eiahmon | Blood Is Chapter 12

Title: Blood Is
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: Do I really have to mention that I don't own Castlevania? If I did, we would have gotten to see Julius curbstomp Dracula, the storyline would have been neatened up a bit, and Dracula and Alucard would have just HUGGED already after the reveal in Lords of Shadow 2.
Summary: Lords of Shadow Continuity: AU to Mirror of Fate and Lords of Shadow 2: Trevor wasn't the only one that had the truth of his parentage kept from him by the Brotherhood.

12.

The other voices were back.

You belong to us.

You cannot run away.

We will find you.

Gabriel shivered as they circled around him, whispering, touching him with their cold hands.

No one will take you away.

Come back to us.

Don't leave us.

He tried to close his ears, but his hands were of no use, and he shivered again despite the warm thing that was covering him.

"Go away." he whimpered as he curled up on himself.

You are mine, Gabriel Belmont! came the angry voice, and suddenly the face was there, filling up the darkness around him, surrounding him, making it impossible to look away. I will find you, and I will bring you back!

Gabriel screamed and struggled to get away from the face, but there was something behind him that stopped him from moving further. He faintly heard one of the nice voices then, but they sounded far away. Warm hands touched him then, and he threw his hands out to stop them. Another voice shouted, but he didn't understand what it said. The other nice voice came from somewhere nearby, and then more hands grabbed him and pulled him out of his curled position. He felt something warm underneath him, and then the nice voice spoke again, but he still couldn't understand it.

I will find you!

Gabriel screamed and squeezed his eyes shut in a failed attempt to block out the face as he heard another voice nearby. He felt a hand against his cheek, and the other voices seemed to speak to each other for a moment.

"Papa? Gam-ma? Gampapa?"

It was the new voice again. He heard it louder than the other voices that haunted his dreams, louder than the angry voices nearby, louder even than the two nice voices beside him. Something small touched his cheek, and angry face vanished as the other voices fell silent.

"Papa sad?"

Papa... He knew that word. What did it mean...

Something small and wet pressed against his cheek. "No more sad, Papa."

It meant...

He opened his eyes, and instead of the endless expanse of darkness that had surrounded him before, he saw a little face in front of him. He reached out and lightly touched it. It didn't look anything like the angry face he had seen before.

It meant... It meant...

"Papa?" he asked. "Why?" Why would anyone be calling him that?

The little face, which had green eyes, smiled at him. "Papa!"

"Papa..." he whispered.

It meant...

He was sat up, but he didn't take his eyes off of that smiling little face.

"I think it's time that everyone get back to bed." said one of the nice voices, and the smiling face was picked up and taken away. He shook his head and reached out to it, but it was carried out of his sight.

"Gabriel?" came the nice voice from behind him, and he turned his head to look at it.

It belonged to an older face that was lined with wrinkles and framed by gray hair. The eyes were brown, and they looked at him with something that he couldn't name. He had never seen it before.

"Gabriel?" the face said again. "Are you all right?" A hand reached up and pushed his hair out of his face, and he shivered. "Papa's here, Gabriel. There's no need to be frightened."

"Papa..." he whispered again.

It meant...

...father.

Gabriel the bastard! No one wants him!

He shook his head faintly. "No..." He didn't have a father or a mother. They hadn't wanted him. They have left him on the doorstep. They had thrown him aside like the trash. He shook his head again, harder this time. "No."

"Gabriel?"

Was this another dream? Was this a trick of the castle?

Was this real?

It couldn't be. This had to be a dream. No one wanted him...

Trust him, Gabriel.

He stilled for a moment; he had heard that voice before, hadn't he? He couldn't remember. He was so tired... He closed his eyes against the face, and it did not continue to be visible like the angry one did. He felt arms around him tugging him over towards where he saw the face, and he felt himself being held against something warm. He laid his head down as he felt the arms rocking him gently.

"Go back to sleep, Gabriel." said the nice voice. "I will keep you safe."

Rest, Gabriel. I will protect you.

Gabriel snuggled into the warmth and fell asleep with a quiet sigh.

******

Wolfram smiled faintly as Gabriel fell asleep in his arms, and it made his heart melt to see that his son trusted him enough to do so. He could feel his quiet breath against his neck, though it was much slower than a human's. He smiled again and rocked him for a bit longer before he decided it was time for both of them to go back to bed.

