Illya heard a voice calling him and he stirred from his sleep.  Not  seeing his quarters when he awoke surprised the vampyr.  Then he noticed Napoleon's sleeping form and he smiled.  It felt so - good, so right to share this bond with the mortal.  He let his senses extend along it and realized suddenly he could feel Napoleon's heartbeat and the soft cadence of blood flowing through veins, but from the inside.  He could feel from inside Napoleon.  He closed his eyes entranced by the feel and
distantly heard Napoleon's unconscious delight in his happiness.

"Illya."

The soft, almost familiar voice snapped his attention away from his fascination with the rapidly strengthening bond.  He looked around the room but saw no one.  Illya looked down at the snowy white guardian, but she only blinked sleepily.  It had been a long night and the snow leopard was tired, her senses growing dull with exhaustion.

"Illya, moi cin, slyooshayete."  The faint whisper called to him, making the back of his neck tingle with its familiar, almost remembered tones. Why was his mother calling to him in Russian?  He shook his head, trying to judge this - was it a joke or figment of his imagination?

"Illya, listen to your blood, your instincts, they will guide you true."  The voice sang, and he knew it was his mother, but the sound was wrong, the tone off.  He must be more tired than he thought.

Slowly, he slipped from the bed and past the guardian.  He was unsettled by the whisper in his head.  He reached out to touch the snow leopard  and realized she had drifted into sleep.  Not wanting to disturb his mortal partner's rest, he quietly to the door leading to the suite's tiny library.

At the door, he turned to look back at the bed.  The ghostly creature was fighting off its sleep, trying to force itself to follow him.  "Stay here and guard him, please.  I need to meditate on the changes," he whispered to her.  In exhaustion, she grumbled and allowed her head to rest on Napoleon's chest.  "Thank you."

"Illya," the whisper rasped against his mind and again it reminded him of something or someone long forgotten.  "I'm waiting, Illya."

Befuddled by the voice and exhausted from the events of the past few days, he never saw the symbols scratched lightly into the doorframe. Once he closed the door, sealing himself into the suite's small library, the lines flared briefly.  And throughout the suite, other hidden runes activated, sealing the entire suite from the rest of the building.

In the U.N.C.L.E. security office, alarms immediately began resounding. In the chapel, the priest who had bound the building, fell to his knees, blood running from his nose and ears.  In their own suite, both Valentine and Alexander felt as if the earth shifted under them and began rotating backwards.  They stared at each other in horror as the spell reached out and bound them in place, silencing their minds in clouds of darkness.

Illya felt and heard none of this as he settled himself on the thick rug, his fingers absently tracing the coloured lines woven into it.
Slowly he relaxed, folding his comfortably under him, wrapping his arms around his ribs, and letting his head fall forward.  As he closed his eyes, the lines in the carpet began to emit a faint light.  The glow increased as he fell deeper under the spell until suddenly flames surged into the air, flowing the glowing lines to entrap Illya's pale form.

The vampyr opened his eyes at the sudden flare of light.  His eyes widened in surprise as he saw the flames - a vampyr's natural enemy.  He reached out for Napoleon to warn him of the fire only to find that he was bound to his body.  He tried to speak, only to find that his voice was silent.  He blinked, noticing now that the flames were constant, not consuming the rug or any of the library furnishings.  And then he understood.

Calmly he studied the flames, seeing the spell that held them in place and incorporated them into the whole network of spells.  The flames were layered.  A pale blue flame at the base of the wall of flames, held the building captive - no vampyr could fight the wards that locked them down as it was reinforced by the building's own protections.  The next layer, a lurid series of red and orange flames that wove through the blue, was a rune spell and it told him things he did not want to know, burning
them into his mind as they flashed past his sight.  Then came a pure, emerald green that slowly was becoming a tainted and noxious colour, with it he could feel the bonds holding him to this place weakening, it was a transportation spell and it was overcoming the blessings and protections the clerics had woven through the building.  The final layer of flames was blood red and amethyst shades of purple and the combination flared together to beget a shadowy black flame that terrified him - it was the flame of a curse such as came from the beginning of time.  When the tip of that flame reached out to caress his hand, Illya screamed at the icy pain that flooded his body.

