Vertus State
By K. M. Mayville
VERTUS STATE
Copyright © 2021 K. M. Mayville
All rights reserved. This book or parts thereof may not be reproduced in any form, stored in any retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or otherwise) without prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews, promotional material, advertising, and certain other uses as permitted by copyright law.
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Cover artwork by ©Placeit:
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First Edition 15MAR21
Disclaimer(s):
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to persons—artificial, divine, living, dead, or undead—businesses, companies, events, or locales is coincidental.
Do not attempt any spells, incantations, magical tethers, curses, or wards contained herein without properly registering with your local Circle of Magi.
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
To all the space vamps out there
It is two-hundred years after the Prey Wars. Mankind lays divided between the territories of victorious vampiric monarchs and their unliving lords. The lords play as stewards to their living lesser—some ruling men through fear, others through a tense symbiosis. No matter their means, the strength of a land's court is oft determined by its lord's appointed vassals.
Vampires that can survive the sun's wrath and influence the minds of men—vassals are at the mercy of their maker’s unbreakable commands. Their loyalty is guaranteed, for ancient, invisible forces ensure mutual harm will meet the vassal, should any ill fate befall their liege.
To betray one's lord as a vassal is to betray one's self.
Contents
Perfect Vassals
Deserter
A Tiny Life
Ribs and Hatred
Loyalty Through Time
Roots in Blood
Comedians and Poets
Afterlife Nazirite
Wasted Time
Bedroom Voice
Acknowledgements
Perfect Vassals
Sebara
Misha gave Lord Deutran a smile that warmed the nervous chill wrapped about her heart. He gently handed her a saucer and cup and poured her a helping of red tea. With a flick of his wrist, he revealed a small biscuit and garnished the side of the cup with it. She gave him a polite nod in return and took a tentative sip of the brew. Pleased with his timing, she gave him a small salute with the cup and set the tea aside for the moment. Through their psychic link, she told him, “Don’t treat Lord Castello to the same. She’s difficult enough whole. It’ll be impossible to negotiate a trade deal if she’s been turned into a puddle.”
“Treat her the same? Is she worth all the rubies this world has to find?” Misha asked innocently, his face glazing over into a mask of expectant neutrality. “You should be more honest with yourself, Lord. Don’t tell me you’d be jealous if I showed her some undo attention.”
“I believe I’m entitled to any jealousy if you show her any undo anything, Misha.” She passed a hand down her dress, flattening its creases across her lap. “Where do you suppose she’s gone?”
She knew this was just the first of many obstacles Lord Castello would put in their way to test their temperaments. Lord Castello was about to discover that Lord Deutran was good at one thing if nothing else: waiting. She had the kind of patience that only comes with having lived for more than two-thousand years—a patience built on a glacial sense of time and its inexorable passage. Misha, her first and eldest vassal, was nearly her equal when it came to standing-by, but his attitude tended towards mischief in its idleness where hers more often cooled into passive aggression.
Misha brushed some long, gossamer strands back from her neck, but when she turned her face towards him, he was standing at rest behind her chair, a purely professional expression on his face. His eyes met hers for the briefest of moments and he thought, “She might be in the hall for all we know… Maybe you should extend a linking invitation? I’d love a peak behind the cover of her mind myself.” He sent her a hint of voyeurist’s lust that suggested a racy alternative to waiting that, in his eyes, seemed far more productive than speculating about the other lord’s intent.
“Mind your manners,” Lord Deutran whispered as a hint of a smile tugged at her lips. “Never know if someone’s listening in, Treasure.”
Over her shoulder, she saw that Misha couldn’t help smirking to himself, and he chortled at her silently. “Of course, Lord,” he said out loud, his tone dry and lifeless. “Wouldn’t want to give the king something to mull over,” he thought, trying to provoke her.
It didn’t work, but only because Lord Castello chose that moment to finally arrive into her own receiving parlor. She was tailed by three of her dozen vassals. Lord Castello herself was a tall, well-built woman with curves in all the right and wrong places. She reminded Lord Deutran of an upside-down pear in a way. She had a sizable bust and mile-long legs, but her purposefully tailored bustle and gown disguised the fact that her ass wasn’t nearly as wide as her hips insinuated.
“Nobody’s perfect,” Misha reminded her internally. “Well, besides you.”
“Focus,” she told him.
“You.”
Lord Castello’s bronze-skinned, elfish features and naturally wavy blonde hair set her apart from her native-looking vassals. She had not come from the lands she ruled over now. She had the look of an old southern American, too long for the sun. In contrast, the three male vassals at attention were pale, dark-eyed Rheinlanders.
One of the three came forward and adjusted the tea table so that Lord Castello could sit comfortably. The two lords greeted each other in the traditional way. Lord Deutran, the guest, touched two fingers to her lips first. Fanged vampire, the gesture revealed. Lord Castello mirrored her gesture with only one finger. A disgraced vampire, missing a fang. The fact that she did not lie about her condition endeared Lord Deutran to her. She almost excused the other for her blatant tardiness.
“Forgive my delay,” Lord Castello said sweetly, but she didn’t offer an excuse. She probably didn’t have one, or she had long ago accepted herself as a terrible liar.
