Chapter 22

The next day the guards seemed to have given up looking for Nikolai and returned to their usual posts. This finally gave the vampire hunter a chance to leave his hiding place, though he made sure to cover his head when he did so to try and conceal his appearance in case he accidentally ran into any guards. He headed out to the market, the best place to try and listen for any news or gossip about whether he had been able to take out the vampire.

Much to Nikolai’s dissatisfaction he soon heard the commoners discussing news of the ‘unsucessful assassination attempt’ on the court jester. He made sure to hear several accounts of the same story to lend more credence to its authenticity, before he left the market and headed back to his hiding place to come up with a new plan.

Nikolai could hardly believe that the vampire had managed to survive three crossbow bolts to the chest like that. The halfbreed was surprisingly resilient, and not just to sunlight. If Nikolai wanted to ensure the vampire’s death he would probably have to do it up close and personal, taking the jester's head from his shoulders. But there was the little issue of the vampire’s towering bodyguard, a man who looked like he could crush Nikolai’s head in his hands, and probably wanted to after the hunter had nearly killed his little lover.

But it wasn’t like Nikolai was going to get another chance to take the vampire out from afar anytime soon. After his last attempt he was sure they would keep the jester out of open spaces, the giant soldier probably protecting him inside some small, defensible room. It was looking like there was going to be only one option left available to the hunter, apart from giving up, which was incomprehensible to him. He had never let a vampire get away alive before, and he wasn’t about to start now.

His only other option was to petition the king and queen about this, to try and convince them of the jester’s true nature, or better yet expose it if possible. Then perhaps they would allow Nikolai to properly dispose of the creature, with the giant guard unable to protect him. The king had seemed happy to allow the vampire hunter to operate in his kingdom, so it seemed unlikely that he knew the jester was a vampire. This could be Nikolai’s only shot.

There was however a chance that this was a trap, that the vampire hunter had been successful but the vampire’s friends were spreading lies to lure him out of hiding so they could exact revenge on him. But Nikolai didn’t have much choice, the only way to confirm if the vampire was dead or not would be to visit the castle anyway. He would simply have to be on his guard and prepared for if things went sideways.

So once he felt he was fully prepared, Nikolai made his way back up to the castle casually, as he had on the first day he had arrived in town. When the gate guards spotted him they looked confused, and quickly exchanged whispers. Nikolai smiled as he approached them, and asked to be granted audience with the king and queen once more.

The guards looked unsure at first, but one of them ran off to get his supervisor, which was good enough for Nikolai. Even if they decided to arrest him, that would still get him in front of the monarchs eventually anyway. After a while of waiting, the fair haired officer who was friends with the vampire appeared, giving Nikolai a look of derision.

“The king and queen will see you shortly, may I accompany you to the waiting room?” the man asked gruffly. Nikolai nodded politely in agreement, and followed the soldier into the castle. The officer led the hunter to the waiting room and left him there. Nikolai took a seat and waited for a few minutes, surprised that it hadn’t been a trap, he hadn’t been arrested and everything was going smoothly so far. It didn’t feel right that it was this easy, but while Nikolai wasn’t about to let his guard down he also wasn’t going to complain.

Soon the officer reappeared, motioning with his head for the hunter to follow him. Nikolai obliged, and was led into the throne room, where the king and queen would take petitions. Nikolai looked around, noting who was present in the room. The king and queen of course sat on their elevated thrones, looking down upon the rest of the room. 

The jester sat in the middle of the stairs leading up to the thrones. He was not wearing his costume, instead his lower half was covered in plain linen pants, his torso was covered in bandages stained red with blood, and he was barefoot. Nikolai could clearly see a large number of dark bruises that covered the vampire’s exposed skin. The small man was hunched over where he sat, arms wrapped around himself and looking miserable.

Nikolai also noted the giant guard, who was standing at his usual post behind the king's throne, helmet on to hide his face as always. The dark haired chirurgeon was also present, standing next to the queen’s throne and scowling down at the hunter. A number of guards were lined up on either side of the walkway that led to the thrones.

“Thank you Cassian,” the king said to the officer who had led Nikolai over to near the base of the stairs. The soldier bowed to the king, and then took a few steps to the side away from the hunter, though still within range to rush at and grab him if need be.

Nikolai bowed politely to the monarchs. “Your majesties, I believe you might already know why I have requested this audience,” Nikolai hazarded, looking up at the king and queen, though keeping an eye on everyone else in his peripheral vision at the same time.

“Indeed,” the king began, peering down at the hunter. “I believe you have come to try and convince us that our jester, whom you tried to murder, is a vampire, while my trusted chirurgeon claims that he is not.”

