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Armand had long lived with pain as his constant companion.
For as long as he could remember, a deep-seated ache in the bowl of his pelvis had accompanied him everywhere he went. Sometimes it was better, merely an unpleasant tightness he could never quite manage to make relax no matter what he did, and other times it would worsen to a sharp, cramping, burning pain that still —even at the age of 517— had the power to leave him curled him up on the floor with his arms wrapped around his middle, keeping him there until it deigned to show him mercy and abate. Then there was the tension he habitually carried in his body —his shoulders, his back, his jaw— leaving him with headaches and stiffness, a near-constant irritation.
He could handle pain. The worst it could do was make him snappy and rude, but he could bear it. Very rarely had he, in his death, experienced a pain that slowed him down in any meaningful way.
This pain didn’t just slow him down. It completely incapacitated him.
Someone was screaming. He was, he noted deliriously, barely aware of anything beside the white hot agony emanating from the left side of his face. It was all-consuming, truly unbearable—
“Hold him down—“ he heard someone say, and he reacted to that with violence. Someone was grasping at his wrists, trying to pull them away from his face (if he could just press a hand over the pain, maybe he could get it to ease — he only needed it to ease a bit, take the sharp edges off even a little, maybe then he would be able to think, to breathe—). He fought back against them, kicking, screaming, thrashing, trying to bite. At who or what, he didn’t know. He couldn’t see, there was only pain, white hot miserable pain and he had to get away from it, get away from the people who were attacking him, hurting him—
“Armand!” a voice yelled, someone leaning their full weight on his upper body, his arms caught underneath them.
The voice sounded vaguely familiar, but Armand couldn’t place it, barely even tried to as panic overrode his conscious mind. He had to get away, get away, get away—
“Armand! It’s me. It’s Daniel!”
…Daniel…?
“Take a deep breath, Armand,” another familiar voice said, tonelessly calm and clinical.
“It’s Dr. Fareed and your fledgling,” the other voice —Daniel— half-pleaded. “We’re not gonna hurt you. We’re trying to help you.”
The pressure eased off Armand’s chest ever so slightly as he ceased his thrashing, and he felt an arm shift closer to his face—
He lunged for it.
“Goddamn it!” the voice yelped, wrenching away from the fangs Armand sunk into the meat of his forearm, probably causing himself more injury than he would have had he just stayed put. Yes, Armand had intended injury to whoever was holding him down, but the second the other’s blood touched his tongue…
“…Daniel…” he croaked, the taste of his fledgling’s blood unmistakeable, even through the all-consuming agony.
“..Yeah…” the voice —his fledgling— sighed. “Yeah, it’s me.”
“…What…” He shifted ever so slightly, moved his head, tried to blink the fog (sticky, burning fog) out of his eyes as his panic eased—
And screamed as that white-hot pain exploded back through the left side of his face.
“Hold him—“ the other voice said.
Hands caught his wrists again, the weight pressing back down on his chest as Armand once again tried to reach for his face, thrash away from the hands holding his head still.
“I know it hurts, maker mine,” Daniel tried to soothe him, his voice rough with stress. “But try and hold still—“
Armand barely heard him, sure as hell couldn’t listen to him, a raw, primal kind of fear coursing through him as he fought, get away get away get away—
Other hands holding him down, shoving his legs apart, forcing their way inside him, hurting him, hurting him, hurting him as he screamed and cried and fought, pleading for mercy, begging for forgiveness—
You are mine. No one else will have you.
No one else will want you.
Through all of it, some small part of him registered the tiniest pinprick on the side of his neck, and everything faded away.
*
Pain. Pain was the first thing to greet him as consciousness returned to him. The same white-hot pain, only lessened in intensity enough for Armand’s thoughts to come with just a bit more clarity, accompanied by a raw sort of ache centered over the left side of his face, over his eye.
He tried to blink, tried to open his eyes—
A whine punched its way out of his throat, his back arching as if to try and shy away from the swell of pain the movement caused, fire curling its way around the side of his head, down his neck—
“Easy…” a familiar voice soothed, arms shifting under his back. “I’ve got you.”
“Daniel…” he bit out, not remembering commanding his mouth to move, his voice to speak.
