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winterAm running like a chicken with my head cut off, so I guess I might as well post this for public consumption. This is the first in a series that I've been writing for the past month - I have 4 chapters out of 9 already finished. It's also origific or as close as makes no difference, since one character is historical and one is inspired by Maki Ichiro's performance as Death in Elisabeth (see icon).
So here's Vlad Draculea, age almost-nine, and the world that surrounds and shapes him into legend.
With thanks to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
fyrie as usual and alice_montrose for beta.
BLOODMARKS 1: MANUS
Anno Domini 1440
Tirgoviste was a city like any other: crowded, cramped and stiflingly hot in the summer. Once the summer heat picked up, everyone made it their business to spend as little time as possible inside the city walls. For the youths of the high families, there were other bonuses to idling away the days in the forest villages. Like the village girls, three of which were circling a dark-haired young man by the barn door.
For his part, Mircea looked happy about the attention. The white shirt he wore shone brighter than the girls’ skirts as he laughed and tried to grasp their hands. They giggled and evaded him, their braids swirling around them. In the sunlight, his dark hair, brown eyes and tanned skin made him look like a forest-spirit out of a fairytale. One of the northern ones, Lithuanian or Polish – a willow devil tricking people into dying.
The boy in the barn loft grinned. He was the one usually getting called a devil, so his thoughts about his elder brother were making him happy. Besides, Mircea was a Dragon-son too, wasn’t he?
Leaning out of the loft opening, the middle son of Vlad Dracul hefted a bunched-together bale of hay in his hands, still damp from the night’s dew. Mircea caught hold of one of the girls and was dragging her to himself. The peasant girl was laughing. She might have been fourteen, fifteen, two years Mircea’s junior. Girls grew up quickly in Wallachia.
The loose bale of hay landed neatly on Mircea’s head, showering him and the girl with golden strands.
Coughing, the youth looked up. “Vlad! You little devil!”
Mircea sprinted for the ladder to the loft, but the boy was already out the other opening, climbing deftly over the roof and dropping straight onto a path that led to the forest, then running for all he was worth. Eight years younger than his elder brother, Vlad son of Dracul was skilled at evading pursuit, be it Mircea, their father, tutors, or worst of all, his little brother Radu, possessed of supernatural powers of attaching himself to Vlad’s side at the most inconvenient moments.
Vlad held his laughter until he was safely hidden in the forest. He fell to his knees beside a fallen trunk and giggled until he doubled over. Too young to accompany his father and the boyars on hunting expeditions the way Mircea did, Vlad had to make his own amusement, and pulling pranks on people was his favourite pastime. That, he thought, and taunting hunting dogs, but the dog master tended to chew him out for it, prince’s son or not.
Vlad edged around the trees, listening for sounds of pursuit. Either way, Mircea deserved it. He was supposed to be teaching Vlad swordwork, not talking to stupid girls. Technically they both had a sword teacher, but the old codger had no idea about moves that actually worked in the field, not just with sticks and wooden shields. The kind of moves no-one expected because they weren’t taught. Mircea hung around with mercenaries and Western warriors long enough to learn them, and then he passed the knowledge to Vlad. And there was little time for that lately, because old Dracul kept fighting wars and his heirs had duties of their own, chief of those staying alive and providing enemies with dispersed targets. Before they arrived in Tirgoviste for the summer harvest, Vlad hadn’t seen his brother for two months.
If only the peaceful weeks weren’t so warm. The moss under Vlad’s feet was so dry, it crackled. Maybe he could take a nap here, give Mircea time to forget about chasing him and let down his guard. Sleeping at noon in the summer was supposed to be a good idea, anyway. His mother had told him stories of the ladies of noontide that walked abroad in noon, bringing bad luck to those that did not bow to them, and she’d learned those stories from her nurse, who learned them before his mother’s cousin had made the pact that brought her homeland into the bosom of the Church. Vlad knew the Church had the best truth, but it didn’t hurt to make right by the little pagan devils, too, as long as it was small things like taking a nap.
Then he could try his luck at the kennels again. Moroi, the big wolf-bastard mongrel that terrorised the rest of the pack, kept growling at him even through the choke-collar it wore to restrain it. If the mangy fleabag got a stick between the ears, it might learn some respect.
