What season are we in? Cacti are terrible for marking time.
[Walking with Jaskier through their park (still their park six hundred years on) is a ritual as old as they are. Alucard spends a few decades living in a place (Libertas this time), takes a nap in the Horizon (thirty five years, the average), then wakes up to find his friend waiting. The dhampir grumbles about being awake. Then somewhere in all of the regular greetings, routine settles in. Alucard arises and throws together something to eat while Jaskier catches him up on what's been missed over the past few decades.
Eventually the conversation sees them exit the Horizon and arrive in the park. Always arm in arm. Always at night, usually by one of the garden features. Alucard knows his friend's biases and welcomes them readily.
The world changes. But the people Alucard trusts don't. Not really, not in the ways that matter. Jaskier is a steady rock to reach equilibrium besides. The first few days awake with him around feel like a wave crashing against the rocks, then settling into the tide line properly.
This time is no different and the dhampir is just as grateful as he's ever been for that consistency.]
To be fair, you've never been very good with time.
[The flaws of being immortal. Being immortal forever, even! Jaskier can't even imagine. It's hardly a unique trait nowadays; some of the other gods are practically nigh-impossible to speak to, with how detached, or pretentious, or depressing they are.
Alucard is a lovely, familiar presence. Steady. There's something about him that, in all its irony, makes it easier to feel human. A permanent piece placed into this world. Jaskier's hand skirts over tall, carefully shaped bushes, springing bright pink flowers which follow them with their sweet scent.] It's about to be early spring. Oh, they're going to start seeding all their fields soon! It's my busiest season.
[So many Echoes that ring and rattle about in his head. Wishes for seeds, for flourishing crops, for sunny days, for vibrate loves, for big cocks -- they're all a bit funny, when you think about it.
But this park was his before he was himself. It holds a piece of his soul, he thinks. A piece he has not had for ages.] You could come with me this year. I can't say it's always fun, but it is entertaining. I like making clever little designs in the corn once it grows to confuse them. They never see it as art, though! Just some sort of... prophecy, or something. It's never been rightfully appreciated.
Nonsense, I'm fine at it. Waking up from the naps is just a little disorienting.
[Once he's awake and actually living in the physical world, it is absolutely fine. Alucard gives his friend a very gentle nudge of his shoulder as a sign of protest, but that's it.
Besides, who would he be without that tie to the world? Alucard has always been invested in his own humanity, even before Abraxas. To be a dhampir was to balance two worlds. In so many ways it made this apotheosis easier, even if he hated the concept down to his bones.
Bones that apparently can be made into soup, something he still thinks about far too much.]
If I was bats, I could hover above and appreciate the art. [He grins, a little sly and very much about to bully his friend.] Maybe those designs could be more elaborate, if you have an audience of one?
[It's an ages-old argument, and one Jaskier really hasn't a leg to stand on anymore when he's taken a few of his own. Sometimes the echoes are too loud. Sometimes he feels himself splitting apart; changing into something he wishes not to be.
Sometimes rest is the only thing he craves.
Jaskier's nose wrinkles.] It's not an audience of one, it's an audience of thirty! You know I still don't like it. Didn't you lose a kidney or something when one of them got lost? Suppose it found its way back... though you probably don't need both kidneys at this point.
One every thirty to forty years is not so many! I'm going to shove you into a cactus.
[Except he won't, because the argument is as reliable as Jaskier. It is a comfort to have such steady things.]
Do you want someone to appreciate the art or not? Because that's the only way I'm going. [And that's final, given the small hmph! that mixes in.]
I was without a kidney, yes, but the problem was someone else grabbed the bat for a study. I had to break into the lab to retrieve it, which I think Geralt helped with? I know it wasn't Ciri.
I can't fit into a cactus! Not like this. Besides, I told you, during your last sleep, I tried your bit. Sleeping in one. It wasn't the worst.
[It goes a bit hand-in-hand with his desert owl form, which has long been one of his favorites. Samll, compact, with an easily manageable appetite and very little need to do anything but flutter around, sleep, and eat bugs.
He cannot describe why they're so particularly delectable when one has a beak.]
Ciri wouldn't help you for free. [He smiles at Alucard's adorable little hmph.] Fine, you can come! As bats! I'll allow it. And we'll have a plague of moths or something to enjoy afterwards.
[As bat and bird. At this point, Jaskier has no reservations about eating just about anything.]
[Alucard is shameless as he nudges Jaskier a bit harder. He appears to very much just want to toss Jaskier into the cacti like this.] You know that's not what I meant! [He grins, a little wicked, but mostly satisfied.]
I remember. And I was very good about not being smug in response to that information. I was simply glad to finally be understood.
[That hmph, apparently, works wonders. Hilda likes it too.]
[Jaskier laughs and pushes back. Their joys are often so small, but seem all the more precious for it. (Has he not, already, been granted the greatest joy of all? He has as much time as he wishes with those he loves. And perhaps he likes to spend some of that time bullying Alucard.)
Jaskier blows through his lips in disbelief. "Very good" at "not being smug." Why, it's like asking a tiger to not show its stripes.]
And why shouldn't it be? I daresay we've done many more things more sinful than a date of moth plagues. Which we should definitely repeat, you know.
Don't you make that noise! And your desert owl form looks perfect in a cactus.
[Look. He'll take being shoved back and being bullied. It is a founding bedrock of their friendship. But Alucard will not be implied to have not been gracious about being right regarding cactus naps.]
Rude. Not sinful. Rude or dickish, never that word. [It smacks of Catholicism.] Funny. I thought this counted as a date.
[He doesn't argue the point about the owl now that he's perfect aware of how adorable he is in every form. Every bird he's taken flight as, all down to the very fluffy paws he has as a gryphon... even with the talons.
He's a whole package, even as a god.]
Dickish, you say? That's funny, considering what I was actually referencing... [He wiggles his brows. No, not sinful. He and Nadine have the same hangup over that word. Or did, at least. He has the feeling they did.
Look, he's only saying he's had fun. Every time.]
Is this? Looking upon the vestiges of the men we used to be? It's certainly romantic, in a grim way. [He's amused as he says it, though, leading the way to this: the monument in the middle of it all. Still standing against all odds, the magic in it more powerful than ever.] I don't think the history books even remember what it was for.
Would you like a little more low hanging fruit, Julian?
[Alucard rolls his eyes, making a huge show of it because that's what Jaskier deserves.
His tone remains light, refusing to drift into something more somber.]
