Chapter Text
They came at night, protected by the darkness and mist surrounding them, quiet and deadly did they enter the house of the Heisenberg's.
It was the screams of his parents that woke Karl up, followed by quick approaching steps, and a hand that took him away from the warmth of his bed, only to hide him underneath it a moment later.
Only then did he realize that it was his mother, her hand lingered on his cheek, a warm and comforting touch, but it was not enough to keep away the feeling of terror that began to spread around Karl's heart like a disease.
He looked at her and now saw the fear that had settled over her face; with a shaking voice she whispered, "You have to be quiet now, don't come out until either me, or your father come to get you." Her hand slipped away from his cheek, taking all warmth with her.
Green eyes watched as his mother moved to leave the room, however she didn't get far.
With a loud bang the door was forced open and his mother was thrown to the ground by something massive. The woman shrieked in pain only to go horrifyingly quiet a moment later. Now a black figure, even darker than the night itself, towered over Karl's motionless mother. This 'thing' was so huge, it almost filled the entire room with its constantly moving mass.
Everything that happened after he was grabbed and pulled away from underneath the bed was a blurry mess of movements, fear, and the lack of consciousness.
What followed were weeks filled with unimaginable pain and terror. His flesh was cut into ribbons, healed, and cut again. His calls for help were unheard, his pleading to end the pain ignored, and then one day, all the agony was nothing more than a distant feeling.
Something cold had settled inside his mind, together with a numbness and the realization that he would never be able to escape this hell that was now his life.
He could only bow to the will of a woman he was to call 'Mother Miranda', and was only barely able to suppress the flicker of hatred deep inside himself every time he uttered her name.
As time went by, Karl noticed that his body was different now. It felt different...odd at times. Something was moving deep inside of him, it mortified him; not knowing what was going to happen...what already had happened...
Time blurred together into a sea of nothingness until Mother Miranda took him with her to a place he couldn't have imagined being possible.
Walls of a castle, so incredibly high, they effectively blocked out the last sunrays the day had to offer. Karl swallowed nervously, standing in front of those imposing doors, he wanted nothing more than to run away, and hide from the events that might occur.
His legs however wouldn't obey him, he followed Mother Miranda, with his heart pounding away inside his chest like a frightened bird.
The inside of the building looked friendlier than the exterior had suggested. What changed his mind, however, was the appearance of a...woman...so tall he had to tilt his head back to see her face.
He looked up, frightened by the appearance of the woman in front of him, yet he felt unable to avert his eyes from her. A shudder went through his body, thinking about the beasts and all those 'things' he had seen in the last few weeks.
This thing...woman...in turn, looked down at him like he was a mere insect. Something to be stepped on and be obliterated from existence without a second thought.
"Mother Miranda, what a pleasant surprise. I was not aware of your plans to visit me….and what is 'this'? Did you bring me fresh food?" The woman's rich voice filled the room and a sinister smile played around ruby red lips.
Miranda's dark robe moved slightly, as if a breeze had touched the fine clothing.
"I did not plan to visit you, but an urgent matter needs my attention." Mother Miranda's hand gestured toward the young child at her side, "This, my daughter, is your new brother, Karl Heisenberg. Karl meet Alcina Dimitrescu, your older sister."
The woman scowled down at Karl, her mouth opened briefly, but closed again when Miranda began to speak anew.
"My experiment with a younger human was a failure. He too, is unfit to be a vessel for Eve. I'll have to seek other methods and other subjects to do my tests on. I will have to go for a few weeks. However, I cannot leave him with neither Donna nor Salvatore."
Lady Dimitrescu snorted and said something that sounded like, 'Salvatore would drown the boy in acids.'
"I will speak to you about everything later, my daughter. For now, I trust you not to harm the boy, and accept my words without any arguments." There was a warning in Mother Miranda's voice, Karl had already learned himself not to go against them, and so must have Lady Dimitrescu.
She kept quiet, her face however showed her displeasure of the situation, but Lady Dimitrescu kept silent with the exception of an uttered farewell to Mother Miranda.
"What will I do with you now, child? You do not belong here. I'm not allowed to eat you, and I can't let you work with my maidens either."
Karl didn't dare to look up this time, green eyes stayed fixed to a point where Lady Dimitrescu knees must have been under her long, cream colored dress.
"I'm sorry, Lady Dimitrescu. I won't be any bother to you. Just let me stay somewhere, and I promise I'll stay out of your way." The young Heisenberg's voice was barely a whisper, but apparently loud enough for Alcina Dimitrescu to hear.
