Komori Seiji had had enough waiting. He didn't know whether to take the word of the half-blood he ought to have already exterminated according to his duty or wait patiently as the lad promised to give him his daughter back.
There were many reasons he should have pulled the trigger on Ruki for violating numerous rules set by his church. He was a half-blood that hadn't yet come to the Vatican for a cure. He hadn't surrendered himself. He had kept his daughter in isolation for weeks. There were numerous things that Seiji wanted to know about his daughter, but the only thing he was being handed by the Mukamis was the hollow promise of his daughter returning safely to him once he had been useful enough for these fanged heathens. Anything that was so against his morals should have been shot to death by him into the chest with his double-barrel long ago. He should have just staked everyone through the heart and be done with it.
But he realised very soon, that it would just make him more of the monster he had become killing these creatures. He hated being held by a leash, and with his church and the hunter's guild failing him, time and again, he needed to improvise at least this time on his strategy.
He had gone back to the Mukami manor, the sole brother sitting beside him, keeping watch. Azuza looked like he had been injured in a nerf match and patched himself up with everything he had in his first aid. He also had pale skin, even by vampire standards.
"Say, Komori san," Azuza asked, his voice strangely strained, "You kill vampires?"
Seiji knotted up his eyebrows in confusion. He didn't want to talk weather with this little punk. Not when his little daughter was in the mansion, and Ruki hadn't come back to the manor as promised. He shook his head and remained silent, trying to be as still as possible.
"Would you rather hurt me? I know you want to..." Azuza drawled on, his tone was pretty depressing to hear at first. Seiji probably thought about the fact that this boy hadn't gone over to his fridge to drink some chilled blood, since he had pretty much enjoyed his hunger pangs.
This one was a pure nutcase. But which immortal hadn't been at one point?
"I wish you would just leave me alone," Seiji said, struggling to keep his anger to himself. He'd been wasting time here. He should have gone with Ruki himself. He should have reconciled with Yui at least. "Or at least, send your familiars to search for Ruki."
Azuza hung his head, obviously having no answer to his requests. "You should... trust Ruki more. He might be a bit mechanical... but he cares for Eve."
Seiji couldn't bear to stay put. "I need to get out of here." He stood up from the sofa, only to be dragged back down by Azuza's iron grip. The vampire stared at him, his bottomless cerulean eyes boring holes right into his soul.
"You would stay here, and you would wait for Ruki kun to come back." The words directed at him were sharp-edged.
Seiji broke eye contact. What made him so submissive towards this weird kid? He hadn't ever been intimidated by a vampire in his entire career. He knew he had once been feared amongst the demon world as the hunter who never missed his mark. He'd once growled at a troll and it had cowered back into its cave, never to come back again. Then how come he had become so vulnerable at the mention of his daughter being in danger?
He had given her up to the church to prove a point, hadn't he?
The memories had now become hazy, but he was forced to give his daughter to the sons of Karlheinz. He'd been promised that his daughter won't be harmed or killed, but he should have known better than to trust the church. They had manipulated him into doing horrible, horrible things in the past.
He swallowed hard, as Azuza got up, and turned towards him. "You will stay and wait for Ruki. I will not have you scampering through the manor at this point, sir."
He nodded, as Azuza smiled at him, the closest to human he could ever get.
"I will go over and talk to Justin for a moment," Azuza got back into his autopilot mode, as he turned, climbing up the stairs in his usual slow-paced walk. Seiji didn't know whether to make use of this opportunity and flee, or believe Ruki and stay put wherever he was. He tapped the floor with his foot, getting anxious. He rested his forehead on his folded hands, praying for a miracle to happen and save his daughter from her impending doom.
***
"Why didn't you send Shu instead?" Ayato questioned Reiji, as they stood on the roof of the mansion. Ayato had been told to be careful with the markings, Shu had taken them an hour to be finished.
"I thought he'd be too preoccupied with his stress of dealing with the young bride's sacrifice, but he's here grumbling about it." Reiji sneered at Shu, the blond boy leaning against the wall opposite to them. "Isn't that right, Nii san?"
Shu must have been caught off guard with his brother addressing him as Nii san. Ayato caught him smiling a bit as he replied, "I think Ayato is more disconcerted by letting his bride go. She'd been following him for so long, it must feel like letting go of a dear pet." Shu's blue eyes settled in on his half-brother. Ayato breathed out, his bangs moving with the light breeze, his green eyes shadowed by his red hair for a brief second. "I don't harbour any feelings for her," he clarified.
"At least pity?" Reiji said, raising an eyebrow. Ayato knew his elder brothers got a kick out of teasing him, but he remained adamant on his statement. "I don't think any of us are capable of showing pity at this point, Reiji."
Shu wolf-whistled, a smug smile on his face. "Cold, even for you, Ayato, seeing as how you were chasing her around like a lost puppy."