“Forgiven,” Lord Deutran said, taking up her tea cup. “I appreciated the refreshments in the meanwhile.”
“Good, good,” Lord Castello said. She snapped at one of her vassals and one of the triplets came forward and poured her a cup of tea. She snapped again and one of the other vassals slit his wrist and drained a small amount into the cup. With a third snap, the cup was placed in her outstretched hand and she downed the concoction with a shiver. She didn’t bother to wipe the trickle of brown from her red lips as she tossed the cup over one shoulder and one of her vassals automatically caught it.
With each snap, Lord Deutran winced. It was an unnecessary gesture. Lord Castello could have simply commanded her vassals with thought alone, but she had them trained like dogs. The behavior was unsightly. Lord Deutran was as old-school as a lord could get. Lord Castello’s behavior belied a stark sense of entitlement and disregard that Lord Deutran could barely abide.
Misha’s voice was a pleasant balm in her mind as he psychically said to her, “Careful, Mon Chere. You’re not this girl’s mother. She’s a young lord, not even four centuries old. She has no inkling of the wa
rs our kind have survived. She has no sense of what we once were. Give her the benefit of her youth and make your case before you lose her interest. Maybe wiggle something shiny and loud at her.”
He was right of course. Lord Deutran said, “I suppose you will want to dispense with pleasantries?”
Lord Castello gave her a surprised look. Unlike Deutran, her face was an animated and lively visage. She then grinned, flashing a silver fang in her direction. “Oh, Darlin’ Deutran, pleasantries are what I live for! Should we establish a link?”
Although it would have made communication that much easier, Lord Deutran recoiled from the idea of having the vampire anywhere near her psychic privates. She inclined her head and said, “That won’t be necessary. I believe—”
“You have somethin’ to hide, Lord?” Lord Castello wasn’t accusing her, only teasing, but the soft jabbing did not warm Lord Deutran’s cooling opinion toward the made of Kassas.
“No. I simply wouldn’t want you to be offended by my vassal’s comments,” Lord Deutran lied. Misha mentally laughed at her, but externally, he could have been an unliving statue.
“Oh! Understandable,” Lord Castello conceded. “I’ll admit my lil’ creatures have a habit of lettin’ their thoughts go wild as well.” She grinned then, finding something kindred between them that was to her liking, evidently. She leaned forward in her seat and asked, “What is his name, if you don’t mind my askin’? I’m curious. I’ve never seen his like.”
“You won’t have,” Lord Deutran assured her. “You may call him Vassal Misha.”
“Misha,” Lord Castello said slowly, dragging his name out as she sat back in her seat, spreading her knees wide. She nodded to herself as she looked over Lord Deutran’s escort and said, “He looks Greek to me. Where’d you get him?”
Lord Deutran took a sip of her tea and bid Misha silently, “Why don’t you tell her all about it, Mo Chuisle?”
Misha gave her an irritated feeling that made her skin crawl. She could relate. But he relented and addressed the lord of North Rhein. “Lord Castello, if I may?”
“Oh, you’ve got a bedroom voice! You may do whatever the hell you want to, Vassal Misha of Cairn-over-Merda,” Lord Castello purred. Despite the formal address, her tone perverted the verbiage, making Lord Deutran grit her teeth.
Misha didn’t miss a beat, however. He’d been dealing with lecherous creatures since the birth of Nero. “Thank you,” he began. “You might be familiar with plastic surgery?”
“I’m familiar,” Lord Castello said neutrally. Lord Deutran had the sneaking suspicion that Lord Castello and plastic surgery were in fact intimately acquainted.
“I was in a bit of an accident during the Hundred Year War and had to replace most of my facial features with a likeness that fit the rest of my shape well enough. This is the result.”
“A bit of an accident?” Lord Castello asked.
“The English executed me by way of the axe.”
Lord Castello gave Lord Deutran a shocked expression. “Vassals can survive that?!”
“Not normally,” Misha said.
“Misha is a special case,” Lord Deutran agreed simply, sipping her tea.
“Truly special,” Lord Castello said and Lord Deutran could see the gears turning behind her lapis-colored eyes. “You’re one of a kind…” She suddenly clapped her hands and said, “Well, you’ve shown off your best, Deutran. It seems only fair, I should show off mine.” She waved a hand and said to one of the vassals waiting behind her, “Shit-for-brains, go get Connie for me, will ya?”
Aloud, the vassal said quietly, “He’s in the infirmary, Lord, af—”
Lord Castello almost flipped the tea table as she stood up. When she did, all three of her vassals flinched and looked down at their feet. She pointed a sharpened fingernail at the middle vassal that had spoken and hissed, “What the fuck have I told you about talkin' in front of guests? What’s the goddamn point of bein’ able to hear every syllable of your pitiful internal dialog if I have to listen to your bitchin' an’ moanin’ out loud too?” She pressed a nail into his vest front and gave him a gentle push toward the parlor door. “Go get Connie, Shit.”
Misha had become an art piece again. He mentally reached out to Lord Deutran, reassuring himself of his own lord’s pleasant presence. It was like he had held out his hand and she had gripped it in solidarity, but neither of them had moved.
