II. Development
The reflection of the sunset glinted in Alucard's eye and he turned quickly away, leaning forward. He cast a side-long glance with his other eye on Maria, who was sitting curled up in the corner beside the window sleeping peacefully. His extensive oral autobiography had worn away the hours and he could tell she had not been able sleep very well while waiting outside his window for the past five days. He let out a sigh that was on the verge of a hiss, stood up, and placed his dishevelled cloak about her shoulders. He marked how odd she looked with her bright golden locks and pink skin against the darkness of the shadows. He now admitted to himself what he had known all along: it was she that had kept him from returning to eternal slumber.
Alucard's expression contorted into a grimace as he stepped, his heels sending a muffled resonance through the floor boards, towards his coffin. Although he did not feel much like sleeping, it was the only way he could do some heavy thinking. Much weighed on the demi-vampire's mind. Like the blood in his veins, two inner forces fought against each other until they threatened to tear him apart.
Maria Maria Maria --Aarrrugghh!! It was all because of her. Since when did he let her complicate things? The moment he put his head out the window that morning, he knew, but that could not have been, or why else would he have tarried so long? Part of him desparately wanted to be open to her, to be able to learn from her, and yet what was the price of eternity with or without knowing? Questions swirled in his head as he lay down to a nap plagued with dreams that were almost visions.
Maria sat in the midst of an endless sunlit meadow with the grass high around her. When he approached, she sprang up and bounded away like a deer. He caught her and held her around the waist. The giggling young woman turned in his embrace and kissed him, but then he felt something go wrong. She began aging rapidly before his eyes and to his horror, where before there was a spirited nymphet, he held a pathetic old hag which then became a fightful skeleton. And finally there was nothing left of her but dust between his fingers. He fell to his knees and spread his fingers against the ground. His head reeled with pain.
He looked up.
The meadow had vanished and now he stood in a town square where a mob was tying a person to a large wooden crucifix. Hearing his name being called, he tried pushing through the crowd to find her, but he was jostled back. His name was being called more earnestly now and as the crucifix was being raised to stand he could see the bound body of a woman on it....
Alucard had dreamt the latter nightmare so many times that he already anticipated what the rest was. However...
...He turned away unable to behold what was going on, and came face to face with his mother, who looked sympathetic. She began speaking to him, but he could not hear her over the cries of the mob. He spun around; it was Maria on the cross.
Alucard's eyes shot open, he inhaled sharply, and was about to sit up when Maria placed a hand on his forehead. She smiled gently.
"You were having a nightmare," she stated softly.
His eyebrows screwed together as if saying, How did you know?
"For the last few minutes you looked, well, you didn't look the way you were sleeping earlier this evening." She grinned sheepishly. She had been intently watching him sleep for the past hour, slipping out only once to buy some food to bring back and eat with him. It was dark, now, she was getting hungry, and she assumed he was too.
Alucard sat up slowly, staring at the toes of his boots. Maria decided he could use a moment to himself so she busied herself by unpacking a bundle of food she had managed to bring up. Although not visibly shaken, Alucard regained composure and stepped out of the offin to stand behind her.
"Maria...?"
"Yes, Adrian?"
When he hesitated to answer, Maria stood up and turned to face him. As he was never the talkative type, Alucard's actions usually sufficed in speaking louder than his words, and this was no exception.
Within the blink of her eye, he had her in his arms and kissed her emphatically. His kiss was hard, nearly bruising her lips. She felt the unnaturalness of his fangs, and his hold was tight enough to crush her spine. Feeling the tautness of her bady against him, he relaxed a little and his kiss became more sensitive.
Wishing the moment would continue, Maria breathed and looked up happily at Alucard to see his strange, somewhat sad expression. Seeing the look in her emerald eyes, he knew he had made the right decision. He tucked her head under his chin and sighed.
"Your wish has been granted; I will stay with you," he said, his eyes unfocusing. "But only for a time of thirteen years. After that I will leave for good no matter what you do or say and I shall never return. . . Do you accept?"
"Oh, Adrian... But--?" she started, even though, in her heart she alreday knew the answer to her own question. He knew it also.
"No. You know that although I am not totally immortal, I age not. I will stay no longer than I dare. Again I ask, do you accept?”
Maria was threatened with tears starting to well up in her eyes. She closed her eyes and swallowed. Hard. Although she knew his departure after a longer period of time would be more painful than if he left that very moment, she would bear it just for the sake of having him by her side.
“Yes,” she whispered. “Yes...” She hugged him harder.
III. (can you say) Recapitulation (?):
Later that night, after eating, the two of them reclined on the gently sloping roof of the old inn, watching the stars appear one by one. Maria, wrapped snuggly in the folds of Alucard’s cape, lay with her arms around his waist, head resting against his firm stomach. Alucard crossed his legs in his usual manner and leaned back. Then, as an afterthought, he shifted to unhook his rapier from his belt. He weighed it in his hands and fingered the hilt.
He remembered when his mother gave it to him on his eighteenth birthday. He did not even remember when his birthday was now, but even back then it was a frivolous thing. His mother never seemed to forget, though.
The tall, lanky, young man sat at the table expectantly as Lisa rummaged into the deepest part of her closet. When she pulled out the thin sword, his eyes widened. His mother hated violence, so to see her hold a weapon as grand as this was ludicrous. He received it in awe despite having seen hundreds of swords in his father’s castle. She told him to take good care of it for it was her family line’s cherished heirloom.
It flamed when he sliced through air and sung as he brought it back around. The sword was made for him. His mother insisted on putting it on him herself and she knelt to hook it onto his belt.
Alucard’s flashback faded into the night. He now looked at his sword, turning it over. With a slight scraping of metal against metal, he pulled the sword out two inches from its sheath. The sword glowed warmly and he fancied he could see his mother’s gentle, smiling face against the backdrop of the nightsky and its countless stars. He clicked the sword and sheath back together, lay it by his side, and let his head fall back against the roof.
“Is something wrong?” Maria lifted her head to look at him.
“Nothing. . . Absolutely nothing.”
And for the first time in over three hundred years, Alucard smiled for mirth.
~END~
All I can feel is this moment,
and all I can breath is your life,
Sooner or later it's over,
I just don't want to miss you tonight.
And I don't want the world to see me,
'Cause I don't think that they'd understand
Well everything's made to be broken,
I just want you to know who I am.
Iris
I could write a short epilogue, but I don’t think this really needs it. (I told you it was going to be lopsided...) So what d’ya think? Send comments to: purple_shad@hotmail.com