Gabriel whimpered when he was laid down, and he cried out softly as Wolfram took his arms away.

Wolfram tucked him under the quilt and gently took his hand and squeezed it. "I'm right here." Gabriel sniffled and grabbed onto him and refused to let go. "Gabriel, I need to go back to bed." He tugged to try and get his hand free, but Gabriel wouldn't relinquish his grip. "Let go, son."

Gabriel shook his head slightly. "No," he mumbled.

"Wolfram?" came Edeline's voice from the door, and he looked over his shoulder to see her standing there. "Are you coming back to bed?"

"I would love to, but a certain someone," He turned to look back at Gabriel, "doesn't want me to leave." He looked up at her as she came closer and saw that the deep cut that Gabriel had inflicted had been stitched shut. She looked down at Gabriel, sound asleep and gripping Wolfram's hand tightly, and smiled.

"Why don't you stay with him tonight then?" she suggested in a quiet voice. "No one will know about it but myself and the two guards, and they won't say anything." She smiled again. "I think we spoiled him on the way home, with keeping him between us as night."

Wolfram chuckled. "We've created a monster." He looked at Gabriel and sighed. "I suppose it won't hurt for one night. If that's what he wants."

"I'll get another quilt for you." Edeline said, and then she walked quietly out of the room.

Wolfram stood up from his chair. "Scoot over, Gabriel. If you want to me stay here with you, I can't spend the entire night in a chair. I'm too old for that." Gabriel didn't protest in any way as he was nudged over, which left just enough space beside him. He used his free hand to tuck the quilt around his son's shoulders, and then he stretched out beside him.

Gabriel immediately released his hand, snuggled close, and grabbed a hold of the under tunic that Wolfram slept in. Wolfram smiled faintly and brushed Gabriel's hair away from his face.

"You had better not bite me, you know." he said quietly as he put his arm around Gabriel's shoulders. "That would mean so much trouble for you." He kissed him goodnight, which prompted a faint smile. "I don't want anything to happen to you."

He heard footsteps coming into the room, and he looked up as Edeline draped a second quilt over them. "Thank you, my dear."

She leaned down, kissed him, and stretched over him to kiss Gabriel as well. "Goodnight, Wolfram. Goodnight, Gabriel." She stood up and walked out of the room, and a second later, the door closed, leaving Wolfram alone in the room with their son.

He settled down in the narrow space between Gabriel and the edge of the bed. "Goodnight, Gabriel. Sleep well. I love you."

Gabriel mumbled something before he went quiet and still again, and Wolfram smiled faintly as he laid his head down on the pillow and closed his eyes. He was asleep within seconds.

******

Wolfram had much to do come morning. Trevor was moved into the nursery that was already occupied by five year old Anna, Wolfram's first cousin, twice removed. Edeline supervised the move and introduced Trevor to the nurse, Miss Sophia. The nursemaid, he had already met. Doing so required leaving Gabriel alone, something that neither of them liked, even though he had his own guards to protect him. They had already lost him once; they weren't going to lose him again. To be on the safe side – his family's easy acceptance of Gabriel had him a bit nervous, he also spoke to John about getting Trevor some guards as well. With that done, he returned to the many tasks that required his attention and quickly lost himself in the work.

He barely noticed the passage of time, and he was in the middle of a report detailing how the planting was going when he was interrupted by a knock on his study door

"Come!" he called out without looking up from the report. The door opened, and he heard soft footsteps approach his desk, which made him look up to see Miss Sophia standing there in front of him. "Is there something you needed?"

"I apologize for disturbing you, m'lord," she said, "but I found this in the clothing that Master Trevor came home in." She held out a small glass shard handing from a leather cord. "I'm not sure what it is, but if it belongs to Master Trevor, perhaps it would be best if you held onto it. I wouldn't want the little mite to cut himself on it."

The sounds of the house going about its business around him seemed to vanish as Wolfram stared at the small shard. He had a crazy feeling that he knew what it was. He reached out to take it, and the sunlight coming through the windows behind him danced off of its polished surface.

"Thank you, Miss Sophia." he heard himself say, though the sound of his own voice was muffled. "You may go." He held the shard in his hands as the young woman walked out, and white light began to shine from it as he looked into it. When it faded, he saw Gabriel's room, with Gabriel lying asleep in bed and Edeline sitting beside him.

