AN: Do y'all prefer foreign language dialogue with translation or nah? Answer me in the comments.

To anyone else, I would've looked like someone had swung a heavy right hook square in my gut. I can confirm that it felt much worse than that. Karma was biting me in the ass for the entire outlook I carried this morning, for my ignorant arrogance. The shock was so great, that I don't even remember what happened exactly after I saw my father like that.

As the phrase goes, it was a four-hundred-and-forty volt shooting through my damned soul. What an idiot I was for not realizing the gravity of the situation sooner.

On my own, it would've been next to nothing for me to juggle Life and Death riding Fate while I was still in the flaming circus known as the World, in fact that was my specialty. Did my father's presence here prove any of Vlad's claims? Probably a lot more than he'd been letting on.

What also stung was that vampires may have been vampires, but my father was no flower either. The only time he would possibly be so docile was when he was guilt-ridden, or had fucked up big time. In this case, either reason was why I was here in the first place. As rocky as things were between us, I was still his blood.

He could hate me, but there was no way he could put my neck on the chopping block.

He wouldn't, I reassured myself, but the more I did the more unsure I became.

The way that that guard had pushed him to the ground on his knees was bad, but it was as if shards of glass stabbing into me when he didn't get back up. It didn't help that I was standing on elevated flooring, it forced me to look down upon him like he was an animal.

Get it the fuck together!

Now's not the time to freak out.

I peeled my eyes away from the horrid sight to try finding my bearings, and took a deep breath. I needed my marbles in place when talking at the very least, since I had no more balls left to go loony on anyone here. I figured out what to say, only to struggle more when actually saying it.

"If you don't mind, dra- sorry, docto-, uh, mister- no, um... Your Ma-..."

"Vlad." He corrected.

"Can I, uh, have a word with my father alone?" I asked. Come cold tea or soggy crackers, I was not going to call him by his name.

Wait up. I deadpanned. Did I just ask to 'have a word' instead of asking if I could leave with my father?

DUMBASS YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO ASK HIM TO LET YOU AND BABA GO!

Nevertheless, he responded rather gracefully to possibly the dumbest thing I could've said to him all morning, and that's saying a lot.

"Feel free to speak with him here and now. I assure you there will be no judgment upon you on behalf of anybody here." He said warmly, and left my current field of view.

I looked into my father's eyes, once so regal looking, now reminded me of conquered gold of defeated kings. I was terrified to know what atrocity had befallen him that brought him to such defeat.

"Tell your henchman to back off a bit as well if you don't mean harm to either of us," I snapped without even looking at him, tired of his creepy bullshit cordiality. Still, I added a soft "Please."

He looked curious and amused, but snapped his fingers nonetheless and went back to sit down. Thankfully, the henchman stepped away and bowed to Vlad before turning around and walking away to stand at the gate.

It took me strength of the ages to not roll my eyes, or raise a brow if I even knew how to. Nevertheless, I looked over my shoulder and nodded a thanks to Vlad without meeting his eyes, not because I feared him, but just because I knew that he had the power to make things worse as of right now and was choosing to be nice for some reason.

I vowed to tug viciously on the frays of the grasp Vladimir Tepes had mentally ensnared me in, when and if I ever got out of the physical one.

Then again, there was the duty of being my father's child to fulfill. I probably didn't realize it at the time, but it was smart of me to speak Urdu since nobody else knew it but us both.

I was unaware that I was on my knees to talk face to face with him, despite there being ascending walkways to walk down, or I could've even hopped down.

"Yeh... yeh sach toh nahi bol raha hai na?"  I asked, pointing a finger at Dracula while looking at my father.

I desperately wanted to believe that Vlad was lying, that maybe this bastard was playing head games, and that even if this was the end, at least I had a place to stand by.

I asked the same thing over and over God knows how many times, unaware of how much I actually needed him to answer.

Moments ago I was acting as if nothing could faze me. Hell, I was even musing the idea that perhaps my father had sold me off like cattle back then. Now that he confirmed it, it just hit me that the man who sired me truly did consider me lower than dirt.

"Beta, woh Sikandar ko-" He started in his raspy voice, with an affection I hadn't heard in a long time. The term of endearment felt like an arrow piercing my chest. (Child, Sikandar would-)

"ARGH!" I cried, cutting him off by startling him. I only had my hands to support me up as my eyes became blurry with tears and reality hit me like a heavy wrench into my face. I didn't even realize I was crying until I felt my body jerk from guttural sobs ripping through my chest and my throat.

At first there were only a few cracks, but his words were the hammer pounding down on my porcelain world. Through all my trials, mirth, and hardships, this one was where I could safely say, that my world shattered.

My own father, the man meant to protect me and guide me with life, whom I was to be the pride and joy of, had knowingly thrown me into the jaws of death and despair. He knew vampires existed, known enough to make a deal with their demonic king, and decided to make me the bartering chip to a transaction I never realized could even happen, just to save my brother because to him, his life was more valuable and meaningful than mine.

He had reduced me to less than a human being, and willingly chosen his son's life over his daughter's. I looked at Vlad, who wasn't looking at either of us.

I looked back at my father, and remembered something. I wanted to cry more, but for some reason I squawked out a bitter cackle like a crow of doom, ending with a few sniffles.

"'Darna mat zyada'?" I recall he said when I'd called him in the car last night. (Don't be too scared?)

I turned back to Vlad, who'd been standing far away and looking the other way to give us some privacy. I was in no condition, with my pathetic sniffles and growing sorrow tearing me up inside, to interact with him at all.

There were some things I knew; he was an enemy, not a confidant. He was no friend of mine in this situation. If anything, him knowing human emotions and vulnerability better than most people made him more dangerous. But at the same time, there was nothing else I could think of but the fact that I got shanghaied.

