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Blood Is Chapter 2-8
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.
A/N: This chapter was supposed to be longer, but no matter what I did, I was not happy with the second half, so I cut it, and I'll rework it into the next one. I'm not to thrilled about how this one ended either. *throws hands up into the air* I give up; I'll figure it out later.
8.
Gabriel quickly skimmed over the letter that his father had just handed him, and then he laid it down on his lap and looked thoughtfully at the fireplace, which was going to ward off the night chill as the area began to move into autumn.
"So Master Liam has had no luck in tracking down Volpe or Master Cecil." he said quietly. "That is not a surprise; those two are too canny to allow themselves to be found easily, and they are both slavishly following this prophecy that they heard, so they will do whatever it takes to avoid being caught until they've managed to force it to completion." He looked up to see Father staring at the fireplace as well. Mother was not in the room. The hour was late, and she was in bed, as was the rest of the household.
"That worries me." Father said as he stroked his chin. "Those two could just pop up out of nowhere and start trouble at any time."
"It would help if I knew exactly what they were planning and what this prophecy said." Gabriel began.
"But they've kept that close to their chest and Sir Quinn knows nothing about it other than it exists." Father finished.
"He knew that I was fated to face the Lords of Shadow and Satan, but no more than that."
They fell silent for a few minutes, and then Father spoke again. "Have you had any luck?"
Gabriel nodded. "Some." His newly created Shadow Whip was certainly a fun toy, but he needed more than that. "I need to keep working at it though." He hadn't told them about the events that had caused the Shadow Whip to appear; they didn't need to know that he had been attacked already. He could see them trying to confine him to the house in a vain attempt to keep him safe, as a result. Of course he would refuse to abide by it – he wasn't a child to be sheltered - but he didn't want to create any more trouble between himself and his parents if he could help it.
"Just be careful out there, son." Father's voice broke him from his thoughts.
"I will. You don't have to worry about that."
"Your mother and I will always worry, Gabriel." Father regarded him with a serious look. "We lost you for 33 years; one can't help but worry after that."
Gabriel bowed his head and smiled faintly at the concern from his father. Some of the other boys he had met as a child still had their parents, and they had commented on how "lucky" he was for not having a mother and father to nag and pester him all the time. He'd had his various minders then, but those other boys had never understood the ache in his soul from having no family to care for him. He'd given anything to have a mother to scold him about getting his clothes dirty, to have a father lecture him for staying out after dark. They just didn't understand.
Gabriel shook his head to clear it and stood up. "I should get moving. I've stayed later than I intended."
Father waved that away. "Why don't you just stay home tonight, Gabriel?"
"I really need to make use of the time that I have, Father. I can't afford to waste any just sitting here and doing nothing."
"I know, believe me, I do, but that letter from Sir Quinn has made me a bit... paranoid, and I don't think I'll sleep tonight if you go out there alone."
Oh, if he only knew. "I suppose I can stay tonight, though I have no idea what I can do to keep myself entertained until sunup."
"I'm sure you'll think of something. I'll just rest easier if I know you're here instead of out there."
"I'll manage then, somehow."
Father gave him a warm smile and stood up from his chair. Gabriel heard the man's joints creaking and popping as he stretched. "Are you off to bed then?"
Father yawned as he released the stretch. "I am." He then walked forward and wrapped Gabriel in his arms. "You are so cold, Gabriel. I wish I could just warm you up."
"I think it's something I should just get used to." Gabriel said as he returned the embrace. "I didn't notice how chilled I was until I woke up here in a warm room."
"Well, you didn't hear this from me, but your mother has admitted a desire to wind you up in blankets and cuddle you until you warm up."
Gabriel laughed quietly. "She might never be able to let go of me then."
"I think that's her plan." Father smiled and released him. "Goodnight, son."
"Goodnight."
Father left the room then, and Gabriel flopped back down into the chair he had just left. Now what to do? He couldn't exactly work out on the grounds – someone was bound to hear and then see him, and that was something he wanted to avoid at all costs. No one had raised any hysteria over a vampire in the house so far, and he wanted to keep it that way as long as possible. He remained in the chair as the fire in the fireplace burned down to embers, and then he stood up and wandered out of the study, closing the door behind him.
He let his mind drift as his feet walked down the darkened hallways with no clear direction in mind. He had a powerful whip to use, but that couldn't be all of it, could it? He'd never tried to see just how strong he was; maybe he should look into that? There was also the lightning that Carmilla and Laura had wielded, so he should try to do the same. He couldn't see himself though, just holding out his hands like Laura had done and shocking his opponents. (No matter how much it had hurt, he remembered with a wince.) so maybe he could channel it another way. That is, if he managed to summon it, he reminded himself.
"Your feet always seem to lead you here, Lord Gabriel."