He laid the shard face down on the desktop, and the sound of the glass hitting the wood seemed to echo loudly in his ears as the sounds of the house rushed back to him. He jumped in his chair, startled by the sudden noise. He then shook his head and quickly pushed aside a small decorative piece of the front of the desk. Behind that was a small keyhole, and with a twist of a small key that he had the only copy of, a hidden drawer dropped down from under the desktop where he could reach it. He put the mirror shard in the compartment, pushed it back into place, relocked it, and pushed the panel back into place over the keyhole. Only he knew about the hidden drawer, not even Edeline knew of it. His father had told him about it, and if things had not gone the way they had, he would have told Mathias of it in time, once he was old enough to keep the secret. There was no way to know if he would ever get to pass all the desk's little secrets on to his son, a thought that saddened him a great deal. Gabriel might never be able to appreciate all the stories that he had to tell him.

"What are you playing, Volpe?" he said quietly. "Were you hoping I would see something? Does this have anything to do with that prophecy you kept mentioning?" He would have to bring it up with Edeline later, but for the moment, his stomach informed him that it was close to lunch, so he straightened up his papers, stood up from the desk, and walked out of his study towards the hall.

As he expected, Edeline was absent from the head table when he walked in, but the rest of the family, save for Trevor, was there, including his brother and nephew. Trevor would eat in his nursery until he was about five or so. The servants filed in not longer after he took his seat at the head of the head table, and soon their chatter as they enjoyed their own meal filled the high ceilinged room.

"Well?" Cordrin demanded once Wolfram had tucked into his lunch.

"Well what, Brother?"

"Are you going to throw the beast out?"

He knew who Cordrin was speaking of, but he wasn't going to give his brother the satisfaction. "Beast? Whatever do you mean, Cordrin?"

"Don't play stupid with me, Wolfram! I'm talking about that vampire that you claim as a son!"

Wolfram leveled a glare at his younger sibling. "Mind your tone, Cordrin. And no, Gabriel is going nowhere."

"He attacked your wife!"

"He lashed out in fear when she startled him while he was having a nightmare. It was her mistake, not his."

"His screaming woke the entire house." Adelar grumbled.

"After what he has experienced," Wolfram replied, "nightmares are to be expected. I'm sure he'll calm down in time."

"How long will that take? Days? Weeks? Months? Years?" Cordrin said with a disbelieving look. "Am I to be woken up every night by his screaming?"

"He's been here 17 days, Cordrin, and this is the first time a nightmare he's had had woken everyone up since he was brought home. I would say that your concerns are unfounded."

Cordrin's eyes flashed, and his opened his mouth, but Wolfram cut him off. "Enough Cordrin! Gabriel has done no permanent harm, and he is staying right here! He is ill, not dangerous!" Cordrin jumped to his feet, and the sound of his chair sliding across the floor was loud enough to catch the servants' attention, and the room slowly went quiet as they turned to watch.

"Sit down, Cordrin!" Wolfram growled. "You've embarrassed yourself and your family enough for one day!" Cordrin's wife, a tiny wisp of a woman with thin black hair and watery brown eyes, tugged him back down into his seat and whispered something in his ear. Wolfram couldn't understand her words, but it was enough to make her husband subside, and he settled for glaring at Wolfram for a brief second before he returned his attention to his meal.

******

After lunch was finished, Wolfram was all too happy to escape the hall to go check on Gabriel, and he found him in his room like usual, with his mother. They were sitting together on a couch that had been moved into the room on Edeline's orders, and Gabriel was leaning against her with his head resting on her chest.

"I'm surprised he's awake." Wolfram said quietly as the door was closed behind him. He moved over to one of the chairs and sat down, and Gabriel slowly raised his head to look at him with tired eyes. Was he imagining things, or was there just a bit more awareness in them than usual? Gabriel blinked once and then laid his head back down.

Edeline didn't take her eyes off of Gabriel as she gently ran her hand over his hair. "He woke up and wandered over here to sit with me about an hour ago. I've tried to get him to go back to bed, but he refuses to move from here."

"Maybe he just wants his mother to hold him?" Wolfram replied with a smile.

Edeline laughed lightly. "Perhaps."

"Has Trevor been taken care of?"

"Yes, he's settling right in, and Anna won't stop cooing over him."

Wolfram smiled to hear that. "Has he been by to visit Gabriel today?"