“Yeah, that’s me,” the voice murmured, rocking him ever so slightly.
He was lying in his fledgling’s lap, he realized as more awareness returned to him. He could smell Daniel’s detergent, his soap, feel the soft material of his shirt under his cheek, hear his heart beating. Daniel’s arms were cradling him to his chest, his fingertips drawing careful patterns over his back, his arms…
“There you go,” Daniel hummed. “Easy. I’ve got you. You’re safe.”
Armand made a toneless sound in the back of his throat, a thousand questions rising to his mind —what happened, where is this pain coming from, why can’t I see— only for unconsciousness to beckon him. He found he didn’t have the strength to resist it.
*
He awoke once more to screaming. His own screaming.
“I know, Armand, I know,” came Daniel’s voice (he was aware enough to recognize that, but that meant he was aware enough to feel the pain increasingly centered over his eye). “Just hold still.”
He tried to listen, his rational mind managing to overrule the panic threatening to overwhelm him, but the intensity of the burning, the stabbing, radiating through his head, down his jaw, his neck—
The pain flared further, and he wrenched his head out of the grasp of whoever had been holding it, vomiting off to the side.
“We’ll have to,” that clinical voice said, the tiniest bit of stress creeping over the vowels. “Hold this over his eyes for a moment.”
The body under him shifted —Daniel, Daniel— and something soft was pressed over his face.
That meant the hand was no longer holding his wrists, and his own hands shot up, grasping at his face, at whatever the material was covering it, trying to figure out what had happened, what was causing this pain, make it stop, make it stop—
Gauze. The material was a kind of soft, nonstick gauze. Daniel (because that was Daniel’s hand, he recognized the ridges and the callouses) was holding it over his left eye. Armand pressed one hand over Daniel’s as if the pressure might ease the pain, his other groping under the edges of the gauze—
“Armand, no—“
Armand’s right eye shot open as his fingertips came into contact with rent, raw flesh, with what must’ve been a horrid wound gouged into his cheekbone. He followed the injury up, looking around frantically only to freeze and cringe as the pain somehow worsened further—
“Both eyes, Daniel, you have to cover both eyes—“
“What’s happened?” Armand croaked, his voice weak. “What’s—“
“You have a significant injury to your face,” came that clinical voice — Fareed. “I’m attempting to repair it, but I need you to refrain from touching it.”
Armand opened his mouth, tried to answer, tried to retort, but only a pained whine escaped.
“Here,” Fareed continued as Daniel shifted the gauze to cover his other eye as well. “Drink.”
A cup was pressed to his lips. He tried to turn away—
“Small sips,” Fareed said. “It will help.”
“I’ve got you,” Daniel soothed. “It’s the blood of some fucker Fareed gave a shit ton of morphine to before draining. It will help. Promise.”
Armand didn’t fight it further, let Fareed tip small sips down his throat and managed to rein in the nausea until a warm, pleasant feeling spread through his limbs. It did precious little to meaningfully touch the pain, but it took the sharp edges off enough for Armand to be lulled back to sleep.
*
Armand did not have the faintest idea how long it continued for — the cycle of wake, sleep, pain, morphine-spiked blood. Part of him wanted to say it must not’ve been very long, because every time he awoke, it was to Daniel’s arms around him, lounged against his chest as he was, his fledgling’s heart thudding away steadily under his ear. But truly he did not know.
“—fucker can’t be allowed to get away with this—“
“Shhhh,” came the voice of…not Fareed…someone else….
“Don’t shush me,” Daniel growled, his chest rumbling under Armand’s uninjured cheek, though he did lower his voice. “Not only did that bastard….but he—“
“I agree with you, Daniel.”
A slight twang on the vowels…
“When I found him there, I thought he was dead—“
“I know.”
…Louis?
Impossible.
“—give him to me. I’ll keep an eye on him while you get some rest.”
He felt Daniel shake his head, his fledgling’s fingertips drawing aimless patterns over his forearms. “I’m good.”
“You’re not good—” answered the voice that sounded like Louis but couldn’t possibly be, because Louis hated him.
Armand tuned the conversation out, soaking up the feeling of warm arms around him and safety until unconsciousness claimed him once more.
