Chapter Text
Guillermo’s heart is beating wildly, though it has literally nothing to do with the murder he just committed (she deserved it) and everything to do with his…master? Best friend? Whatever the fuck he’s supposed to be, because whatever the fuck he is, Guillermo’s pretty sure his brain has just been put through a blender.
(“Wait, you can hypnotize vampires?” Guillermo asks, hushed.
“It’s my special power,” the vampire that Guillermo’s pretty sure he heard Nandor call “Jan” says smugly. “And I gotta say Nandy here is a little easier to hypnotize than most.”)
Nandor is nearly silent, only making occasional mumbly alarmed sounds when Guillermo tugs on him more insistently. He’s holding Guillermo’s hand tightly.
He recognized you, Guillermo reminds himself over and over again, because it was true.
In spite of everything, when Guillermo stumbled upon the room where Nandor was standing with a stranger, Nandor turned to him with a smile and said, “Guillermo! I missed you!”
He knew your name. Why would he know your name if he wasn’t in his right mind?
Guillermo’s a little rough when he shoves Nandor into the car, eliciting a yelp from the very confused vampire, but he doesn’t apologize as he buckles Nandor’s seatbelt, ignoring Nandor’s disoriented flailing. They don’t have much time. At some point, the other vampires Guillermo saw before finding Nandor by sheer dumb luck are going to notice that Jan isn’t coming back.
Guillermo sticks the keys in the car, puts it into gear. Nandor makes a confused little sound, reaching out, touching Guillermo’s shoulder.
Guillermo can’t help it. He turns to look at Nandor, whose eyes are wide and baffled. He cocks his head. “A horse?” he asks nonsensically, and Guillermo doesn’t even respond to that, because he has to ask, he has to know—
“Master, do you know who you are? Do you know what you are?”
(“Is this even actually hypnosis? Or are you just fucking up his head?”
Jan shrugs. “Dunno. Let’s see.”)
Nandor blinks at him, his face the picture of blank confusion. It’s not exactly a look Guillermo’s never seen before, but it’s freaking him out a lot more than usual. His stomach lurches. He swallows down bile, terrified that the hypnosis actually took.
(“You are a human. And you’d do anything for me. Forget everything else. I am the most important person in your life, and you follow—”
And that’s when Guillermo manages to tackle her out of the way.
Staking her, at least, is second nature.)
What’s going to happen if Nandor actually thinks he’s a human, actually thinks Jan’s the most important person in his life? No, if he thought that, he would’ve fought harder against Guillermo, he would’ve…
Tentatively, Nandor reaches out and boops Guillermo’s nose.
Guillermo swallows down either hysterical laughter or hysterical tears; he’s not sure which one they would’ve been and has zero time to indulge in either.
“You’re Nandor the Relentless,” he says faintly. “And you’re a vampire. You’re my vampire. Remember?” The hope in his voice is delicate, ready to be crushed.
Nandor blinks. “Nandor the Relentless,” he parrots. He frowns, before suddenly brightening. “I live in a house.”
Guillermo latches on to those words as though they’re a fucking treatise on the self. “Yes! Yes you do! And I’m gonna take you back there, okay?”
“What was I doing here?” Nandor asks, puzzled. Guillermo shakes his head. That’s something he has no problem with Nandor forgetting.
“It doesn’t matter,” Guillermo says. “I’m taking you home.” Maybe Nandor’s not that far gone, or gone at all. Maybe he’s just confused.
Then Nandor, with disarming adoration in his voice and gaze, happily says, “Guillermo!”
He smiles proudly. Guillermo doesn’t know how to respond, so he just gives Nandor a thin smile. “That’s me,” he says weakly. “And I only want what’s best for you, okay? So do what I say.”
