Still no Home

It had been two weeks that Walterus had the little vampire child in his care.  

He had done everything he could to keep his new housemate sated.

The man was excellent with the bow and arrow, and had done his best to hunt birds as they flew over the town.  

They sooner he could get out of this disgusting town, the better.  Damn the locks on the doors.  

If he had truly wanted to, Walterus was sure he could break the gate down in his lycan form.  The chances of someone piercing him with a silver arrow were slim.  

But he had a somewhat good life in the city of London.  He was a blacksmith and made good money crafting weapons for the knights and royalty to use.   It was a craft he'd learned from his father.

Of course his weapons were not made of silver, but instead steel and iron.  

The plague was everywhere.  At least here he had a job, income, and a home.  

Nothing was waiting for him outside the city walls.  

Nothing except finding a home for this little vampire on his hands.  

He walked in the door with two ducks in hand.  

"Vampire, I've brought you supper." He said, placing the ducks on the table.  

The boy could drink their blood and then Walterus could eat the meat.

The tiny Vampire had been bundled up in bed.

The Lycan had blacked out a room for him to stay in during the day where the sun couldn't react him.

He woke when he heard the man return home. Carefully he wiggled out of bed, giving Roland a kiss before heading to the kitchen.

"Amos."
He corrected with a yawn as he rubbed his eyes, he had told him before, his name was Amos, not Vampire.

The small boy padded over to the table and climbed up onto the chair eagerly as he leaned over the table and looked at the birds.

They weren't as nice as human blood, they tasted funny but at least it filled his tummy and didn't make him throw up.

Tiny fangs stuck up from behind his pale lips.

He dragged the bird closer, stroking it's feathers apologetically, he wasn't used to his food having to die for him to eat.

Still, he carefully pulled out a few feathers until he could reach clean skin and bit into it, purring softly as blood filled his mouth.

He drank eagerly only stopping when there was none left in the creature at which point he pushed it toward Walterus and started on the next.

Walterus couldn't bring himself to call the little creature by it's name. That would be making it relatable. And he didn't want any sort of attachment to Amos.

The child was a burden. Sometimes he wished he'd had the strength to just kill it as he'd planned.

But the boy was so innocent and sweet... so weak and vulnerable. Walterus wouldn't be able to forgive himself for such a needless slaughter.

He took the bird, now drained of it's blood, and began plucking it's feathers out. He kept the feathers separated, making sure not to throw them away. He'd sell them to make some extra coin.

His little fangs bit into the throat of the bird gently, he wasn't savage about it at all.

His fangs barely looked like a threat, all those years feeding on his own parents had made him a gentle creature when it came to feeding, there was no need to be violent.

He drank a little more slowly this time, savoring the taste of clean blood as he took tiny gulps, a light purr sounding in his chest as the pains in his stomach faded.

"Thank you for dinner."

He muttered, looking up at the man and licking his lips clean, his bright eyes turning down to watch the man pluck feathers, slowly copying him on his own bird.

The child was much different then any vampire Walterus had ever met.

It was odd for him to witness. He wondered if all vampire children were this well behaved.

He remembered being a boy and, as a pure lycan, was very energetic, rowdy, and just overall a pain in the ass.

Well that didn't matter. Amos was still a pain in his ass... somehow...

"Make sure you don't waste the feathers, Vampire." He said, his voice stern.

"Amos."

He corrected again with a small grumble, he didn't like being called Vampire, it made him feel bad, not that he understood why.

"Not wasting."

He muttered as he pulled a few out and added them to Walterus' little pile.

He was trying to help but always seemed to get in the way, he didn't mean to, he tried to be on his best behaviour though he strongly suspected that Walterus wasn't fond of him.

"When am I leaving?"

He asked, looking up at the man, he didn't want to be here if the man was always mad at him, he didn't mean to make him mad.

"Good." Walterus grumbled.  Once he'd had his bird naked he took out a knife and split open it's abdomen, allowing the guts to spill out on the table.  

He carved up the bird, getting every scrap of meat he could from it's small body.  The bones he disposed of, but he saved some of the guts for eating and fertilizing.  

At first he didn't answer Amos's question.  

"You stay with me, or you die." He said finally.  It was the truth.  There was no way he'd allow a human to take Amos into their care.  

"Right now we can't leave London.  Because of the sickness that killed your father.  I'm doing my best boy.  The least you can do is be grateful." He said in a huff.  

Though he realized deep down he wasn't being fair.  Amos had been so well behaved, so sweet as he stayed here.  Walterus was being too hard on him... and it was on purpose.  

Don't get attached, and don't let him get attached to you.  Because...

"Hopefully it won't be much longer until they open the gate."

Amos flinched when that hard truth was shoved in his face.

He knew well enough that he was at the threat of dying, he didn't want to die and the concept of it had him constantly scared.

