Remilius spoke no further than what was necessary, he knew his place and was neither ashamed of it nor boastful. To him, because he was the only living and breathing servant in the whole of the castle, other than half-demented cooks that is, that in itself was enough for him to hold a sense of self-worth far greater than he had ever experienced. He had spent much of his early life accustomed to abuse, exploitation, and humiliation, constantly thrown out of taverns, taken up with a traveling circus (where he learned much of his necromancer abilities), and arrested for crimes he never committed. Out of everything, becoming a valet, the head of a household bringing enormous responsibility for everyone and everything in it, was the best thing that ever happened to him by far. Even if he did serve under a bloodthirsty vampire, witnessing many a ruthless slaughtering, several beheadings, and a few disembodiments here and there. There wasn't much here that went on at Beniste Castle that he didn't know about. Except this moment.
Despite his solemn character, who often kept his emotions and thoughts to himself as his job description required, Remilius' couldn't help but succumb to his curiosity at times. He supposed it was innate in his elven blood and that his own species frequently suffered because of it. After all, one can never really escape the things that they are born with. Whenever he wanted to know a certain aspect of something, the first thing he would do was confront Dietrich about it. He would always be open to give a satisfying answer to all of the harmless questions. Dietrich never saw anything to hide from Remilius, except the trysts with Bellona and some other aspects of his past. When that never sufficed, he resorted to snooping of his own. He would look through old documents, performed dark incantations in his dormitory, and even spy a little bit when he could learn nothing from the other two methods.
Now more than ever did he feel the return of his nagging curiosity. Remilius wondered why his master had brought home a woman. Of course, it was really none of his business, what Dietrich by his own volition was his own; sub-consciously, however, as the hub of the household, he did feel he had a right to now. It had been at least a century and half since he had last returned home with a member of the fairer sex, in all incidents they never returned to their homes because they ended up in the castle crypt. Dietrich actually wasn't as lusty as vampires were often reputed to be. True, a vampire's sex drive often went unmatched, he was no exception to that when the mood set him. But because he kept himself busy with so many other things; attending meetings with the coven, dealing with hunters, pissing Cronus off among other things, he was too absorbed with himself and tasks his own to think about such things.
Remilius could see instantaneously that there was nothing light or fair about this woman. Around her, he received the air of ferocity that he hadn't experienced at all in his life, except once in the circus when the ringmaster (who was a woman) had whipped him relentlessly for stealing a piece of bread from her private food storage. Her remark about his skin and ears did not offend him for his type of elf was rare, it was something he heard often. The ferocity did not frighten him, or even intimidate as he figured that was what such attitude did to most people, but instead made him suspicious as to her doings here. Whatever it was, he decided, he would ask Dietrich when he awoke the following evening? For now he would keep the professional distance he was so accustomed to, obey and command.
When Ziarre tossed her belongings to the floor, he instinctively gathered them up and placed them on a nearby chair. As a necromancer he sensed a disturbance in the mental position of Ziarre (he wasn't a psychic, but the macabre hidden deep within people's minds called out to him like an ave's wild whoop). It alarmed him, if only vaguely, seeing clearly that she was trying hard to ignore it. Remilius placed it in the back of his mind for later, it might be one of those interesting facts he could share with the master of the house later. It was the little things like these that Remilius felt Dietrich ought to know.
He had been standing still, eying the weaponry and baggage she carried, until he realized she bade him a request for a bath. Well, it was more of a barking command, but he jumped to the start all the same. As he moved to the washroom, drawing the bath in the porcelain tub, he answered, "I'm the only elf here. There are various other undead servants, zombie and skeletal, that do the cleaning. And, of course the cooks, a few half-crazed witches that seem to be more than obsessed with their positions." The water finished pouring into the tub as he finished, "I doubt there have been any other elven servants before me since I have been working here for at least four hundred years." Remilius stood and walked back into the room, asking, "Will you be needing anything else?"