Vlad couldn’t wait until he was big enough to make everyone respect him the way dogs and horses did.
A shimmer of light beyond the trees caught his eye. The little lake was a pleasant surprise – he’d never ventured this far east of the city into the thickest forest, except for the few times his father had let him ride with the hunt. It was barely more than a pool, a long shallow dip in the ground filled with water from a narrow stream, but it was clear and sand-lined. Vlad shed his shirt, looking forward to cooling down with the lake water.
He heard the rustle of the bushes first. He whirled around, expecting to see his elder brother’s tall figure, prepared to start running once more. Then he heard the growl.
The sound made his skin ripple with a shudder. It was like the hounds faced with a boar.
Or a wolf who’d just caught sight of a juicy lamb, Vlad thought as Moroi padded out of the bushes. The damned animal was scratched and battered, its choke collar cutting deep into its neck and trailing a length of frayed rope. Hell of a time for the mutt to slip the kennels.
All right, he could do this. So many times he’d watched the hound master, had to be good for something. Calm, assured, demanding respect. Would be a hell of a lot easier if Moroi wasn’t exactly as tall as him and about twice as heavy. With very sharp teeth.
The hound took another step forward. A thick branch broke under a heavy paw. The maw was open, letting out the growl. The stench of rotting raw meat washed over Vlad, making his lips curl.
Moroi’s grey coat was dappled with blood, he saw. They were in a small clearing bordered on two sides by thick brambles. On the other was the lake, shallow enough for the hound to run through it. And now the animal barred the way Vlad had come.
The growl again, louder.
Hell of a time for the mutt to remember who’d tried to set fire to it, too.
Moroi took a step forward. Vlad took a step back. The hound settled back on its haunches and the boy frantically wondered if he could jump over the animal’s head before it attacked him.
Then the hound leaped.
Vlad threw himself sideways, catching himself on one arm that went numb with the force of impact. Heavy paws landed on his leg, then Moroi whirled, jaws gaping, teeth closing around Vlad’s ankle, slipping on the leather boot.
A frantic kick sent the hound reeling for a second. Vlad scrambled to his feet, his hand scrabbling in the dry grass until it closed on a heavy branch. With a desperate jump he avoided another lunge, landing with his bare back to the brambles that cut deep into his skin.
His green eyes wide, the boy bared his own teeth. Fear was forgotten in the face of savage delight.
He let out a loud growl, startling the hound into backing a step. He wound his shirt around his numbed forearm and slipped his hand along the branch until his grip was sure.
Moroi leapt again, and Vlad met it head-on.
The stench washed over him as fangs cut into cloth and flesh. Ignoring the pain, he brought the branch down on the hound’s forehead with a loud crack. Another blow broke the branch completely, but step after step he dragged the dazed, struggling animal towards the trees. He didn’t know which one of them growled the louder, panted more.
A tree-trunk at the edge of his vision, and with the swing of an arm he managed to drive the hound’s head against it, and again. Bleeding freely, Moroi loosened its grip at last, knocking Vlad off his feet with the bulk of its body. The animal lunged, intent on ripping out Vlad’s throat, and the boy raised his hand in the only move left to him.
A soul-piercing keening echoed in the clearing as the broken end of the branch drove into Moroi’s throat.
The hound staggered back, but Vlad followed, leaping on hands and knees, stabbing the sharp fragment of wood into flesh again and again. In his fury, he’d rend the animal’s flesh with his teeth if he could. Throat, ribs, gut, again he pierced the bloodsoaked fur, until the hound moved no more.
Vlad heard a sobbing sound, then realised he was choking on bile.
Moroi’s ribs still moved, but the breathing was agonal. Vlad rose to his knees, then slowly set one foot on the ground, followed by the other. Raising himself from a crouch took centuries, and all to take the few steps that separated him from the lake. His legs left red trails in the cold water.
As he washed the blood from his face and hands, he heard a harsh rattle in the hound’s breath. He turned on his knees, the water running down his face half obscuring his vision.
