Chapter Text
The worst part about the Oakhurst jail cell wasn’t the bars made of silver, nor its claustrophobic nature, not even the fact that it was right next to an North-East facing window that forced Owen into a corner every time the sun rose. No, the worst part was that Avid allowed visitors. It felt like every remaining human in the little village (it was more like a colony at this point) had come to gawk at him. Avid watched him daily, sending threats his way, with Drift following behind him. Pearl had visited once to ask some questions, but he hadn’t been listening. Martyn and his gaggle of fools were the ones that brought him here in the first place. The Doctor and his butler friend (Owen never bothered to learn his name) made an appearance… he didn’t have a heart to hear him out with. Even that hypocrite Apo went to visit him. Yeah, Owen wasn’t about to give the blood traitor the time of day.
He hated all of them, despised them. He wanted to burn them like he did those women and children, make them suffer for the way they did to him… to him. Owen chuckled bitterly to himself. What would Louis think of him now? He was a peaceful man, likely only living off of the blood of livestock. He ran the town well too, it was extremely prosperous. God, he loved those people. He would be heartbroken if he knew what happened to them.
That realization hit Owen like a bird hitting a glass window. He thought had avenged Louis, but what if all he was doing was torturing the man’s spirit? What if Louis would hate him for what he’d done? Did it even matter anymore..? Owen was going to die soon anyway, would he really be regretting what he did now? Two hundred years after the deed? No, humans were still monsters. They may be alive, but that didn’t make them kind. Humans were paranoid, sick, cruel beings. They can’t even accept their own kind, how could they-
“Hey, you,” Owen looked up instinctively, quickly regretting the fact he had acknowledged him at all. Avid sat on a chair on the other side of the room, holding a cross shaped stake in his hands. The paranoid man had barely left Owen out of his sight since he got here three days ago. He wouldn’t imagine it was a particularly pretty image. Owen’s once brown skin resembled more of a sickly brownish-gray, his hair was a ratty mud color, and his eyes, even though he couldn’t see them, were most certainly a dim red. He had contemplated trying to scare Avid, but the silver made him almost too weak to move.
“Stop muttering to yourself, it’s creepy,” Avid said coldly, but he had a cockiness in the back of his voice. He always had it, people like him always had it. Overconfident fools.. Well, maybe he wasn’t a total fool. He had the foresight to make these bars out of silver. “Who is that you keep talking about? Lou-?”
“Shut your mouth.” Owen hissed. He would eat a clove of garlic before he let that name be soiled by the likes of him. Avid seemed surprised at his reaction. It was reasonable, considering Owen had barely spoken to any of them since he was forced in here.
“Well someone’s getting restless,” Avid chuckled, clearly unnerved behind the confidence. He was rather pathetic, really. “Well, I have good news for you then. We’ve decided on what to do with you.”
Owen scoffed, rolling his eyes. It was painfully obvious what he planned to do.
“Today at sunrise, we’re going to execute you,” He continued, standing up and walking towards the bars. He had an annoying smile on his face. I need him dead. “You won’t be able to kill anyone ever again, and hopefully that will send your mind some sort of warning to stay away.”
“My kind?” Owen gaped, a dirty look on his face. “Your kind were the ones to hunt us down and attack us! You came barging into Scott’s castle with fire and silver-”
“On please, not this again,” Avid scowled at the caged vampire, leaning on the same bars that burnt Owen when he touched them. “You turned them”
“I didn’t turn anybody!” Owen stood up, managing strength despite his proximity to the bars. “That’s all that blue haired idiot's fault. You people came barging into cursed land and decided to live here. This is your own fault.”
Avid made a huffy sound, rolling his eyes. He looked ready to kill him, but was holding back. That’s a new one for him. “It doesn’t matter, you’ll be burnt by sunrise.”
Burnt?
“Burnt?” Owen stared up, wide eyes getting even wider.
“Yes, Martyn suggested burning you at the stake-” No. “But I figured it would be much more fool proof to tie you to the pyre-“ No. “-and let the sun have at you.”
Owen didn’t hear him, or at least didn’t listen. He heard the sounds of cheering crowds, the crackling of a bonfire. He could smell flesh burning- was the sun coming up? He could practically see the fire burning away his flesh, charring his hair and bones. Why were they so happy to see someone die? How sick were they? They enjoyed the smell of fear and death. The sounds of suffering. Owen could’ve stopped it- could’ve saved him. He was too late. Too late too late too-
“Hey- hey!” Avid's shrill voice broke Owen out of whatever flashback he was having. When he looked up, he was surprised to see the man look genuinely scared. Concerned? No, that was ridiculous. “Why did you just start hyperventilating like that? What did-”
“You humans really haven’t changed,” Owen snapped, voice rawer than it had been in 200 years. He got close to the bars, the silver making his skin hot. “Burning people to death, killing people with no mercy- you’re more monsters than the cannibals you claim to save people from. You kill innocents based on rumor and paranoia- you killed him when he had done nothing wrong!”