*
The heartbeat under his ear was different. The arms around him were cold, firm, and the voice that was humming to him was decidedly not Daniel’s.
Naturally, Armand freaked the fuck out.
“Armand—“
Those cold arms locked around his chest, holding him down as Armand panicked, get off me, get off me, get off me, where’s Daniel, where’s Fareed, let me go, let me go, you got what you wanted, took and did what you wanted, let me go, let me go—
“Armand, it’s me. It’s Louis. You’re okay, everything’s okay.”
Armand kept thrashing, not believing any part of that for a second.
The arms held him tighter, and they were stronger than him, which only egged him on more. Louis was not and never had been stronger than him—
One of the arms moved then, a hand touching his face. The gauze shifted out of the way, and Armand blinked his eye open, ignoring the pain lacing around the back of his head—
Louis de Pointe du Lac’s face very slowly came into focus.
“Hey, stranger,” his ex-husband hummed with a tired smile.
Armand stared at him uncomprehendingly.
Louis looked away after a moment, nodding off into the distance. “Your fledgling will be back in a minute. I made him go take a shower and get something to eat. He’s been watching over you for a while now.”
Armand kept staring at him. “…You’re not real,” he croaked, his voice coming out bathed in gravel. Maybe it had been longer than he thought.
‘Louis’ raised a brow. “Is that right?”
“…My ex hates me…” he got out, the pain intensifying as he looked around with the uncovered eye, feeling almost a terrible grinding in his left, like stones were lodged under his eyelid. “He would not—“ He broke off, shutting his eye as the pain got the better of him, nausea brewing hotly in his throat.
A thumb brushed soothingly over his arm. “…’Hate’ is a strong word..." came the reply, barely audible. "...I’m fucking furious with you still, and I definitely hate some of the things you’ve done…but you were my husband for seventy years. That does count for something.”
Does it?
“And…I owe you on top of that. You were gonna leave me after I burned….but you didn’t. You stayed when I asked. For better or for worse.”
Armand did not know what to say to that, wondered what could have happened to—
He knew what had happened. He remembered. But his mind had thrown up a wall between it and him, and he let it stay there, protecting him from the sharp edges…
Sharp as the claws that had—
A hand brushed over his hair, soothing him.
“….Get some rest,” Louis murmured. “Daniel’ll be back in sec.”
Armand thought no more on it.
*
“—he’d have it coming—“
“Like everything else you’ve said, I agree with you, Danny, but what the fuck are you—“
Daniel’s chest was back under his cheek, his arms wrapped around him, and Armand couldn’t be arsed to care about anything else.
*
Not even Daniel’s embrace could chase away the nightmares that peeked over the walls of Armand’s mind. The hands with sharp claws…arms stronger than his had ever been…ears that did not hear how loudly he screamed for mercy…
“I’m fine…” he mumbled into Daniel’s chest after those screams burst out of his lungs, waking them both from their uneasy sleep. “I’ve been raped before…”
Daniel’s fingertips kept drawing gentle patterns over his arms, though the heart under Armand’s ear beat harder and faster. “…Does that really make it better?”
Armand shuddered. “…No…”
*
He had forgotten…the fear, the revulsion…how much it could hurt….
*
You abandoned me, why did you abandon me? And if I meant so little to you, if I was such a failure, a disappointment, a shadow of what you wished I could be, so far below you that you left me for 500 years…why have you done this to me now?
*
Fareed didn’t know why the wound wasn’t healing. He couldn’t figure it out. And if he couldn’t figure it out…
Armand sat perfectly still as the good doctor changed the bandage on his face, inspecting the stitches. His work was neat, as neat as any work attempting to repair the mess of Armand’s face could be, anyway. A long scratch cut across the left side of Armand’s face, from just above his eyebrow to his cheekbone under his eye. Scratch, far too weak a word to describe the deep gouge that had been cut into his face, that had gone through skin and muscle all the way down to bone, through his eyelid and—
Tears leaked silently out of his one good eye as he sway, the morphine making him dizzy and overly warm.