You used to be perhaps. I've worked very hard to maintain my human half, thank you very much. [It was the main reason Alucard had resisted the transformation for so long, making it more painful. More drawn out. He was an idiot about it.] To your last point though, of course not. I placed an explanatory stone at the base of it ages ago, and I keep an eye on it. Even if the memorial has become a spot for grieving on a whole, the original intent is known.
[He was asking for it! And Jaskier can take his friend throwing him into a wall, if need be. He survives things very well, thank you, and the proof of that is in his grin, which is unapologetic.
So many years have earned him the rights to be a bastard.
The you used to strikes Jaskier like a physical hit -- stronger than being thrown into a wall, and for a moment, his grin is gone. Completely. It isn't Alucard's fault -- he's a bastard, too, but in a very different way -- but it's a sharp reminder is all.]
So have I. But there isn't a man alive who can resists the siren call of power forever. [He sighs. Well, his little ball joke has lost its luster. Sometimes being around Adrian is akin to being assaulted with ice-cold water, several times over.] You can't mean to say that after all this time, you still haven't forgotten some things.
I'm not sure that my legs rate higher than my balls, but you can be the judge of that.
[They're decent legs, but Alucard is keenly aware that his top half is much more attractive. It is a statement he can agree with.
He isn't surprised he managed to kill the mood. Given the choice, Alucard would still refuse ascending to this state. His natural lifespan, the possibility of resting and the chance to be redefined over and over again through work, that is a greater appeal. He's said as much before. He won't rehash it now. He will only give his friend a small smile before letting the topic go.]
I have forgotten some things. But projects? Things made with my own hands, and in this case, together? No. I'd never forget those.
[He squeezes Jaskier's arm as if to reinforce the point, and pauses just a moment to lean his head gently against that of his friend.]
I've never been a straight ball man myself, to be fair. Who knows if I'll be an honest judge?
[This is truly them now: a back and forth that has no real meaning nor importance. Why care about every second spent when you know you have so many ahead of? A number so large that, to him, it may as well be infinite? He can't allow himself to wallow for too long; in those moments, he begins to feel something strange inside him. An alien. And the alien thing is him, his mind, his thoughts... dissipating into an infinite swell of time.
Jaskier stops in front of their memorial, with Alucard's hand holding his, squeezing it. Another anchor: the people who have entered eternity with him, or that he followed after.] You're right. I'd never let you hear the end of it.
[After this long, this memorial still feels like his, partly; their magic weaves in it, stronger than ever. He cannot recall a single face that this memorial was meant to stand for... but he does remember what caused them to build it in the first place. That deep, overwhelming sorrow.
It's rare the sunrays in him ever fade; over time, perhaps he's begun to fear them even more than he used to.] You're the only one who understands we've never stopped working.
An honest judge knows my chest is my best feature anyway.
[The topic can float away with Alucard's self-assured grin. Standing in front of the memorial, it feels incorrect to linger on the topic. Insulting to the dead, especially when the two of them have outlived everyone represented on the walls eight times over.
It's aged well. There has been care and upkeep, some expansion to allow for more memories of those passed to be shared. The evolution has been natural and welcome, and to make something that works for so many over the centuries is...well, you peak at a certain age. Alucard's maintained that this is probably one of the best things he's done in all his lifetimes. The meaning has shifted and endured. That counts for a lot.
He squeezes Jaskier's hand back. Leans a little bit more on the bard, the moment feeling correct to do so.]
I had the advantage of having already thought about how to handle a long life, Julian. That and a compulsive need for projects, lest I sit with my thoughts too long. Don't lionize it.
[His tone is so very warm. Everything he's said is true, but there's no resentment present, no disapproval, nothing but a simple truth that has never really offended Alucard to look in the eye.]
[To be fair, Jaskier lets him have it. His chest has always been a wonderful feature, even if some days he cannot even recall where or when that scar happened; it is as much a part of Alucard as his hair and witty comebacks.
They lean together in that perfect way where the other's body balances them. Perhaps if Jaskier wasn't associated with so many of the other Summoned, they would have their whole own following: a pair of art gods that leave memorials to mortals in their wake. That reminds them of how mortal they are, but how their momentary lives have meaning.
Even if he should die tomorrow or live another 800 years, he will always believe that.]
I do think it worth lionizing. Is that not what all the tales of immortals always warned? They grow bored with life. With mortal existence. They become old and older and more rotten in their core. But you... you've really remained the same. I don't think a few decades of knowing you're an immortal truly prepared you for that.
[Sometimes he still laughs about it. Technically, even now, Jaskier is older than him. Jaskier turns into him, drawing Alucard closer, and kisses him with a firm press to his lips.] Perhaps I can admit you've aided me in not becoming a complete bastard of an immortal, too.
Maybe growing up around vampires where various parts of that rotten core had already started to show is what did it. Maybe I'm just very good at being old. Who's to say, really?
[Alucard doesn't think it matters, in the end. This is how it has shaken out, and while he will always have strong opinions about certain choices some of his fellow Summoned have made over the centuries, the dhampir knows the ones he thinks handled the transition well enough.
There's another thought to be had, but the kiss leaves him just a little taken aback. It isn't as if it is the first time it has happened - far from it - but it is always a little bit of a surprise.
He laughs, soft and warm and just glad for the company.]
Oh, I'd agree with that. Holding back the hand that wants to smite has somehow become my specialty. [It is a wholly unsurprising to Alucard, but that's not here nor there.] You've kept me grounded simply by knowing you're going to be there when I decide to return to the world.
[They're not depression naps anymore, just breaks. And Jaskier is there every time, waiting for him. Alucard's appreciates it, just as he appreciates that when he and Jaskier are spoken of together, all emphasis is on having a complimentary partnership that balances personalities and skills.
Balance is perhaps the word of the day, and Alucard leans in to return the kiss. It is no less fir or reaffirming of where they stand with each other, although Alucard also knows his friend well enough. A little bit of fang enters into the equation. Not enough to draw blood, just there to make itself known.]
[Maybe. It could be, considering what Jaskier remembers hearing of them. (Though the idea of Alucard being "good at being old" is absolutely laughable. He's so comedic, especially when he isn't trying to be.)]
The times I've wanted to smite have been very low in number. [He insists. A musician who wrote a mocking ballad about him. The writer who dissected his lyrics for a study in the university, calling them "trite" and "too punny."
The luteist who changed the words in The Fishmonger's Daughter. He didn't even like that song, but it was the principle of the thing.
Jaskier takes that offering, flicking a tongue as a tease against a fang. He knows well, after all this time, how to move around them. And they still invoke a flare of heat in him.]
As I shall always be. And when the Singularity draws the last drop of life out of the universe, I'll make sure you perish first, so that you should never be without me.
