My Little Ventrue Pt. 02 Ch. 08

"Alright alright. I'll... yeah, I'll do that."

"Good." She leaned on her elbow and faced the woman before her again. "You have had a much harsher life than most, Beatrice, considering the circumstances of your embrace. I appreciate that it has not warped you into a monster."

So many words. It was a bit of a gamble, dumping so much information on the new witch. It was nothing Antoinette could not spare to say, but that did not mean she was doing herself any favors handing so much information to Jacob's newfound pet.

"What do you know about my embrace?"

"Nosferatu can be such tragic figures. And one such tragedy, Jerem Montallia, obsessed over a woman who embodied everything he wanted, both before and after his embrace. But he did not have my permission to sire -- I do not let my city grow uncontrolled -- so he acted on his own. I was the one that decreed he would die his second death for his unsanctioned action, remember?"

"Yeah, I remember. So you think you know me now, hmm?" This time Beatrice stepped closer. Antoinette could see the young thing was terrified, and the beast in her gut was shaking with fear, but rage pushed her through it. "I had nothing and no one and your utopia was hell on Earth for me."

"Then imagine how much worse it would have been, if someone such as Lucas had taken advantage of your misery, brainwashed you with fool notions of purpose in a God's divine plan, and then used you as cannon fodder in a true war between covenants?" Antoinette kept the words soft. She did not want to defeat Beatrice in this conversation, merely enlighten her. If Julias enjoyed Beatrice so, it must have meant the woman had depth to her, a depth Antoinette could encourage.

"I imagine I'd be dead."

"Indeed. So think carefully when Jacob preaches of his ideals, of a world where the strong rule the weak with tooth and claw. Do you think such a society could last?"

"No, but that doesn't mean there isn't a lot of value, and wisdom in old views. We'd be fucking idiots to just dismiss what we are... Prince." Beatrice was standing only a couple feet from her, and was looking up at her and meeting her gaze. The Nosferatu had courage indeed.

Antoinette nodded and looked back toward the crowd beneath them. "True. I battle against our own nature. And it is a long fight, but I think I will win." She gave a dismissing wave, and turned to start walking back toward the boys. But first, a quick glance over her should back at Beatrice. "I always win."

Beatrice frowned like a chipmunk, with a scrunched up nose that almost had Antoinette break into another chuckle. But she did not want to offend the woman. The young Nosferatu had power to her; it was why Jacob had scooped her up. A seed of thought planted in her mind would, Antoinette hoped, yield fruit.

"You two ok?" Jack said once she was near.

"Merely womanly talk," Antoinette said.

Julias gave her a quiet look with a raised brow, but said nothing.

"Yeah." Beatrice shrugged and stood next to Julias again, a little closer than necessary. Fear, perhaps? Or had Antoinette's words of love broken into the stubborn child's skull?

"I bid you both a good evening then. Come Jack, I would speak with Mister Tones." A nod for the couple, a nod returned, and she walked back down the stairs.

Jack joined her. He too said nothing, but glanced back over his shoulder at Beatrice, and then to Antoinette. When she looked at him, he did not break her gaze, but met it with a couple of telling blinks and a nod in the Nosferatu's direction. Antoinette smiled down at the young man, and shook her head. Women keep their secrets, dear boy.

"Mister Tones," she said once near the Gangrel. "You look... please, if you would give me but a day, I could have crafted for you the most luxurious tuxedos and suits. Something more to your size and facial shape." The man was a dark, brooding, sexually alluring beast, but he did not know how to dress for it.

Garry frowned at her. Her teasing, it appeared, would not ease his fury. Lucas and his return were on the man's mind, no doubt.

"Prince." Despite his anger, the man gave her a small bow. "Enjoying the evening?"

"I am. Have you ever witnessed so many Kindred under one roof? Delightful."

"Yeah, I—"

But then the doors opened. The marshal of the court said some words of defiance, but the growing group of figures overwhelmed him with their numbers. Soon the marshal was forced to step off the stairs to make room for the large group of black-robed vampires.

"Good evening," the man in the front said.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

~~Damien~~

"Lucas!" Her voice was so loud, Damien checked the walls for speakers.

But there were none, there was only the pure white fury of the Prince. The rest of the Kindred in the Black Hall parted like the Red Sea, and they even bowed their heads like beasts cowering before their pack leader.

