The warm glow of the crackling fireplace cast dancing shadows across the den, painting a picture of serenity that belied the impending chaos. Jamie giggled delightedly as his father swept him up, tossing him into the air before catching him in a tender embrace. His mother looked on with a content smile, her eyes reflecting the flickering flames as she lovingly ran her fingers through her son’s tousled blond locks.
“Time for bed, little one,” She said softly, rising from her seat and opening her arms to take Jamie. “You’ve got to get up early tomorrow.”
Before he could protest or offer a last plea for five more minutes, a thunderous pounding erupted at the front door, shattering the tranquil moment. Jamie’s parents immediately froze, their previous smiles replaced by stark fear that sent shivers down Jamie’s spine. With a wordless understanding, his grabbed him and swiftly ushered his family towards the pantry, his movements urgent yet deliberate.
“Don’t make a sound, Jamie,” He whispered urgently, his voice barely above a breath as they huddled together in the cramped space. “No matter what, you stay hidden and keep quiet—”
The knocks escalated into a bone-rattling frenzy of blows that burst the door off its hinges. An unholy growl reverberated through the air, sending a chill down Jamie’s spine as a hulking, shadowy mass barreled across the threshold. Jamie’s heart hammered in his chest, threatening to burst from the confines of his rib cage. He couldn’t stifle the scream that clawed its way out of his throat, the sound echoing in the small pantry.
In one brutal swipe, the beast seized his father, its claws sinking into his flesh as it viciously snapped his neck with a crack. His mother’s anguished screams pierced the air, but they were abruptly silenced as the beast threw her against the wall with a force that seemed to defy gravity, crimson spraying the wallpaper.
As the monster turned its feral, glowing crimson eyes upon the petrified boy, Jamie couldn’t even find the breath to cry. This was no mere beast - it was the devil himself, vengeance incarnate, and Jamie knew in that moment that his life would never be the same again.
####
The horse’s hooves thundered ominously as the carriage rolled up the winding path flanked by twisted, leafless trees. Jamie couldn’t tear his gaze away from the vision of dread looming ahead - the colossal wrought-iron gates and foreboding turrets of Darling Academy pierced the stormy sky like dark sentinels.
This daunting Gothic cathedral of a castle had been home to generations of vampire highborn youths. And now, after a childhood spent shuffling from one unremarkable foster home to the next, it would be his own personal house of horrors.
Jamie shivered despite the plush velvet interior, reflexively rubbing the faded bite marks on his forearm. Ever since that fateful night, even the slightest graze reopened the floodgates, visions of gnashing fangs and crimson spraying across his mind’s eye. How was he supposed to willingly walk into the blood-suckers’ den?
The carriage slowed to a bone-rattling halt. Jamie gripped the door’s latch, his heart pounding. This was really happening - no more avoiding his vampiric heritage. Vincent was really his only family left, for better or worse.
As the door swung open, Jamie squinted against the icy downpour, making out a solitary caped figure standing vigil down the path. Even from yards away, Vincent’s powerful vampiric presence was palpable, seeming to draw the shadows towards him like a black hole.
Descending the carriage, Jamie treaded cautiously towards his estranged brother, unable to read the elder vampire’s inscrutable obsidian stare.
“You’re utterly drenched,” Vincent finally rumbled in a baritone voice, appraising Jamie coolly. “Let’s get you inside and out of those dripping rags.”
Jamie couldn’t help but shrink under his brother’s scrutinizing glare as he followed Vincent’s lengthy strides down the winding path. Despite his teenage growth spurt, he felt all of seven years old again, instinctively shrinking from the looming spires that seemed to watch him with hungry disdain.
As the chateau’s spiked black gates swung ponderously open, granting them entry to the nightmarish unknown within, Jamie couldn’t shake his body’s screaming urgency to turn and flee.
The great oak doors groaned open, granting entry into the breathtaking main foyer. Despite the castle’s archaic exterior, the interior corridor seemed frozen in a baroque era of opulence.
Haunting strains of string quartet drifted through the chambers. Ornate candlesconces bathed the ceilings in a flickering golden glow. Everywhere Jamie’s eyes landed, the lavish splendor assaulted his senses - rich brocade tapestries, exquisite marble sculptures, intricate woodcarvings tracing the paneling.
Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.
It was as if he’d stepped into one of the fancy museum galleries he’d admired through glass on childhood field trips. Except this was no abandoned relic - vampires prowled these decadent halls.
A sudden flurry of movement in his periphery made Jamie’s heart stutter. At the ends of the corridor, figures seemed to be emerging from the shadows, their gazes locking on the newcomer like predators sanctioning fresh prey.
Vampires, unmistakably - both male and female, their chiseled patrician features and penetrating stares exuding an intoxicating mixture of beauty and danger. Some were garishly over-adorned in velvets and silks befitting royalty. Others were wrapped in deceptively simple robes, somehow more unsettling in their restraint.
All of them, however, shared the same rapacious hunger behind their eyes.
“Keep up with me,” Vincent’s gruff command shook Jamie from his trance-like gawking. “Don’t look at them. Vampires can literally smell fear, and you reek of it.”