[To be fair, Alucard was actually trying to be funny with that comment. Give him some credit.]
They have. And they have all been very petty. [It wasn't as if Alucard was unsympathetic on the matter. He also just very, very much thought it better to leave those things alone. People can have mean opinions that hurt your feelings.
In these moments, it is very, very easy to understand why Jaskier's romances have endured. It isn't the sense of the sun shining down on you so much as the knowledge that the statements, for all the flowery language, are genuine. For Alucard, who has always better with actions over words, it always means a lot be the moment truly romantic or one based on centuries of their friendship.
He smiles, gently resting his forehead against Jaskier's.]
[The truth hurts, unfortunately; being immortal has hardly done much to give him the sort of armor without its chinks, in which perfectly placed darts of criticism can easily slide inside and hurt his heart.
Still true.
Well.
He laughs, and kisses him again.] I knew you had it in you to say exactly what I wished to hear. [Love has always comes easy, but never this long. That it has endured is testament to its unyielding strength.] Now, before you distract me with your sexy sincerity, shall we go check on the Hall next?
[A bit mean? Maybe. But honest? Very much yes. Alucard has always been the screen door on the submarine when needed, and has never protested at playing that role. With Jaskier, it can often be fun.
Alucard laughs softly at the phrasing of sexy sincerity because honestly, what the fuck is that even?, before he considers.]
Perhaps we just head out to the grassy areas for a bit and remain outside? The Hall isn't going anywhere.
[Neither are we, even if Alucard tugs at Jaskier hand and starts to walk again.]
Oh? [His smile is much more knowing, curled at the edges. The grassy areas, after this conversation? Clearly he's asking for more than just a bit of skygazing. A roll in the grass, even -- and when one is so associated with nature, one hardly worries about a bit of dirt and grass stains.]
The Hall's never gone anywhere.
[He says it as a point of pride, squeezing Alucard's hand tightly as he steals another kiss. No, neither are they -- not with an infinite amount of time ahead of them, now that death is hardly an option.]
Come. Time waits for no one, but I won't wait for long, either.
[Alucard has come to suspect that 95% of the Summoned, which is to say pretty much everyone excluding himself, Geralt, and maybe one or two other people, are not made for effective immortality. People get too bored, too restless, too itching for the novel after the first century and a half. He's seen vampires like this in Wallachia, where existing close together makes people sick of each other. Then there are clashes. Then fights, and the world burns down because a vampire feels like being dramatic.
So there being great and sudden chaos in the Horizon in the direction of the floating ship that Astarion relies on is not a surprise to the dhampir. He's heard rumors. He's ignored them and kept to his human world, working in Solvunn this time around as a black haired, grey eyed young man to create better means of storing food and sharing information. It is a quieter version of past work, but the quiet is appreciated. He has a small home and workshop at the edge of the secondary settlement, and every so often at night, he slips into the Horizon to recharge himself more fully.
To say he's surprised when the only other Summoned vampire shows up on his Horizon doorstep a little while after the crash is an understatement. Alucard's face goes on a journey. Then he just lets Astarion in, gives him the only bedroom in the little hut, and lets him just...exist. Gives a few house rules (no wild parties, no orgies, please put everything back where you found it, don't change anything in here without my permission) and then leaves him to lick his wounds.
The bigger surprise comes four months in. Alucard isn't even sure Astarion's moved from the small bedroom he has in his little Horizon hut, heated by a wood burning stove and surrounded by books.
He sighs, leaning down in the doorway.]
You should get up and at least let me change the bed linens.
[ Once upon a time, in a life that he lost long before he came here, Astarion had been born a high elf. He would have lived many centuries already, had he not been turned before he'd even reached a half century in age. He had known, very early on in his undead life, that immortality could be a curse. Especially when you had no control over your own future.
He had, perhaps, let some of his newfound power and freedom go to his head. Some. But then - why shouldn't he have let it?
Four months is not nearly enough time for him to accept his fault in the matter. The remains of his once majestic domain have only just stopped smoldering where they crashed into the surface of Horizon.
He has, actually, moved in these four months. Once to visit the site, where poisonous flowers immediately sprang from the wake of his steps. Once again he left to check on them out of boredom, and had found a festering meadow. ]
You hardly need me to move for that. [ he replies with a slight scowl, now currently lounging on the bed. The point is that Alucard could change the sheets if he very well wanted to with only a thought.
There's a wine bottle filled with blood on the little nightstand. The ceaseless ache left him centuries ago, but he still craves the taste - even here, where he hardly has the same physical restrictions as he once did. ]
Correct. You've caught me in an attempt to move you out of bed for five seconds.
[His arms are folded across his chest, and Alucard is pointedly not offering any sympathy in his face for the vampire crashing on his bed. In the first place, Alucard cannot imagine that Astarion would accept such a gesture in better times, and secondly, there is absolutely none to be had at the moment. The fallout of what has happened was not contained to only two people, and that is what Alucard considers a genuine problem.
Yet he hasn't kicked Astarion out. He has his own reasons for that.]
May I bribe you with food that isn't just wine instead in pursuit of the same goal?
[ Alucard is, as usual, correct in his read. On top of that, Astarion had yet to make apologies for any of the collateral damage he's caused - let alone acknowledge that such a thing may or may not have occurred multiple times in the centuries long maelstrom that was his wrecked marriage.
He does, after a long moment and a deep sigh, sit up - although he does not get out of bed just yet. There's something performative about his protests and his petulance, as though he going through the motions of his own behaviors out of habit, but Alucard might sense a disconnect. A lack of commitment. Or, worse, a lack of direction - because were he to allow himself to actually get up and do something about the way he's been thrown between fits of rage and sinking into despondency, he might actually lash out and do intentional damage somewhere. Not to Alucard, who could handle him in his violence, but to someone or somewhere that might not bear a raging god without breaking. ]
I suppose. [ he finally answers, eyeing his put upon friend and squashing a very sudden and unwanted wave of guilt. He didn't force himself into Alucard's space, and he's followed his 'rules'. He has no reason to feel guilty. Instead, he lets mockery slip into his tone. ]
[Alucard doesn't mind trying to match the attempt at banter. It is a first stab at something remotely approaching normal. and he does not assume it will actually land. Nothing that has happened is normal, even if Astarion's actions register at like a 2.5, maybe 3 on the vampire scale of overkill emotional reactions. (He spent a long time working on the scale. 4 is attempted destruction of a sizeable portion of the population, 5 is pulling it off.)