He blinked back his tears and looked again at the flames, they were closer now and reached above his head, forming a cage.  He could feel the tug of the dislocation spell and struggled to fight it.  Even with his newly augmented strength, he could feel himself losing the battle. As he began to despair, he felt the flames reach for him and recoil and a sudden burning ache centered on his chest.

Slowly and painfully, he managed to bring his injured hand up, to wrap around the burning brand that rested around his neck.  It was Napoleon's crucifix.  The moment his hand closed around it, he mourned his partner.  If he died, he knew Napoleon would too.

"Illya!"  The now too-familiar voice whispered from the flames.  "I promised to come back for you.  Stop fighting the inevitable, my son, and come."

Grabbing tightly to the crucifix and praying for the first time in his life, let his soul make the plea he could not.  Illya fought both the siren call of the voice and the pull of the spells surrounding him.  He could feel other spells being layered on top of the ones he was currently fighting.  Feeling himself begin sliding away from the U.N.C.L.E. strong hold, he tore the crucifix loose, winding the gold chain about his fire blacked hand, and cried out, "Boshe moi! Help me, please! For Napoleon's sake, do not let them take me!"

The words froze on his tongue, held there by the spell that made him silent, but they had been heard.  A flash of pure, iridescent white light exploded through the tiny library.  Illya heard the voice that had been calling him shriek in mingled pain and fury.  Following the shriek, all of the spells surrounding him shattered, backfiring on their casters.  For a brief moment he heard a battle surge around him.

"If I cannot have him, neither can you!"  a male voice yelled and suddenly a shaft of pure agony thrust through Illya's chest.  Mad, red rimmed eyes flashed in front of him and Illya read pure hate in the Lilim's gaze before it was forced away by a flaming sword.

Moments later, gentle hands gathered him close and he felt the pain vanish.  The library around him faded away into a gentle fog of muted light and warmth.

The nuns gently studied the heavy wooden spike impaled in the pale  haired man's chest.  Finally, after a long, serious  conversation amongst themselves they nodded.  One carefully grasped the spike, holding it steady and firm.  Her two strongest sisters gripped the man's long, pale limbs, clamping them to the bed.  Three others began the work of pulling flesh back from the spike so they could see what damage had been done while the two finest seamstresses began threading tiny needles with
fine, gossamer threads.

Once they were prepared, the four working with the spike began the complex removal of the object, slow enough to keep the man from dying, fast enough to allow the two sisters to work, and steady enough to finish before he broke through the induced sleep.  A swordsman knelt at the wounded man's head, his hands resting on the pale forehead as he willed life and strength into him.

"Will he survive?"  A young seraph asked, peeking inside the small room.

"I was not told."  Another replied as he stripped off his bloodied tunic.  "It will be close."

"Is he really a vampyr?"

"Prince Illya is the heir to Valentine's house, as is prophesied." The seraph who had answered Illya's call grinned at his younger colleague's shocked surprise.  "It is not ours to judge or second guess, it is ours to obey."

"But a. a vampyr. here?"

"Here, he is a wounded man and has a chance at surviving.  On Earth, as a vampyr - he would have been dead before anyone could have taken another breath." The seraph settled against the wall and began cleaning his sword, tsking to himself at the Lilim blood that tainted and stained the blade.

"The sisters are safe from him?"

"From this one they always were." The older seraph continued cleaning his sword.  "Just as the Lilim and the Vampyr have their prophecy about Illya Nicovech, so have we."

The younger seraph's eyes widened.  "This is the one?"

The seraphim around them quoted the words together with the sword bearer.  Then he smiled gently, "It is still too early though and there is much to do.  Go and rest.  His healing will be long and the battle we enjoin will be hard."

"And so will the Vampyr prince rest among the Blessed." The youngest seraph whispered, still in shock that the events he never believed could come true were happening in his vicinity.

Far away, Napoleon awoke in time to see the library door explode in a fiery white explosion.  He tried to roll from the bed, but a screaming virago landed next to him.  Wild red-rimmed eyes in a once beautiful face stared at him, and then rose above him, long brown hair whipping around her as the furious woman changed before him and became Lilim.