A Bad Bar Joke

Once upon a time in the kingdom of Cortem there lived a king by the name of Maximus Thottington, built like a righteous barrel, with a jaw fit to grind flour on, and a powdered wig that could stop bullets. He had two sons and two daughters who were also built like righteous barrels, and another one somewhere… he wasn’t very impressive, so maybe we’ll look for him later.

What we’re picturing is a luxuriant garden bigger than your mum, populated by mingling frilly diplomats bigger than your mum after a couple scones. Lined by hedges trimmed into the shapes of pompous exotic animals, scented by the most pungent of flowers to mask the poverty wafting in from a couple blocks down, every blade of grass a peacock in its own right.

“And they want water,” gasped King Thottington, in between gasps of mighty laughter. “Bless them.”

“Haha, quite,” echoed the waves of sycophants.

Today was the weekly garden party in which the righteous king would leaf through the latest reports of the lower classes' concerns, and graciously assess them before an audience. After which the reports were used as toilet paper.

“And the right to trial,” His Majesty roared. He slapped his knee. “What do you think, Aa…”

Oh, bugger. He’d thought he was about to make eye contact with one of his more memorable children, and accidentally made eye contact with the wrong one.

“Oswald?” His Majesty guessed.

The spindly, freckle-faced youth looked up at his father with the incredulity of a dog that had gone after a fraudulently thrown ball.

“My name is Archibald, father.” he whined.

His Majesty paused. He gently rifled through his mental drawers.

“Oh, yes. Good boy. Carry on.” he said. Not disdainfully. Not fully disinterestedly. Yet, even that betrayed a lack of commitment.

Prince Archibald Thottington stood still with his mouth open for several minutes.

The king moved on. The party moved on. Eventually, Prince Archibald abandoned his demonstration and retreated sulkily down the garden path. He ignored the noble girls that attempted to acknowledge him, surely only because the line to talk to his brothers had gotten too long. Nobody acknowledged him. God, what a sad existence.

...Say, wasn’t he going a bit far?

Oh, but it was on safe, manicured royal territory. Nothing would happen.

Orvin was dressed in the finest clothes he owned; a pair of brown trousers with only a single tear in the knee and his newest white shirt, which flared at the ends of his sleeves. However, amongst the noblemen and women of King Thottington's company, he looked to be a beggar. So he kept to the bushes, hoping to just be able to snatch even a nice fork, it would sell for at least a bit of money.

However, a cute blonde caught his eye, and he recognized him as Archibald, one of the kings sons. Orvin had noticed that Archie was always off to the side in family portraits distributed to the kingdom and wondered why. Well, maybe he should ask him.

Orvin followed Archibald down the pathway leading out of the gardens, staying out of sight of the noble girls as he formulated a plan on how to start a conversation. Say, the prince has wondered rather far from the castle hasn't he? Someone could just snatch him up and hold him for ransom. Wait, Orvin could hold him for ransom. Shame he doesnt have any kidnapping supplies on him. He supposes he'll just have to ask. What could go wrong? Orvin steps out from behind the bushes.

"Prince Archibald Thottington, i hereby formally request for you to allow me to kidnap you and hold you for ransom at the expense of your father."

Archibald stopped right in his tracks. There it was. All the right syllables. A godsend from above.

Could it be? Could it be that it was so simple? Even this illiterate-looking vagabond could get it right.

The young prince gazed wistfully into the trees, bewitched, gratified, and yet, more aware than ever before since this morning that the very thing he wanted from just one person came easily and only from anyone, anyone else. Tragic.

It took the prince half a minute to wrap up this train of thought. Thankfully, our production lacks the budget for a song.

Oh yes, what was the other thing the scruffy peasant had said? Ransom? Kidnapping. Something about a kidnapping. Kidnapping him. Him? Oooh.

Archibald threw back his head, his pristine curls bouncing softly in the glamourous breeze. He laughed derisively. Deliriously. Like a vicious spoiled dolphin.

"I ought to have you strung from the parapet! But how could I be mad at… at this.” He gestured carelessly at the stranger before him.

“Please." He removed a ruby encrusted ring from his hand, pressed it into the stranger’s hand, slapped him lightly on the chest. "Buy yourself a little sense. Perhaps even taste, while you're at it."

Brutal. Clever. Perfect. Archibald continued.

"The whole party's high on wine and croquet by now. If you want my father's notice you'd be better off taking the butler.

He remembers... the butler's name."

The prince’s grin instantly melted. A darkly sullen look crossed his youthful brow.

"Actually, no, I rather am in a hanging mood right now.

Get out of my sight, before I change my mind." he added in a smaller voice.

