"Excellent, excellent!" The voice of Bloodbyrn's father jabbed like a knife into her hindbrain. Bloodbyrn jerked, squeaked, and tried to shove her lord off of her. He did not want to go and Lord of Blood help her, she did not want him to go.
Dark aristocracy, however, was much less concerned with self-gratification that the lower classes would assume. Bloodbyrn was well-schooled in self-discipline. Or, more accurately, self-denial. She pushed harder on her lord's broad chest.
Feerborg made some sort of noise against her mouth, reproducible perhaps as "mfphguh!" and jerked away. The gremlin on his head, who had of course witnessed the whole thing, raised a tiny eyebrow at her and smirked. She and Feerborg were no longer locked in embarrassing intimacy when her father, the Duke DeMacabre, parted the curtains.
"All right, everybody. Intermission!"
The Ultimate Fiend looked at her, eyes wide and once-again wholly black. No doubt he was frustrated, poor thing, but such is the nature of existence, that what one wants most is the thing that is most often denied one. For her part, Bloodbyrn could admit to just a touch of annoyance at the interruption, mostly inspired by her curiosity as to what her lord would have done next. However, as the thespians say, the dark and un-holy ritual must go on.
With four crisp clicks of metal, the manacles snapped off Bloodbyrn's ankles and wrists. Smiling at the Ultimate Fiend, who had by this time stopped protesting, she shrugged out of her gown and rose naked from the bed.
Round, soft, girt with curtains, and equipped with the best in modern shackles and manacles, the nuptial bed stood upon an altar plinth of onyx in the center of the Ceremonial Seraglio of the Ultimate Fiend. Being mostly reserved for dark rituals, the room was rather smaller than the Seraglio proper, and of course that larger pleasure chamber lacked the audience seating necessary in this one.
The audience discomfited Bloodbyrn not at all; what sort of Sangboise lady would she be if she were unused to having her Little Deaths observed, commented upon, and graded for style? Dark aristocrats and un-holy men regarded her with suitable expressions of lust and malice as Bloodbyrn parted the curtains and descended from the bed. She passed between the cauldrons of boiling blood and bowed, formally, to her father.
"A most admirable performance, my daughter," Duke Milielan DeMacabre said for the benefit of their audience, "I foresee fury, terror, and offspring of surpassing evil arising from your union."
"I am entirely in concurrence," answered Bloodbyrn as she looked about the chamber. Shadows skittered across the walls as bats, specially imported from the Murderwood of sSt'tdrakh, fluttered around the glowing crystals. Foul-smelling water, condensing from the steam rising from the seething blood cauldrons, dripped down the chains of the machinery in the ceiling. Everything seemed to be in order.
Her father stood ready to play his part, even Prince Feerix looked less mutinous than usual, hair freshly spiked and sneering rather less than was his usual wont. His un-holiness Aman DeSammdie the Bloodless had taken the central place in the triskaidekagram opposite the bed, swinging his knife-tipped censor and chanting in Liturgical Sangboise. Facing him, at the west-ward pointing apex of the sigil, Hafdern Teirgog the Deathless muttered maledictions in Deep Necronomics and clutched a live mouse strung around his neck. Bloodbyrn was unable to appreciate this example of religious syncretism, however, due to the insistent demands of her Soon-to-be-master and lover.
"My lord," she said, turning to the location where Ferrborg struggled in the arms of several of DeSammdie's catamites, "I must entreat you to staunch your obstreperous exertions and reconcile yourself to the agenda of the ritual of which we are a part." That was a very good sentence, and Bloodbyrn made mental note to use it again should the circumstances call for it. Knowing her lord Feerborg, they probably would. "The purpose of this intermission is to raise the sexual tension of the partners, which I am happy to see has been accomplished. Additionally, however, time must now be taken to prepare for the next phase of the ceremony, a process in which I trust you will fully cooperate; let yourself be undressed, anointed, drained of blood, and so forth."
Bloodbyrn turned to her father and spoke over King Feerborg's rising protestations, "Father, shall we not retire and refresh ourselves, you and I, while the un-holy men continue their preparations?"
Father nodded, grinning his usual public mask. "Whatever you wish, my daughter." He turned to King Feerborg, now surrounded by acolytes with forceps, athames, and sangrail chalices. "Do simply attempt to remain patient, my lord! We shan't be a moment."
