#deromanum

{ meme } | accepting ;••••; @deromanum​ asked▬

👔 (why not!!)

From ruins, to market streets that were crowded all hours of the day and night, from walking the rim of Mount Vesuvius – that is how Dracula spent his time with the most amiable companion, Marius. He had not stayed so long in this land, nor intended to, upon visiting, but it wasn’t the ruins, the Baroque art and architecture that had kept him this long. No, it was the oldest of their breed that he had ever encountered. In his life, Dracula had known Italy well enough, he knew the history, the streets that wound this way and that, the location of landmarks, but what he wished to know more was the seemingly humble and wise guide, few of words, but vastly profound. What better way was there, really? To watch the gestures and the pleasant curve of Marius’s mouth instead of looking at or to where was the reason for them being out.

This particular night started off with light discussion of the constellations that now hung above them out in the fair-weathered night. The stories of how they came to be, their role in prophecies, the natural and supernatural phenomena tied to them. Both shared the balcony of Dracula’s apartment, marveling at the flecks of distant light. Once the innumerable heavens were exhausted, Dracula, with a casual air took the day’s paper and saw a favorable review column of a theater performance. The night was young after all, wasn’t it? Dracula announced he wished to go, but he would need to be in more proper attire, leaving no space for an answer from Marius as he disappeared to change.

He reemerged into the lavish parlor, lit by the fire and kerosene lamps, all ready save for the waistcoat and jacket—all black, of course. Everything black from his night-stained hair to the shine of his shoes, save for the gold cuff links and earrings that never left their place.

Dracula was always meticulous about his appearance, but, a button of his black linen shirt must have undone itself, from moment upon reappearing in the parlor, the white marble fingers of Marius materialized at Dracula’s chest, adjusting the button which lie just beneath his collarbone.

Stony stillness was a commonality in these beings, but oh, Dracula was possibly the stillest he had ever been. A small and sharp a breath drew into his useless lungs. If it was not bid to be silenced for all time, his heart surely would have hammered violently, forcing torrential currents of blood into every vein, a pounding tightness would rise in his temples. This was perhaps the closest they had been. Oh, certainly the friendly pat on the back or assuring grip of the shoulder had become routine, but this had Dracula rendered completely incapable of reacting. His hands hung at his sides, unemployed, if he had at least hung on to the waistcoat or something else it would have offered him something to grasp, given him something to do rather than just stand dumbfounded. But, even if he wanted to move, he couldn’t will himself to. He could not look away to distract himself from the sudden attention. This gesture had him utterly frozen, except for his gaze.  Rather, as he did every night when they kept each other as company, he studied the line of Marius’s jaw, the golden wisp of lashes, the bleached brows, the inexplicable color of his eyes, the shape of his prominent nose – the closeness and Marius’s diverted attention allowed, or rather, forced Dracula to look upon him.

The only indication that he had not become inanimate was the icy breath that passed over parted lips shakily and slowly, the thick swallow that moved visibly down his throat for his mouth had dried, the quick wetting of his lips.

The impact Lestat made with the ground knocked the wind out of him, and his body surged with blinding pain as nearly every bone in his body shattered from the force. He couldn’t move, and if he tried his whole body jolted with agony. All he wanted from Armand was a little blood to heal the burn wounds he’d suffered at the hands of his fledglings, but Armand had shunned him and sent him flying off the top of Magnus’s old tower. Where the auburn-haired cherub was now, he didn’t know. 

A pained groan escaped as he stared up into the night sky. It would be a few hours before the sun rose but he was trapped here, and there was no way in hell that he’d be healed enough to get out of here, himself. He didn’t know where Marius was, but the ancient Roman was his only hope for recovery now. Marius! Marius, I need you. Please help me - I don’t want to die. He kept repeating Marius’s name in his head, hoping that the elder would hear him and come to his aid. 

send my muse a 📖 to receive bad advice

Marius, I write to you, knowing that nothing I write will adequately express the feeling that has overcome me since you departed. How empty this room. How empty the chair at my desk which became yours the moment you fell into it. How empty this bed, which is at once too small with you in it and much too large for me alone. Is this some purposeful attempt on your part to bewitch me? If it is a game of yours, I beg you to release me. I beg that you not read the subsequent lines of this letter as I take you, as Virgil did Dante who loved him, through each level of hell as I have known it since you took your leave of me.

 I am afraid to touch the things that you have touched, I seek to evince from these mundane articles the remnant of your nearness. I am unsatisfied. And I am a difficult man, all told. You have not noticed this, or perhaps you’ve been too polite to mention it, but I know that pride is chief among my sins. I should have asked you to linger, if not that evening under the canopy, at my desk, or in the doorway. I refused to savour what was mine for hope that you would return. But you have not returned. I require you for my own purely selfish reasons, but I worry for you, too. You are not made of stone. I beg that you open yourself once more to that most essential feeling that we uncovered, together, and that you trust me again to bear witness to it. 

Until then, my agony reaches a fever pitch that so resembles that same ecstasy. I walk in waking dreams of you that are half memory, half fabrication of my embittered imagination which wills me to hate you though I cannot hate you. I will never hate you. I will long for you with something akin to the burning of hatred, but know that it could never be. That I could never hate you, Marius. I could not hate you, even as you hide yourself from me. 

What I feel for you is anything but hatred. My care for you touches the calcified heart in me. I fear to use the stronger word, but you must know it. We French learned of it from your tongue. 

I must have tasted it there.

They all had their ghost stories.

