Title: The World Before Dawn
Author: Slashydutchie
Fandom: Dracula
Pairing/character: Count Vlad Dracula/Professor Abraham van Helsing
Rating: FRT
Prompt: Love of mine won't you lay by my side and rest your weary eyes before we're out of time

Kink: private love affair or whatever you like

Dawn was approaching, fast and silent like an assassin, hiding its lethal sun behind a cloudy horizon.

Its effects could be felt even deep within the castle, fatigue and weakness already tugging at the edges of Dracula's subconscious in spite of the thick walls of Castle Dracula around him shielding the vampire from the sun's deadly rays.

Willing away the tiredness Dracula smiled down on the sleeping face of the man beside him.

Abraham was so warm, so living... Vlad would never be sure whether leaving the man alive was truly the right thing to do, but looking down at him now, watching the other man breathe, eyes moving beneath their lids in what was possibly a dream, it all seemed right.

Most others wouldn't understand this, wouldn't be able to comprehend the image of professor Abraham van Helsing resting peacefully in Count Vlad Dracula's embrace, but if the long centuries had taught the vampire anything it was that lines could be very thin indeed. The one between lover and enemy in particular. After all, weren't both love and hate among the strongest and most irrational emotions either of their species could experience?

A small thrill ran up Vlad's back, resonating through his belly and finally coming to rest within his unbeating heart, when he noticed the first signs of wakening. Abraham's lips would begin to twitch and the vampire noted with amusement that the other man would always try to hide between his body and the mattress, burrowing closer in a hopeless effort to stay asleep. Was the land of sleep and dreams really that much more attractive than reality?

While it had been a long time ago Dracula had actually dreamt, he imagined it was.

Often their morning goodbyes were as cold as their nightly encounters were hot and passionate. Something seemed to change within Abraham when Vlad's realm of night was exchanged for man's day. Responsibilities, he'd called it once. It stung that most of those responsibilities were directly linked with Dracula's potential final death.

Still, Vlad never objected.

The studies were part of Abraham. A part he did not like because of their subject, but loved because of the whole they belonged to.

Somehow, somewhere, the vampire felt the tentative hope that Van Helsing's studies weren't what they seemed to be. Perhaps all the research was so he could better understand Vlad's condition, to help him decide whether he wished to share his eternal fate... or maybe Abraham wanted to know what he should do to protect the world should the man he loved ever really disappear and leave nothing but a monster.

Dracula sighed and shook his head lightly, shifting a little to make the man in his arms more comfortable in his embrace.

Only the future would tell, so perhaps it was for the best that he had plenty of that. For now, he wished for nothing more than for Abraham to remain asleep, rest for just a little while longer before day would steal him away once more, to be his for just a few more minutes.

Who'd have known that a few minutes upon an eternity could be of such importance?