Gabriel's head whipped up to find that he had wandered into the chapel – again, and that Father Caleb was standing just before the Holy Table, back lit by the seven branched lamp stand that burned with a soft light in the otherwise darkened space.
"So it would seem. I am surprised to see you awake at this hour."
Father Caleb only smiled faintly and said nothing as Gabriel came up the isle towards him. "What brings you here tonight, Lord Gabriel?"
"I do not know."
"Oh, I think you do."
"Then why don't you tell me, priest."
"Then why don't you join me in my quarters again?"
Gabriel couldn't help the smirk that appeared on his face then. "Hardly the proper place for a confession, I would think, Father."
"Who said anything about a confession? I just invited you in to have a talk, nothing more." Caleb brushed passed him, and Gabriel shrugged and followed. What else was there to do?
The priest's simple rooms were once again warmly lit by the fireplace and a single lamp in the middle of the table, and Gabriel sat down in one of the simple wooden chairs there. A minute later, the priest handed him a cup of mulled wine. He sighed in pleasure as the warmth of it seeped through into his hands, and a sip caused that warmth to spread even further.
"I have forgotten what it feels like to be warm at all times." he said softly as Caleb sat down on the other side of the table. "Even when standing next to a roaring fire, I feel chilled. I hadn't noticed it until I came here."
"A winter alone in Bernhard Castle would leave any one chilled, save for Satan himself." Caleb remarked, followed by a sip of his own wine.
"Does everyone know the story of how I came to be here?"
"Your father announced it the night they brought you home, as they believed getting the truth out instead of trying to hide you would be the safest option for you."
"I don't remember any of it." Gabriel replied as he took another sip.
"You were most certainly not well then."
"So I've heard."
There was a pause, and then Caleb asked:
"Are you still carrying your anger towards God, Lord Gabriel?"
"I am."
"May I asked when you started to feel this anger?"
"When I realized that everything I had done was for nothing. When it dawned on me that I had been led around like a dog on a rope."
"How much of that was His doing? How much of that was the doing of your superiors in the Brotherhood?"
"I..." Gabriel paused as he pondered the question. "I don't know." He gave Caleb a sideways look. "I thought this wasn't a confession?"
Caleb smiled a small smile. "Then how do you know who to direct your answer to? He gave you the power you needed to send Lucifer back to hell, so why?"
"He could not give me back what I had lost."
"You regained your life, didn't you?"
Gabriel was vaguely aware of the sound of the cup being crushed in his hand as he clenched it into a fist. "How do you know that! I've not told anyone!"
"I am a man of God, Lord Gabriel; I can heard His voice and the voices of His angels when needed."
"What have They told you?"
"Not as much as you would like, I'm afraid."
"Nothing useful then. Have They at least mentioned this prophecy that Volpe seems so fixated on?"
"I know no more than you."
"Of course not. Why did They allow that to happen anyway? What good did it do?"
"The message can only be passed on, Lord Gabriel. What happens after that is out of His hands."
"So He just sits back and watches? He just watched and did nothing as I lost everything?"
"What would you have had Him do?"
"Something! Anything!"
"You channeled His power to banish Satan, did you not? He gave you what you needed to succeed in the end."
"And then could not give me what I had come all that way for."
"Your wife's life."
Gabriel lowered his gaze to stare at the remains of his cup. "Yes. I had done all of that in the hopes of getting her back, and when she ascended without me..."
"He allowed the path to change, Lord Gabriel. He realized that you were close to breaking, so He allowed things to be altered to give you the strength you needed to go on."
"How was it changed? When did the path divert from where it had been going? Will it change anything in the end? Or will Volpe and Satan still get their way? Is this all just a temporary reprieve before Satan takes his vengeance on me by destroying the family I just regained?"
"You'll have to ask Him that, Lord Gabriel. I do not know."
Gabriel looked up and stared at the priest, but the man's calm gaze belied nothing. With a huff, Gabriel abruptly stood up and strode out of the room.
His booted footsteps echoed loudly against the floors as he walked at a brisk pace away from the chapel, away from the priest with his serene gaze, his answers that really didn't answer anything, and his questions that led Gabriel's thoughts in directions he really didn't want them to go. So what if God had given him the power to banish Satan; He'd then done nothing while His chosen one had slowly been losing his mind in Bernhard Castle, and He'd done nothing to stop Volpe and Master Cecil from fleeing.
A click of a door latch, followed by the sound of creaking hinges made him break from his thoughts and look up, and he blinked in surprise when he recognized the door to his father's study. How had he gotten here so quickly? And hadn't he closed that door behind him earlier? Was someone in there? He could hear no heartbeats or sense any presence on the other side of the door. Yet he had just heard that door open.
