Belle Morte Bites (Belle Morte 4.3)

Francois: Part Two

Paris, 1680

Edmond wasn't expecting the mob when it came.

When François returned after another night spent alone somewhere in the city, Edmond was waiting for him in the parlour. Usually they didn't talk about where he went, but Edmond couldn't bear it anymore.

The man who'd become his best friend was slipping away from him, the bonds of everything they shared unravelling and Edmond didn't know why, or how to stop it.

"Where do you go at night?" he asked without preamble.

François paused in the doorway, head tilted.

"We used to do everything together and now I don't even know who you are anymore," Edmond pressed.

François turned to leave, and Edmond launched himself forward, pushing the older vampire against the wall in the hallway.

They froze like that for a moment, staring at each other. Then François curled his hands around Edmond's, just hard enough to display his superior strength.

"Let go of me," he said, quiet and deadly.

"I'm trying to help you," Edmond said, refusing to back off.

François's eyes hardened, red creeping in, but before he could say anything, there was a sudden crash at the door.

Edmond let François go just as another crash sounded, the door shaking under the impact of whatever was hitting it.

François's eyes flared fully red, his lip curling back from his fangs. "What's –"

The door flew open.

A horde of people spilled inside, and Edmond recognised none of them, but they all stared at him and François like they wanted to skin them alive.

"What is this?" Edmond murmured.

François didn't get a chance to answer.

The man at the head of the horde strode forward, his face dark with anger and hatred. "Do you know me, demon?" he asked François.

François looked him up and down, lazily, as if the man was barely worth his time. "Should I?"

"My name is Frédéric Auclair." His voice was taut with rage. "I believe you knew my daughter."

Edmond looked from François to Frédéric, utterly baffled. "Your daughter?"

Frédéric didn't tear his eyes from François.

"François? What's going on?" Edmond said urgently, dread creeping like ice across his skin. "What have you done?"

"This is a misunderstanding," said François, smooth and unruffled.

"You murdered my daughter," Frédéric roared.

He snatched a silver cross from under his coat and slapped it against François's face. It was the silver rather than the religious icon that caused François to scream and reel back, but it emboldened the mob anyway, and they charged at him, brandishing knives and clubs.

François tore the cross away from his face, and a long strip of skin came with it, fused to the silver, leaving a bloody, blistered furrow running from his forehead to his jaw.

Eyes blazing, he snapped Frédéric's neck with one hand and hurled his body at the rest of the mob, but it didn't slow them down.

Some of them were praying, their eyes bright with fervour, and more wielded crosses and bibles like weapons as they closed in on François. He fought them, and Edmond, flattened against the wall, heard the awful sound of crunching bones and tearing flesh, but François's eyes were full of blood, streaming from the hideous wound on his face, and vampires weren't invulnerable, even ones as old and strong as François.