#my terrible bloodbound muses

[clansayeed]

hi i’m jack and i’m not fuckign ready but also i specifically set funds aside to buy diamonds for this shit -- whatever it takes to save my queen

[clansayeed]

Bound by Choice ― II.iii. The Beginning of the End

PAIRING: OC x OC x OC (Valdas x Isseya x Cynbel) RATING: Mature (reader discretion advised)

⥼ MASTERLIST ⥽

⥼ Bound by Choice ⥽

Before there were Clans and Councils, before the fate of the world rested in certain hands, before the rise and fall of a Shadow King ― there was the Trinity. Three souls intertwined in the early hands of the universe who came to define the concept of eternity together. Because that was how they began and how they hoped to end; together. For over 2,000 years Valdas, Cynbel, and Isseya have walked through histories both mortal and supernatural. But in the early years of the 20th century something happened―something terrible. Their story has a beginning, and this is the end.

Bound by Choice and the rest of the Oblivion Bound series is an ongoing dramatic retelling project of the Bloodbound series. Find out more [HERE].

Note: Choice is the only book in the series not based on an existing Choices story. It is set in the Bloodbound universe and features many canon characters.

*Let me know if you would like to be added to the Choice/series tag list!

⥼ Chapter Summary ⥽

The Trinity’s enemies grow in number.

[READ IT ON AO3]

Three nights before…

Old wood and old metal and bones older still take refuge from the bitter night rain.

In the shadows Cynbel waits, watches. The smith brings down his hammer against white-hot metal clang. clang. clang. Hunting like a different kind of predator and oh he has been so many that this… this he barely feels in the shift of his skin.

Steam erupts into the air, filled with the foul smell of a burning port where the worker submerges his latest creation beneath the water’s surface. Ignorant; blissfully ignorant.

“One would think after a long day’s toiling away, any opportunity for respite would be welcomed.”

Surprise catches in the mortal’s bones. Makes him release his work from the grasp of rusted tongs. He spins around, looks this way and that, but is no better than a blind man in his efforts.

“Who goes there?” Then, once the young man catches himself, “We are closed for the night. Please, return tomorrow at dawn.”

Does he think he plays at manhood? But this new age of innovation demands it of such boys, does it not. He might feel pity for them — if he could.

“Alas,” and when he replies his voice wraps around the small hovel; an embrace from Winter herself, “I cannot.”

Still the boy persists. “I insist, monsieur.”

“Who are you to insist of me?”

It’s advantageous; the hesitation that follows. Gives Cynbel a chance to emerge from his not-so-hidden refuge beside a basket of ores. He A shine catches his eye and he plucks it from the dark and misshapen pile, raises it against the light of the furnace to marvel at the gemstone’s glossy sheen.

He pockets it with little thought. A token of affection for his darling girl — so recently bored of diadems and jewelry and smitten with such… imperfections.

“Hey, that doesn’t bel—”

“Sssh…” The vampire presses a finger to his lips and the human goes quiet. Good, he likes them obedient.

This part of the workshop, back and away from the street where the front room displays the prides of masters and apprentices alike, requires a bit of meandering. But he’s an opportunistic man and takes what is offered for his own uses. Sways his hips with every movement slow, seductive.

Every good hunter knows his prey.

And indeed — when Cynbel comes to tower over the young man’s figure he can see each bead of sweat that rolls down his temples. Not just from the room’s stifling heat. Watches one bead along a shaven chin and glisten over the lump in his throat.

Here, and now in the light, things are different. Aren’t they?

Here every pump of the mortal’s racing heart threatens to deafen him in the best of ways. Here he is illuminated in fire’s heavenly glow; and recognized.

Cynbel lets his finger fall in unspoken permission. Watches as he’s taken in rapturously and in ways he has only seen between the pious and their places of worship… in ways he, too, has found rapture from his own religion.

When the human finally speaks it is rushed; exhaled, “I-worried-you-would-not-come…”

“For you,” and he weaves his fingers through locks of mousy hair, uses it as a master to his hound to pull him forward; breathes his honey-drenched words against peeling lips, “always.”

