AMoS Chapter 4-3

[eiahmon]

Title: A Moment of Stupidity Part 4: 1476 - 1535
Rating: R for language, and mentions of RAPE and M/M SLASH. Don't like, then don't read.
Disclaimer: Castlevania and its characters and situations are the sole property of Konami. I am making no money or profit off of this fanfiction and no copyright infringement is intended.
Summary: AU. What if Joachim Armster had lived through his fight with Leon Belmont? What might have been different? Well hang on, because Joachim is going to tell you all about it. From his kidnapping and forced turning to his rescue from the ruins of Walter's castle, and from Trevor's birth and to Richter's death of old age, he tells all - and blames it all on Leon while he's at it.
Section Summary: Part 4 covers Dracula's Curse to Trevor's death.

3.
Resurrection

The joy of Jacob's birth was quickly diminished by the worsening conditions around us. As well as the famine to deal with, there seemed to be an air of hostility floating around. Everyone could feel it, and it made people irritable, short tempered, and prone to fits of violence. At least one man was hanged after he murdered his young son during one such fit.

Trevor spent two days with Sypha and Jacob, and then he was back out in the wilds, helping with the hunting and trying to keep the ever growing number of monsters under control. I assisted whenever I could, but I also had my own hands full keeping my territory clear, since the monsters had no qualms about attacking vampires.

It was during one such hunt that I was chasing down a minotaur that had had the audacity to fling its ax at me. I had dodged it easily, but I certainly wasn't going to let the creature get away with it. It wasn't that far ahead of me, and I was reaching out to rip out its heart through its back, when a blade flashed, and it fell to the ground with a spray of blood, cleaved neatly it two. I stopped just before I ran into the same blade, and I quickly followed it back to its wielder.

A young man stood nearby, looking as surprised to see me as I was to see him. Dappled moonlight shone off his shoulder length hair that was as white as mine, and his blue eyes were wide with shock. For a brief moment, I sensed something odd about him, but the feeling disappeared so quickly that I dismissed it. After a brief moment, he nodded at me and ran off. I watched him go for a second, and then I went in the opposite direction.

******

Several nights later, I was at home when I received a brief image of Trevor's face, followed by a feeling of severe danger. I bolted out of my chair and ran for the door, and I had barely cleared the threshold when I morphed into my wolf form and ran with all due speed towards the Belmont lands.

I heard the sounds of battle long before I reached the property line. The central green between the houses was a mass of monsters of all kinds, while the various menfolk of the clan struggled to make headway against the teeming mass. In the middle of it all was Trevor. Due to the tight confines, he was using a sword and his various subweapons instead of the whip, but he was still cutting through them like nothing. Flashes of spellfire slammed into the group, and I spotted Sypha in the window of Jacob's nursery, raining magic down on the monsters.

Summoning my swords as I went, I returned to my normal form and slammed hard into the group, scattering some of them and giving Trevor some breathing room. He immediately took advantage of that to trade his sword for the Vampire Killer, and started killing them in one strike. With every crack of the whip, a monster died in a blaze of fire, which allowed him to clear even more space and take some of the stress off of the others.

We whittled down their numbers quickly after that, and once the last creature had fallen, Trevor looked up at Sypha, and she nodded at him to tell him that she and Jacob were all right. Then he turned to the rest of the clan and started issuing orders. People jumped to obey him, and I dismissed my swords and walked up to him as the rest of the family scattered.

"We had no warning." he said quietly. "They just seemingly appeared out of nowhere. We need to find a way to ward these lands, or we will never be safe. My defeat of Dracula has painted a very large target on us."

I nodded silently, and he ran off to help the others.

Within short order, the injured were taken into the hall, while two doctors from the family treated them. The more severely injured were left to me, and all it took was a quick sip of my blood to fix them right up. The lesser injured demanded some of mine as well, but they were silenced by a look from Trevor.

"I'd be happy to give you some." I told them sweetly. "If you would be so kind to allow me to feed from you to replenish it first?" They all paled and shook their hands frantically. "I didn't think so."

There were a few chuckles, and Trevor grinned at me, despite how tired he was.

No one had died, thankfully, but the final tally was 17 injured, five seriously, with four houses damaged, plus one that had been rendered structurally unsound. The injured were taken home, while the family whose house had been ruined were allowed to bunk at Trevor and Sypha's for the time being. I took a moment to visit a nearby village to feed, and then I returned to watch over the Belmonts for the rest of the night. Trevor insisted on watching with me, and it wasn't until sunup that I was able to convince him to go to bed.