He’d finally looked at it the day before, lifted up the bandages, glimpsed the ragged edges of flesh stitched back together, and at the mess of milky white and red that had once been his left eye, completely blind now. The rest of his injuries had healed (leaving behind only a worsened ache in the bowl of his pelvis, the ghosts of hands gripping bruises into his hips and thighs, of cutting off air he didn’t need as they pressed into his throat), so why hadn’t these?
What was left of his vision blurred further.
“…I’m sorry…” Fareed murmured, wrapping bandages around his head to hold the gauze over his eye, and Armand could hear the frustration in the doctor’s voice, the grief…
Armand said nothing.
Daniel sat silently off to the side, watching the proceedings with an unreadable expression.
*
Armand wondered if that’s when he decided to do it, or if he’d already made up his mind.
*
“Danny, it’s suicide—“
“I don’t think so.”
“How the fuck are you planning on—“
“Fuck if I know.”
“So—“
“So that’s exactly how I’m gonna do it. All I need’s an opportunity, Louis.”
“…Where do I come into this?”
Daniel chuckled.
*
When Armand awoke again, he was alone.
Save for Fareed, he realized as he gingerly sat up, turning his head enough that his now much reduced vision picked up the doctor reading in the corner.
Fareed glanced up, hearing him shift. “Your fledgling loves you, Armand,” he said simply, turning back to his book.
*
His fledgling, who didn’t come home that night, or any night after. Because the little fucker got himself arrested.
*
The Detroit coven did not take kindly to a high profile murder occurring in their territory.
On one hand, Armand could understand it. Had a similar incident occurred in his territory in Paris, he would have…lost his shit, to speak in modern terms (as Daniel might speak). Never mind that this coven —more of a cult than a coven— proclaimed themselves the Children of Darkness reborn, and dragged back many of the old laws and rituals Armand had left to die back when he met Lestat. And the light in which they held Armand….
So no. They did not take kindly to the sudden and violent death of Armand’s maker.
Louis was…objectively a better person than him, Armand thought, shivering as Louis rubbed gentle circles into his back. He’d have every right to hang this over my head for what I allowed to be done to Claudia, to him…as I sit here now with my fledgling, my lover on trial for murder—
He’d said as much to Louis as they walked.
“…Nah…” Louis had muttered, his arm around Armand’s waist, steadying him as pain and a drastic change in visual field made him dizzy, made him stumble. “I take no pleasure in this.”
Feeling like every eye in the room was on him, Armand was certain he would have cracked down the middle were it not for Louis’s hand on his back. And he would have caused an even bigger scene had that hand not twisted in the back of his coat when they brought Daniel out.
Someone had beaten him. Someone had beaten him badly.
“Daniel Molloy—“ spoke the coven leader, whatever the fuck his name was.
“I think there’s supposed to be a ‘vampire’ in there somewhere,” Daniel quipped, like his face hadn’t been beaten black and blue, like he wasn’t covered in scratches and splatters of blood—
The coven leader ignored him. “You stand accused of a heinous crime: the murder of the vampire Marius de Romanus—“
“It was murder,” Daniel interjected offhandedly, an easy smile stretching across his remarkably unbothered face given the window just barely shuttered above him, the rising daylight beginning to peek around the edges.. “But it was hardly a crime.”
Hushed whispers flittered around the courtroom (a courtroom, an actual courtroom, no longer the dingy tunnels that made up the Paris catacombs—).
“Oh, and I didn’t do it,” Daniel added, folding his battered arms over his chest. “Though it’s incredibly flattering that you think my three year old ass could have taken out him.”
“Breathe, Armand,” Louis murmured from beside him.
Armand couldn’t breathe. And he didn’t let himself think either.
No one could —or would— read the truth out of his mind.
*
“You’re safe now, Armand,” Daniel had whispered into his hair after Armand jolted awake from a nightmare, jarring his bandage and the stitches in his wound. “At least you’re gonna be. Promise.”
*
The trial went by in a blur. A slew of accusations and evidence that all blended together in Armand’s singular eye.
He didn’t remember deciding to stand up, or if he had even done it at an appropriate moment.
“I wish…” he got out, his legs shaking under him. “…To take the stand.”
The coven leader allowed it, clearly believing…something.
Armand told the truth, he had once said.