"Did you knock me out last night?" I asked him softly. "What, did all of you collectively make this plan? AND WHERE ARE MY FRIENDS!" I shouted.

Next time I cry and talk at the same time, I should probably save some time for crying between each sentence I say.

I said many things to my father, from anger to sorrow to pure incoherence, thanks to my emotional breakdown. I said all I needed to regarding his place in my life.

I screamed about how he only had to say he needed my help and I wouldn't have hesitated to take on his enemies to protect him with all I could, regardless of whether I'd live or die. I would've given up my life without a care if it meant he or Sikandar would be safe.

He, in turn, tried to reason with me in the best way he could to someone he definitely didn't love; as a businessman would. I could translate every word he said to the one language that mattered- truth. When he praised my strength, what he meant was I was easier to give up and he could care less for me. When he brought up Sikandar's wife and kids, he was telling me that my life was less valuable than theirs to him and I had nothing to lose, thus I deserved no rights to live the way I wanted to. It was clear that even if I had been that perfect daughter he never wanted in the first place, I would still end up in the same place right now. However, when he revealed the reason for why this was happening to us at all, I lost my shit.

Remember when I mentioned my father was a CEO with a strangely large claim to Romanian lands? The same lands that my ancestors, the Ottoman Turks tried to take from the same Dracul Vladimir Tepes who stood a few feet away from me? Also the fact that my mother was Turkish? The reasoning was extremely stupid, because let's just say those two facts came into play around it.

If heartbreak meant a temporary losing all sense of being and every shred of public composure, my blood vessels threatening to burst and bleed out through my nose, and realizing I was screaming my lungs out only after my throat became too hoarse to continue doing so, then heartbroken was what I was at that moment.

I ended up saying something that I never would've said in a hundred years. And when I started, I couldn't stop.

"Pray that I don't get out of here alive, I wish I wasn't your daughter." I said in Urdu. I tried getting up, but my feet had fallen asleep, making me tumble back down.

I stared at the gate, knowing that it was what closed the world behind it from me, probably never to open again for me to leave.

I'm now officially a hostage...

NO! No! It can't!

I wiped my tears with the back of my hand and looked up at Vlad,  who was already looking at us. Perhaps I shouldn't have spoken that last bit in English, because he didn't seem too happy.

Our eyes met for a few seconds, as shrewd depth of the sea tried to discern the mysterious earth so feeble yet out of its reach. With that thought, I looked back at him. He broke his gaze away and grumbled something indistinctively in Romanian. I suppose whatever he read in my eyes didn't please him either, though I wouldn't exactly know what it was.

"Ah!" My father cried out in pain, making me turn around just to see the ogre grab him by his neck and lift him by one hand like a rag doll. Before my eyes, the guard's face began to contort and dark veins rapidly pulsed out of his bald head and around his eyes. He opened his mouth as if to scream, but the silence of his fangs growing out of his gums was far more disturbing.

"D-don't hurt him!" I shakingly called.

"Mayvish Ansari," Vlad's voice boomed behind me, and made me turn around to face my fate. "You had promised your submission in return for meeting with your father." Vlad reminded me. Yup, he sounded pissed as hell. No wonder even the room had a few degrees dropped.

"It's Mavis." Was all I could say.

"Your negotiations have been met. If you wish to let your father leave with his life, pledge your allegiance to me now, draga." He demanded, his tone was simmering with impatience. He only called me that just to rub it in. To me it felt like he was chastising a dog for not obeying him.

I was at a crossroads.

Should I keep defying him?

After making demands which I admit, I didn't make in my right mind, was it right to not follow though with it? To him, it was a deal, and to me it was a gamble.

One look at my father's bluing tear-strickened face and one choked sob from his constricted throat, was all it took for me to make my decision.

I wouldn't have to care about him anymore.

I mean, besides my life, what else could I possibly lose here?

I faced him properly, and got down on one knee like a knight. He raised his head a little in pride with a little smug smirk, and sat back down on his chair. The agony of my entire value as a human being being on the balance was maddening, like a fresh loss of a loved one.

However, this chaotic state of mind felt damningly awesome. It was a liberation from the fury and fear I'd been entangled with this entire morning. It made me forget that the fucker in front of me could easily tear me and my father to shreds if I put a toe out of line. I wanted to destroy the line, redefine it, violate his control to render him as insane as me.

"I, Mavis, pledge my life to Vladimir Tepes, King of Wallachia." I said in one breath with my head down.

Yeah it's not like you're giving him a license to un-alive you if you do something he doesn't like.

Somehow, the thought didn't feel as bad anymore. I tried making myself feel fear again, replaying his manhandling and kidnapping and demonstrations of his power when he brought me here. But truthfully, I felt nothing.

He was pensively staring down at me, and when he shifted his gaze I followed it to find my father being let down on the ground to my relief, but the pale clawed hand still stayed wrapped around his neck.

Vlad snapped his fingers to get my attention, making me glare at him for treating me like a dog.

You're going to regret that... big time.

"Now accept the marriage contract." He commanded, laying back and resting his elbows on the armrests with his fingers interlocked with one another to help his chin resting under his hand.

Oh, hell no. Why do I keep forgetting about that?

"I accept, I accept, I accept," I said solemnly. However, I just had to rain on Vlad's parade right when it started. "But that doesn't matter."

"Explain."

"Oh, well... um- yeah, you see..." I started. I really didn't know how to put it in words for him so suddenly.

"Hmm," He mocked my riddled speech. "Perhaps you cannot forgive your father."

"No! Wait!" I yelled as he had only looked at my father. "It's not that! It's that because-well..."

"Because?"

"Because it's not up to me, man!"