Cathedral

Frozen Sea, 1873. The forgotten cathedral.

The place was old; the air inside was thin but clean. Light, which was rare because of the grey sky, struggled through the high, narrow windows of stained glass.

Conall Winfield stood at the head of a long black table. It reflected the ceiling above, making it seem as if they were all in a dark, cold sky.

Conall had a smile on his face. His hair was black again, and his eyes calm.

Around the table sat the other lords.

Lord Albescu, a man in a poorly tailored suit, leaned forward on the table.

Besides him, Lord Morvai, a slender and tall man. Mimicking his senior, he also leaned.

Those two were the new blood of their respective families, so when they saw a change, they were also eager to understand why and what was going to happen next.

Then there was their eldest: Lord Varnhame. He was ancient, his skin already beginning to fall. He didn't lean forward; he sat perfectly still, his hands resting on the table. His eyes were patient, looking over the hall.

There was an empty seat for the last vampire family, but they, having their own trouble, didn't come for today's meeting.

On the other side of the hall stood the chairs of the human families. They were all empty, busy with their problems, not caring about futile vampire issues. However, there was one human.

Gilbert Bradforde Froste sat apart from the main table, lounging on a simple stone chair near a grand pillar as if the very concept of joining their politics was physically repulsive.

He was the sole representative of the human kingdom. This was not an oversight. But a profound arrogance.

The human king could have sent a delegation of diplomats and knights. That would have been an invitation to negotiate. Instead, he sent a living weapon. A sage.

The message to the vampire lords was simple and brutally clear: we do not need to talk. We have him. This meeting is merely the courtesy we extend before we consider erasing you.

Conall knew this. He had realized it sooner than everyone else. For now, Gilbert looked bored, his blue eyes drifting lazily from the intricate carvings on the ceiling to the shifting patterns of light on the floor. He hadn't looked at a single vampire since he'd arrived.

The time was right. Everyone stood silent, so Conall broke it.

"My lords," he began. His voice filled the hall. "I thank you for answering my call on such short notice. We gather today under a shadow that was cast by human hands."

He paused, letting everyone hear his words. Albescu's grin widened, but he said nothing. Morvai shifted in his seat.

"The Duke of Nerton is dead." Conall continued his commanding tone, "Executed. Not by a rival, not by a beast or plague, but by a so-called sage of the Froste family. And the worst part? He was a human, one of their own. They shattered a bridge without a thought, not even informing us about what they are doing in Nerton, a place where our people live. Aren't we their supposed partners in this 'Great Truce'?"

He began to walk slowly along the side of the table. His footsteps echoed.

"They say he was doing illegal work behind the scenes and called it justice. But I see a message; I call it an execution of our peace. For decades, we have honored this truce. We have remained in our shadows, policed our own, and allowed humanity to fester and grow, believing their myth of dominance. And what has it earned us?"

He stopped behind Lord Albescu's chair, placing a hand on its high back. "It has earned us complacency. It has earned us this...quiet death. They break our agreements, and we say nothing. They let their people hunt our kind in the cities, and we call it 'Mistakes.' They build entire orders of mages sworn to our destruction, and we call it security."

His voice was even higher, full of passion that moved the hearts of any vampire watching. "And now, the final insult. My own father, Lord Winfield, was assassinated. Slain in his own home. And who do the humans and our timid council name as the culprit? An unknown boy. A nobody. A story they feed us to hide the truth. They are getting ready, and one day they will point a sword at all of our throats."

Lord Albescu slammed a fist on the table. The sound echoed through the hall: "He speaks the truth! The human families have grown too bold! They see us as animals, not as equals."

Lord Morvai, joining in, added, "The peace is just a cage at this point. We are fighters, yet we starve ourselves while they grow fat and arrogant."

Conall saw the fire catch in their eyes. And put a smile on his face. He returned to the head of the table, his expression changing to one of sadness.

"This is why I have called you. Not to mourn my father, but to act and use it as fuel. The time for hiding, pretending the world is not changing, is over. I propose a war council. All the families unified. We must strike first. We must remind the world of who we are. We must remind them why their ancestors didn't go out at night."

