Chapter Text
Adrian thought the travel room would be a respite from everything the castle was. From the memories and ghosts that seemed to haunt it, the silence that pressed down with an oppressiveness that only something unfathomably ancient managed to create. He hoped he wouldn't see his father's ghost here, where Sypha had left her mark so strongly and visibly when she had bent the machinery to her will for their most important fight. And his mother had rarely been here, so her ghost shouldn't wait anywhere among the walkways.
Adrian hadn't expected to feel the absence of his friends, for that was what they were, so keenly down here. Looking at the melted cogs, seeing the shattered remains of his father's many-sided center piece, the one that brought the castle where his will demanded it, didn't offer him respite. If anything, a different kind of ache spread through him, like a tender bruise across his insides.
He couldn't help the humorless, soft huff that escaped him. They were gone but a week and he was already wishing they hadn't left. Wishing they would return. He couldn't help but wonder if they missed him too, or if, while they liked him well enough, they didn't mind his absence much.
Adrian came to a stop in front of the broken pieces of the once many-sided center piece. He couldn't help but think he felt the way that thing looked. The parts all come apart and now crooked and broken at the edges, as though they hadn't taken kindly to their fall. A rather morose and histrionic thought and it was far too early for him to sink so deeply into it. Even if everything, right now, felt as broken apart as that piece of machinery with no more magic to hold it together.
Crouching down in a slow, fluid motion, Adrian reached out to gather the pieces together. His father's death was a long time coming and his mother had passed away over a year ago. They had saved Wallachia, Trevor and Sypha and he. They had put a stop to the monster his father had become and his mother's spirit could rest easy now, reassured in the believe that his father would do no more evil. So why did it feel like their deaths, all that he had lost, the small and big things that they had once shared, were taking him apart at the seams?
He wished his mother was still alive and he liked to believe that even without his father going insane, he still would have met Sypha and Trevor. Would have traveled with them and befriended them and fought at their side. They could have met his mother, then. I wish none of this had happened, he found himself thinking, feeling tired and worn and aching in a way he had never expected, though maybe he should have.
As soon as his thought finished, the shards in his hands reacted. Adrian felt a small twitch in his hands and arms in surprise, though it quickly changed to wariness as the pieces realigned themselves into a new shape. It looked nothing like before and instead now was a small, eight pointed star, hovering over his palms with a faint hum. It changed color as well and now looked like a night sky speckled in bright, brilliant stars.
"That's strange," he murmured to himself and cautiously let go. It remained floating in place, as though it waited patiently to be picked up again.
Adrian stared at it for a moment longer, though he could make no sense of it. His father had taken him to the travel room a few times and the machinery had never listened to him, much like the mirror pieces in other rooms. What belonged to his father, what was loyal to him, had never reacted to Adrian, be it before or now after his father's death. So why this? Had something changed?
He wished Sypha were here, to show this to her and help her figure out what it was. To watch her eyes brighten and the excitement in her gestures, to know that no matter what it was, she would not only find a way to do it, but stand side by side with him as well. He wanted to watch her weave her magic, to bend possibilities to her will and draw them close when they had seemed out of reach before.
He wished Trevor was there to root through other things in the room and listen to them as they threw ideas back and forth, a steady and reliable presence at their backs. To know neither he nor Sypha would have to keep an eye out, because Trevor was subtly but unmistakably between them and what danger might come towards them. To banter with him, more gentle and fond now compared to the barbs it had been when they had first met.
The travel room felt devoid and cold without them. The whole castle did, without Sypha and Trevor to marvel and joke at things, to lighten the mood and distract him, or to busy themselves while he was quiet without leaving him alone.
The castle had been his home, once, but back then his mother had been alive and warm lights had been lit everywhere. There had always been something new going on, something exciting and amazing. A new project or experiment, medicine getting created, pages rustling as someone looked through a book. Now this place was dark and cold and as dead as his parents. A graveyard, as much as the Belmont estate, only one child left of each family.
Turning away from the floating star, Adrian left the travel room. There was nothing here for him, even less so than everywhere else in the castle.
His steps were slow, echoing through the silence, as he made his way back towards the main entrance. He found himself drifting there more than anywhere else. Partly it was because he still had to finish cleaning up the space, but mostly it was because the big doors let in a lot of sunlight. The castle wasn't really designed for the joy of daylight, considering who had once resided in it.
The sound of steps brought him out of his thoughts and his gaze snapped towards the entrance, just in time to see two people head his way, one faster than the other. His eyes widened briefly and he felt his breath catch in his throat.
Sypha came to a stop in front of him, smiling bright and wide and hair a bit windswept. She reached out to grab his hand and he found his fingers curling around hers right away. Behind her, Trevor sauntered up, hand still bandaged and hair a bit windswept as well. He gave Adrian a crooked half-smile-half-smirk. Why were they back? Had something happened?
Adrian turned to Sypha, opening his mouth to ask her, when he noticed the way her eyes searched his face. Her expression turned determined and she let go of his hand to wrap her arms around him in a tight hug. He sucked in a silent breath before he could stop himself, his body growing still.
"We missed you," she said, slightly muffled by his shirt. At her words, he found his stillness breaking and slowly, he lifted his arms to wrap them around her gently. "We shouldn't have left without you."
"Someone needs to watch over these places," Adrian found himself saying and Trevor stepped up beside him, a small furrow between his brows. And then, he lifted his chin a tad, as though in defiant determination and took that last step forward to hug him too, his arms reaching easily around both Adrian and Sypha. Adrian shifted one hand off of Sypha's back to reach up and grip Trevor's lower arm.
