The old vampire count arrived at Ellental Manor at four in the afternoon, in a black carriage drawn by six zombies in tiny cravats.
He was a tall, thin gentleman in a faded black cape with a collar that stood up like a pair of folded wings. His hair was silver. His manners were four hundred years old and had never once been dropped. He descended from the carriage with a small bow to the zombies, who bowed back, and he stood for a moment in the wide plaza below the manor, drawing on a pair of white gloves, looking at the town of lesser vampires with the benevolent air of a man inspecting a very promising vineyard.
"Count!" said Blanc, running down the road with one shoe untied.
"My dear Baron."
"You came!"
"I was invited," said the Count, with great warmth. "I make a point of attending whenever I am invited. It is the only way to learn who is still alive."
"Weiss made cake."
"I have heard. I have also heard," said the Count, glancing past her at the enormous shape sprawled across the far side of the plaza, "that you have been busy."
Burgundy lay on the cobbles, three long skulls resting on his forepaws, snoring gently. A flock of crows had settled on his ribs. Beside him, a pair of flesh golems sat cross-legged, like overgrown schoolchildren, watching him sleep.
"That's Burgundy!" said Blanc proudly. "Leah put three of my Dragonsteeth in an egg."
"So I understand. A remarkable piece of work." The Count adjusted his gloves. "It is a very fine dragon. I should like to meet the heads."
"Sure! Bun!"
The left head lifted at once, wagging its jaw in a delighted whine.
"Chomp!"
The right head swung around and regarded the Count with solemn, burning attention.
"Nap!"
The middle head did not move.
"Nap is asleep," Blanc explained. "He's always asleep."
The Count had stopped moving, the way a clock stops.
Behind him, Weiss, who had come out onto the front steps with a silver tray, gave a very small, very careful cough.
"My dear Baron," said the Count, very gently. "May I ask what, precisely, those are?"
"Their names."
"Their names are Vermilion, Scarlet and Crimson."
"Those are their real names," said Blanc. "These are their nicknames."
"Madam."
"Yes?"
"A dragon of a vampire's household," said the Count, "does not answer to a bread roll."
"Bun's cute!"
"The middle one is named for a nap."
"He naps."
"That is a description. It is not a name."
"It's a really good description."
The Count closed his eyes. He was a very old man, and he had survived a great deal, and for several seconds he appeared to be reaching for something deep inside himself that could cope.
"A vampire's retainers bear names the color of blood," he said at last. "Vermilion. Scarlet. Crimson. It is how a household announces itself. It is how a household is remembered. Do you know what the Vault Holders see when they cast their little Appraisal on this creature?"
"A really big dragon?"
"Weiss."
"Milady," said Weiss, and stepped forward with a small, apologetic cough. "The Appraisal reads whichever name the tamer uses most. For the past nine days, it has been reading..." He consulted a folded card. "Bun. Chomp. And Nap."
"Oh no," said Blanc.
"A party of six arrived at the front gate on Tuesday," said Weiss. "They cast Appraisal. They read the names. They laughed."
"They did?"
"For eleven seconds."
"Then what happened?"
"Then he sat on them," said Weiss.
"See?" said Blanc. "He's still scary."
"They fear Burgundy," said the Count. "They giggle at Bun. It is a fine and dangerous distinction. A raid boss must be feared in every syllable."
"Players have begun leaving flowers," said Weiss.
"Flowers?"
"For Nap."
"That's sweet!"
"It is a catastrophe," said the Count, and for the first time in the conversation, his voice had a thread of real pain in it. "I have maintained my castle for four hundred years. Do you know what I have never once done? I have never once named a creature in my household after a pastry."
"Mister Dennis," said a small, rasping voice.
All heads turned. One of the zombies at the head of the carriage team was wearing a wooden name tag on a string around its neck. It read, in small, careful letters: DENNIS.
"That is not a pastry," said the Count, very stiffly.
"No, sir."
"That is a name."
"Yes, sir."
"Thank you, Dennis."
"You are welcome, sir."
The Count turned back. For a moment, the plaza was entirely silent.
"Ah," said Blanc. "Okay. That's a good point."
"I knew you would see reason."
"But can I keep the nicknames?"
"No."
"A few?"
"Absolutely not."
"A very small one?"
"Baron," said the Count, "I will make you a bargain."
***
It took eleven days.
Appraisal, as Leah explained when she arrived through the gateway at dusk, did not care what the system said. It cared what the tamer said. If the tamer called the left head Bun for nine days, it displayed Bun. If she called it Vermilion, it displayed Vermilion. There was no way to force it. There was only repetition, and patience, and a cold, firm voice standing in the plaza every morning at dawn.