Someone was bent over Moroi’s body. A slim figure with long silver locks of hair, but too graceful as it knelt down for the silver to be the gild of age. Clothes of Hungarian cut, black velvet with silver embroidery and white jewels that glittered in the sunlight in ways more suited to evening revels at the court in Buda-Pesth than to a noontide forest in Wallachia.
The clothes were male, as were the broad shoulders, but the grace of the slim, gloved hand as it touched the hound’s blood-darkened flesh was not. Vlad held his breath, as if his very life depended on the answer to that question.
The stranger looked up. The face was pale, each line smooth and elegantly shaped. The wide dark eyes were elongated, the cheekbones set at an angle that made the features foreign, Tartar-like, though the stranger was too beautiful and pale to be one of those eastern barbarians. Then the stranger raised – his? her? – head and a ray of sunlight caught across the elegant features. It brightened the black eyes to a deep purple.
As the world swirled and darkened around him, Vlad smiled, astonished and awed by the beauty of Death.
The next thing he saw was Mircea’s face. His prank seemed forgotten as his elder brother hugged him and scolded him, describing an hours-long search after Moroi’s escape had been discovered and the hound master remembered how much the animal hated Vlad.
“I took him down,” Vlad muttered sullenly as he submitted to an examination of his wounds.
“And you fainted in the lake, you idiot,” Mircea scoffed, pulling on Vlad’s hair. “If you’d fallen the other way, you’d have drowned before you came to himself. I’ll tell Father you’re not to be let out the town walls until you’re twelve.”
“Good luck with that.” Vlad poked his brother in the nose. “Father likes me.”
“He did, until you slaughtered his best hound.” Mircea looked at the hound’s mangled body. “Good work, brat.”
As his brother helped him to his feet, Vlad looked back at the shore of the lake. Mircea would not understand, for his mother had not told him stories of pagan ghosts, but Vlad knew he had not imagined things. He had a feeling he would be seeing Death again.
-TO BE CONTINUED
So here's Vlad Draculea, age almost-nine, and the world that surrounds and shapes him into legend.
With thanks to
fyrie as usual and alice_montrose for beta. BLOODMARKS 1: MANUS
Anno Domini 1440
Tirgoviste was a city like any other: crowded, cramped and stiflingly hot in the summer. Once the summer heat picked up, everyone made it their business to spend as little time as possible inside the city walls. For the youths of the high families, there were other bonuses to idling away the days in the forest villages. Like the village girls, three of which were circling a dark-haired young man by the barn door.
For his part, Mircea looked happy about the attention. The white shirt he wore shone brighter than the girls’ skirts as he laughed and tried to grasp their hands. They giggled and evaded him, their braids swirling around them. In the sunlight, his dark hair, brown eyes and tanned skin made him look like a forest-spirit out of a fairytale. One of the northern ones, Lithuanian or Polish – a willow devil tricking people into dying.
The boy in the barn loft grinned. He was the one usually getting called a devil, so his thoughts about his elder brother were making him happy. Besides, Mircea was a Dragon-son too, wasn’t he?
Leaning out of the loft opening, the middle son of Vlad Dracul hefted a bunched-together bale of hay in his hands, still damp from the night’s dew. Mircea caught hold of one of the girls and was dragging her to himself. The peasant girl was laughing. She might have been fourteen, fifteen, two years Mircea’s junior. Girls grew up quickly in Wallachia.
The loose bale of hay landed neatly on Mircea’s head, showering him and the girl with golden strands.
Coughing, the youth looked up. “Vlad! You little devil!”
Mircea sprinted for the ladder to the loft, but the boy was already out the other opening, climbing deftly over the roof and dropping straight onto a path that led to the forest, then running for all he was worth. Eight years younger than his elder brother, Vlad son of Dracul was skilled at evading pursuit, be it Mircea, their father, tutors, or worst of all, his little brother Radu, possessed of supernatural powers of attaching himself to Vlad’s side at the most inconvenient moments.
Vlad held his laughter until he was safely hidden in the forest. He fell to his knees beside a fallen trunk and giggled until he doubled over. Too young to accompany his father and the boyars on hunting expeditions the way Mircea did, Vlad had to make his own amusement, and pulling pranks on people was his favourite pastime. That, he thought, and taunting hunting dogs, but the dog master tended to chew him out for it, prince’s son or not.