She huffed and flexed her long, pale fingers, "At least you have some kind of manners. Follow me, I'll show you to a room you can stay in."
Karl had to be fast to keep up with Dimitrescu, for every single step the woman made, it took him nearly ten. Thankfully it didn't take long for them to arrive in front of a door on the first floor and with a flick of her hand, she gestured Karl to enter.
Her dark green eyes followed the child without any sympathy inside of them. "Hmmm, maybe I should eat you. I could say it was an accident..." She muttered, more to herself than to Karl, and moved to close the door without another word.
Karl Heisenberg had so many questions left to ask, fear was the only thing stopping him from speaking them out loud.
Now, left alone inside his room, he was finally able to let go of the tension that had built up over the past hours. Slowly, he sunk to the ground, and let tears fill his cloudy green eyes, he had already shed so many of them in the last few weeks, he was surprised he still had some left.
Not for the first time he wondered if his parents were still alive and if they were; Did they miss him? Where they looking for him?
Or had they given up on him already...
He cried himself to sleep on the ground that night, his mind in turmoil.
Weeks passed, and since then, he had only seen Lady Dimitrescu twice. What Karl noticed, however, was that he became more and more aware of his powers with each passing day. It started small, a tiny piece of metal in the corner of the room moved after he had fixated on it. Now metal bent, twisted, and moved at his will, although it could sometimes happen too, when nightmares haunted his dreams during the night.
Then one night, the most unthinkable happened, lost and trapped in the most terrible nightmares, he lost control of his abilities.
He woke up to the ground shaking, and a screeching sound next to him.
Karl flung himself from the edge of the bed he had slept on, and stared at the towering figure of Lady Dimitrescu.
"Stop it now! How dare you use your powers inside my castle!?" Lady Dimitrescu shouted at the terrified child, she didn't seem to be surprised by what had happened, only angered that it did.
While she was screaming in anger, long dark claws emerged from her fingertips and sank into the ground just inches away from the boy. Terrified of the long claws that had dug deep down into the wooden floor, Karl did the first thing that came to mind.
Karl had to flee
He moved fast, short legs carried him outside and away from the place where he had spent the last few weeks in isolation and fear.
The voice of Alcina Dimitrescu echoed out behind him, but he was unwilling to stop. The sudden taste of freedom mixed with the slightest possibility of getting back home again was all he needed to keep him going.
He ran outside through one of the side entrances and was met with heavy snowfall, but he kept going, ran as fast as his small legs could carry him, however it didn't take long for him to tire out, with the snow falling as heavy as it was now, he had lost every bit of orientation.
He came to a stop at a larger tree at the edge of the forest, unable to keep going the cold had seeped into his thin clothes faster than Karl had anticipated, it melted, turning everything into a sheet of ice.
The cold felt like needles digging painfully into his skin, though it still wasn't painful enough to make him want to go back. A tired sigh left his pale lips, his mind and body were incredibly tired. Leaning against the rough bark of the tree behind him, he slowly sank to the snow-covered ground. Thick snowflakes landed on him, draping over each other until his clothes were covered in white.
Green eyes continued to watch, there was once a time when he loved the snow, now he felt indifferent to it. Now, he just wanted it all to stop, he wanted to sleep, and see his parents again.
His heart ached for something that would give him hope, but there wasn't any left.
Heavy eyelids closed for one last time, hiding away green eyes, before sleep took Karl Heisenberg.
He was unaware of anything by the time Lady Alcina Dimitrescu had managed to locate him. It only took her a few steps before she was beside him, bowing low to dig his small body out of the snow.
"You foolish child! What did you think you were doing? Do you want to die? There are faster ways to end your life than to freeze to death in the snow." She cursed at the boy for being so stupid, though something at the back of her mind berated her for acting like she did.
Karl Heisenberg was a child. And yet, she didn't even know his age, but he couldn't be older than maybe eleven years. It never crossed her mind to ask, and if she was honest with herself, Alcina had to admit...she'd forgotten the boy.
For a brief moment she thought back to her own three daughters and remembered how every now and then one of them would wake up in the middle of the night because of a nightmare… Alcina shook her head as she tried to push the memories aside, now was not the moment to reminisce.
A frown settled over her face when the pale skin of the young Heisenberg child came into view, his skin had taken on an unnatural shade of blue...death would take this child away soon if she didn't act quickly.
Mutations and cadou inside the boy be damn, they weren't immortal, Alcina Dimitrescu knew that already, everyone had their limits and the child's abilities weren't even fully developed yet.
She rose from her crouched position, holding the boy's icy body tightly against herself and felt the blood flow in his veins, too slow and sluggish. A hiss left her lips as anger begun to curse through her.