Armand felt Daniel’s eyes on him as he approached the stand, took it (and Louis’s, felt his ex’s hand reaching out after him, as if to steady him or maybe stop him).
Armand did not look at Daniel. Could not.
If he had, Daniel just might’ve tried to stop him, too.
“The vampire Daniel Molloy did not kill my maker, Marius de Romanus,” he stated when he was confident he had gotten enough breath back in his lungs.
He heard the judge, the jury, and the executioner huff a quiet laugh. “If he did not, then who did?”
Armand lifted his head. “I did.”
The gasp that went through the room.
Out if the corner of his one good eye, he saw Daniel lurch beside him, saw his mouth open, watched him move to rise to his feet, refute that—
Armand looked at him then, and froze him solid with half a thought.
No, my fledgling, he thought, the tiniest of smiles touching his lips. No.
Daniel’s wide eyes stared back at him, clouded with confusion and fear.
Armand looked away as he raised his now-trembling hands, slowly unwinding the bandage from around his head.
The crowd let out another gasp as soon as the bandages fell away from his face.
“It was self-defense,” he stated, turning his head and letting them all see the jagged gash, the mess of flesh and what used to be his eye. “I hope none of you intend to sit there and tell me I was wrong.”
No. As it turned out, none of them did.
*
One did. One did not believe him as far as he could spit and tried to get him to explain the details of the murder (details Armand did not know and could not pluck from Daniel’s mind, nor could he risk plucking them from Louis’s, if his ex even knew them). Armand dodged the questions, leaned into the coven’s admiration of him, and let the coven leader shut her down.
“The vampire Armand is not on trial. Nor will he be.”
Who didn’t love a good double standard?
It was, perhaps, the first time one had ever leaned in his favor.
*
“Armand….”
The vampire in question flinched at the sound of his name, lost in thought as he had been, waiting for his fledgling to find him at the edge of the river.
He heard Daniel begin to approach him. “Boss, I—“
The second he deemed him close enough, Armand whipped around and cracked him across the face.
Daniel staggered, his hand rising to cradle his cheek.
Armand smacked him again. And again and again, and then he didn’t watch his claws, let them scratch into Daniel’s face before he twisted his hands in the front of his fledgling’s shirt, shaking him and shaking him and—
“Armand!” Daniel shouted, managing to get his hands on Armand’s shoulders, knocking him out of his rage. “Armand, stop. It’s okay. It’s okay…”
It was only then that Armand realized he was crying.
“You stupid child,” he snarled, gripping the fabric of his shirt hard enough to tear. “You foolish, miserable boy—“
Daniel lifted his hand, brushing the tears off Armand’s good cheek.
It only served to make him cry harder. “I do not need your protection, I do not need your help, especially not when it comes at the cost of…”
He broke off, his throat seizing up, remembering the shuttered skylight sitting above his fledgling, his precious fledgling, the rope in the executioner’s hand—
Daniel’s thumb stroked over his cheek. “I didn’t know you cared, boss.”
Armand smacked him again. And once more after that, for good measure.
…Then he might’ve dove into his fledgling’s arms, dragging him upright and holding him as tight as he could.
Daniel’s arms came up around him, too. “…You know I love you, right?” he whispered. “I’d do anything for you—“
Armand nodded, ignoring the pain in his left eye at the movement. “Never, ever risk yourself for me again!”
Daniel rubbed his back. “I could say the same to you.”
Armand couldn’t. He couldn’t breathe, he couldn’t speak, something swelling up so strongly in his chest that he feared he might explode—
“Thank you,” he bit out, his face buried in Daniel’s neck. “Thank you.”
He felt Daniel let out a shuddering breath. “…Always, maker mine. Always.”
*
Drawing in deep, gasping breaths and still holding his fledgling tight, Armand managed, “How did you do it?”
Daniel laughed. “Oh, but I didn’t, remember?”
Armand pinched him, making his fledgling squeal.
“Jesus, fine!” Daniel groused, still rubbing gentle circles into Armand’s back. “He underestimated me and all I needed was a second. Hell hath no fury like a fledgling scorned, you know.”
That wasn’t an answer. That barely even came close—
Armand rested his cheek on Daniel’s shoulder…and let it go.