Vlad edged around the trees, listening for sounds of pursuit. Either way, Mircea deserved it. He was supposed to be teaching Vlad swordwork, not talking to stupid girls. Technically they both had a sword teacher, but the old codger had no idea about moves that actually worked in the field, not just with sticks and wooden shields. The kind of moves no-one expected because they weren’t taught. Mircea hung around with mercenaries and Western warriors long enough to learn them, and then he passed the knowledge to Vlad. And there was little time for that lately, because old Dracul kept fighting wars and his heirs had duties of their own, chief of those staying alive and providing enemies with dispersed targets. Before they arrived in Tirgoviste for the summer harvest, Vlad hadn’t seen his brother for two months.
If only the peaceful weeks weren’t so warm. The moss under Vlad’s feet was so dry, it crackled. Maybe he could take a nap here, give Mircea time to forget about chasing him and let down his guard. Sleeping at noon in the summer was supposed to be a good idea, anyway. His mother had told him stories of the ladies of noontide that walked abroad in noon, bringing bad luck to those that did not bow to them, and she’d learned those stories from her nurse, who learned them before his mother’s cousin had made the pact that brought her homeland into the bosom of the Church. Vlad knew the Church had the best truth, but it didn’t hurt to make right by the little pagan devils, too, as long as it was small things like taking a nap.
Then he could try his luck at the kennels again. Moroi, the big wolf-bastard mongrel that terrorised the rest of the pack, kept growling at him even through the choke-collar it wore to restrain it. If the mangy fleabag got a stick between the ears, it might learn some respect.
Vlad couldn’t wait until he was big enough to make everyone respect him the way dogs and horses did.
A shimmer of light beyond the trees caught his eye. The little lake was a pleasant surprise – he’d never ventured this far east of the city into the thickest forest, except for the few times his father had let him ride with the hunt. It was barely more than a pool, a long shallow dip in the ground filled with water from a narrow stream, but it was clear and sand-lined. Vlad shed his shirt, looking forward to cooling down with the lake water.
He heard the rustle of the bushes first. He whirled around, expecting to see his elder brother’s tall figure, prepared to start running once more. Then he heard the growl.
The sound made his skin ripple with a shudder. It was like the hounds faced with a boar.
Or a wolf who’d just caught sight of a juicy lamb, Vlad thought as Moroi padded out of the bushes. The damned animal was scratched and battered, its choke collar cutting deep into its neck and trailing a length of frayed rope. Hell of a time for the mutt to slip the kennels.
All right, he could do this. So many times he’d watched the hound master, had to be good for something. Calm, assured, demanding respect. Would be a hell of a lot easier if Moroi wasn’t exactly as tall as him and about twice as heavy. With very sharp teeth.
The hound took another step forward. A thick branch broke under a heavy paw. The maw was open, letting out the growl. The stench of rotting raw meat washed over Vlad, making his lips curl.
Moroi’s grey coat was dappled with blood, he saw. They were in a small clearing bordered on two sides by thick brambles. On the other was the lake, shallow enough for the hound to run through it. And now the animal barred the way Vlad had come.
The growl again, louder.
Hell of a time for the mutt to remember who’d tried to set fire to it, too.
Moroi took a step forward. Vlad took a step back. The hound settled back on its haunches and the boy frantically wondered if he could jump over the animal’s head before it attacked him.
Then the hound leaped.
Vlad threw himself sideways, catching himself on one arm that went numb with the force of impact. Heavy paws landed on his leg, then Moroi whirled, jaws gaping, teeth closing around Vlad’s ankle, slipping on the leather boot.
A frantic kick sent the hound reeling for a second. Vlad scrambled to his feet, his hand scrabbling in the dry grass until it closed on a heavy branch. With a desperate jump he avoided another lunge, landing with his bare back to the brambles that cut deep into his skin.
His green eyes wide, the boy bared his own teeth. Fear was forgotten in the face of savage delight.
He let out a loud growl, startling the hound into backing a step. He wound his shirt around his numbed forearm and slipped his hand along the branch until his grip was sure.