He stepped towards the open door, and a sliver of moonlight shining through the gap between the door and its frame fell on him as he eased it open and looked inside. There was no one, living or not, inside, but as he began to back out into the hallway, a glint of moonlight on the desk caught his attention. He stepped fully into the room and absently waved his hand to snuff the last few glowing coals in the fireplace as he walked up to the desk.
Lying in the center of the desktop was a small glass shard on a leather cord, the mirror shard that his father had shown him a little over a month ago. Hadn't it been hidden away somewhere? And if so, who had brought it out?
And why?
Gabriel sighed as he reached forward and snatched it off the desktop by it's cord, and he turned to walk out of the room. He would hold onto it until morning, when he would give it to his father so the latter could put it away. With the mirror's ability to show the past, present, and future, it would be disastrous is someone like his uncle got a hold of it, so he needed to make sure it -
The shard began to shine with light.
"Stop it." Gabriel hissed as he paused on his way to the door. "I don't want to see what you have to show me."
So why then was he bringing it up to look into it?
He brought it up to eye level just as its light faded, and it showed him slumped down in a throne. He had never seen such a room, but he knew with a certainty that he couldn't explain that it was the throne room of Bernhard Castle. As he watched, the version of himself in the throne began to thrash and cry out, as though in the grips of a nightmare. His hair moved as though invisible fingers were running through it.
We will take care of you here.
The mirror flashed, and the scene changed. It again showed him, wearing a gold trimmed red coat, black trousers, and boots, rampaging about the castle. His lower arms were wreathed in flames as he punched the walls and columns that held up the structure, but the damage always repaired itself in front of him. His eyes, he noticed, were squeezed tightly shut, and his mouth was open as though he was screaming in rage.
He saw the lesser creatures of the night: the lesser vampires, the remaining lycans, the ghouls, and the lesser demons, flocking to join him. He saw himself sending them out to destroy and kill everything and everyone they came across. He saw countless innocents dying on his orders and saw himself watching from Bernhard Castle as the flames rose up, laughing in fiendish delight.
He saw the Brotherhood waste itself against his walls, as the tried uselessly to defeat him. Few could reach him, none could survive combat against him. He saw their numbers dwindle until the very old, as well as the very young were sent out to face him. He saw Master Liam fall during one assault on the castle, his head nearly ripped off by a lesser vampire.
Gabriel tried to put the shard down, but his arm refused to obey, nor did his eyes close when he told them to. Whatever it was that was making him look was not going to release him until he had seen what it wanted him to it seemed. So he was forced to watch, unable to tear his gaze away, as Trevor was taught to hate and fear him and raised to face him like a lamb brought up for slaughter.
And a slaughter is exactly what his son found, when he trekked through the castle and confronted the monster his father had become in the mirror room. The boy had no chance, and Gabriel was forced to watch the battle between them, which ended when he wrenched Trevor's weapon from his hands and -
"No!" Gabriel howled as he was finally able to turn his head away. He dropped the mirror shard to the floor and fled the room at a run. He let his feet carry him where they willed as he ran from the images he had seen. That would not happen! Trevor would not.. would not... He would die before he harmed his son!
"Back again so soon?"
"What?" Gabriel blinked as he realized that he was yet again in the chapel. How had -? He looked back the way he had come. "How did I get here from the study?"
Caleb walked down the isle towards him. "Perhaps you were guided?"
"Then whoever is doing the guiding needs to stop!" Gabriel snapped. "I've had enough of being led around!"
Caleb said nothing in response to the outburst. Instead he only moved over to a pew and sat down. He patted the space next to him without turning to look at the angry vampire behind him. "Come sit with me, Gabriel."
Gabriel sneered and shook his head as he turned to leave, but something seemed to stop him. He knew that, if he truly wanted to, he could walk out those doors back into the rest of the house, yet he seemed oddly... reluctant to do so. After a moment, he sighed, turned around, and walked over to the pew and sat down.
"How do I keep ending up in here?" he asked in a low tone as he stared at the back of the pew in front of him.
"As I said," Caleb replied, "perhaps you were guided."
"And for what purpose?"
"Maybe you need to resolve this anger you have?"
"What good will that do?"
"I imagine being angry at Him will make it difficult to channel His power again, should it be needed."
"So that's what this is all about; fighting His battles for Him again. Why doesn't He just do it Himself, instead of relying on me?"
"Would you be able to kill your child, Gabriel?"
"What kind of question is that!" Gabriel snarled, and the ceiling beams above them creaked as the light from the candelabra dimmed. I won't let that happen to Trevor!
"A simple one. Could you kill your child, even if he had become a danger to the world at large? Would you be able to take his life to spare others?"
"No!"
"Yet that it what you just expected Him to do. You love your son, as a parent should; you would do anything for him, even if it means punishing him when he misbehaves. Yet if he goes too far, will you be able to bring yourself to do what must be done, even for the good of others?"
"Trevor would never do that!"
