"Leave us," Boarstaff ordered again, though his blade never wavered. "Our guest has made his nature quite clear. Now we proceed accordingly."
The footfalls retreated up the wooden stairs, light following up behind them.
"Accordingly." The word hung in crystal-lit air as Boarstaff circled the chamber's edge. His movements held nothing of the earlier gentleness. Nothing of offered choices or careful handling. Just the steady purpose of a predator who'd confirmed his prey's true nature. "Tell me, vampire. In your feeding chambers, what happens to thosewho can't control themselves? Those who strike without permission?"
Sebastian tried to track the warchief's movement through sound, through scent, but the pain of the wards' increased restraint made everything blur. The knife's cut across his chest bled vapor instead of blood, another component deep in his chest was failing under the Heart Tree's assault.
"You think I fear whatever primitive punishment you," The words cut off in a hiss as Boarstaff's boot pressed against his chest, directly over the wound.
"I think you fear nothing because you still believe you have options." The pressure increased slowly, deliberately. "That this is some temporary discomfort before your father's armies find you. Before you return to your synthetic precision and carefully regulated existence." A low laugh. "You're wrong."
Metal clinked against the Heart Tree's living floor as Boarstaff set something down, not weapons, Sebastian realized through the haze of hunger and pain. New restraints. Ancient rawhide bindings adorned with carved bone beads and small crystal fragments, thicker and stronger than the first set, but carrying the same magic as the other bindings and wards. Old power that sang through his dying components like liquid fire.
"Before mechanical regulation." Boarstaff lifted the first length. "Before your kind learned to process blood and pretend at civilization. This is how we contained pure vampire nature." The ancient binding caught crystal light like captured lightning, the embedded fragments gleaming with power. "No choices. No dignity. No pretense of control until control is earned."
The first binding touched his throat, just above his synthetic collar. Power burned through every remaining system, seeking out the places where brass met flesh, where copper threaded through muscle. Not attacking the components this time. Binding them. Converting them into conduits for the Heart Tree's ancient magic.
"The metal remembers." Boarstaff placed each knot with methodical care. "These bindings held your kind before steam and machinery gave you the illusion of choice."
Sebastian's body convulsed as another wave of transformation swept through him. The chamber's crystals flared in response, theirlight shifting from crimson to indigo depths that suggested change rather than merely constraint.
"These remain until you demonstrate you deserve otherwise," Boarstaff declared as he secured another length. "When you prove worthy of gentler treatment, you'll receive it." His movements never hesitated despite Sebastian's struggling. "Your continued existence here demands more than aristocratic pride and unchecked feeding instincts."
The final binding settled into place. Sebastian's world narrowed to points of burning contact where ancient rawhide and crystal touched his skin, his brass, his very nature. The Heart Tree's magic sang through every knot, every dead component, every careful lie he'd ever told himself about control.
"Now," Boarstaff's voice came from above him, carrying fresh blood-scent that made hunger surge against unyielding restraint, "let's try this again. Without illusions about choice or dignity or anything except what you are." A pause heavy with purpose. "And what you'll become through necessity."
The scent of blood filled the chamber again, stronger, more immediate. Sebastian tried to turn away, to maintain some pretense of choice, of pride, of anything except pure need. But the reinforced bindings held him with ancient purpose, converting every dead mechanical component into a conduit for magic that knew exactly how to break a vampire's will.
"Stop fighting it," Boarstaff said.
"I am a noble of House de la Sang," Sebastian tried to snarl, but the words emerged more desperate than defiant. "I won't be reduced to-"
"You're already reduced." Boarstaff's voice held no cruelty, just simple truth that cut deeper than steel. "To exactly what you are beneath improvement and artifice. The only choice now is whether you learn to exist in that truth, or break against it."
Sebastian wanted to deny it. To cling to some remnant of the nobility that had defined him for two centuries. But the hunger tore through every practiced deception, every artificial restraint, until only raw need remained, a truth the ancient bindings forced him to confront.
"That's it," Boarstaff said as Sebastian's defiance faltered. "Let the magic reveal what you truly are. What exists beneath your people's frantic attempts to overcome nature."
Blood touched Sebastian's lips, not offered this time, but administered. Like medicine. Like necessity. Like truth he couldn't hide from anymore.
The blood hit his tongue, untainted, unprocessed, overwhelming in its power. Without mechanical regulation, without the careful filtration of feeding chambers, every drop seared through his remaining systems like liquid fire. His body convulsed against the restraints, against magic that remembered exactly how much freedom a vampire could be allowed.
"Slowly," Boarstaff commanded as Sebastian tried to take more. The bindings tightened in response to his desperation, converting dead brass into anchors for power that knew exactly how to control pure vampire nature. "You'll take what you're given, how you're given it. Nothing more."
Sebastian wanted to snarl defiance, to prove he was more than just need and hunger. But his fangs wouldn't even fully descend without the binding's permission. Every part of him existed at the mercy of ancient magic, of remembered containment, of pure truth he couldn't regulate away.
Another drop hit his tongue. Then another. Each one carefully measured, deliberately administered. Not feeding, training. Breaking down every artificial pretense until nothing remained except what he truly was.
The blood stopped, not enough, never enough to satisfy pure vampire nature. Just enough to keep him alive. To keep him aware. To keep him remembering exactly what he'd earned through his failed attack.
"Remember this," Boarstaff said as he drew back, as Sebastian tried to follow despite restraints that held him perfectly still. "Remember what happens when you let hunger rule. When you prove you need the old ways." His voice hardened. "Next time, earn the right to something gentler."
Sebastian lay naked in the crystal-lit chamber of the Heart Tree, ancient magic tightening around dead brass that remembered toomuch. That converted every mechanical component into a conduit for magic that knew exactly how to contain vampire nature.
How to break vampire pride.
How to teach predator what it meant to truly be prey.