Their kiss is desperate, fervent with inevitability. Smoke-stained hands smeared over his jaw and Cynbel resists the urge to bite out his inexperienced tongue as a second gift for his beloved. Lets himself be defiled with the touches of a young man craven for affection and so so alone… unable to give it.

He would call this creature pitiful but even that would be too kind. That the mortal is too obsessed with his own gratification to realize every drop of passion is entirely from his own cup, that Cynbel’s cup could not be more barren in his presence, is nothing short of pathetic.

He pulls back as he always does. Stops those dirty wandering fingers as he always does. Kisses the day’s work from trembling knuckles as he always does.

“What kept you away?” The mortal whimpers.

And as he always does Cynbel lies through his teeth. “It matters not — that you stand before me now is more than enough.”

The mortal beams with pride. Though that is not the only vice Cynbel has been able to impart on him.

Everything in the smithy is exactly the same as he had left it a fortnight ago — well, almost.

He doesn’t have to pretend in this. The way he (none too) gently urges the wayward man aside to cross the room in several strides. Among the hammers and horseshoes the work done here is for the meager rank and file of Paris. Nothing as flashy as settings for gems or swords for battle. Cynbel knows this because his time has been well-spent these last months. Because the thing that separates the hunters who fail from the ones who survive is found in the little things.

Surveying the prey. Entering its nest. Staking its claim over the carcass before it has even been devoured.

Knowing all that he does — it begs the question of the mannequin—freshly carved—and the armor—freshly polished—settled snug upon it.

“Is this your work?”

He looks back and hears the skip in the mortal’s heart as he nods. “Indeed. Are you taken with it?”

“As taken as I am with you,” he croons in response; and knows the flush in living cheeks is not from the heat.

“That is why I am still here, actually,” he remembers his work then, and plucks the now solid metal from the bucket to wipe it dry with his sleeve. Small, in comparison to the rest of the pieces, but Cynbel takes it when it is offered; lets their touch linger in a promise he does not intend to keep.

The fastening is crude; its finer points interrupted by Cynbel’s arrival. But the sigil would be difficult not to recognize — especially for his kind. The halo around the center meant to be the sun. The fleur de lis enshrined within it in need of a little more dedication to be perfect.

More likely than not his little apprentice smith knows not what he is being asked to make. The holy war he is urging forward in his own way. A suspicion confirmed as Cynbel offers the work back and allows the mortal to continue to hold his hand.

“This is the only thing left. The master had just arranged contract with the Duke who ordered it when he fell ill,” —he explains this like Cynbel doesn’t know, like he didn’t ensure it— “and as his eldest apprentice the duty fell to me. I don’t know what overcame me, my love… it was as though the muses of old inspired my every movement.

“I missed you terribly, Claude, but I was fortunate there was this work to help me pass the time.”

Should he never hear the false name given for this ruse again it would be too soon.

Cynbel gestures to the armor, a “may I?” whispered reverent on his lips. With the human’s permission he steps closer, ghosts his touch over the refined metal. Imagines all the ways he will go about tearing it from whatever unfortunate soul it is given to limb from bloody, gory limb.

“You have outdone yourself.”

“Truly?”

Is the first of his praises not enough? Disgusting whelp. “Truly and more. I dare say whomever commissioned this will command any battlefield.”

Warm arms encircle his waist. The tack of the human’s sweating forehead presses against his doublet and already Cynbel begins practicing the apologies he will give to his beloveds upon his return. No doubt his Lord and Love will banish him from the apartment for the stench.

It is torture, pure and simple.

“May I confess something to you, Claude?”

Cynbel swallows back his bile. “Anything, always.” And he doesn’t need to see the human’s face to hear his pathetic ‘secret.’

“The Duke has sent word he will arrive in Paris tomorrow — and he hopes to see how the piece is coming along. I hope to convince him of my skill… perhaps even take some of the spoils for myself.”

Greed. One of the few things that make his presence bearable against all his shortcomings.

Cynbel turns in his arms; feigns as though he could never imagine such a scandal. “And what of your master? Will he not cast you out for the gall of it?”

“Perhaps he may not be around long enough to do such.”

“Don’t sound so hopeful.”

“Why not, when you inspire in me such a wonderful hope?”

Their second kiss is far more chaste, entirely so on part of the vampire. The disappointment on the other’s face is impossible to miss.

