In the Dark

Prologue

The irony that he was muzzled by vampires might dawn on Leon one day. On that day, it would be laughable that these pointy-toothed fuckers had strapped leather into his mouth just to still his tongue. The leather was so thick, it left no room for his tongue to move, and he'd gagged on it at first. After he'd grown accustomed enough to the feel of it, he'd rounded angrily on the nearest vampire, only to find the most he was capable of doing was make very muffled angry sounds that sounded animal in nature even to his own ears. Puffing, he'd had to admit defeat and let himself fall to silence. This situation was definitely not funny yet.

Despite the bravado he'd been bravely displaying in front of his captors so far, he was, in fact, terrified. He'd been taken off the road as easily and naively as a dog, following a stranger's promise of warm food straight into the claws of these fanged fucks. He now found himself bruised and sore from the resulting journey, not only having been gagged for his mouth, but also finding himself on the receiving end of a few angry fists.

He was disoriented from it all, and was a little fuzzy on the time it had taken to reach their destination. He was certain it had been many days, however, as he'd caught a glance of the great expanse of desert that lay to the west of where he'd been. It was at least a 4 day journey to the edges of the desert from where they'd started from. It was no wonder at all that he was aching from bouncing in the back of a carriage.

Despite it all, Leon found himself still capable of walking behind the tall vampire who led him to his fate. His wrists were tied in rope, connected to the vampire's hand who held it tightly in his fist. Leon could do nothing in protest but drag his feet and glare a hole into the back of his head, which was little more than doing nothing, and eventually the vampire scoffed, annoyed.

"Hurry up," the man growled in a most inhuman way when Leon reached the end of his rope yet again from lagging behind. The vampire lurched it forward, sending Leon stumbling as he tried to keep from falling forward. The vampire glanced back in time to see the murderous glare Leon gave him, but only smiled cruelly back. "You better not give such ugly looks to the empress," he said. "She won't take such disrespect from you." At seeing Leon's look, he laughed. "That's right. The empress. She'll be very interested in you. No one's seen a fae in almost a century. She'll be wanting a taste for sure."

'Fuck you,' Leon tried to shout through the gag, but the noises that came were, of course, incomprehensible. It was a shame he could not let the curses flow like a river; perhaps it would not help him out of this situation, but it would feel so good.

Leon continued to be lead in silence after that through what was certainly an impressive piece of architecture. It was hard for Leon to make out in the darkness of this vampire's lair, but he saw great stone pillars that stood proud and strong as they rose up into a ceiling so impossibly high up that it was more like a blanket of darkness than something Leon could quite grasp as a tangible shelter above them. In between pillars was a stone railing, and just beyond it... Leon wasn't quite sure what it was he was seeing. There were flickers of light as if like fire lit far off in the distance, illuminating only tiny portions of what seemed like an expansive space out in the darkness. He could faintly hear voices echoing, but he wasn't sure if that was from out in the darkness or somewhere closer by. With how disorienting this dark was, Leon was sure even if he managed to somehow overpower the vampire leading him through it that he would be unable to escape simply for how he would certainly stumble around in the darkness.

The silent walk through chilling darkness was finally broken by the vampire stopping them in front of a large set of double doors carved into the wood like lattice with flowering vines climbing up it. The flowering vine pattern instantly made him want for home with a dull ache in his heart. What he wouldn't give to see his family's lush garden just one more time: to roll in the soft clover with their dog, pick strawberries and eat them right there in the sunlight, and to splash and laugh in the river with his siblings.