Ayato crossed his arms across his chest. "You got anything else to talk about, Shu?"
"Other than our dead mother coming back?" Shu raised his eyebrows at Reiji. Reiji ignored him largely, focusing his attention at Ayato. "Come with me for a second. I've got something important to discuss."
Ayato hesitated but complied as Reiji pulled Ayato aside towards the stairs leading up to the terrace.
"I didn't send Shu back there to fetch Yui because I still have doubts about his intentions." Reiji's tone was blunt and to the point. Ayato didn't know what to expect from Reiji at this point. He and Laito had schemed to hell and back for this sacrifice to be successful, and he didn't want to ruin everything with his theories only to be proven wrong.
"You think Shu is misleading you," Ayato asked, unsure, "But why would he do that when he was the one to suggest the ritual in the first place?"
"I'm not entirely sure," Reiji said, pushing his glasses back. "I'd been positive enough to roll him in with the plan, but it was weird, seeing as to how he's looking forward to raising mother, even though he has a clear idea of what I would do after she has been summoned."
Ayato felt his knees almost buckle up. "What are you implying with this, Reiji?"
Reiji appeared to be distressed as he confessed, pretty straightforward with his words. "I was searching his room for some fibres of Kanato's teddy bear to make it from scratch, and I found this in his cupboards." Reiji extended a leather-bound diary to him. Ayato stared at the diary, before snatching it from Reiji's hands. He knew he had seen that somewhere. He vaguely remembered a diary inside Yui's drawer when he had come into her room. The first page cleared and answered all his suspicions.
"This is Komori Seiji's diary," Ayato gasped. He hadn't bothered about concluding their names. He had thought Komori must have been a popular surname in the human world, he hadn't thought of it much, but as he thought about it, the pieces fell into place, slowly. "She's the daughter of the vampire hunter, isn't she?"
"Turn the page," Reiji said, his voice a bit shaking. Ayato looked at him, then dared to flip the next page.
"What in the world is this?" Ayato said, reading the words, Memento mori, printed on the page in cursive. He turned the page and raised his eyebrows. "Oh, this isn't happening."
"He is probably planning this in conjunction with another brother of ours," Reiji said. "They're going to use the girl's body for their own gain." Ayato didn't want to suddenly doubt his brothers over stupid pagan rituals. He had worked enough against his ego to reach this point, and he couldn't have that mortal girl ruin them yet again.
"I've told Kanato and Shu about false locations where I will keep her before the sacrifice, and whoever tries to come upon any of those locations would be trapped into those places until the end of the ceremony." Reiji paused, trying to keep the panic in his voice at the bare minimum. "If I find them trapped, there is no way in hell I would let them live."
Ayato shook his head, letting out a nervous chuckle. "So you mean you're just setting bait for Shu, you suspect Kanato but not Laito and me?"
Reiji relaxed a bit, appearing to be confident now. "It's because he can only work with one that is well versed with magic to conduct the ritual properly."
Ayato couldn't believe his fate. "And they'd do what exactly with this power?"
Reiji cocked his head to the side, and said, "They're going to fight for the title of the vampire king."
***
Ruki heard that distinct splash beyond the stream of sewer water. Something rolled down towards him, as he bent to pick it up.
"Ruki kun?" Yui said, a few steps ahead of him. "Did you hear anything?"
The bat had led them into a drain that ended up in a grilled wall. Ruki had tried enough to knock the grill out, but he had mostly failed to do so. An end of the wall jutted out; its sharp edges coated with a layer of Ruki's blood.
Yui pressed her ear on the grill, while Ruki inspected the wall behind him. The bat had flown back towards the stream, and though they hadn't gotten anywhere, at least there was no one following them till now. He strained himself to be a bit more alert, running on hardly three hours of sleep, but the only thing he heard was the splash of water and the trickling of the sewer stream.
They should have been able to at least reach an outlet on the city side by now. It was taking them too long to even travel through this route. It had started to get on Ruki's nerves now.
"Ruki kun, I hear..."
The wall was shattered in merely a millisecond, as Reiji saw hands reach out through the grill, pulling it apart. He stretched his arm outward, pumping his legs as he reached out to grab Yui back, but it was too late. Yui's mouth was clamped shut by tawny fingers, as she was dragged away by somebody that had broken down the wall.
"EVE!"
Ruki stumbled forwards, caught in the sharp edge of the wall, his stomach now spilling its contents. He felt vomit in his throat, as he looked at a vague shadow of Laito, hauling Yui over his shoulders, as he turned towards Ruki, chuckling. "So long, Ruki kun."
Ruki wiped the blood off his nose. "Laito! Give her back!"
"Why don't you come after her yourself, Ruki kun?" Laito hopped off, leaving Ruki a bloodied mess.
"I will kill you, Laito," Ruki said, biting down on his pain. "I promise you that."
A/N: Double update! I hope you enjoyed it!