The words are so bold that his face flushes. Nandor’s eyes widen, and Guillermo thinks, for a brief, almost-hopeful moment, that Nandor’s going to come back to himself from sheer entitled affrontment at his servant speaking to him like this, but then Nandor nods eagerly and, inexplicably, turns his attention to his seatbelt, grabbing it curiously.
Shit.
Guillermo winces at the sick sizzling sound Nandor’s skin makes when it comes into contact with the silver threaded into the seatbelt, and again at the shriek Nandor lets out in response. He swings his head over to look at Guillermo, his shorter hair fanning around his expression of puppyish dismay.
“Oh, no, don’t touch that, Master,” Guillermo says apologetically, batting Nandor’s hands away. Finally, he puts the car into gear and pulls out, which makes Nandor jump and yelp.
“Where is the horse?” he asks.
Guillermo takes a deep breath. “There’s no horse, Master. It’s a car. You’ve been in a car before.”
Nandor grabs the seatbelt again.
Again, he cries out.
“Master!” Guillermo says, admonishing. “Don’t touch that!” He’s really regretting that seatbelt now, but he kind of thought this would be a lot harder. Or…hard in a different way, maybe. “Just sit quietly, okay? Sit quietly and don’t touch the seatbelt. It’s gonna be okay. It’s okay. I’m here, and I’m going to take care of you.”
Thirteen days later…
Sometimes the changes that have happened in this house—from Nandor’s brain scramblies to Colin Robinson ‘dying’ and becoming a baby for who-fucking-knows how long, since the piece of paper Laszlo tore from a book and apparently didn’t bother to fully read until Colin was seemingly literally dead didn’t give an exact timeline—within just two weeks make Guillermo’s head spin.
He thinks he’s been handling it pretty well, though. He has to.
Laszlo’s dealing with Colin, Nadja’s working with the Vampiric Council, and Nandor…
Nandor is Guillermo’s responsibility, just like he’s always been.
Unfortunately, in the face of getting his hair brushed, Guillermo’s responsibility has decided to be a fucking brat tonight.
And yeah, Nandor before he got scramblied was a brat too, but right now it’s a lot more—Guillermo’s not sure what to call it. Concentrated?
Nandor seems to be delighting in pushing Guillermo’s buttons, outright giggling and trying to grab the brush every time Guillermo runs it through his hair. It’s getting annoying.
Another swipe at the hairbrush.
Okay, it was already annoying, and now Guillermo’s over it.
He puts his foot down, because now when Nandor’s a brat, he can actually do something about it.
“Master! Stop fussing right now! Calm down and let me brush your hair!” Guillermo snaps, holding the hairbrush out of reach and tightly fisting a hand in Nandor’s hair.
Nandor lets out a tiny gasp, shocked, and goes mostly still, just shuffling his feet a little.
Guillermo relaxes his hold slightly once Nandor’s stopped squirming, and, relieved, says, “Thank you, Master.” He releases Nandor from his grip completely. “Now just let me finish up with your hair, okay?”
Nandor gives him a sheepish nod, and is completely agreeable for the rest of the brushing.
It’s only when Guillermo’s done teasing out the last tangle that he notices the forlorn snuffling sounds coming from the vampire in front of him. His stomach doesn’t drop so much as swoop when he lets the brush fall to the floor and gently, hesitantly places his hands on Nandor’s shoulders. “Master?”
Nandor lets out a whimpering little sob before scrubbing at his face, ducking his head down.
“Angry with me,” Nandor says sadly.
“Oh,” Guillermo breathes out almost silently. With a pang of what he refuses to believe isn’t guilt, he realizes that Nandor’s probably been standing there crying quietly ever since Guillermo told him off a few minutes ago. “Oh, no, it’s okay, Master,” Guillermo says, falling easily into the sweet, cajoling tone of voice he uses when Nandor’s feeling his stroppiest. “It’s okay, I’m not mad at you, I just wanted to finish up your hair so you could go to bed. Aren’t you sleepy? I think you’re sleepy.”
