dear_mun | @ luceti - Post!canon Isaac poorly pretending he doesn't think much at all about Hector.

...bellow his name from beyond the keep of castle gates?

[His eyes widen slightly at a voice all-too-familiar. He wasn't quite... expecting you, you understand.]

...speak of the devil.

[It comes a little more cooly than he meant to.]

Seek polished silver plates, and you'll also see him, Isaac.

[He snorts softly, mirthlessly, glancing elsewhere for a moment as if annoyed already. But it's not long before he meets Hector's gaze once more, a wry smile quirking the corners of his lips.]

Have you come to torment me?

[Perhaps he cuts a bit of a pitiful figure as he stands there, holding out his hands, palms-up, to show he is unarmed and devoid of trickery now (though he does keep a dagger in one of his boots) and as if to invite his former companion to strike at him.

They drop to his sides after a moment.]

[ So very much eye-rolling, because he wasn't born yesterday ~~only the two days ago~~. ]

Don't put that burden on my shoulders. I've been summoned, Isaac. You might have known your mouth to speak it.

[His turn now to roll his eyes oh so theatrically.]

Ah, yes, and what a great burden that would be.

[If only you knew what pain you caused, he thinks. And then shakes his head, humorouslessly, despite his lingering smile.]

I was merely discussing matters with my dear Mundane. And then you came... like a dog.

[It's a petty jab, not uncommon when he's a little upset. Well, this is a promising beginning to patching things up, eh pal?]

[ Like long lost brotherhood, except with an arsenal of well sharpened weapons! ]

Mind that I do not try my jaw and rip off the hand that would feed me its complaints like a dog, Isaac.

[ But he can, sometimes, pretend to be sensible. ]

What does your human will of me?

Biting the hand that feeds you... [He echoes musingly.] 'twould not be the first time.

[But freed from the curse, Hector deserting their former lord does not suffuse him with a great, trembling rage it once would have. In the wake of his death, he has few kind words for that crusty old bat who'd used his body, his power, and left him to die without acknowledgement in the ultimate sacrifice. Like he were nothing, and after years of unwavering servitude.

He breathes out through his nostrils as if answering the question were doing Hector a favour.]

She would have you join me. And Julia. [Trying so present himself as cool and composed, he wills a smile once again. It's tight at the corners.]

...I am told you and my dear sister have gotten along swimmingly. [It's painful, his attempt at a casual approach. He huffs a hollow laugh after a moment, but finds himself searching Hector's eyes almost desperately for some truth he wouldn't want to recognize.]

Not everything that shares your blood shares your spite.

[ And there's always a degree of discomfort in trying to word appreciation for the kin of madmen to the latter's faces. ]

She has... a better mind to her than most. Than you.

[ ...actually, than Hector too. But, as they say, details. ]

[Shutting his eyes now, he half-absently chews on the inside of his cheek. It's a while before he manages an answer, his attention sharply focused on this nagging, deepening ache in his chest. Yet, he can't leave this alone. He wants to hear more, to know more, to poke and prod and see just how much more it could hurt.]

Mn.

[He nods gently, pleasantly, and for a while that's the most he can say. Well, he can't deny she's the better Laforeze, willingly showing a cruel and ill-deserving world kindness and mercy and forgiveness. He couldn't comprehend it.]

Such kindly words. [Polite with the ladies. He'd seen you with Rosaly.] But surely even you fancy more than her mind.

[He can't bridle his tongue.]

[ Well, now - this surprises. ]

You can't mean you haven't taken notice of the ways in which she's accomplished. [ Half-gritted. ] You're a fool. You're not blind.

[Accomplished, indeed. Well, there's one word for it, he muses bitterly. Nose wrinkling with disgust, he looks for a moment as if he'd been told he should feel attracted to his own sister.]

Forgive me if I do not look upon her with your eyes.

[A beat, his jaw shifting sullenly.]

