Chapter 9

Chapter 9

Close call

Walking through part of the castle I had not been to, I admired the tapestries hanging on the walls and the banners showing the sigil of House Martel. It had been a few weeks since I had returned from the winery, and in that short amount of time, Klaus had sired Lucien by mistake. Klaus had been meeting Aroura at night, Lucien assuming Klaus had betrayed him and got with Aurora behind his back, had made a scene, Tristan overheard and locked him in the dungeon to **** him, assuming he was attracted to Aroura. Klaus visited Lucien in the dungeons and, with a hidden knife, stabbed Klaus. In the following struggle, their blood mixed, healing Lucien, who, thinking he was now a vampire, went to kill Tristan. Unfortunately, one of Tristan's guards had got to Lucien, striking him down before he could reach his intended victim. Lucien rose as a full-fledged vampire hours later on a makeshift funeral pyre Klaus and Elijah had made for him. Since then, Elijah had also sired Tristan in the hope that Tristan would be the first in a cabal of civilised vampires who would work to better this world, named the strix by Elijah. Rebekah had also sired her first vampire, that being Aroura, who had tricked Rebekah into feeding her her blood to heal from an apparent suicide attempt. Aroura, now having vampire blood in her system, flung herself off the castle walls and was reborn as a vampire. I had intended to stake Lucien through the heart as soon as the opportunity arose. Still, unfortunately, he had not left Klaus's idea since he became a vampire, leaving me unable to end a threat before it began.

As I walked through the empty hall, a large bang erupted throughout the castle. The faces of Finn and Rebekah emerged in front of me "Brother, we must run, father is at the castle gates". Seeing the terror in their eyes, I knew that what they said was true, "gather as much of our things as you can and get ready to leave. I shall get the rest of our siblings", I responded calmly. "They already know, they are preparing to leave through some tunnels in the dungeon". No, I sent them to gather what they could before we left, then I walked towards the Count's room, his guards attempted to block me, which I solved easily with compulsion before forcing the door open, snapping the lock with ease. Walking through the ruined doorway, the beady eyes of Count de Martel met my face, "What is the meaning of this? We are under attack. How did you get past my guards"? Smiling, I answered none of his questions before drawing closer to him. As I approached, he must have sensed my ill intention, as he threw a clay pot at me, which shattered on my face. Smiling all the more, I seized his head with my hands, "You should be more careful where you allow your eyes to wander, Count. Allow me to help with that," I whispered just loud enough for him to hear before driving my clawed thumbs into his eyes. Screams echoed through the room as the Count tried to escape my **** grip but he was too weak to even make me falter. Realising that I was taking perhaps a bit too long killing the Co,unt I dropped him to the ground before sinking my hand into his back and pulling out his spine, as I left the dying Co,unt I crushed his head beneath my foot, oot then left. The guards I left outside were still there, oblivious to the fact that I had just murdered the man they swore to protect. I sped past them, going straight to the dungeon, straight to my siblings. When I arrived, I saw all of them with worried looks on their faces. They were shaken by the recent turn of events. We had got complacent, and it backfired on us.

Looking around, I noticed three faces missing. I knew that in the show, the first three non-original vampires were compelled by Elijah, but I hoped that he had not got to them yet. "Where are Aroura, Tristan and Lucien" I voiced my concerns. "Gon, my brother, I learnt of a new power of ours, the ability to control the mind. As I sent them a note, pretending to be u, along with three other people, we turned. Hopeful, they will buy us some time, and Mikael will go after them," Elijah answered my doubts. That's unfortunate, I thought I had hoped to kill Lucien. "We should go", Klaus spoke up, all my siblings in agreement, but I thought otherwise. "You should, I will buy you some time and meet up with you later, if I don't keep him busy, then he will be too close behind us". Seeing the look of surprise cross my siblings' faces, I thought they might argue, but only Rebekah seemed to disagree with me. We did not have the time to argue, so I told them to run, not before promising my sister that I would return soon. With tears in her eyes, she left, following the rest of our family.

