OLD Chapter 206 (UPDATE AS OF 11/23/23 - These original chapters 195-210 will be pushed out to another future part of the book or recycled. New chapters starting at 195 are being posted after the original 210, and these original chapters will soon be removed. For now, skip ahead to the NEW Chapter 195 past old 210) (Patreon)

Chapter 206

Jalel’s red eyes flashed ominously from underneath his hood, gazing up at the cloudy sky above them covered in airships.  A strange mark akin to the crescent blood moon was burned into his forehead, radiating crimson energies belonging to that of the queen, akin to that of a collar on a dog.

A mark of the disgraced.

The dark burgundy robes he wore swirled about him, and his two elite vampire guards escorting him stood out to either side with hands on extravagant longswords.

The cityscape reminded him of a canyon, though instead of rocks there were large multi-layered buildings.  Blocky ones, with deep crevices between them where thousands upon thousands of vehicles raced through the air like an ant colony.  This was also the case overhead, though most of the ships in the sky were not of this world.

They were of House Wraithtide, and that of House Crushada.

He had not only brought one ship as Fay’s new master had thought.  An armada, many tens of thousands strong, sporting enormous armored battle cruisers and fleets of faster smaller airships with the sigil of the Blood Moon Requiem clouded the skies.  They were all very sleek, very long, and very sharp - typical of the style of their empire over the course of the millenia.  The world of Castar had frantically mustered their own forces on the horizon to some extent and more were coming in, but in comparison they were only a mere fraction of the absolute might of the two vampiric noble houses.

If the requiem wanted to crush this world today, they could - and this world knew it.  Alarms were going off all over the city calling for the citizens to take cover, and a few sweating diplomats were being flown in on platforms miles out - racing over while projecting their faces with titles on display above their heads and messages written out asking the requiem to wait for their arrival alongside estimated arrival timers.  The population was in an absolute panic, requests to their allies on other worlds had already been blasted over galactic coms, and the entire sector - a small and usually undistinguished sector at that - held their breath while watching broadcasting channels as one of the most feared S-tier factions of this particular universe hovered in wait; ready to strike.  What made things worse was that the requiem was absolutely ignoring any attempts at contact, and the planet below - aside from a few select individuals - didn’t have any idea why they had arrived without starting an all out attack.

A smaller and more extravagantly decorated transport came to a hovering stop just feet above the city tower Jalel had landed on himself, and he internally groaned as Kathrine’s Parents, the Duke and Dutchess of House Crushada themselves stepped off with their own guards in tow.  They looked very much like their daughter on Panu, with silky brown hair and pale white skin - high cheekbones and graceful features.  They wore elegant black robes with red flowers decorating the edges, and both wore hoods similar to Jalel in order to stave off the sunlight even despite the overcast sky.

“You look absolutely miserable.” Duke Crushada said with a chuckle, stepping forward to stand next to the disgraced prince with an amused smirk.  “Not enjoying your new position as retainer for House Wraithtide?  I heard your father is furious with you, that you brought your house disgrace and the Queen may even demote your family from greater to lesser nobility!”

“Fuck yourself.” Jalel muttered under his breath with narrowed eyes, and both the Duke and Dutchess of House Crushada began loudly cackling at his misfortune.  “Be happy your whore daughter can spread her legs well enough to increase your standing, because your recent rise to power is nothing but that.”

“That is part of the grand political game we play!” The dutchess said with a grin, exposing her fangs, wrapping an arm around her husband’s own.  “Seduction is a fair way to go about it, far more fair than your poor attempt at stealing a shard of sin I might add.  And we paid a large sum of money, resources, and even a continent on our homeworld in order to acquire him for our daughter's marriage.  You played your hand your own way, and you lost.  Drastically, I must say.  Amazing that he’s gained 11 shards in such a short time, wouldn't you agree?  That amount of wealth… that amount of power.  He’s already on the path to cultivating one of the seven and has already made it to the Abyss as an F-grade!  Truly, he will bring our house great fortune should our daughter succeed in ‘spreading her legs’ for him as you say.  I’m personally rather proud of her.”

The duke nodded his agreement.  “Riven is a prince of the main bloodline, has the gift, could perhaps become the everseer if we get incredibly lucky, and is the son of her favorite granddaughter.  We couldn’t ask for Kathrine to do a better job.”