...Have you slept with her?

[He attempts an even delivery in that lilting voice of his, but there's no way to ask casually, is there? Because his curiosity is hardly casual.]

[ There is a moment, an impossible, infinite, lost moment when he has the causal malice to deliver insult well worth Isaac's pettiness, if not either their time.

It's one moment, and it's gone, and in its wake it stirs tension in the grip of knuckle bones, in the length of clenched fingers, in their damned marrow. ]

Let your steps take you one farther, and ask it of me again. One, Isaac.

You did not answer my question. [Isaac hisses with a sudden viciousness, feeling a cold, queasy feeling squirm in the pit of his stomach. His throat goes dry and clenches up.]

- - But you've said quite enough. [He muses under his breath, staring back hopelessly.

Such fierce indignation on Hector's part. It's yes, he thinks, isn't it?

With a stiff, bitter, incredulous little smile, he turns away sharply, his gaze wildly and blindly searching the room. Just breathing and breathing now, aware of the roaring of blood against his eardrums as he closes his eyes and fights a losing battle against his anger. On one hand, he knows better than anyone else how his sister has struggled, how she has lived in fear of being hunted like vermin for something she could not help. He knows she deserves far better than that. But did it have to be Hector? The sheer intensity of his jealousy has his hands trembling slightly, and for an instant, brings him just on the verge of throwing up. Such disgusting weakness - but what could he do?]

[ There's been enough impatience won off him to feed a slaughterhouse of demons - all of them, his. Curse Isaac's little -

His teeth grit. Grind. ]

We are not all wretches who would lay hand on an innocent out of spite and vengeance, you many-headed snake.

[Where is this wordsmith's clever, biting response? In this moment his cruel wit fails him entirely.]

Shut up! [He snaps savagely, breathing in and out through gritted teeth. And then he whirls on him, his hands clawed as if they were ready to grab Hector by the throat. But they close into empty, powerless fists, the leather of his gloves creaking.]

Feeble-minded creature!

[All the blood in his body is working into a boil. These things he's said aloud to himself many times before, these words burst out of him, irrepressible. Where's his cool grace now? He'd always wanted to be the better of them both, and now is just falling apart before him.]

Are you so blind? Or do you enjoy playing the ignorant fool? [He grins fiercely.] Yes, let us have a laugh and see just how much he can take before he goes mad.

[Well, a second time.]

[ He should leave. He should laugh. He should commit to a wealth of gestures that would finally instigate Isaac to a well-deserved snap and see their conflict resolved in violence... ]

You are past insanity's redemption. I've a mind to think you always were.

[ ...but he is long tired of the women in his life losing theirs on Isaac's whim and Hector's count.

A sigh, hand passing through his hair - ]

Your quarrel is with me, not your sister. Leave her be.

[For all the fierceness of his jealousy – something he recognizes on occasion - he has no intentions of hurting her. Not his only family, not the only one who still cared--

Sometimes, even more than he burns with the desire to push his lips against Hector’s with savage hunger, with years of tormented frustration and hope and desperate need behind it, he wants to beat him to a bloody fucking pulp. Words fail him now; his Adam’s apple bobbles in his throat. And he stares with the blank-faced intensity of a child told his life as he knew it was a lie before he remembers himself and cracks a sorry grin at last, a sharp exhalation – some attempt at a chuckle - escaping him. He hangs his head after a moment, and then it comes, the trembling of his shoulders. And uncontrollable laughter, low and broken laughter not far from sobs of wrenching self-pity.]

To think -- I’d once waited… and hoped-- [The word is said with such a snarling disgust, his nose wrinkling. Breaking off, he looks his fellow Forgemaster dead in the eyes, amusement gone and a weary resignation in its place, aging him beyond his twenty six years. What rejection was there to fear, now, from Hector? This, he muses… what little they had now, if anything at all, was beyond fixing.]

