Death's Herald

By Forever Frost

Note: original fiction, from the smouldering ruin of my brain, once again.

Summary: (YAOI) an enigmatic vampire abducts chronically depressed, suicidal Remy, but what does he plan to do with him? Is it as simple as finding a willing victim to feed from, or is there something more going on?

Warnings: eventual yaoi, despair, angst, and I don't really know since I haven't really planned this one, but be prepared for anything.

"This story does not take place once upon a time. It does not even take place far, far away. It takes place right here, in the slowly mouldering centre of the dark shadows that line my mind."

Long skeletal fingers cloaked in the glistening black of fine leather gloves slowly curled around the end of the armrest on the regal-looking and ornately engraved chair he was occupying. There were no lights whatsoever, what little Remy could see was provided by the pale grey illumination of moonlight that filtered in through the large, expensive glass windows that stretched up to the distant ceiling. He struggled uncomfortably for a moment in the chair, the coarse rope tied tightly around his wrists. "Well, listen, that's great and everything, I mean really stellar, but I'm not interested in an autobiography—"

"Oh?" the voice sounded disappointed, but there was no change in the white mask-like face. The eyes were luminescent, like a cats, and flashed through the darkness. "So, I should simply . . . kill you . . . now?"

Remy choked. He felt his heart knot up in his chest and a shiver raced through his arms and legs. Sweat coated his palms. He gasped as his captor rose, with the elegant grace of a sleek black panther. He tried to speak, but . . .

"What's the matter, Mr. Devoil?" his captor asked in a low voice, sitting gracefully on the polished oak wood desk, and studying Remy, his head tilted slightly to one side as though he were listening very hard to something, his long black hair falling in straight streams of darkness past his clean-shaven corpse-like face, past his shoulders, melting into the surrounding shadows. He seemed to be a creature of the shadows.

Remy swallowed hard, feeling his heart pounding against his rib cage painfully. "Wh—what are you going to do to me?" he asked in a weak voice.

"Oh. I don't know," the enigmatic, though he had to admit somewhat debonair, in a dark, dark way, man replied simply, as though it really made no difference to him. "Whatever I feel like, really."

"So this is all some sick game to you?" Remy shouted, his terror jolting the words out of him in a high-pitched shriek of mixed anger but mostly fear. "You mean there's no—no ransom or anything?"

His captor chuckled softly, the sound made shivers crawl up Remy's neck. "And whom would I send the ransom to, my dear Remy. You have no one, you know. No one but myself, Hraefn-scaga, the Watcher from the Raven Forest," he murmured this softly, draping one arm, cloaked in the black leather of his trench coat, over Remy's shoulders and peering at him intently with those glowing, piercing, otherworldly eyes.

"You may call me Raven, it is easier in your tongue," he finally turned his gaze away from his captive, moving slowly to the tall glass window. He peered out, into the misty deep darkness of the night, and the black clouds moving across the full, yellow moon. "Oh what a night it is, the mist is thick, the clouds dark and heavy, the air cold with the taste of frost and death."

"Listen," Remy began shakily, beginning to grow more disturbed then afraid, "why are you talking to me like—"

"Like I know you?" Raven asked, in a flash he had both hands on Remy's shoulders, grasping so hard that the young man nearly yelled in pain. Their faces were inches apart. "Well, I do know you," Raven told him, leaning so close that his breath brushed against Remy's face. Again, came the dull, low chuckling noise and he reached forwards and snapped off Remy's glasses, with a flick of his wrist sending them neatly to the desk.

"I have known you . . . since you were a child, of course, when you lived in that rundown old apartment in the city. With the rotting floorboards and the cockroaches so large, and the spiders, you cried when you saw them,"

Remy felt his face flush red with anger and embarrassment for a moment, but then a chilling wave of fear chased the other emotions out. "How—how do you—"

Raven waved him away, like one might a child, and continued. "You used to cry, curled up in the closet, didn't you. Your parents—your father a drunk who did nothing but yell and yell until you were too terrified to even approach him. And your mother, a harpy of a woman, nothing was ever good enough to make her proud. You were too fat, so you lost all of the weight you could and now, now you're much to skinny for her, not healthy at all. You tried your hardest to make her proud of your school work but, when you graduated with the top marks in your high school she didn't even bat an eye, it seemed not to faze her at all. There was no kind word, there was no pride at all. So you gave up with school entirely, tried to find what would please her, but nothing did, you eventually came to the realization that you would always be nothing in her eyes and so, to finally escape the constant floods of harsh words and criticisms you ran away, landed your own minimum wage job and an apartment in the bad side of town," his captor sighed, walked around the chair Remy was tied in so that he stood behind him, and draped both thin arms over his captive's shoulders languidly, resting his pointed chin on Remy's head.

"Well, I suppose it was all good for something, after all I might not have been needed at all if not for that. You see, it all added up, eventually you're heart and soul just became such dark holes that you were drowning in despair, sinking in it, like a corpse rotting away . . . veritably screaming for the help of someone like myself."

"I—I don't even know what's going on here! I don't know how you know all of these things, or who you are, or where—"

"Remy, Remy, Remy . . ." Raven cooed gently, brushing his short blonde hair out of his eyes and leaning over to kiss his cheek so that Remy jumped, but the cords binding him held him sharply in place. His captor laughed, and knelt down in front of him, looking up into his face.

"Do you not realize yet? I know everything about you. Everything. I know how scared you were the first time you were away from home, how you cried and buried your face in your pillow, and your stomach hurt but you were to afraid to tell anyone. And I know about how, when you went home, there was no warmth or comfort to be received there, just more harsh words and accusations. I know the torrent of pain that has clung to your breast like a many-clawed little demon since you were a child. I know all of your despair and even the rare little joys you have had."

Remy's breath was coming in shaken sobs now, tears slid from his eyes and blurred his already fractured vision, but he was frightened and confused beyond reason. "Who—what—are you?" he asked piteously.

"I am—your guardian angel," the creature said simply, taking Remy's bound hands in his gloved ones and slowly dragging his tongue across the quivering, cold flesh. "Is that hard to believe?" he asked, smiling slightly at Remy's horrified-confused-shocked expression. "Well? Is that not what you wanted to here. Isn't it more comforting than telling you I am . . . what is the word in your language? A vampire."

"Wh—what are you talking about now?" Remy asked, choking and quivering.

The vampire gestured gracefully with one thin arm. "Something of a prince among vampires, if I do say so myself," he smirked. "Heralds of death and darkness . . ." he laughed softly. "But really, humans are so much more delicious prey when they're willing, and I've chosen you carefully, Remy."

"Wh—what?" Remy sputtered.

"Don't you know?" Raven asked, slowly rising and, taking Remy's face in his gloved hands, tilted it up, to face him, so that their foreheads were touching. And he spoke in a soft, low voice: "you were going to kill yourself today."

Remy's eyes widened. Tears slid down his face and his pale lips trembled. But somewhere, deep in his heart, even though with his words he was already trying to deny it, somewhere, he felt the cold pit in his chest, the cold, sharp pit that told him the creature's words were true. "I—I was—but, so, so are you going to stop me, is that it?" Remy asked shakily.

"Oh no," Raven replied coolly, "I am simply going to help you."

TBC…

Author's Note:

Sorry it's so short, I really don't know where I am going with this one so any suggestions will be appreciated, thanks :)