And then he was surrounded by scents and people he had grown to know very well, even if they had traveled together only for a couple of weeks. His eyes slid shut of their own volition and his head tipped to the side, just enough to rest his cheek against Trevor's temple and to hug Sypha a little tighter. They both tightened their hold in return.
"Didn't think we'd be the hugging type," Adrian found himself saying into the quiet. Just simple quiet, as though his two friends, his fated companions, held the oppressive silence at bay with their presences alone.
"Oh, shut it," Trevor answered without any heat, words slightly muffled by Adrian's shoulder. "Don't ruin the fucking moment."
"Oh, we're having a moment now?" he sniped back, but a smile snuck onto his face and he breathed in the scent of Trevor and Sypha combined, their natural, human scents mixed with the smells of travel, of the woods and horse and campfire smoke and a bit of clinging sweat.
Trevor only huffed and Sypha gave his back a pat with her hand. "Deal with it," she said and while he couldn't see her face right now, there was a smile in her voice. "You're stuck with us now."
His throat closed up at her words and before he knew it, he had to fight down the urge to tear up. He was stronger than this. Sypha, because she always knew so much more than he expected and often saw what others missed, pulled back just enough to look up at him. Her eyes were clear and bright and unflinching and so understanding he felt something in him crack, then crumble.
"We're not leaving you." Her voice was gentle and quiet and sure and Trevor hummed in agreement.
"What she said," he added and at Sypha's exasperated, fond look, shrugged without letting go of Adrian.
They fell silent when he bowed his head and they said nothing about the subtle shake in his shoulders and they only hugged him tighter, when he pressed his face into Trevor's shoulder to hide the tears threatening to spill over. Sypha's hand gently rubbed his back and Trevor shifted his stance just enough to have both of them leaning against him.
Adrian trusted them, enough to allow this moment, to lean into Trevor and find him strong and holding up easily under his weight, standing between them and the open door, at just enough of an angle to notice it if anyone came in. To have Sypha hold him close and to fill his nose with the scent of magic. Her hands, smaller than his but warm and capable of capturing magic castles, were steadying and reassuring on his back.
"Call me Adrian," he said, voice low and soft, as he shared the name he could retake now, after his father's death. The name his mother had given him when he had been born, even if he couldn't bring himself to take his last name back as well.
"Of course," Sypha said and let her head rest against his collarbone, her hair tickling the underside of his chin.
"Adrian," Trevor said, rolling the name across his tongue as he tried it out and then he huffed softly and Adrian could imagine the smirk that stole across his face. "Not as pretentious as Alucard, that's for sure."
And before he knew it, he was laughing and Trevor was chuckling and going by the shaking of Sypha's shoulders under his arms, she was muffling her own laughter.
Mother would have loved them, he couldn't help but think, a smile lingering on his lips for the first time in days.
~*~
Trevor couldn't possibly have predicted what it would be like to live in Dracula's castle. Well, Aluc- Adrian's castle now. The first few days had been a mixture of eerie and exciting. They had cleaned up a bit more rubble, though none of them knew what to do about the massive hole left by the flaming sphere of death and destruction Dracula had conjured. The rest of the time they explored, finding many empty rooms, so many in fact, that Trevor seriously wondered what Dracula's deal had been. Had the guy just liked so many empty rooms and large spaces?
And then they had found the lower levels, where a truly staggering amount of livestock was kept. After staring at the baffling amount of pigs, sheep and cows, they had unceremoniously decided to set them free. Neither of them had any idea about how to care for the animals beyond some simple things and they didn't need to worry about it either. Trevor knew these woods, even if it had been years since he had been here. They would find plenty to hunt and wild fruit and berries and mushrooms and roots to harvest. And for anything else, they could always travel to the next village and return swiftly.
It took only a few nights of sleeping in guest bedrooms, for them all to gravitate towards a comfortable common room. And they found themselves staying there, talking or caring for their equipment or reading, until they dropped off, one after another. Often enough, Adrian was the one who remained awake and it was easy to sleep with that watchful, quiet presence beside them. Which wasn't a feeling Trevor had ever expected to have around a vampire, even if it was a half-vampire.
Sometimes, Trevor wondered if his ancestors were turning in their graves, moaning in the afterlife about the stupid Belmont heir, the last of their kind, who not only befriended a vampire, but also trusted him. He didn't think about what his parents or siblings would think about this, shied from thinking about them as he always did.
Sypha was currently digging her way through a part of Dracula's library, while Trevor found himself heading down into the Belmont Hold with Adrian, both of them creating a temporary, if rather shoddy, way down. A good chunk of the stairs were still there, but what parts had been destroyed and broken they bridged in other ways. It certainly helped a lot to have a floating vampire. Before long, they managed to make their way down, the stones dark with dried blood and mud that had trickled down through the hole.
Cursing and grumbling under his breath as he build a way down, he still found hitting his thumb with a hammer preferable to staying up there. To seeing the spots where he remembered his family vividly, even with the estate being ruined. He remembered the spots where his older sister and brother had hid with him, pressing hands to their mouths to muffle their giggles, while their uncle tried to find them in a game of hide and seek. The study room, where his father would press kisses to his mother's face until she laughed or the court yard, where he trained with his older siblings.
It was better to work and not think about them, this graveyard, filled with memories that hurt more than anything else. He hadn't drunk in a while, but just knowing the estate was there was ensuring he struggled with the urge on a good day.
"We should look into a way to patch this," Trevor remarked when they reached the bottom, staring up at the large entrance above. How to fix this, though, he didn't know. He was a fighter, not an architect or a builder. That he managed to cobble together a rickety way up and down had already been hard enough.