"And I'm sure that, at one time, He thought the same of Lucifer."
Gabriel lowered his gaze to the floor. "It's not fair."
"No, it isn't fair. In a perfect world, He would deal with Satan Himself, but He can no more make Himself end His child than you could."
"So yet again, I must make the sacrifice."
"The path has changed, Gabriel. Things are different. A sacrifice will still be required," The priest's eyes seemed to dim for a second. "but if things go the way He wishes, then it won't be you doing it."
"What about those around me? Will they also be spared?"
"Would that fall under you doing the sacrificing?"
"For some, yes."
"Maybe you should just ask Him?"
"He won't speak to me."
"Of course He will. You are His Chosen One. What other vampire can wear a silver crucifix around his neck without being harmed by it?"
Gabriel didn't answer that. He was aware of the small silver object that had hung from his neck ever since his parents had rescued him from the castle, and he had never taken it off, despite everything that had happened. He didn't know why he kept it on, but the mere idea of removing it seemed... wrong somehow. He had been told of how it had opened doors and prevented the castle from reclaiming him, and he didn't think his parents were lying to him about it. It just seemed too unbelievable. A vampire, one that had killed others, being protected by God Himself?
He stood up. "I'm going to bed." he said, and then he walked out of the chapel without a backward glance.
Instead of heading towards his rooms though, he turned in the direction of the nursery to check on Trevor. The guards at the door nodded at him and let him through, and he found his small son snuggled down in his bed, sound asleep. He carefully sat down beside him so not to wake the child and gently ran his hand over the boy's soft hair. Trevor was safe. He wasn't going to be raised as a lamb for the slaughter. He wasn't going to be sent out to face a battle he had no hope of winning. He wasn't going to die at his father's hands.
"I won't let anything happen to you, Trevor." Gabriel whispered. "I swear I'll protect you better than I protected your mother."
It was you who murdered your wife!
Gabriel shuddered as he stood up, and he wiped at his eyes as he walked out of the nursery and went in search of his own bed.
It was still hours from sunrise as the nights grew longer as winter approached, but it didn't make his bed look any less inviting when he walked into the room. The servants kept the fire going nearly around the clock to keep the room as warm as possible, and he was grateful for that warmth as he dressed himself for bed. He climbed under the covers and laid on his left side, and he felt the slight weight of the crucifix shift under his sleeping tunic as he did so. He reached down into his shirt collar, grasped a hold of the fine silver chain, and pulled the crucifix out so he could look at it.
The firelight glinted off the silver, though being worn constantly had rubbed off some of the shine. He still couldn't understand why he never took it off. Why keep it, when he had no long had any need for God's love? Because his mother had given it to him? No, she had been the one to put it around his neck, but she had gotten it from someone else, and she had intended to return it to that person but had been unable to find them.
With a sigh, Gabriel tucked it back into his shirt and settled into the mattress to sleep the rest of the night and the following day away. He pushed all thoughts of the god he used to follow to the back of his mind; he would deal with them another day.
******
Why do you still carry this anger, Gabriel?
Because He cost me everything without giving anything back.
He did not make you murder your wife. He did not keep your son from you. He did not take you away from your family as an infant. He did give you the power to defeat Satan. He did allow the path to change. He did see you reunited with the parents that lost you and the son you didn't know existed. So why again, do you carry this anger towards Him?
I don't want to fight His battles for Him.
No one is asking you to do that, Gabriel.
Yes, He is! Or are those other "tasks" merely fetching the water and mending His shirt for Him?
He knows as well as you do that Lucifer and Zobek will not allow you to live out your life. They will come for you, Gabriel, no matter how long you hide. You know this.
Can't He stop them?
No, Gabriel, He can't. Lucifer hasn't listened to His word since ages past, and Zobek has his free will, just as you do.
Free will to attack me whenever he likes.
I'm sorry, Gabriel. Truly, I am. I know you just want to live your life in peace, but until your tasks are complete, then that won't be possible.
What am I to do?
Just do what you've been doing, Gabriel. Enjoy your family, love your son, and keep learning what you can. The stronger you are, the better your chances will be when the time comes.
Can you at least tell me when that will be?
There was a pause, and then: You have a few years at least. After that, I do not know.
That's better than not knowing at all. At least I have some time.
Use it well, Gabriel. Now get some sleep; you have much to do still.
The voice fell silent then, and Gabriel was faintly aware of the feel of a hand running through his hair as he fell into a deeper sleep.
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Well, if you decided to go for the full game, drop me a line. XD And you'll have to let me know how that goes. XD
I still can't upload to ff.net, but hopefully it'll be up later today, so keep an eye on the feed!
http://www.setsunakou.com/ufo/castlevania.html *whistles innocently*
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Thanks for the heads up about that, I'm looking forward to it. :)
D'awww! re: the chibi Allie plush.
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