The Cardinal’s voice, already thin with frustration, rose into a sharp, trembling pitch.
“What you’re doing goes against the Holy Order!” he barked, spittle flashing under the dying torchlight.
Van Dijk turned his gaze toward him with a look that was neither amused nor angry—merely tired. A wolf regarding a barking dog.
“You know, Clement,” Van Dijk said, his voice low, steady as the slow pull of a blade from its sheath, “I was here when your ‘Order’ was still nothing but a group of ragged preachers, begging scraps in the alleys of Lufondal.”
He took a step forward.
Mot said nothing—did nothing. He only watched.
“I was here,” Van Dijk continued, “when you were little more than a cult, pulling desperate fools into your promises of the Four Gods’ mercy. I was here when the city branded you heretics.”
Another step. Closer. The chains clinked faintly at his ankles, but they no longer restrained him.
“I was here,” Van Dijk whispered, “seven hundred years ago.”
The Cardinal took a half-step back, instinctively.
“And yet…” Van Dijk smiled faintly. No warmth. No joy. Just inevitability. “Why do I still live, Clement?”
The Cardinal’s mouth opened, but no words came.
Van Dijk tilted his head, observing the old man like a curious specimen.
“I’ll tell you,” he said, his voice almost soft. “Because I did nothing.”
Clement frowned. “What—?”
“I haven’t actively participated in the world’s affairs for centuries,” Van Dijk continued, voice sharpening. “I didn’t seek revenge. I didn’t correct the wrongs. I didn’t rebuild what they took from me. I grew stronger. I learned. I waited.”
He folded his hands behind his back, posture relaxed—almost regal.
“Do you know why, Cardinal?”
The question hung in the air. Heavy. Suffocating.
Clement didn’t answer. But the hunger in his eyes was clear.
Van Dijk obliged him.
“Because I am immortal,” he said simply. “And to me… you are all children. Your lives are like falling leaves. Beautiful, struggling… but ultimately brief. You work, you fight, you bleed… and you die. Forgotten.”
He let the words settle into the cracks of the chamber.
“For a True Vampire,” Van Dijk said, “time is but a river. And we—” he smiled thinly— “we are the stones that the current cannot erode.”
The Cardinal’s knuckles whitened around his staff.
“Even True Vampires can die!” he snapped.
Van Dijk’s smile never faltered.
“Indeed,” he said. His voice grew quieter. Sadder. “Even my father died. My brothers. My dearest sister…”
He closed his eyes for a moment, as if feeling the weight of those names.
“They were all True Vampires. Their blood pure. Their power immense.”
A pause.
“And yet they fell.”
His eyes opened, burning gold in the dark.
“Do you know why?”
He didn’t wait for an answer.
“Because they were weak.”
The words cracked like a whip through the air.
“I am not.”
The torchlight flickered violently for a moment, as if reacting to the force in his voice.
“So believe me, Clement,” Van Dijk said, stepping even closer, voice dropping to a near-whisper. “If you think my capture at the Black Tower was your doing—you are mistaken.”
Clement stiffened, but said nothing.
“I allowed myself to be taken,” Van Dijk continued. “Because I needed time. Time to understand what treachery brewed within my walls. I let my disciple escape.”
The Cardinal seized on it instantly.
“Aha!” he cried, jabbing a finger. “You admit it! You aided a fugitive!”
Van Dijk’s eyes turned to ice.
“And what,” he said slowly, each word laced with quiet venom, “are you going to do about it?”
The chamber fell into a strained silence.
Even Mot shifted, stepping forward—this time not with hostility, but with calm deliberation.
“Master Van Dijk,” the boy said, his voice unusually formal. “My lord wishes to speak with you.”
Van Dijk arched a brow and tilted his head downward to the boy’s small frame.
“What is it?” he asked.
Mot’s body tensed for a breath, then his eyes shifted again—changing in that grotesque, impossible way. His irises stretched into squares. His pupils dilated into something alien, beyond comprehension.
And then, Mot spoke—but the voice that came forth was layered. A child’s tone overlaid with something vast and ancient. Something wrong.
“One who seeks the End,” the voice said, reverberating without sound, seeping into the very stones, “it is advised that you calm your wrath. Though it is but a spark in a sea of fire, it would be enough to ignite the land. Do not destroy this place. This is not an order, but a request. For its preservation shall serve you in ways you do not yet see.”
The torches guttered once, as if gasping for air.
Then, as quickly as it had come, the presence withdrew. Mot blinked twice, confused.
“What did he say?” the boy asked innocently.
Van Dijk straightened, expression unreadable.
He turned his gaze back to Clement—who stood frozen, wide-eyed, having heard nothing.
“So only I heard,” Van Dijk muttered under his breath. “Figures. It’s always the damn scary ones that talk directly.”
He let out a slow, resigned sigh.
“Well,” he said, voice dry. “Second time I get to talk to a god personally. I suppose I should listen.”
He stepped back toward the torture chair, chains and glyphs utterly meaningless now, and sat down with a casual grunt as if he were sitting on a royal throne.
“But at least,” he added, leaning back with a grin, “someone bring me a proper meal. I’m getting tired of pretending I enjoy blood-stained porridge.”
The Cardinal still looked stricken.
The two bishops glanced at each other, visibly rattled.
They had exhausted every torture method they knew. Every sacred rite. Every physical punishment. Nothing had cracked Van Dijk. Nothing had broken him.
And now… it seemed nothing could.
Clement opened his mouth—to argue, to order something—but Van Dijk beat him to it.
“I’m simply doing,” he said, voice lilting with dark humor, “what your boy’s god advises.”
He drummed his fingers idly on the chair’s arm.
“Chilling here.”
The Cardinal turned sharply toward Mot. The boy merely nodded, serene and unbothered.
Clement looked like he was about to explode. He threw up his hands with a frustrated growl.
“For the love of the Four, Van Dijk, you’re insufferable!”
He stomped toward the exit, nearly knocking over one of the bishops in his wake.
“I’m getting the Pontiff!” he barked as he stormed out.
The heavy doors slammed closed behind him, leaving the chamber once again cloaked in uneasy darkness.
Van Dijk sighed contentedly and closed his eyes.
At last, peace.
A silence he welcomed.