Mayfair Manor

[Vikteren]

All the while, as this fragmented conversation went on about him, Vikteren, at the window, had been perfectly still; watching Antha and her cousins from behind a curtain of dark hair, without so much as a flicker of interest within those moss-green eyes.
But he was interested.
The vampire reached out, brushing gently against Antha's mind, much like an errant breeze might stir her curls, searching for something to link their words together into coherence.  

[XCandy and LunacyX]

Whether she knew he was invading her mind or not wasn't clear, but she put up no barriers and the answers were fresh on Antha's mind. So many years, all of her life and Armand's life and Julien's life---everyone who had been born into the Mayfair family since Suzanne's lives---had suffered it. They had never been human, and most humans knew as much of them. Vampires hated them for facts they had no hand in, and so often vampires found sport in torturing witches. So many Mayfairs had gone crazy because of what they were, Antha included.
Witches were suspended between the two races, vampire and human. They could never fall onto the side of human, though many still hoped. The only solution Antha and her cousins could ever find was to become vampires. They wouldn't be halflings, couldn't be discriminated against by vampires. To them it was the only way to get off of the dividing line and find their place.
Quickly her mind closed up, her eyes hardening as the thin veil of salt water sprang up, never spilling over but quivering against her eyelids for a moment before drying. "Soon, mon cher." Her eyes flickered at Vikteren, the emotion in her face wiped clean for a split second before she looked back to Armand.

 

[Vikteren]

+Rotting Lunacy+

Whether she knew he was invading her mind or not wasn't clear, but she put up no barriers and the answers were fresh on Antha's mind. So many years, all of her life and Armand's life and Julien's life---everyone who had been born into the Mayfair family since Suzanne's lives---had suffered it. They had never been human, and most humans knew as much of them. Vampires hated them for facts they had no hand in, and so often vampires found sport in torturing witches. So many Mayfairs had gone crazy because of what they were, Antha included.
Witches were suspended between the two races, vampire and human. They could never fall onto the side of human, though many still hoped. The only solution Antha and her cousins could ever find was to become vampires. They wouldn't be halflings, couldn't be discriminated against by vampires. To them it was the only way to get off of the dividing line and find their place.
Quickly her mind closed up, her eyes hardening as the thin veil of salt water sprang up, never spilling over but quivering against her eyelids for a moment before drying. "Soon, mon cher." Her eyes flickered at Vikteren, the emotion in her face wiped clean for a split second before she looked back to Armand.

Vikteren stiffened slightly, but said nothing. This was Antha's choice, and there was likely very little that he could have said that would have persuaded her from it.
As long as he wasn't called upon to turn her himself, he would keep well out of it. Ridiculous thing to want, even for the unmanageable brat princess herself.  

[Hell Is Upon Us]

Lawrence, Dolly Jean, and Cortland followed up the stairs. Dolly Jean stood beside the door and cried. Cortland kicked back in a chair adn threw books at Armand while he watched the vampire from the corner of his eye. Lawrence stood motionless. He saw Antha falling, falling, down into the open grave. Little Antha, his 11 year old cousin. Falling, falling, and he couldn't move and save her. He had dreamed this and it had run through his mind for days. Antha in the rickety cage. Sleet rattling the cage, plunging his hands in and shaking Antha violently. Antha crying, screaming. In the hospital rushing through the hallway on a stretcher hooked up to emergency wires. Feeble breath in the oxygen mask and the heart monitor going dead. Antha dead. "He'll pay eventually."
Cortland shrugged and lit up a cigarette. "What the hell are we discussing any more?" He made a gesture with the lighter and chucked it at the vampire by the window. He wanted to test him.  

[Vikteren]

Hell Is Upon Us

Lawrence, Dolly Jean, and Cortland followed up the stairs. Dolly Jean stood beside the door and cried. Cortland kicked back in a chair adn threw books at Armand while he watched the vampire from the corner of his eye. Lawrence stood motionless. He saw Antha falling, falling, down into the open grave. Little Antha, his 11 year old cousin. Falling, falling, and he couldn't move and save her. He had dreamed this and it had run through his mind for days. Antha in the rickety cage. Sleet rattling the cage, plunging his hands in and shaking Antha violently. Antha crying, screaming. In the hospital rushing through the hallway on a stretcher hooked up to emergency wires. Feeble breath in the oxygen mask and the heart monitor going dead. Antha dead. "He'll pay eventually."
Cortland shrugged and lit up a cigarette. "What the hell are we discussing any more?" He made a gesture with the lighter and chucked it at the vampire by the window. He wanted to test him.

