— Inspector Evelyn Hartwright, Report on Public Institutions in Outer Peccatum (1841)*
Arthur stood behind Xeliara as she knocked on the large, ornate door to Draven’s chambers.
His heart was racing. It had taken him longer than he had intended to bring the jar of Thornmire Leaves. He could only hope that Lord Draven and General Marcellus weren’t too furious because of the delay.
The door swung open, and a mountain of a vampire met the two. He wore scarlet leather, with a black cloak and black gloves. His boots were dry and cracked, and a longsword swung from his belt in a leather scabbard. He had an ugly scar that split his face in half. When he spoke, it was in a menacing, metallic voice that sounded like a dog’s bark. “What took you so long, Eldric?”
“Apologies, General Marcellus,” Arthur said, holding up the jar. “We’re low on stock. This is all we have left.”
“Do not be too hard on the poor half-blood,” Xeliara cooed. “He is still adjusting to life here. Give him time, and he’ll be as efficient as the others.” She moved to push past him, but General Marcellus stood his ground.
“And why are you here?”
She gave a grateful bow. “To see my master, of course. I heard he was injured and came to offer comfort.”
General Marcellus grumbled to himself. “Very well.” He stepped aside to let them in. “Bring Lord Draven the herbs, now!”
Across the overly embellished chamber, which smelled of sour wine, candles, and overripe fruit, was an elaborate four-poster bed. The silk sheets rustled as Lord Draven lay across them. He was bare from the waist up, with a head bound in bandages. Not even the burns across his chest had fully healed yet, which was odd in and of itself. Draven was a pureblood; such wounds would have vanished mere seconds after he had acquired them.
Clara, as well as another one of his personal maids, sat beside him. They worked diligently to undo the bandages so that they could apply the herbs.
Xeliara strutted across the room and sat on the edge of the bed, laying her hand on Lord Draven’s thigh. “My, what have those savages done to you, my lord?” she said sweetly.
Arthur handed Clara the jar of herbs and gave her an affirming stare. Admittedly, she had done a better job than he had with hiding how uncomfortable she felt in this hellhole, but he knew her better than anyone. Behind her stern eyes, she was afraid. They were walking a tightrope, being so close to the man who wanted to kidnap their daughter, but if they could ensure they would be here to free Emily if he found her, then it would all be worth it.
When the last bandage peeled from Draven’s red face, Arthur grimaced. Even Xeliara pulled her hand away in shock. Her victim had more of a face than Draven. Together, Clara and the other maidens started applying the herbal leaves.
“How does it feel, my lord?” General Marcellus came to stand beside the bed.
“Please, tell us, my lord,” Clara said. “If there is anything else Eldric can fetch to help with the—”
“You know not the torment holy water brings,” Draven rasped, his voice laden with agony. “My face throbs. It sears with each touch like a sting from a legion of fiery hornets. None of you knows what it is like to feel your flesh bubble and burn, to melt off your bones.”
Arthur and Clara shared another glance. The memory of that horrible day was seared into both their memories; the day they awoke as monsters. It was impossible to forget the stench of charred flesh or the sight of Emeric’s burned body looming over them, his flesh melted and raw.
“No, Lord Draven,” Arthur said, “We most certainly do not.”
“Consider yourselves lucky.” He took a long, raspy breath. When the leaves were finished being applied, his face was rewrapped.
“My lord,” General Marcellus started. “If you are able, please inform me of what happened.”
Draven let out a hoarse chuckle, then groaned through his gritted teeth. “She was in the palm of my hand, but plucked away like a fleeting dream.”
“You found her?” General Marcellus asked. “The Conduit?”
Draven nodded weakly. “She would not have gotten away if she had not had assistance.”
Xeliara curled up beside him and gently traced her fingers below the burn marks across his chest. Clara and the other maiden had begun dressing those next with the Thornmire Leaves.
General Marcellus stared for a moment, tilting his head. “Who?”
“It was Wilhelmina, Marcellus. Wilhelmina.”
Suddenly, General Marcellus’ face dropped. “The Raven of Reghin? She was there?”
Arthur exchanged another glance with Clara, mirroring her confusion. “Who might that be, my lord?” he then asked, already having an idea.
