** Trigger warning, talk of abuse, dark thoughts, and mature language. ***
disclaimer I do not own these characters they are the work of amazing miss mead.
"What a bloody waste of money" I heard a familiar voice growl, he was in the next room, but he might as well have been sitting next to me, only slightly muffled through the ornate stone walls.
"Calm down Nathan" My mother's voice, was much harder to hear than my father's, seeing as she wasn't screeching at the top of her lungs like a stark raving lunatic.
"Don't tell me to calm down, that boy is a disappointment always has been, and you need to stop coddling him. This isn't the first college he's been expelled from, and it isn't even the second." he roared. I rolled my eyes.
I never told my parents I had been expelled from school, When I had shown up midway through the semester on my parent's doorstep, I'd specifically said I was taking a much-needed break. I hadn't been expelled. Well, I hadn't given them the chance to expel me, I'd gotten in some pretty deep shit back at school, but I hadn't hung around for the consequences, so who knew. Maybe I had been kicked out. I didn't care, I wasn't going back there, and that's why my parents – well my so-called father—were bursting a blood vessel about.
"Nathan" she scolded, a little louder this time. "Adrian might hear you" I got out of bed and moved closer to the door and only just caught her words with my superior hearing.
"I don't care, bring him in here right now and I'll tell it to his ungrateful face. And don't you dare give me that look, Daniella, contrary to what you and Adrian think I'm not made of money"
"You shouldn't speak about your son like that" my mother chided sadly. It was always this way with them, my dad had a temper like no other. He screamed, he crashed around, he broke things, and he sulked like a toddler when he didn't get his way and my mother just took it. He never abused her, well not physically, but she hadn't left him anyway. I don't think she ever would or could. People, no royals, especially high-ranking royals like my parents didn't just get divorced, it would dishonor their families or some crap. I only stuck around for my mother, I didn't care if I ever saw my father again, but for all her flaws and she certainly had plenty, I loved her. And I wasn't just going to leave her alone with that maniac.
"I will speak about him however I damn well please, I fund that boy's whole life, I fund the parties and the alcohol and those disgusting cigarettes and the gambling and whatever else he indulges in on my dime, and all I ask is that he be a respectable part of this society and go to college and get a degree and maybe not be a complete fuck up."
I always loved how my father constantly brought up money, we – they—had plenty of it, more than most people would know what to do with. My great-aunt was the bloody Queen After all, and the rich just get richer. We weren't exactly common folk. It was just one of those things he used to control me, and my mother. It wasn't uncommon for Nathan Ivashkov to go through mine or my mother's credit card statements and demand explanations for each item. I'd made a sport out of naming the stupidest and most outrageous things I could the more he asked. I smiled remembering being home during the last school break and my father printing out my statement and reading it at the dinner table.
"Adrian, what is this purchase here, says you spent $2,000 at 4 am in the morning" my father looked at me over the papers across the table, I had a wicked headache. I was all out of booze, my mother said our housekeeper 'accidentally' dropped our entire extensive collection of spirits while cleaning them hours before my return. A coincidence indeed.
"Hmm" I speculated dramatically, tipping back in my chair like I knew my father hated. "$2,000 at 4 am you say?"
"Yes, surely you remember that, or were you too drunk" he ribbed, looking pointedly at the raised front chair legs with disdain. He didn't comment though.
"Of course not, I'm just trying to remember if that's when I brought Guinness or something else" I mused tipping further back in my seat at a dangerous angle for the chair legs one breeze away from tipping over backward but completely worth it for the irate look on his face.
"You don't drink Guinness." he scoffed.
"Oh no, Guinness is my pet chinchilla, purebred but worth the price. But he doesn't really like being kept in a cage, so I let him loose in the apartment when I got home the other day, but I just can't seem to find the little bastard. Or should I say little bitch, I think he's a she, and likely pregnant" I shrugged and pressed forward in my chair till the legs hit the ground with a resounding crack. My Father fumed, both at the chair and my antics.
"You know" I interrupted when he went to speak "Chinchillas can have up to 6 babies or should I say Kit's at a time" Nathan looked aghast "I know, how cute would it be to have 7 little precious angles around here, liven the place up a bit don't you think?" I grinned, enjoying myself immensely, He wouldn't even let me have a dog growing up, I couldn't imagine what he would do with multiple 'rodents' running around his precious house.
His face burned beet red, and I could practically see steam coming out of his ears. His voice booming in the room next to me brought me back to the present and I could almost picture that same look on his face as he replied to my mother's suggestion.