Just as dry and less hollow are the next words out of Alucard's mouth:]
[ He frowns at the offer a soup, and then his nose wrinkles at the insult that follows. Normally it might get a rise out of him, as he had only just seemed quite prickly and ready for banter a moment earlier, but for some reason those words just seem to suck all the air out of him, his tone defeated. Not despondent, but slightly pained. ]
Oh - what does it even matter now.
[ Astarion pulls the sheets around himself like a cocoon, shoulders slouched. Picnic or soup, it doesn't matter very much - does it? Nothing in Horizon matters. This entire space is their playground - and yet, it's been at least a century since any of his antics have felt fulfilling, here or in the Material Realm of Abraxas.
He laughs to himself, very abruptly and with little humor. ]
Maybe I ought to take a turn at appearing as some sewer-dwelling wretch for a decade or two. The change might be refreshing...
I don't mind cooking to preference if your ambitions are beyond soup, but point taken.
[Alucard knows that cooking in the Horizon is just playing house. He's never minded it before, but there's no surprise that the banter attempt fails. Time. Place. Emotion. He can't imagine what Astarion's interior thoughts are at the moment. Doubtlessly a nasty storm of everything.
But the act of the blanket burritoing oneself says everything. Alucard is quiet for a moment, then sits down on the floor. It puts him at a weird right angle from the vampire and at a lower level.
Also, the floor is good.]
It'd be different, if nothing else. I don't know what sort of general lifestyle activities are available in the sewer, but I imagine you'd invent new ones.
... you're much too accommodating, you know. It's maddening.
[ Maddening instead of infuriating, as he might've once said. In the back of his mind he knows he doesn't deserve loyalty like this. He grimaces, red eyes following Alucard's descent to floor seating.
The talk of sewers unfortunately stirs the dust off other memories, those now beginning to fade in the past century or so. In the first two centuries after he'd been turned he had found the loss of important details of his past upsetting. Now, he finds relief in not being able to recall the face of the monster the turned him, his name long forgotten. Even the scars on his back have begun to fade over time, the ugly, raised lines that mark him slightly less pronounced than they once were. Maybe in another few centuries they'll vanish all together.
He scowls to himself.]
You must think I'm pathetic. Or simply being dramatic. Histrionic.
[ And over what? A rejection. From someone he feels nothing for anymore, who he hasn't felt anything for in decades. It's hard to remember what even brought the two of them together in the first place, or why he feels so gutted. ]
Truthfully? I assume that whatever I say is nothing in comparison to your own thoughts, and whatever I say on the matter is something you've had run through your mind fifty times at least so far.
[Alucard leans his head back, closing his eyes to at least give Astarion the illusion of privacy. Whatever his thoughts are, even as they turn to sewers, they're not pleasant. He knows that much.]
I think two things: that you're grieving something that held meaning and if I say anything you suspect brushes against pity, you'll have my throat out.
[The pity part is something Alucard recalls when Astarion first showed up in Abraxas, defenses raised all too high and in a way that smacked of...well. Never mind who it reminded him of. That person's not going to be showing up in Abraxas now. And if he did, or if Sypha returned, how would they react to any of it?
[ He barks out a short, humorless laugh as confirmation to the first part, taking a moment to study Alucard's features when the dhampir's eyes close. As for the rest, as for his grieving -
A sudden, terrible impulse toward violence stirs within him. He has spent a good part of the past few centuries giving in to that impulse without care, and sometimes needing little cause. Better to destroy what could betray you than give it the chance to do harm. Perhaps that's what went wrong with him and his lovely wife. They couldn't kill one another, but they couldn't survive each other either.
He imagines his fist closing around Alucard's throat, sharpened nails digging in the second before he tears into that lovely, pale skin with his teeth. The dhampir had once been able to easily overpower him. Now? Astarion suspects the ascension has put them on a more even playing field.
But those thoughts are followed by a sudden, thick revulsion that rises in his throat like bile. ]
Too pretty a throat to ruin, unfortunately. [ he drawls, though there's a tension across his form now, mostly hidden beneath the blankets.
Sulking again, he throws them over his head and lies down again, curling up on himself. His voice is muffled beneath the thick fabric. ]
You must have better things to do. Go. I'll have your soup later.
[It's nice to know that he's right. That laugh confirms that much, and saves some time. Alucard won't complain about either.
He's glad not to fully be in Astarion's head for the rest. Alucard can take a guess, and if any of the fantasies were said, he'd simply shrug and point out that if he can murder his father, anyone else is easy in comparison. Deity or not.]
If you were in a better frame of mind, I'd take that bait. But fine.
[Astarion sat up for at least a few minutes. That is a victory, so far as Alucard is concerned. He gets himself up off the floor, leaving his guest to continue his noble line of work as a sad pile of blankets.
At some point, there is indeed soup left for the sad blanket pile. Tomato, along with a substantial cheese plate, although it is left at the door to force someone out of bed just a little bit more.
Alucard has figured it'll be like this for a while. He can manage that.]
Geralt; Alucard Soup, Part 1 [CW FOR LIGHT CANNIBALISM]
[Alucard is aware that having a small, functioning kitchen in the middle of a forest is the absolute height of pants on head ridiculousness. However, the prospect of having to watch his own bone boil (and he remembers it is his bone only when looking directly at it, the whole bone-and-memory thing is baffling) on a sad campfire was unacceptable. Better to spend two hours creating a perfectly functioning kitchen, then spend another hour and a half making the broth than that.
The broth smells decent enough. Herbal for the most part, full of thyme and sage and orange peel along with onions, carrots, and celery. Salt and pepper go without saying. Something that could be truly great if it a chicken in there, not...weird dhampir bone, and just the one.
Time passes. Alucard gets up and ladles the broth into a small mug made of solid ceramic and a large handle that may be a fluffy wolf tail if one squints right.
Here goes nothing.]
Geralt?
maybe it's not cannibalism if they're technically a different species.
[ Is this what he wants to be doing? No. Is it what he's doing regardless? Regrettably, yes. A part of him wishes Alucard had not told him of this potential solution if only because now that he knows, he cannot refuse to try. Something, eventually, has to work.
He does not know how long he can let Ciri believe she will never be remembered. He wants to fix this. For her, if nothing else, but...for himself, too. He hates how much his life—spanning centuries—has shrunk to a handful of moments that make up barely decades, years.
Naturally, Alucard being Alucard insists on this being a significantly greater ordeal than simply boiling some fucking bone in water and swallowing a cup. Geralt intended this to be, at best, an hour or two. Instead, it's taken twice as long, and he has alternated between napping and meditating for all four of those hours. Not until he hears his name does he crack open an eye.
Geralt sits up with a grunt. ] You're sure they won't return in a flood?
