A painful moment of held breath passes when the hooded figure turns around at the voices down the alley. Yeosang's fingers are quivering from anticipation, but the knight clutches the fabric of his cloak before he can move from his spot. Flaring eyes crosses with his, faint features are covered by long strands of dark hair, and Yeosang would have sworn if it is not for how his heart seems to wake troublesomely in his chest at the sight; for he can smell the distant note of familiarness.

Not a beat later, the figure darts away, bucket quickly fetched from the edge of the well as he turns down another alley. Yeosang pulls at his arm only to find that Jongho is still keeping him close to him. The boy hisses sharply and he can feel the sharp pinch of his fangs at the inside of his mouth.

"Jongho! Let me get to him before he is off our limits again!"

But Jongho's eyes are stern, drawn sharply as he aims all the reasons why he shall not be running after one who can just as well be a stranger. "No, Yeosang. You must start to control your strong and unreflective urges to act. What if that person is not who we seek?"

Clenching his teeth, Yeosang glares at the other, determined that he is indeed not wrong, "And we will never know if we do not look for it ourselves. Come on!" He pulled at the other again.

Eventually, Jongho gives in, sighing deeply as so, "Fine, last time, then," he grumbles before letting himself be pulled forward.

The boy's sight refocuses on his surroundings, legs sprinting across the ground as he lets his nose catch up on the distinct memory. His newborn body is moving quicker than any human would ever be able to, and soon, with only a few turns down corners of the alley, stonewalls are trapping the running figure on both his sides, the hood haven fallen down his head in the run and the bucket in his hand now scrambling across the ground. Something feels off.

Yeosang presses himself the last bit, feet seemingly gliding through the air as he decisively catches up on him. Walls are stretching up about them and Yeosang doubts that he will get away. Suddenly, a shadow throws itself past him, boots striding across the ground as Jongho blocks the runner's way further down the alley. Fear strikes the air, and without many thoughts to it, the figure presses into the slight space between the wall and a tall cart. As he finally reaches the place, Yeosang expects to be met with the pull of harsh panting, but to his surprise, no such thing is heard. When his eyes fall upon the face, body harshly pressed into the wall, a threatening hiss tears the man's features with revulsing, long teeth. Jongho growls in response, eyes pricking with every last strand of patience he has left.

The boy has lost his words.

In front of him stands a man whose corpse should have withered a long time ago, the remnants of a soul's spirit staring him right in the eyes with the glow of redness. Yeosang's limbs start uncontrollably shaking as his sight wavers.

"Sander?"

The knight's voice is full of fright and Yeosang does not know if he shall act the same. He is too startled to say anything when the face of the knight he supposedly should have killed is being right in front of him, baring his own set of fangs as red is glaring him down. The boy shudders. A moment passes before he recollects himself, but there it is already too late.

Jongho shoves him away when the other vampire leaps forward, the impact so strong that he trips over his own feet and tumbles across the gravel. His heart nearly sparks alive again at the sound of guttural growling and Yeosang turns himself around to see how Jongho fists the other's clothes, forcing his limbs around as he hisses and kicks and resembles nothing else than a wild untamed beast. A punch collides with the side of Jongho's face before the knight stomps his heel down into San's foot and sends a knee straight into his groin. San lets out a deep groan of agony before attacking Jongho another time, throwing his entire body weight forward onto the other. Their counterparting strengths force them both down to the ground with gravity where they tumble around, arms and legs kicking and beating around even when Jongho's head pounds the wall and San seem to have cornered him. Yeosang gathers himself and hurries to their side, pulling San's arms away from where his claws are cutting into Jongho's throat.

"San stop! It is us! You know who we are," Yeosang yells at him while his might fights against San's combative self. The boy moves around, soon coming to look right into blood-red orbs a moment before spit-dripping fangs strike at him.

But Yeosang is stronger than San.

"San!" he repeats, desperation lingering in the way he tones his words. Another hand smothers around San's throat and Jongho's growls vibrate against the skin of his neck as he leans over him from behind.

Slowly, the pressure from them both makes him calm down, and it seems he realises who has caught him with their bare hands. San tries to scramble back but it is of no use as they are too strong for him.

"Wh-what are you two doing here?! Are.. are they coming for me- are they coming to hunt me down.. I.." his ruby eyes bat between them both, and Yeosang believes he must be trying to make out the situation he is caught in. The boy feels how San's eyes come to linger on the fangs peeking out of his mouth and suddenly it looks like he recognises something, "You are.. just like me, the both of you," he bites his lip and Yeosang cannot stop himself from doing the same, feeling how guilt pools in his insides, "but how?"