"Wait!" shouted her Soon-to-be-husband, "you can't leave me with these people! What are those knives for?"
"My lord," soothed Bloodbyrn, "you are larger than me, so even though you are required to give more blood, it should discomfort you less." This excellent advice produced rather opposite the expected reaction to the one she had expected, but Bloodbyrn did not have the leisure at the moment to pursue the matter further before her father stepped in.
"Just visualize my daughter," DeMacabre said. "Imagine the second act, hmm? Plan the thrusts and counter-thrusts—"
"Let us go, father," Bloodbyrn motioned for a catamite to follow her with an athame and sangrail.
She strode toward the door, where there stood the various monsters that one had to employ in Skrea. ssSkreekirkaakh, her companion on her journey across the Bulwarks and one of the more tolerable monstrosities for her acquaintance, gave her a solemn nod from his place on the ceiling, where he clung in usual style. Her ogres did not seem to register her passage, but the captain of the king's guard, Skystarke, watched her and her father's progress with furious and distrustful yellow eyes. Even as she watched the creature's lip pulled back to the lower edge of the nostrils, and a faint hate-filled hiss could be heard to issue from between its crooked fangs. Bloodbyrn did not generally make it a habit to inquire into the personal dispositions of her minions, but as Queen, she would have to deal with this one, should it prove loyal to the King.
Bloodbyrn walked with her father from the Ceremonial Seraglio into the smaller adjoining chamber, of whose purpose Bloodbyrn was not precisely cognizant. However, given the small cot, the manacles, the drainage grate on the floor, and the observation holes in the wall, she felt sure she could hazard a guess.
Bloodbyrn sat on the bed, the catamite scuttling past him to present her with the ceremonial athame and sangrail.
"Do not hand the chalice to me, imbecile," she snapped at the servant in Sangboise, "Hold it while I bleed into it."
She made the incision on her inner thigh, near, but much more professionally made than the cut placed there by her lord. Had he known the symbolism, or had he chosen by chance the most erotic of the 39
Blessures Majores
?
"You do not hesitate, daughter." DeMacabre commented as the life fluid began to drip into the chalice in the catamite's hands, "you do not wonder what vein or artery you should part for this, the final cut of your un-subjugated life?"
Bloodbyrn smiled indulgently up at her father. "You have never been a little girl. Oh the hours we used to spend in the dormitory of the academy, discussing from where we would draw the blood for our nuptial rites…" her smile faded as her voice trailed off.
"Indeed," said her father, his eyes on the hunched back of the servant. "My child, I know the Ultimate Fiend is…not what you expected, but…"
"That is enough," Bloodbyrn spoke to the catamite as she placed her thumb over the incision. "Go now, and anoint my lord with my heart's blood, that the ritual of Engenderation may proceed."
Once the boy had sidled out, she said, "You wish to speak of my Soon-to-be-un-husband, father?"
In response, Duke DeMacabre raised his hands, flicking his athame forth and slicing open his palm in a single practiced movement. Blood streamed sideways from the cut, and as if caught in a high wind, it swirled about them, effervescing into a fine red mist, which settled into a sphere about their heads. Bloodbyrn felt those tiny droplets resonate with in consanguinity she shared with the last living member of her family.
The vaporized blood began to vibrate in the air, producing a buzzing red noise that would foil any listening spies. "I know this King Feerborg is not what you expected," her father continued when he was sure their speech could not be overheard."But I think, no, I know, that he will be good for you."
"Of course he will be good for me." Bloodbyrn pressed her hand to the wound on her thigh as her blood-magic knitted the flesh back together, "Do you doubt I can make my lord do whatever it is I wish of him?" Self-ministration done, she looked back up at her father, who nodded.
"Your manipulations so far have left nothing at all to be desired. I do not remonstrate you, daughter, I merely express my filial devotion."
Bloodbyrn supposed it was not so unusual for one's father to be patronizing, after all, and she responded politely enough. "One could wish for a man of more predictable temperament."
Her father chuckled. "Predictability in early marriage leads to complacency in middle marriage and boredom in late. Without a liberal dash of chaos, your mother and I would, ah, well we would not have remained together as long as we did." He stopped for a moment, obsessed, she knew, by a memory no less poignant for its age, and no less bitter. "Ah well. In any case, I believe our lord's erratic nature is one of his few positive traits. Like a cockroach scuttling about the abattoir floor, he has proved most difficult to squash."