He moved out of it's path, and watched it fall past him.
Then he plucked it from the air, too neatly to be human, as though it fell as slowly as a feather in his eyes.
After a moment, he tossed it back.  

[XCandy and LunacyX]

Antha sighed, a hand thrown up to her temple and eyes closed in frustration. After a few moments, when Armand was still freaking out and Malakai and Lawrence were worrying themselves over nothing and Dolly Jean wouldn't stop crying, she gave a loud sound of exasperation, leaping up and crawling into Courtland's arms with her hands over her ears. "We have such a loud family," she muttered in complaint, "I mean really now!"

 

[.David Talbot.]

Malakai's eyes were wary. "Antha?" he asked calmly, his voice full of concern, "Are you alright?" He didn't got o her; he knew Courtland was too possessive to let Malakai touch a girl that had run to him. So instead he turned to Vikteren with a brittle smile. I would like to talk with you. Would you mind following me to the kitchen? He didn't doubt that any outsider would like to escape the gathering int he library. Like they said, Mayfairs were crazy. So quietly he slipped out and retraced his steps back into the kitchen, sitting back in the same spot at the table and quickly snatching up the sheet of paper and putting it into his pocket.

 

[XCandy and LunacyX]

Quickly Antha's eyes narrowed as she lifted her head and her sights trailed after Malakai. But she kept quiet until he was safely seated downstairs. It was then that, gradually, the light matter in the air came together and Antha's image was fashioned leaning against the wall, bare but for the white button-up shirt of Nicolae's that she wore to sleep and the immaculate Mayfair emerald strung around her neck.
The effect she placed upon her image was both natural and eerie---without her makeup, the extravagance of her eyes was more easily noticeable as reality rather than some trick produced by the black bordering them, and the lack of lipstick and powder made her more severe in her intense expression than ever.
This was how she let her image stand, arms folded over her chest and gaze fixed on her dear older brother. Do be careful what you say, she told him sternly, a sincere threat, the words only in his head though her pale lips did move. Because I know you, Malakai, and you never did hesitate to betray my wishes for what you believed to be in my best interest, did you now?

 

[Vikteren]

.David Talbot.

Malakai's eyes were wary. "Antha?" he asked calmly, his voice full of concern, "Are you alright?" He didn't got o her; he knew Courtland was too possessive to let Malakai touch a girl that had run to him. So instead he turned to Vikteren with a brittle smile. I would like to talk with you. Would you mind following me to the kitchen? He didn't doubt that any outsider would like to escape the gathering int he library. Like they said, Mayfairs were crazy. So quietly he slipped out and retraced his steps back into the kitchen, sitting back in the same spot at the table and quickly snatching up the sheet of paper and putting it into his pocket.

His gaze went to Antha; partially out of concern, partially because it was so very easy--even after all this time--to slip into his old habits. But he followed Malakai; he too wished to speak with the other. Tucking his pale hands into the dark fabric of his trouser pockets, Vikteren followed Malakai out of the library. He kept his head high and his gaze uninterrupted, but any who knew him well--and very few belonged in that category--might have noted the subtle tensing in his shoulders, the lapse of his gait into that curiously unnatural vampiric grace once again. Little signs that he was not quite at the ease which his upbringing gave him the ability to pretend at.  

[.David Talbot.]

Malakai was quiet for a minute and just watched Antha's figure before he took a deep breath and sent the small collection of spirits at his side out at her shadow. It wouldn't keep her away for long, and she would be angry when she came again, but he needed the minute alone. "Vikteren." His eyes looked up from behind his lashes and strands of black hair. "I don't imagine protecting Antha is what you'd really like to be doing right about now. And I don't know why exactly you're doing it either. But right now, I owe you my life." His eyes lowered again when he came to the point and he began lacing and unlacing his fingers. "Antha is all I have. She means the world to me. She might have died going into Sleet's room alone and he'd be after her now if you weren't beside her. So I just wanted to say that no matter what our aunts and uncles and cousins say, I think I'm not the only one who's grateful. It might not mean much to you but it's true. So....." He raised his eyes to the vampire again. "So just thank you." He stood up quietly and rounded the table to go back to the stairs. He stopped when he passed by Vikteren and looked at him for a moment, reflecting on everything Antha had said and done. "Did......" He lost his words and sat down again, hands clenched together on the table. "Did Antha....did she tell you about the Red Crayon Aristocrats? About the things we've done?"