Draven brushed Xeliara and the maidens away, then slowly rose from his bed. His legs quaked, and he slumped forward, leaning against the nearby desk for support. He gazed toward the ornate mirror hanging from his wall and pressed his hand over his eyes with a pained groan.
“What is it, my lord?” Clara asked.
“It is nothing. My vision is merely… weakened. It will recover.” He took a deep breath. “Few know The Raven of Reghin by her real name. Mina, she calls herself now, but that does not change what she is: a vampire turned monster hunter. If not for the Conduit’s magic, I would have had them both. It weakened me. Slowed me. Gave Wilhelmina her opportunity.”
A flood of hope spread quickly through Arthur’s heart, but he fought to conceal it.
General Marcellus growled. “Shall we inform The Widow, my lord?”
“No,” he said with a sigh. “Lady Mircella does not need to know of this. If any of her birds are here, I entrust you to clip their wings.”
“Yes, my lord,” General Marcellus said.
“I do not need the Master of Whispers informing Queen Lockhart of my failures. They are mine to relay, or not to relay in whatever manner I see fit. The Queen and her court have their own concerns to attend to. We handle this on our own.”
“Then I swear to you, my lord,” General Marcellus said, “I will track Wilhelmina to the corners of Ageria. We will find the Conduit.”
“You have not had the misfortune of trying to track her down.” Draven snarled. “I do not know how she does it, but try as I have the last few years to keep an eye on her whereabouts, she vanishes like a phantom. Every lead and every rumor is a dead end. No scout I send has returned. The woman is as hideous as they come, and with hair as white as snow, she should be a beacon in a crowd, and yet she slips by unnoticed. If she vanished with the Conduit, it’ll take years of searching. The only other time we have been able to find her, fate had put her in our midst. She was trained by Stanfield of The Salvation Brotherhood. If she were to apply those teachings to the Conduit, it would pose a great risk, yes. She would teach that girl to strike like a Sindwinder in the night.”
General Marcellus grunted. “No warrior can outmatch you, my lord.”
“I’d like to believe that myself, but there are a few I deem worthy of a challenge. This Conduit may be weak, but her powers alone are enough to kill even me.” He placed a hand upon the burns on his chest. “These are not from ordinary flames. The Conduit produced them. I can still feel the magic emanating from my wounds, like a lingering plague; it is searing my skin. It will not heal easily.”
“What are we to do then, my lord? If she is a phantom, how are we to find her?”
“The same way we found the Conduit. Persistence. Unfortunately, time is against us now. Not only will Queen Lockhart demand updates on the hunt soon, but the Conduit will grow in power by the day. Emily, her name was. She’s weak-minded and lacks discipline and control, but I know Wilhelmina; she will train the girl and give her the power and strength to stand against us and Queen Lockhart.”
“But my lord, you cannot continue the search in your condition.”
“You’re right. My wounds will need time to heal. Herbs are not enough. Evidently, what I need is to savor the Conduit’s blood. The Conduit’s blood is of such potency that it will enhance the powers of anything that drinks it. Our healing factor may not be able to counter the effects of holy water now, but if I were to sip but a taste of the Conduit’s blood, I could cure my visage. But alas, the Conduit isn’t here. Even if I were to send out another legion of vampires to every town and every village and every city, they’d all turn up empty-handed. And if they found Wilhelmina by some miracle, they would not live long enough to relay to me her position.”
“Then send me, my lord,” General Marcellus insisted. “I will venture out with my own flock, vampires trained to combat under my leadership. We will comb Ageria. Every town, every mountain, village, and valley. We will not stop until Wilhelmina is found and the Conduit’s neck at your lips.”
“Your faith is misguided. I have been Master of the Hunt for many years. If we were to go looking for any other living soul, it would be a swift effort. Wilhelmina has evaded us for years. She is a master at evading detection, even in the densest of crowds. In my efforts, I believe I have searched every populated area in Ageria twice over. Wherever it is she resides, it is either damn well hidden or in such plain sight we would never expect it.”
“But we will find her eventually. She cannot remain hidden forever. If you found her once before, she can be found again.”
“It was not I who found her. It was her twin.”
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“Why not request her assistance, my lord?” General Marcellus said.
