. 07

~~Jack~~

"Um, sure. Is that ok, my Prince?" he said.

"... oui, mon amour. But, return to my side when you are done."

He gave her his best 'I love you' smile, and with a small bow, turned and walked off to join Athalia. As he turned, he took a glance at everyone's gaze, to see what they thought of this strange development. Bunch of raised eyebrows. People were as confused as him.

It took a little bit for the two of them to find a place that was a little quieter, a little further away from everyone else. With so many people around, a private conversation was basically impossible, but Athalia took them up the balcony stairway, and as they passed the symphony, Athalia guided them along the wall into a corner near a balcony railing. Best they were going to get.

"Jack," she said, "I understand that you've been a bit of an ambassador for the Kindred to the Uratha."

"Um, not exactly. I'm just a middle man, exchanging information between the two. If I was an ambassador for the Kindred, I'd have a little decision making power. Got none of that."

She nodded, stroked her chin a few times, and turned to lean against the wall. And, much like Beatrice would, she folded her arms across her chest, and sneered as she looked out over the balcony.

"Your bosses tell you what they did?"

"... no." Uh oh.

"Well, fuck em. They put explosives in the tunnels where Azamel lives. Remote detonators too. If she does anything to upset them, they blow the tunnels."

Welp, shit.

"I... I'm sure they're just trying to deter—"

"Don't even say the word." Athalia sighed, and threw up her hands like she was ready to scream, but folded them under her bosom once more. "Now you know how serious the situation is, when I say Azamel wants a way to communicate."

Of course she did. "And that way is me."

"Seems to be the 'in' thing to do. No fights between the vamps and werewolves yet, so that's a plus in your court. And you're in deep with the Prince, so that's a valuable angle right there."

Don't ask her why she hates Kindred, don't ask her.

"... why do you hate the Kindred so much?"

God damn it Jack. If there is one way you're going to die, it's pissing off a monster with your big mouth.

"Christ you got balls. But, I am being pretty rude here. Not that I'm going to stop, but it warrants explanation. I lost important people to vamps."

"Lost?"

"Yeah, lost you little fuckwad. Dead, killed, gone. I was just a little girl, and I lost a lot of important people to Viktor. You know, your grandsire?"

Oh shit. Shit shit shit. "I... I'm s—"

"Stow it. I was just a kid then, long time ago. I was in my late twenties when I became a Begotten, and that was over twenty years ago," she said. He took a moment to look her up and down. Begotten definitely aged slowly then, cause the woman looked no older than thirty.

He wanted to ask her what Viktor did to those people, specifically, but it could have been anything, including some seriously nasty shit better not asked about. Daniel would know, but he wasn't sure he wanted to pry. But, dead loved ones because of vampires? Yeah, he could understand hating a people, a race, because of that. He wasn't even that close with his family when he was alive, and the thought of his sister or mother being murdered sent a chill down his spine.

"And the Uratha?"

"Fuck the dogs. I've been to other cities, and the dogs there are fucking pricks. Call everything their territory. I try to be nice, and all I get is suspicion. Suspicion turns to a fight, and before you know it, I've got a pack of wolves on my ass. Killing a werewolf is not easy, let alone three."

He blinked at her, a few times, and then stepped over to the balcony railing to look down at the socializing people. The buffet was getting a little heated, with more than a few of the kine there now naked save for some underwear, and hands rubbing them as a couple Kindred pinned many of them down onto chairs, or held them tight onto tables. The kine seemed more than happy to let the Kindred indulge, the Kiss being an enjoyable experience when the Kindred made it so, but he was surprised to see how loose everyone was getting with it.

Stop avoiding Athalia. She'd killed three werewolves? Her? The hell kind of monster was inside this woman?

"Well... Viktor's dead, and the Uratha here are—"

"Viktor's dead, the Invictus aren't. And far as I can tell, none of you give a shit about your kine." She raised her fingers to quote the word 'kine'. "As you can see from the orgy below, they're just bloodbags to you. So, fuck your vampires. And the wolves? Just angry dogs waiting to bite anything that gets too close. So fuck them too. And... and I don't have to justify my anger to you, that's not why I invited you to chat."

He'd expected someone a little more closed off, brooding and quiet, not this loud mouth ready to yell at anything that moved. This woman would have pissed off a tree, given time to shout at it enough.

"Then—"

"I invited you up here to tell you Azamel wants to speak with you. Alone."

"But—"

"Don't tell your giant girlfriend with the tits hanging out. Don't tell your bosses or friends either. If you do, this whole ambassador idea is shot, and you vamps can go to hell."

Volatile. He sighed, but nodded, and rubbed his buzzed hair as he considered the implications. Talk to Azamel, alone, without telling his boss or Antoinette? They'd be pissed. And now that the Invictus were apparently trying to control Azamel, they'd be super pissed if he talked to her without telling them.

But the other options were to tell them, and piss her off, or not go, and piss her off. Azamel seemed reasonable enough last time he spoke with her, and that meeting hadn't exactly been planned, dropping by randomly like he did. But he trusted Julias, and Julias told him to stay away from her.

"... when does she want to see me?" Fuck it. Nothing risked, nothing gained, right?