I stayed until noon to make sure nothing was going to attack during the daylight hours, and then I went to see Silvanus.

"Of course, I can ward the Belmont Estate." he told me. "At least the small area where the houses are. The full lands are, of course, too large for easy warding. I suppose I might be able to put creature aversion wards to help repel them from the villages and towns, but it won't stop them completely."

"After what happened last night, I think we'll take whatever we can get."

Silvanus pulled a book off a nearby shelf and opened it. "I'll be there tonight then." he said as he turned his attention to the pages in front of him. "I'll meet Trevor at his home."

"Trevor?"

"Of course. He's the landowner, so it would work best if he were to participate in the warding. Sypha would also be a great help, as she's magical. Having them both there will speed up the process considerably, and it will also make the resulting wards stronger than they would be otherwise. Make sure both of them are rested by the time I get there."

Feeling as though I'd been dismissed, I left Silvanus' home and returned to the Belmont lands.

******

True to his word, Silvanus appeared just after sundown. Trevor and Sypha were waiting for him, and Sypha informed me that Jacob should sleep for the next few hours without any fuss and that she expected to be back in time for his next feeding.

"You will be." Silvanus assured her. "Before we go though, Joachim, I'll need some of your blood." He handed me a small crystal vial, similar to the one I had given to Trevor a few years before.

I took it. "Why?"

"So I can key you to the wards. I intend for the wards to stop all vampires and other night prowlers. To cross the ward line, you'll have to be keyed into them. We can add others at a later date."

I shrugged, bit into the tip of one of my fingers, and let the blood drip into the vial. Once it was filled, I capped it and handed it back to Silvanus. He slipped it into a pocket and nodded to me. "We'll back before midnight if everything works out." He, with Trevor and Sypha following close behind, then walked out of the house, while I settled down to wait.

It actually took several days in total to ward the Belmont lands. Silvanus focused on the weaker, larger wards first; the ones that made creatures such as the ones that had attacked the property want to stay away from the towns and villages. As he moved close to the main area, the wards grew in strength. The most powerful ones were the ones that surrounded the main plot of land that the Belmont Clan lived on, and the ones around each individual home.

The wards would stop anyone that wished harm upon the family; they would flat out kill any hostile creature that tried to cross them. All of them were tied to a control stone that was placed on the mantlepiece above the fireplace in Trevor's study. By pressing various runes and feeding power to them, Trevor could lower the wards, increase their power, disable them temporarily, or if need be, bring them to full strength, which would lock down the main wards and prevent anyone or anything from going in or out. Silvanus had to key him into the ward stone, so to prevent just anyone from bringing the wards down, and he also added Jonathon and Sypha on a just in case.

The Belmonts breathed a sigh of relief, and an unexpected side effect of the wards was that the feelings of evil and hostility that covered the area were lessened when under them. It was known only to Silvanus, Trevor, Sypha, Jonathon, and myself that Kerwin, Celia, Matatias, Ladislas, and Rachim were also keyed into the wards, allowing them safe passage onto the Belmont lands. As the main warder, Silvanus was automatically allowed in. Ladislas even mentioned that he was thinking about asking Trevor if Rachim could shelter there until things were settled, since the constant monster attacks on his castle were making it difficult to give Rachim the care and attention he needed. Trevor said that it was fine with him if Ladislas decided it was needed.

******

That turned out to be unneeded however. Barely a month after Silvanus put the wards up, Trevor heard of a witch burning in one of the villages and went to investigate. Of course it was too late to save the poor woman, but he found the charges of witchcraft against her groundless and saw to it that those responsible were dealt with. He returned home, solemn and pensive, but it wasn't the execution of an innocent woman that had him worried.

"Dracula had two generals in his service." he told me late one night as we relaxed in the family room. "One apparently forswore his powers and fled before I arrived, but I caught glimpses of the second one off and on, though he never confronted us directly. I can't grasp why, but he seemed familiar to me, like I had seen him before." He glanced down at the empty fireplace and took a sip of his ale. "Does the phrase 'Devil Forgemaster' mean anything to you?"

I nearly spit my own ale across the room. "Dracula had a Devil Forgemaster working for him!"

"Two of them apparently, though one left for whatever reason. The other I assume is still loyal to his master."

I closed my eyes and leaned back in my chair.