“No!” Draven smashed his fist through the desk, shattering it into splinters. Bottles and books tumbled to the floor. “If we were to request her help in this endeavor, Queen Lockhart will suspect something. She cannot, under any circumstances, learn of what transpired tonight. She cannot learn that Wilhelmina has the Conduit—!”
The room fell silent as a pulsing red light suddenly emanated from the ornate mirror, casting an eerie crimson glow across the chamber. It was coming from the runes etched deep into the mirror's gilded frame.
Arthur glanced at Clara, his brow furrowed, and she met his gaze with a mirrored expression, her eyes wide and uncertain.
Draven let out a weary sigh and straightened his posture with a visible wince. “Speak of the devil and she shall appear.” Slowly, he positioned himself before the mirror. “Remain silent, all of you. Follow my lead, and utter not a whisper about the Conduit. We dance on the edge of a precipice here; one misstep, and it’s to the bloodfarms for us all.”
General Marcellus nodded and turned to the others. “Against the wall, you three!” he barked at Arthur, Clara, and the other maiden. They pressed their backs to the cold stone. Xeliara, however, lounged languidly on Draven's opulent bed with a sinister grin.
“My, this is going to be interesting,” she giggled.
Draven placed his hand upon the glass. In a voice so low that it eluded even Arthur’s heightened hearing, he uttered a phrase. The reflection in the glass rippled, distorting like water disturbed by a stone, swirling into color and form until it coalesced into something—or rather, someone—else entirely.
A woman materialized in the mirror, her image so tantalizingly gorgeous that for a fleeting second, it eclipsed all else in Arthur’s mind, making him forget Clara’s presence beside him. Her hair was as smooth and dark as ink, cascading like waves over her bare shoulders like a black river, and across her lavish crimson dress. Her silver eyes shone with an intensity so bright it was almost hypnotizing, drawing Arthur in like a moth to a flame. They were intently focused on the book in her hands as she lounged upon a velvet sofa, in a room starkly similar in decor to the one Arthur found himself standing in. But then his own eyes were drawn to the naked, kneeling man she was using to rest her legs upon. The skin on his back was shredded to the bone, and he trembled as the woman’s bare soles pressed down into the raw muscle.
He blinked, shaking himself from the trance as if emerging from a dream. He turned to Clara, only to find her staring at the woman with the same rapt fascination, her cheeks flushed and her breath caught in her throat.
Draven struggled to bow respectfully, his body visibly protesting. “Your Majesty.”
“It has been too long since we last spoke, Draven,” she said with a voice like honey, not yet looking up from her book.
“I have been preoccupied.”
“With the hunt, yes?”
He took a shaky breath. “There have been some complications.”
Finally, Queen Lockhart’s eyes shot up from her book, and the moment they landed on Draven’s bandaged figure, they widened. She shot to her feet and hurried to the mirror, leaving a trail of bloodied footprints against the mahogany floor. Queen Lockhart placed a hand to her chest and let out a breathy gasp. “Oh, my dearest Draven, whatever has befallen you? You look positively ravaged.”
He straightened his posture once more. “No thanks to your insufferable whelp of a daughter.”
Queen Lockhart’s eyes sparkled with a mix of shock and perverse delight. Her mouth gaped open into a big smile that revealed her sharp teeth. “Wilhelmina did this to you?” she exclaimed, her tone bubbling with joyous incredulity.
“She ambushed me, and she could have done far worse, my queen, if I were not so fortunate, or perhaps cunning enough, to flee her wrath in the nick of time. A lesser being would have been reduced to ashes, but I... I endure, as always.”
The queen tilted her head as her gaze roamed hungrily over his bandages. “How did she manage this? Come now, spare no detail.”
“How she managed it is not important. What is important is that she managed it at all. I warned you that she should have been brought back to the island forthwith. Your decision to let her roam free, to wallow in her grief, would come back to haunt us one day. And lo, the day has dawned, bathed in my blood, and I have paid the price for your leniency.”
Queen Lockhart laughed. “She’s just upset. A little storm in a teacup.”
“She’s more than upset, Your Majesty. She’s furious. Not a storm but a tempest unleashed with claws bared and fangs gleaming. She seeks to end the tapestry we’ve so meticulously woven, and she nearly started with me! She is a problem, and she is going to interfere with the hunt. If not for your blasted pardon, that ill-advised mercy you bestowed upon her like a crown of thorns, she could have been dealt with long ago. My visage could have remained intact, my form unmarred, and I could continue serving you without this... inconvenience.”