Yeosang beats Jongho to be breaching the silence first, "Do you not remember?"

The knight has loosened his grip around San's throat just enough for the boy to see how he gulps troublesomely and diverts his gaze somewhere else. He does not answer.

"Sander, listen here, we need to know what you are doing here. How many have you killed?" Jongho says instead and the boy can clearly hear the urgent frown in his words.

San closes his eyes and it looks painful, "I- maybe a few..not many, I promise."

"Bloody hell," the knight curses before he moves away from them both, "We need to get away from this village then, we cannot stay here when the Order is already close to this area."

It is as if he and Jongho have changed roles.

All of a sudden San's eyes widen as he strains against Yeosang's hands holding his arms, "No! We cannot leave this place.. I have someone I need to look out for- he is sick, which is all my fault. I.. I am confident you both know how..."

Letting go of the former knight's arms, Yeosang slides back across the uneven ground until they both are within his view. Jongho is pinching the bridge of his nose, dark locks of hair falling into his eyes at the way his head is tilting downwards. "You must understand- we cannot wait around here, it would be hazardous!"

"Then you go! I will stay with him," San counters as he embraces himself underneath the untidied cloak he wears. His facial expression is deeply serious as he looks around at them both and the boy cannot hold his thoughts to wander along the foul memories from the dungeons. He can not have San experiencing that, too.

"San, they will find you and they will make you suffer, you must not know how cruel they are to those who they believe to be hell's demons," his voice cracked at the last word, fear tracing through the lines of pauses for unneeded breath as trembling pupils widened. From the way that San's own eyes widen, he knows that he must have sounded like he was telling from the scars painting his soul with stains that never would heal. The man in front of him realises this now and his lips quiver with unspoken words.

"You do not understand; this man put himself in danger to save the remnants of my life. This is the least I can do for him," San says, and he is not to pull out of his made decision. This man must be excessively special to San.

To his right, Jongho snorts out of disgruntlement, shaking his head as he pulls himself to stand. With both his hands he flattens out his ruffled clothes and silently dries the smudged blood off his cheek. The knight sighs heavily before he notices Yeosang looking at him with beseeching eyes; pleading with him to do anything about this.

"We could find somewhere to hide in the village.."

Growling lowly, Jongho steps forward and pulls the boy to his feet, his thumb and pointer finger grasping around his chin as he stares him right into his red-stained eyes, "I know that you just want to make sure he is safe, but staying here would be risking all of our lives. If Sander says he has killed people in this village, then it will not take long before the Order will invade; it is only a matter of time before they will come, for murder is the most obvious clue to vampire activities. Words will travel around in this area."

"What if we.. follow him to the place he stays at and we discuss everything there then? Please Jongho.. please, just this time. If they come here, we could silently leave the village through the shadowy alleys where they never will see."

For a moment contemplation graces the other's face as Yeosang watches how he falls into considerative pondering of what he just has said. The continuing whispers of small pleas echo in the dark alley as Yeosang's head falls into Jongho's chest. His knotted guts tighten so much that he faintly can feel the tears running down his face. Yeosang feels so many emotions at once that his body cannot comprehend what to show first. Relief? Grief? Happiness?

A soft hand combs through his neck hair before the strong knight puts his following words firmly, "Alright then, Sander, show us the way to the place you stay at."

"Follow me."

_____

Jongho stays close by the boy's side when they wander down different alleys in the darkness that San steers them through. No one is saying anything, but the silence is enough for Yeosang to discern the heaviness of the many emotions blending from them all.

There is something quite different about San aside from the obvious of his own rebirth as one living off drinking blood. His hood is pulled up, hiding his head from any curious eyes of the night, despite that is so, the boy still can make out the missing blonde hair beneath the thick fabric. The bright knight he had met at the fortress has been replaced by an anxious, dark creature - there is no doubt poison has been in touch with his blood banes and infected him with an immortal disease, perhaps one considered even worse than the Black Death. One that they will never be relieved of.

San does not look like himself. His blonde hair is coloured ink black and Yeosang fears the reason why.

Soon they stand in front of a gate into a crammed backyard and San glances across his shoulders to look at Jongho and him, but Yeosang suspects it to be that he makes sure that no one is following him. Without any shared word, they step through the opening, quickly being guided toward the door into the prosperous-looking building. The home is dark, but Yeosang can still make out the interiors, mixing with the scent of something sweet. When San fetches a burning lantern from another room Yeosang's eyes fall upon the stains of blood across the stone wall.

"I killed the family," says San expressionlessly in a way that takes the boy by surprise to how the other suddenly seems so poised.