[ This is his main concern. What glimpse of his memories have returned, he understands they are...unpleasant. He is not interested in a "cure" that will only drive him to madness. ]
I don't think we win on technicalities on this one
Honestly? I have no idea. This was Ciri's theory in the first place.
[It made sense, of course. Alucard's blood always had healing properties. His bones now had weird magic that focused on rebuilding and adding structure. To think that finding a way to consume them might help was perfectly logical, if not a little unnerving. It spoke to how dire the situation felt from her perspective, and as unsure as Alucard was about how it all might go, it seemed a small thing to give a friend.
He sighs, leaning against the counter in the middle of the woods once Geralt's taken the mug.]
Maybe just take a sip or two first and then see what happens. Chugging this seems ill advised at best.
This is the last of what doesn't need to go to the workshop for adjustments. Which room do you want to start moving into first?
[Alucard knows how this got started, actually. His last lifetime was spent in Aquila where he spent a lot of time organizing for the arts professions but doing very little design work and even less building work. His glamor had him as a shorter red headed man with slim glasses and a good mind for the marriage of art and commerce, and while it had been enjoyable, it was not as fulfilling as he hoped.
In discussing that last point with Hilda (following an excellent faked death that appeared to be of entirely natural causes and a will that stipulated a burial at sea), they had discussed what might be a deeply indulgent lifetime for the next go around. A cozy house that was moved into but the interior was designed to the nines, indulgent in all of the baroque-over-the-top-ness Alucard typically didn't feel the need to let out into the wild.
Somehow that got into how that sort of style could be approached in two very, very different color palettes, how much could be bought and styled versus designed wholly a new, and wouldn't it be funny if the outside was deceiving?
It would be. And there'd be no better venue for that than Solvunn and...
...and that's why Alucard is standing in his own foyer besides the staircase, forearms resting on a secretary desk that needs to go somewhere on Hilda's floor. It is entirely hers excluding the kitchen (Alucard redesigned what was there to be a little more practical), whereas he has the second floor. The aesthetics mesh in a way they shouldn't, and it's fun except for when the community goats find their way into the house (neither of them has figured out how) and wreck havoc.
For now, they're goatless and full of furniture. There's a few other pieces crammed into the space that also need to be moved, with two intended for upstairs.]
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Jaskier;
[Walking with Jaskier through their park (still their park six hundred years on) is a ritual as old as they are. Alucard spends a few decades living in a place (Libertas this time), takes a nap in the Horizon (thirty five years, the average), then wakes up to find his friend waiting. The dhampir grumbles about being awake. Then somewhere in all of the regular greetings, routine settles in. Alucard arises and throws together something to eat while Jaskier catches him up on what's been missed over the past few decades.
Eventually the conversation sees them exit the Horizon and arrive in the park. Always arm in arm. Always at night, usually by one of the garden features. Alucard knows his friend's biases and welcomes them readily.
The world changes. But the people Alucard trusts don't. Not really, not in the ways that matter. Jaskier is a steady rock to reach equilibrium besides. The first few days awake with him around feel like a wave crashing against the rocks, then settling into the tide line properly.
This time is no different and the dhampir is just as grateful as he's ever been for that consistency.]
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[The flaws of being immortal. Being immortal forever, even! Jaskier can't even imagine. It's hardly a unique trait nowadays; some of the other gods are practically nigh-impossible to speak to, with how detached, or pretentious, or depressing they are.
Alucard is a lovely, familiar presence. Steady. There's something about him that, in all its irony, makes it easier to feel human. A permanent piece placed into this world. Jaskier's hand skirts over tall, carefully shaped bushes, springing bright pink flowers which follow them with their sweet scent.] It's about to be early spring. Oh, they're going to start seeding all their fields soon! It's my busiest season.
[So many Echoes that ring and rattle about in his head. Wishes for seeds, for flourishing crops, for sunny days, for vibrate loves, for big cocks -- they're all a bit funny, when you think about it.
But this park was his before he was himself. It holds a piece of his soul, he thinks. A piece he has not had for ages.] You could come with me this year. I can't say it's always fun, but it is entertaining. I like making clever little designs in the corn once it grows to confuse them. They never see it as art, though! Just some sort of... prophecy, or something. It's never been rightfully appreciated.
[But he keeps doing it, because it's fun.]
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[Once he's awake and actually living in the physical world, it is absolutely fine. Alucard gives his friend a very gentle nudge of his shoulder as a sign of protest, but that's it.
Besides, who would he be without that tie to the world? Alucard has always been invested in his own humanity, even before Abraxas. To be a dhampir was to balance two worlds. In so many ways it made this apotheosis easier, even if he hated the concept down to his bones.
Bones that apparently can be made into soup, something he still thinks about far too much.]
If I was bats, I could hover above and appreciate the art. [He grins, a little sly and very much about to bully his friend.] Maybe those designs could be more elaborate, if you have an audience of one?
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[It's an ages-old argument, and one Jaskier really hasn't a leg to stand on anymore when he's taken a few of his own. Sometimes the echoes are too loud. Sometimes he feels himself splitting apart; changing into something he wishes not to be.
Sometimes rest is the only thing he craves.
Jaskier's nose wrinkles.] It's not an audience of one, it's an audience of thirty! You know I still don't like it. Didn't you lose a kidney or something when one of them got lost? Suppose it found its way back... though you probably don't need both kidneys at this point.
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[Except he won't, because the argument is as reliable as Jaskier. It is a comfort to have such steady things.]
Do you want someone to appreciate the art or not? Because that's the only way I'm going. [And that's final, given the small hmph! that mixes in.]
I was without a kidney, yes, but the problem was someone else grabbed the bat for a study. I had to break into the lab to retrieve it, which I think Geralt helped with? I know it wasn't Ciri.
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[It goes a bit hand-in-hand with his desert owl form, which has long been one of his favorites. Samll, compact, with an easily manageable appetite and very little need to do anything but flutter around, sleep, and eat bugs.
He cannot describe why they're so particularly delectable when one has a beak.]
Ciri wouldn't help you for free. [He smiles at Alucard's adorable little hmph.] Fine, you can come! As bats! I'll allow it. And we'll have a plague of moths or something to enjoy afterwards.
[As bat and bird. At this point, Jaskier has no reservations about eating just about anything.]
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I remember. And I was very good about not being smug in response to that information. I was simply glad to finally be understood.
[That hmph, apparently, works wonders. Hilda likes it too.]
Careful now, that almost sounds like a date.
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Jaskier blows through his lips in disbelief. "Very good" at "not being smug." Why, it's like asking a tiger to not show its stripes.]