The queen’s silver eyes narrowed as she placed a finger to her lips. “You are the Master of the Hunt. I have no doubt you're capable of apprehending her.”
“Sentiment clouds your judgment, my queen, turning a blind eye to the serpent in our garden. Lift the pardon so that I may deal with her properly! Unshackle me from this folly, and I shall end this farce before it consumes us all. Grant me the liberty to hunt without restraint, and Wilhelmina will be but a footnote in our history.”
Queen Lockhart laughed again. “If you had children of your own, you would understand that there is an art form to nurturing. To guiding. Even when it means pain. Let her grieve, let her rage; it builds character, makes her stronger. Besides, a mother’s heart knows best.”
“At least I can have children,” Draven growled.
A chill ran up Arthur’s spine.
Queen Lockhart stared back in silence with an unreadable expression.
Draven stood before the mirror, staring her down, waiting for an answer. But it never came. Not until a womanly hand fell upon his shoulder from behind. Draven’s body went rigid before he was violently swung around to face the queen herself with her book still in hand.
She had appeared too quickly for Arthur to process her presence. But when he did, Arthur and Clara both gasped and pressed against the wall beside Draven’s other maiden. For a moment, the air behind Draven was empty; the next, she towered there, her seven-foot figure looming like a goddess descended. General Marcellus tensed, his broad shoulders squaring as if ready for battle, but his face betrayed a poorly hidden terror. Even Xeliara scrambled from the bed and backed against the wall, panting hard as she stared up at her. Arthur hadn’t expected her to be as tall as she was, at least seven feet.
Queen Lockhart’s hair began to weave down with a life of its own, tendrils uncoiling like serpents awakening from slumber. It poured to the floor and rippled like an inky wave across the stone. The strands ensnared Draven’s legs in a cluster of writhing tendrils that rooted him in place. It then surged toward the others, ensnaring and binding everyone’s legs together. Arthur grunted, testing the hold, but the hair only constricted further, sending pain up his legs. General Marcellus swore under his breath as his boots were swallowed. Xeliara hissed as the tendrils claimed her. Even the maiden beside Clara let out a muffled sob, trembling as the hair wove around her.
Queen Lockhart extended a sharp nail and slowly sliced through the bandages on Draven’s face. He groaned, his body arching involuntarily as blood gushed from the opening wound. “Do you remember your place, my dear Draven?” she murmured. Before he could respond, her tendril hair launched out like a striking viper to completely ensnare him in a glossy black cocoon that left only his head free. He struggled futilely.
The shadows grew darker by the second.
General Marcellus almost attempted a move to free his master, but hesitated.
“What are you, Draven? Remind me, darling.” Her hair then began forcibly bending his arm, the tendrils applying pressure that elicited a restrained groan from Draven’s sealed lips. His arm snapped backward at the elbow, and the bone ripped through the encasing hair with a spray of blood, only for more tendrils to surge forth and ensnare the protruding shard.
Draven grunted violently, his jaw clenching as he glared back at the queen. “The huntsman.”
“And what do huntsmen do?” she asked.
The air was tightening, the walls closing in.
Her hair snapped Draven’s other arm, then began forcing his knees to bend backward. He groaned, throwing his head back as his body convulsed in the hair’s grip. “Hunt,” Draven answered between heavy breaths.
Queen Lockhart removed the bandages to reveal the blistered and blackened face. Raw patches of flesh had peeled away to expose the glistening muscle beneath. One eye socket was rimmed with scorched tissue that pulled the lid taut, giving him a perpetual glare of agony. “Precisely,” Queen Lockhart said with gleeful approval, as she grabbed the sides of Draven’s head with both hands, dropping her book to the floor. Her fingers were digging into the tender, burned flesh with just enough pressure to elicit a hiss from him. She tilted his head to the side and leaned in close. Slowly, she dragged her tongue across the textured surface of rough, cratered burns and raw muscle. She traced every ridge and valley of the scarred tissue, her tongue probing the edges of the weeping sores, lapping up the salty tang of pus that oozed from the cracks. Her breaths came in soft, ecstatic moans while Draven balled his fists, grunting and straining to keep his composure.