Adrian said nothing, but he didn't have to. They both knew they had no idea how to fix that hole, short of tearing out the entrance doors of the castle and placing them over it. Which wouldn't really solve anything, they'd just exchange one busted entrance for another busted entrance.
"How many secrets do you think are still here?" Adrian asked, as they stepped into the Belmont Hold, and if not equally as vast as Dracula's, it was a very close second.
"Many," Trevor admitted. "Though if they are protected by magic, I doubt we'd find them without Sypha."
"True enough," Adrian hummed and simply vaulted over the banister to drop down, making it look light and effortless. Show off. Instead of getting annoyed though, Trevor just found himself rolling his eyes with a fond, wry smile. Heading down the stairs, he realized that Adrian had paused in front of one of the display cabinets.
Joining his friend, Trevor realized it was the one with vampire skulls and an uncomfortable feeling skittered through his gut, like a small, cold spider. And then he saw what Adrian's gaze had snagged on, much like the last time they had been here, only this time, Trevor really paid attention.
That, right there, was a child's skull.
Trevor couldn't say that he cared for the vampire race. Usually they were enemies and he stood by the opinion that those who went around slaughtering humans needed to be stopped. But. That was a child's skull. One of his ancestors had murdered a child.
"We can bury them," the words were out of his mouth before he knew it. Adrian beside him grew very still and Trevor felt his gaze on him now. "I don't know who they were, but there is a plot of land, a bit behind the estate."
It wasn't the family cemetery, that was east of the estate, but the spot where his family's vegetable garden used to be seemed good enough. Adrian was silent for a long moment, his gaze heavy and thoughtful.
"Yes," he answered, quieter than before.
Wordlessly, they looked around and found a few bags to put the skulls in. Trevor held the bags open while Adrian filled them. While he wasn't careless with any of the skulls, the child's one he set down last on top of the others, gently and with care.
They were quiet as they headed back up and Adrian left briefly to get a shovel from the castle. Which was really weird for some reason. Trevor had thought the mighty Dracula to be above needing such a mundane thing.
They dug a hole, deep enough that the wildlife wouldn't attempt digging the bones back up and laid the bags down inside. Trevor didn't even think to offer a prayer, the vampires would probably have been offended by that anyway. Or something like that.
"Let's head back down," Trevor said a long moment after the earth came to rest on the bags. Adrian glanced at him with a nod and while his face looked as calm as always, there was something warmer in his gaze. Maybe something a bit softer too. Trevor looked away quickly again and ignored the warm tingle that look caused in his chest.
They headed back down, some of the makeshift construction creaking precariously, but it held. And, well, if he fell, Adrian would catch him. It wasn't even weird to think at this point, not after everything. Nothing would happen to him while Adrian was there.
They walked past the display cabinet, now empty, on their way to a different corner of the collection, when something caught Trevor's eye. There was something about the wall behind the cabinet, previously hidden by the skulls. Pausing, he reached out and tapped Adrian's arm, not taking his eyes off the spot, frowning as he eyed the stonework. A second later, he understood. There was a loose stone in the foundation.
Adrian stopped, glancing back and must have spotted what Trevor had seen a second later. Without needing to say anything, he grabbed the cabinet and easily shifted it aside enough for them to reach the wall.
"What do you think it is?" Adrian asked and Trevor couldn't help but shrug. His parents might have taken him down here a few times, but that didn't mean he knew more than a handful of secrets, or that his memory was perfect. It had been so long ago and he had avoided thinking about it for nearly as long and he didn't entirely trust the blurry moments he could recall.
Shit, he wanted a drink.
"Let's find out," he said and reached out. He managed to pry the stone out with a bit of gentle, patient wriggling. Stooping down a bit with Adrian doing the same, they both peered inside to find a flat little something wrapped in cloth.
Exchanging a brief look, Trevor slowly reached out and very carefully tugged the thing out. From the shape and feel of it, it probably was a book. Shaking the cloth loose and letting it drift to the ground, he stared down at a book he had never seen before. It was stupidly thin, too, held together by thread and leather. It honestly looked more like a handmade journal than any of the tomes in the rest of the collection.
Flipping it open, he realized right away that he wouldn't understand a lick of it, mostly because it was in a language he couldn't understand. Glancing at Adrian, he got a small shrug in return. He couldn't read it either, then.
For Sypha, they agreed on silently.
With their find tucked under his arm, they both headed back up and sought out Sypha in one of the studies Adrian had shown them to.
"Oh, did you find anything?" she asked when they stepped inside, putting down a scroll she had read through. Adrian hung back a step, as Trevor handed the thin book over.
"Found it down in the Belmont Hold, hidden in the wall," he explained and oh, that spark in her eyes was trouble. Usually for everyone but them, so Trevor found himself smiling crookedly and he settled back on his heels, feeling strangely satisfied and with soft warmth spreading through his chest.
It was easy, from there, to settle down on the comfortable couch in the study. It was a bit of a weird one too, large enough for two people to easily use it as a bed. Trevor picked up a book, while Adrian bent over the thin one with Sypha, asking questions.
Adrian sat down beside him, after getting Sypha a couple of books and leaving her to research through tomes none of them could read. Though, he still looked rather curious and interested in what she was doing.
Trevor's eyes drifted shut after a moment, lulled by the voices of his companions, Adrian's steady, low voice that sometimes showed a hint of a smile and Sypha's thoughtful muttering and excited exclaims when she figured something out.
Trevor only realized that he had fallen asleep, when he was moved. Where his head had rested against Adrian's shoulder before, he felt a strong, gentle hand cradling his head, the other holding his shoulder and he was laid down with his head on a pillow so smoothly he would have slept through it if he hadn't woken up before. His legs were straightened out a moment later, and then a blanket was carefully draped over him.