And why shouldn't it be? I daresay we've done many more things more sinful than a date of moth plagues. Which we should definitely repeat, you know.
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[Look. He'll take being shoved back and being bullied. It is a founding bedrock of their friendship. But Alucard will not be implied to have not been gracious about being right regarding cactus naps.]
Rude. Not sinful. Rude or dickish, never that word. [It smacks of Catholicism.] Funny. I thought this counted as a date.
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He's a whole package, even as a god.]
Dickish, you say? That's funny, considering what I was actually referencing... [He wiggles his brows. No, not sinful. He and Nadine have the same hangup over that word. Or did, at least. He has the feeling they did.
Look, he's only saying he's had fun. Every time.]
Is this? Looking upon the vestiges of the men we used to be? It's certainly romantic, in a grim way. [He's amused as he says it, though, leading the way to this: the monument in the middle of it all. Still standing against all odds, the magic in it more powerful than ever.] I don't think the history books even remember what it was for.
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[Alucard rolls his eyes, making a huge show of it because that's what Jaskier deserves.
His tone remains light, refusing to drift into something more somber.]
You used to be perhaps. I've worked very hard to maintain my human half, thank you very much. [It was the main reason Alucard had resisted the transformation for so long, making it more painful. More drawn out. He was an idiot about it.] To your last point though, of course not. I placed an explanatory stone at the base of it ages ago, and I keep an eye on it. Even if the memorial has become a spot for grieving on a whole, the original intent is known.
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[He was asking for it! And Jaskier can take his friend throwing him into a wall, if need be. He survives things very well, thank you, and the proof of that is in his grin, which is unapologetic.
So many years have earned him the rights to be a bastard.
The you used to strikes Jaskier like a physical hit -- stronger than being thrown into a wall, and for a moment, his grin is gone. Completely. It isn't Alucard's fault -- he's a bastard, too, but in a very different way -- but it's a sharp reminder is all.]
So have I. But there isn't a man alive who can resists the siren call of power forever. [He sighs. Well, his little ball joke has lost its luster. Sometimes being around Adrian is akin to being assaulted with ice-cold water, several times over.] You can't mean to say that after all this time, you still haven't forgotten some things.
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[They're decent legs, but Alucard is keenly aware that his top half is much more attractive. It is a statement he can agree with.
He isn't surprised he managed to kill the mood. Given the choice, Alucard would still refuse ascending to this state. His natural lifespan, the possibility of resting and the chance to be redefined over and over again through work, that is a greater appeal. He's said as much before. He won't rehash it now. He will only give his friend a small smile before letting the topic go.]
I have forgotten some things. But projects? Things made with my own hands, and in this case, together? No. I'd never forget those.
[He squeezes Jaskier's arm as if to reinforce the point, and pauses just a moment to lean his head gently against that of his friend.]
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[This is truly them now: a back and forth that has no real meaning nor importance. Why care about every second spent when you know you have so many ahead of? A number so large that, to him, it may as well be infinite? He can't allow himself to wallow for too long; in those moments, he begins to feel something strange inside him. An alien. And the alien thing is him, his mind, his thoughts... dissipating into an infinite swell of time.
Jaskier stops in front of their memorial, with Alucard's hand holding his, squeezing it. Another anchor: the people who have entered eternity with him, or that he followed after.] You're right. I'd never let you hear the end of it.
[After this long, this memorial still feels like his, partly; their magic weaves in it, stronger than ever. He cannot recall a single face that this memorial was meant to stand for... but he does remember what caused them to build it in the first place. That deep, overwhelming sorrow.
It's rare the sunrays in him ever fade; over time, perhaps he's begun to fear them even more than he used to.] You're the only one who understands we've never stopped working.
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[The topic can float away with Alucard's self-assured grin. Standing in front of the memorial, it feels incorrect to linger on the topic. Insulting to the dead, especially when the two of them have outlived everyone represented on the walls eight times over.
It's aged well. There has been care and upkeep, some expansion to allow for more memories of those passed to be shared. The evolution has been natural and welcome, and to make something that works for so many over the centuries is...well, you peak at a certain age. Alucard's maintained that this is probably one of the best things he's done in all his lifetimes. The meaning has shifted and endured. That counts for a lot.
He squeezes Jaskier's hand back. Leans a little bit more on the bard, the moment feeling correct to do so.]
I had the advantage of having already thought about how to handle a long life, Julian. That and a compulsive need for projects, lest I sit with my thoughts too long. Don't lionize it.
[His tone is so very warm. Everything he's said is true, but there's no resentment present, no disapproval, nothing but a simple truth that has never really offended Alucard to look in the eye.]
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They lean together in that perfect way where the other's body balances them. Perhaps if Jaskier wasn't associated with so many of the other Summoned, they would have their whole own following: a pair of art gods that leave memorials to mortals in their wake. That reminds them of how mortal they are, but how their momentary lives have meaning.
Even if he should die tomorrow or live another 800 years, he will always believe that.]
I do think it worth lionizing. Is that not what all the tales of immortals always warned? They grow bored with life. With mortal existence. They become old and older and more rotten in their core. But you... you've really remained the same. I don't think a few decades of knowing you're an immortal truly prepared you for that.
[Sometimes he still laughs about it. Technically, even now, Jaskier is older than him. Jaskier turns into him, drawing Alucard closer, and kisses him with a firm press to his lips.] Perhaps I can admit you've aided me in not becoming a complete bastard of an immortal, too.
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[Alucard doesn't think it matters, in the end. This is how it has shaken out, and while he will always have strong opinions about certain choices some of his fellow Summoned have made over the centuries, the dhampir knows the ones he thinks handled the transition well enough.
There's another thought to be had, but the kiss leaves him just a little taken aback. It isn't as if it is the first time it has happened - far from it - but it is always a little bit of a surprise.
He laughs, soft and warm and just glad for the company.]
Oh, I'd agree with that. Holding back the hand that wants to smite has somehow become my specialty. [It is a wholly unsurprising to Alucard, but that's not here nor there.] You've kept me grounded simply by knowing you're going to be there when I decide to return to the world.
[They're not depression naps anymore, just breaks. And Jaskier is there every time, waiting for him. Alucard's appreciates it, just as he appreciates that when he and Jaskier are spoken of together, all emphasis is on having a complimentary partnership that balances personalities and skills.
Balance is perhaps the word of the day, and Alucard leans in to return the kiss. It is no less fir or reaffirming of where they stand with each other, although Alucard also knows his friend well enough. A little bit of fang enters into the equation. Not enough to draw blood, just there to make itself known.]