"In a week. Show up around two, and be alone. No friends either."

"Two AM, next Saturday. Got it."

Athalia nodded, sighed, and moved toward the balcony stairway.

"Leaving?"

"Course I'm leaving. I don't want to be here."

"Kind of thought maybe Daniel had convinced you."

"He offered, and Azamel saw an opportunity to get a feel for the situation here." She shrugged, but at least she'd stopped and turned to face him. "Idiot is just trying to make it up to me."

"It? What happened?"

"Wouldn't you like to know? Fuck, you are a nosy kid. Want to know, go ask him." And again, she turned to leave. But he stepped forward, and grabbed her wrist. "... what the fuck?"

Yeah, what the fuck Jack? Stop playing with fire, and let the volatile explosive in heels leave.

"Not everyone is like Viktor."

"Kid, you have to have a death wish. Let go before I—"

"I'm doing you a favor, Athalia, because everyone in a ten-mile radius can see how deep you are in your hatred, to the point you can't see out of it. You're at the point of reflex, where it's a part of how you think, how your subconscious works, to hate. If you pulled your head out of the black water drowning you for a moment, you might see that many of us are just good people trying to get by."

She twisted, yanked her arm free, and approached him. Oh good god she was going to break his neck. Could a Kindred recover from that? Sure, but he didn't want to feel what that was like.

"You talk like you know me, you little brat."

"Don't need to be a psychologist to see someone trapped inside their assumptions, Athalia, someone afraid to look outside their prejudices, in case they might be wrong." Stop talking stop talking stop talking.

"You think cause your big bad girlfriend is here I won't rip your arm off?"

"I think you wouldn't get so defensive if I wasn't hitting so close to home. I know, I'm just a stranger, some kid you don't know, but I've known people just like you. Viktor's gone, and if you took a second to look around, you'd see how much better things are now that he's dead. No one's sad he's dust, and if you swallowed your hate long enough to look down over the balcony, really look, you'd see everyone, Fiona, the wolves, the humans too, are all enjoying themselves. Could be you." Yeap, he was a total idiot. He had no reason to say this to this woman, no reason to try and yank her out of her pit of self-inflected despair. Let her rot in her own misery, let her stew in the pain she brings on herself. Why the fuck do you want to open her mind, when you barely know her?

"... you have serious balls, kid. And you love to open your mouth when you shouldn't, don't you?"

"Yeah, I do. Bad habit, and I know it's going to get me killed one day. Just... some things need to be said, you know? And no one else says them. So I say them." And he's been saying them more, and more, with more confidence each time. Or cockiness. Hubris, Jack, hubris. "Kindred are sneaky creatures by nature, lot of lying, manipulation, misdirection. I'm... not a fan of that."

"... neither am I." The sneer on her face didn't go away, but at least she walked over to the balcony, and took a long hard look at the people laughing, drinking, socializing. More than a few people had joined Fiona, and were chatting with the increasingly drunk woman; poor girl was going to need a chaperon.

Jack came over and stood beside her. This woman was dangerous, and he could feel the alien power coming from her, something dark and haunting and more than capable of tearing him to bits. It didn't stop him. Maybe he was just getting used to that feeling, being around deadly predators so often.

He smiled down at the sight of four Kindred standing around one of the tables, with a kine lying upon it. A beautiful woman to be sure, with a black dress that barely covered anything. The four vampires were drinking her from different places, and holding her down as they did. It might have warranted interruption, if the kine's face wasn't smiling bliss. One of the Kindred slipped her hand underneath the woman's skirt, and the kine's moans joined the increasingly boisterous noise of the party. More hands reached out for her body, sliding into the cleavage and pulling it down to expose her breasts. Fingers all over her, massaging, groping, fingering the trapped woman into a very obvious slew of orgasms as the vampires very, very slowly drank her.

You could taste the difference in the blood, he knew, from his time with Ashley and Julee.

He'd never seen one of these balls get this physical, this sexual, despite knowing full well it was a very real possibility. Not a ball, it was never a ball. This was a party, just like Bloodlust, and the Kindred called it a ball in some weird sense of superiority. When the rubber hit the road though, the vampires jumped on the opportunity to get physical. If there'd been rave music and darker lighting, he was sure half the people in the room would have been fucking or dancing naked.

"Christ you vamps are fucking horny."

"I, um... I mean they keep telling me Kindred often lose their sex drive as they get older, and the bliss of the Kiss replaces it. So far, that does not seem to be the case for almost anyone I know." Maybe Jacob, maybe Maria, but as far as he knew, Dolareido kept nearly every Kindred's sex drive sky high at all times.

"I can see why you're making the impact you are, kid."

"Impact?"

"Yeah. Azamel described to me what this place was like, before I was born, and what it's like now. A lot due to you," she said. No mention of Jack's direct influence over the fate of three elders though, thank god. "You do speak your mind. And you've got this cute thing going that makes it hard to want to hurt you for your big mouth."

"... thanks."