Blearily opening his eyes, he watched Adrian head over to the desk, where Sypha was asleep now as well, her head resting on the desk and she was surrounded by books and scrolls.
"Sypha?" Adrian's voice was quiet, soft and gentle, as though he was loathe to wake her. "This position isn't good for your back."
She still stirred after a moment and Trevor briefly wondered how long he had been out, for her to fall asleep like this in the first place. Sypha still didn't seem to be entirely there and Adrian gently and with a soft, unyielding sort of persistence got her to stand up. With the same care he had shown Trevor, Adrian got Sypha over to the couch, letting her lean into him and his arm wrapped around her shoulders, while her head dropped against his shoulder.
Their eyes met for a moment and Adrian looked briefly surprised to see him awake, to which Trevor merely blinked. His mind was still sleep addled and he didn't doubt that, should he close his eyes again, he'd be back asleep within moments. Adrian got Sypha to lie down on the couch and spread a blanket over her as well, once she settled beside Trevor. As he made to pull away, Sypha reached back, her fingers closing around Adrian's wrist.
"Stay," she mumbled into the pillow, voice slightly slurred by sleep crawling back up to claim her.
Adrian paused and glanced up at Trevor again, who was really too tired to think or care much. So he just shrugged and sluggishly lifted a hand to tug at Adrian's fancy sleeve. "You heard her," he muttered, face smushed against the other pillow.
Adrian's mouth twitched into a shadow of a smile and for a second it looked like he might refuse, until he finally, slowly moved, placing a knee on the couch. "Move over, then."
Sypha shifted closer and Trevor moved until his back was pressed against the couch and Sypha's head was resting on his shoulder, his arm now draped over her and her knees bumping his. She blinking blearily, but when Adrian carefully laid down behind her, she hummed in quiet satisfaction and closed her eyes again.
One of Adrian's arms came to rest across Sypha's side, with his hand lying on Trevor's ribs. Adrian wasn't a naturally warm person, but his hand was a reassuring, gentle pressure and his own hand was pressing against Adrian's side.
"Blanket?" Sypha asked, voice heavy with sleep and wriggled a hand up just enough to take hold of Adrian's sleeve.
"No need," Adrian answered.
Trevor would have rolled his eyes had he been more awake and helped Sypha flap half her blanket over hip, saying, "'s still nice."
"Yeah," Adrian whispered a second later, quiet and soft. Trevor let himself sink fully into the couch and Sypha exhaled long and slow between them. Adrian tipped his head until his forehead was almost touching Trevor's, his nose nearly buried in Sypha's hair. Trevor let his eyes fall closed again, his breath evening out.
Yeah, this was better than sleeping spread out, even if they were in the same room. This felt right.
~*~
The book Trevor had gotten her proved to be a fascinating mystery, and she was getting closer and closer to cracking it with every day.
Things had slowly settled for them, after days of wandering the castle and figuring out where everything was. They ate their meals together and Adrian often accompanied Trevor on hunts, while Sypha dug through the secrets of the castle.
They always found themselves in the same place sooner or later again anyway, gravitating together and then hovering in the same space. Sleeping like that had come naturally too, after that first night in the study. No matter how comfortable the beds in the castle were, there was something right about sleeping with the others close by. Often, it helped with the nightmares and they all had them. It helped to wake up to her companions there, to know she was safe and everything was fine, and to provide the same when they woke from dreams that were memories.
Adrian slowly looked a bit better as well, he no longer walked as though he was an unwelcomed guest in his own home and slowly he had started to smile more again. At times, she was worried about both him and Trevor, these two men that meant so much to her and who now lived in the graveyards of their families. If there had been a way to pack up all the knowledge and take it with them or seal it away safely, she would have done so in a heartbeat and then ushered them both out the door to take them somewhere else.
But neither was possible and so the best they could do was stick together and figure things out as they went. Then again, that was what they were good at.
A knock on the door made her look up from her research on the strange book. Adrian stood in the doorframe, a gentle furrow between his brows and his lips slightly pressed together. Sypha straightened and from the corner of her eye, saw Trevor doing the same from his spot on the couch.
"I'd like you to take a look at something," Adrian said. "If you have the time for another mystery."
"Always." Without hesitation, she stood up. The mysteries might be her favorite part about the castle and Belmont estate and sometimes, their only redeeming feature as well, especially when she noticed the sadness and pain in Adrian and Trevor. "What is it?"
"Let me show you," Adrian said, the ghost of a smile touching his lips and he led Sypha down the hall, Trevor following with quiet curiosity.
Adrian led her into the room with the massive cogs half melted. Her gaze was immediately drawn to a floating star at the end of the walkway. It looked to be made of colored glass and silver metal and the hum of magic it emanated was one she hadn't encountered before.
"What is this?" she asked as she stepped up to it, Adrian and Trevor hanging back a step but still close enough to look at the star as well.
"I hoped you'd be able to tell me that," Adrian said. "It once was the mechanism that my father used to move the castle. It had shattered after you destroyed the machinery. When I touched it, it turned into this."
Curious, Sypha reached out and found no resistance from the star. It went willingly into her hands, hovering there and her skin buzzing gently with the magic it emanated. It certainly was very different compared to before, when it had belonged to Dracula and fought her pull. Focusing on it, she quickly found something full of power hovering in front of her, with such an amount of magic that she felt as though she could have destroyed half of Wallachia before running out. Only, it was beyond her reach, as though it was locked and waiting.
"It's full of power," she told Adrian after a moment, reluctantly pulling herself away from the sense of pure magic crackling just beyond her reach. "If this is what once powered the castle moving, I would say it's a power source. But...it's locked. Something keeps it from being used."