Damien kept to Lucas's side, but he would not cower. While he was dressed in black robes of a modern make, Lucas had worn his old robes from when he was a true Archbishop. The hood was raised, the whole of it was worn with dirt, and it was colored dust and brown on its edge. It was stitched together with dirty, thick thread, and a rope of twined human thread circled his waist. Not everyone knew, but Damien could see it so close; the robe was patched together layers of human skin.

"Prince Antoinette." Lucas gave a small bow. "I have come as invited."

"The invitation was not for you!"

"I had heard all Kindred were invited." His sire tilted his head to the side. "We are Kindred."

"Do not play coy with me, vermin. I have postponed dealing with you, and you spit on the last shred of kindness I offer you."

"Kindness? The Lancea et Sanctum has a right to practice in this city, Prince, despite your views as to otherwise." Lucas began to pass side to side, with a lowered head and fingers netted behind his back. "And despite losing several Kindred mere weeks ago, we have not retaliated. We wish only for peace."

"Lies." Antoinette kept marching up toward Lucas, alone. The sheriff was nowhere to be seen, and everyone else in the room had backed off. The Kindred that Lucas brought also backed away, and it took everything Damien had to stand his ground beside his sire. It was her, the woman who'd butchered so many Bishops and priests. The beautiful dress did not detract from the fury that poured out of her, washing over everyone in close proximity and crushing them.

"Lies? I have sat quiet for fifty years to let anger fade and wounds heal. We can start fresh, and coexist. That is what you want, is it not?"

That stopped her a good ten feet before she reached him. Her hands were so tight by her side, Damien was sure they'd snap at the fingers.

"Everything I have done was for peace," she said.

"Then why can I not attend this ball meant for all Kindred?"

"Because you are not capable of peace, monster."

Lucas lowered his head, and with a slow, heavy motion, he lowered his hood and exposed his dark skin, short curly hair, and his tired eyes. "Fifty years of torpor can change one's perspective. We clashed in the past, and I do not wish to repeat history."

Garry stomped forward from the side with enough weight in his step to draw everyone's eyes. "Fuck you. Repeat history? Mother fucker I'll rip you to bits you fuck—"

Antoinette put an arm in front of him to stop him from passing her. Damien relaxed, slowly, and let go of the sword in his robes. Garry was a different problem; one wrong word and that psycho mutt would be a much harder fight than Jessy ever was.

When Damien looked past them though, and saw the two Invictus by the stairs, he focused his gaze on them. Mehket eyes could see how McDonald was watching intently, but a white veil was over Maria's face. The way she moved though, the body language, subtle shifts and a sway of her hips, he could tell there was anxiety there. Lucas and Maria had something between them, but he had no idea how far that went.

"Garry Tones, there was a lot of anger between us."

"Is that some sort of bad joke?"

"Not at all." Lucas shook his head. "I am here in hopes we can move past that. It was fifty years ago, and I have done nothing to seek vengeance for the deaths of my flock at your hands."

Garry was shaking, grinding his teeth, and staring daggers into Lucas. "I lost as many to yours."

"And... for that, I can only apologize. It is a different time now, and I realize the iron fist of the Lancea et Sanctum will no longer create peace. We must adapt, and we will maintain the peace for as long as you will."

Damien quirked a brow. They would? As far as he knew, Lucas had every intent of taking over the entire city in a slow crawl, like a mighty plague of Egypt. At least, that's what his sire had told him. In all his sermons, Damien realized, he never heard Lucas speak of their plans for domination to the congregation, like it were some sort of vague secret of an idea.

The congregation nodded at each other, and quiet murmurs of agreement spread throughout them. They liked they idea of peace. What was Lucas doing?

The Prince did not seem too accepting of the idea. "Peace? You?" She walked closer. Lucas did not move, but every Kindred stepped back as she approached. Even Damien took a step back, as if a tidal wave of aggression was pushing against him. The beast in his gut struggled against the dominant force of hers, but it was just a puppy standing its ground against an alpha wolf.

"Please, Prince Antoinette, I—"

"You do not want peace! You want submission, and blind faith."

How Lucas could stand against this woman's fury was beyond Damien. In a distant memory, Damien could recall when Lucas commanded a dozen Bishops and many priests, and had many Kindred bow to him, but never did the man raise his voice or use rage and fury. Always Lucas was gentle, and intelligent, and talkative about the ways of Longinus. There was no blind faith here.

