Helena

The sky was black that day—for there was little room for sunshine in the world, or so it seemed to a great many people, no matter how hard-pressed they would be to admit it. The thunder was a booming that shook you to your soul, the lightning a blinding, seeing-spots-for-hours-afterward strike through the air.

Densunus carried the coffin, a heavy wooden box. When that box took its place in the family mausoleum, his heart would be buried with it. The box slid into its indentation in the wall, the freshly carved inscription shining up at him.

Gregory Aidan Calloway

To love and be loved is to lose out in the end.

As depressing as it was, the inscription seemed to fit Aidan’s life. To be struck down at twenty-one by an ex-lover…

Densunus didn’t really listen to the eulogy. It was presented by one of the royal priests, who hadn’t seen Aidan in five years, so it was unlikely he would say anything to comfort the vampire king. His mind drifted back to the events of Aidan’s regrettably short life…

(H)(e)(l)(e)(n)(a)

When he was three, he woke up crying in the middle of the night. I sang him a lullaby and he fell asleep in my arms, holding my hand. I couldn’t bear to wake him up, so I curled up beside him and fell asleep, still holding his hand.

Mother’s Day, five years old—we baked mother a cake. I read the directions and fixed everything; he tripped and tipped the mixing bowl onto his head. The cake was ruined, but mother appreciated the pictures of the two of us with batter in our hair just as much as she would’ve enjoyed the cake.

It happened when he was six. It’s a horrible thing to do to anyone, but to a six-year old… Aidan was never the same again.

And it was all my fault.

Seven years old—he tried to commit suicide seventeen times. I took his memories from him to get rid of the guilt in my heart. He was forced to live with his soul incomplete for the rest of his life, but I can’t make myself regret doing it.

After all, I’m a selfish person.

He met Ailill when he was eight. Ailill was older by five years, but even then I could tell that maybe—just maybe—he could be the one to save my little brother.

When Aidan was ten, father sent him to Academy. I worried about him—who would protect him, hold him when he cried, sing him to sleep at night?

Thankfully, Ailill did a very good job of filling the vacancy I left.

Aidan went through a radical change, almost reminding me of how he was before it happened. He laughed, he smiled—God, his smile was beautiful—he cried only tears of joy. No new flecks of blood were added to his bedroom wall that year.

At thirteen, I began noticing things about Aidan—the way he flushed slightly when he was talking about Ailill, the way his eyes lit up whenever he saw Ailill, the way he wrote the boy’s name all over his notebooks… --;;

Aidan was in love, and I couldn’t be happier.

Fifteen through seventeen were heaven. That was the happiest Aidan ever was. He and Ailill were more in love than any two people I’d ever seen, and they weren’t afraid of showing their feelings.

Ailill drove a hearse, and I knew the backseat wasn’t used to transport corpses. I didn’t mind. As long as Aidan was happy, I didn’t care.

I didn’t feel so guilty then—the shame burning away my stomach lining wasn’t quite so insistent then.

But then it all changed. Two years of heaven were a prerequisite to hell.

It wasn’t Ailill, I knew that much. But it was Ailill’s body. He killed our parents.

And now, he’s killed Aidan.

(H)(e)(l)(e)(n)(a)

The funeral was over and everyone was leaving when a man emerged from the surrounding forest, a dozen black roses held in his hand. Densunus watched with wide eyes before striding up to the man, outraged.

“What are you doing here?! How could you come here? How dare you!” The tips of the vampire king’s fingers crackled with dark magic as he fisted a hand in the other’s robes, yanking him forward.

“I’m simply paying my respects, Densunus. No need to get so tetchy.”

“You bastard!” Densunus punched at the man’s stomach with as much force as he could muster; he crumpled to the ground, his black hair falling over his face.

“Don’t blame me for being just like you, Densunus.” The man examined his bouquet of coffin-black roses. “I couldn’t stand to see him hurting, either, so when he asked…”

Densunus’s vision got a little blurry around the edges.

“…How could I refuse, when he asked me? Asked me, with tears in his eyes and pain in his heart… I only did the same thing you did. I set him free. I took his burden onto myself.”

The vampire king brought his hands up to his face to hide the tears that trickled down his face.

The mage king stood, moving in front of the grave and dropping the flowers in front of it. “Goodbye, luv,” he murmured, pressing his lips to the cold stone.

Densunus could hear him approaching, but wasn’t bothered by it as much as he was by everything else. He wasn’t expecting it—he wouldn’t have been surprised in the least to feel a dagger in his heart or a bullet through his stomach or poison forced down his throat—but he certainly didn’t expect to feel warm, gentle arms encircling him, and a head leaning against his shoulder.

“It’s gonna be OK, Densunus. We’re going to be fine.”

And then Densunus opened his eyes and all the warmth was gone. The only evidence of the man’s visit was the bouquet and the black smoke that billowed around him—and that would soon be gone.

The king wrapped shaking arms around himself before turning around and going home. It would not do to dwell here. He could afford a little selfishness, but he didn’t have the luxury to be as egotistic as Aidan.

He cared too much for the people who still loved him to kill himself.

So long and goodnight,

So long and goodnight…

Helena, My Chemical Romance