"In so far as that skill allows him to confuse our enemies, it benefits us," Bloodbyrn admitted. "It only means I must step on him with all the greater force."
DeMacabre smiled. "I know you can, my most poisonous flower. I wish only to—"
There was a knock at the door and catamite entered again. This was one of the servants tasked to drain the blood of the Ultimate Fiend, and Bloodbyrn could tell all was not going well with that assignment. Someone seemed to have struck this boy with some force on the left temple. In trembling pale fingers, he held out a sangrail.
DeMacabre looked into it and shook his head. "This will not do at all. There is not enough blood here to anoint my daughter's front, let alone her back. Go you extract at least this much again."
"He complains…most forcefully, dark lord and lady," the servant whined.
"Tell him to cease his contumacion," Bloodbyrn said. "Have you reminded him of the volume of his blood relative to my own? I thought that was an excellent argument in favor of compliance."
"I-I have done so, dark lady, but he seems…singularly unmoved," said the catamite, trembling, "The Ultimate Fiend said—I paraphrase here to avoid your wrath, dark lady—he said that your glorious and sweetly tender body has much more practice at bloodletting, belonging as it does to a blood-magic-wielding sorceress of much marvelous and terrible power."
Bloodbyrn raised an eyebrow, "did he now?" She sighed. "Then make it clear to him that if he forces
me
to oversee the process, he will lose more than merely blood."
The catamite bowed and left them with the half-empty sangrail. Bloodbyrn fancied she heard shouts from the adjoining room.
"I admire your confidence, little one," said DeMacabre after the servant had left, "but humor your old father when he reviews some details in these last moments of anticipation before the act itself."
"Hardly the last, father." Bloodbyrn dipped her fingers into the sangrail. "We have several ceremonies to overcome before the final act." She frowned with concentration. The rite of Engenderation, by which a man and woman used blood-magic to control the inception of a child, was not a simple spell, but it was subtle and powerful. Skilled practitioners could use the technique to select everything from the gender of their future offspring to its political predilections to its taste in deserts. As any Sangboise would say, therein lay the secret behind the strength, intelligence, and beauty of the people of their nation. Critics pointed out the unusually high instance of roaring insanity among Sangboise, but everyone makes mistakes at the best of times. Of course at the time of the spell's casting, the participants would not be doing anything that aided concentration.
No process can for long remain opaque to determined mental effort, however, and Bloodbyrn was fully confident in her mastery of the technique.
"Pah." DeMacabre waved a languid hand, "I foresee no major obstacles there. Teirgog the Hafdern priest of the First God may make his play tonight. He would be a fool not to, but I could not prevent his attendance at the un-wedding of the Ultimate Fiend, after all…hmm. m-But let us focus not on details, but on the grand scheme."
"My part in that is small enough." With deft fingers, Bloodbyrn applied her lord's blood to herself, beginning with the power nexus around her belly and loins, then moving outward in concentric patterns of swirled lines.
"Small but essential." DeMacabre smiled at her as she traced the blood swirls over her left arm. "Only you can ensure the final act of tonight's little performance results in an heir, after all."
"A pregnancy and a male embryo," Bloodbyrn summarized succinctly. "I have prepared myself and I am fully cognizant of the spells and rituals. I have no doubt at all that tonight will give us the outcome we desire."
Next she painted the focusing gyre over each breast, not that her lord needed magical assistance to draw his attention to that portion of her anatomy.
"I have no doubt of it, either, child. Are you sure the navel vortex is even? It seems lopsided to me.
"It is not lopsided." Bloodbyrn completed a loop. "So. I will become pregnant with the heir of the Ultimate Fiend, and as his first conquest, I can ensure that this heir will enjoy a distinct competitive advantage over any other children my lord might have, as well as over their mothers. In the normal course of events, that is."
Bloodbyrn closed her mouth at the sound of footsteps outside the room and a knock. The door opened to reveal the same suffering catamite. The sangrail he held contained even less blood than the last one, but from the look on his face, it was clear Bloodbyrn would get not more from her lord unless she carried out her threat and extracted it herself.