“Something the matter?”

“I would not have your well-earned pride ruined for it. Pay me no mind.”

“Claude,” Cynbel’s cheeks are taken in grimy mortal hands and he shivers, lets him take it as he wishes, “there is no joy I can bask in without you. Let me ease the weight on your chest. Please.”

Let it be known that he does not give in to the mortal’s whims. But with demons of the night leaping from shadow to shadow among the rafters, with every horrendous and degrading sentiment forced through his teeth; then and there Cynbel has had enough. Enough pretending, enough disgust.

Enough with feeling somehow unworthy of the love bestowed upon him when he returns to the arms of the ones with whom he truly belongs. Oh they placate him dutifully but he sees the twitch of a sensitive nose — a touch moved elsewhere at the last moment. These things are their prey; no better than chattel.

He was amusing at first. But…

“You have simply outlived your usefulness to me.” With no risk comes no reward they say but there is no risk here. He might be inclined to entertain it further if there was.

And like a child the human seems only to hear the kindly things. Continues to hold him, to adore him. To sicken him.

So he continues. “There is no risk, here. Only the continued debasement of the Golden Son, of the first of Valdemaras’ blood. If, when all the ages wither, I find in my soul no love of self then I must at least continue to love the part of me that is my God. Wouldn’t you agree?”

Sure enough that rouses him. As if from a slumber. The masquerade finally coming to a close.

“I don’t understand.”

“Was I not speaking French?” Which could have been a possibility. As it is his muscles tense, predatory, in preparation of the first violent act that comes to mind.

“Yes, Claude, but — what you are saying makes little sense.”

So simpering, so pitiful that Cynbel actually stomachs the will to kiss him again. If only to whisper the insult to his lips; “I would expect nothing less of such a feeble mind.”

He’s seen heartbreak before. This is not it. This is a pantomime—what the inexperienced whelp believes heartbreak to be. Tries, so fleetingly, to wrench himself from Cynbel’s grasp but the charade is finally over. And with it the need to disguise his true strength.

“I had hoped you would have completed all of the armor in time, and maybe had I a stronger constitution one more night would have done the trick.” He looks back to the suit with true critique in his newfound eyes. Such a waste — talent like that in the hands of a worm. “But their sigil is clear enough that any member would recognize it as their own. I suppose there’s a poetic drama to the incomplete set.

“Isseya would know of such things better than I. She’s quite taken with the stage. She is the voice behind my tender affections towards you in fact.”

All the while the human tries to free himself to no avail. His workman’s hands are used to shaping manacles but have never been imprisoned by them after all.

Finally some sense comes about the man. All the telltale signs of a scream; flared nostrils, flushed pallor, the sour odor of fear near his knocking knees. Too late.

“HE—!”

Valdas would be proud how he silences any cry and practices for the upcoming ball in one swift movement. Pulling so hard he feels the joint come loose in a feeble shoulder and presses them close as lovers, back to front; molded against every vibrating measure of him and a hand tight over his lips.

“Ah ah ah…” He turns them both to face his work. Will give him that final gift of his life’s work burned behind his eyelids in the moments before death. “Don’t you want to know, my love? To understand?”

The fussy little fucker actually shakes his head. As though that will save him. As if he is held captive only until Cynbel has given him light where there was previously only darkness.

But that light is not for him. It belongs to them.

He belongs to them.

“If that is what you wish, fine. Throw away my gift, and your life with it.”

“Mmmph!”

“No no taking it back now. My mind is made up.”

“MMmnpm…” A needling heat pierces his skin. The sight of it makes the vampire laugh.

“A tear, really? And here I thought it was quite impossible for me to think less of you.”

He wrestles the human’s head to position; nearly breaks his neck several times in the process. Forces him to take in the splendor that will soon serve as a crafted casket for whatever heathen is suffered to wear it.

Unsympathetic, Cynbel places a final kiss to his temple. “Everything is in place now darling. I want you to know I could not have done it without you. Well—no—I just cannot help myself but lie to you it seems.” Another wave of muffled whimpers drowned in his laughter. “But you have made it easier on me. The Knights will collect your work and your corpse with it. One little life — that’s all it will take to earn their ire. Clever little hellions that they are… they’ll follow every crumb I’ve left. All. the way. to me.