"Where is he?" Jongho asks and Yeosang senses how his fingers dance around the grip of his sword.

"I was supposed to bring some more water when you two found me, as I told you before he is deadly sick and I simply just wanted to relieve him a little from the fever."

"San, please do us the favour and show us him. Perhaps can we help, but if it already is too late, then he might already be out of this building on a killing spree, I need to know whether any of those are true," the knight's fingers are trailing along the grooves in the wall, touching the dried stains of blood as to emphasize the reason of him to know.

Gulping, San nods at him with a firm swift with his head before he walks further into the heart of the building. They both follow him as they pass a small dining room and continue up a row of stairs. Then he halts in front of a heavy door, turning on his feet to tell them that he locked the room for the exact reason that Jongho priorly had voiced.

"I was afraid that he would just run off before I got him under control," San then says, before placing down the lantern onto the floor and pulling up a key from his pocket. Then he unlocks the door and it creaks open.

As the boy moves forward, Jongho draws him back, pulling him in behind himself as he shields him with his body from any possible attack. Yeosang knows it is only of protective instincts that Jongho does, but he cannot help himself but taste the bitterness in his mouth. He can defend himself if needed, and Jongho knows it.

They are enveloped in the scent of boiling blood heavily lingering in the air, sticking to their bodies as they move into the hollering darkness. Despite not being able to see the man yet, the smell reveals how life still clings on to the body being in here, at least for the time being now. His heart is helplessly fighting against a death sentence.

San places the lantern onto a bed table, moving around the bed and gently sitting down on the bed as he lifts his hands to feel the dying man's forehead.

A dry whispering crosses the dense air, hovering above their heads as if pressing them deeper into the floor, "..San?" Yeosang thinks the man sounds so feeble that he wonders when the time will come when life will leave him entirely. And yet, the boy pivots his hearing to the heavy pattern of his breathing, fingers clutching around Jongho's arm as he steps around to see the man in the bed better.

There he sees how tense the situation actually outplays; how San's shaking hands hold around the man's head that Yeosang has trouble perceiving if it is out of fear of observing a human dying or for being so close to a heart full of fresh, vital blood. Yeosang's intestines twist around and he diverts his eyes elsewhere when the scene suddenly stands so intimate for him to watch.

"I am here, I am here.." San stresses, hands reassuringly pressing around the man's shoulders, "Do you want some water?"

The man on the bed does not move anywhere and yet his breath still hitches, "I can't, San I can't.. It hurts, hurts so so much."

"Wooyoung can you look at me, please? There you go, there, focus on me."

Yeosang shudders at San's relieving words, unconsciously starting to sway a little on his feet. That is until the knight by his side grabs him and tugs him into his arms, face still directing the man on the bed. His teeth ache for the seething blood he can hear streaming through the veins. San moves the light to stand on the opposite side of the man's head, now lighting up the tear stains following the hollowness of his cheeks.

At that moment Yeosang thinks his eyes are going to burst out of their eye sockets. This cannot be..

"Am I..." his Wooyoung mumbles incoherently, looking Yeosang right into his gaze with a feverish glaze across his dark eyes. The former knight by his side leans further down to him, tucking a strand of his hair behind his ear carefully, "Are you what? Wooyoung..?"

Words are formed, but it seems like they leave Wooyoung's lips soundlessly, "Am I.. I dreaming.. Yeo..."

Rolling shut, the man's expression unfocuses before fully fading. San's hands silently pull at him to gain his attention anew but Yeosang is sure that he knows the racing heart in the other's chest already has cramped its last beat.

The boy feels his legs give in under him before he even perceives what is happening. In the far distance where his own voice screams at him his body writhes in Jongho's strong hold on him as he keeps howling: "Wooyoung! Wooyoung!!" as if that would bring him back alive.

Yeosang bares his fangs at them both, arms before he wildly kicks the knight away from him and jolts forward into the bed where Wooyoung lays. His trembling hands cradle the dead man's head as tears drip down and puddle in the dips of his features. He screams at the world; at humankind's foolish beliefs; at his life; at his twisted fate! Somewhere amidst all of it he turns around and scares the other predators away, strings of spit running from his mouth as he feral hisses at them to go away and leave him alone - for his heart is bleeding with sorrows and so much pain.

Yeosang's childhood friend has just died a tragic death and he is the reason why.

With his shoulders hunched in the way he hovers above Wooyoung's lifeless body, his chest could have been heaving and sinking and the boy's eyes darken. Slowly, he pulls down at the clothing around Wooyoung's neck but he shall not far down before he is met with the faint traces of a two-pointed wound that has healed. Nothing else is to be seen.

⚔︎