Chapter 11: The Hardest Choice

The theater was dark, except for the stage lamps that illuminated the actors. Their costumes were expertly crafted and their lines well-rehearsed. Their sharp fangs and red eyes gleamed as they sang in elvish in a masterful performance of Ladraeicus’s opera, The Ashen Tree. The audience was full of fellow ghouls, guests staying in the Andromeda estate. Up above their heads, in a private balcony, Lupin sat with Andromeda. She had invited him for another outing beyond his room so that he might enjoy some classic dramaturgy. However, he also knew how much she enjoyed seeing him squirm.

Here, above a legion of Profane, he felt less like an opera attendee and more like a worm on a hook, with a school of ravenous fish ready to devour him. They would never dare attack while he was in Andromeda’s custody, but he could sense their bloodlust. Every time one of them looked at him, he could see the hunger in their eyes. It was an unnerving feeling to be surrounded by people who wanted nothing more than to peel the flesh from his bones and feed on his entrails. More than the simple fact that he was human, they’d all love the chance to dine on royalty, even if he tasted no different from a commoner.

According to Andromeda, most of these ghouls—human, dwarf, and even some elves—were the ones who chose to go into the long sleep, and wait until the world had dropped its guard. The others were those who stayed awake, spending the centuries living in hiding and feeding on those whose absence would go unnoticed, all to maintain the lie that the Profane had gone extinct while keeping a vigil. However, not all of them lived so covertly. Like Ragar, plenty of ghouls were garbed in the clothes of aristocrats, having hidden in the shadow of Uther and Vandheim’s nobility to gather food and information.

“Are you enjoying the show?” Andromeda whispered.

“Very much. Your actors and actresses are masters of their craft,” Lupin replied, having to maintain a civil guise. He couldn’t help but imagine Aithorn’s reaction to hearing his native language sung by the Profane. That said, it was honest praise. Despite his situation, he could appreciate the work and expertise that went into the performance.

“They should be. They have centuries of experience.”

“I can’t believe you have peerage just to perform plays and operas for you.”

“As it stands, I have more peerage than any other Profane alive. Of course, I would assign some the duty of keeping me entertained, on top of their other chores. I imagine you had something similar in Colbrand?”

“Yes, the royal palace has an opera hall like this. When I was young, my mother made sure I was well-versed in all thespian works. She believed that a king should be a scholar first, a politician second, and a warrior third. A king who did not value the arts and culture did not understand the nation he was supposed to protect.”

“A woman after my own heart. How did she die?”

Lupin glanced at Andromeda, wondering if that was a legitimate question. Though she often seemed genuinely focused on being a kind, accommodating host, her Profane side would act up from time to time when she spoke with him. The look on her face told him she was waiting for an answer, but not why.

“She died in childbirth, delivering my brother.” He then paused, trying to hold back the words he had never told anyone before. “Ever since then, immersing myself in the plays and stories we both loved was the only way I could feel close to her.”

“I admire those feelings. The ghouls below us, they’re mostly attending because they’re bored and have nothing else to do. They see such things as being below them. They’re so blinded by the cause, by their superiority over the mortals, that they are ungrateful for all that they give us. Art is what gives color to the world.”

“But what color can exist in the darkness of a Profane world?”

Andromeda looked at him, but said nothing. As Lupin watched the play, Nell was with Helena, whimpering with her face buried in a pillow as she was vigorously finger-blasted, with Helena relishing her familiar’s weak little voice.

“My, my, you’re so insatiable tonight. Normally, you just take it like bitter medicine, but you’re suddenly so eager. What changed?”

“I need more power. I need to get stronger for Lupin.”

“Oh, really?” Helena asked, biting her lip. She then slapped Nell on the ass and spread her cheeks, relishing the sight of Nell’s brown eye winking at her. She buried her tongue in her desperate servant’s back door, making Nell shudder from the sinful sensation, all while she continued fingering her pussy. After a minute, she pulled away and spanked Nell again. “And where is this sudden lust for power coming from?”

“It’s so that I can ... eeeeh!” Nell whined as she felt Helena’s fingers penetrate her ass and begin sliding back and forth with sadistic speed. “So ... that ... I ... can ... help ... him! Aah!” She soon cried out as she was brought to climax, the first time ever from having her ass played with. She then shuddered as she felt Helena remove her fingers.

“He’s been so disheartened since he dined with Mistress Andromeda. The fiend who murdered his father walks these halls, and it’s reopened the wound in his heart. My succubus powers are too weak for me to help him. I can put him to sleep, but barely scratch the surface of his mind. If I were stronger, I know I could go in and take the pain away, just carve it right out of him. I could take away everything that hurts him and give him nothing but happiness. For that, I need more power.”