“If my beloved is correct—if the Godmaker graces the evening with his vile presence—then I may finally have the opportunity to rid the world of two evils. Can you imagine? No longer looking over our shoulders… no longer fearing unholy wrath…” The very thought has him in near ecstasy. Actually—quite close to the real thing.

But thoughts of a life free of the Knights draw him, as they inevitably do, to a darker place.

To the cursed memories of Isseya prone, neck bare… to the taste of steel on his tongue and the delicious smell of roasted game—but he was the meal of bubbling blistering flesh and every tear he shed—she shed a fresh wave of agon—

“The events that will unfold will ensure their safety. No one will dare to take them from me ever again…” Cynbel surprises them both in that his voice breaks with unbridled fury, with withheld anguish.

“Lest they remember what befell the last to even try.”

Countless hours spend seducing the young smith who surely had a name that he hadn’t bothered to remember go to waste, then. Such a fragile neck in his grasp — the way it sounds when it snaps is like the first notes of a sonnet.

But there’s still one crucial crumb that needs leaving. One that will ensure the Holy Sacred Knights of the Rising Dawn know exactly who has courted them such.

One that will ensure they amass their armies beneath Paris in droves.

One fallen innocent is a message.

A slaughtered horde—that’s a warning.

He takes his leave of the workshop in much the same way as he entered; undetected by any soul living or dead. The mortal’s blood is tacky on his soaked hands the long walk back to their lodgings. He wants his lovers to taste of the wretched little cur so they know; so they understand.

Their sigil—the Brand of the Made-God Valdemaras—left to dry red on the breastplate. The unfinished clasp fastened neatly in the middle.

It was not unheard of for the vampires of Paris to think themselves important. Far more relevant than they actually are. Cynbel had gazed upon the half-masque of Serafine Dupont in the halls below and assumed her prestige nothing more than vanity; the hostess putting on airs for her guests.

But he’s a big enough man to admit when he’s wrong.

It takes a skill honed from centuries for the discipline she shows now. All of her remaining strength fixated on her injuries, on the effort to stand and set the bone to heal. A wound that would cripple a mortal—and even a younger vampire—rendered fruitless as muscle and flesh knit together in the tapestry of her dedication.

They watch the show of her impressed — but never intimidated. They will give credit where it is due.

With a vengeful cry she lunges forward and all credit is lost when her open palm meets his face.

Cynbel reaches up, feels the heat of the sting on his cheek with a shiver down his spine. Like all pain it fades too fast — but while there may be no more Knights in vain attempts to slay him Serafine still stands there and she looks positively craven for the excuse to strike again.

A look seen by more than just him. One that lands her pinned to a building exterior with splayed limbs and Valdas’ hand around her throat.

“Apologize.”

Yet even as his darling’s softer hands skirt feather-light touches over his healed skin Cynbel laughs. Laughs and laughs and adjusts his hair where the whore had sent it askew.

“No no, let her come for me. The Knights proved no real contest, maybe she’ll last a moment or two longer than they.”

“How dare you mock them,” seethes the woman with labored breaths; and because it isn’t the apology he asked for Valdas only tightens his grip, only strains her further in a wraithish rasp, “have you no grief for our brothers, our sisters who were slaughtered?!”

“They are no kin of ours.” Isseya answers for him. He snakes an arm around her waist and squeezes.

“Forgive her, my God,” he croons, would rather keep his lovers close than risk their already fractured good luck, “the poor thing seems to be under the impression we are on some equal standing.”

And he does, eventually, let her go. But only when it takes longer than a passing moment for the carvings of his nails at her neck to heal.

“A mistake she would do well not to make again.”

Serafine’s eyes are wild; a frightened animal that takes them in all at once. The way they were meant to be understood — the way they had always been understood. Her voiceless words aren’t worth the effort it would take to even try to comprehend her.

“The same blood runs through your veins that does mine, le tueur.” She snarls.

Isseya’s eyes narrow. “Not for long. Not with that foul tongue.”

“Now now, Iss’, let the little thing mourn.” Cynbel attempts to placate her with long, slow pets to her hair.