“You realize your daughter will fall behind these two demons of his, if he even agrees.  She will be nothing more than a concubine.” Jalel spat with venom in his words.

The duke shrugged indifferently.  “He won’t have a choice.  And even if you’re right about where Kathrine falls, it will not matter.  The end goal is to produce more heirs with the gift, if he wants to have these playthings without any titles in the eyes of the empire then let him.  The populace love him for it too, that is even why we’re here is it not?  To play hero to the hero so the masses who’ve become so enraptured with the life of those two siblings look at us favorably?  To save one of those playthings so that we win over his favor?  We do something for him, he does something for us, and we look good doing it.  Simple.”

Jalel dramatically rolled his eyes and huffed rather loudly, but he didn’t bite back when they laughed at him again even despite the nearby guards of House Wraithtide grinning at one another due to his misfortune.  His title and position over them was only symbolic, these soldiers were actually here to keep Jalel in line - as he’d essentially been made a slave with honors at this point.

At least temporarily.  Should he gain the queen’s favor again he may be given his titles back, but until now - he was just a fallen, disgraced prince without any rights.  He was a traitor to the crown, until the queen said otherwise.

The door to the rooftop swung open, and out stepped five men.  Four of them ushered the fifth out from behind, glancing around nervously and shoving him ahead - causing him to stumble and nearly fall.  He was a very handsome human with tanned skin, short brown hair and a well kept beard.  The man was very nervous just by the way he looked around, and sweat was dripping down his skin as his limbs trembled underneath him - barely keeping him upright.

“Portus.” Jalel said with certainty, having already known what the man looked like through reports he’d acquired via a demonic information broker who’d just happened to know of Fay’s exact location.  “I’d say it’s nice to finally meet you, but your life is worth less than dirt.  I do not like entertaining cattle, so tell me: where is the succubus?”

The man shuddered, looking wide eyed at the sky filled with the swarming vampiric fleet.  His gaze landed on Jalel.  “She’s inside.  I just wanted to say that if I have somehow offended you or the requiem, I never knew she-”

“Silence.” Jalel cut the man off, irritation oozing from his voice while the other nobles nearby continued to smirk in silence.  “I am not here for your excuses, mortal.  Bring her out, and do it now.”

The man opened his mouth to reply, but thought better of it; then quickly turned around to yell into the doorway.  “Fay!  Get out here!”

Not long after that, a blue skinned succubus emerged from the depths of the building.  She was wearing a fur robe that covered most of her body, and she had a couple of bruises on her face, but she was certainly the one Jalel had been looking for.

She hesitated next to her new master - only for her attention to be drawn to Dutchess Crushada when the stunning, pale woman stepped forward with an extended hand.

“You do not need to fear that worm, child.” Dutchess Crushada said with a lovely smile, red eyes piercing the succubus as she almost teleported forward due to the sheer speed she had - and slowly touched Fay’s bruised face.  The bruise began to heal, fading away into her skin moments later, and she reached down to take Fay’s hands in her own as the succubus looked up in startled disbelief at the armada floating over the planet.

“Is your name Fay?  Are you the succubus previously bonded to Riven Thane?”  The duchess asked softly.  It was apparent they knew who she was, and the duchess was likely just being polite by asking.

Fay slowly nodded, still shocked at the sight above them.

“Is this man your current master?” The duchess asked, head-bobbing towards the handsome human man on her right.

Fay instinctively cringed in fear when her eyes met Portus’s, but she nodded again.  “Yes.”

“I see.”  The duchess smiled, brushing the white hair out of Fay’s black eyes, and took a step back with hands clasped in front of her.  “We’ve acquired knowledge from a particular information broker that you don’t like the position you’ve landed in, after your rather impulsive decision to leave.  Do you wish to go back to the way things were?”

There was a pause at the noble lady’s question, and Fay’s eyebrows shot up.  “Information broker… was it my mother?”

The dutchess grinned.  “Perhaps.  Regardless of who told us, we are pleased that they did.  Your absence is already impacting Riven’s cultivation by leaps and bounds, you know.  We can’t have our prince constantly depressed because you left, it could have resonating impacts on his progress at this rate.  Would it be alright of us to ask you to come back?  At least until the integration is finished.  This is a request of High Queen Nephridi herself, and she’s put Jalel here in charge of getting you whatever you need until we can contact Riven after his run through the Abyss.”