“Yes, your highness,” Nikolai nodded, glancing at the chirurgeon Balthasar who was frowning deeply at him.

“So what is your evidence?” the king asked, leaning forward slightly in his seat. “I know you are a vampire hunter of great renown, so I doubt you would go around making baseless accusations.”

“Well your majesty, allow me to start off with the most simple of the vampiric traits, his crimson eyes,” Nikolai decided to begin with something more well known about vampires, that they might already be familiar with.

“If you would allow me to object to that, your majesty?” Balthasar asked, and the king nodded at him. “Thedrick has a rare genetic condition called albinism. It causes a lack of pigment in a person’s skin, hair and eyes. The red colour you see in his eyes is because they are almost transparent, and the red is from the blood vessels at the back of the eye.” The chirurgeon looked pretty smug after his explanation. “But I guess for someone who’s only experience with red eyes is vampirism, they might not know about that.” Now Balthasar was smirking.

“Of course I am aware of albinism, that wasn’t my only piece of evidence,” Nikolai snapped in response. “Very convenient for him to have that condition as an excuse,” he additionally muttered to himself.

“What else then?” the king asked patiently.

“Well, another feature is his pointed ears,” Nikolai claimed, and quickly started striding towards the vampire. Everyone looked startled, and a few guards including Cassian took a step towards him, reaching out. The jester’s eyes had gone wide with fear, and he was pressing his body back against the stairs he was sitting on. Nikolai stopped for a moment and held up his hands. “Relax, I’m not going to hurt him, I’m just going to show you,” he said, before more slowly approaching the vampire. 

The creature looked like he wanted to try and wriggle away, but Nikolai grabbed him by the arm and hoisted him to his feet. Then he grabbed the wild white hair that was covering the side of the vampire’s head and pulled it out of the way, exposing the pointed ear. Nikolai held the jester in place for a moment so the monarchs could see the ear, before he let go and the vampire scrambled a short distance away from him.

“Again, if I may object, your majesty?” the chirurgeon requested, which the king agreed with another nod of his head. “Thedrick has pointed ears because he is an elf, obviously. He is the same height as an elf, as you have probably noticed,” Balthasar explained.

“Hrm… I heard that elves are small… but I thought they had dark skin?” the king mused with slight confusion.

“It’s because of the albinism, your majesty. The condition strips all pigment from the skin, which is why he is so pale. He is simply an albino elf,” Balthasar concluded, looking pleased with himself.

“Again… very convenient that he is the size of an elf to use that as an excuse for his ears,” Nikolai said quietly, starting to feel a little frustrated. “But no matter, I am not out of evidence yet. Anecdotally, have you ever seen him eat? Have you noticed how thin he is? It’s because he doesn’t eat any real food, only blood.”

“Thedrick has a very sensitive stomach, and many foods make him feel nauseous, so he doesn’t eat very much and certainly not around other people in case he throws up,” Balthasar defended straight away, not even asking the king’s permission to speak this time.

“That’s just what you say as a cover up, as you are his friend and hide what he is from everyone!” Nikolai accused, annoyed that the chirurgeon had a convenient argument against everything that he said.

“Calm down, both of you,” the king cut in before Balthasar could say anything to defend himself. “You seem to have a lot of coincidental evidence, hunter, but do you have any solid proof?”

“Let me show you,” Nikolai said more calmly now, and approached the vampire again while reaching into his satchel. The jester looked up at him with massive, worried eyes as the hunter pulled out several objects.

Nikolai held out a loop of prayer beads with a sun pendant towards the vampire, whose expression changed to confusion. “Vampire’s are adverse to holy items imbued with the power of the sun, such as these prayer beads,” he said as he held the prayer beads close to the jester. But now it was Nikolai’s turn to be confused when he touched the vampire with the beads and nothing happened. 

“Or… uh… blessed water…” he continued with uncertainty, withdrawing the beads and opening a small glass bottle of liquid. Nikolai glanced up at Balthasar only to see the chirurgeon not looking the least bit concerned, and neither did the jester. Nikolai splashed some of the water on the vampire, who just blinked up at him as the liquid ran down his pale skin.

“H… How are you immune to this?” Nikolai stammered out, looking down at the vampire in bewilderment.

“Because he is not a vampire,” Balthasar stated firmly.

“He is though! He fainted from my spell!” Nikolai exclaimed, gesturing with his hands.

“Perhaps he is just sensitive to fainting spells?” Balthasar suggested nonchalantly, examining his nails with apparent disinterest.

“No, that was a spell specifically for use against vampires!” Nikolai insisted.