"Not yet. I figure that later in the evening, before Trevor goes to bed and when Gabriel is more awake, would be a better option."

Wolfram nodded as he watched Gabriel reclining in his mother's embrace and smiled at the sight. "He's as beautiful now as he was the day he was born." he said quietly.

Edeline laid her head down on Gabriel's. "Yes, he is." Gabriel shifted, which prompted her to raise her head, and he looked up at her. She smiled at him and kissed him on his forehead. He returned the smile and then laid his head down again.

"How did lunch go?" Edeline asked.

Wolfram sighed and sat up in his chair. "As well as one could expect. Cordrin demanded to know when I was intending to throw Gabriel out for attacking you."

"Attack me!" Edeline gave him an outraged look. "I frightened him!"

Wolfram held up his hands. "I know that, and you know that, but you know Cordrin. He wants Adelar to inherit, and they only way that will happen is if something happens to remove Gabriel and Trevor from the house."

"Gabriel will likely never be able to inherit anyway, not in his current state."

Wolfram nodded slowly. "I don't know what Cordrin's logic is. Perhaps he thinks that if Gabriel is gone, Trevor won't count somehow."

"Or that you'll disinherit him."

"He would believe that too."

"What do you plan to do?"

"Nothing for now. He's done nothing more than grumble about Gabriel, and until he actually threatens him, there is little I can do. With our precarious position, even if he were to threaten or even attack him, I would have to tread carefully."

"No, it wouldn't do for Cordrin to go running to everyone that will listen that we're harboring a vampire."

"Or worse, telling Volpe that Gabriel still lives." Edeline looked at him in confusion. "Gabriel is God's Chosen. His vampirism being discovered could possibly be lessened by that simple fact. Volpe somehow managing to get his hands on Gabriel again would be a disaster, especially if he has not recovered yet."

Edeline shivered. "I don't want to think of Gabriel in the state he is, being at the mercy of that man. There is no telling what he would do to him." She held Gabriel tighter and laid her cheek against the top of his head.

"There is something else too."

Edeline closed her eyes. "Dare I ask?"

Wolfram leaned back in his chair to stare at the ceiling. "Volpe sent Trevor home with a gift."

"A gift?"

"Remember that mirror we saw in the castle? Well, Miss Sophia found a shard of it in the clothes that Trevor wore home."

Edeline raised her head and stared at him wordlessly for a moment. "Oh my..." she breathed. "Did you look into it? Did you see anything?"

"I did. I saw Gabriel's room here, with him sleeping in bed and you sitting beside him."

"What are you going to do with it?"

"Nothing for now. I have it stored in a safe place while I try to figure out what Volpe intended. I have no doubt that the shard being in Trevor's possession was his idea, so I need to learn what his intentions were. Does it have anything to do with that prophecy he kept mentioning?" He sighed. "Part of me wishes I had asked him before leaving with Trevor."

"No, I'm glad that you didn't." He raised his head to see Edeline gazing into the distance. "Getting Trevor out of there was the important thing, and you managed that because you had Volpe off balance. Asking him anything about that prophecy would have put you under his control instead of the other way around, and you wouldn't have never gotten out of there with Trevor. We'll have to find out about this prophecy some other way."

"It may not even be important. It could be just something that Volpe made up to justify his actions. We may never know."

"Should we ask the mirror?"

Wolfram paused for a long moment. "I don't know." he said finally. "The mirror helped us before, but I'm... afraid to see what it will show us now. It could show us that rescuing Gabriel was in vain. It might show him dying at a mob's hands, or worse, by my hand."

"But Wolfram, you wouldn't -!"

"If he ever became impossible to control, I would have to, for his sake as well as everyone around him. Besides," His voice quieted. "if I knew we were dying and that our deaths would leave Gabriel at the mercy of his uncle, I would take his life, to spare him from whatever Cordrin might do to him. You know that my brother would at the very least lock him in the dungeons to starve. Gabriel doesn't deserve that."

He stood up from his chair, crossed the room, and sat down on the couch on Gabriel's other side. Gabriel looked at him, sat up, and then leaned into his arms when he held them out. "Yes, that's right." he murmured as he rocked him slightly. "Papa will take care of you. No one will hurt you." Gabriel looked up at him.

"Papa?" he said with a confused frown.

