Hollow Immortal

The New Arrival

Dmitri felt very worn out. He ran his fingers through his hair as he stared at the key. He was sitting in Vlad's... his own study so he felt a little less awkward.

He was alone. For the first time in a while, he was alone. He was enjoying the solitude, the only thing he had for company was the sound of the swaying pendulum of a large grandfather clock.

He cringed when three, loud knocks sounded from the doors. He sighed and quickly put the key back into one of his desk drawers.

"Enter!" he called, to let whoever was on the other side of the door know they could come in.

The door squeaked a little when his second in command, Theodore, opened it and he made a mental mote to oil it. Theodore strode to the middle of the room before announcing his reason for disturbing him.

"There is a new arrival I think you might be interested in," he said.

Dmitri raised an eyebrow, "Another Fledgling? Why do I need to see this one?"

"I'd rather not ruin the surprise," Theodore said, then called to the Fledgling outside.

A tall, lean, young man with broad shoulders stepped through the doors. He had a very soft, almost friendly kind of face that was smooth as a little child's and glossy, shoulder-length, black hair. Dmitri looked at his eyes to try and determine what he was. His eyes were pale lilac in colour, indicating that he was Nekrosenti. Dmitri looked at Theodore, questioning his reasoning. He returned his gaze to the Fledgling to look him up and down. He was most certainly a fine male specimen who definitely looked like he could hold his own in a fight but other than that, Dmitri couldn't really see anything special about him.

"Alright," he said, "I'm waiting."

Theodore nodded to the Fledgling, "Tell him what you told me."

"I was attacked," he said, "the other night in my home. I'm not entirely sure how long I was out but I woke up a few hours ago, in my bed, with this on my bedside table."

He reached into a pocket in his brown, leather jacket and presented Dmitri with a folded up piece of paper. Dmitri took it from the Fledgling and unfolded it. It turned out to be a map. A map on which the location that Castle Dracula was located at was marked and, written in red pen and a neat print script, next to the large marker were the words go here.

Dmitri frowned at the map in his hands as he tried to make sense of it. Usually when someone turned a Fledgling they'd bring them in themselves and sort them out. The fact that this one had been left to find his own way was deeply disturbing and made Dmitri more than a little angry. He realised that he was probably going to take his first disciplinary action as the Head of the Draculesti Coven.

"I see," he said, "what's your name?"

"My name is Samuel," the Fledgling said.

There was something about the way he spoke and the way he carried himself that reminded Dmitri of someone else, maybe two others but he couldn't place his finger on who.

"Samuel," he repeated, "welcome to Castle Dracula. I know everything I'm about to say is going to sound crazy to you but you need to know that you are a..."

"Vampire," Samuel finished, "yes, I figured that out on my own. Y'know the lack of a pulse and all."

Dmitri glanced at Theodore, who shrugged and shook his head, then back to Samuel, "You seem to have accepted that."

Samuel nodded, "What else can I do? It's not like it can be reversed or anything so I might as well just go with it."

Dmitri smiled, "Adaptable. You and I will get on just fine. I am Dmitri Vasilescu, by the way. I'm the head of this coven."

Samuel nodded and accepted his hand shake, "I can see that, sir. You're doing a fine job."

Dmitri sighed, it was nice to hear that, "Well, I try my best. Now, on to our first order of business; finding your sire."