"Adrian work with my aunt, The Queen, Adrian, work, my aunt, the queen!" He was spluttering repeating those words again and again like he'd finally gone and lost his mind completely. I heard my mother's weary sigh and her start to reply or calm him down but I'd had enough. I didn't want to be at school. There was nothing for me there. I wasn't interested in the classes my father and great aunt had signed me up for, I hated the people there, always hanging around me and fawning over me in the hopes of getting in good with my family. They weren't real friends, I felt like I was going crazy. I couldn't stay there, but I couldn't stay here either. I didn't have the answers, I didn't belong anywhere I didn't know what I wanted but I knew what I needed right now and that was a stiff drink, maybe more than one.
Even though it was almost daylight – the middle of the vampiric day-I walked out of the room grabbing my coat as I went, I heard the loose rattle of my cigarettes in their case in my jacket pocket, I knew I was running low, and would need to pick some up today, it was never a good day when I ran out. My mother's perturbed look didn't stop me as I walked straight past them standing in the living room and walked to the front door without a word.
"Adrian" she beckoned; her voice tight. But I ignored her and closed the door behind me, closing them off, my father's stormy face and my mother's pale sad one still there behind my eyelids.
I beelined straight for my favorite bar, a little hole in the wall that nobody paid me any mind at, it was dark and dusty and had a smell I could never quite put my finger on, its unsightly edge meant that no other royals dared to step foot in this place and that's the way I liked it, I tilted my head as a scantily dressed dhampir woman breezed past me with a tray of what looked like beers for a table next to me with 4 or 5 of off duty guardians. I stared at them as they took their drinks, clinking their glasses together and smacking each other on their backs good-naturedly their boisterous laughter loud even over the crackling music playing from the speaker beside me, they looked happy and I hated them for it, I couldn't remember the last time I was actually happy, the last time I drank with friends who actually were my friends, or even celebrated anything, why would anyone like me for me, when I didn't even like me.
I turned my head away from them and came face to face with the smudged mirror hanging on the wall of my little booth. My pale face loomed before me, my hair just a little too messy for my liking, a little too long, and a little too limp. I stared harder, daring my reflection to say something to me, to mock me like my father or anxiously simper over me like my mother, but mirror me did nothing just stared back looking like an idiot, I almost turned away but then a golden light flickered around me, I'd seen it before, it was the color that usually surrounded me, my aura. But today strands of black wove around the glittering rays of gold like it was strangling it, drowning that beautiful glow, poisoning it with its dark sticky taint.
I was interrupted in my inspection of the colors when the dhampir women I had seen earlier serving drinks, placed down my vodka on the rocks. She paused there for a moment, and I looked up at her, she smiled, and her eyes crinkled at the corners.
"What's a guy like you doing in a place like this" She purred, she was pretty. Nothing startling, she didn't make me want to take up poetry or draw her portrait on one of the blank canvases back in my room, but she looked soft and warm, and she smelt like booze. I inclined my head to my drink.
"Best drinks in the place, none of those fancy cocktails or mixers with umbrellas and orange twists and all that frou-frou shit, but just good old fashion alcohol, like it should be. Straight up" I picked up the glass and downed it in one big gulp. It burned as it went down and felt like it dropped into a pit as it reached my stomach. I suppressed a shutter, truthfully, I hated the taste of alcohol, but I had grown used to that acidic burn, I had to it was one of the only things that quieted that little demon inside me constantly shouting about how pathetic and useless I was, unsurprisingly it sounded a lot like my father.
"Another vodka or would you prefer something else?" the dhampir girl grinned. She ran her fingers through the ends of her platinum blond bob, drawing my eye up to her long, elegant neck, it was marred with tiny puncture wounds, bite marks, and lots of them, a few partially healed but I could see scaring there too, she was clearly used to this kind of thing, my eyes met hers and I saw the eager look in her dark green eyes, her tongue darted out and wet her lower lip. "You're Adrian Ivashkov, aren't you?"
I groaned, I had felt my fangs press lightly into my lower lip at her suggestion, but they practically retracted back into my skull at the fanatic look on her face.
"I am." I said a little bluntly "what's it to you?" I tried to soften my voice when I saw her blink hard at my first response, my fingertip ringing the edge of my glass.
"I know all about you, you're a bad bad boy" She touched her hand to my shoulder, her nails were long and pointed painted in a flamingo pink color that matched the material of her very short dress.
Before I could respond to her implications that I was a 'bad boy' like I was some kind of misbehaving dog that has pissed on somebodies' rug, a man ran into the bar and we all froze, not a man but a dhampir, a guardian. Big and tall and as intimidating as they all were, somebody who could snap me in half without breaking a sweat, but his size and intimidation level wasn't what had stopped all of us, but the look on his face. Pure unadulterated terror.
When you saw a scared guardian, you knew shit was about to hit the fan, all of the guardians on the table next to me rose in unison, they reminded me of dancers sometimes, so deadly but also oddly beautiful in a way.