As she re-entered her castle, she was met by a flurry of maids who were pushed aside as Dimitrescu rushed to the boy's room.
"Get him dressed in something warm, and put him to bed. I'll be back shortly." Alcina called out to one of her maidens after she had placed the unconscious child onto the bed.
Her clothes, too, had gotten wet from the melting snow and were now sticking uncomfortably to her skin. The dress was beyond saving, as was her hair, and her whole appearance. She wanted to rage, but what use was it now. Quickly, she changed into dry clothes before striding back to Karl's room.
When she entered the room, the maids had already left and the boy was put under a thick blanket, but it didn't take Alcina much to realize that one blanket was nowhere near enough.
She turned to the wardrobe at the far side of the room, yanked its doors open with more force than necessary before pulling out the remaining blankets from it. With swift movements she threw them over the Heisenberg child, and before she could stop herself, her fingertips touched Karl's forehead. His skin still felt too cold, although it was a little warmer and less pale than it was half an hour ago.
From then on everything was a waiting game, but she hoped the boy wouldn't get sick, that was the last thing she needed. Alcina scoffed loudly before she settled into one of the larger armchairs by the roaring fireplace.
Fortunately, it didn't take long for Karl to start moving. The mutation in his body helped him getting warm faster too, Lady Dimitrescu noted with interest.
At first, he moved slowly, limbs twitching under the heavy weight of all the blankets that were draped over him. Lady Dimitrescu sat up straighter, focusing on green eyes that fluttered open slowly. "You are a foolish child, you almost died, you know that right?"
The boy startled as Dimitrescu's voice rang out, glassy eyes opened wide and fixated on her like a frightened animal would look at a predator. "Stop looking at me like that, I won't eat you!" She tried to calm the boy down, with only little success. A shudder went through Karl's body and he curled into himself a bit, it was a good sign though, if he was shaking now, he was getting warmer.
Soon after, the boy sat up too, pushing a few blankets away from himself, although he had yet to address Lady Dimitrescu.
"I ruined one of my dresses and my finger almost froze off when I had to dig you out of the snow." She tried to get his attention, and this time it seemed to have worked.
Green eyes peeked up at her while a shiver went through his body once again, "Why did you come after me? You did not have to…"
He stopped talking as if he wanted to think about the next words he wanted to say. "I just want to go home, please...let me go home. I do not belong here, you said it yourself. Please, Lady Dimitrescu, let me leave."
Many people had begged Alcina... they had asked to go home ... had pleaded for their lives. This time, however, it wasn't some prey or a maid who pleaded before her, but a child mutated by Mother Miranda.
Alcina sighed tiredly and sat down onto the armchair once again. "You cannot go home; you are not a normal human being anymore. You are a part of this Village now, and a part of this family." It was a bitter pill for Dimitrescu to swallow and to recognize Karl Heisenberg as part of her family.
Karl's green eyes had lost some of their fear, "They are dead, aren't they? My parents...I'll never see them again..." The boy fiddled with a part of one of the blankets.
"Yes, they are dead. You are the last surviving member of the house Heisenberg." Alcina watched his green eyes fill with tears again, but this time none were shed. For the first time since Mother Miranda had brought the boy here, Lady Dimitrescu wondered ... was it worth it?
To ruin the life of another child, to resuscitate that of a long-dead one?
Maybe…
Alcina Dimitrescu had lost her own three daughters a long time ago. She didn't know, and was unwilling to ponder any longer over it. "Get some rest now, you need it."
"Can you...?"
Dimitrescu was about to step out of the room when Karl's voice rang out, and she stopped to turn around ever so slightly. "Can I what? Spit it out already."
"Could you stay? Just this one night?"
There it was!
This one thing that made Alcina Dimitrescu want to keep her distance from the boy. Seeing this look in those green eyes… a look only a child was able to make…pure vulnerability. Alcina didn't answer verbally, but nodded to the boy before she sat down on the larger armchair again, keeping vigil...just for this one night.
The Heisenberg boy watched her for a few more moments. Something that could have been relief flickered through his eyes, and he moved to hide under the mountain of blankets again.
For Karl, however, sleep came easier that night, nightmares of the past torture and monsters were held at bay by the security and warmth he felt in this moment. It had been a long time since he felt that way.
When he gifted his 'sister' a pair of soft, finely crafted leather gloves, he managed to buy from the Duke a few months later, and saw something soften inside her green eyes, he didn't comment on it.
Karl would, however, hold onto that tiny piece of memory and look back at it when one day seemed darker than another, and there were many to come.