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The times I've wanted to smite have been very low in number. [He insists. A musician who wrote a mocking ballad about him. The writer who dissected his lyrics for a study in the university, calling them "trite" and "too punny."
The luteist who changed the words in The Fishmonger's Daughter. He didn't even like that song, but it was the principle of the thing.
Jaskier takes that offering, flicking a tongue as a tease against a fang. He knows well, after all this time, how to move around them. And they still invoke a flare of heat in him.]
As I shall always be. And when the Singularity draws the last drop of life out of the universe, I'll make sure you perish first, so that you should never be without me.
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They have. And they have all been very petty. [It wasn't as if Alucard was unsympathetic on the matter. He also just very, very much thought it better to leave those things alone. People can have mean opinions that hurt your feelings.
In these moments, it is very, very easy to understand why Jaskier's romances have endured. It isn't the sense of the sun shining down on you so much as the knowledge that the statements, for all the flowery language, are genuine. For Alucard, who has always better with actions over words, it always means a lot be the moment truly romantic or one based on centuries of their friendship.
He smiles, gently resting his forehead against Jaskier's.]
I love you too.
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[The truth hurts, unfortunately; being immortal has hardly done much to give him the sort of armor without its chinks, in which perfectly placed darts of criticism can easily slide inside and hurt his heart.
Still true.
Well.
He laughs, and kisses him again.] I knew you had it in you to say exactly what I wished to hear. [Love has always comes easy, but never this long. That it has endured is testament to its unyielding strength.] Now, before you distract me with your sexy sincerity, shall we go check on the Hall next?
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Alucard laughs softly at the phrasing of sexy sincerity because honestly, what the fuck is that even?, before he considers.]
Perhaps we just head out to the grassy areas for a bit and remain outside? The Hall isn't going anywhere.
[Neither are we, even if Alucard tugs at Jaskier hand and starts to walk again.]
🎀
The Hall's never gone anywhere.
[He says it as a point of pride, squeezing Alucard's hand tightly as he steals another kiss. No, neither are they -- not with an infinite amount of time ahead of them, now that death is hardly an option.]
Come. Time waits for no one, but I won't wait for long, either.
Astarion; circa Divorce
So there being great and sudden chaos in the Horizon in the direction of the floating ship that Astarion relies on is not a surprise to the dhampir. He's heard rumors. He's ignored them and kept to his human world, working in Solvunn this time around as a black haired, grey eyed young man to create better means of storing food and sharing information. It is a quieter version of past work, but the quiet is appreciated. He has a small home and workshop at the edge of the secondary settlement, and every so often at night, he slips into the Horizon to recharge himself more fully.
To say he's surprised when the only other Summoned vampire shows up on his Horizon doorstep a little while after the crash is an understatement. Alucard's face goes on a journey. Then he just lets Astarion in, gives him the only bedroom in the little hut, and lets him just...exist. Gives a few house rules (no wild parties, no orgies, please put everything back where you found it, don't change anything in here without my permission) and then leaves him to lick his wounds.
The bigger surprise comes four months in. Alucard isn't even sure Astarion's moved from the small bedroom he has in his little Horizon hut, heated by a wood burning stove and surrounded by books.
He sighs, leaning down in the doorway.]
You should get up and at least let me change the bed linens.
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He had, perhaps, let some of his newfound power and freedom go to his head. Some. But then - why shouldn't he have let it?
Four months is not nearly enough time for him to accept his fault in the matter. The remains of his once majestic domain have only just stopped smoldering where they crashed into the surface of Horizon.
He has, actually, moved in these four months. Once to visit the site, where poisonous flowers immediately sprang from the wake of his steps. Once again he left to check on them out of boredom, and had found a festering meadow. ]
You hardly need me to move for that. [ he replies with a slight scowl, now currently lounging on the bed. The point is that Alucard could change the sheets if he very well wanted to with only a thought.
There's a wine bottle filled with blood on the little nightstand. The ceaseless ache left him centuries ago, but he still craves the taste - even here, where he hardly has the same physical restrictions as he once did. ]
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[His arms are folded across his chest, and Alucard is pointedly not offering any sympathy in his face for the vampire crashing on his bed. In the first place, Alucard cannot imagine that Astarion would accept such a gesture in better times, and secondly, there is absolutely none to be had at the moment. The fallout of what has happened was not contained to only two people, and that is what Alucard considers a genuine problem.
Yet he hasn't kicked Astarion out. He has his own reasons for that.]
May I bribe you with food that isn't just wine instead in pursuit of the same goal?
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He does, after a long moment and a deep sigh, sit up - although he does not get out of bed just yet. There's something performative about his protests and his petulance, as though he going through the motions of his own behaviors out of habit, but Alucard might sense a disconnect. A lack of commitment. Or, worse, a lack of direction - because were he to allow himself to actually get up and do something about the way he's been thrown between fits of rage and sinking into despondency, he might actually lash out and do intentional damage somewhere. Not to Alucard, who could handle him in his violence, but to someone or somewhere that might not bear a raging god without breaking. ]
I suppose. [ he finally answers, eyeing his put upon friend and squashing a very sudden and unwanted wave of guilt. He didn't force himself into Alucard's space, and he's followed his 'rules'. He has no reason to feel guilty. Instead, he lets mockery slip into his tone. ]
What shall it be - are we to have a picnic, then?
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[Alucard doesn't mind trying to match the attempt at banter. It is a first stab at something remotely approaching normal. and he does not assume it will actually land. Nothing that has happened is normal, even if Astarion's actions register at like a 2.5, maybe 3 on the vampire scale of overkill emotional reactions. (He spent a long time working on the scale. 4 is attempted destruction of a sizeable portion of the population, 5 is pulling it off.)
Just as dry and less hollow are the next words out of Alucard's mouth:]
You also look like shit.
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Oh - what does it even matter now.
[ Astarion pulls the sheets around himself like a cocoon, shoulders slouched. Picnic or soup, it doesn't matter very much - does it? Nothing in Horizon matters. This entire space is their playground - and yet, it's been at least a century since any of his antics have felt fulfilling, here or in the Material Realm of Abraxas.
He laughs to himself, very abruptly and with little humor. ]
Maybe I ought to take a turn at appearing as some sewer-dwelling wretch for a decade or two. The change might be refreshing...
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[Alucard knows that cooking in the Horizon is just playing house. He's never minded it before, but there's no surprise that the banter attempt fails. Time. Place. Emotion. He can't imagine what Astarion's interior thoughts are at the moment. Doubtlessly a nasty storm of everything.
But the act of the blanket burritoing oneself says everything. Alucard is quiet for a moment, then sits down on the floor. It puts him at a weird right angle from the vampire and at a lower level.