While licking her fingers clean, Helena sat back on the bed. “Fun as this is, a simple romp with me won’t give you power like that. Even feeding on other men won’t do it. To be honest, when I turned you, I gave you as little venom as possible, barely a drop. At full strength, you barely compare to Duska when she’s starving and exhausted. If you want power, it’ll require a different method.”

“Like what?”

“A parasite.”

“I thought those were just for turning the unturned?”

“Not always. Curcio is working on parasites that can augment our powers. My own Leanne had one applied to her and was able to penetrate the minds of the most powerful elves in the west. I know we have one or two prototypes waiting in stasis that we might try.”

Nell bowed before her. “Thank you, Mistress! You are too kind!”

“Don’t thank me yet.” Helena turned around and spread her cheeks for Nell. “Not until you put that tongue of yours to work.

The opera soon finished, and the philistines in attendance gave a half-hearted applause. Andromeda and Lupin exited their balcony through a door into a corridor, where Harrigan was waiting.

“Did you enjoy the performance, Mistress?”

“Exemplary, as always.”

“Wonderful. Now, allow me to escort Prince Lupin back to his room.”

“No need, Harrigan. I’ll do it myself.” This surprised both Lupin and Harrigan, though they were both skilled in maintaining stoic appearances.

“As you wish, Mistress.”

Harrigan stepped aside, and Andromeda walked the halls with Lupin behind her, leading him to his room with all Profane standing at attention as she passed. They reached Lupin’s moonlit room, and she opened the door.

“Thank you for the wonderful evening, madam,” said Lupin with a nod before stepping into his room. He expected her to close it behind him, but instead, she entered after him. “What are you—?” She put her finger to his lips to silence him.

“Join us, Lupin. Become one of the Profane.”

He sighed in annoyance and turned away. “After everything you people have done to me, everything you’ve taken away, you would ask me such a thing? Is there no limit to your cruelty?”

“I’m not asking you to be cruel. I’m asking because I think it would be best for you.”

“How would your unholy corruption be what’s best for me?”

“Becoming a Profane isn’t simply about corruption; it’s about preservation. You are granted more than just power to throw around on the battlefield, but immunity to the ravages of aging and disease.”

“I have watched the people I trusted, the people I cared about, turn into monsters I could no longer recognize. The woman I loved looks at me like food and has lost the will to face reality. The friend who had become like a brother to me in Welindar killed his own comrades and laughed because he was drunk on power. They wanted to turn me too, but how could I let them, after seeing what they became?”

“Because they loved you. Do you really not understand that? They didn’t want you to die. We Profane live for hundreds, possibly even thousands of years, but you will wither away in a few short decades. They saw you as someone worth preserving, someone too good for the life of a mortal.”

“And is that what you want? Or are you simply after the Wassengel? You and your kind want to corrupt it as well, and turn it into a weapon that will unleash unspeakable horrors upon the world. If I give in, if I let you use me to seize its power, the first thing you’ll do is annihilate Uther.”

“I do not crave death and destruction. I do not seek the annihilation of anyone, but their assimilation.” Andromeda walked over to a vase sitting on a nearby table and picked it up. “I am a collector, Lupin. Art, history, people; I collect them all because they are worth preserving. Within these walls, everything I hold dear to me is protected from the chaos of the outside world. I fight against entropy, just as you do.” She dropped the vase and it shattered on the floor. “This world and its beauty are such fragile things, weak and short-lived, but a Profane world will endure, as will its citizens. We can remake it. We can end the pattern of suffering and strife that afflicts so many. Picture it, Lupin, a united world free of war and chaos.”

“Noah once told me that there is no such thing as chaos. He told me that chaos is merely a definition of order we happen to disagree with. Maybe you do seek peace and the preservation of what you consider beautiful, but while you’ve hidden yourself within your mansion and dreamed of a perfect Profane world, your allies have been spreading the chaos you seek to end. They burn, slaughter, and desecrate, driven by bloodlust and madness. They feed on the suffering of mortals like me, seeing us as nothing more than food and playthings. A world of life and sunlight—that is chaos in their eyes, and they want to replace it with the silence of death.”

“Every great transition involves great pain. Is our conquest really so much different than yours? When you took Welindar, you enslaved the populace under the flag of your nation. You spoke to them of wanting to make the city and its people a part of Uther, of wanting to make them citizens, but at the end of the day, all you did was rob them of their autonomy and force citizenship upon them while your men plundered their land for resources. How many beastmen were bound in chains and sold into bondage because of you? How many had their freedom stolen to satiate the hunger of your nation?”

“But you stole their souls. You talk about chains, but what about those parasites forced onto them, twisting them into mindless abominations? I know what happened in those labs. I know the madness your kind inflicted on them under the guise of power, and that madness will destroy everything in its path, even you. A Profane world cannot function. Deep down, you must know that.