My Little Ventrue Pt. 07 Ch. 22

That, Damien did not like the sound of. "Do you think she'd be so horrible as to... slip Fiona some of her blood?"

His friend winced at that. The power of the Vinculum was extreme, and they had no idea if the Begotten were immune to its effects. Since it could affect both kine and Kindred, Damien guessed it could affect anyone.

"Hard to say. I'd guess no, if only as a favor to us for killing the hunters who killed her student Barry."

That was true. Damien, Jack, and the witches were heroes in a sense. As much as the city's Kindred looked at them as if they were dangerous, they also looked at them with a mix of pride and wonder, too. Pride, because it was Kindred who defeated the enemy. Wonder, because it was Kindred they knew, who'd managed to defeat a deadly threat, deadly enough to enslave a Begotten and kill Julias Mire. No one in the city would have expected them to succeed in what looked like a suicide mission on the outside.

They were champions, according to the announcer. Or at least, Jack was, and the rest of them were the champion's guard. An accurate enough assessment, and enough of a title boast that Damien noticed several women were looking at him, women that had ignored him in the past. Which made him wonder if Fiona would feel jealousy like he did. Considering the amount of wine she was inhaling, if she did feel any jealousy, she might throw a punch before the night was done.

The image of little Fiona throwing a tiny fist at some Kindred's face, was strangely hilarious.

The two of them arrived at Jacob, who'd been rejoined by Aaron and Beatrice in the meantime. Jennifer was still taking Sándor around the room, introducing him to Kindred without missing a single name as far as Damien could tell, save for the recently embraced. Impressive of her, to memorize so many names and titles.

Jack and Damien nodded to Triss and Aaron, they nodded in return, and Jack stepped up to Jacob.

"Jacob," Jack said, "been looking to talk to you." Not the most respectful greeting Damien had ever heard, but it seemed fitting. Jacob didn't like pleasantries, or formalities.

The Nos smiled, an evil looking expression, and he ran his fingers back through his hair. "Me? You're the hero of the night, Jack, you and the crew you took with you on your... excursion. Should be me looking to talk to you."

"You're the one who has Elen. You know damn well I'd be coming to talk about that."

"Touché." Jacob raised his glass, didn't bother to wait for Jack to reciprocate, and took a sip. "Don't you worry your pretty little head about it, Clarice."

Jack stepped in a little closer, until only a single foot separated the two men. "I worry, Jacob."

Damien looked between them, and found his hand reaching for his sword. His sword wasn't there. No one was allowed to carry arms in the Black Hall, and that was particularly problematic for Mekhet. Nosferatu and Daeva were quite strong, and Gangrel and Ventrue were tough as hell. Mekhet were neither. They used their speed and stuck to the shadows. Out in the open like this, he'd rely on a sword and gun, and without them, he felt naked.

If Jacob and Jack started fighting, it'd be chaos in seconds. Jacob could summon insane strength, maybe even greater than Jack's curse, and he could bestow literal nightmares on the Ventrue. Jack's curse could summon a legion of creatures to his aid, and could likely manifest endurance to match Jacob's strength. Jack could also attempt to Dominate the man. If he succeeded, that would be terrifying.

So Damien stood there, feeling terribly useless, but smart enough to keep watching and look for any detail that might be useful. Beatrice and Aaron had backed off, giving Jacob enough space to have his conversation, but close enough that they could jump in if something happened. Damien nodded to them, and they nodded to him, a bit of camaraderie forming. They'd all survived the same mission together. That had to be worth something, as far as trust was concerned.

"Elen is under my... protection," Jacob said, grinning into his drink as he sipped. "Her flesh chamber has collapsed, since she hasn't been able to manage it, bound as I have her. And no hunters have even attempted to find her."

Jack frowned, and stayed where he was. It'd have been too close for comfort for Damien, to have someone standing this close to him, but Jacob didn't seem to notice, or care. "She's ancient, Jacob. How is she even still alive?"

"Her magic keeps her alive. She's done some interesting things to herself. She doesn't eat, doesn't sleep." He chuckled, and dipped his glass left and right until the blood swirled inside it. "Pretty fucking disturbing shit, if I do say so myself."

Damien smirked at that, for a second. Jacob calling anything disturbing, was disturbing.

"What do you plan to do with her?" Jack asked.

"I plan the to enact the great ritual of Nunya."

