#dracula!bard

Like thats who he originally was before he ended up in Middle Earth somehow, before he became Bard, only now he’s older, better at control. He can walk amongst them during the day, can actually control the illusions he weaves so he looks to age with his new people. 

Maybe his children are his children but maybe they’re not, maybe he found them and took them in because they remind him of the son he lost, though countless years alone have taught him to value the small fragile humans and he loves them, loves them with all his heart and he loves them for them and they could never be a replacement. 

He’s been hiding in Laketown for years until the dwarves appeared and brought a dragon with them and then a war and its just like how it was before, him being thrust back into kingship and battle and being expected to lead these people.

But still he’s lonely, he misses his wife (both wives because while she might not have been Mirena his wife in Middle Earth was beautiful and strong and didn’t fear him in the slightest. no instead she taught him how to sew and sing lullabies and how not to stab himself with the pointy end of the needle and she had loved him and he had loved her and Bard was never looking for a replacement). 

But then there’s this stupid elf riding his stupid elk and he’s as far from Mirena as you could get, what with his cold hands and cold heart but there is a light in his eyes that Bard recognises, recognises from an age ago when his first love had looked at him and seen, not just her new husband, but also a warlord, a killer and had still told him no. No more children lost. No more death.

He may have commanded armies but she had commanded him. 

In the end it had been that strength of will that had drawn him in like a moth to flame. The only difference this time is that its coming from someone who might share in his lifespan. 

But still there is a war to happen, and he does his part. He fights alongside humans, and elves and dwarves.

He calls his creatures to him but discretely this time; normal bats swarming at the edges of the battlefields, attacking but going mostly unnoticed in the heat of battle. Crows dart in and out, weaving amongst the people, distracting the enemy at crucial moments so the injured can flee or strike.

Later on wolves emerge from the forests and spread out across the battlefield under the light of the moon, hours after the allied armies had left, disposing of any creatures that still draw breath and howling over the bodies of those people still living until help could be found. 

And Bard is grateful that he’s so busy because the smell of blood is strong on the wind, it seeps into the soil and the skin of his people and it makes the monster in him move. He makes sure to disappear at night, moving past the sentries and stealing off into the darker parts of the woods to find animals to drain, mere snacks but enough.

Later he accepts his new title of Lord of Dale but with a fumbling grace because its been an age since he’s led and he wants these people to like him, to follow him and while he knows that slaying the dragon (and oh the irony he feels from that, Bard the Dragonslayer, if only they knew) bought him a lot of good will, he wasn’t human, he wasn’t good, and he fears that revealing what he is might end with another building set alight around him.

And the stupid elf keeps showing up, bringing food for his people and sharing his wealth and Bard couldn’t not give him the glittering emeralds that had been his because really, what did he care for jewels when they sat so beautifully against pale skin; simple adornments for an unearthly being he could never bring himself to touch.

xxx

Oh but guys. Guys.

What if this is the reason why Bard has so many issues with the dragon sickness? Why he holds so much distain for the Master; a man who lets his greed and cravings rule him?

After all, there was a time when something akin to it had afflicted him as well. The only difference was that he had been aware of it, had fought it till the last moment and even then the only reason he had given in was because his wife had begged him to and only to save their son.

Bard knows what it is like to desire something so much it clouds your mind, to feel a thirst that would never be slaked. But in the end, after all was said and done he had given it up as completely as he could. He had let himself burn, had become one of a hundred blackened bodies strewn across a battlefield because he had thought it was better that way.

And if it hadn’t been for that damnable man then thats how he would have stayed.

Instead here he is, being thrown back into a war caused by greed and madness. 

Maybe despite their tentative friendship, Bard is wary of Thranduil because he knows that a part of the elf had a want for jewels that shone like starlight and any alliance with the Dwarves is strained at first until he sees proof that the madness ended with Thorin’s line.