Centuries before, in Walter's massive library, I had come across a dusty tome that had talked about Devil Forging. A branch of Necromancy, one had to be born with the talent; it could not be learned. Once it was mastered, the Devil Forgemaster had a unique power over the souls of the dead and could summon them to the world of the living as familiars. The book mentioned that a Devil Forgemaster at full power was extremely dangerous and should be avoided at all costs.

"When I investigated the witch burning," Trevor's voice broke me from my thoughts, "I learned that a effeminate, tall, red haired man had been the one to level the charges against the woman. I managed to get a decent description of him from a few people, and it sounds like it could be the second Devil Forgemanster. If it is him, then he must be tracked down and destroyed."

"Do you think he could be responsible for everything?"

"No, not everything. I'm certain we're under a curse of Dracula's making, but I'm sure that his loyal general is stirring up trouble. Why he sought to have a woman executed, I don't know, but I intend to find out."

"You're going to look for him?"

Trevor gave me a look, and his resemblance to Mathias then was so clear that I had to repress a shudder. "Of course I am." was all he said.

"When?"

Trevor took another sip of his ale. "Tomorrow."

"So soon?"

"We can't keep going on like this, Uncle Joachim. This curse has plagued us for three years now; when will it stop? We cannot survive another failed harvest."

I sighed in defeat; he was right. The arrival of spring had made things easier for everyone, but the famine was still ongoing. It was now early summer, so if Dracula and his general were responsible for the mess we were in, it had to be taken care of soon.

"You will look after Sypha and Jacob?" Trevor asked me.

"Always."

******

Trevor departed in the morning, and like I had three years before, I watched him go from the stable door. I wished I could make him stay, but he had to do what he felt was his duty. Sypha had wanted to go with him, but she was expecting again, and so had to stay safely behind. That was fine with me. Jacob, who was 16 months old by then, was upset enough that his "Pa-pa" had left. His mother leaving as well would have left him inconsolable. He clung to me while his father was gone, and I tried to keep him distracted, but it was going to be a long wait.

Twelve days after Trevor left, I was seated in the dark library, staring at the empty fireplace and trying not to worry when I was nearly thrown from my chair by a shockwave of dark power that rolled through the house. I heard shouts from the servants as they were startled awake, but I ignored them all as I heard Jacob start crying. I ran up the stairs to his room just in time to see Sypha scooping him out of his bed and into her arms. She looked at me as she cooed to him.

"Dracula's castle." she whispered. "It's back."

I leaned back against the wall; I had never expected him to resurrect so soon. A second later, Sypha stiffened, and then she nearly dropped Jacob as she screamed. I ran forward to catch Jacob and steady her.

"He's hurt!" she cried as I tried to hold her. "Trevor is hurt! He's dying! Go find him, Joachim! Find him, and bring him home!"

"I don't know where he's at, Sypha." I replied, even as I felt my heart stutter to a stop at the thought of Trevor dying.

She wrenched herself out of my arms while still holding a wailing Jacob. She reached up with her free arm and placed her hand on my forehead, and I received an image of mountains on the edge of the neutral zone, of a ruined castle, and of Trevor, lying on the floor in an ever growing pool of blood. I gasped in horror at the image, but I knew where he was.

"Lock down the wards until I return!" I shouted as I ran out of the room. I didn't pause to see if Sypha understood me, nor did I really care at that point. My only concern was getting to my godson as quickly as possible. I ran out the front door and launched myself into the air, moving as quickly as I could eastward. I ignored the whisper that informed me that, no matter how fast I moved, I would never make it in time. I had to get to Trevor.

It took me two days to reach the area that Sypha had showed me, and I found the ruined castle quickly. I paid scarce attention to the fact that I could no longer feel Dracula's power, or that I couldn't see his castle anywhere. My focus was solely on finding Trevor, and I braced myself before I entered the room where he was, expecting to find him dead on the floor. Taking a steadying breath, I pushed open the door.

But Trevor wasn't there.

There was a dried blood pool on the floor, and I could tell by scent that it was definitely his, but my godson was nowhere to be found. I stepped closer to the pool and spotted small shoe prints leading away from the center of the room, back towards the door that I had come in through, but they vanished before reaching it. Had someone reached him first? Of course, that led to the next question. Had that someone saved him, or finished him off, and where was he?