"Yes Gabriel. I am your papa."

Gabriel shook his head. "No," he said softly, "No,"

'Yes, little one. I know you don't believe me, and I know the Brotherhood told you that we didn't want you, but they lied to you."

"No," Gabriel shook his head again.

"Maybe we could use the mirror to show him?" Edeline said hopefully, and then it was turn for Wolfram to shake his head as Gabriel leaned against him again.

"I don't know if that's a good idea right now." he replied. "We don't know how he will react to seeing what we saw. It could just drive him further away from himself instead of helping." He looked down as Gabriel snuggled close to him and began to relax into sleep. "Let's give him more time, then we'll revisit the issue."

Edeline gave him a sad smile and nodded in agreement. "I just want our baby back, Wolfram."

"So do I." Wolfram sighed as he gathered Gabriel up and stood up to take him back to bed. "More than I can say." He carried his sleeping son the short distance to his bed and laid him down. The boy mumbled something as he was tucked in, but he then curled up on his right side under the quilt and went quiet.

"Perhaps he was waiting for his father to come and hold him." Edeline said with amusement, and the thought made Wolfram smile as he looked down at Gabriel. He leaned down, and kissed his son softly on the side of his head, and then he returned to the couch and sat down next to his wife.

"He looks so peaceful when he's asleep." she said softly.

"He does. I envy him a little; he has no idea of the danger he's in, or the trouble his arrival is going to cause."

Edeline gave him a sharp look. "What do you mean?"

"Do you honestly expect Cordrin to accept his presence here? He's going to try something at some point; I just don't know exactly what or when. He'll have to tread carefully, lest he bring us all down, which I'm certain he wishes to avoid, but I have no doubt that he's planning something."

"And we can't do anything without proof."

"No, nothing but hope that Gabriel comes back to himself. It'll be much easier to keep him safe if he's capable of defending himself."

"He comes back to himself to find that he must watch out for backstabbing relatives."

Wolfram winced; it sounded so much worse when spoken out loud. "What other option do we have, Edeline? We couldn't leave him in that castle, and there is no other place for him to go, even if we were inclined to send him away after finally finding him again."

"It would be so much easier if he wasn't a vampire. I understand why he did what he did, but it's making things so difficult."

"I know, but he's still our son, and we'll protect him from anyone that wants to hurt him, even his uncle and cousin."

******

That evening, once the household had had supper, Miss Sophia brought Trevor by for a visit. Wolfram dismissed her to return to the nursery, and he walked the child into the room to see his father. Gabriel was sitting up in bed, propped up on pillows against the headboard, and he turned to look at Trevor when the boy ran up to him, giggling.

"Papa!"

Gabriel frowned, and then he looked up at his mother in confusion as Trevor climbed up onto his quilt covered lap. Wolfram stepped forward to snatch his grandson away just in case, but Edeline sat down on the bed beside them before he could get closer.

"Oh Gabriel," she said gently as he she reached out and brushed his hair out of his eyes, "This little one is Trevor, Trevor Belmont, your son."

Gabriel shook his head. "No,"

"Yes, Gabriel." Wolfram said as he pulled a chair up to the bed and sat down. "He was born while you were away capturing a demon for the Brotherhood, and they took him away from your wife."

Gabriel looked back and forth between them for a moment, and then he looked down at Trevor, who had snuggled against him. "Marie?"

Wolfram wished suddenly that they had gotten their daughter-in-law's name somehow, but he opted to go with it. "Yes Gabriel, Marie. Trevor is the son that she bore you."

Gabriel shook his head frantically, and he looked down at Trevor with wide, panicked eyes. "No!"

"Yes, Gabriel." Edeline said patiently as she took Gabriel's hands in her own. "This is your son sitting on your lap, and he needs you."

"No!" Gabriel wailed as he began to cry, and Wolfram moved from his chair to sit by him. Gabriel reached out to him, and he wrapped his son in his arms as the boy hid his face in his hair.

Edeline pulled Trevor off of Gabriel's lap, and the toddler looked up at her. "Papa crying." he said solemnly. "Papa sad?"

Wolfram didn't pay attention to her reply; his focus was on Gabriel, crying in his arms. He barely noticed when she took their grandson out of the room as he tried to calm his son down.