"The... the Archbishop doesn't want blind faith! He teaches us, we learn!" one of the Kindred with them said.

The look the Prince gave the innocent vampire shut her up, hard stop. Those red eyes of the dragon's were like fire.

"... will you not let us stay?" Lucas asked. Begged. The tone was almost enough to break Damien's withered heart. Half for the sadness of it, and half for lie of it.

"You will leave my hall at once!" The Prince's voice boomed.

Damien peaked around the deadly creature and to Jacob. The oldest Kindred in the city, Jacob and Lucas. There was a friendship there, a weird one, one that Damien knew nothing about, but Lucas had said they were friends.

But Jacob was just grinning. The Nosferatu met Damien's gaze, as much as he could with no eyes of his own, and his grin only grew.

The only friend they could have possibly found in this den of sinners was Maria, and she remained silent.

Lucas let out a sad sigh. "I—"

"Enough! You will leave the hall immediately, and you have three days to leave my city. Three days, you stupid, tired old fool, or I will wipe clean the sewers you hide in of you, your ashes, your ghouls, and every single Kindred who dares call you Archbishop."

The entire Hall, already silent, somehow grew even more quiet. A pin drop would have shattered the walls.

She was talking about war, another war. Damien gritted his teeth, and did everything he could to keep his voice from escaping. Lucas had to know this conversation would have gone this way. The other Kindred were younger, and ignorant of the massacre fifty years ago; they didn't know what the Prince was like when confronted by the Lancea et Sanctum.

What was Lucas doing goading her? What would this madness possibly accomplish?

The Archbishop lowered his head. "... as you wish, Prince." Then he turned, gave a tiny dismissing wave to his congregation, and walked through them to leave the Black Hall.

Whispers erupted. Everyone started talking at once, the congregation and the rest of the hall alike.

"What's going to happen to us now?" Damien's flock asked. "Are we leaving? But how... where?" With heavy heads, they all left.

Damien was the last to leave, and he stood his ground before the Prince with a harsh eye. She returned it, but with no where near the rage of before. In fact, she looked sad. Morose.

It infuriated him. How dare she, how fucking dare she look sad. This was all her doing! She was ruining their lives. She was ruining his life and Lucas's life a second time.

He was fast, and she was unarmed. He could try and kill her there. Maybe, just maybe. She was so close too, only ten feet away; might as well have been nose-to-nose close, and the sword in his robes could cut her head off the same as any head. She would fall apart in ashes, and right there in a single strike, he could stop this madness and Lucas could resume his role of a true Archbishop, and even Prince himself.

But that look in her eyes stopped him. Sad, but confident. She knew what she said, and it had hurt her? She stood her ground at looked at Damien with enough weight in her own eyes to press him into the earth. He couldn't meet those eyes of hers anymore. Red, ancient, knowing... mournful.

He turned and left.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The walk back to their underground network was depressing. Lucas kept the congregation under the veil of his cloak of night, so they could walk among the kine uninterrupted, but despite their privacy none talked.

Once back into their deep metal hole under the city, they entered the room they treated as their church, and sat in their pews without so much as a word from anyone. Lucas, with fingers netted together behind him and head lowered, hood raised, walked with heavy feet toward the podium, and did not stand behind it with any enthusiasm. And when he raised his head to expose his grimace, Damien's heart sank even more.

"Three days, until we must leave," Lucas said.

"We can't leave! This is our home! Some of us have had lives here for decades," someone in the crowd said.

"This is crazy. We can't just leave."

"Yeah, we have to do something! She threatened us and we haven't done anything!"

"Even when the Invictus attacked us, we didn't retaliate! We just want peace."

Damien watched his flock grow louder and louder. There were no ghouls there, it was only Kindred, and the Kindred were rising from their quiet composure and growing into a mob.

"Please my children, the only way we could stop the Prince is if we struck first. We do not have the numbers or territory for war." Lucas shook his head and ran his fingers down the edges of his Testament of Longinus. The book overwhelmed the podium with its size, and Damien was sure it was bound in human skin, like the Archbishop's robes.

Someone in the crowd stood up. "Then... then we strike first!"

Lucas shook his head, stepped around the podium, and reached up to lower his hood. "You know not what you ask, my flock. War is why I spent fifty years waiting. The Prince's hate and insanity was to be avoided."