Lord Deutran told him silently, “I’m having second thoughts about this arrangement, Misha.”
He only sent her an overwhelming feeling of agreement.
Eventually, the three Rheinlander vassals arranged themselves around the perimeter of the room and the door was opened to admit another handful of Lord Castello’s turned vassals. Four figures entered. Two of them held open the doors and supported the other two that came shuffling in. The two that entered the room were clearly not from the Rhein. One of them was an ochre-colored woman, layered with tight, twining muscles. She was dragging what looked like a limp corpse in her arms, showing more emotion than effort in the muscles of her square-jaw.
Lord Castello had a look of rapture on her face as she gestured at one of the sofas and the woman draped the corpse onto it. Then Lord Castello snapped her fingers and the room emptied upon command. After the doors shut, Lord Castello gestured at the body and said, “This is my masterpiece, Conscript! He’s my oldest vassal—a lottery gift from my maker, King Kassas himself.”
“He’s fucking dead,” Misha thought, horrified by the sight, but Lord Deutran knew that was not the case. She felt sick to her stomach.
The naked creature laying on the couch didn’t look more than twenty in age, but his body was in tatters. He had been haphazardly cut open and sutured shut in swirling patterns and deliberate shapes. His eyelids were sewn open, pulling at the delicate skin below his brow. His eyes were an eerie yellow color, their whites shot through with new and old blood vessels, drowning the irises in brown and red and black. His fingers had been cut off and sewn back on. The same went for his toes and his ears. It seemed the only thing that hadn’t been pulled off and stuck back on at some point were his reproductive organs. A small mercy, for Lord Deutran suspected Castello had left no inch of this man abused in some other way.
“Not wounds,” Misha thought at her. “Marks, Sebara. A toy. A plaything.” His rage started to boil up inside him. “What vampire maims her own kind like this? Little creatures, she calls them. She’s the creature!”
She couldn’t bring herself to force him into a calmer state, but she did send him reassurances that they would not be staying for very much longer. Her placations only managed to stop him from becoming yet more enraged. He understood how sensitive the situation was, but he would not abide an apathetic response from Deutran of Cairn-over-Merda.
“Conscript,” Lord Deutran stated. “Why did you name him so?”
Lord Castello, still beaming at her beau, said distractedly, “He was made a ghoul out of the last wave of war criminals. He didn’t choose vampirism. Vampirism chose him. It was destiny that he was sent to serve me.” Lord Castello turned toward Lord Deutran then and their eyes locked together. Lapis lazuli and moonstone glanced off each other like flint and steel. The two of them saw each other in part at that point.
Lord Castello had been putting on. She was not some air-headed, manner-less young lord. She was a tireless sociopath capable of subjugating the minds of even the strongest of vassals. And she was proud of herself.
Lord Deutran had been putting on a farce as well. The truth was, behind her cold, calculating exterior, she was a scared little girl that possessed no stomach or patience for the blatant savagery the rest of her kind reveled in.
Lord Castello grinned and Lord Deutran simply returned a polite smile.
“Ya want a bite of him?” Lord Castello asked. “Or maybe a ride?”
Misha’s revulsion hit Lord Deutran like a smack to the back of her head. Irritated, she snapped at him psychically, “You think I would consi
der it?!” She severed the mental link between them and Misha physically put a hand to the side of his head before he caught himself, stood up straight, and looked away from her, trying to hide his remorse.
“No, I ate on the way,” Lord Deutran said plainly, boredly. “Can he hear us?” she asked.
“Oh, of course! Connie’s just a little tired. Yesterday, we got into a bit of an argument, so I had him drained. You know how obstinate some vassals can be. Sometimes a broken back is a small price to pay for insubordination.”
“He seems to have sustained a lot of discipline in his time with you,” Lord Deutran said thoughtfully. “Why not release him?”
“Kill him, you mean?” Lord Castello laughed out loud, flashing more silvered teeth. “I’ve misjudged you, Lord Deutran. I figured you for a woman of pragmatism. I hadn’t entertained the possibility that you might be a sympathetic.” She stood then and went to kneel by Conscript. She took up her vassal’s hand and said, “Vassals are extensions of our will as lords. We hear their thoughts and their notions as our own, but their wishes and hopes and dreams are not ours. Their whimsy is servant to ours. It’s basic biology.” She met Lord Deutran’s eyes then and said, “For example, if I told Conscript to pluck out his right eye, he would have no choice. I am his god.”
“But, would he not be made lesser, lacking one eye?” Misha suddenly asked, his voice carefully controlled, betraying nothing in his tone save a banal sort of curiosity.
Lord Castello’s smile fell. “You think he’s lesser?”
“No ma’am, I didn’t—”
“Quiet.” The vampire stood up, dropping her vassal’s crooked hand, and she stared into Lord Deutran’s expressionless face as she said, “Conscript, give me your right eye.” She held out her hand.
Lord Deutran psychically reached out to Misha, as if seeking comfort in the confines of his mind, and she found he was attempting to do the same to her. Their mutual link braided together and they braced themselves against one another.
Vertus State (Vassal State Book 1) Page 1