She stared at the star a moment longer and then turned to Adrian, who had a small, thoughtful frown on his face. "Can I take it to the study?" she asked. "I'd like to see if we could use it."
"Of course, I don't see any use for it down here," he said and Sypha carefully moved the star along with her. Trevor eyed it with wary curiosity and a hint of thoughtfulness.
The next moment, she found herself chuckling, earning questioning looks from both of them. "You've both given me amazing things and mysteries," she explained, holding the star close and a smile crinkling the corners of her eyes. "Thank you."
Both Trevor and Adrian seemed to straighten at her words and she saw the slightly crooked, warm smile on Trevor's face, the soft, fond curling of Adrian's lips.
"Probably won't keep you busy for long," Trevor joked and shrugged. "We can always find new ones."
"Indeed." Adrian's smile widened a bit. "I might already know a few more that could interest you."
"One after the other," Sypha interjected with a laugh. "And we'll be here a while, so it's good to know we'll keep busy." She glanced at the star and then up at both of them, their eyes on her, attentive and waiting. "So, will you help me solve this?"
"You really need to ask?" Trevor stepped up to her side, throwing his arm across her shoulders, a warm and welcome weight.
"With pleasure," Adrian added, walking close enough that their arms brushed slightly and Sypha...realized she was happy. She was truly, deeply happy in this moment and even if she missed her family and the other Speakers, she was right where she was supposed to be.
Everything else, they'd figure out along the way.
In the end, it took Sypha another month to figure out the contents of the handmade book. The book wasn't, as Trevor had suspected, a journal and with a lot of cross-referencing languages from other books, she pieced the answer together.
What she found was...rather unsettling. It was a spell, one that spanned pages upon pages, easily the most complicated thing she had ever seen. She didn't see herself attempting it anytime soon. And then, there were the warnings. Pages upon pages of warnings, written in different hands and she needed a different book to cross-reference languages again to figure some of the writings out.
"What is it?" Trevor asked when she slowly closed the thin book, staring down at the cover. Adrian, who had thumbed through a book of his own, looked up.
"It's a time spell," Sypha said after a moment. "Possibly the only almost working one in existence."
"What do you mean?" Adrian joined them by the table with a small frown between his brows, concern and wariness in his eyes as he looked from her to the book in her hands.
"The spell spans a couple of pages, and the rest of it is full of warnings." She opened it back up, pointing out a passage, even if the others couldn't read it. "Here it speaks of a man who rapidly aged and crumbled to dust after using the spell. And here is a woman who disappears forever and here are twins who use the spell and both disappear for a split second, only for one to reappear as a child and the other as an old person."
"So it's a broken spell?" Trevor was frowning at the book now too.
"I don't know, it looks complete, but no one who attempted it succeeded. At least, no one has written about succeeding." She thumbed to the parts that were the spell. "Here, everything lines up, it's a fully formed spell and by all accounts, it should work."
"Then why doesn't it?" Adrian asked, reaching out and taking the book to look at himself.
"Maybe it's not meant to," Trevor suggested. "Could you imagine the chaos and destruction if changing time or past events were possible?"
That was a valid point. God, as a higher power, might not allow such a thing. Or maybe He would and simply didn't care and there was something wrong with the spell after all. Sypha accepted the book back after Trevor had looked through it as well. Something about it niggled in the back of her mind, like a loose tooth. This mystery wasn't done, she had to figure out what was wrong with this spell.
"Anything else about the star?" Adrian asked and Sypha frowned a bit.
"Give me a bit more time," she said. "I think it's been locked for a reason, like it has some sort of purpose, but I can't figure out what yet."
Adrian had once described that, when the star had been his father's mechanism, that it would open up along the seams when in use. But no matter what she attempted with the star, it remained unchanging. As if it was waiting for something.
Sypha held out the star to Adrian. He hadn't asked back for it once since showing it to her and even now he seemed to prefer it in her hands. Still, after a second, he slowly accepted it from her.
Sypha ran her finger along the edges of the star hovering in his cupped hands. "When your father transported the castle with this, it opened up so he could use its magic. We could use it too, once I figure out what keeps it in this state. Or maybe I can find a spell in the Belmont Hold that allows me to draw its power out of it."
Adrian looked at the star for a long moment and there was a heaviness in his gaze. Something sad and worn. He held out the star to her with the smallest of smiles and something about it made her chest ache quietly, a bit like heartbreak.
"It is yours, then," he said softly. "I wouldn't know what to do with it and it's safe in your hands."
Sypha accepted the star back silently and couldn't help but cradle it close, as though Adrian had handed her a piece of his heart to watch over. Maybe he had. The star hummed softly, waiting and vast amounts of magic locked away by something she was yet to figure out.
~*~
Adrian's sword clanged against Trevor's as he appeared swiftly behind him and Trevor pushed him back with a strong lunge. Trevor moved with strength and purpose, and his skill with his blade and whip were nothing short of mesmerizing. If Adrian was honest, he could watch him fight for hours.
"You need to break that habit," Trevor told him, a quick flurry of swings and stabs following and Adrian danced around his attacks, their blades meeting for brief moments to parry. "You always go for the back."
"It's usually unprotected," Adrian answered, forcing Trevor to draw back and his friend gain a bit of distance, just enough to make use of his whip again. A simple whip though, they left the Morningstar with Sypha, who was holding Adrian's star in one hand, while the book with the time spell was open in her lap. "But I see your point."
"You're not wrong," Trevor conceded and Adrian ducked below an expert attack of the training whip. "But that trick only works once, maybe twice against a less experienced opponent. Unless you can kill them on the first try."