“She dare call you the killer when those sycophants live?”

She turns her face away from their accuser, tucked into the ridge of his shoulder and Cynbel holds her tighter for it. Knows that she, too, is plagued with memory. That if he coaxed her face up he would see the shine of unshed tears in her beautiful eyes.

“Less of them now,” he whispers, “thanks to us.” For now it is all he can offer her. And for now it is enough. They only have this thorn to deal with before he can comfort Isseya—both of his lovers—properly and as they deserve.

“And while the Knights posed an entertaining foe, I’ll admit there were far more of our kind in attendance tonight than I thought there would be. The cost should have dwarfed the rewards.”

“What rewards? What reward could there possibly be for the senseless murder of our kind?!”

“Victory over the Knights of course.”

The noise she makes; strangled and not quite fully alive before it died in her throat, only amuses the woman on his arm. Has her reaching out for their God like she wants to mock Serafine. And that may very well be the case.

Here is my salvation. Where is yours?

“How was this to be a victory? You speak like —”

“Like he tipped the scales of this war with a battlefield of his own choosing?” offers Valdas -- now comfortable against his surviving lovers. “A soldier ‘til the end, my golden boy.”

Here he thought the deaths of the Knights would not be the only victory this night — the next to come much later and wrapped in sheets of the finest imported silk. But here stands another much to his surprise, crept up out of the gutters like vermin.

It is with utter delight that Cynbel watches Serafine come to understand the truth of the matter; watches the horror and disgust twist upon her beautiful features somehow made better by all-consuming sorrow.

Fills him with an arousal usually reserved for carnage and lovemaking; but this works too.

“You— You… brought the Knights of the Dawn to the crypts?”

“I didn’t hold their hands, no, though I almost needed to. Fucking simpletons.”

The woman’s voice catches. “How?”

“The righteous are terribly predictable. A few bodies here, a few whispers there. If they think their cause to be one of justice they’re akin to a persistent plague.”

Serafine is less an annoyance now; more a festering wound. Really, must she take the fun out of it? As it is he has to reconcile with the Godmaker surviving — no doubt leagues from Paris by now with his Bloodqueen in tow. Can he not just have this?

“You orchestrated this… this culling?”

“Those who died did so because of their own weakness.”

“You willingly led our enemies straight to us!”

“And now they are an army fewer in number.”

The look he gives her — disinterest, boredom. If you seek to make me remorseful you seek in vain.

“Monsters,” Serafine finally chokes out; said to them all but Cynbel takes it just a tad personally, “monsters… the three of you. Les Trois Amants no more than old, cruel, mindless creatures of bloodshed.”

“Not quite,” Cynbel’s hand stays his Maker from attacking her, allows him to meet her gaze level and calm with a lover on each arm. United; permanent.

“Where they seek justice I gave vengeance. That I was able to lead them to us at all says all the things you wish to ignore—to put as blame upon my shoulders. The Knights would have eventually discovered the catacombs our refuge. If not tonight then tomorrow, or a fortnight from now. Would you rather that, mademoiselle? Would you rather they have had the time to plan, to cut off completely all means of escape?

“You should be thanking me that the living outnumber the dead. And that you may count yourself among them.” And with his victory inevitably wilted Cynbel has had enough of her accusations. “But yes — I would watch every vampire alive burn at the hands of the Knights themselves so long as my beloveds are by my side.”

With the last of her strength the vampiress snarls with fangs bared. Such a pitiful portrait she paints of herself; he knows it, all three of them do. It doesn’t even warrant Valdas’ reaction and isn’t that saying something.

“You will see justice at the hands of your enemies.”

“Four centuries and the bastards have yet to do any lasting damage.” An amusing thought, too.

“The Holy Knights are not your only enemy today.”

He can see it, too. A hotter, blinding flame burning inside of her far stronger than the ones that ravage underneath their feet. Give it a century or two, he thinks, and it will be snuffed out with the rest.

Two sets of hands try to keep him close but he gently coaxes them aside. Approaches the tempest before him with her wild eyes and wild hair and finds satisfaction in the flinch of her when his fingertips graze her silken chin.

“My victory is—has always been—inevitable, ma chérie. And I look forward to the prestige it will bring.”