Closing my eyes, I reached out with my senses and tried to feel for him. I got nothing at first, but then I felt a faint flicker from the northwest, followed by the feeling of pain and fever. I opened my eyes and sighed; he was alive, if only barely. I left the room, and headed in the direction that my senses were telling me to go. I left the ruins of the castle, and wandered into the nearby mountains. In short order I came to a path, and off that path was a doorway and two windows carved into the mountainside. I could smell Trevor's scent coming from within, but I could also detect two others close to him. One was clearly human, while the second felt human, but at the same time did not.

Deciding that I would worry about once I knew that Trevor was safe, I walked in without knocking. I walked into a cozy room with a shop counter that cut it into two halves, and I spotted right away the blond human woman that put off the same magical feel that Sypha did standing behind it. Her eyes widened when she saw me, but I ignored her. Trevor was in the room behind her.

I hopped over the counter as she began shouting for someone named Hector, but I paid her no mind. I pushed open the door to the living area in the back, and my eyes immediately focused on Trevor, lying still on a makeshift bed in a darkened corner. I translocated over to him, but before I could do more than give him a quick glancing over, I heard the door behind me slam open, and I turned around just in time to catch the blade of a sword that had been swung at me.

I followed the blade back to its wielder, and to my surprise, it was the young man I had met in the woods the year before. Like he had before, he looked just as surprised to see me as I was to see him, and he quickly lowered the blade and stepped back. As he did, I sensed what I had only caught a flicker of before.

"You're the other Devil Forgemanster." I said as I looked at him.

"I am," he replied, "and you're Joachim Armster, the vampire that watches over the Belmont Clan."

"I am, and as you can see, I came here for my godson."

He sheathed his sword. "I understand." He turned and walked out of the room then, ushering the woman out with him, and once the door had shut behind them, I turned my attention back to Trevor.

He was lying sprawled out on his back on the pile of blankets and pillows, and someone had dressed him in a simple nightshirt. His bloodied hunting clothes I spotted lying in a pile on the floor nearby. He was completely still save for the rise and fall of his chest, his skin was pale and clammy to the touch, and he was bathed in sweat from a fever. I gently brushed his hair out of his face, and his eyes flickered open at the touch.

"Uncle... Joachim?" he whispered faintly.

"Hush, child, I'm here."

"It... hurts."

I felt my heart break then. "I know, little one. I know it hurts. Go back to sleep now."

I went to move my hand away, but to my surprise, Trevor tried to raise his head from the pillow, fangs bared. "Are you thirsty, Trevor?"

He gave up trying to lift his head and nodded weakly.

"Alright," I bit into my finger and held it to his mouth. "You've bled out too much to have more than a little bit, but this will help you heal, and it will settle the thirst down."

Trevor was so weak that he was only barely able to drink the blood that I offered him, and I wanted to cry at seeing him in such a state. Instead I had to settle for running my fingers through his hair while he drank, and I had to resist the urge to give him more when he whined in distress when I took my hand away.

"You can't have anymore, little one." I told him. "I don't think you wished to be turned, am I correct?" He only groaned in response, and I managed a faint smile. "I'm going to look you over now. Go back to sleep, Trevor."

"Don't.. don't go." he managed to whisper as his eyes closed, and I felt my heart break again at his plea.

"I'm not going anywhere, Trevor. I'm not going to leave you alone. Rest and focus on getting better."

With a soft sigh, I felt Trevor relax as he slipped into sleep, and I took the time then to unlace the collar of the nightshirt that he was wearing so I could see where he was injured.

His chest was wrapped in bloodied bandages, and when I peeled them back, I first saw that he had a new cut across his chest, but that one was relatively shallow and clear of infection. A second later, I saw what had alarmed Sypha so much. A deep laceration was positioned just to the left of his heart; anymore to the right and whatever weapon that had inflicted it would have pierced his heart and killed him instantly. As it was, his left lung had been hit, as well as a few major arteries. How had he survived?

I bit deeply into the muscle of my right thumb and allowed a bit of my blood to drip into the injury. I was pushing it with giving him anymore, but if his lung did not start healing soon, he would never survive, so it was a risk I had to take. He groaned and squirmed a bit in pain as the wound closed, but he did not wake. I replaced the bandages and closed his nightshirt, and it was then that I heard a clink! of something hitting the wooden floor beside him. I took a moment to cover him with a blanket, and then I looked to the side, where the candlelight glinted off a small cylindrical object on the floor. I leaned down and picked it up.