Training together was fun and would be even more so, once Sypha joined them. Though, she probably wouldn't today. It was getting pretty late, even with spring edging towards summer at a snail's pace.
Sypha suddenly jumping up with a triumphant shout caused Adrian to pull back quickly and Trevor coiled back his whip, expertly and quickly rolling it up.
"I figured it out!" she shouted, holding up the book. "I know what's wrong with the spell!"
"What is it?" Adrian asked, using his powers to appear right by her side. At the way she blinked widened eyes in surprise, she hadn't expected that and he felt a smile appearing on his face.
It was...nice, to be himself around them. Adrian hadn't really had friends before and while his father had met with his generals then and again, they hadn't been overly close either. Usually, it had just been his parents and him in the castle. Having Trevor and Sypha, who didn't flinch from his abilities, who honestly didn't even care, even when they found him with one of his father's blood containers, was a novelty. Well, Trevor liked to make a few jokes about vampires, but there was real, honest trust between them and an understanding of who they were and what they've been through, which grew with every day.
"It's power," Sypha said, gently holding the book, while still keeping a careful grip of the star. She always handled both items with care. "No one has enough magical power for the spell. Those who crumbled to dust did so because the spell had sucked all their power out of them. And those who managed to actually try to use it couldn't control it. It just...dragged them along, I think. That's how some came back as babies or old people."
"Do you have enough power for it?" Trevor asked and there was slight trepidation in his voice, while he picked up the Morningstar. Adrian found that he shared it. Time was a powerful thing to mess with and the thought of loosing Sypha to it was...painful. It stole his breath away for a second and he exchanged a quick look with Trevor, seeing the same thought in his eyes.
Sypha was silent for a long moment and then sighed. "No." She eyed the star for a long moment and then carefully closed the book. When she spoke again, her voice was quiet, "I think...it's best to hide these away for now."
"There are vaults," Adrian offered and reached out one hand to gently brush her elbow. There was a hint of defeat in the slope of her shoulders and her smile looked sad. "It will be safe there."
"I mean, what would you do with a time spell anyway?" Trevor asked and Adrian shot him a look. He still wasn't good at the comforting thing and Trevor raised his shoulders in a small, helpless gesture. "No, seriously. What would you do? Change what you ate last week?"
Sypha huffed, a wry smile curling at the corners of her lips. "Well, there was this really bad stew."
Trevor threw up his hands in exasperation, but Adrian saw the corners of his mouth twitch up in a quickly hidden smile. "See if I cook for you lot again! It's not my fault Dracula's kitchen is a hellscape."
Adrian leaned towards Sypha, voice pitched lower, but not enough that Trevor wouldn't hear him. "I think we should be sad about the fact that he didn't know that too much salt on things is bad."
Trevor flipped him off with a sour expression and a moment later, they all broke out into chuckles. Sypha was right though, the stew had been bad. Then again, they couldn't have known that the last person to use the kitchen hadn't properly screwed on the top of the salt shaker, so when Trevor had used it, the top had come off and all the salt had fallen straight into the pot.
"Come on," Adrian said once they calmed down. "There is a smaller vault where we can put it."
"Of course there is," Trevor said with a wry eyeroll. "Sometimes I wouldn't be surprised to find the holy grail somewhere in that damn castle."
Adrian couldn't help but huff in amusement. "Wouldn't that be a thing."
There was a flutter overhead and Adrian looked up with a frown, tilting his head as he listened. "Wait." He held out a hand to his friends, who stopped in their tracks. "Something's wrong."
A second later, the forest around them fell silent. First the bird song disappeared, then the crickets and finally, even the wind seemed to stop, falling still to avoid rustling even a single leaf.
Monsters descended upon them the next second. It was startling, to find creatures his father had sent out into the world attacking them. He had thought that was over, that with his father's fall, the scourge upon human kind was done.
They fought, a longer and more vicious battle than Adrian had expected and afterwards, they withdrew into the castle, closing the double doors and finding themselves holed up in the study they always went to.
"What the fuck was that?" Trevor asked, slumping down on the couch and letting his whip settle on a cushion beside him. "I thought we were done with that shit."
"So did I," Adrian answered and once Sypha sat down as well, he joined them. There was monster blood drying on his boots and strands of hair were stuck to Sypha's forehead with sweat.
"Maybe they're the last ones and they came here for revenge?" Sypha suggested, but even her own voice said that she didn't quite believe it.
Neither Trevor nor Sypha slept particularly well that night, even with Adrian there to watch over them. Though he felt that without his presence, their rest that night would have indeed been very poor.
They had settled too much into calmness, he thought, as he watched his friends, their backs pressed together and their rest filled with unease. Something almost like peace had settled over the castle and Belmont estate these past few weeks and they had been foolish to trust it.
The attack wasn't a singular event. Night after night, they found themselves attacked and they had no choice but to fend them off, if they didn't wish for the monsters to burrow through the castle walls.
They managed to piece things together by monsters capable of speech. A vampire called Carmilla was behind the attacks and there was something in the castle she wanted. And she would get it and pretend to have avenged Dracula all in one go.
"We won against Dracula," Trevor said, while pushing a monster down the stairs in front of the entrance door with his foot. "We can take her."
Adrian looked out over the carnage, feeling a dull pressure in his jaw and teeth and hunger crawling through his veins. He'd have to drink blood after this.
"Father was..." Adrian resisted the urge to swallow at the memory. "I think he wasn't at his best, when we fought him." From the corner of his eye, he watched Trevor straighten with frustrated indignation and turned a serious gaze to him. "Do you truly think that we could have won, if he had been at height of his power?"
