Daemon clung to Vladimir and shuddered in the man's arms. Why was Nathaniel so angry at him for? He had done nothing but love the boy. He cared for him and nurtured him and he was basically throwing all of that effort back in his face. It affected Daemon too much. Vladimir was suffering because Daemon was hardly around him anymore. The only times they even have contact with each other is when Daemon is sobbing in this man's arms. He clutched the vampire's shirt and sobbed.

"W-what did I do to him? I-I..."

Daemon didn't want to cry right here. He never let Nathaniel see him cry. He always made sure to leave the room, then again the teenager had left to his room. Daemon buried his face in Vladimir's chest.

Vladimir ran his finger comfortingly through Daemon's long, black hair. It was moments like these where he was usually pushed away so that his lover could be alone. Vladimir would never follow. He was always afraid of hovering Daemon too much to the point where his lover would despise his company...but, now, Daemon wasn't pushing him away. He didn't tell Vladimir to let go or to leave him alone. That made his heart swell, but at the same time, a growing ache grew in his chest as he felt the tears stain his shirt. This was the same boy who fussed over Nightwing, who said multiple times that he wanted to be just like Vladimir while also having his mother's attitude...a boy with such vivid imagination. What replaced him was a teenager full of angst of unknown origin. All Vladimir could do without being forceful with his parenting was hold his lover as he shed tears and continue to give as much encouragement as he could.

"I don't know, darling. I really don't...but, I promise you...we will find out why he is acting the way that he is and put a stop to it." Vladimir said softly.

Daemon looked up at Vladimir and sniffled.

"what if this is just how he grows up? What if he stays like this? I don't know if I could live with that. He's so cruel to me and never even acknowledges me anymore. I'm surprised he hasn't insulted me yet... I hope it doesn't come to that.."

Daemon laid his head against Vladimir's chest and hugged the other tightly. Hopefully their son would not insult him. Daemon didn't know what he would do at that point.

Vladimir frowned as his lover expressed his concerns. He worried about that too. Nathaniel could possibly remain like this for the rest of his days until he finally decided to run off and leave. Vladimir could only do so much to keep Nathaniel from doing so, and chasing him down wouldn't make things any better and letting him go would make Daemon devastated. There was no easy way to deal with this situation without possibly crossing the barrier of what it means to be a good parent and an abusive one. He couldn't lock Nathaniel in his room forever, but he also didn't give Nathaniel all of the freedom he wanted. There was only one occurrence that he remembered where Nathaniel attempted to leave the border of the nearby town and Vladimir had to show a bit of an ugly side of himself to his son to get him to go home...he didn't hit his son, but he still felt horrible for it. He tightened his arms around Daemon when his lover returned his head to his chest.

Daemon laid his head on the man's chest and wiped away his own tears. This was not something that happened everyday, but it still hit him very hard when Nathaniel acted out. What happened to the sweet little boy who would just laugh at everything his mother did? That little boy was gone and now there was this very angst filled teenager. He sighed and hugged Vladimir.

"Damn it.... I feel bad. I mean, was I not a good enough mother? Did we spoil him too much while he was a child?"

Daemon sighed heavily and nuzzled into Vladimir.

"I don't know, Daemon. That's just it. I don't know what happened. It all started with the dark clothes, then he wanted his room the be painted a darker color, then all of this loud music, and now...he's associating with these strangers who we've never met and he's carrying this bad attitude everywhere he goes." Vladimir replied as he ran his fingers through Daemon's long, dark locks.

Daemon held the man's shirt, hugging the vampire tightly. There had to be something that they did or was this just something every teenager went through? There had to be a reason for this sudden change. Daemon let go of Vladimir's shirt so that he could rub the man's back.

"He won't even talk to me.... You've had to be firm him... You raised your voice a while back when he was getting out of control... I'm afraid of it getting worse."

"My love, I know. I fear the same thing. The only thing we can do is try and do our best to keep him from getting worse, maybe starting with how often he leaves the house. I don't want to say that we keep him locked up here all the time, but just keeping him here more often until we can find out if it's the people he's hanging around or not." Vladimir replied.

Daemon nodded and looked up at Vladimir. "alright... Hopefully we can find out who these people are before he decides to run away... Which I hope he hasn't even considered. I would hope he didn't run away actually..."

((is this dead?))