krystalkatzficz | The night you came part 25

“My father was always cold towards me” Nino explained softly his eyes closing as they settled back on the sofa with a blanket wrapped around them. “I was never his favourite child even when I was his only child. He couldn’t be in the same room with me without telling me how much of a disappointment I was…I never cared, he wasn’t what I would have wanted in a father either, so I suppose that it made two of us…When Jun was born, he was completely different. He showed him affection that he never showed to me. More often than not he tried to make us compete against each other…”

“He and my father would like each other…How can parents be so cold to their children?” Satoshi hummed his arms tightening around him and Nino rested back against the human. He was the king of the vampires. So much was expected of him but here in Satoshi’s arms he felt…Cherished. He liked that feeling and he didn’t want to ever lose it.

“I don’t know, his need to control me and Jun came to nothing. Jun has always been one of my biggest fans even if he pretends not to like me…” Nino grinned happily turning to face the human and pressing his nose into his neck. “This isn’t impossible, I have given it a lot of thought. Jun was always better suited to run the company side of things. I don’t really do anything as king these days. Just settle petty feuds which can be done anywhere, and they only crop up every so often…Except the Yamashita’s and Ikuta’s. Honestly nobody would even notice that I wasn’t there…”

His father had liked to act more involved often throwing his weight around into peoples’ business even when they hadn’t wanted him to, but Nino wasn’t going to be like that. The other vampires weren’t children that needed to be monitored 24-7 after all. He had overheard the other heads of families talking about his father and he knew that the interference his father had done had almost caused a civil…Or rather not so civil war. They wanted a figure head. A relic of the once glorious past but they didn’t want him sticking his nose in where it wasn’t needed, and Nino was more than happy to live by that.

“What does the king of Vampires do anyway?” Satoshi mused gently and Nino chuckled before humming;

“Sit pretty and wave…There is a meeting once a year with the heads of the houses and I have to sit there and wave…or frown. Depending on what is being said…”

“But how did the Ninomiya’s get picked?” Satoshi asked and Nino smiled. He wished the Ninomiya’s had been picked. The Ninomiya’s were more level headed than the Matsumoto’s although he wasn’t close with them, he had always had more of an attachment to his grandparents on his mother’s side, it was why he had honoured them by carrying the Ninomiya name when he was appointed king.

“The Ninomiya’s didn’t the Ninomiya’s are my mother’s family I am the only one that uses the name Ninomiya…It is the Matsumoto side…You know that mark on my hip that you are so fond of? It has been on every king of vampires for a thousand or more years. The story goes that a thousand years ago the vampire clans were fighting each trying to prove that they were the best. Then Dracula…”

“Dracula? Come on…He’s not real…” Satoshi spluttered, and Nino laughed a little confused before he remembered the story written by Bram Stoker. By all accounts the vampire Stoker had gotten a kick out of writing Dracula and making it as unrealistic as possible.

“No…But Vlad was, Stoker was a vampire himself…Listen okay? Vlad…Dracula…He saw the way that all the vampires were fighting and realised that if we carried on like that, we would either kill ourselves or expose ourselves to the humans. He came up with a tournament…” Nino said with a little shrug easily remembering the story from the book he had read when he had been only ten years old. It had been a dusty old tome kept in his father’s study...Which was probably his study now…He could feel the way the yellowed pages had crinkled under his touch and feel the harsh blow that his father had given him for touching it at all. “All families were allowed to put forth an heir as champion. The tournament lasted for several months but in the end the victor became the head…The king…The Matsumoto’s won” Nino frowned rubbing his cheek as though his father had just struck him now. “When they had done so Dracula was said to have heated up a fire poker and set it on the hip of the champion declaring that from that day forth all true heirs of the Matsumoto line would bear the mark of the king…Since then every king has born the mark and all vampires listen...”

“Why did they respect that?” It was a fair question and one that Nino had wondered himself until he had spoken about it with Sho. The vampiric priest had reminded him that Dracula was the closest thing to a god like figure the vampires had. His word was law and even now the name Dracula was enough to send shivers down even the most battle hardened vampire before they looked around to make sure he wasn’t there.

“Dracula is basically our God…” Nino explained wishing Sho was here to explain it a little better. He hadn’t paid attention to his own religious education he wasn’t going to listen to the human religions. “Would you want to go against God? The things you’ve heard about are only half of what he was like…”

“Then why didn’t he become king?”

“He fought but was beaten…Though historical evidence suggests that he didn’t want to win. That’s what the families believe anyway…” Nino mumbled. It was what he believed. Dracula was already worshiped as a god why would he want to be a king.

“But they don’t have to follow now. Why not rebel?”

“Because there isn’t a need to and…Vampires are smaller in number now…” Nino answered expecting the question that came next, more so after what Satoshi had asked that morning about being changed into a vampire.

“But the heads of families can make more. You said…”

“When a human is changed by anyone but the king…They don’t come back whole…There was a time when these half-vampires were used as soldiers…They are also where the idea of vampires being killed by sunlight comes from…” He said in a whisper rolling over and looking the human in the face. “I could change you and you would be a perfect vampire but if…Yamashita senor changed you…You would be no better than a blood thirsty zombie…”

“So, I want to be changed I come to you…” Satoshi laughed weakly and Nino gave a smile in response before nipping lightly at the man’s neck squeezing him tight before humming softly;

“I will be waiting…”

TBC

A/N: I hope that this is okay >.<