Avid stared at the creature before him with confusion. Owen, this blood thirsty monster who threatened to kill them all, was breathing heavily and crying in front of him. If not for Avid's strong sense of compassion, he might’ve found it pathetic.
“..him?” Avid repeated, tilting his head. Owen fell back to the ground, laughing bitterly. Instead of ignoring or scoffing at him, he did something that surprised Avid. He opened his mouth and kept talking.
“Louis. The man that gave me my gift,” He said that name like a prayer, but the word like a curse. The contrast threatened to give Avid whiplash. “He saved me, cursed me of my illness, my loneliness. He was the only man who ever gave me the time of day. He talked to me like I was human.” Owens voice began to break at that.
“You humans had to take him from me,” He continued, lowering his volume to almost a whisper. “I just wanted to live a peaceful life with him, and you took him. The only person that ever loved me, the only person I ever loved.”
“Vampires aren’t capable of love,” Avid said on impulse. Owen had to be lying, trying to manipulate him into feeling pity. What else could it be? Vampires couldn’t love, and yet here he was… crying on the floor like a widow who actually loved her husband. He couldn’t have actually-
In half a second, Owen lunged at the bars. He hissed, blood and anger flaring up in his eyes. Avid fell back, thumping onto the ground. There was a scream, and suddenly Owen was on the floor, clutching his hand. The room filled with the smell of burning flesh as the vampires hand blistered and boiled. Just looking at it made Avid sick.
“You can- kill me,” The lumberjack hissed, staring at Avid with murder in his eyes. “You can torture me with garlic and sliver, but you if you ever imply that I didn’t love the man I killed thousands for, I will kill you.”
Avid could only stare as Owen shrunk back in pain, clutching his hand like it was a statue of the Virgin Mary. As he got to his feet, his mind was reeling. He had so many thoughts in his head- He loved someone? Vampires can’t love, they can’t feel human emotions- but then what was that? He touched silver just to make me feel bad? Among others. The one that terrified him the most though was certainly:
Did I kill Her for nothing?
Avid watched his caged vampire, what might’ve been his pride and joy, curled up in the corner. He was breathing heavily from the pain, shaking from starvation. Horrifyingly, instead of a monster, a vampire, a creature of the night… Avid saw a person suffering. A horrible, murder of a person, but certainly a person. That unnerved Avid. Without saying a word, he opened the silver door to the prison and stepped outside.
Once the door slammed shut, Owen allowed himself to cry. Holy fucking Mary standing on a snake that was painful. Not just the silver tearing off his flesh and burning it raw, but the memories that came rushing back. He had been so stuck in the night Louis died, he hadn’t thought about all those nights they spent talking together, laughing together.. being genuinely happy together for the first time in years. They had made plans to live together, and Owen remembered Louis going on and on about how he wouldn’t be allowed to “make his manor unpleasant to the eye.” Owen had bit back that it was already dark and unpleasant, to which Louis had gotten hilariously angry. That memory and all the others like it were threatening to eat him from the inside out far more than the hunger in his gut.
“Owen,” This time, he didn’t bother looking up, until something was pushed through the bars. It looked like a glass of water- why the hell was Avid giving him water? “For your hand, that looks like it hurts.”
“Yeah no shit-” Owen looked up to scowl at the man, before pausing. Avid was holding a beheaded, bleeding chicken by its foot, staring down at him with a blank look on his face. “What..”
“This isn’t going to be enough to restore you to village killing power, right?” Avid raised an eyebrow, squatting down to the vampires level. He looked at him with pity. A strange expression to see on his face.
“It’s a pathetic offering,” Owen said, slowly eyeing the dead chicken. If he had enough liquid in his body to create saliva, he would be drooling. “Why-”
“You looked hungry,” Avid said simply, averting his eyes as he threw the dead chicken in the cage. Owen grabbed it, sucking the blood out of it before biting down on the raw meat. “And..”
“I loved someone too, once,” He said quietly, eyeing the stake at his belt. “She.. I guess I don’t think she’d want to see me starving before I go see her again. I figured he wouldn’t want that for you either.” Owen stared at Avid. Was this compassion? From a human of all creatures?
“..thank you.”