Shadows within darkness

AN: *clears throat* Hey there. I know it has been ages since I updated this story, I am so sorry >__< I have never really forgotten about it, I just wasn´t sure how to proceed. Now I know and this will be the chapter before last. I hope you still enjoy it!

To refresh your memory about what happened in the last chapter here is a shor summary:

Lucrecia, Vincent´s old love, paid the boys a visit at their castle. Slowly but surely she drives a wedge between Vincent and Yazoo to the point where Vincent tells Yazoo that he should leave them and start his own life. They have a fall out with Yazoo confrontic Vincent with the fact that Lucrecia will leave him again, and that Sephiroth sent her, most likely to make Vincent miserable again. Vincent doesn´t want to hear it and leaves the room and Yazoo gives up. The next night he finds himself alone in he castle, grabs his stuff and is about toleave when Vincent appears before him, apologizing and redeeming his decision. Together they wait for Lucrecia to come home from her hunt and then Vincent tells her that he decided to stay with Yazoo and she is to leave them. Lucrecia tries to argue with him but loses the battle and leaves eventually. Yazoo is not satisfied wih just that and demands that Vincent finally tells him about his past because he is tired of being kept in the dark. And so Vincent does. During a battle he ws captured by the vampire Hojo, turned and held prisoner for years until he can escape with Lucrecia, Hojo´s assistant. They find refuge with a vampire clan that is lead by Sephiroth and his ominous mother and they turn out to be brutal and reckless. Vincent bears with it for Lucrecia´s sake, but at one point causes a mess when he helps humans to get away from the vampires. Consequently he is brought before the Mother, Jenova, who demands that Vincent leavean offspring to them and then he´d be free to go. Vincent kills her and manages to escape with Lucrecia but Sephiroth is hunting them down now.

And this is where the new chapter picks up again. I hope you enjoy it, and I want to thank all of you who kept reading and reviewing and encouraging me to continue this; especially Rina and Chephren who did an awesome fanwork you can look at here: http://darkmorgainelefay.deviantart.com/gallery/#/d2w1u2u



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Chapter 45


And so their yearlong escape began. Sephiroth chased them with infinite energy and wrath, all around the world. Whenever they believed that they had lost him and had settled down somewhere he would appear and they always barely escaped his insane urge for destruction.

Wherever they went Sephiroth left a bloody path in their wake, killing everything and everyone that came to stand between him and his goal. Even though they never let him near enough to come face to face Vincent and Lucrecia knew from the violent, unbridled blood lust that radiated from his presence that he had completely lost his mind.

It probably would have been a lot more plausible to face him and have a battle to the death instead of enduring this tiring life. Vincent was confident that he had a fair chance making it out alive. He could feel the change in his entire body that had come with consuming the Mother´s ancient blood, the power pumping through his veins. But it was also that very same blood that restrained him from seeking a direct confrontation. Because whatever Jenova had been, a monster, a sadistic, cruel blood drinker, she had in fact been Sephiroth´s mother and maker. He was her first son and had all her appreciation, as well as her power. Her blood inside Vincent´s dead body refused to battle him.

So they ran and slowly but surely the distances between them settling down and Sephiroth finding them became larger, until eventually, they could not feel him anymore.

Vincent was wary though. He did not believe that a madman like Sephiroth would give up so easily without satisfying his thirst for blood and without having carried out his revenge. It seemed that everything went well for them for a while though. They settled down in an old church, where they slept during the day and during the nights they went into the cities, hunting. Lucrecia had been able to transform by now and so even long distances were no problem for them.

Vincent could convince her to agree to his one-victim-per-night policy, and the rest of the nights were spent in peaceful quiet. Or so he thought. As another 20 years had passed, her absences during the night became longer and she seemed somewhat restless. When he asked her about it, Lucrecia just smiled and kissed him before going back to brooding over her documents. Vincent knew that it were the same files she had rescued the night of their escape, but she never showed them to him and he never asked, respecting her privacy.

More and more he came to the conclusion that they were the source of her uneasiness however, and after 18 years of them being together the night came when he noticed that she had drunk from more than two victims. He tolerated it for about two months, thinking that it was just a phase and that she would cease doing it by herself. But instead of less victims it became more and eventually he couldn´t keep quiet anymore. Upon his careful inquiry, Lucrecia looked only a little guilty and asked him to be lenient with her, that she had really tried, but she wasn´t as strong willed as he was and she needed the blood. He gave his quiet consent after a long discussion, trying to hide his disappointment as well as he could, hoping that her strange mood would come to an end now.

It got better for a while, but eventually Lucrecia´s periods of absence became longer again, going to the point that she was away for entire weeks without telling him where she went.

He could feel the distance between them increase and it pained the vampire to no end, but he also had no idea how he could stop it. One night after he had feasted, he therefore made the momentous decision that it could no longer go on like this.

After he had made sure that she wasn´t coming back too soon by reaching out for her presence and not finding her anywhere near, Vincent went over to her coffin and took out the papers she always had there with her. He did not feel good about reading her obviously most private documents, but he was desperate and did not see any alternative.