Moroi leapt again, and Vlad met it head-on.
The stench washed over him as fangs cut into cloth and flesh. Ignoring the pain, he brought the branch down on the hound’s forehead with a loud crack. Another blow broke the branch completely, but step after step he dragged the dazed, struggling animal towards the trees. He didn’t know which one of them growled the louder, panted more.
A tree-trunk at the edge of his vision, and with the swing of an arm he managed to drive the hound’s head against it, and again. Bleeding freely, Moroi loosened its grip at last, knocking Vlad off his feet with the bulk of its body. The animal lunged, intent on ripping out Vlad’s throat, and the boy raised his hand in the only move left to him.
A soul-piercing keening echoed in the clearing as the broken end of the branch drove into Moroi’s throat.
The hound staggered back, but Vlad followed, leaping on hands and knees, stabbing the sharp fragment of wood into flesh again and again. In his fury, he’d rend the animal’s flesh with his teeth if he could. Throat, ribs, gut, again he pierced the bloodsoaked fur, until the hound moved no more.
Vlad heard a sobbing sound, then realised he was choking on bile.
Moroi’s ribs still moved, but the breathing was agonal. Vlad rose to his knees, then slowly set one foot on the ground, followed by the other. Raising himself from a crouch took centuries, and all to take the few steps that separated him from the lake. His legs left red trails in the cold water.
As he washed the blood from his face and hands, he heard a harsh rattle in the hound’s breath. He turned on his knees, the water running down his face half obscuring his vision.
Someone was bent over Moroi’s body. A slim figure with long silver locks of hair, but too graceful as it knelt down for the silver to be the gild of age. Clothes of Hungarian cut, black velvet with silver embroidery and white jewels that glittered in the sunlight in ways more suited to evening revels at the court in Buda-Pesth than to a noontide forest in Wallachia.
The clothes were male, as were the broad shoulders, but the grace of the slim, gloved hand as it touched the hound’s blood-darkened flesh was not. Vlad held his breath, as if his very life depended on the answer to that question.
The stranger looked up. The face was pale, each line smooth and elegantly shaped. The wide dark eyes were elongated, the cheekbones set at an angle that made the features foreign, Tartar-like, though the stranger was too beautiful and pale to be one of those eastern barbarians. Then the stranger raised – his? her? – head and a ray of sunlight caught across the elegant features. It brightened the black eyes to a deep purple.
As the world swirled and darkened around him, Vlad smiled, astonished and awed by the beauty of Death.
The next thing he saw was Mircea’s face. His prank seemed forgotten as his elder brother hugged him and scolded him, describing an hours-long search after Moroi’s escape had been discovered and the hound master remembered how much the animal hated Vlad.
“I took him down,” Vlad muttered sullenly as he submitted to an examination of his wounds.
“And you fainted in the lake, you idiot,” Mircea scoffed, pulling on Vlad’s hair. “If you’d fallen the other way, you’d have drowned before you came to himself. I’ll tell Father you’re not to be let out the town walls until you’re twelve.”
“Good luck with that.” Vlad poked his brother in the nose. “Father likes me.”
“He did, until you slaughtered his best hound.” Mircea looked at the hound’s mangled body. “Good work, brat.”
As his brother helped him to his feet, Vlad looked back at the shore of the lake. Mircea would not understand, for his mother had not told him stories of pagan ghosts, but Vlad knew he had not imagined things. He had a feeling he would be seeing Death again.
-TO BE CONTINUED
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2006-09-21 06:35 am (UTC)And good luck! Lots of it :)
(no subject)
Date: 2006-09-21 06:42 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-09-21 06:47 am (UTC)Random fact: having watched "Bram Stoker's Dracula" two days ago, I noticed that Gary Oldman/as/Dracula calls that wolf "moroi" and "strigoi" at some point. *sweatdrops*
(no subject)
Date: 2006-09-21 06:49 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-09-21 06:56 am (UTC)Suuuuuuuuuuure! Throw it my way as soon as you feel like it! *gets all bouncy*
(no subject)
Date: 2006-09-21 11:03 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-09-21 04:54 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-09-21 02:37 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-09-21 05:07 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-09-22 01:41 am (UTC)