Swallowing hard, Jamie hurried his steps, frantically focusing on the elaborate marble inlays beneath his hastening feet. Still, he could feel those unnaturally focused stares piercing his flesh, awakening the sickening phantom ache of torn tissue and searing venom.
Vincent led them up a sprawling staircase, each step increasingly suffocating as the air thickened with an omnipresent metallic musk. The cloying, intoxicating aroma seemed to be emanating from the very halls themselves, curling seductively into Jamie’s nostrils and prickling his sensitized skin.
Blood. He was utterly surrounded, immersed in the vampires’ world on a cellular level. Their lair reeked of the primal essence. Suddenly light-headed, Jamie gripped the railing, struggling to keep his stomach contents down.
“Get ahold of yourself!” Vincent’s words bit like the lash of a whip. “You’re only making a greater spectacle. I’d hoped a few years on your own might finally make you into a man…”
As his brother’s scornful words faded to white noise pounding in his ears, Jamie stole a terrified glance over his shoulder. Crimson maws agape, the callous vampires shamelessly drank in his mortal terror, some licking their glistening fangs in crude relish.
He was the helpless, cornered lamb, and they were the wolves baring their hunger. Sickening deja vu washed over him in a cold sweat. Jamie squeezed his eyes shut, fists clenching, fighting visceral traumatic flashes of the demon’s razored maw descending, his parents’ choked screams…
A firm grip on Jamie’s arm wrenched him back into the disorienting present. Vincent had halted, his chiseled features etched in disgust.
“If you’re done being pathetic,” his brother snarled under his breath. “Eyes in front and silence that rattling breath, unless you want to become the main course.”
With a mortified grimace, Jamie complied, locking his gaze straight ahead. They continued down a dimly-lit corridor, the sounds of faint revelry echoing from adjacent chambers. Despite Jamie’s attempts at steadying his breathing, his pulse thundered in his ears, each exhale seeming to fan the ambiance.
Finally, they emerged into a dimly-lit chamber. A series of severe wooden doors lined the circular room, their thresholds adorned with emblems burning low on covered torches.
Vincent rapped his knuckles against the largest door, the booming impacts making Jamie flinch. When the door finally creaked open, an impeccably-dressed gentleman stood framed in the entrance like a reaper.
Even by vampiric standards, his complexion was a chilling bluish pallor. His widow-peaked black locks and piercing emerald stare exuded a chilling gravitas well beyond his apparent years.
Vincent favored him with a curt bow. “Headmaster Thurian. As requested, I’ve retrieved the … human charge for enrollment.”
If Thurian found the introduction distasteful, his expression didn’t flinch. “Of course. The Council has issued its will regarding the, ah, special case. Please, young man, have a seat.”
Hesitantly, Jamie crossed the threshold, his gaze inevitably drawn to the lavish splendor surrounding the apparent headmaster’s study. One entire wall was adorned with sprawling built-in shelves housing what seemed to be thousands of antique tomes and leather-bound folios.
An enormous stone hearth dominated the room’s center, its crackling fire casting the only warm ambiance amid looming shadows veiling every corner. Mounted display cases housed a vast array of archaic artifacts - wands, chalices, and wicked ceremonial blades accented in tarnished silver.
“I am Headmaster Dalius Thurian,” the vampire’s deep tone made Jamie start as he settled into a plush highbacked chair. “And it is both my regrettable duty and honor to induct alumni of either … persuasion into the hallowed culture of Darling.”
Thurian languidly traced a long nail along a jade chalice, his hypnotic stare boring into Jamie with unsettling intensity.
“For over a millennium, this academy has cultivated the education of our kind’s posterity. We have long looked askance at diluting such sanctity with the rites of humans. However, in your … particular case, certain contingencies supersede decorum.”
The headmaster drew the heavy scarlet drapes aside, the dark shadows beyond revealing a sweeping vista of the academy’s sprawling outer grounds. Jamie’s breath escaped in a shuddering gasp.
The craggy black spires of Darling stood sentinel over manicured courtyards and rambling trails, watched by moss-veined gargoyles leering from gothic podiums. Nestled in the imposing valley, the moonlight and falling ice glinted off a shimmering mirror lake.
But it was the endless forest engulfing the horizon that snatched Jamie’s focus, the twisted boughs of ancient sheltering groves teeming with terrifying life. How many ravenous beasts and unholy denizens made their lairs in there?
“Darling sits at the pulsing heart of ancestral territory,” Thurian’s voice sliced through the tension. “For ages untold, these realms have served as both protector and provider to our people’s most sacred dynasties.”
The headmaster turned to face Jamie directly, lips quirking in a thin smile that did nothing to soften his frigid mien.
“So you see, the forest and its … occupants must be given the same obedience and reverence as the faculty.” His stare intensified until Jamie squirmed under its weight. “Woe to any reckless whelp who breaches that dominion without express permission.”
Only then did Jamie realize the emerald glints burning in Thurian’s gaze weren’t merely reflections of the hearth. They were inhuman, unmistakable smolders of predatory instinct swimming beneath the surface, threatening to obliterate Jamie’s fragile human form on the slightest indiscretion.
“Now, let’s begin your indoctrination into Darling’s rites and wonders, shall we?”