Dragon Gods Reign

[City of the night]

Arriving at their destination a few minutes later, Darganth, Jennia, and Allaire were immediately reminded of Caedmon's castle as they stepped through the large front door.

Behind it, both walls were lined with golems in the form of full sets of plate armor, with one filling each space between the pillars that bulged out from the rest of the wall. Though apart from these, the long hallways stood mostly empty, with the occasional servant being the only vampires their group saw as they made their way through the castle.

“Is the staff just busy or is this castle always this desolate?” Allaire asked as they ascended yet another floor without meeting another living being.

“A combination of both. Crelvic has slightly more servants in his employ than me, but only about the same number who he can trust not to lose control of their impulses. And as his castle is the largest among the vampiric lords by far, something he reminds me and the other of regularly, these already comparatively few servants are spread even thinner today.” Caedmon explained to her.

“The empty district was probably for the same reason?” Allaire inquired further.

“Naturally, any incidents would reflect poorly on me and Crelvic as hosts.” Caedmon said.

While Allaire nodded in response to this, the others were more blunt in showing their thoughts on the matter, only shrugging indifferently or not reacting at all. After all, only few vampires who didn't learn how to control their blood-lust would grow powerful enough to be a threat to any one of them, not to mention that Neandra was with them.

Not surprised by their reactions, Caedmon turned his attention ahead again as they reached the next floor. Looking through the finely decorated corridor that was the first thing to greet them there, he instead focused past the open doorway on its other end and toward their destination.

As he did, a pair of glowing red eyes met his gaze.

Stopping a moment later as Crelvic kept staring at him with piercing eyes, Caedmon quickly stepped to the side to give way for Darganth. And though he raised an eyebrow at the demonstration of authority happening right before his eyes, Darganth wasn't too surprised by it and kept pace undisturbed.

When he stepped past Caedmon, Crelivc's gaze became less intense and shifted from his fellow vampire lord to Darganth.

Frowning as he noticed that the vampire lord still had his bloodsight active, Darganth met his gaze with narrowed eyes. Letting mana flow into his eyes when this wasn't immediately followed by a reaction from Crelvic, he met the latter's bloodsight with his own draconic vision and slowly shook his head in a clear show of his disapproval.

Watching as the vampire lord's facial expression first turned to confusion, then to suspicion before finally becoming one of shock, Darganth soon felt his bloodsight deactivate. Letting his dragon eyes return to their passive state in return, Darganth gave Crelvic a short nod when he stepped into the banquette hall a few seconds later.

“Thank you for following my invitation and please forgive my mistake just now.” The vampire said, rising from his chair at the head of the oval-shaped table.

“We'll forget anything happened. This time.” Darganth answered in an annoyed tone that made it clear that he wasn't willing to overlook something like this a second time.

Nodding with an easygoing smile at the first part, Crelvic's expression froze at the second sentence. Hastily following this up with a more serious confirmation, he assured Darganth that he'd watch out in the future.

“Well, well, well. I had thought that you learned from last time, but it seems that I need to lower my expectations for you.” Neandra said as she stepped into the hall as the last of their group, having had a clear view of the exchange from the corridor.

“What last time?” Crelvic asked in a mix of confusion and annoyance.

“I doubt your bloodsight is regularly found out so just think for a second.” Neandra said mockingly.

For a moment this only added to Crelvic's confusion, with him not recognizing her even though she was still using the same humanoid form that she had transformed into at the last emperor meeting.

But as a few seconds passed, Crelvic remembered the day all those decades ago that Neandra was referring to. Taking a closer look at her for a second as the realization started to dawn on him, he stepped back with a shocked expression once he fully recognized her.

“What are you-? Why are you-? You, here-?” He stammered completely confused.

“See, I told you that you'll remember. So, what do you have to say?” Neandra asked with a threateningly calm smile as she sat down on one of the chairs.

Noticing Crelivic's fear of her, Darganth turned his head toward Neandra with a pleading look.

“Neandra, please.” He asked her.

“I wasn't going to do anything, I was just asking.” She said.

“Yeah, but we won't manage to have a productive conversation if you intimidate him.” Darganth said.

Glancing at him from the corner of her eyes, Neandra wordlessly agreed with him by leaning back with a look of acceptance on her face.

“Thank you.” Darganth said before turning back to Crelvic.

“See, nothing to worry about so we can get on with the original plan.” He said.

“Right, the emperor meeting.” Crelvic said, still nervously glancing at Neandra from time to time.

“I assume her presence here means that she'll be included in the plans we make for it?” He asked a moment later, wanting to be sure.

“Yes.”

Barely reacting to the expected answer, Crelvic motioned for Caedmon to come over while he himself returned to his seat at the head of the table.

“Originally I planned to start by explaining how the current meetings are structured since Batoim hasn't been to them for some time but that doesn't seem to be necessary anymore.” Crelvic said with a nervous smile as he sat down.

“But I was anyways more curious whether you have found something to exchange for the favor Caedmon promised you.” He added.

Thinking about whether he should already commit to the idea he had for a couple of seconds, Darganth ultimately decided to still keep it a secret from Crelvic for now.

“I can't tell you yet, but you'll know what it is when you see it during the closed session part of the day.” Darganth said.

Frowning slightly at the vague answer, Crelvic nonetheless didn't dare complain in Neandra's presence. However, this didn't stop him from coming up with his own conjectures based on the only hint Darganth's answer gave him.

Still, as he had never before participated in the closed session of an emperor meeting, he couldn't come up with much. This was because unlike the opening ceremony and the open session of the meeting where species outside of the big five and even some large organizations were invited, the closed session was reserved for only the emperors, their two respective guards, as well as the neutral arbiter of that year.

“Then I'll look forward to it.” Crelvic said without much enthusiasm.

“Don't worry, I won't immediately demand you follow through with it and instead leave you until a few days after the meeting to answer.” Darganth reassured him.

Nodding somewhat relieved, Crelvic leaned back with a sigh. Seeing this, Caedmon interjected with a question of his own.

“It's more of a question than something to discuss, but you wouldn't happen to need another emperor to take one of you along into the closed meeting as bodyguard, would you?”

“I want to see who will even try to enforce the limit on us, so not really.” Darganth said.

“Why even, do you want to have an excuse to get rid of someone?” Jennia joked.

Watching Caedmon purposefully turn away from her to avoid the question, Jennia only became even more interested in his answer.

“You do.” She exclaimed in surprise.

Sighing, Crelvic interrupted by answering in Caedmon's stead.

“There's a reason why the third member that will be part of our delegation isn't here today. Thorim is part of the subsection of vampires that prefer to grow their power by advancing through the ranks of aura or magic cultivation instead of our innate abilities.

Generally, I wouldn't care, but he uses it to try and argue that if we get an emperor seat, he should be the one to occupy it as I'm barely even in the mythic rank and wouldn't be taken seriously. Sadly that line of thought is widespread among the younger members of our kind as magic and aura allow for faster advancements. For them, he is somewhat of a role model so I can't just exclude him without a good reason as I need his influence if I want my rule to be anything more than an empty title.”

“If it's just that then there are other ways to deal with it if he tries anything, whether during or after the meeting.” Darganth said.

“We'll see. But if that's all, I am done with the major things I wanted to talk about, the rest is just a lot of minor stuff. So unless you still have something we should talk about in this constellation, I would have my servants bring us some food for the remainder of the meeting.” Crelvic said.

Seeing Darganth and the others shake their heads, he did as announced and let the doors spring open with a snap of his fingers.