Damien blinked. "Nunya?"

Before Jacob could respond, Jack put up a hand and looked to Damien. "Nunya business." Oh, a joke. Forever the trickster, and juvenile, deranged lunatic, was Jacob. Damien and Jack both rolled their eyes, before Jack continued. "I felt something, when Sándor broke the ritual. Something that felt familiar." Jacob smiled, but said nothing. "You nearly let Triss die, so you could have a shot of stealing Elen? What, was that a plan? Something you've been cooking up since we learned about her? Pretty damn cold."

Beatrice took a step toward them, but Jacob held up a hand, and she stepped back, frown growing.

"Cold, is it?" The man shrugged as his smile went through twenty phases. Was he angry, sad, happy, furious, manic? It was impossible to tell. Damien tried, analyzed Jacob every chance he could, but the man was such a question mark, that Lucas had warned him about the Nosferatu on several occasions before his extended torpor, and several times again thereafter.

"Yes, it's cold. She could have died, Jacob."

"All my witches were there. One of those fucking dogs was there. This assassin-in-training," he gestured to Damien, "was there. And let's not forget, the Strix curse was there." His grin grew until Damien thought his lips would split at the cheek. "You know, that horrible abomination you willingly used? A dark, twisted thing that you've embraced? A very witchy-witch thing to do."

Jack snarled, and Damien found himself taking a step back. In the past, Jack snarling would have meant little. These days, it meant quite a bit.

"I haven't embraced it."

"Ha, sure you haven't." He took another sip, before he nodded in Elaine's direction. "You know her?"

That made Jack freeze. Damien raised a brow as he looked between the two men, and it was clear the Nos had said something to disturb Jack. The old man always knew what to say to get under a person's skin. Damien could only be content that Jacob never seemed interested in harassing him. Once, Jack had told Damien that Jacob had been interested in him, when he worked for Lucas. That interest had died when Lucas died. All the better.

"I don't know her."

"Sure you don't. You looked like you saw a ghost when she came in."

"I... don't know her."

Laughing, Jacob sipped again, shrugged, and looked to Elaine. She'd rejoined Antoinette, apparently done with her conversation with Daniel, and the two of them chatted with the werewolf pack.

"I'll find out eventually, Jack. You know I will."

"I'd prefer if you just stayed out of it."

With that, Jacob stepped close, until only six inches separated him from the small Ventrue. It was enough to stir Beatrice and Aaron a step closer, but they calmed when Jack didn't move.

"Then let's make a deal."

Jack frowned, but remained where he was. "What deal?"

"Don't interfere with me and mine, and I won't interfere with you and yours."

"Interfere with me? What could--"

Jacob leaned in until he was almost kissing Jack, and he chuckled. "Think about it."

That time, Jack did back away a little, and he looked to Damien through the corner of his eye. Which was a mistake, because it let Jacob know they had an inkling of what he meant, but it was a mistake anyone would have made.

"Jacob... we're all on the same team, right?" Jack said.

The elder grinned his usual, crazy grin, shrugged, and stepped back. "I think we are. Sometimes, I don't know. Maybe that's a problem that needs fixing."

"That you don't know?"

"That we might be on the same team."

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~~Antoinette~~

"I cannot tell if I like her or not," Elaine said, rejoining Antoinette. She gestured to the wolf woman the two of them had finished speaking with, moments before.

"Avery? She is... difficult to deal with, I admit. Less so than Simon, though."

Elaine nodded as she stood shoulder to shoulder with her, sipped her blood, and looked out at the crowd. The two of them stood in the center of the ballroom floor, and while the crowd gave them their space, people had begun to enjoy themselves to the point they no longer avoided them due to their Beasts' fear. By the end of the ball, perhaps her Kindred would no longer avoid her at all, drunk on blood and desire.

She grinned subtly at the thought. No, her city would never fully be comfortable with her, both due to her altered body, but also due to her position. She was the Prince. This was her city. Such was the way of things.

"Daniel," Elaine continued, "seems to be... interested, in Athalia."

Antoinette looked past her friend to her sheriff, who stood in a corner with the Begotten, and her childe Samantha.

"Yes, I fear he is, old friend."

"A shame. I would very much like to crack that cold exterior of his."

"You have known my sheriff for centuries, and have made no progress. Why pursue him so?"