And for what…? [He throws his arms out.] …Tell me, Hector. Tell me of your passionate hate and your revulsion -- [But he doesn’t stop long enough to invite him to speak. What began as a lilting voice suddenly transforms in a snarl, his chest heaving.]

-- tell me of the way you wonder how it is a beautiful, gentle creature like Julia and this beast could be of the same blood!!

[Pausing, he then smiles distantly in a moment of self-awareness as if to apologize.]

Oh, how I’d wanted to fuck you. [A low, conspiratory murmur.] I would dream of it – of touching you in ways you’d never known. Of showing you such pleasure. Feeling you beneath me, warm, trembling, wanting, my name on your lips.

[He snorts softly at the thought, at these fantasies he’s entertained for far too long and that still had the power to shake him.]

I could have taken you any time I pleased. ...You trusted me, once, you may recall.

[A beat. Smiling to himself.] Or enough. [He glances up expectantly as if to ask, ‘do you know why?’]

…I imagine you ask yourself what on earth could have possibly compelled me to… restrain myself. Or perhaps this matters not to you, at all. And why should it? [Wryly:] Of what value are the words of a madman, after all?

[ A long moment's silence, hard won by - fury. Stupor. Shaking, raw breaths, and the spite that's born them. He should not yield. He should not give Isaac the maelstrom he so asks for, should be the wiser of the two, the moderate. Would have, really, if not for this last littlest speech.

One step closer, the second, third. Finally, he's close enough to plant to dare a hand on Isaac's shoulder, then the next. The mimicry of an affectionate gesture, perhaps. ]

Brother.

[ Kin in the art, if nothing else. ]

Brother, I shall have your head. I shall reap your eyes from their lairs, and sow vermin in the sockets. I shall cut down your tongue and rip you tendon by tendon, bone by bone, I shall peel away skin, flesh, layers of fat, marrow. There are things fire and blade should not do to a corpse, and we know them, and you have my word - they will be done unto you.

[ At his most soothing, most affectionate, really - ]

You think you know violation enough to speak to me of it, Isaac?

[ Laughter, thin. Thinner. ]

You will wish for it, you will kiss my boot, my hand, and each bone and each joint of my Forgeries' limbs, and you will beg, Isaac - you will beg for something so simple, once I've done with you.

[He’s wary of it and rightfully so, this fraternal touch, the very most Hector has given him in years – and then he sees it in the tautness of his jaw and the fierce intent in his eyes and knows every last one of these brutal words to be true. They sink in inch by inch, digested slowly, his pulse quickening. But he’s unafraid of fleshly tortures Hector could inflict, or so he tells himself. For what greater pain can there be than to wander the world alive and bereft of purpose and meaning, despised by a man he’d once considered his only companion, and to die alone eventually, like some miserable dog? There is nothing worse than this.]

I had been afraid. [He shuts his eyes for a moment, breaking into a self-ridiculing chuckle.] Afraid. …Afraid of what? God forbid I should be overtaken by lust and destroy the one good thing I’d known in that castle. God forbid he should wrinkle his nose at this filthy, God-forsaken sodomite and run, and never to return.

[Smiling still, and swallowing thickly, he slides a dagger from one of his boots and lifts it between them, slowly, so slowly. Searching Hector’s eyes still for the slightest flicker of emotion other than outrage and disgust. And then, then he pulls one of his hands, carefully, from his shoulder, pressing the hilt into his palm and gently closing his fingers around it. There is a moment now, a strange, misplaced moment of tenderness in which he strokes Hector’s hand with his thumb before he guides it and the point of his knife towards himself. It presses into his chest, off-center, just to the left. Not yet breaking the skin through his shirt. A tired, lopsided smile tugs at the corners of his lips, the amusement not reaching his eyes.]

Take what is yours.

[He doesn’t know how much clearer he can be. But rare, gut-wrenching sincerity means nothing now, he thinks.]

‘twas always yours.