"But we can't avoid it." Yet another voice.

"And if we leave, we could die on the journey, or find ourselves oppressed again! Tony left us all behind, and now we have to defend ourselves from her!"

The congregation were all getting up, looking at each other, exchanging words of violence and intent, and looking to Lucas with expectant eyes. Damien just watched the madness and fury unfold around him, and he nearly let his jaw drop. Was this really happening?

Lucas put up his hands and lowered them. "Please! Children! Calm yourselves."

It took a minute, but quiet eventually fell upon the flock.

Lucas let out a long sigh, and then sat upon the stage of the podium. "Gather close then children."

A little confused, the Kindred rose from their pews and stepped in closer, and as they gathered, they got to their knees so everyone could be near Lucas. He was sitting, and his face carried the most gentle look Damien had ever seen, like Jesus Christ himself talking with his disciples.

"Do you truly wish to risk our lives, to save our home and our faith?"

Some of the congregation went quiet and looked between each other with hesitation. The three Invictus they had recruited stepped back with bowed heads. But many, even most, were all too eager to nod and vow to their cause.

Damien just watched.

Lucas smiled at those that stepped back. "If you do not wish to come, we understand. Do we not, my children?"

The rest of the flock hummed their confirmation.

"Then... we are in agreement."

More hums and grunts of agreement.

Damien said nothing.

"Then we must strike fast, and hard. We must make preparations now, and tomorrow night, we will unleash the vengeance of Longinus upon this unbeliever."

The crowd cheered. Damien blinked in disbelief.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

They were alone again, in their sealed alter room. Lucas was leaning over the alter of artifacts, and the grin was on his face lit by candlelight. Damien was next to him, but he dared not touch anything. His hands were not worthy.

"The shield of ash and flesh is ready. They will gather arms, and tomorrow night we will do the unthinkable, my Bishop."

Damien grimaced. Their congregation were going to be that shield, and that meant they were going to get slaughtered. "You plan to attack the Prince head on."

"I do indeed. You, and I, and our flock, against the Prince. We will flood her home and crush her there, where she least expects it."

Damien avoided the now almost psychotic gaze of his sire. "What of the sheriff?"

"Thanks to you, we know his weakness. I have many times battled minds with that dragon, and I know he has a weakness for someone. His childe, it is. Now, I must go talk with Maria, and the arrangements will be made."

"But...." How could he say this without insulting his sire? "You.. are still weak, from torpor. And the Prince has shown to be truly brutal."

"Faith, my good Bishop." Lucas reached out, put both hands on Damien's shoulders, squeezed, and shook him. "Faith! Come, practice your eyes and set your touch upon this." His sire grabbed the antique sword from the alter, and placed it in Damien's hands.

The younger Mehket quirked a brow at his sire, but did as commanded. A Mehket was a creature of secrets, of shadows and speed. But they were also the only Kindred who could see with more than eyes.

When the sword entered his hands, it took little effort to cast otherworldly eyes upon it. The vision attacked him with viciousness. Like lightning, it cracked against his closed eyes and tore into his mind. There were men. Soldiers. Guards? There was a garden. There was a man standing between the guards and another man, and he'd drawn this sword. For a moment, Damien was that man, and in a flash, he cut off someone's ear.

Damien dropped sword, took a step back, and fell back with hand grasping at his chest. Lucas was quick to catch the sword, and the Archbishop gave him one of now many odd grins.

"I may not be able to fight with the same strength as before, not for months, even years. But I still have my faith. I will call upon God's help, and he will smite the dragon for us. The sheriff will not move against us while I hold his childe captive, and you will have many Kindred at your side."

His side? He would be fighting the Prince? Damien forced himself up. Analyze. Think. "God will smite her for us?"

"There is power in faith, good Bishop, and I will show it to you. The Prince will still be a threat though, but with God on our side and our congregation throwing themselves at her, you will have the opportunity to end her. I trust in your skills, Damien." Lucas put his free hand on his shoulder, and kept the sword in the other. "And we will triumph."

Damien nodded, but his mind was going a mile a minute. It was all planned. Lucas was looking for an opportunity to strike with a zealot's madness. A suicide mission. A kamikaze mission. This was not the Lucas he remembered. Where was the gentle man and his soft voice who taught them to respect God and guide kine into his embrace? This new Lucas, his eyes were wide, his gaze was frightening, and any softness was an act.