Fay blinked, then blinked again.  She had a lot of questions about the ‘Abyss’, and concerning the high queen, but one thing stood out above all the others.  Her voice was wavery and hesitant, and a ball began to form in her throat as she spoke.  “You’re saying he misses me?”

“Of course he does.” Duchess Crushada said with a frown, hands clasped together in front of her black and red dress.  Her pale skin contorted with confusion, furrowing her brows.  “You don’t believe he would?  You’re quite silly to think it’d be otherwise.  Ever since you left, he goes through waves of depression that could seriously impact his cultivation.  I won’t go into details but our empire pays Elysium a very high premium in resources in order to watch this little show of his… Let me ask you a question.  Do you love him?”

Fay’s eyes began to glisten as tears formed, and she nodded while biting her lips.  “Yes, but he chose Athela-”

“Do you want to go back?” The duchess cut her off with a dismissive wave of her hand, curiously tilting her head to the side as Jalel rolled his eyes behind her.  “Because we can leave you here if you want to stay.  And don’t believe for one moment that we would waste our time to come out to this backwater planet to get you if you weren’t important to him.  We’d leave you here to rot.  The very fact that we’re here should speak volumes.”

There was a pause.

Fay took in a heavy breath, shuddering as she let it out.  “Does Riven know you’re here?  Did he send you?”

“No.  The queen did.”

Portus lifted his eyebrows slightly, then cleared his throat to speak.  “If I may, perhaps I-”

"Animals don't get to talk unless spoken to."  The duchess lifted a finger and the man’s kneecaps blew off in a spray of blood, causing him to scream and flop onto the ground face first.

She turned her eyes on the man, gesturing to him.  “Guards, take this cow and put him in a cell.  If he withdraws Fay into the nether realms or if he gives her any kind of command at all, start breaking his bones one by one until he learns to settle down.  Keep him alive though, the queen wishes to speak to Fay before we talk to Riven and we need him to temporarily keep the contract intact.”

One of the heavily armored soldiers bearing a polearm nodded, stepped forward and picked the screaming man up by his neck as the man’s compatriots from the stairway gawked.

“The general of House Wraithtide’s forces, the man leading this fleet wishes to speak to you on the flagship.” Dutchess Crushada stated with a quick twist of her hips.  “He’s very eager to meet you.  Please, follow me.  You too Jalel, you’re coming along for the ride whether you like it or not.”

Jalel grumbled at this, but eventually sighed and turned to follow them as Duke Crushada continued to chuckle - patting the younger noble on his shoulder mockingly.

Fay took a look back at the world behind her.  She sniffled and glared at the men in the stairway as they hid like rabbits in the presence of wolves, but she bit back her urge to scream at them for the way they’d let Portus treat her.  It was mostly her fault anyways for allowing herself to bond to a man like this, and the excitement and anxiety she was feeling about potentially meeting Riven again was bearing down on her too much to care about them.  She’d daydreamed about being rescued by him, even despite him being stuck on an integration planet with no way to her, only to have his countrymen travel across the galaxy in a show of force she would have never expected.

What was she going to do, what was she going to say if she met Riven again?  Would he even want to talk to her?  Did he really miss her like they said they did?  Or were these people jumping to conclusions?

She wiped away a tear and her heart skipped a couple beats when she thought about meeting him again.  No, she’d made a mistake by just leaving like she had.  She wanted to at least try to talk to him again, to try to fix things, and perhaps change his mind.  She shouldn’t have just abandoned him and forced him to make a decision like that, she knew it, but being shot down in favor of Athela had been a real gut punch.

She hoped he wouldn’t be mad at her.  Would he tell her to leave?  Would he throw her out?  She hoped he’d take her back as a minion, at least… at least so that she could be around him.  Even if he didn’t want her the way she wanted him, he was kind, and…

And if being with Athela was what made him happy, then so be it.

She still wanted to be in his life.

God the anxiety was building.  Was this infatuation?  She didn’t think so.  Her feelings ran deeper than that, but she would have to do a lot of soul searching after this to really know how to feel before she met him again.

The exquisite transport began to channel energy into the engines on either side of the ship as they boarded, with Fay shooting a quick glance to where her new master Portus had been dragged bodily into a back room with a trail of blood marking his exit.  Taking a seat on a well cushioned couch built into the wall, Jalel folded his arms and rubbed the bridge of his nose.