And that’s what they had seemed, to him - the ancients. Like phantoms, haunting the cities of Europe, built over the bones of their civilizations. Like lost shades, or the reverberation of dead noise: existing in the echoes of a language long since vanished from living memory. He could not fathom it, their vastness.

Laurent had heard of entire covens falling to them across the continent: Kortrijk, Laon, Besalú - and how the pyre of their dead had been invoked as both memorial and condemnation. 

But like all ghost stories, or fairytales, it had felt distant and at remove - an exhortation for infants to ware the dangers of the world and the creatures that stalked its deep places and dreams. But in arrogance he had come to believe the Children the dark things, like nightmares, like Furies - commanded by God to harry His creation for the wilful sin they had welcomed into their midst. The ancients had been forgotten, and when the Children of Darkness had been scattered to ash and dust, the old evils of the world seemed far away.

But tonight he heard the heart of something impossible.

He had not known it for what it was, at first - a steady, powerful thrum that seemed to fill his head with so much of itself, and in the face of it he recognized his own insignificance.

For all that he had borrowed the role of actor, wearing it like the stolen skin of a stranger, Laurent could not help the hunted flash of his eyes, or the animal tensing of his shoulders. He stays only because he knows that should he run, he will be caught.

But a curiosity coils in him like the serpent in Eden, murmuring a sibilant whisper in his ear: Why show himself, if not to talk?

“Mon seigneur,” Laurent murmurs, but the shape of it sounds insignificant, grasping. It sounds small. And against the scope of this terrible, ancient heart, it seems not enough to measure the chasm of time behind the ungiving flesh, across the gulf between them. What should it be, then? What mortal word could ever be enough? 

His heart flutters in his throat, numbing his tongue where it cleaves, heavy and mute against his teeth. It is hard to fathom the nature of the creature before him, a creature so like himself and entirely beyond him. This being clothed in the skin of a man and yet resembling nothing close to human. He had once thought Armand the angel of the sepulchure - ageless, flesh smoothed by time, a thing without flaw. 

He could not guess why such an entity had revealed itself to him, no more than he could disguise the cautious courtesy freezing him there. Would that he could send them all screaming to Hell ! Would that he could shout the names of the dead and choke him with it ! Would that he had the power to do anything else but this.

Send me ✉ for a drunk text from my muse:

[Text: Him]: Ithinkwe should bothjustgetdrunk. Hashitalloutinto the open.

[Text: Him]:Forinstancesometimes iwanttoslapand kiss you inthesamebreath.

@deromanum

Things were going rather smoothly for the nights operations, Armand walked through the area behind the main stage of the old theatre, watching the immortals dressing and doing their make-up. It was an hour after sunset, and most of the preparation was already done. Vampires were quick and efficient, after all. There were already humans filing into the theatre, he could hear them all. Their heartbeats, their voices, their minds. He raised his shields a bit tighter, blocking their thoughts from his own.

There was one anomaly, however. An unfamiliar - yet eerily familiar - sound. Like a drum. Slow, steady, louder than anything else in the theatre's main auditorium. It almost reverberated through the entire building. With the uneasy tense-ness that he saw in the other immortals, he knew he was not the only one who heard it, though they seemed even more wary than he did. He made his way to the stage, shifting the curtain back slowly, peering beyond into the gathering crowd.

There, toward the back, there was a flash of red. As it always did, it tugged at Armand's heart, his memories, but he forced himself to look away. It was never him. It was always some idiotic mortal, or a hallucination caused by wishful thinking. He had to stop looking for Him. He was gone, and that was that. He saw nothing out of the ordinary, though his eyes subconsciously looked for the spot of red once more. It was gone, a hallucination then, or the mortal had moved on, or removed their cloak. Either way, he did not immediately find the source of the drumming sound.

He closed the curtain and the show went on as planned. Armand's eyes scanned over the crowd, as they did when he was on stage, and there again, the flash of red that was gone when he looked again. He was used to it by now. His heart sped up, eyes darting back to the spot only to find that it was a mortal... or an empty seat he hadn't looked at closely enough. Empty seats were rare, but they did happen on occasion. The drumming sound never stopped through the entire night, the immortals were tense, fidgety. He had to find the source.

Once the show had finished, the drumming sound dimmed just a little... not much... but Armand decided it would be best to follow it. Out of the theatre and into the crisp night air. There... a flash of red... and then it disappeared, the drumming sound getting lower, softer, further away. Armand gave chase. But the drumming sound got softer and softer until finally... he couldn't hear it anymore. He stopped, perched on the edge of a rooftop near the outskirts of Paris, one of his preferred hunting grounds. "Merde," he cursed softly.

But then, the drumming came back... and it was louder than ever. A gust of wind from the rooftop behind him. He spun rapidly, eyes fixed on the red cloak, the tall figure whose hood was pulled over his head. Definitely male, vampire. His eyes narrowed as he slowly straightened. This individual was taller than he was... and - a glimpse of blond hair? His heart skipped. No. It couldn't be. The only logical explanation - "Lestat?"

The instant he said it, he knew it was not the young immortal who had disappeared several decades ago. This immortal was old. His heartbeat was the drum. And he held himself differently. He wasn't angled in a cocky manner the way Lestat would have been for having caught Armand off guard. Lestat would never have been able to outrun him, nor sneak up on him this way. He couldn't hear this immortal's mind. And for the fleetest of moments... his heart skipped, and as he spoke, his voice was a mere whisper that disappeared on the wind, too soft for any human to ever detect... and yet... a slightly hopeful, and saddened...