By the final line, he had to turn his face away. If this tanned and admittedly rather well built vagabond saw his upper lip quiver the way it was about to, it would be truly the end of the world.

It takes Orvin a moment to process the rollercoaster of emotions the boy before him is going through, but upon its end hes angry, very, very angry. He slips the ring in his pocket, assuming the prince will wish for it back and sweeps Archibald up before he even knows what he's doing, holding him close and stomping down the path. No one was going to treat anyone that way, especially not a prince. Caught up in his storm of thoughts, he doesn't notice Archibald curling into his chest with a barely audible sigh. It starts to pour seemingly out of nowhere, and Orvin is brought back to reality by the prince shivering in his arms. He quickly takes shelter in a seemingly abandoned building, attempting to warm Archibald by keeping him closer.

Outrageous. Unheard of. A crime against all order. Oh, there would be a hanging for sure, thought Prince Archibald from his position curled up against the ruffian's tight, ample chest.

"Oh, get off, peasant." Archibald enunciated, readily ignorant of who had been resting upon whom. He stood up, and made a show of brushing the dirt off of his trousers.

They were in- oh, heavens- the abandoned royal summer home. Fallen to certain infestations. Archibald made no attempt to suppress a judgemental lip curl.

He squinted, and frowned. The furniture was wrong. It was blanketed in a layer of dust, which ought to have been appropriate for an abandoned dwelling, but this was not the dust of furniture that had been abandoned for years. It was the dust of furniture that had been abandoned for a week at best.

And then, from the rafters above.

The two were suddenly and thoroughly welcomed by the gentle thrumming of half a thousand bats.

Archibald stumbled rapidly backwards to the ornate door handle, high heels clacking in terror.

"ALRIGHT we're leavi-"

BOOM.

A freak thunderstorm had erupted outside.

Archibald leapt violently into the ruffian's arms.

"I'm still hanging you later." he clarified.

It was a dark and stormy night, and the castle was just as empty and eerie as it usually was. It was the perfect home for a vampire-

Luke sighed.

It's not really fitting for a vampire, he relented. He wasn't even sure if there really was a thing fitting for a vampire, but he was pretty sure that it wasn't going to take the form of this place. For one thing, it wasn't really a castle; it was an abandoned summer home that the Thottingtons had discarded for reasons Luke hadn't really been able to figure out. And while it had some really creepy things that fit a vampire's creepy castle, the architecture was all off.

The home wasn't empty, either. It was filled with all sorts of creatures. Luke tried his best to keep it clean, but it was the perfect roosting place for bats. Maybe he should have tried shooing them away, but weren't vampires like the weird cross between humans and bats? Didn't they kind of count as family?

...Also, it wasn't really a dark and stormy night. It was dark, and it was stormy, but it was the middle of the afternoon. Lucas had been stupid enough to step outside earlier and had started getting what had to be the worst case of sunburn he had ever gotten.

So more correctly: it was a dark and stormy afternoon, and the old abandoned summer home was just as full of life as it usually was. But even though Luke was hidden away in the library—even though he couldn't read, he liked the ~aesthetic~ of the books there—he could tell that something was off. He could hear the bats flitting their wings out in the hallway beyond, and something smelled really good.

He got to his feet, taking the blanket on his lap off and wrapping it around his shoulders. He liked keeping the black side out and the red side in; he knew it was silly, but having the black side out made him feel like he could blend in with the darkness of the home more.

He opened the door.

The smell was getting stronger. It was two different smells, technically, but it smelled so good. Like pastries, or a good stew, or-

He stopped in the hallway.

There were people.

In the home.

That he lived in.

There were people in the home that he lived in, and Luke was absolutely terrified. Because while he was very much used to being a vampire living in an abandoned building, he definitely wasn't used to being a vampire around other people.

(Also, they smelled really good. Had he acknowledged that already? He had been drinking blood from cows in the towns nearby. He hadn't actually had blood from a human before, but it had to be good.)

(Also again: he could barely make them out right now because it was dark and they weren't looking right at him, but they looked good. In an objective sort of way. Luke had never really understood the whole sexy/hot thing and-wait, now was not the time to be having a sexuality crisis-)

Luke cleared his throat.

"Hello?" he said, the greeting coming out more as a question than anything else. He tried to steady himself by leaning up against the door frame, but then he slipped and panicked for a second. When he finally got his footing again, he raised an arm to hide his blushing face behind the blanket.

