some delight, when some anger entered D's normally calm grey eyes.

"The woman...where are you hiding her?" D asked, then added, "And what have you done with my apprentice?" He got only an evil smile from Carmilla, before her ghostly form took the shape of thousands of bats, and flew off.

"Damn..." Belladonna muttered, crying out when a silver arrow narrowly missed D.

"Borgoff, what're you doing?.! We don't have time for this!" Leila, (who had been the one Belladonna had run into) shouted, as the eldest Markus brother slowly approached; his crossbow notched and ready to fire. He only gave her, Belladonna, and D an unreadable glare.

"Leila, are you in love with this dunpeal?" Borgoff asked, coarsely, ignoring Leila's question completely.

"Are you crazy? What is wrong with you, Borgoff?.!" Leila asked, as she approached him to try and diffuse the situation, and gasped when he grabbed her and held her in point-blank range of his crossbow.

"Dunpeals, drop your weapons! Now! Drop them now!" Borgoff growled, as his good eye changed from its' usual brown color, to vampiric red.

"Oh hell! He's been..." Belladonna mind cried, as she hesitantly made a move for her guns; uncertain of what she was going to do next...or what D was going to do, for that matter.

"She took you in, didn't she?" D questioned, a disappointed tone emerging in his voice as he said that, and as he began to slowly approach them. Borgoff's expression became more feral, and he lowered his now fang-filled mouth to Leila's neck as a threat to warn him off.

"She'll die! I'm warning you, dunpeal, don't come any closer!" Borgoff snarled, as Leila tried to cringe away from the cold breath that now came from her adopted brother's mouth.

"Please, hurry and do something, D! Don't let her die like this!" Belladonna thought, frantically; wringing her hands and cursing the bad angle. Leila's head was far too close to Borgoff's for comfort, and Belladonna knew she had nowhere near the amount of experience it would take to fire off a shot, and get Leila out of that situation.

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Dirk uttered a pained cry when he felt the monster's razor-sharp claws slash into the skin of his back, rending his cloak in that one spot before he could swing around and defend himself.

"This thing...It's too damn fast for me to kill! No sooner do I get turned back around, it's coming at me from all sides again!" Dirk thought, as he struggled to ignore the lancing pain coming from his wounds, and the scent of his own blood filling his nostrils.

"I...I can't give up now...But I'm too worn out to fight! I can't keep this up for much longer!" Dirk mused, flinching when the monster rebounded off one of the walls, and flew straight towards his face and chest. Yet, before he could raise his sword, a strong light took hold of the demonic beast, and tore it apart right before his astonished eyes.

"That will be quite enough." a deep, male voice growled, as the creature screamed once, and then disintegrated within the light.

"Dirk! Are you all right?" another, more familiar voice asked, worriedly.

"Mother?.!" Dirk asked, as the ghostly form of his mother appeared before him, smiled calmly, and nodded.

"The one and only. Are you okay?" the true Doris again asked. Dirk could only breathe a sigh of relief, and relax somewhat.

"Yeah. I'm okay. Thanks to you. But what're you doing here?" Dirk questioned, watching as a male figure appeared alongside Doris and gave him a grim look.

"Saving your life, for one. Protecting what is left of my family line, another." the male ghost stated, quietly. Dirk gave him a confused look.

"Your family line? Sir, you wouldn't happen to be...?" Dirk started to ask, but was interrupted by a wave of the figure's hand.

"That isn't important right now, young one. For now, you must focus on saving a young woman from Bloody Carmilla's fangs." he said, watching as worry for the human woman overcame Dirk's youthful features.

"Point me in the right direction." Dirk said, determinedly. The male figure nodded, and he and Doris both started leading the way.

"Will you be able to keep up with us, Dirk?" Doris asked, with motherly worry for her only child filling her eyes. The quarter-vampire only gave her a cocksure grin as he ran alongside them.

"Don't worry about me, Mother. I am, after all, the son of an imfamous Dunpeal Hunter!" Dirk assured her, as he raced down the darkened halls, with the two phantoms at his side.

Author's Note!

Getting there! Hang tight, everyone!

Gemini14