And so he settled down in his chair and flicked through the pages. They were in no order and only fragmented,but they told him everything he needed to know nonetheless. Apparently they were documentations about tests she had conducted during their stay with the vampires. And to his shock Vincent had to notice that they seemed to be of a very similar nature to the experiments Hojo had performed on him only a century earlier.

They spoke of recovery times and the anatomy of blood drinkers, one could only know if one took a ‘deeper look’ into the subjects´ bodies. Vincent did not know if she had performed any of the horrendous tortures herself but she had known about them without a doubt and apparently not objected against them.

What disturbed him most was that there were also entries that had been made just very recently. With trembling hands he put the papers down and then laid them back into her coffin.

Three nights later Lucrecia graced him with her presence again. Of course he confronted her with his findings. Instead of remorse, she only showed anger that he had dared to read her diaries. Desperately, Vincent tried to understand what was driving her, but all she could offer were passionate explanations about how important it was to know about their kind and hence casualties had to be made. It was totally beyond his ability of comprehension and he asked her finally, if she was going back to her work during the nights she was absent.

Lucrecia bit her lip and admitted that, yes, she had a deal with Sephiroth. He would not chase them any longer and she would continue his tests. Vincent fell into his chair, crestfallen, trying to comprehend what had happened behind his back all these years.

She just stood beside her coffin and watched him in his misery, not knowing what to say, having no words of comfort to offer.

Eventually Vincent looked up at her again and begged her to end it instantly. If it was their safety she feared for, he would face and destroy Sephiroth. Falling into his arms she said that it was all right, that he did not have to do it and that she was sorry for having him caused so much pain. They remained in their embrace for quite a while until dawn came and they had to go back to their coffins. With a kiss she promised him that everything would be all right, that she loved him still and they parted.

The next night she was gone, as were her documents. Of course he instantly searched for her, but she had either shielded her presence from him or had already gone too far. Vincent found no trace of her. He even went back to the vampires’ former hideout, but the catacombs were vacant, the halls empty and dusty and he had to return to his own coffin empty handed.

Two months later he got a visit from his arch enemy, who stood in the doorway, smirking, gloating at his misery and bringing the message that Lucrecia did not wish for him to search for her. Of course Vincent didn´t believe one word and attacked instantly, but Sephiroth only hold a handwritten letter into his furious face that said exactly the same and the vampire had to accept it, no matter how much it pained him.

He blamed himself for this outcome, thinking that she wouldn´t have left if he hadn´t betrayed her trust. Drawing himself deeper and deeper into a world of resignation and misery, Vincent had stopped eating and tried various ways to end the pain. But the only way he knew how to kill a blood drinker was unusable on himself on his own.

Occasionally Sephiroth came by to bask in his destitution and at one point Vincent had even begged him to end his life, but the other had only laughed, smirking that he liked Vincent like that much better than dead.

And so it continued for decades, with Vincent being unable to kill himself nor getting over it.

Eventually he got back on his feet, sort of, forced himself to set up some kind of routine again, by buying a house and building a library that would provide him with maybe a few restful hours, but it only worked for so long before he got caught up in the depressing reality again. And then the night had come where he found two boys in an alley, one beaten up after a failed attempt to ‘earn’ some money, and the other desperate to rescue him.

Yazoo got very attentive when Vincent hesitantly told him about their first meeting that the young vampire had forgotten. The elder had to be delicate about the matter or he would destroy more than he would gain. He didn´t want to lie about it either, so he held Yazoo close, paying attention to his expression, since he couldn´t catch any hints from an accelerated heartbeat, or a hitched breath.

He started on how he had come to the town, how he had built himself a home, found Aeris as a maid. He´d been living in the house for not even a year when Yazoo and his brothers had taken refugee in the city. Vincent had seen them during one of his hunts at the harbour, prowling close to the bars. It wasn´t a too unusual sight, sadly; orphans were seen there every now and again and Vincent had suspected that they were trying to get hired on a boat or ship as shipboys. Maybe they were searching for another kind of job, maybe they were selling their too young, dirty thin bodies. Vincent didn´t give it more than a fleeing thought because children were off his menu. No matter their actions they were innocent, couldn´t be hold responsible. Or so he thought unless he caught a cold thought that made him stop in his tracks and hide in the shadows above the roofs.

“We gotta kill da next one an I dun care if they´re whining an´complainin' again. So sick o' it...”

He tracked it back to the long haired middle child with the hauntingly green eyes that stared coldly out of a smudgy, muddy face. Instantly, the vampire was intrigued, alarmed and strangely captured by those startling orbs and ruthless thoughts. He couldn´t smell any blood on the boy, so he most likely hadn´t killed anyone yet, and a quick scan of his mind confirmed that. Vincent believed in free will and the power of choice, so under normal circumstances he would have left the kids alone; just because someone thought of killing someone else didn´t mean that they would. Thoughts were free and constructed; actions defined a person.

With Yazoo it was different however. For some reason, the vampire mislabelled as boredom, he started following the brothers around discreetly, watching them, watching Yazoo.

