THESE CELESTIAL BODIES (Demetre)

Chapter sixteen

"Ra's own masterpiece. What is it like to conquer?
Broken boy
Fearless man
What is it like to burn her?"

Kara Saemos slammed the doors to her father's meeting room. She'd been called upon suddenly, she disliked having to travel so far for a simple meeting. Her face was of ice and steel. Her father merely glanced up at her arrival and returned to lounging by the fire. Strange to see a vampyre by a fire, they were not immune to it. Kara's seething expression abated when she noticed Astaroth slouching opposite her father. Her vampiric senses immediately snapped into place.
     'Father,' she knelt, suddenly remembering herself.
     'Daughter,' her father motioned for her to rise. She approached her father's chair, weary of Astaroth glaring at her from behind, and offered her hand for her father to kiss. 'I have missed your company in these walls.'
     Truthfully, she hated their home. It was barren and dark, empty. Her mother made this place a home, if vampyrs even had homes. A part of Kara will never forgive her father for selling her to the brothels once he had bred her like an animal. 'Is there a reason you summoned me?' she asked, keeping her voice light. She had better things to worry about, like how to get Dean to accept her as his claim. He was being a nuisance.

'The girl that your future husband has taken as his pet,' Astaroth sat up and the shoulder of his shirt slipped off. If Kara could blush, she would have. The lord was nude beneath. 'How is she?'
     Her father summoned her all the way out here for this? An interrogation? 'I thought I told you I'd return with information once I had it.'
     Balderik squeezed her fingers to the point of breaking. 'Mind your tongue, you useless girl.'
     Kara pressed her lips into a thin line and turned back to Astaroth. 'I fear Dean has grown to care for the mortal. Just yesterday, he invited her into his observatory so he might teach her of our history.'
     Astaroth's face hardened. It was not what he wanted to hear, it seemed. Kara would be lying if she was not struck by Rose's beauty, that day on the courts, she saw her blood red hair and amber eyes and sick fury rolled in her stomach. Kara was born a fucking Wite, she was born to seduce, to be beautiful, and yet that mortal somehow had Dean's attention without any supernatural powers. With her arched neck and freckled skin, she was lovely. She'd love to gauge out her eyes.
     Astaroth stood quickly. 'I'll take care of her. All you have to do is be ready to take your crown.'
     'What are you doing to do to her?'
     'What do you want me to do to her?'
Kara's shoulders squared at the sheer ruthlessness in the lord's voice. Cold and predatory. What else could she do? If she wanted to become the Queen of Flesh, she needed to pave the way. 'I want her head on a spike,' Kara said. 'I want her burned to ashes.'

Astaroth's smile was wicked and vile.

~

Rose's fist collided with Ekki's bare cheek. She ducked just in time to avoid a hit to her teeth. Beyond them, Rhazien was throwing out orders like they were on the battlefield.
     'You're keeping too much weight on your right side, Ekki could—'
     Her back slammed against the hard floor and hollowed air pushed from her lungs.
     'Knock you down,' Rhazien sighed.
Rose squinted up to the sky and glared at Ekki's smirk. The three of them have been at it for days, part of her classes, apparently. Rose couldn't help but think they just wanted to teach her to fight to test a mortal's strength. She was glad of the distraction, though.
     Rose took Ekki's outstretched hand and pulled herself up. A thud landed to her left, Rhazien strode towards them with a shrug. 'Not bad but you'd be dead in battle.'
     'Good thing I'm not going to be in a battle any time soon,' she grumbled.
     'Are you sure you don't want to try the Rhygar again?'
Rose's gaze slid to the white staff leaning on a rock behind her. It was a gift from Meredith, a light staff, one capable of challenging her power into offensive attacks. They tried to use it a few times in their sessions, but she had no control, she couldn't channel her power into it for a narrow strike. It was like a toddler acting on its own accord. Unfocused, Meredith has clipped. She was unfocused. And no one knew why, the only person who did was the last person she wanted to interact with.