“Hopefully this little trip was worth it, though I don’t see how that could possibly be the case.” Jalel muttered, glaring at the succubus as the other two nobles sat nearby.  “Utterly ridiculous that I have to do this kind of footwork.”

“Be happy she even left you alive, ingrate.” The duchess spat, shaking her head and focusing back on Fay.  She gestured to Jalel beside her.  “This idiot tried to set Riven up so he could steal the shards of Gluttony Riven possessed.  He’s going to be your servant for the foreseeable future during the time you’re away from Panu, for as long as you’re in our lands - or more specifically, while you’re in the lands of House Wraithtide.  Riven’s house.  The high queen is waiting for you there, for what reason I am not entirely sure - but if I’m honest I think you’re going to be used as a token of goodwill.  I think.  Nothing to worry about.”

“Don’t count on it.” Jalel grumbled while the ship lifted off and the door shut to seal it air-tight.  “She only does things to forward her own agenda, you’re a bargaining tool.  For what is anybody’s guess.”

Thrusters from all around the sky lit up as the armada prepared for travel, and soon their transport was flying amidst dozens of sleeker, sharper looking attack-oriented ships with pilots on high alert to keep the transport safe.  Far above them an enormous, armored battle cruiser - likely the Wraithtide Flagship - was prepping its shields and turning around to leave the atmosphere.

Fay frowned nervously while she watched the planet’s surface fall far below them.  “What’s the high queen like?”

“A raging-”

Jalel’s reply was cut off when Duke Crushada slapped him across the face, then he turned a kind smile on Fay.  “You’ll see soon enough for yourself.  Don’t worry child, you’re going to be fine.  Perhaps you and my daughter will even get along and become friends one day should everything go to plan.  Now, just sit back and relax… and try to ignore the screaming that Portus fellow is doing.  There’ll be a lot of that, again by order of the high queen.”

Meeting the queen of this vampiric empire was certainly not on her list of 'relaxing' things to think about.  Fay paled, but she nodded.   "Where exactly is it we're going now?  I mean, after we get to the flagship?"

"The planet Vartesh." The duke replied, putting his hands behind his head and leaning back into the cushions.  "Also known as Riven's inheritance, or the planetary headquarters of House Wraithtide, a massive trading hub on the outskirts of requiem space.  It'll be a long trip, but it'll be well worth the ride."

***

It was a room with no entrance, but it did have an exit.

Pillars of green stone held up the roof far above Riven’s head.  One moment he’d been making love to Athela, the next he’d found himself in front of the door channeling energy into the runes around the circular dragon sigil.

Now he was here.

“You ok?” Riven asked Athela while helping her up.

She blinked rapidly, looking around and rubbing her eyes in shock.  “Did that weird out of body experience happen to you too?”

“Yeah.”

She frowned.  “Where are the others?”

Riven’s brows furrowed and he turned around to see… everyone else was gone.

He concentrated on his soul link as he began to panic, but that panic quickly died down into relief when he briefly merged his two soul halves again.  Unbinding them and diverting the two halves of his soul again, he let out a breath.  “They’re fine.  Allie, Thale and my other body are somewhere else… they’re in a large temple with a bell.  I think it’s one of the three bells we need to ring, but no one knows why or how.  And this…”

Riven gestured around him to the dark green stone walls decorated with carvings of dragons.  “I don’t know what this is about either.”

As if on cue, a notification answered that question for him.

[Welcome to the Temple of Time.  Permanent key detected: Malignancy.  Temporary key detected: Steadfast.  Key Lacking: Balance.  Find the key of Balance in order to access the central chamber.]

His eyebrow raised and he glanced back up at Athela.  “Malignancy.  Is that talking about my prophecies?  Athela - any idea what this is talking about?”

“I barely know more than you do.” Athela admitted with a shrug.  “But let’s see where this takes us… at least it appears none of the superpowers of this place can follow us here.  It’s likely a tier restricted area… but there’s only one way out it seems.”

She gestured towards the hallway that ended at a right hook.  Grinning, she pulled Riven’s hand into her own.  “As long as the others are fine let's not worry too much.  No need to worry until we're given a real reason to do so.  Want to take a stroll good sir!?”

His lips slowly curled into a smile at the way she popped out her hip, and he rolled his eyes.  “I thought you’d never ask.”