[The hand wrapped around Hector’s fist slides off, reluctantly, and then he waits, not quite sure what would come.]

[ The knife stands lighter in his hand - lighter than he remembered - always light when it nears a kill. He gives it its slow measure: pure steel, sharp; balances in well, shines quite eager. Forged, he supposed, traditionally, in some man's castle fire.

The hand's withdrawn, the knife with it. He sheaths it, stiff on his belt, where scalpels and sword lie. No point in returning a gift so freely given. ]

My time, not yours, Isaac. I take what is mine on my time.

[Isaac breathes evenly, in and out, his focus sharply drawn to that single point and the threat of penetration. And he realizes he’s ready to see Hector give into darker impulses and to feel his own knife bury into him, the blade scraping bone along the way. A fitting end, perhaps. But just like that, the pressure is gone, the knife tucked away. In place of a great sense of relief others would have felt is surprise and disappointment as he opens his eyes and recognizes his time had not yet come.]

Tell me this... if nothing more.

[He searches Hector's face, his voice dispassionate.] Was there ever any hope… for you and I? Or was it naught but a fever dream for which this worthless, foolish piece of flesh beat faster?

[ Rosalie deserved a man who wouldn't give her unrepentant killer kindness. This is - should be - the only truth between them now.

But he feels almost a parting pity at the thought of landing the final blow. ]

We had the kinship that was mine to give. And you spat upon it.

[He turns his face away at the other's words as if ashamed and unable to bear this company, but then he fixes a fierce, red-eyed glare on him, his hand lashing out to grab a fistful of Hector's shirt. He tugs him close to his snarling face so taut with fury.]

You fled- - [Ever word works its way past that damned aching knot lodged in his throat, his mouth twisting into a stiff grimace that threatens to twitch at the corners.] You fled without a single word and left me with nothing!!

[And in anger and desperation, the curse had truly taken hold.]

Don't you dare presume you know what I felt!!

[ The sudden pull costs him his footing; he regains it quickly enough, not without a soft curse under his breath. Isaac is entirely too fond of exhausting his temper.

Rolling eyes settle under the bridge of a strong frown. ]

And you mean to have it said that one of Lord -

[ Mocking, too mocking, sing-sung. ]

Dracula's best perfected tools can't have found me, if he wished to go with me?

[ Because, really, hadn't Isaac done just that, if later? ]

You play the victim, now? And I, your equal, should have broken your shackles, along with mine? You had eyes, Isaac, you saw as I saw. You had the freedom to leave, the time and the possibility. You had no inclination, and that is no fault of mine.

[Colour rises into his face, his chest surging powerfully. His surroundings have long since faded from his notice as his temples throb and his vision pulses and tunnels more sharply around this man’s face. He’s much too far beyond noticing the spit that has dribbled onto his chin.]

My equal?!

[He gives Hector a vicious shake, his lips peeling back further - and had there been a wall nearby, he’d have seen it fit to slam him into it.]

You son of a whore!! Think you that Dracula –- [The title of ‘lord’ is very deliberately omitted.] -- would have me come after you, and with orders not to kill you myself, if you were my equal? Oh, yes… you were not to be slain like any other deserter, for you were much too useful. Much too close to his black little heart. Everything I did, unquestioning and unfailing, wasn’t enough! He favoured you, your power - - and when you ran, he punished me that I had not foreseen it!

[His expression twists into an embittered sneer and he has to look away for a moment as if the sheer gall of the other man was just too much.]

And, pray tell, where was I to go? [He asks oh-so lightly.] To mingle among humans? And what a fine time of it you had.

[The smile drops suddenly.]

LOOK AT ME!! [Isaac roars, his knuckles whitening around Hector’s shirt. He’d learned early that he would inspire nothing short of terror and hatred from most everyone with the hair of a strigoi and a demon’s eyes. When he pulls together enough composure to press on, his voice is lower, taut.]