 

[Vikteren]

.David Talbot.

Malakai was quiet for a minute and just watched Antha's figure before he took a deep breath and sent the small collection of spirits at his side out at her shadow. It wouldn't keep her away for long, and she would be angry when she came again, but he needed the minute alone. "Vikteren." His eyes looked up from behind his lashes and strands of black hair. "I don't imagine protecting Antha is what you'd really like to be doing right about now. And I don't know why exactly you're doing it either. But right now, I owe you my life." His eyes lowered again when he came to the point and he began lacing and unlacing his fingers. "Antha is all I have. She means the world to me. She might have died going into Sleet's room alone and he'd be after her now if you weren't beside her. So I just wanted to say that no matter what our aunts and uncles and cousins say, I think I'm not the only one who's grateful. It might not mean much to you but it's true. So....." He raised his eyes to the vampire again. "So just thank you." He stood up quietly and rounded the table to go back to the stairs. He stopped when he passed by Vikteren and looked at him for a moment, reflecting on everything Antha had said and done. "Did......" He lost his words and sat down again, hands clenched together on the table. "Did Antha....did she tell you about the Red Crayon Aristocrats? About the things we've done?"

A flicker of recognition in those eyes, at an unfamiliar gesture.
Surprise, although it showed nowhere else upon his face. He might have been a statue, carved of stone, for all the emotion he betrayed.
Vikteren watched Malakai, guarded, wary, as he approached, half-expecting...he didn't know what.
But when only the question came, he let himself relax. Only a fraction.
"No." he said. "The topic has not availed itself as of yet."
The vampire hesitated.
"But I must confess that I am curious."  

[.David Talbot.]

He was quiet for almost two entire minutes while he organized his thoughts. He just watched the table, half waiting for Antha to return, and thought very hard about what was too much to say and what wasn't. "It was never easy being a Mayfair. Especially not for Antha and not for us either. That was why he---our prince---sort of snapped when we were little. Everything they told us about ideal Mayfairs, their special traits and their beauty and their power and grace, he started to believe because it was easier that way on his mind. He started telling us it was true too. We were all very young and he didn't have much trouble convincing us. Eventually he decided that those who did not fit in our family or who would hurt our family should be gotten rid of. So we came up with a sort of secret world, somewhere where no one could find us and only the worst umbra would follow us. Whenever we stepped through the door, that madness and bitterness took over. So we did what seemed necessary and began getting rid of the half-Mayfairs. They didn't deserve the life they'd been given. Well so we thought. The things we did to them, horrible things, I can never forgive myself for and many of the others agree." He didn't know if he was about to cross the line of too much information but for the moment it seemed necessary. Malakai needed his understanding of them. "Then one day, he turned our attention to our little cousin Savannah Mayfair, a full Mayfair and a niece to most of us by Julien. She was a brat who always told the adults everything we did and always lied and tried to trick us. She got solid proof of what we were doing and she went running to tell Julien. That's why the prince convinced Armand and Lawrence---her own full-blooded brother---to chase after her and they brought her kicking and screaming and crying back to him. We did her just like the others then put her in the Mayfair Manor attic just like the rest of them. No one ever asked what happened. Antha had cried not to do it to Savannah but he soothed her until she was quiet. Then she tried not to go back. But that place.......it calls to you. It's horrible. Then the prince just left."

 

[XCandy and LunacyX]

When Antha opened her eyes again, they had sharpened severely into some dim anger. She did nothing for a moment, sitting quietly with her head against Courtland's shoulder, just thinking. But eventually, as Malakai had feared, she sprang into action, the anger welled up inside, and left the room with a quick slam of the door. She wanted to yell at Malakai---he wasn't supposed to tell him things like this. By the time she reached the narrow stairs leading down to the kitchen, she had even begun to imagine what punishment would be inflicted upon him, the once Marquis. Halfway down, however, she stopped cold. My blood. She had seen it when they had dealt Savannah the final blow. The blood pooling up on the floor, spreading out into a simple crimson web...it was her own blood. And Malakai! She had just thought of putting her own brother, so near and dear to her, upon the stand to endure their trial. Who had ever walked free from the trials? Never. Forgive me, forgive me! But I'm a monster, it's true. She didn't work to protect these thoughts---she couldn't even imagine someone caring for the vague, choppy line of thinking---until she put her back to the wall and slid quietly down it, curling up on the stair and listening to their carrying voices. 'Then the prince just left.' Them perhaps, but Antha was not so lucky.