"You've already been hurt so much," he murmured over Gabriel's sobbing, "and now you're hearing things that just make it worse. I know it's hard to understand, but we're not lying to you. We're your family, and that little boy is your son." Gabriel shook his head again in denial, and Wolfram sighed. "Are you ever going to come back to us, Gabriel? Did taking you out of that place have any positive effect?"

Gabriel of course did not answer. He only cried as Wolfram held him, and he cried himself to sleep in his father's arms.

******

The household was quiet.

Wolfram rolled over onto his side in bed and sighed quietly. The moon was high in the sky as it neared midnight, and he had been lying awake for hours. Everyone else, the entire family, all of the servants, were asleep, but he found himself unable to do the same. After Gabriel had cried himself to sleep earlier, he had held him for a little longer, and then he had put him to bed for the night. He had not tried to hang onto him like he had the night before, something that saddened Wolfram a little. It was nice to know that Gabriel reached out for him for comfort, but when he didn't, even when he was so obviously upset...

Wolfram sighed again. Had they really done Gabriel any good? Oh, he told himself that getting him out of that castle had been the best thing, and he truly believed that leaving his son there would have ended in disaster, but he couldn't really see how having him at home helped any either. Certainly, Gabriel seemed to trust them on some level, otherwise he wouldn't allow them to hold him, and he wouldn't reach out to them like he did, but his mind didn't seem to be getting any clearer. Perhaps... perhaps Gabriel being in the care of the Brotherhood might be best for him. He had called their compound home, he had been raised and trained by those men, and he likely knew every single one of them by name. Maybe being around people he recognized would be better for him then being in a house with strangers, at least two of which were likely plotting against him.

He threw the blankets back before he could think about it and got up. There was only one way to get the answers to his questions, and he cursed Volpe in his mind as he left the bedroom and walked the dark, empty halls to his study. A rainstorm had moved it, and despite the lateness of the season, the house was chilly as he went, but he ignored that as he walked into his study and securely bolted the door closed behind him. He didn't bother to light the lamps or candles; the moonlight shining through the two tall windows behind the desk provided enough light to see by as he walked up to the desk and sat down in his chair. He opened the hidden drawer (and tried to remember when he had picked up his keyring.) and took out the small mirror shard on its leather cord. He looked into it's polished surface for several minutes without saying anything.

He sighed; he had come this far. "Did bringing Gabriel home change anything?" he asked softly, and he felt his stomach twist into a knot as the mirror began to shine.

When the light faded, he saw the castle again, more specifically the throne room where they had found Gabriel. Gabriel raged about the room, attacking the pillars and walls, screaming in rage and grief. The stones crumbled under the power of his blows, but they always reformed, as though the castle were a living creature. He roamed the empty rooms and corridors, attacking everything that came near him, and when there was nothing to attack, he attacked himself: clawing at himself, tearing at his hair, tearing strips of his skin off. At one point he even clawed out his eyes, but they only regenerated with no sign that he had done anything. He sank to his knees in despair, crying and rocking himself, desperate for any crumb of comfort, only to leap to his feet and rage again after only a few minutes. Wolfram watched as Gabriel slumped down in the throne, exhausted, but he could not rest. He thrashed and screamed in the throes of nightmares, waking to see that there was no one there to comfort him, no one there to tell him that everything was all right. No one but the castle and its voices.

The mirror flashed, and when it cleared, Gabriel was seated on the throne again, but he was not crying in grief or thrashing about to escape a nightmare. Instead he was seated there like a king, holding a goblet in one hand. His head was bowed, and his eyes were closed. Wolfram watched as he sat there for a moment, and then his head came up and his eyes opened. Instead of the dull incomprehension he was used to seeing, his son's red eyes were alight with sharp awareness, and one side of his mouth curled up in vicious looking smile before he emptied the contents of the goblet and tossed it aside. He then stood up from the chair and vanished in a cloud of smoke and embers.

The mirror flashed, and the scene changed, showing the mirror room. A young man was there, wearing an armored green coat and carrying a large cross in his hand. He spun around in place as a dark cloud swirled around him, and that cloud coalesced into Gabriel. The two of them spoke for a short while, and then Gabriel attacked. Wolfram watched the battle between them and saw his son wrench the challenger's weapon away from him and ram it into his chest. As the young man lay there dying, the mirror closed in on his face, and his green eyes seemed to bore into Wolfram's as he coughed up blood.

Green eyes.

Trevor's eyes!