…That leech once our master, for all his treachery in the end, gave me shelter. Made known to me this power... with which I would no longer fear man and the crimes they commit on God’s glorious behalf.

[He’d felt indebted, then, among other things.

Alas, there was no perfect world where he and Julia could find peace, he was convinced; such a place existed only in their dreams as children. The closest thing to fixing the world, as he saw it, was to rip apart any man who would think to have him or her burn for existing. She'd born capable of magic, he muses; and him the same, but also an ugly creature instilled with the sinful desire for his own sex. Were they both not creations of the Almighty?]

...

[What did he expect from Hector now? A sincere apology? Were it to come at all, it would be too little, too late. Pausing at length, he wets his lips, a muscle rippling tensely in his jaw. And he releases his grip with a bit of a shove, wiping the saliva from his chin with the back of his hand. Shaking just slightly from the intensity and the adrenaline.]

[ There are, he has learned over time and far too much opportunity, two particular reactions to hysteria: leave the subject to tire of his own tirade, until he's worn enough energy and grief that he slithers back to near-unconsciousness; or act.

For the better part of it, he listened - made the (in)glorious attempt, eyes perhaps a little glazed, a little more lost. He heard the words, but they weighed less than the blade fresh on his belt, less than last night's nightmares. Insults, vehemence, paltry excuses. A choice dish of which he has long tasted. Had his fill.

When Isaac gives him freedom, he thinks to gift wisdom in return. Kindness - a kindness, if nothing else. Doesn't.

...instead, finally, wordlessly, fingers stiff, brazen, he commits to what he should have long ago -

And aims a hard punch the way of Isaac's jaw.

Really, you classless, arrogant fool.

Really? ]

[Where he expects some sort of verbal response, perhaps even a moment of stunned realization, he receives this instead. The jarring blow connects, his head snapping to one side with the impact. Blank-faced, he tastes the coppery tang of blood in an instant and tongues the new, stinging split in his lower lip. There is just a short-lived moment now, before he seemingly becomes fiercely pissed, where his head reels with a sickening dizziness and he’s silent, breathing through parted lips, shaking slightly.

In light of this, their whole conversation, Hector should have been dead to him. He should be able to wash his hands of him at last and move on with this second chance at life unasked for. But a lingering sense of an attachment both foolish and fierce resists every god-damned attempt at being cut and setting him free. Though there is nothing here but hatred, Hector, he can't let you go; even if he never had you to begin with.]

Brother, please, calm down! [ She sighs, placing her hands on her hips. Really, dude, anger management. :|

In any case, she offers him a small smile. ]

Tell me... would you truly like to have Hector join us...?

[What the bloody hell are you so cheery about?]

It matters not... [A little too firmly.] ...nor is it in your power even if you willed it.

[He looks away as if to say, pffft, what sort of question is that?]

[ When am I never attempting to be cheery? ]

I suppose you are correct. 'Twas just a question.

Of course.

...Are you angry with me, brother?

[He exhales through his nose.]

Not you. [Shifting blame onto the mundane, are we? Yes, of course.]

[ She frowns, wanting nothing more than to make poor Isaac happy. She's not really sure that's fully possible, of course, but it would be nice to take his mind off of... things. ]

Forgive me. Is there anything I can do for you, at least?

[Isaac nearly blurts out, 'go away' on an impulse as he turns away, but just barely manages to bite it back and offer a gentler answer.]

Leave me be.

[Where there was once teasing humour, there is nothing now. He bows his head slightly, gazing out with unfocused eyes. ~~It's not your fault, Julia; it's all Hector's fault.~~]

[ She visibly winces; his words sting, even if that was not the intention. ]

...Very well. Farewell.

[ Without another word, she turns and goes her own way to leave her brother to his thoughts. ]

@ luceti - Post!canon Isaac poorly pretending he doesn't think much at all about Hector.

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TW for language and sexual references. Isaac being Isaac.

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