She tapped a finger against her chin, looked over her shoulder, and let out a quiet sigh as she looked at the man. "I am not sure, honestly. I cannot help but sense much sadness in him, and I would very much like to warm him."

Antoinette doubted that was all there was to it. Elaine, like many women, craved what they could not have.

"There has been much sadness in his life, but with the return of his childe, a grain of joy has been found. That joy is perhaps the only reason he speaks to Athalia." Antoinette sipped her own blood, and lightly traced a finger along her old friend's beautiful shoulder. "Could you not have worn something less brazen?"

"I am more covered than you."

"You cannot see through my clothes."

She shrugged. "And you cannot see through mine, unless you stare."

Antoinette laughed at her friend's knowing grin, and looked around. People were staring. Many had never seen Elaine before, and were obviously enraptured with her beauty. Antoinette could not blame them.

"You knew very well my love would gawk, from what I told you. Poor Jack has not been able to stop looking at you."

"That is your own fault, for planting images in his head." She sipped her drink, and looked to the boy as she did, currently conversing with Jacob. "I admit, he is very handsome. And the way he squirms is... very... appealing." She licked her lips, sipped again, and kept her eyes on Jack as she swayed gently with the music. "I did not expect the intensity in his eyes, the sheer openness of them. But after seeing his mother, I can see where his eyes came from."

Antoinette nodded, but her eyes lingered on Jack and Jacob. While it brought her limitless discomfort to see the old snake talking with her lover, she trusted Jack. He had proven capable of managing the curse, at least to some extent, and he was proving intelligent enough to handle scenarios she would never have trusted a neonate to handle. Speaking with Jacob, an elder, someone no neonate would willingly speak with, was something Jack was equipped to handle, intellectually, and now thanks to the curse, in power.

"He knows something," Elaine said.

"Oui, that he does. But I do not know what. My love said he would tell us though, and I trust him." It did have her mind running in circles trying to predict what that knowledge would be, however. He had looked upon Elaine with the awe and lust Antoinette had expected to see, that she had helped create with her stories, but he had also looked at her with the shock of someone surprised. For the second life of her, she could not figure out why.

"He leaves us in suspense."

"That he does."

Elaine giggled, and looked back to her as she sipped her drink. "A man after my own heart."

"Then I regret to inform you, that he is taken."

They laughed. It was a strange, silly discussion, talking over a man like young girls. To the Ordo, little meant more than the mastery of their coils, and talk of romance was largely discarded once they reached their ancilla years, let alone into their elder years. She had not spoken with Elaine like this since she had sired Tony, so long ago, blurry memories she could not recall beyond vague notions. It sent a joyful chuckle through her, to once again be talking of something as simple, juvenile, and yet as all powerful, as love.

She guided Elaine toward one cluster of Kindred she looked forward to speaking to.

"Miss Leauvion," Antoinette said with a nod to Isabella. "Attempting to recruit Miss Young into your troupe?"

The Daeva smiled at her, a fake and pompous thing, but well crafted and seamless. Such a gorgeous creature, Isabella, with her long dark blonde hair, sharp features, above average height, and piercing blue gaze. She did not look dissimilar to Elaine, though Elaine, a touch taller, wore her hair free instead of in ponytails, and had brown eyes.

A tiny flicker in Isabella's eyes betrayed her, a glance at Antoinette's bust and corset that clearly dwarfed her own. A petty thing, for Antoinette to enjoy a grain of pride and ego in that moment, but she did. The men about clearly looked at each other in a similar manner, and not-so-subtly analyzed physiques to see who had the broader shoulders and flatter stomach. Such was life, and unlife, an unending game of comparing the self to others.

If Isabella devoted herself more to the future of the Invictus, instead of her own pursuits and obsessions, as many Daeva did, she would no doubt have risen in the ranks of her covenant. But no, she spent her days mastering the art of acting, teaching her troupe to act, and by large, she had succeeded. Her plays were held in high regard, but were ultimately of zero use to the Invictus. The arts would never earn the income of a corporation brought to its knees by blackmail, or insider trading, tools the Invictus often used.

"She is beautiful," Isabella said, smiling at Fiona and earning a loud giggle from the intoxicated redhead. "But I do not believe she holds the... discipline, to be an actress."

Jessy snorted on a laugh. "You mean she probably can't memorize lines."