 

[Vikteren]

.David Talbot.

He was quiet for almost two entire minutes while he organized his thoughts. He just watched the table, half waiting for Antha to return, and thought very hard about what was too much to say and what wasn't. "It was never easy being a Mayfair. Especially not for Antha and not for us either. That was why he---our prince---sort of snapped when we were little. Everything they told us about ideal Mayfairs, their special traits and their beauty and their power and grace, he started to believe because it was easier that way on his mind. He started telling us it was true too. We were all very young and he didn't have much trouble convincing us. Eventually he decided that those who did not fit in our family or who would hurt our family should be gotten rid of. So we came up with a sort of secret world, somewhere where no one could find us and only the worst umbra would follow us. Whenever we stepped through the door, that madness and bitterness took over. So we did what seemed necessary and began getting rid of the half-Mayfairs. They didn't deserve the life they'd been given. Well so we thought. The things we did to them, horrible things, I can never forgive myself for and many of the others agree." He didn't know if he was about to cross the line of too much information but for the moment it seemed necessary. Malakai needed his understanding of them. "Then one day, he turned our attention to our little cousin Savannah Mayfair, a full Mayfair and a niece to most of us by Julien. She was a brat who always told the adults everything we did and always lied and tried to trick us. She got solid proof of what we were doing and she went running to tell Julien. That's why the prince convinced Armand and Lawrence---her own full-blooded brother---to chase after her and they brought her kicking and screaming and crying back to him. We did her just like the others then put her in the Mayfair Manor attic just like the rest of them. No one ever asked what happened. Antha had cried not to do it to Savannah but he soothed her until she was quiet. Then she tried not to go back. But that place.......it calls to you. It's horrible. Then the prince just left."

His expression did not change; unjudging even in the face of this--revelation was the kind word for it, the neutral word, the word which did not condemn the horror of what they had done. What they had been indoctrinated with.
"The prince," he said, eventually, after he had given Malakai what he felt was adequate time to suppress any lingering emotion--he wasn't cruel enough to drag it out into the open--"Who was he? And what happened after he left?"  

[.David Talbot.]

For a minute he traced words on the table, eyes downcast, not saying anything. When he finally spared Vikteren a glance, the surprise was earnest. "Can't you guess?" It seemed to him an impossibility that a person couldn't take one look at the prince and not realize him for what he was.
He was too weak to protect his thoughts well. When he came up with the image of the glorious brat prince he was shadowed, his features hidden except for the big sharp eyes, the smug grin, and his vast amount of golden hair. His tall, lean body was gray with shadow except for the white button-up shirt that Antha had made vivid in his mind. "I should love him most. I'm supposed to. But he's too much for me. He's too much like Antha in his wild insanity but he doesn't have her thoughtfulness or consideration. He's selfish. Vain. I want to hate him. No matter how desperately she loves him we all want to hate him. It's the idea of the way he manipulated us and his final betrayal. He abandoned us when he changed. It was his own stupid fault." He didn't want to say the name. If Vikteren couldn't see it there was no point in telling him.
He sighed deeply. "When he left Antha broke down. Everything broke down. She wanted nothing from reality. We didn't know what to do without him. We acted like he was still there but it was chaos. Everyone was condemning a different halfling. Everyone was ignoring the codes and trials and going around killing whoever they chose. Sometimes we'd go to our secret place and there'd just be gore and blood and a body or two thrown int he floor. Antha started curling up in the corner and covering her ears and humming to herself a lot. Lawrence was afraid to leave the secret place because he thought people could see his crimes on his face. Dorian started disappearing for weeks on end. Dolly Jean always complained about the blood on her face. But one day Antha and Cortland came in while we were cleaning up another mess. Antha fell down screaming words I couldn't understand and clutching at Cortland's shoulder while he tried to help her up. Finally he left her on her knees hugging herself on the floor and went to get a wooden pole from by the window. He came up and smashed it into the side of Jack's head and beat him with it when he fell to the ground. He barely left him alive. Antha stopped screaming and he dropped the pole and went and picked her up and carried her out. It came to order again after that."