Last of the Belmonts (A Castlevania: Season 1 and 2 Fanfiction)

Chapter 7: Aftermath

Gresit. Wallachia. 

The morning was filled with the burying of the dead. Terrified men and women huddled in dark corners, or hugged each other, weeping. The night horde sweeping through had left multiple more dead, and the ravens flew about in anticipation of the carnage. 

Elsewhere in Gresit, Sypha Belnades waved goodbye to her grandfather and the wagon full of Speakers as they travelled elsewhere. Trevor Belmont walked up to her. 

'Your people are going to be fine, you know,' Trevor said, placing a hand on her shoulder softly as her hand dropped. 

'I know. And I know they have to do it. Other towns need their aid. And to have their stories saved,' Sypha replied. 'I'm not worried about them.'

'You're worried about yourself, Sypha. You've always been with family. You've never travelled alone.' Her head bowed. 

'Never. Isn't it silly? They're heading into who knows what danger, and I'm standing here sad and angry because they're together, and I'm alone.' Trevor remained silent. She glared up at him. 'This is where you're supposed to tell me that I'm not alone, Belmont.' He removed his hand from her shoulder. 'You are really not very good at this.'

'I learned to travel alone early in life. Maybe I just got too used to it.'

'You had a family, though.' 

'Not much of one, and not for long. Except for Alyx. Okay, look. I know a little bit of what you're feeling. I'm sorry. But we have a thing to do now. All I can do is try and make sure it doesn't get you killed, so you can see your family again.'

'That's your encouraging talk?' 

'Or you get killed and they get eaten in the forest so none of you have to be sad. How's that?' Trevor began to walk away. 

'I was right about you the first time, you know. You are rude,' she replied indignantly, glaring at his back. 

'I've been called worse.' 

'Oh, I'm just getting started.' 

Alucard and I sat in the old Speakers home, and he was sketching in the dirt. A face. The face of a man. 

'Alucard, they called me,' he muttered. 'The opposite of you. Mother never liked that. Did you know that? She hated the idea that I might define myself by you. Even in opposition to you. She loved us both, enough that she wanted us to be our own people, living our own lives, making our own choices.' He sketched another face next to it. 'And so here I am... choosing to honour my mother by killing my father.' He scratched out the face next to the one he'd just drawn. 'No longer Adrian Tepes. Choosing to be Alucard of Wallachia, the name of my mother's people.' A tear dropped onto the sketch of the woman. 'I'm sorry, Mother.' The shadows of two people filled the doorway, and Alucard hesitantly scratched out the drawing of the woman. 'And so we begin again.' 

'So, how do we proceed?' Sypha asked. 

'Have the Speakers left?' Alucard asked. 

'Yeah,' Trevor replied. 

'I'm sorry,' Alucard replied softly. 'In success, you will see them again soon, in far happier circumstances,' he added, looking up at Sypha, and it was the first time I saw him slip a small smile. Trevor stalked past Sypha. 

'See?' she said matter-of-factly. 'He knows how to be nice. Is it true, then? The castle can travel somehow? We know the stories, but sometimes, it's hard to separate myth from truth.'

'Tell her about Dracula's castle, Alucard. Her day can't get any more ruined,' Trevor grumbled. 

'Dracula's castle moves,' Alucard replied. 'How to describe it? It travels without moving. It appears at locations as if... well, as if by magic.' Trevor dug around in a box, pulling out a bottle. 

'There has to be some way to trap it,' I mused. 'How do we start?'

'I want to go home,' Trevor grumbled. I sighed. 

'Tough shit, brother. We can't go home. We don't have one, remember? And have you been drinking again?' 

'Some chance,' he growled. 'But no. I want to go home. The old Belmont estate.' I rolled my eyes, leaning back against the wall. 

'God, you're insufferable, Trevor,' I mumbled, and I saw the golden-haired vampire cast his gaze to me, a small smile quirking at the side of his lips. 

'I was under the impression it was destroyed,' Alucard said, gazing at Trevor next. 'Villagers, pitchforks, and torches, that sort of thing.'

'It was. But the value of the old house wasn't the house itself,' Trevor replied. 'It was what was underneath it. The Belmont Hold. Our family library and trove.'

'The collective knowledge and material of generations of Belmonts who fought the creatures of the night. Sounds interesting. If it survives.'

'If there are solutions to the problems of finding and killing Dracula,' Trevor said, 'they are in the Hold.'

'At least - they should be.'

'You're guessing, though,' Alucard shot back. 

'I am guessing. I can't read or understand magic. But my family stored everything they found, including books of magic and whatever other weird stuff they came across. I just can't do anything with it. But you two can.' 

'Fortunate indeed, then, that I chose to not kill you and eat you, Belmont,' Alucard sniped. 

'And that I decided against gutting you and flaying you and turning you into shoes, Alucard,' Trevor sniped back. 

'Such a merry band we are,' Sypha said, walking away. 'I will find us a covered wagon and horses. If you two can manage not to kill each other while I'm gone.' 

'Oh, please,' Alucard chided. 'We're not children.'

'I'll stay as a buffer, Sypha,' I called out. 'My brother's insufferable enough as it is, he doesn't need a half-vampire egging him on.' The Speaker-magician shot me a grateful smile and walked away. 

'Eat shit and die,' Trevor growled, pointing at Alucard for good measure. 

'Yes, fuck you,' Alucard retorted, and I laughed, as did Trevor, slumping down near me. 'You really believe we could find the tools to kill my father at your old home?' the vampire asked, looking between me and Trevor. 

'I'll be honest with you. I really don't have a better idea. I just know that right here, right now, we are under-equipped for the job.' 

'I'm trusting you, Belmont. Don't make me regret it.' I frowned, but the phrase seemed to be more directed at Trevor than me. 

'Everybody regrets it in the end, Alucard.' 

That evening, as the sun set in the sky, Trevor, Sypha, Alucard and I drove away from the ruined city of Gresit in a covered wagon. Alucard and I sat in the back of the wagon, staring at the cross that sat high on the top of the chapel residing over the city.