"Guardian Mead," one of the guardians beside me said his voice grave. He was the tallest of the lot of them and had a beard that rivaled Gandolf's. I wondered momentarily if this was a smart idea, surely it provided a great handhold for a strigoi to grab hold of and snap his neck.
"There was an attack" the guardian who had run in panted. "The Badica's the whole household, there were children, their guardians. All dead. 12 of them. They say it looks like it could have been 6 strigoi, maybe even more" everyone was silent. The dhampir girl beside me shrunk back as even I stood.
"6 strigoi working together, that's unheard of" the words came out of my mouth before I could stop them. Everyone turned to me, I expected them to be mad that I was eavesdropping, but their faces and their auras didn't show anger, well not at me – there was a whole lot of anger towards those undead bastards—but they felt pity for me, just a spoilt royal Moroi who had no real idea about the world or how to protect myself.
"It's becoming more and more common," one of the other guardians said, he was clearly the oldest, any guardian who lived to a respectable age automatically garnered my respect. But he probably was no older than 45 or 50, were as the others around him looked to be in their late to early 20s. The others around him nodded gravely.
"What's the panic going to be with this one, everyone will be too afraid to travel for the holidays, and a lot of families are going to be separated this year" one of the others guy his face grim. Sometimes I forget that people actually wanted to spend time with their own families. My own family was meant to travel for Christmas but not me. Joy, I guess that meant we'd all be home for the holidays.
"There's already a plan in place, the guardian's over at St Vladimir's have planned and organized a huge ski lodge up in the mountains that everyone can go to and be secured, all the school's guardians plus all the private guardians together we can enforce wards and patrol in shifts. It is a pretty great idea. " Guardian Mead said. I was impressed again at how swiftly the guardians acted on these things.
"I better go see my charge, I wonder if she's going. You think we'd get free time to do a little skiing?" one of the guardians asked a little eagerly despite the grim situation. They had taken their seats again and so had I, but I tilted towards them, watching them out of the corner of my eye.
"You're guarding that Liz Ozera girl, aren't you? She's from one of the good branches, isn't she? she runs in pretty fancy circles if anyone who's anyone is going. I bet she will" one of the other guardians answered, I didn't doubt by 'good' he meant not trained by strigoi. My Parents always talked about the disgraced Ozera line, a couple their age who turned strigoi years ago for the power, they had brought shame on their branch, a taint I'm sure the rest of them didn't deserve, I'd met Tasha Ozera once before and she was badass.
"I doubt my charge is going, he barely leaves court anymore, and swears as soon as he steps foot over the wards Strigoi will kill him," another guardian said breaking me out of my thoughts of the Ozera's
"Why Jeremy?" Another guardian asked with a sort of laugh.
"Thinks because he's from a smaller family he's prime picking because strigoi want to finish off his line." The first guardian –Jeremy- replied a little exasperated. "But he's a Conta, there's still a good 50- 60 of them left, it's not like he's like the Dragomir Princess. The last one in her line, now there's a job I don't envy." the others nodded in agreement.
"Heard she's back at school and doing well after that crazy novice kidnapped her for 2 whole years." a guardian with sandy blonde hair and olive skin added.
"Janine Hathaway's daughter" the older guardian laughed. "I heard she's even more of a spitfire than her mother, and that's saying something. But you know what, she kept her hidden and protected out in the real world at 16, I know it's not wise. But I'm impressed, not even finished her training. I'm curious to see if she even overtakes her own mother in achievements"
"They let her back into school?" another guardian asked in disbelief. I had heard stories about The Dragomir princess and her wild dhampir best friend, but had never had the pleasure of meeting with either of them. Rumors had it the dhampir was hot hot hot. But crazy, but I was okay with that, that might actually make her hotter.
"Yeah, she's being personally tutored by Dimitri Belikov" some of the guardians oohed and awed, I'd never heard of the name but apparently the guy was a god, if these hulking men thought that guy was good, he must have been bloody superman.
"You know, I heard that the Hathaway girl took the Princess away from the school because she never specialized and is a bit crazy." the guardian who spoke said it in a hushed tone and looked around as he said it like it was really top-secret information and not schoolyard gossip but the bit about not specializing stuck with me. I never specialized and it always made me feel like a freak, maybe the Dragomir girl, Vasilisa I think her name was. Maybe she had the answers to who I was.
Suddenly I desperately wanted to go on that ski trip.
"I hope you enjoyed the first chapter of this story
I really feel like Adrian can be a glossed-over character.
if this chapter is well received I will keep going
I really feel like there's a lot of inner turmoil going on inside Adrian, and he can get really dark, Like Lissa, he doesn't really have anyone before he meets the crew.
I've always had a soft spot for our fav play boy moroi and I hope I served him justice.
"So please review if you'd like another chapter
Thanks for reading!