Dashing back down the corridors, compelling every guard that came my way to follow, I quickly arrived at the courtyard. I had gotten the guards to wait in a hall, makeshift wooden weapons in hand. Just as I arrived, the heavy wooden gate gave way, crashing inwards, and the face of Mikael, my father, came into view. "Son," he spoke, hatred filling his voice, "where is the bastard?" he spat, the rage filling his voice. "Why would I tell you that, so you can kill him? Klaus may be bad, but you are far worse," I responded without a hint of emotion. "He murdered your mother, surely that must anger you, make you hate him as I do". Shaking my head at his response and drawing my blade, "You always hated him, and let's be honest here, father, after you kill him, what then? I know you will do the same for the rest of us. I can not and will not allow that, so let's see who is the better warrior after all". I brought my sword up as he drew his, not even trying to deny my words. Instead, he charged me, our blades met in a violent clash, sending sparks throughout the air. Mercilessly, I hacked and slashed at him, but he was too skilled to suffer injuries that easily, deflecting each of my strikes with little effort. He struck back when the opportunity arose, but I was just as skilled, keeping each blow away from my body with ease. Our blades locked together, er, turning this into a battle of strength, which was unfortunately a battle I could not win. I knew that he had an enhanced version of the spell that turned us into vampires. I felt a stab at my stomach, looking down, I saw a dagger piercing into my body, "I thought you were above such tactics, father", I spat venom lacing my words, in the single moment of distraction my words gave him, I delivered a headbutt into his nose, knocking him back. Grabbing the dagger in my stomach, I pulled it out, launching it back at Mikael, who side-stepped it with ease. He came forward again with a powerful overhead strike. Matching his strike with my own, I felt the vibrations course through my body, and by the look on his face, he was similarly affected, but neither of us stopped. We kept at it, each strike brutally powerful, as I defended against one of his strikes, the worst happened, my sword, the blade that had been by my side for my entire life, cracked, then shattered with a second strike. Rage filled me, as I drew my claws, I slashed at him and delivered a kick to his chest, he flew backwards, crashing into a wall with enough **** to make it bulge outwards. As he stood back up, I threw myself into the air, my flight taking me straight at, my now stunned father's surprise at my newfound ability on his face. His blade went through me, but I ignored the pain instead digging my claws deep into his shoulders and raising us both into the air, then dived towards a hallway. As we crashed, the two dozen guards I had left pounced, driving makeshift wooden stakes into Mikael, who roared in rage and started to cut them down. Their distraction gave me a moment of rest, which I gladly took before diving back at Mikael, delivering slashes all over his already injured body. My hand grasped his throat, and I started to strangle. At first, he fought, unable to accept his defeat. As I felt more and more magic enter my body his skin started turning grey and his resistance faded until he could no longer move. I stood all but one guard lay dead around us, searching Mikael for the white oak stake I found nothing, shit I thought he must have hid it. I walked to the one guard still alive, he barely clung to life and I kneeled next to him, with a quick slash I opened my wrist, then **** it into his mouth. His injuries started healing much to his shock, "What's your name"? I asked the stunned guard, "Louis, my Lord," he responded, shock still evident in his voice. "Well, Louis, how would you like to live for centuries to come?" disbelief spread across his face before he slowly nodded. I then snapped his neck.

When Louis woke a few hours later, I handed him a chalice of blood. As he drank with urgency, I watched. "What next, my lord?" he spoke up after fining the chalice. "We get rid of him" I nodded at the chained body of Mikael. With the help of Louis, I threw Mikael into a coffin, then onto a cart before we rode out towards a local river. We got off our horses and looked around, checking the river. I found that it was not as deep as I would have liked, so instead we settled for a cave system nearby. Towards the bottom of the cave, over three hundred metres down, we left the coffin containing Mikael before heading back up. The cave system was on the bank of the river, giving me an idea, we had brought shovels with us just in case we had to bury him, so we set out to divert a small stream of the river. It took almost a week for us to completely divert part of the river into the cave, but once we did, it started to fill quickly. "Louis, you should go further into France, set up a life. I need to find my siblings. Once I do, I will call for you to join us, but until then, live well, friend", I said before handing him a pouch of gold I salvaged from the Martel castle. He nodded before shaking my hand and setting off with his horse.

Looking around, I breathed a sigh of relief. Mikael was dealt with for now, my siblings were heading for Italy, and I would join them soon. First, though, I needed to get my sword reforged. I had gathered every fragment possible from the castle and hoped that it could be remade. Then I would carve runes into it to increase its durability, and put a self-repair rune on it, hopefully that would be enough to ensure it did not get broken again.

I set off my horse still having the cart attached to it, a few chests strewn about on top of it. Each chest contained whatever riches I could shove into it. I smiled, thinking about how we would live in Italy, free from the madness of our father chasing us.