It was the crystal vial that I had given Trevor three years before. Its wax seal was broken, and the blood it had once contained was gone, which informed me how he had lived as long as he had after being injured so severely. I closed my eyes and sighed.

"Oh, Trevor..." I whispered as I reached out and touched his cheek, which now had a little bit of color to it. He was still so very close to death, but I could do nothing more than care for him and hope my blood was enough to accelerate his healing.

I reached out to my bond with Kerwin and gave it a tug to get his attention. I received his query, and I informed him that I had found Trevor and that he was alive, but he was seriously hurt and in no shape to travel. Could he pass it on to Sypha? He responded that he would, and I thanked him and closed the link. If my suspicions about Trevor and Sypha were correct, I was certain that she already knew that Trevor still lived, but it wouldn't hurt to be safe.

My suspicions were confirmed when, about 20 minutes later, Trevor smiled in his sleep and whispered his wife's name. I smiled myself and tucked the blanket around his shoulders, but then a faint knock came from the door behind me.

"Come in," I said without taking my eyes off of Trevor's sleeping form, and then I heard the door open and sensed the Devil Forgemaster coming close, with the human woman close behind him.

"Trevor is too weak to move." I told them. "I will be staying with him until I can take him home." I looked at them to see them nodding in understanding. "What happened here?"

The Devil Forgemaster – I really needed to get his name – sighed and closed his eyes for a moment. The woman gently squeezed his shoulder in support and then she stepped away, saying something about starting supper. I ignored her as she walked out of the room and into what I could see was a small kitchen; my focus was on the man in front of me as he rubbed his arms for a moment, as if he was trying to draw comfort from it.

"Fifteen days ago," he began quietly, "my wife was executed as a witch."

I started in surprise. "That was her that died?" He nodded sadly and looked down at the floor as a few tears fell.

"At least Lord Belmont took care of the ones that killed her." he whispered. "But he wasn't able to get the one that incited it to begin with."

"Who was that?"

"Isaac. He was... he and I grew up together. Lord Dracula raised us after we lost our families, though I wonder now how much of that was because he knew what we were before we did. He found Isaac first, then me a year or so later." He paused for a long moment.

"Isaac," I turned around at the sound of Trevor's voice to see him trying to raise his head again. "Isaac, was the one... the child we saw with Dracula... at the council." He went limp on the blankets then, breathing heavily and wheezing due to his damaged lung. I remembered then, the small red haired child with silver eyes that we had seen trotting behind Mathias that day, and I recalled Celia's comment about sensing something dark about him. I then pushed that aside in favor of soothing Trevor back to sleep. Once that was done, I turned back to the other Forgemaster.

"Isaac mentioned that." he said quietly. "He told me of Lord Dracula's attack on the council years ago. It was not long afterward that he took me in. He knew from the beginning what we were, and he encouraged us to make use of our talents, and we did so."

"What changed?" I asked gently, sensing that this was a delicate subject for him.

"Lord Dracula changed. I couldn't stand by and watch him hurt people any longer, so I left. I had to fight my way through his undead legions to do it, but I did. I then killed my Innocent Devils and locked my powers away. I wanted no part of that life anymore. Rosaly found me, injured and ill, and took me in. I married her, less than a month before she died." He looked down at the floor again. "I was consumed by rage. He had let me see him, so I knew it was him. I followed him here, looking for vengeance, and I also encountered Lord Belmont." He nodded at Trevor, who was sleeping soundly. "He tried to stop me from pursuing Isaac, and he even attacked me at one point, believing that I was the one responsible for everything. Eventually, he decided that I would be the one to face Isaac for the sake of Rosaly's memory, but we had played right into Dracula's hands."

"How so?"

"Death knew of the seal that Lord Belmont had placed on the castle, and he knew of the demonic energy needed to break it. A Devil Forgemaster in battle can easily raise the needed amount of magic. I encountered the guard that Lord Belmont had placed there, and that was enough to break the seal. It was then that Isaac attacked Lord Belmont from behind, to prevent him from reaching Dracula."

"So Mathias – Dracula," I said at the Forgemaster's confused look, "was revived?"

"The curse," The Forgemaster straightened up in his chair and sighed, "The curse was Lord Dracula's plan to ensure his resurrection. If someone was completely consumed by the curse, he would be able to use them to be reborn. He and Death had hoped it would be me, but I was able to resist at the last moment. So they used Isaac instead. I fought Lord Dracula, and managed to temporarily lock the castle away again, but Isaac did not survive his revival. We had to leave him behind when the castle crumbled."

