Page 103 of Besieger
His second attempt to fashion a fledgling had been with Mihaela. Her hunger differed from the others’, it lacked the carnality and mundanity of the vampires Ingenuar had brought forth. The girl craved knowledge… a poor choice of desire, in Felivar’s eyes, yet it had been there, strong and tempting. With Felivar’s blood, time would no longer have power over her; she could pursue all the secrets and histories of the human world to her heart’s content.
There had been other experiments, other failed attempts. When the humans began crafting glass and mirrors, Felivar had felt naturally drawn to them, anxious to behold his reflection—what would his body look like when it was not shaped by another’s ambition? How might he appear without the imprint of greed and hunger? But the mercury refused to obey him, the mirrors offered no reflection.
And if none of the human-made mirrors could show his face, then he would contrive one of his own, craft a glass that could capture a demon. His image, his being.
As he had done with Ingenuar so many centuries ago, Felivar cut his wrist and let the Blood mix with the mercury. When the substance hardened into silver, polished to a shine, he gazed down at his creation and found himself erased, like Narcissus undone. He pressed his fingers into it, and all of him dissolved,liquid and cold. For one fragile breath, he forced through and found himself on the other side of the looking glass, becoming the watcher, never the watched.
Dissatisfied, Felivar had discarded the mirror among the many trinkets in Ingenuar’s room of antiques in the Berlin Coven, and forgot it entirely until the day its surface quavered under the blood-smeared fingers of a Regent: the futureMarquisBracci.
Felivar watched as the two vampires stood in front of the mirror, and the long-haired fledgling pushing his master against the glass.
“Who else but me can preach to others how to worship and obey you?” Emerick cooed. “I can be the High Priest at the altar of your flesh. I will serve them the body of a worthierChristus, an eucharist of blood.”
“…worship in Béziers,” Silvio cut him off, and Felivar had wanted to follow them. To follow the greed that oozed from the one with the green eyes. The Regent had been brimming with excitement to consummate the freedom his ascension promised, yet he was so, so impatient.
There were many ways to feed greed and starvation, and Felivar had mastered all of them as the demon of want.Greed needs little to fester, especially in this place of worship you have built for yourself,Marquis,Felivar thought while he examined the new surroundings. TheMarquishad taken the mirror and placed it in his bedroom above the bed, this makeshift altar. If Felivar wished—if he dared—he could reach out through the quicksilver and touch theMarquis; get a better, lingering taste of theComte, wind his fingers around that beautiful hair and draw him nearer.
In the end, it had been theMarquiswho came to Felivar.
Silvio had acted on instinct, locking the door behind him once he entered the study.
The man standing over the body of the All Father was a stranger, his mind sealed and void when Silvio tried to pierce it and piece together what had happened. The man’s features seemed to ooze from the lines of his face, until they settled into a curious grimace. His silver eyes fixed on Silvio, and his mouth pursed in a half-smile.
“MarquisBracci,” the stranger greeted him; voice harsh and cold. Whatever warmth had lingered in the room drained at the sound. “It is an honour to meet you in the flesh.”
Silvio arched an eyebrow at the stranger’s choice of words. His gaze narrowed at the garments the man wore. They resembled loose-fitting robes, dyed in crimson, like rust or red clay, pooling around his feet and the corpse. The blood that had seeped out of Ingenuar had soaked into the hem of the fabric. The colour unsettled Silvio. During his many visits to the Coven, he had never seen another vampire besides the All Father wear red. The scene before him was an act of sacrilege.
“Sacrilege is too strong a word, don’t you think?” The stranger inclined his head and stepped aside, leaving a wet, dark trail behind. The smeared Blood let out a hiss, disintegrating the further it was drawn away from the body. “Especially for an act with so little planning behind it.”
“What manner of creature kills its Father on a whim?”
Despite himself, Silvio moved closer.On a whim… he almost barked a laugh.To kill the All Father on a whim!He nearly dropped to his knees to examine the body. It had not stirred, lying in mute witness to their exchange.
“Oh, Ingenuar did not sire me. But he did nurture me.”
The thing was teasing him, goading Silvio into asking more questions, into letting it lapse into a soliloquy he had no wish to hear. And yet, the more it spoke, the more familiar it sounded. Not long ago, a similar impish voice had nipped at Silvio’s head. It had been this voice which ordered Emerick to go and subdueMihaela when they hunted her at the All Father’s behest. Oh, how she had screamed and tried to flee, as Emerick pushed her to the ground, her legs kicking in the snow while he rewrote her mind, etching into it like a scribe, melting in delirium. The same voice had sent his consort up the flight of stairs to the room of the mother and the father, to erase their memories of Mihaela, orphaning her to the mortal world.
“Thank you for bringing her to me—my elusive daughter.” The stranger’s voice dipped near; an echo of Silvio’s thoughts.
A clawed hand tapped Silvio’s shoulder forcing him to whip his head up. Without meaning to, he had fallen to the floor with his hands dipped in the Blood. Its colour had paled in the light, turning into the same shade as the stranger’s eyes. Silvio’s gums ached from the urge to lick it, despite his aversion to its horrid taste.
“Ah, there it is, your bitter greed.” The creature’s hand trailed off Silvio’s shoulder; he circled back to the other side of the corpse and looked down at it fondly. “But it bears such sweet fruit, does it not?”
I have enjoyed watching you through my little looking glass for quite some time,Marquis. You and your paramour.
“Looking glass?” Silvio heard himself ask, but could not raise his head.
He kept looking down at the dark blotches which had formed on the sleeves of his polo. More of Ingenuar’s blood had evaporated, leaving the body, and the space around it, eerily clean and neat. All that was left behind was the copper tang filling Silvio’s nostrils; it made him sick.
The last time he had tasted the All Father’s blood had been at his ascension. Ingenuar had sent him and Emerick afterwards to pick out a gift, a token of their union Silvio might take back to his new home. From among the cluttered knick-knacks and furniture in the room of antiques, on a whim Silvio had selected a mirror.
A mirror that—
The same mirror that had cut him, swallowing a drop of his blood.
A mirror that hangs up on my bedroom wall.
Over the years the candlelight had played tricks on Silvio, as he had gazed up at his reflection, while lying amidst the silk sheets with Emerick beside him. The shadows had flickered, distorting the image. There had been other—minor, seemingly unimportant—instances where Silvio had passed a mirror somewhere and his image had been muddy, fading. He could only see himself if he focused, finding it too vain to stop and stare.