~
Dietrich, locking himself in his room as was his custom, and drawing the heavy curtains over the thick glass windows overlooking a terrace, had removed all of his wet clothes and slipped into his sleeping wardrobe. The chances of the rain continuing on through to morning were high and it gave the room its usual cold feeling, he was not distracted from letting his tired mind receive the rest it so deserved, his body would concur too. The wounds, though no longer open, were still a little sore as the mattress yielded to his weight, causing him to wince slightly. He sighed graciously as he let his stalwart body fall to rest.
The next part was easy enough: Sleep. With himself as tired as he was, Dietrich allowed himself to become Slumber's silent victim. Images of the evening and Ziarre flashed beneath his closed eyes, watching his mind's movies until he felt himself drift off into perpetual darkness. "No," a voice said in the back of his mind beneath the layers of sleep, "Not again...."
Dietrich was watching himself, seeing what he was seeing all over again. A mirror of a dream.
He had run away when his mentor was not looking, trying to go back, wanting that nostalgia that had driven him so far. It was twenty-six years later from the date of his death on Cecile's wedding day. Dietrich knew that she had wed Travin and had children of her own now, completely forgotten about him, but he did not forget her. He would keep the promise that he had made to Cecile.
Dietrich was observing through the cabin window at Cecile, now a woman in her forties. He watched with a growing anger, hate, and slim chance of regret, her kiss her husband and embrace her now eighteen-year old daughter... He had wanted to break into there, make her bleed, make her feel all the pain she had caused him. But that would only have hurt her physically. Physical pain only lasted so long... If he attacked her heart to make her see... Yes, then she would truly see... He continued to look at the happy moment with empty jealousy, taking note of everything, storing it way into the back of his mind; until he spotted the sparkle from her daughter's finger. An engagement ring? It must be... Then a boy appeared, about the same age as the girl, with the same kind of ring on his own finger. Yes it was an engagement ring... Then the plan came to him: The key to Cecile's heart was through the daughter...
He knelt low, watching the fiancé suddenly leave the room to another room in a dark corner of the cabin. Now was his chance. Moving from his spot beneath the window, Dietrich slipped around the corner and into a darkened room where the boy had entered. In quick kill, he silently snapped the boy's neck and dragged him outside through the window and into the bushes. Then he felt his body change, his built arms to the boy's lanky limbs, his hardened torso to a thinned trunk, Dietrich's face exactly into the boy's. Shape shifting was now his prime gift, feeling his outside alter physically was stirring mentally.
Sneaking back into the window, he readjusted the ring on the bony finger and smiled maliciously to himself. It was a perfect plan...nothing could go wrong. He hid behind the corner that led to the family room, where girl had been waiting by herself after Cecile and Travin walked upstairs momentarily. After searching though his victim's memory, he finally found her name. "Elycia," he whispered harshly, showing his face ever so slightly.
Smiling, Elycia walked towards him, "Bastil, what are you doing back there? What's taking you so long to get the wine?"
"Come here." She approached him in the darkness and assumed a loving gaze and held her as a fiancé should. He kissed her a few times, doing playful gestures. She merely returned the actions, lipping at his neck and questioning what he was doing. It was only when he changed back did she become alarmed. Before she could scream, Dietrich was on her and apprehended her quickly, then slipping out of the window once again.
The vision was blurred as Dietrich tossed in a fitful sleep. Beclouded until...
He was carrying Elycia up the stairs to his room at the castle as she struggled against him. But he was too strong for her... She could only feel a dangerous stranger holding her in a way that she could not fight him... She succumbed to his will...
Dietrich felt the rage that scurried through him fade away as he realized what he had done. "No!" cried out that last wrinkle of humanity left in him, but he no longer could give a damn. What was done was done... But as a final act of mercy, not to Cecile but to Elycia, he grabbed the dagger beneath his pillow and thrust it into her heart, killing her instantly...
"No..." Dietrich mumbled in his sleep. His hands thrashed from one side of the bed to the other, gripping one pillow with agitation.
Disguising himself as a villager he returned her lifeless body to Cecile's home, grinning maliciously inside at the horror that filled her face. When she looked back at the villager's face, there was a familiar glow that made her heart leap into her throat. But before she knew it, he was gone...
It was his final act of revenge and his final act of mercy... It was all over now, there was no going back...
[ I think I put too much action in one post. Might use the blood scene for later though. *makes note to self*]