Also, the floor is good.]
It'd be different, if nothing else. I don't know what sort of general lifestyle activities are available in the sewer, but I imagine you'd invent new ones.
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[ Maddening instead of infuriating, as he might've once said. In the back of his mind he knows he doesn't deserve loyalty like this. He grimaces, red eyes following Alucard's descent to floor seating.
The talk of sewers unfortunately stirs the dust off other memories, those now beginning to fade in the past century or so. In the first two centuries after he'd been turned he had found the loss of important details of his past upsetting. Now, he finds relief in not being able to recall the face of the monster the turned him, his name long forgotten. Even the scars on his back have begun to fade over time, the ugly, raised lines that mark him slightly less pronounced than they once were. Maybe in another few centuries they'll vanish all together.
He scowls to himself.]
You must think I'm pathetic. Or simply being dramatic. Histrionic.
[ And over what? A rejection. From someone he feels nothing for anymore, who he hasn't felt anything for in decades. It's hard to remember what even brought the two of them together in the first place, or why he feels so gutted. ]
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[Alucard leans his head back, closing his eyes to at least give Astarion the illusion of privacy. Whatever his thoughts are, even as they turn to sewers, they're not pleasant. He knows that much.]
I think two things: that you're grieving something that held meaning and if I say anything you suspect brushes against pity, you'll have my throat out.
[The pity part is something Alucard recalls when Astarion first showed up in Abraxas, defenses raised all too high and in a way that smacked of...well. Never mind who it reminded him of. That person's not going to be showing up in Abraxas now. And if he did, or if Sypha returned, how would they react to any of it?
That's not an Alucard problem.]
feel free to skip ahead when needed!
A sudden, terrible impulse toward violence stirs within him. He has spent a good part of the past few centuries giving in to that impulse without care, and sometimes needing little cause. Better to destroy what could betray you than give it the chance to do harm. Perhaps that's what went wrong with him and his lovely wife. They couldn't kill one another, but they couldn't survive each other either.
He imagines his fist closing around Alucard's throat, sharpened nails digging in the second before he tears into that lovely, pale skin with his teeth. The dhampir had once been able to easily overpower him. Now? Astarion suspects the ascension has put them on a more even playing field.
But those thoughts are followed by a sudden, thick revulsion that rises in his throat like bile. ]
Too pretty a throat to ruin, unfortunately. [ he drawls, though there's a tension across his form now, mostly hidden beneath the blankets.
Sulking again, he throws them over his head and lies down again, curling up on himself. His voice is muffled beneath the thick fabric. ]
You must have better things to do. Go. I'll have your soup later.
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He's glad not to fully be in Astarion's head for the rest. Alucard can take a guess, and if any of the fantasies were said, he'd simply shrug and point out that if he can murder his father, anyone else is easy in comparison. Deity or not.]
If you were in a better frame of mind, I'd take that bait. But fine.
[Astarion sat up for at least a few minutes. That is a victory, so far as Alucard is concerned. He gets himself up off the floor, leaving his guest to continue his noble line of work as a sad pile of blankets.
At some point, there is indeed soup left for the sad blanket pile. Tomato, along with a substantial cheese plate, although it is left at the door to force someone out of bed just a little bit more.
Alucard has figured it'll be like this for a while. He can manage that.]
Geralt; Alucard Soup, Part 1 [CW FOR LIGHT CANNIBALISM]
The broth smells decent enough. Herbal for the most part, full of thyme and sage and orange peel along with onions, carrots, and celery. Salt and pepper go without saying. Something that could be truly great if it a chicken in there, not...weird dhampir bone, and just the one.
Time passes. Alucard gets up and ladles the broth into a small mug made of solid ceramic and a large handle that may be a fluffy wolf tail if one squints right.
Here goes nothing.]
Geralt?
maybe it's not cannibalism if they're technically a different species.
He does not know how long he can let Ciri believe she will never be remembered. He wants to fix this. For her, if nothing else, but...for himself, too. He hates how much his life—spanning centuries—has shrunk to a handful of moments that make up barely decades, years.
Naturally, Alucard being Alucard insists on this being a significantly greater ordeal than simply boiling some fucking bone in water and swallowing a cup. Geralt intended this to be, at best, an hour or two. Instead, it's taken twice as long, and he has alternated between napping and meditating for all four of those hours. Not until he hears his name does he crack open an eye.
Geralt sits up with a grunt. ] You're sure they won't return in a flood?
[ This is his main concern. What glimpse of his memories have returned, he understands they are...unpleasant. He is not interested in a "cure" that will only drive him to madness. ]
I don't think we win on technicalities on this one
[It made sense, of course. Alucard's blood always had healing properties. His bones now had weird magic that focused on rebuilding and adding structure. To think that finding a way to consume them might help was perfectly logical, if not a little unnerving. It spoke to how dire the situation felt from her perspective, and as unsure as Alucard was about how it all might go, it seemed a small thing to give a friend.
He sighs, leaning against the counter in the middle of the woods once Geralt's taken the mug.]
Maybe just take a sip or two first and then see what happens. Chugging this seems ill advised at best.
Pink and Goth share a house and it is a delight
[Alucard knows how this got started, actually. His last lifetime was spent in Aquila where he spent a lot of time organizing for the arts professions but doing very little design work and even less building work. His glamor had him as a shorter red headed man with slim glasses and a good mind for the marriage of art and commerce, and while it had been enjoyable, it was not as fulfilling as he hoped.
In discussing that last point with Hilda (following an excellent faked death that appeared to be of entirely natural causes and a will that stipulated a burial at sea), they had discussed what might be a deeply indulgent lifetime for the next go around. A cozy house that was moved into but the interior was designed to the nines, indulgent in all of the baroque-over-the-top-ness Alucard typically didn't feel the need to let out into the wild.
Somehow that got into how that sort of style could be approached in two very, very different color palettes, how much could be bought and styled versus designed wholly a new, and wouldn't it be funny if the outside was deceiving?
It would be. And there'd be no better venue for that than Solvunn and...
...and that's why Alucard is standing in his own foyer besides the staircase, forearms resting on a secretary desk that needs to go somewhere on Hilda's floor. It is entirely hers excluding the kitchen (Alucard redesigned what was there to be a little more practical), whereas he has the second floor. The aesthetics mesh in a way they shouldn't, and it's fun except for when the community goats find their way into the house (neither of them has figured out how) and wreck havoc.
For now, they're goatless and full of furniture. There's a few other pieces crammed into the space that also need to be moved, with two intended for upstairs.]