Little Fiona's eyes set into a hard glare, and she took a weak swing at Jessy. The vampire let her, and Fiona's fist bounced harmlessly off Jessy's arm, while Fiona simultaneously spilled some of her wine from her other glass.

"I can memorize lines!"

"You couldn't memorize a menu."

"I... I..." Suddenly, the tiny girl started to weep. Not a loud sob, but tiny sniffles. "Yer right! I couldnae! I tried, but they had to let me go. Fired!"

Jessy blinked at her, before leaning in and hooking her arm over the woman's shoulders. "Ok, guess I was a bit on the nose there. Don't worry about it. You don't want to work for this bitch anyway."

"I beg your pardon?" Isabella scoffed, and looked to her lover Hella beside her. "Can you believe this?"

Hella offered her lover some silent condolences, and Antoinette turned her attention to the nearby hunters. They were surrounded by Isabella's troupe, a group of beautiful young Invictus Kindred, and things were quickly growing sexual. They had stepped quite close to the hunters, and the female Kindred were not only touching them with roaming hands, they were exposing their legs and breasts in subtle, flirting displays. Predictable, considering Isabella and her proclivities, but Antoinette did not mind. In truth, she had hoped for this, that the Kindred would approach the hunters with aim to seduce.

If hunters could come to Dolareido, leave Dolareido, and spread word that the city was to be ignored by their ilk, it could save her great trials in the future, especially after so many died under Jack's hand.

The small group of Kindred surrounding the hunters stepped aside when Antoinette and Elaine approached. The hunters had seen her dress already, but not Elaine's, and the three of them looked to the elder Ventrue for several moments, jaw's dropping, before looking to the Prince. The two men did their best to hide their growing erections.

"Harcourt, LeBlanc, Hemmer, I trust you are enjoying yourselves?"

"Um, y-yes Prince," Harcourt said. The man may have been a strange, overt, and silly individual, but he had courage.

Elaine grinned at them as she sipped from her glass. "But you have not tasted the wine." Before Harcourt could respond, she flicked her hand upward in dismissal. "We can smell the lack of alcohol on your breaths."

"Um... well, we thought... maybe it wasn't a good idea to get drunk in a room filled with vampires and werewolves and monsters?"

"Nonsense." Antoinette snapped her fingers, and several servants joined them immediately. One of them had wine, and she dismissed the other two, before motioning the final servant, a waitress, toward the hunters. "Your lives are in no danger, and you are to be rewarded for your aid in defeating Jeremiah and Angela."

The woman, Marge, stepped up beside her friend. With a slow, trembling hand, she took a glass of the wine.

"Thank you. B-But, you can understand why we're so... scared, right? We're still your prisoners." With a trembling hand, she raised the glass, and took a cautious sip. "The three of us, we're vampire hunters. We're all very aware of the things you can do to us with a glance, or a drop of blood."

Marge was a beautiful woman, a touch short with a lean, almost skinny physique. Her curly brown hair reached her shoulders, and her brown eyes stared at Antoinette as she sipped her wine. A black woman, with light skin and pink lips. To think of her as a vampire hunter was difficult. She looked more an innocent doe than a hunter. Perhaps that was part of her hunting tactics, to feign weakness, before striking.

Dennis, a white man with short blonde hair and green eyes, took a glass as well, and sniffed it several times. The fool must have known sniffing wine would never discover tampering, but he did anyway. He was taller than Harcourt, bigger, and while Harcourt was an attractive man, it was clear some of the women nearby with similar tastes to Jessy, were looking to Dennis. Though, a glance Jessy's way showed the Gangrel was looking at Marge, more than the men.

"You have my promise that no harm will come to you," Antoinette said, and she spoke a touch louder so those nearby could hear over the music. "Any who attempt to place you under the Vinculum will quickly find themselves witnessing a sunrise."

That earned at least a small bit of trust from the hunters, and the three of them took another sip of their new drinks, though none of them looked down when they did, eyes up, scanning.

"Still can't believe you're really letting us be here," Harcourt said.

"Forever a visionary, the Prince," Elaine said. "Be happy your bosses met their end in Dolareido. I have lived in cities where your corpses would be left for the crows. But here in Dolareido, my lovely friend insists on peace where she can find it."

Antoinette rolled her eyes, but her smile remained. Elaine did love to joust with her, and she enjoyed the game.

"If and when I decide to let our three hunters leave the city, their opinions of Dolareido will have changed."