Wolfram gasped as Trevor, who had been mortally wounded by his own father, said something to Gabriel. He saw Gabriel's confusion, and his horrified understanding as he looked into the mirror. He appeared kneeling on the floor by Trevor's side as he gasped his last breath, scooped him up into his arms and forced his blood down his son's throat. There was no sound as always, but Wolfram imagined he could hear his son begging Trevor to live as tears poured down his face. He saw the attempt to turn Trevor into a vampire fail, watched as Gabriel constructed a tomb for his son and laid him to rest inside.

Wolfram saw Gabriel return to the throne room, saw him scream in rage and grief and order his minions: vampires and monsters that looked like something out of every childhood nightmare ever, to attack the Brotherhood, to wipe them all out. He watched as the small city that had grown up around the Brotherhood compound that they had taken Trevor from was burned to its foundations by Gabriel's monsters, as everyone: men, women, and children were slaughtered where they stood without mercy, without remorse. All the while Gabriel watched from the castle with a satisfied smile.

The mirror flashed again, and this time it showed Trevor rising from his coffin. His hair had gone white, and he stared into the mirror for a moment before breaking down in tears. He then hunted Gabriel down, aided by a red headed man that looked as though he had come from the mountains. The two reached the throne room and faced Gabriel in combat, and Wolfram cried out in horror as Trevor restrained his father so the red haired man could ram the stake of a cross into his chest. Gabriel let out a scream as his body dissolved and vanished, and Wolfram tossed the mirror shard to the desk, unable to watch anymore.

He leaned back in his chair, chest heaving as though he'd been running for miles, and thought of what he had just seen. Had all of that been Volpe's intention? Why? Why? WHY? He raked his hair back from his face. Gabriel had come back to himself, but he had come back filled with rage that he had been seemingly unable or unwilling to control, and everyone around him had borne the brunt of it.

Even his own son.

Wolfram closed his eyes as a shudder ran through him, and he opened them to pick up the mirror shard and put it back in its hiding place. Light shone from it again – what now? - and he almost stuffed it into the hidden drawer without looking, but his eyes drifted over to it of their own accord.

Instead of seeing more scenes of death and destruction, he saw Gabriel in a dark, windowless room. A single candle put off faint, flickering light, and that was enough to allow Wolfram to see the moisture glinting on the walls as well as off the heavy iron chains that were hooked to shackles on Gabriel's wrists and ankles. Gabriel was not moving, and his head was bowed. His hair was matted into a solid mass, and he was wearing only the ragged remains of what might have been a shirt at one time.

From somewhere out of the image, a door opened, and light that was only a tiny bit brighter fell across Gabriel, which prompted him to raise his head. His cheeks were sunk in, his lips were dry and cracked, he looked as though he hadn't fed in months, and it seemed to be a struggle for him to hold his head up. He seemed to gather himself, and then he slowly raised his shackled arms, despite how much they shook under the effort. His face crumpled, but no tears rolled down the papery skin of his face as a familiar, hated figure walked into the tiny cell.

Volpe stopped just out of Gabriel's reach, and ignoring Gabriel's silent pleas, he stared at him for a long moment. He then turned and walked back out of the cell. The door closed behind him, and Gabriel slumped down, crying silently in the dark room.

Wolfram swallowed thickly as the mirror flashed again , this time showing Gabriel in his room, but he was not asleep. He was sitting up in bed, with his knees drawn up to his chest and his arms around them as he rocked himself slightly. Wolfram watched the moving image for a minute, and then he put the shard away and closed up the hidden drawer. He then walked out of the study and went straight for Gabriel's room.

The guards said not a word as he walked up to them; instead they only opened the door and let him in. Inside, he found Gabriel just as the mirror showed him, and the boy raised his head to look at him as he walked in. A single candle burning on the mantlepiece showed the tear tracks on his face, and Wolfram walked up to the bed, sat down, and opened his arms. Gabriel looked at him for a moment, sniffling, and he leaned into the offered embrace. He laid his head down on his father's shoulder and grasped the sleeves of his under tunic tightly.

"Papa's here, Gabriel." Wolfram said gently. "Everything will be all right. I love you." Gabriel whimpered quietly and snuggled close, and Wolfram closed his eyes and just sat there, holding his son.

Family: 11 -- Family: 13
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Blood Is Chapter 12

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