Arthur could only watch in horror as the queen indulged herself. His stomach knotted, and bile rose, but he managed to swallow it back down.
Draven’s legs finally snapped, and his mouth fell open in a barely contained cry.
Lockhart pulled away at last, her tongue darting out to lick a stray droplet of blood from her lips, her expression one of satisfied glee. “You will not speak of my daughter like that again. You will not speak of me like that again, or I will take away your ability to have children. You will continue your duty. And if Wilhelmina is to interfere, you bring her to me alive. Preferably, so we might… reminisce. But do not seek her out; she is not your priority. The Conduit is to be seventeen years of age by now. Our window to find it before they grow in power is dwindling.”
Draven grunted as he struggled to maintain his composure, his mutilated face twitching. “Yes, Your Majesty.”
“Good,” she purred cheerfully, her hair beginning to retract, slowly uncoiling from everyone. Draven collapsed into a heap on the ground. Without the hair to hold him back, his limbs started cracking back into place. In the blink of an eye, Queen Lockhart vanished. She was back in the mirror, and Arthur only caught a fleeting final glimpse of the queen before the glass rippled, and the reflection of the room returned. All that was left was the book she had dropped and seemingly left behind: ‘The Ballads of Chester Finch: Volume 14 - Nevermore.’
General Marcellus rushed to Draven’s side and helped him to his feet. He stood for a moment, wobbling on his freshly healed legs. Gradually, his breathing rose before he whipped around and threw his fist into the mirror with a scream. The glass exploded onto the floor, and the frame shattered from the force. He breathed, slowly regaining his composure.
The room had fallen completely silent. Xeliara was cowering against the wall, her legs still trembling, and her claws scraping against the stone.
“She can’t be where she can’t see,” Draven muttered under his breath. He looked to General Marcellus. “Even if my eyesight were untainted, the pain of holy water would only hold me back. You’ll continue the search in my stead. Assemble a search party, train them well, and bring them both to me alive.”
General Marcellus nodded quickly. “Yes, my lord.” His voice shook. “I will act right away, my lord.”
“Take some of the hospital staff and begin your search within the city walls. She likely hasn’t gotten far. If you act swiftly, you might catch her before she flees from this cesspool.”
“It will be done.” General Marcellus nodded again and marched out of the room.
Draven sighed tiredly and returned to his bed, lying with a groan. “Eldric, Selene,” he then muttered.
Arthur and Clara looked over at him.
“Make yourselves useful. Bring me some blood. Xeliara, fresh bandages.”
The succubus hardly answered at first. She nodded vigorously after a moment and hurried to fetch some. “There was a patient recently disposed of in the asylum wing,” she suggested, clearing her throat. “It has yet to be taken care of. I’m sure our newest lovebirds wouldn’t mind fetching it for your pleasure.”
“Blood is best when it’s fresh,” he muttered. “Bring me the corpse.”
“Yes, my lord,” Arthur and Clara said in unison, then bowed stiffly and hurriedly left the room, leaving the other maiden and Xeliara to care for Draven. As they navigated the asylum side-by-side, Arthur’s mind and heart were racing. His hands were still shaking.
Before reaching the asylum ward, Clara pulled Arthur into a closet and shut the door. They shared a horrid look, either unsure what to say at first. For a time, they just embraced each other.
“She’s alive, Ar—!”
“Hush.” He put a finger to her lips and spoke quietly. “We need to tread lightly. They must never know.”
“She’s out there, we can’t just do nothing!”
“Remember the plan. We need to stay here, wait for an opportunity. We just have to pray to Asdros that Mina will train her to stand against Draven and… and her. She just needs time.”
“We can use that,” Clara said. “You saw it, the way they spoke to each other. If we were to put a wedge between them, encourage Draven to turn against her, we could kill him before he finds Emily.”
“How?”
“I do not know, but I will come up with something.”
“Right. One way or another, Emily will find her way here. When that day comes, we must be ready to help her in any way we can. We need to be careful about our approach. Keep up the act, learn what we can, and act when the time is right. Draven is weak now. Perhaps we can kill him, perhaps not. But one thing is for certain. We will kill him. It may not be today, it may not be tomorrow, but we will kill him.”
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