The woman came into the room then, and her face looked pained as she announced that dinner was ready. She gave me a small bowl of soup to feed Trevor once he was awake, and then she had the Forgemaster moved to the small dining table to eat. I woke Trevor to feed him, though I was reluctant to do so. He needed to rest if he was going to heal, but healing such a serious injury would consume a great deal of energy, so he couldn't afford to skip a meal. I carefully sat him up, and cradled him in my left arm with his head lying against my chest and spoon fed him the soup. He sipped a little water afterward, and then he went right back to sleep.

After everyone had eaten, the other two introduced themselves. The woman was Julia LeForeze, and she was the younger sister to Isaac. They had been separated as children after their parents drove Isaac away.

"I was able to hide my power better than he could." she told me. "Our father was a man of God and could not cope with having a 'devil child' such as Isaac in the house. Isaac was six when our entire village chased him out into the forest to die. I left as soon as I was able, and I was relieved to find him alive, though he was in Dracula's employ by then."

The other Forgemaster was named Hector. "I no longer remember my family name, or if I even had one." he told me quietly as everyone was preparing to bed down for the night. He, like Isaac, had been driven out into the wild to die by a family that had not wanted him. Unlike Isaac, however, it had been his mother that had been the impetus behind his banishment. "Apparently, she had no trouble with her husband being an alchemist, but her son having magic of any kind? Perish the thought!"

I got the distinct impression that Hector was a little bitter.

"I survived for a few months by begging at other villages, as I was about ten or so then, but I was run out of every place I stopped, because everyone knew that I had powers of some kind. Lord Dracula found me as I was being hunted down to be killed."

He and Julia headed off the bed then, and I pulled up a chair beside Trevor to better watch him through the night. Trevor slept deeply through the night, which I was glad for, as it became clear that he was in a great deal of pain. I held one of his clammy hands in my own and kept a steady watch on his breathing. His heartbeat remained slow and steady as the hours ticked by, and finally my own exhaustion from my frantic flight here caught up to me just before sunrise.

******

The smell of cooking breakfast rose me only a few hours later. I checked on Trevor to find him still sleeping soundly with steady breathing, so I went out for a quick hunt. When I returned, I woke Trevor, fed him his breakfast, bathed him, and changed his bandages, and it was then that I realized that the large wound to his chest was worse than I had thought. I had heard Hector say that Isaac had attacked him from behind, but it wasn't until I saw the festering wound on Trevor's back that it actually dawned on me what he meant. With Julia's help, I turned Trevor onto his side and dripped blood into the injury. There was a hissing sound as the infection was burned out, which made Trevor groan in pain, but the wound sealed itself. We then wrapped new bandages around his chest, dressed him in a clean shirt, and tucked him back in. I then gave him a little more blood to drink.

His fever finally broke then with the infection that had been causing it gone. Trevor sighed in relief as his temperature returned to normal, and the deep sigh showed me that his injured lung was healing well. He went back to sleep, and I reached out to Kerwin and asked him to let Sypha know that Trevor was doing better. He responded in the affirmative, so I returned my attention to watching Trevor breathe while listening to his heartbeat.

It was another two days before I decided that Trevor was well enough to go home. He was so weak still, so it would be slow going, even though he was going to be carried the entire way. Julia helped me wrap him snugly in blankets to protect him from the cooler night air, while Hector secured his hunting clothes, subweapons, and the Vampire Killer into a pack that I could carry on my back.

"What will you do now, Hector?" I asked as I slung the pack over my shoulders.

He shrugged. "Julia has invited me to stay for as long as I need. After that? I do not know. I have many little friends that I have to take care of; needless to say they cannot be seen by the common folk." I nodded in understanding; I had seen many of his little friends and found them fascinating. Despite that I was eager to get home, and not just because of Trevor. Hector's power rolled around him like a thunderstorm, and it made me nervous. As old as I was, I knew that he wouldn't have much in way of difficulty in taking me down, and that made me uneasy, even though I had no reason to fear him.

I gently scooped Trevor, who was sleeping again, up into my arms and carried him out of the small cave house and onto the path outside. The sun was nearly down, and after making sure that the blankets were securely wound around him with only a small opening so he could breathe, I lifted off into the air and flew off towards the Belmont lands.

Chapter 4-2 -- Chapter 4-4
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