His gaze moved across the room. "We must show them a war before they drag us into a slow, grinding extinction. Under one leader, we can do this."

He didn't need to say his own name; the implication was already there.

Albescu and Morvai were practically full of excitement. They saw it, a new order where they don't need to hide anymore. A chance for glory and power they could never achieve with the old Winfield. They were ready to pledge their swords, their houses, and their very blood to this cause.

But then a dry voice cut through the very thoughts of the lords.

"A truly inspiring oration, Lord Conall."

All eyes turned to Lord Varnhame. He hadn't moved a muscle, but his eyes were fixed on Conall.

"You wear your father's title with… remarkable confidence for one so recently assigned." Varnhame's words were calm. "And your rise to this moment of crisis is, if you will permit an old man his insight. Remarkably convenient."

Conall's smile didn't change, but his look toward Varhame did. "Convenience, Lord Varhame? What do you mean?"

Varhame let out a slight sigh. "I have lived for many centuries. I have learned that when a simple answer presents itself for a complex problem, it is often a lie. A boy appears from nowhere, is granted your father's trust, and then my old friend is dead. And you, his son, a boy who has never left his family's mansion, suddenly possess the wisdom and ambition to unite us all for a war that would break a peace that has served our kind for hundreds of years."

Varnhame leaned forward. His movement is slow. "Tell me, young Lord. This "unknown boy" who killed your father… And the forbidden knowledge the Duke of Nerton was dabbling in... Both of their origins are a mystery. Do you not find it strange that such potent unknown forces have emerged in our world at the very moment you are poised to benefit from the chaos they create?"

The air was cold. Varnhame didn't make an accusation. He had simply asked a question. Albescu and Morvai both looked uneasy, doubt starting to be planted in them.

Apart from them all, Gilbert finally showed a sign of interest. His bored gaze had been drifting aimlessly, but at Varnhame's words, it stopped. He still wasn't listening to the politics, not really. The squabbles of these filth-born creatures were less interesting than the life cycle of a fly. But his supernatural senses picked up on something else entirely.

His eyes drifted to Conall; the boy was powerful. Unnaturally so, he was more powerful than all the lords here combined. Yet Gilbert knew that he himself didn't know that; the power felt tainted even beyond that of a normal night creature.

Then his gaze slid past the lords to a servant standing in line with the others, behind Vernhame's seat.

A young man with red eyes, dressed in the plain grey livery of House Varnhame. There was something off about him. A strange scent, not quite vampire, not quite undead, but an unsettling fusion of the two.

It was the same smell he sensed by the river in Nerton. Near him was a girl with bronze hair pulled back into a low ponytail. While they looked normal on the outside, their heart rate was faster than anyone else here.

Gilbert's lips twitched into a hint of a smile. This was getting a bit less boring. A boy who's about to start a war, and two anomalies who don't seem to be what they are.

He leaned his head back against the cold stone pillar and closed his eyes, content to simply observe for now. He had one job here. His orders were simple. If this meeting concluded with a declaration of war or any other outcome deemed hostile to human interests, he was to kill everyone in the room. It was simple.

He hoped it would come to that. It would be more interesting than listening to the talk.

Conall smiled and started preparing his rebuttal to Varnhame's questions.

However, the old Varnhame fell back into his chair. "Let's all have a drink, shall we? On me."

The servants and maids behind Varnhame moved along the table. Eden, who was one of them, filled the goblets with the deep red wine.

She walked back after finishing and reached where I stood in my servant's attire. She looked at me.

And her eyes met mine. Then I nodded, understanding what she meant.

I moved away.

"Lord Varnhame," Conall's voice continued. He was smiling again. "You talk about me hiding something, but you are the one hiding, aren't you? Hiding behind centuries of peace that have rotted the strength from our people. You see a convenient story because you lack the courage to see the simple, brutal truth."

He pointed a finger at Lord Varnhame. "The humans are coming for us. I am not the cause of this crisis. I am the one who is trying to save us. And you can either stand with the future or be buried with the past."

The hall was silent; tension was even more apparent than before.