The boy tried his best but the Lycan was always mad at him, always telling him off.

"I'm sorry..."

He murmured, tears welling in his eyes, he hadn't meant to be ungrateful, he just wanted to leave so Walterus wouldn't be mad any more.

The boy gave a soft sniffle as he wiped his nose on his sleeve, pushing the bird toward the man to pluck as he got down from the chair and padded into his darkened bedroom.

If he stayed away from him then he couldn't be mad at him, right?

Amos grabbed Roland and crawled into his favourite little hiding spot, the place he went when he got scared during the day. The two of them hid inside of the wardrobe, curling up in the base of it cuddling.

In truth, he didn't want to stay here any more, Walterus scared him, but he wasn't allowed to leave.

Walterus saw the tears well in the little boy's eyes and heard the sniffles.  

He remembered being a small child.  He was not as sweet as Amos was, not as sensitive.  He was loud, rowdy, and selfish.  

But every now and then something would happen that would make him cry.  

He remembered his father scolding him for showing tears.  Tears solved nothing, and showed weakness.  A lycan never cries.  

He didn't even know that vampires could cry.  He'd always thought of them as beings that were void of any emotion.  Life-suckers that stained the planet with their existence.  

He continued cleaning and preparing the second bird, letting Amos have some time alone.  

When he finished, he stood and went outside, using the little water he had to wash off his hands.  It was dirty.  Everything about this disgusting city was so dirty all of the time.  

He missed the days he could go to a lovely forest river and bathe in water not tainted with the grime of the city.  

Still he did his best to clean up.  

He then went back into the house and opened up the cupboard, looking down to find Amos still there, cuddling his stuffed animal.

The man knelt down and looked the child in the eyes.  

"No more crying.  Tears don't help you."  He said.  This was the best he could do to try and cheer the child up.

"You are a vampire.  No more hiding and weeping like a human babe."  He said, gently using his thumb to tilt Amos's chin up and wipe the tears away.

Amos sat there, in his safe place away from everything else.

He curled into a smaller ball when the man opened the cupboard, looking up at him with furrowed eyes as the man wiped away his tears and told him not to cry.

"We should cry when we are saddened, smile when happy, scream when maddened. Do not hide it in a box, or our humanity will be lost."

The small boy recited in a gentle tone, as if the poem had been repeated to him many times in his young life.

Amos looked down at his rabbit, petting it softly as he gave another sniffle, a small smile shadowing his lips.

His father had told him that all the time, if a Vampire became detached from their emotions, if they no longer felt for those around them, then they became beasts.

It was best to show how they felt, no matter what Walterus tried to tell him.

"It's okay to cry."

He muttered looking up at the man through watery eye, even though he smiled softly. Normally he listened to everything the man said and did as he was told, but he was wrong about this.

Walterus openly scoffed at the adorable little boy's words.

"Who taught you that Vampire? Your mother, your father? Whoever it was they're dead now." He said, showing no sensitivity.

"And unless you want to be like them, you'll listen to my advice now. Humanity is just a word, one that is becoming more and more of a myth. You have the capability to be much stronger then this." He said, and in one motion he scooped the little boy up and placed him on his lap.

He continued to wipe away Amos's tears with his thumb in a gentle manner.

"Tears show weakness, and you are not weak. You have lived when others have died." Walterus said, sounding a fair deal like his father. But unlike his father, he showed a bit more compassion.

Clearly Amos was very sensitive, and Waterus would never know what it felt like to be so young and lose everyone he loved.

Realizing this, he wasn't as gruff with the little one as his own father was with him.

Amos didn't answer, instead he just hung his head, he had never know his mother and being reminded on his father's death only made him more upset.

He gave a soft whimper as his tears were wiped away though no more fell after he gave a sniffle and wiped his nose on his sleeve.

He didn't know how he felt about Walterus, he didn't like the man, he was mean and grumpy, but he took care of him and fed him.

At the very least he was grateful enough not to throw a tantrum or go against what the man told him to do.

He curled in closer to the man, stealing his warmth, he wouldn't go against what his Father had always told him, instead, he would just cry on the inside so that he wasn't told off again.

Walterus gave a soft grin when he saw Amos bucking up.

He gave the boy a gentle nudge on the chin.

"See? Much better." He encouraged, and then set Amos back down in the cupboard.

He stood up and started a fire going so he could cook the ducks before they went bad.

Amos wasn't use to the rough, strong nature of Lycans.

Vampires were much more gentle beings, at least in his mind, he was accustomed to their soft ways.

The boy sat back down in the cupboard and hugged Roland, he would try his best not to upset Walterus.

He wouldn't cry anymore, and he would stop annoying the man as best he could.

Maybe he would get use to this treatment and be happy again, maybe, though he still wanted to get to his new family soon.