And then, one night, he decided that he just didn´t want to watch anymore; Vincent wanted those jade jewels to look at him, see him. Somewhere in his subconsciousness voices were battling. One was protesting that he couldn´t just take the boy because he wanted to, another voice argued that the boy was dangerous and that he had to be stopped before he hurt someone. The discussion was going on and on, but Vincent didn´t even listen. He waited for his opportunity and then he made his move.

The vampire told Yazoo what had happened that night in a calm steady voice, how they had proceeded in pretty much the same manner that they still did with their victims. Yazoo seemed a bit pale during that part of the story and Vincent gently stroked with his thumb over the young vampire´s back reassuringly. He told his lover that in the end he wasn´t able to do it, because he realised that Yazoo was just a scared, desperate boy that tried to get his brothers through, even though he acted all tough and cool. On top of that Vincent came to know that he didn´t want to kill Yazoo; he wanted him, but not in the usual way.

Confused, Vincent had just erased the boy´s mind and brought him back to the shack Yazoo and his brothers occupied. It wasn´t before he had drunk some of Yazoo's blood, though, to built a mental connection. This way Yazoo wouldn´t be able to escape him; no matter where he went Vincent would find him if he chose to, even though for now the vampire had planned to bring some distance between the two of them, to give it a rest and get his strange desires and cravings under control.

As it was things turned out differently.

The next night his intervention was required already and a dark part of his soul Vincent wasn´t proud of took advantage of the desperate situation the brothers were in. Like a n egocentric brat that went over dead bodies to get what it wanted Vincent cruelly ripped the little family apart for his own selfish curiosity. He demanded Kadaj give him Yazoo. Admittedly, Vincent had planned on helping and healing him. And he had also planned on compensating the other two; had planned to go back there the next night, to give them money, gold and a good, carefree life. And who knew; once he had satisfied his curiosity about Yazoo he might allow them to reunite and be together again. All this he told Yazoo with a quiet, remorseful voice, though he was vague about the nature of Yazoo´s injuries. There was no need to add yet another trauma, and Yazoo didn´t ask. He didn´t say anything at all, just listened.

So that had been the plan, but reality taught Vincent that though he reigned at the top of the food chain he was by no means almighty. The next night he went to the boys' shack he hadn´t found anything but two cold, little corpses. It had been a hard slap into his arrogant, bloodless face but it was something that couldn´t be made undone. After a while of just staring at their pale dirty bodies lying hunched together on the dusty ground, illuminated by cold moonlight that spilled through the wood, Vincent gathered them in his arms. They were far too light and bony, and another emotion Vincent thought he had forgotten long ago crawled up to his heart and squeezed it mercilessly: sympathy and pity, mixing up to regret.

Kadaj´s head lolled back strangely over the vampire´s elbow as his neck had been broken. At least it had been a quick, painless death, but Vincent had to shut the boy´s empty, accusing eyes still. Loz hadn´t been so lucky it seemed, his body was black and blue; he must have fought like a lion to protect his little brother. Vincent had a pretty good idea against whom they had been up to and his eyes turned crystal hard.

Still, before he hunted them down he cleaned the two boys up. He dressed them in fine wool and found a priest who was willing to give them a proper, discreet burial, for a generous donation of course. Vincent couldn´t attend the ceremony himself, but he watched from afar and gave the boys his last respects. He had briefly contemplated bringing Yazoo, but the boy was still sick and weak and Vincent doubted that he would have the strength to go through this.

After the burial he hunted them down.

It was the same men that had attacked Yazoo the day prior and they didn´t even try to deny what they had done to the children. Their deaths weren´t as pleasant as the ones Vincent usually granted his victims; there was no warm bath, no rich food, no satin sheets. It was a bloody, long hunt and Vincent was playing with them like a cat with mice, but he didn´t do it for his amusement but their pain and misery. In the end they were begging, soaked in their own piss but there was no mercy for them. The vampire felt that he owed it to the boys and he took revenge for them, all right. It was all he could do. Apart from tying to make it up to Yazoo that was, by giving him a home, education, everything he could wish for. Of course this could never lift the burden of guilt from the vampire´s shoulders, but at least he could pretend it did. And then everything had turned out so very different than Vincent had planned.

His strange infatuation with the potty mouthed boy had taken over once the shock about getting his brothers killed had worn off and Yazoo started to get older. Yazoo turned out to be bright, thoughtful, quiet... and ultimately irresistible. At a certain point Vincent didn´t really want to resist anymore, though he kept telling himself otherwise. It placated his conscience for as long as it took Yazoo to run out of patience. Till that night where he killed himself, or at least attempted to; that was the point where Vincent couldn´t lie to himself anylonger, where he was stripped off his fake detachment, left vulnerable and raw.

And right now he just felt like that night again, desperate and exhausted and it was all depending on Yazoo again; whether he forgave Vincent, accepted his company or would turn his back on his maker for good.

tbc

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I´d love to hear your opinion on this chapter! Are you still intereted in reading?