Blood Curse

Yuui lay on his back on the floor of an old storage shed. His eyes were closed but his senses were returning to him as he woke. He could feel the hard stone floor against his back and he could smell a musty scent in the air coupled with stale hay. His body felt strange, his limbs were heavy.

But...why was he feeling anything at all? His recent memories were hazy. But he knew that he should be dead. He remembered being held in Wall's massive arms, his blood limp as blood, his life essence, drained out of him onto the ground.

He'd known he was going to die. And yet he could still feel things. But no pain. There was absolutely no pain, just some mild discomfort from laying too long on a hard floor.

He could sense Wall near him. The man's presence was hard to miss as large as he was. And it was a familiar thing for Yuui to know that Wall was there beside him when he woke. He also could tell.

Something was different though. He could hear Wall's heart beating. He could sense the flood of blood through his body. And with that thought came a thirst so strong that burned his throat and caused him to groan.

Wall didn't speak, though he badly wanted to check that yuui was okay. But the guilt was setting in and he was sure that his solution to the problem wouldn't be well received.

Worse than that, he had failed. Failed to protect his little mouse.

Silence from Wall was nothing unusual. He didn't feel like he could speak yet. So he stayed quiet and continued to lay there on the floor. His memories were slowly returning. He'd been struggling against Wall saving him. He'd begged him not to. And then a pain had gone through all of his body.

Is that why he ached now? The pain? But what had caused it? And why the iron taste in his mouth?

Slowly he tried to sit up. He felt so weak. He opened his eyes and blinked against the sunlight coming in through the patches in the roof. His eyes scanned the room and found Wall. His eyes, once the blue of Valerian's royalty, were no longer that color but golden. A vampire's eyes.

Wall stared back at those eyes. His own saying a whole lot more than his mouth did. He opened his lips to say something, but instead he closed them. His eyes didn't falter and he didn't look away either.

Wall's silence spoke quite a lot to Yuui. The way that he looked at him did as well. Wall might not be breaking eye contact but Yuui did. He looked down at his body. At his clothing. His clothes were ruined and stained with blood but the flesh underneath was untouched. That wasn't right...

"What did you do?" he asked Wall, his voice hoarse and soft. He hadn't been healed. He remembered Megumi trying and failing. He'd been too close to death for her to save with what remained of her magic at that moment.

"The only think I could to save you," Wall said, his voice betraying his feelings. It creaked and croaked horribly. "I am sorry, mouse. For my selfish behaviour."

"Selfish..." Yuui repeated. He didn't understand. Other than saving him when he didn't want to be saved, how could he be selfish? He went to ask again what it was that he had become. But the memory surfaced then. One word floated to the surface and hung there. "Vampire?!" he gasped, the very word paining him to say. A fear like he'd never felt before gripped at his heart and caused his chest to tighten. He bent over slightly from it, staring at Wall for desperate confirmation that it wasn't so.

"Yes." Wall said, he didn't say anything else. He didn't see the point. That was enough for Yuui to never forgive him.

Yuui certainly wasn't think of forgiveness at the moment. He could only stare at Wall with a shocked expression on his face. Shock turned to anger, something he'd never felt towards Wall before. "How could you do this to me?!" he cried, hot tears spilling down his cheeks with anger. "Why could you not just let me go? How could you ever think that I would want to live if it meant taking the lives of others?! I won't do it! I won't be a monster!" he shouted.

"I'm not asking you to be." Wall said, he could feel his anger bubbling. But he wasn't going to snap. Not at Yuui. "I have it figured out, mouse."

Yuui's anger fizzled. It was so hard for him to be angry. It was not an emotion he felt very often. And of late it was really only towards Jihae. But never towards Wall. "What?" he asked, no longer shouting.

His head was starting to ache. He was so thirsty. But now he knew what that thirst was and what it meant. He did not want to do anything about it. He just couldn't do that. He'd starve before he killed an innocent for their blood.

"You will feed from me. I am big strong man, you tiny mouse. You cannot drain me." Wall said, he felt very confident in that. "You will never have to kill. You will only drink what you need from me."

Yuui stared at Wall. The man was probably right. He was far too big to be able to drain. Not when Yuui was much smaller than him. "From you?" he asked. "I don't know if I can do that to you.."

"You can. But if not I force you. You need to drink to survive. It's like eating. Come here." Wall said and waved his hand to motion Yuui over. "You won't hurt me. I trust you, like you trust monster."

Yuui sighed softly. "You are not a monster," he said. "That's always been me." The cursed boy that killed an entire kingdom of people. He was the monster. Not the gentle giant before him.

Slowly he crawled over to Wall. He was far too weak to stand and walk to him. But he couldn't bring himself to do it. To bite Wall. The very idea was repulsive to him even if his body was screaming at him with how thirsty he was.

Wall scoffed, "little mouse is no monster." He didn't and wouldn't ever believe that. When he noticed that Yuui wasn't drinking still, he took a knife and cut his wrist. "Little mouse feed now," he said and held it out to him.

Yuui did not want to drink the blood. The very thought disgusted him. Unfortunately that was only mentally. Physically he very much wanted that blood. And he needed it. So while he resisted, in the end he could not win, and he lunged for the wrist, lapping up the blood that spilled out of the wound that Wall had created.

The blood had an iron taste that was not surprising but it was also sweet. The pain of his thirst eased as he continued to drink. He stopped well before he was full, just when the thirst was gone and he realized what he'd done. He shoved Wall's wrist away but he knew as he did that there was no point. This was how he had to live now.

Yuui wasn't strong enough to push Wall's wrist anyway, but the man moved it. "Feel better?"

"Yes," Yuui replied miserably. The pain in his head and throat were gone. He couldn't deny that the blood helped him. But he couldn't find the words to say anything more on it. He was still weak from being brought back from the brink of death and undergoing the change in his body to become a vampire.

"You must rest, before we leave. The others are waiting for you to get your strength back." Wall said, because he wasn't the only one that needed Yuui anymore.

Yuui put his head down at the mention of the others and felt a strange sort of guilt. "You're right..." He cared very little for his own life. He wasn't out to die but if it happened to protect someone, well, he'd be okay with that. But he couldn't die yet. Those children, they needed someone who would look out for them for no other reason than to help them. And they didn't have that but in him. He couldn't stop going yet. Not while they still needed him.

"I am not just selfish for me. But for dragon boy and fish girl. Who will protect them from evil overlord if not you?" Wall said and stroked Yuui's hair affectionately. "It is not just us any more, little mouse. We have family to protect."

"I've never actually succeeded at that..." Yuui said mournfully. All his family had died despite his best efforts. "But I guess that's no reason to give up trying," he added, trying to smile for Wall though he didn't really feel it inside.

"New family is different. We have learned from past endeavours and will apply in new adventures. No?" Wall said, he knew the smile wasnt really a real one. But he'd get there. "Besides, evil overlord can't be trusted with new family. Impure priestess has weird feelings for dragon boys, because dragon man with good intent, bad actions is also him. They will be lost without us. They're all idiots in a rat maze and just one brain cell to lead them."

Yuui laughed then. "You're not wrong," he said. He thought the same thing but in different terms. "Oh, they're definitely complicated people in a strange situation none of them seem to grasp well. And it's not like we can exactly trust the spy to lead them properly either...He'll just do as Ryuu wants." Ah, but it was so stupid, this whole situation.

"This wouldn't be so hard if Dialga would just play nice and explain himself. But They never do that, do they? I swear they like to watch us squirm and run about. Except for My Lady, of course." He sighed unhappily.