Chapter Text
The forest floor tears at Jason's bare feet as he stumbles through the undergrowth, branches catching at his torn shirt and scratching fresh lines across skin already mapped with scrapes and bruises. He's sure he would be bleeding if there was enough blood in his system.
He can feel his undead heart hammering against his ribs. It's a frantic, unnatural rhythm that should be impossible but pounds nonetheless, driving him forward through sheer terror.
The dark silhouettes of mountains loom around him. Their peaks cutting jagged wounds against the star-scattered sky. He has to be in a valley, he realizes dimly, trapped between those ancient, towering walls of stone.
He has never seen mountains before. Only heard about them in the stories his mother read to him back when everything was still... okay. Those fairytales where brave princes fought dragons and magical creatures lived in hidden caves. He almost expects to see Snow White and some dwarfs coming his way. Aren't they supposed to live in the mountains? It's been so long, he doesn't remember the story. He tries to think about it, concentrate on the memory, but it's vanishing from his mind like smoke. He can't even remember the voice of his mother.
A howl echoes in the distance, it sounds low and mournful. A bird startles from the trees above, wings beating frantically as it escapes into the night. He should not be afraid. They always call him a predator, after all. He doesn't feel like one. Has never felt like one.
His legs shake with each step. He's not sure when they last let him feed. Days ago, maybe longer. It was hard to really determine time trapped in that crate.
Sionis's men had thrown them scraps: dead mice, rotting rats, things that barely qualify as sustenance. Just enough to keep the vampire children going, barely enough to keep them growing up. Jason's stomach cramps as he stumbles over an exposed root. He feels empty and aching, but he forces himself to keep moving.
He knows he only has this one chance. There won't be another one.
He had been locked in that chest for what felt like an eternity. There was only suffocating darkness, until suddenly the horse stumbled on the rocky path and the cart broke apart with a crash that sounded like salvation.
And he knew it then with certainty: it was his only chance.
Because he can't do it anymore. The hunger, the fear, the not knowing if today will be the day they decide he isn't worth keeping as their curious entertainment for some noble's twisted amusement.
It's enough. It has to be enough.
But the longer he runs, or stumbles more like, through this endless forest, the more he realizes he isn't sure he's chosen any better.
He knows his escape can't go on forever. He can feel it almost.
The sky above is beginning to change. Not lighter, not yet, but there is something different in the quality of the darkness, a subtle shift that makes his skin prickle with dread. Dawn is coming. Dawn is always coming, creeping closer with each frantic heartbeat, each stumbled step.
Panic claws at his throat.
He needs shelter. Anything. A cave, an overhang, even a shadow deep enough to keep the sun from finding him. But there is nothing.
The trees are too sparse, their canopy too thin to block out any light. The rocks here are small, useless, scattered like pebbles across the forest floor.
His options are running out as fast as the night.
Maybe that is good, he thinks, and the idea comes with a strange, hollow calm. Maybe this is how it ends.
At least he's tried. At least he's fought. At least he won't die in a box, shipped from one gang to another like cargo. Like a thing.
Tears track cold lines down his cheeks, drying quickly in the wind that whips past him. They sting in the night air, salt and sorrow mixing with the metallic taste of fear on his tongue.
Mother, he thinks, and the word is a prayer to a God he isn't sure will listen to something like him. The church says he has no soul. Says there is no afterlife for the undead, no heaven for the damned.
There has never been a life for him here either. Not really. Just existence, just survival, just the endless gnawing hunger and the constant fear.
But maybe, just maybe, there is something else waiting. Maybe he'll see her again. Maybe when the sun comes up and burns away everything he is, there will be something beyond the pain, beyond the ending.
The thought should terrify him. Instead, in this moment of desperation, it feels almost like hope. Like salvation.
That's when he sees it.
Through a gap in the trees, barely visible in the pre-dawn gloom: a light in the darkness. A light coming from a window.
From a... a house? There are walls. A roof. He can see the solid, blessed outline of a building rising from the forest like a beacon in his darkest hour.
But something is strange about this. It's too big. Too... grand? Too noble?
Noble... a hunting lodge maybe? From what he can make out, it's two stories tall with white walls.
How absurd to have white walls out here in the wilderness, he thinks.
He has heard some nobleman talking about something like this at one of the parties they forced him to attend as entertainment. This must be one of those places where wealthy men come to play at wilderness and danger, surrounded by every comfort and luxury they could want.
But... but this is his best shot. He is in the middle of nowhere. Maybe they have a stable where he can hide from the coming sun. A cellar even? A room without any windows.
He has always hated how cellars smell. The damp, the smell of decay and earth but he can do it. He can hide.
Jason's legs nearly give out with relief.
He stumbles toward the lodge, his vision blurring with exhaustion and hope and the terrible, desperate need to survive just one more day.
Just one more day.
He soon realizes he doesn’t have any luck. He never does, does he?
There are wards everywhere. These people are careful. Really careful.
There is a stable just ahead, and he can almost feel the blessed warmth radiating from the horses inside. He can hear them snoring, munching on their hay in the quiet safety of their stalls. But when he reaches for the door, he can't enter.
The wards shimmer invisible and deadly in the night air, even around the old barn where the firewood is stored. These people know exactly what they're dealing with.
When he tries to cross the line against his better judgment, the pain hits him like lightning. It makes him fall hard to the cold ground, gasping and shaking.
That's when he starts properly crying, the tears coming hot and desperate. This can't be happening. It's so cruelly unfair.
Sprawled on the frost-covered earth, he can see the dawn creeping up behind the mountains. Can feel the subtle shift in the air. The sky is no longer the deep black but the darkest blue. Soon it will lighten further. Soon it will kill him.
There is only one option left, really. One last desperate chance.
The door. An invitation. They need to invite him inside.
He knows someone is there. He can see the warm, golden light glowing from the windows inside.
Like a wounded animal he creeps closer to the main entrance. His bare, torn feet are silent on the cold stone steps.
With his heart battering frantically against his ribs, he raises a trembling fist and knocks.
There are footsteps inside. They are heavy, measured, coming closer to him. The door opens.
The man is enormous, is the first thing he thinks. There is a dark cloak draped around his impossibly broad shoulders.
The light streams from behind him, making it impossible to see his face clearly in the shadow.
He looks like some kind of dark angel framed in divine radiance, terrible and beautiful all at once.
"Please..." Jason mumbles, his voice barely above a whisper.
"Please can I come inside?"