That had been before the madness, Adrian didn't say. Before his father had wanted to die and take all of humanity with him. Possibly most of the vampire population as well, he probably didn't care much about things in the end.
Trevor muttered a few curses under his breath and dragged a hand through his hair. "What do you suggest we do, then?"
"We're not letting her take anything, for a start," Sypha cut in, voice strong and sure and Adrian felt himself exhale and focus again. She was watching them, eyes bright and fierce and even exhausted, there was magic in her and surrounding her, like an unspoken challenge. "This is our home now and we will protect it."
"Yes," Adrian agreed and found himself drifting closer to them and even with monster blood and sweat in the air, their smells were welcome and...home. They were home now and should the legacy of Dracula and the Belmont's crumble in this battle, he'd still have them. They could make another home elsewhere. But Sypha was right. They would defend this place.
Trevor exhaled and bumped their shoulders together, a gentle, warm contact and he rested there for a moment, before reaching out to rub at a fleck of blood on Sypha's sleeve.
"You're usually neater than that," Trevor joked and Sypha gave him the fondest of eyerolls.
"With you two spraying blood everywhere, that is kind of hard." She reached out to take both their hands and with a gentle tug pulled them inside. "Let's get clean and heal up. This is far from over."
Sadly, Sypha was right. And what was worse, where his father had been out for destruction and death overall, Carmilla seemed to have a far better plan. She was brutal and efficient and focused and driven and Adrian felt more and more exhausted.
They were getting run into the ground. It wasn't hard to see, when Sypha and Trevor were covered in half healed wounds and had to apply bandages after every battle. Adrian himself was running out of strength. Even with the blood his father had collected previously, he keenly felt his half-human side. He was powerful, no doubt and thanks to his father being his sire, but there was only so long he could keep up with continuous battle. Even sleep started to become necessary again.
And then, their hardest battle yet took place and they were exhausted. The night would have been mild and nice otherwise, with summer finally reaching warm fingers across the land and the forest in flourishing all around them.
Adrian felt a subtle shake in his hands and his fangs ached and his breathing was harder than before. Sypha was fighting as fiercely as ever, but he noticed her being more sparse with her spells, risking monsters getting closer to take them out with a single blast of magic, instead of going after them from farther away. Trevor was breathing hard and bleeding and even the Morningstar could only do so much when they were surrounded from all sides.
They were better at fighting together now, nothing like the trio that had faced Dracula and had done their best to stay out of each other's attacks and pitch in when possible. Now they moved together like a well oiled machine, even exhausted. Sypha's fire fit neatly with Trevor's arching chain whip and Adrian found ice supporting his movement and strikes and a whip taking out enemy's legs to let him deliver the killing blow.
It wasn't enough.
"Pull back," he said sharply and Sypha and Trevor gave him a look of grim understanding. Together, they fought their way up the stairs and Sypha used what must have been most of her reserves to create a large wall of ice, which gave them enough time to close the massive entrance door.
"What now?" Trevor asked, wiping a hand over his forehead and smearing sweat and blood from a cut into his hair. The smell of blood was thick in the air and Adrian was more upset than hungry now, because he knew it was theirs. Knew both of them were bleeding and the scent was mingling with his own injuries, even if the bloodflow had stopped. They hadn't healed over though, which only showed that he was at the end of his rope as well.
Adrian had no answer and they heard the muffled snarling and howling from the monsters outside. The door rattled and while Adrian knew that it could withstand quite a bit, in the end, it wouldn't hold. There was a reason why the greatest defense had always been the castle moving away. And then, if one was Dracula, that was really all the offense and defense a place needed. At least, it had been that way.
"Adrian?" came Trevor's voice and he turned his head to meet his friend's gaze. A sudden, fierce desire to keep them all safe struck him. To tell them to go, to find a window they could fit through in the back and sneak out. They could make it if he distracted the horde long enough. It was a useless wish though, as much as he wanted otherwise. They wouldn't abandon him.
"I don't know," he admitted after a moment. They didn't know what Carmilla wanted either. She saw them as an obstacle she would overcome and then all the gutted remains of the castle would be hers.
"We need more time," Sypha said and the door shivered again. A small fracture ran through the stone beside one of the hinges. She looked at them and Adrian knew at once what she wanted to try, as did Trevor. There was an unspoken question in her eyes and Adrian realized she left the decision up to them.
"We'll be dead either way." The words felt like ash on his tongue, sticking and coating and turning all taste and sensation to nothing. It was the truth, though, and they all knew it.
"Do it," Trevor added after a second. A humorless, rough laugh escaped him. "Might as well try." A concerned frown appeared on his face. "But...you said the spell needed power?"
Sypha nodded and pulled the book from her robes. And then, she pulled out the star. Adrian knew that she could fit quite a few things into her pockets, but he hadn't quite expected that. He'd have to ask her to show him how she hid things among her person if they survived this.
"Maybe the spell will devour the star and it's going to be enough," Sypha said, shooting Adrian an apologetic look as she said it, then continued, "I'll try to take us back four months."
That was a good bit before all this mess had started. Enough time to go and find Carmilla and prevent this and it was definitely after...after he killed his father.
"What if it doesn't take the star?" Trevor asked and Sypha took a deep breath, only to stop with a wince. Bruised ribs, Adrian realized with concern and moved a step towards her before he was aware of it. Trevor had done the same, his hand slightly raised, before he stopped.
Behind them, the door shuddered again and the fracture spread, while a second one appeared on the other side of the door. Adrian looked back at it. There was no way they'd survive the fight and maybe the spell would kill them too, but at least there was an actual chance to make it.
