The Ball Room

Plop... plop....plop...

The distant, echoes of footfalls resounding through the dusty castle interior, getting louder as they approach the mostly empty ballroom. Light spills through the empty space, showing off peeling wall paper, cracked masonry, parqued flooring...

A tall, lonely figure stands in the doorway of the ball room, the most exquisite ballroom a vampire could ever lay eyes on. Feasts, gatherings, dancing... these halls once sang, once ringed, once hummed with life. Ironically, when filled with the living dead. The 'young man' approaches one of the many discarded instruments in the room. A violin covered in thick layers of dust. He blows the refuse away, and lets it rest between his shoulder and cheek. A smile, slowly spreads across his handsome face as he takes bow in hand, and begins to play...



The 'abandoned' castle was empty enough in most rooms for the sound of the strings to travel from the ballroom on the ground floor to areas so far off like the dungeons deeper, below the keep's main foyer and even reach the attic, the sole proprietor would have wagered!

He paused however... strings of the Violin weren't enough to occupy his mind. Smiling...

He waltzed over to the Harpischord...

He aggressively took hold of the viola...



The song picked up, the sounds still travelling throughout the estate's grounds were met with new ones, combining, forming a ghost chorus that blended magically together! The sound of the combined instruments which lingered and bounced off this strange castle's walls and corridors made the building resonate. Out in the former service tunnels, beyond the hidden...well, mostly hidden, path that lead to the beautifully decaying Castle Ravencroft, one could potentially even hear the ghastly call of 'La Folia- the madness'. It was a Ravencroft favorite, and one that Damien M. Ravencroft, Lord of the Castle, a blackened tomb literally buried beneath rock and stone, played well. It was a lonely, dark place... an uncared for head stone of what was the proud keep of the Ravencroft House, the bastion of its undead residents. The wealth, the influence, the privilege. Damien could remember when his father and uncle built this place, stone by stone... he knew these walls better than any vampire in the Grand House of Bathory, and more than Carmilla's when the Four Houses: Bathory, Orlok, Dracul, and Cain- fell. Centuries of warfare, of in fighting... then Carmilla steps forward and reunites the fractured houses; the offspring of Lady Bathory and Lord Dracul- an offspring of incest no less! Would he pledge himself to someone so vial, a person whose existence caused all of that blood shed?

"You're damn right I did!" He says, finishing the piece... sitting back in the chair, glancing over to the grand piano and its dusty keys. Carmilla was not only a convincing woman, but she was a thing of disgusting beauty. So beautiful, you hated it. She was contradiction, and contradiction always fascinated Damien. He walked over, dragging the less ornate piano and brought it between his chair and the baby grand...

He leaned back, closing his eyes as he played an older piece... one Carmilla was fond of.



He played between both pianos, fingers flitting the keys, his mind deep into the sound of the music as he picked up pace and organized his thoughts.

Damien Mathias Ravencroft... a true genius among vampires, there was a time when his name was world renowned and it brought the light of intrigue and fancy into the eyes of the few who were not privy of his preceding reputation. Now? He would be surprised if anyone, outside the fractured vampire society they've endured for the last 27 years. Short time for vampires, but as far as civilizations crumbling it was a long time without any attempt of recovery. No bounce back, simply... wandering clans. Unity was fractured, and everyone scattered to the wind like ashes of a funeral pyre...

The Grand Houses... the Minor Houses... all died. His uncle became a notorious 'gangster' making himself the head of a Vampire Mafia... the utter ridiculousness of it. Where ever that old leech is... I hope he's suffering to the fullest. He says to himself, smiling as he changed the tune once more, this time using the keys of only the grand piano.



One of Carmilla's favorites, and his as well... he played it countless times in her icy keep, deep, deep south... past the frozen lands of death, past all living civilization save penguins and pesky kitsune.

Why did I come into this room again...? He asked himself, still playing all the while.

...Nostalgia?

His fingers glide across the ivory, the keys moving swiftly, dust rolling off the alabaster as he closed his eyes again.

Longing?

The castle echoed with the sound of music; a facade that more than one soul lived within the rotting corpse. How fitting descriptions? Like the vampire society itself, these walls stand now from the foundations made by a breed of vampire long since past. The world had moved on, forgot itself, and discarded what it meant to be a member of the crimson eyed court, to be a servant of the blood soaked progenitors and those who came before them. Vampire society? Was something that had long fell... and Damien didn't foresee it coming back anytime soon... at least...

He flicked on a portable music player:



He leaned back, arms folded behind his neck, looking up at the high, vaulted ceiling and the diamond chandelier. "Not without change. Should we let the chains of the past, of traditions old hold us back, we will built the same foundations our predecessors made and on the same, unstable ground. Should we to resurface? We will need to take what's worth saving, and rebuild anew." He says, closing his eyes and listened to the music...

---

Once finished relfecting, Damien crossed the hall, pushing through the double doors, feeling somewhat refreshed. "Maybe, I'll go out. It's been some time." He chuckled, talking to himself like always.

(to wherever when I get there haha)