The silence was worse than the screams. At least the screams meant Sebastian was still fighting.
His muscles ached from testing the restraints, searching for weaknesses and finding none. The metal responded to each attempt, tightening automatically until he was forced to stop. Blood dried in thin trails where the edges had cut into his wrists and ankles. He had finally settled into stillness, conserving strength for whatever came next.
Hours passed, marked only by the rhythmic pulsing of brass fixtures along the walls. Then the door slid open. Lady Elisandra again, her brass-tipped fingers gleaming in the harsh light, her mechanical eyes adjusting with soft clicks as they focused on him.
"Still alive, I see." Her voice carried those same musical undertones that had unsettled him during their first meeting. "I thought I might check on our primitive guest before Sebastian's presentation."
Zarek followed her into the chamber, his damaged jaw now more extensively repaired with fresh brass components. "As requested, Lady Elisandra," he said, circling the examinationtable where Boarstaff lay restrained. "Though I fail to see the appeal of observing it further."
Elisandra approached with inhuman grace, each step meticulously planned. Her metal-tipped fingers hovered above Boarstaff's chest without touching. "Lord Cornelius's examination should be fascinating. Perhaps there's something in primitive physiology that creates vulnerability in our regulatory systems."
"A design flaw to be corrected," Zarek agreed, watching as Elisandra finally made contact, her metal fingers cold against Boarstaff's skin.
"I must admit, I'm still curious." Elisandra drew patterns across Boarstaff's chest with calculated precision. Her touch was neither gentle nor cruel, merely analytical, as if he were a specimen being cataloged. "Sebastian has always been the most resistant to improvements. The most... nostalgic for inefficient existence." Her fingers found the scar across Boarstaff's ribs from an old border skirmish. "Yet you managed to affect him more deeply than centuries of proper regulation."
Boarstaff remained silent, refusing to give them the satisfaction of a response. But he couldn't control the way his heart rate increased under her touch, a fact her mechanical eyes registered with clinical interest.
"Physiological responses suggest discomfort," she noted to Zarek. "Yet he remains silent. Primitive restraint, perhaps?"
"Or simple fear." Zarek stepped closer. "They experience it more acutely without regulation."
Elisandra's brass-tipped fingers moved to Boarstaff's throat, applying just enough pressure to remind him of his vulnerability. "About the child." She changed subjects with mechanical abruptness. "My retrieval team leaves tomorrow. I've designed special preliminary components specifically forher small form." Her fingers tightened fractionally. "She'll be such a perfect addition to my collection."
Boarstaff couldn't stop the surge of protective rage at the mention of Sarah.
Elisandra noticed immediately, her mechanical eyes adjusting as they registered his response. "Ah, there it is." Satisfaction hummed in her precisely modulated voice. "The same emotional attachment I saw before. So inefficient, yet so useful for manipulation." Her fingers relaxed, moving to trace the line of Boarstaff's jaw. "I wonder if the child still remembers my betrothed. How disappointing that she'll find him changed when we bring her back."
Zarek leaned closer, watching Elisandra's examination with growing interest. "The reconditioning is nearly complete. Father has installed completely new regulatory systems. Nothing of what this primitive cultivated will remain."
"Excellent." Elisandra finally withdrew her fingers from Boarstaff's skin. She turned to Zarek, something like anticipation in her mechanically perfect features. "Will I witness the results soon?"
"Very soon," Zarek promised. "Lord Cornelius is making final adjustments now."
Elisandra's hand rose to Zarek's face, fingers tracing the fresh brass components along his damaged jaw. "Your repairs are coming along nicely," she observed. "Though I find the asymmetry strangely compelling."
Her touch lingered, brass fingertips exploring the seam where new components met flesh. Zarek's eyes adjusted with soft clicks, focusing entirely on her face as she leaned closer. Their lips met in a kiss that contained nothing of affection, only calculated precision and engineered hunger. Her brass-tipped fingers dug into the repairs on his jaw, causing dark fluid toseep from the seams, yet Zarek showed no sign of pain, only increasing intensity.
Boarstaff looked away, the display revealing more about vampire nature than any explanation could have. Their connection was not love or even desire, just regulation-approved appetite, precise and artificial. Two machines engaging in a simulation of intimacy that held nothing of genuine feeling.
When they separated, both turned their attention back to him as if nothing had occurred. No flush of emotion colored their perfect composure, no change in their precisely modulated voices.
"I should return to Lord Cornelius's laboratory," Elisandra said. "I want to observe my betrothed's final adjustments."
"Of course," Zarek replied. "I'll check on our guest periodically until it's time for the demonstration."
Elisandra's brass-rimmed eyes fixed on Boarstaff one final time. "Enjoy your last hours of existence, primitive." Her voice carried musical notes that somehow made the threat more disturbing. "Your life has been inefficient and purposeless, but it will serve a purpose in death, proving the success of my betrothed's reconditioning."
She departed with the same predatory grace with which she'd entered, leaving Boarstaff alone with Zarek, who settled into mechanical stillness nearby, watching him with the patience of a creature who no longer experienced time as a limitation.
More hours passed. Zarek eventually departed as well, leaving Boarstaff to the silence and his thoughts. A single attendant entered once, expressionless behind a regulation mask, to check the restraints without acknowledging Boarstaff's questions. Then more silence, more waiting, more wondering what they were doing to Sebastian.
When the door finally slid open, Boarstaff tensed, expecting Zarek's clinical cruelty or another of the vampire nobles.Instead, two figures entered. Zarek with his damaged jaw further repaired, and Dominic, his copper-threaded skin catching the harsh light as he moved with mechanical precision.
Between them was a third figure that made Boarstaff's breath catch.
Sebastian. And yet not Sebastian.
He moved unsteadily, his gait lacking its usual fluid grace. Each step seemed to require conscious effort, as if he was fighting against his own body. He wore loose black pants, soft black shoes, and a sleeveless tunic with gold embroidery that caught the light as he approached. Fresh bandages wrapped parts of his arms and throat, dark stains seeping through where the "improvements" had been installed. But it was the metal that drew Boarstaff's gaze, gleaming components extending down both arms, curving around his neck, spreading across the backs of his hands in intricate patterns. More extensive than before. More controlling.