Nandor shuffles around so that he’s facing Guillermo. With Guillermo on his stepstool, Nandor actually has to look up at him, if only a bit.
Guillermo softens when he sees Nandor’s tear-streaked face. There are even tears still escaping the corners of his eyes as he sniffles, looking up at Guillermo with a mix of sweet confusion and regret.
Nandor so rarely seems to regret anything he does to Guillermo that Guillermo can’t help but file away this expression. Maybe even treasure it.
“Yeah, I think you are sleepy,” Guillermo says, taking a handkerchief from his pocket and quietly cleaning Nandor’s face with it. “You’ve had a long night.”
Nandor nods in hesitant agreement, as if he isn’t entirely sure what Guillermo’s talking about but thinks he is making a good argument for it.
Guillermo tucks his handkerchief back into his pocket and then smooths Nandor’s hair back. Nandor gives him a shaky smile. Guillermo’s heart melts a little.
“Good job, Master,” he says warmly. “Time for coffin.”
“Coffin,” Nandor agrees. “Handhold?” he asks hopefully, and Guillermo smiles. He wonders if it’s a bad thing that Nandor’s never been cuter to him than he is now.
It’s definitely a bad thing that Guillermo enjoys how cute Nandor is like this.
(It’s a much, much worse thing that the fact a cure for this probably isn’t going to happen doesn’t feel like such a tragedy anymore.)
“Of course,” Guillermo says, herding Nandor over to his coffin and offering him a hand, which Nandor eagerly takes, apparently so interested in the contact that he continues to keep an awkward grip on Guillermo even once he’s lying down.
Guillermo chuckles. Gently, he says, “Master, handhold time is over so you can go to sleep.”
Nandor blinks at him, confused. He sits up, which is the opposite of what Guillermo wanted, but he can’t bring himself to be annoyed. “The handhold is over so soon?” Nandor asks with no small amount of disappointment.
“Only for now,” Guillermo assures. “Tomorrow you can hold my hand all you want, okay?”
Nandor blinks at him slowly, and then nods. “Night night,” he says as if in understanding.
“There you go, Master,” Guillermo murmurs tenderly, guiding Nandor so that he’s lying back and closing the coffin over him. “Night night.”
-
After putting Nandor to coffin, Guillermo goes to get some rest of his own. He hasn’t even entered REM sleep yet when he’s unceremoniously shoved aside as a body that’s far too big to fit into his bed climbs over him and settles against his back.
Guillermo huffs out a sigh, reluctantly amused.
Thankfully, Nandor seems to forget his own strength these days, but not how a super-strong being would usually forget their strength—he actually seems to forget he’s stronger than Guillermo, allowing himself to be moved around like a ragdoll and, thankfully, not squeezing Guillermo too tight when he spoons him. He’s done it a few times now. He likes being close to Guillermo.
Guillermo can’t help but feel a kind of fond smugness at Nandor’s behavior towards him. It seems that, in the end, this is Nandor stripped down to his most fundamental parts, disinterested in lying or obfuscating or being aloof. And it turns out that stripped down, Nandor trusts Guillermo more than anyone. Stripped down, Nandor adores Guillermo.
It’s an amazing feeling, finally knowing what he’s suspected for so long but didn’t allow himself to entertain as more than a semi-constant fleeting thought, because Nandor was always so enthusiastically pushing him away, sometimes in the same undead breath as he seemed to genuinely love him.
But that amazing feeling, Guillermo can quietly admit, if only to himself, is steeped in bitterness. It’s not too intense. More of a creeping, gentle fury that fills his body like a warm drink, because the confirmation that Nandor’s been very, very fond of him for a while now also confirms that he really, really tried not to show it, and sometimes—sometimes he was really fucking mean about it.
And that makes Guillermo angry enough to do things like fist his hand in Nandor’s hair and feel a rush when he stops moving. When he defers.
He knows it’s wrong.
But a lot of things are wrong.