"Vermilion," said Blanc, pointing.
"Bun!" said Vermilion, delighted.
"Vermilion."
"Bun?"
"Vermilion, please."
The left head tilted. It seemed to be thinking about it very hard.
"Scarlet," said Blanc, turning.
The right head gave a grave, approving nod.
"That one is easy," said Weiss.
"Scarlet's always been the serious one."
"Crimson," said Blanc, turning to the middle skull.
Nothing happened.
"Crimson."
Somewhere in the depths of the plaza, a very small crow shuffled its feathers.
"Crimson, wake up."
"He cannot hear you," said Magenta.
"Why not?"
"He is asleep."
"He is always asleep."
"That is why it is called a nap," said Carmine, helpfully.
"I thought we were not calling him that," said Azalea.
"We are not. I am being descriptive."
"Crimson," said Blanc, in a very small voice, and the middle head opened one great luminous eye, regarded her for a long moment, and, with an enormous, rolling sigh, closed it again.
"He heard it," said Weiss.
"How do you know?"
"His tail moved."
It was the first day. By the fifth, Appraisal had begun to flicker. By the eighth, Vermilion was answering to either name with equal enthusiasm. By the eleventh, Leah stood at the edge of the plaza with her glasses pushed up on her forehead, aimed one thin white finger at the great skeletal dragon, and said, "Appraisal."
A little pane of pale light unfolded before her face.
Name: Burgundy
Heads: Vermilion, Crimson, Scarlet
"It's done," said Leah.
"Really?" said Blanc.
"Really."
"Everything?"
"Everything."
"I did it," said Blanc, in a trembling voice. She turned. She flung both arms around the nearest rib. "I did it, Burgundy! We did it! You're Vermilion and Crimson and Scarlet!"
All three heads gazed at her with expressions of pure, patient love.
"Excellent," said the Count, from the carriage steps, where he had been standing in a neat pool of shade with a cup of tea. "Then we may conclude the agreement."
"What agreement?" said Leah.
"Formal names in company," said the Count. "Nicknames at home."
"Define company," said Lyla, who had arrived with a notebook and was already writing.
"Any guest who is not a member of the household," said Weiss, "a zombie, or Miss Leah."
"I am an exception?" said Leah.
"You made the egg."
"Fair."
"And Lord Ainz?" said Lyla.
"We will review the matter on arrival," said Weiss.
"That's reasonable."
"I am a very reasonable vampire," said the Count.
"He is not," said Weiss, in a low voice.
"I heard that."
"I intended you to."
***
The Count left at dusk.
He climbed into his carriage with a courteous nod to Dennis, who closed the door with immense care, and the six zombies in their tiny cravats set off up the road at a stately walk. For some time, he sat in silence. The lamps of Ellental flickered by outside the window. A long way off, a bell rang, and the lesser vampires in their little shuttered houses began, one by one, to wake.
He had been a count for four hundred years. He knew a great deal about names. He knew, for instance, that a name was a thing you gave to the dark so that it would stop being quite so large. He knew that he had once had a dog called Biscuit, whom he had buried in the south garden under a stone that said, in tiny, careful letters, BISCUIT, and that he visited it on Sundays. He had never told anyone this. He did not intend to.
The carriage rounded the last bend in the road. Behind it, far below on the hill, the plaza of Ellental lay empty and silver in the starlight.
And in that plaza, the enormous dragon, who was not called Bun, or Nap, or Chomp, and who had been told so very firmly, had curled himself into a great, slow circle around a small girl in a red-and-black dress, who was sitting on the cobbles with her back against his ribs.
"Goodnight, Bun," whispered Blanc.
The left head sighed happily against her shoulder.
"Goodnight, Chomp."
The right head blinked once, solemnly, and settled.
"Goodnight, Nap."
The middle head, in the way of such things, did not even stir.
Far off, on a road in the dark, the Count's carriage slowed for the barest instant. A gloved hand lifted a corner of the curtain. For a long moment, a pair of old, tired, ink-black eyes looked back at the hill.
Then the curtain fell, and the carriage went on, and neither the Count, nor Dennis, nor any of the six zombies in their small cravats ever said a word about it, then or afterward.
Weiss, standing on the front steps with a lantern, watched the carriage go. He had heard the whisper. He had seen the curtain move.
He wrote one line in the household ledger, under the heading of matters concerning names:
"Formal in company. At home, as milady wishes."
He underlined it, closed the book, and went in.
Spoiler
Hi Author note here, while I'm NTR the Original Source and the story is Not totally Right. It would help the the story if you comment the facts from the Original Source.
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