“Plus, haven’t we been overlooking throughout this whole proceeding the biggest piece of evidence that Thedrick is in fact not a vampire?” Balthasar declared loudly, quickly changing the topic. “He is unaffected by the sun! You would know best of all people that vampires burn up under the light of the sun,” he directed the last part at Nikolai.

“He’s a half vampire, that’s why none of this is working,” Nikolai claimed angrily, scowling up at the chirurgeon.

“A half vampire? Are you out of your mind?” Balthasar accused. “Vampires are an entirely different race from humans, and they see themselves as so much better than us, there’s no way they would want to crossbreed. It’s probably not even biologically possible, and such a halfbreed has never been recorded before in history!”

“I can prove he is, I swear,” Nikolai growled, and pulled a knife out of his bag. “Watch, I’ll make him get his fangs out for you all to see!” he exclaimed, noticing some guards stepping towards him carefully as he brandished the knife. But he didn’t put in anywhere near the now suddenly again terrified vampire, instead rolling up his own sleeve and dragging the blade across his skin, creating a gash where blood started to flow freely. 

Nikolai then dropped the knife, and held his bloody arm out towards the vampire. He saw the creature take a sniff, and then he quickly grabbed the vampire’s head, lifting it up as he grabbed its mouth and pulled back its lips in triumph. But then he saw inside the mouth only normal blunt teeth, no fangs.

Nikolai blinked in disbelief as he was roughly grabbed by the back of his cloak, and soon the guards were forcing him to let go of the vampire and pulling him away from it. “W-Wait, no, hold on. He really is a vampire, I can prove it! If you’d just wait for sundown, then I can show you that his eyes glow in the dark!”

“I think you have shown us enough, hunter,” the king said wearily, frowning down at Nikolai. “It is clear from your tests that you have proved to us and also yourself that Thedrick is not, in fact, a vampire.”

“I know you probably don’t like getting it wrong, but you should really let this one go,” Balthasar added smugly, smirking down at the hunter.

“No, I promise you, he’s a vampire! You admitted it to me yourself the other night, and only a vampire would have been affected by my spell! You have to believe me, you have to let me kill it!” Nikolai protested and he fought against the guards who were holding him. With quick shoves he managed to push the guards off him, then Nikolai surged forward before they could grab him again, bending to pick the knife he had dropped up off the floor on his way past, then lurched straight at the vampire.

The jester quickly scrambled to his feet before Nikolai could reach him, and scampered up the stairs towards the throne while coughing. Nikolai chased after him up the stairs, his eyes focused on his prey. But then suddenly he was grabbed by the shoulder and stopped in place. Nikolai tried to pull out of the grasp as he looked up at the giant guard towering over him, while the vampire scuttled behind the chirurgeon.

Beowulf held tightly onto Nikolai’s shoulder, and the hunter couldn’t pull out of the strong grasp. Then the soldier used his other large armoured hand to grab the hand Nikolai held the knife in, and squeeze it until the hunter grip on the weapon loosened and it fell to the floor. Then, Beowulf moved his hand to the hunter’s upper arm and started to pull.

“Wh…What are you doing?” the hunter squeaked out as the guard held his shoulder firmly in place while pulling down on his arm. Nikolai could feel all his muscles and tendons in the arm stretching to their limit. But Beowulf didn’t stop, and soon the hunter was letting out a cry of agony as the guard pulled his arm out of its socket.

“Beowulf, stop!” he heard someone cry out, it sounded like perhaps the officer but Nikolai wasn’t sure as all his focus was on the pain and trying to pull out of the big man’s grip. But Beowulf continued to pull on the arm still. Nikolai tried to kick him, but it didn’t seem to affect the guard at all. He heard more people calling out to Beowulf to stop, but it seemed the soldier was ignoring them. Nikolai looked up at Beowulf’s helmet beseechingly, heart pounding in terror.

“Please, stop!” Nikolai finally cried out, but Beowulf ignored him. There was the sound of tearing flesh, soon drowned out by Nikolai’s screams as waves of extreme pain crashed over him. Beowulf yanked on the arm and pulled it free from the hunter’s body, the last bits of flesh and clothing tearing away, and then the soldier dropped the limb to the floor, letting go of the wailing hunter.

Nikolai staggered backwards, clutching with his other hand at the spot where his right arm used to be attached. He cried as he felt his legs going weak beneath him, but then there were hands on him, people holding him upright, probably the guards. The hunter looked up, trying to focus through the tears and agony. Nikolai saw Cassian pointing up at Beowulf while scowling, and could hear he was yelling but it sounded muffled like the rest of the commotion around him.

The hunter tried to focus on breathing while his head was spinning. Nikolai saw the shape of the chirurgeon coming down the steps towards him, and then he was being led out of the room by the guards, while Balthasar helped him put pressure on the bleeding stump.