"Do it," he decided and found the strength to smile at her. "I trust you."
"You captured Dracula's castle," Trevor said and stepped up to her side, a slight limp in one step and blood was coating his sides from where claws had gotten him. "If anyone can do this, it's you."
Sypha gave them a brief smile and her lip was split, a drop of blood running down. Adrian just wanted them safe.
"Hold onto me," Sypha said and Adrian and Trevor wrapped their hands around her upper arms. "Tightly, don't let go."
"I don't want to hurt you," Adrian said, but shut up when she shot him a serious, sharp look. He tightened his grip, until he was sure no force in the world could rip him away. He saw Trevor do the same.
Sypha took a slow, careful breath and then opened the book and clutched the star close. As she started to read, the words turned to nonsense for Adrian. He should have understood some of it, considering he had helped her a bit with translating and deciphering everything, but her voice turned to nothing he could understand.
The first thing he noticed was how a strange howling had filled his ears and the snarling and growling of the monsters had disappeared. Then the castle around them seemed to warp, as though the walls and pillars had turned into clay and were bending beneath an invisible hand trying to squash it down. The ground started to fracture beneath them and the entrance hall turned fuzzy and strange and all he could really focus on were Sypha and Trevor's breathing had turned into tight, short little bursts.
And then, the second Sypha finished the spell, the star burst open along the edges and Adrian felt its power for a brief moment, before the floor fell out from beneath them and the castle warped around them and he felt himself torn away.
~*~
Sypha had hoped, but not expected, the aid of the star. But just as she finished the spell and focused on a day four months ago, a soft afternoon where they had joked around while clearing away debris, it had snapped open. It's power started to get devoured by the spell instead of her magic and life force and then the star had done something to the spell. Had ripped time away from her and she felt everything vanish, only the tight, painfully so, grips of Trevor and Adrian remained.
The spell was quickly unraveling, the magic turning hungry and consuming and for a second, she felt the grinding of time. Felt it's unforgivable power, like the very weight of the world itself, the drowning drag of all the ocean waves and a thousand grieving cries of death and wails of new life. And then she felt Trevor and Adrian ducking down against her, felt the edges of them starting to get devoured by the spell and fury replaced the terror that had started to grip her.
"No!" she snarled and ripped up her hands, hooking her will into the spell and curling her hands as though they were claws to sink into the magic howling around them. "You will not kill us."
It felt almost like when she had tried to stop the ball of fiery death Dracula had hurled at them and the next second, she felt Adrian and Trevor push against her, their shoulders bracing hers and she dragged up every inch of willpower, every scrap of magic that remained in her veins and the fierce, unshakable desire to protect these two men, to see them safe and hear them laugh again. She sank it like fangs into the spell, wrapped it like chains around the magic and held tight.
The spell shuddered and twitched and then, finally, reached back to her and pulled them along. The star pulsed once, twice and Sypha felt something in the spell shift, without turning it loose and uncontrolled again. It dragged them through a space that stole breath and thought from her body for a split second, before she found herself yanked, hands disappearing from her arms and darkness enveloping her, as she seemed to fall through nothingness for an endless second.
The next moment she slammed onto the ground, a stone digging into her hip and her bruised rips stealing all breath away. With a wheeze, she hurried to get up again, her injuries aching and her body trembling, exhaustion dragging at her limbs like heavy stones. Looking down at her hands, she only found a bit of glittering dust and a fistful of ashes. The book was gone and what pieces of the star had traveled with her as well.
"Sypha!" a familiar, entirely unexpected voice called out to her and she snapped up her head, feeling dizzy and disorientated and ready to sleep for days.
Her grandfather was hurrying towards her, eyes wide and horrified and there were all the other Speakers, the family she had missed dearly, all of them startled and worried. They hurried towards her as well and Sypha couldn't help but stare at them, blood dripping down her lip and from a wound at her shoulder and her ribs ached fiercely. With a sharp gasp, she looked around, only to realize Trevor and Adrian weren't there.
"Where are they?" she asked as soon as her grandfather reached her sides, his hands hovering with worry and one of the other Speakers quickly grabbing some bandages and herbs. "There should be Trevor and Ad-Alucard with me. Have you seen them?"
She reached out and gripped her grandfather's arm, her hand shaking with exhaustion.
"Sypha..." her grandfather sounded and looked so utterly confused and the other Speakers had fallen silent. "Sypha, what happened? What are you talking about"
Sypha stilled. There was no way her grandfather would have forgotten Trevor or what she had set out to do with a newly discovered Adrian. And neither would have the other Speakers. She looked from him to them and saw no recognition in any of their faces, only a deep worry and confusion.
"What year is it?" the question was a soft, shaky exhale and her grandfather inhaled sharply, held his breath for a second and then exhaled, reaching out to gently take her hand.
"It's a month into 1475," her grandfather said and Sypha felt her eyes widen, a sharp gasp caught in her chest. That was...that was far too far back in time! How had four months turned into over a year?
Oh. Oh no, what if Trevor and Adrian hadn't made it back with her? Or what if they had and they were now...where were they even at this time? She didn't know, only knew that Trevor had been traveling and that Adrian had been below Gresit at the time they had met, after...after Adrian's mother had been killed.
Sypha jerked to her feet, even if her grandfather had to quickly catch her when she swayed in place. Adrian's mother, maybe she could reach her in time! Maybe she could spare him the agony of losing her and having to kill his father. She didn't dare think about what to do if they didn't remember her, but regardless, she would do everything she could to save his mother. She had to.
"I need to get to Lupu," she said, forcing her heavy legs steady beneath her and she straightened from her grandfather's supportive grasp. "How far is it?"