Orvin chuckles when the prince is in his arms. "Sure, your Highness," He's exhausted from the anger, never having been able to keep up any emotion like that for long, it consumes too much of his energy. However, when a voice from the shadows says hello, he's immediately on edge, placing Archibald down and turning to face it, keeping the prince behind him. "Who's there?" He demands before looking further into the darkness, realizing the person is posing like the actors on the pamphlets the church give out to make you hate vampires and the sort. He had never liked those.

Prince Archibald attempted to pose assertively from behind his new bodygaurd. Like a chihuahua behind a pitbull facing an actual bull.

"Watch yourself. There's no telling what... tropical diseases that thing might carry."

Tropical diseases? Thing? Luke knew he got bad bedhead sometimes and that he technically hadn't brushed his hair yet today because it had felt fine when he ran his fingers through it earlier that morning, but still. That was rude.

He faltered.

Then again, he was a vampire. These two definitely weren't; they smelled too good to be vampires.

(He wasn't really sure what vampires usually smelled like, but he knew humans were supposed to be like food to vampires. So it made sense that humans would smell way better, right?)

He lowered the blanket from in front of his face, but still kept leaning against the door frame. He wasn't sure he could stand assertively without it.

"My name is..." He paused. He could say the name he had gone by for years, but did he really want people to know who he used to be? He was a vampire now. Luke Smith didn't really sound like a vampire name, and he wasn't really sure what either man would do if they knew that he was some random guy who had gotten turned. It didn't seem as intimidating as a vampire who had always been a vampire, or a vampire who was vaguely important before he got turned.

"...Lucas," he said. "Lucas S. Winterquist."

He gave them a smile that didn't reach his eyes—he was panicking too much internally right now to really feel like giving one—and completely forgot that said smile showed his fangs.

"Prince Archibald Thottington, or Your Highness will do." said Archibald airily and importantly from behind his cover.

Ah, but he placed his hand on the fellow's broad shoulder in a superior fashion, and that was the gesture that was important, wasn't it.

"And this is..."

Well, damn. Who was this?

He stepped forward slightly at Archibald's cue.

"Orvin Lance Cockburn, Captain of The Treacherous Beauty" He said, standing straight and allowing his full height to be apparent. He didn't know what he would do in the event of Lucas actually attacking him, but he hoped his appearance may deter such an attempt.

Lucas had fangs, so he likely was a vampire. However, Orvin didn't want to assume.

"So, Lucas, you're a vampire, yes?

Captain of the... Hang on. Archibald had heard that name somewhere before. At a national security briefing.

Something about a scrappy young pirate known for many small crimes of minimal casualty and petty scale, yet bizarre and impressive in difficulty.

Archibald aimed a funny look at Orvin's back.

"The pirate Orvin Lance Cockburn who stole sensitive documents from the office of a senior diplomat, refrained from pilfering so much as a letter opener on his way out, returned the papers, and then left with every candlestick in the building?" Archibald recounted incredulously.

And then he remembered there was a bloody vampire of all things to worry about but his eyebrows were in an attractively doutbtful arrangement at the moment so being stared stiff was an advantage if one thought about it.

Lucas almost choked on his own spit at their introductions.

One of them was the prince. The guy who technically owned this place. Lucas was squatting in his house. Could he be executed for that? Wait, wouldn't he be executed for being a vampire first???

Princes aside, there was also a pirate. Lucas had never been all that aware of seafaring news, but everyone knew Captain Orvin Lance Cockburn—don't laugh at the name don't laugh at the name—and what he had done. He had snuck into the palace, stolen some documents, and returned them shortly afterwards with little paw marks all over them later on. No one knew why he had done it, but said paw marks were probably from his (also stolen) pet rats.

Lucas had thought that the prince and a pirate captain smelled good. He had briefly thought about tasting their blood. How was he supposed to play things calm now? Also, they were both kind of objectively hot. Even though he still didn't get what made hot people appealing, he just knew they'd fit the standards. And here he was, standing here with his bedhead and blanket wrapped around him.

Great job, Lucas, he thought. You're really making a good impression, aren't you?

"I am a vampire," he confirmed, finally getting his thoughts ordered enough to reply to the captain's question about him being a vampire. It was only after he spoke that he realized that the prince had spoke too, and that he hadn't even referred to Lucas when he did.

It was too bad he was a vampire because dying from embarrassment sounded like a really good idea right now.

"Candlesticks fetch a good price in most markets." He shrugged, hoping to god neither of them ask why he stole the documents. Or returned them, for that matter. The truth was rather embarrassing. He looked Lucas' way when he spoke, nodding in acknowledgement of what he said.

A crack of lightning sounded from outside, and Orvin looked towards the door.

"I don't think we'll be able to leave until nightfall, Archibald." Orvin said absentmindedly.