"And, it's the whole sincerity thing, genuine... giving a shit. Only vamp I've ever met who talks like that." She shrugged again, and gestured to yet another kine. "Fuck, utterly shameless." A man, one of Jennifer's ghouls, standing, with four Kindred around him. A woman undid the man's loincloth, and let it fall away, before she wrapped her fingers around his length, and started to stroke it. All the while, she was pressing her side to the man's chest, and sinking her teeth into his shoulder, while the other three found spaces to bite along his neck and other shoulder.

"Shameless, but harmless," he said. "The kine are enjoying themselves. Hell, even the Uratha and Fiona seem to be enjoying the show." Fiona in particular had come to stand close to the four Kindred feasting on Jennifer's ghoul, and Jack could see her blushing as she watched the man struggle to stay standing with four sets of fangs slowly draining him of blood. Girl was also very obviously staring at the hand stroking him off to a quick orgasm. It made sense, being Begotten and not Kindred, that it wouldn't be the biting that'd interest her.

None of the Kindred got naked, or started having sex, or touched themselves. That'd be crossing a weird line. No, this was about Kindred indulging in the utter decadence of having a literal buffet at their beck and call. The worst any of them had to worry about these days was a disagreement over the Mirrden district, or maybe Azamel or Avery causing trouble. And the overwhelming majority of Kindred in the ball weren't even alive, let alone embraced, when those two had caused issues for Dolareido.

Everyone was ignoring the danger Barry's death represented.

So, like carefree teenagers, they embraced the deliciousness laid out before them. And Jack couldn't blame them. And he couldn't understand why anyone would. Hell, with the fucked up world they lived in, Kindred, Begotten, Uratha, they all in the shadows so the near eight billion humans didn't discover them and annihilate them. Yeah, some harmless sex wasn't just acceptable, it was encouraged.

Athalia kept watching, and he took a few peeks at her as she did. Girl could hate them for what Viktor did to her, what the Uratha did to her, all she wanted, but he could tell there was more going on there in her mind, whether she realized it or not. That was what spurned his random outburst to a stranger. He could see there was more.

And on top of that he could see she was getting aroused. Poor girl was no vampire, who could simply refuse to blush life to hide their arousal; unless they'd just ate of course. So he forced himself to look away as she squirmed a little, and her nipples started to harden against her dress. Considering how many Kindred were drinking the kine below, hard nipples poking through dresses were everywhere.

"Sorry I got into your face," he said. "Normally I'd wait until the fourth time meeting you before violating your personal space like that."

She laughed. A real, fun laugh, and turned to face him. "Yeah, watch where you step. But I appreciate it. Just, hearing that come from one of you was a bit of a shock. Guess there's a reason Azamel's asking for you."

"I'll do my best to see her, and not tell anyone. Got a real nice thing going here in Dolareido, and it'd really suck if something broke that."

"I admit, it's definitely not the place I remember. I—oh god look at that." She motioned to one of the darker corners in the ball room. The lighting was never very bright, when Kindred had the option, and the ballroom's lighting was soft enough for some shadows to exist. In one of those shadows, two male Kindred, Carthians, were getting very hands-on with one of the kine. "Surprised that wolf doesn't just tear them apart."

"Wolf?" He squinted his eyes to try and see. Wait, the woman being touched by the two Kindred, he recognized her. She was one of Avery's pack. "You can really tell just by looking? From this far?"

"Fiona told me she explained it to you."

"She did, it's just... hard to imagine that you can literally see the beast in us. For us it's something hidden in the shadows of the mind. We can't see it, only feel it."

"I can see it, these wisp of black with fangs inside you. Sneaky, fast, a shadow with a bloodlust." She shrugged, and leaned forward on her elbows a little further, eyes on the woman. "Begotten don't crave blood, usually. We feed on... well, it's different for each Begotten. But, I can imagine a werewolf's blood must be pretty tasty." The two Kindred were in front of the distant woman, hands on her, pulling down the straps of her chest and letting her breasts slip free of the black dress. One was leaning in, and was definitely Kissing her neck. The other was fingering her, hard enough to make her body shake lightly, for her legs to tremble, and for her to hold onto the two men lest she fall.

"They lost one in that whole Azlu incident," he said. "You were there."

"I was. Saw the remains. Pretty horrible."

"I'm guessing she's trying to find some comfort, after losing a pack mate." He nodded toward the werewolf.

"Yeah, some people do that, turn to sex when they're sad."

"Is that bad?"

"It can be, but... in this circumstance?" She shrugged, smirked, and started to head back toward the stairway. "Looks fine to me."

He smiled after her, and followed. Really shouldn't have tried to get through to her, stupid of him to think he could break through years of her walls of hatred in twenty seconds. He was a stranger to her, and he didn't have any of the details about what'd happened to her. Really, really stupid of him.

Still kind of hoped he did get through to her, though.

He stepped back down into the ball. Party. Rave? Well, no rave music, but the setting was becoming more heated by the minute. And as he walked past yet a few more kine giving their blood to various Kindred, he took more than a few peeks. Cause, wow, he really hadn't expected to be seeing so much genitalia at this party, but there they were. A lot of humans, and one werewolf, enjoying the Kiss and having a set of fingers stroking or fingering or whatnot.

"I see the stress and tension of my city has built to a staggering amount." Antoinette reached out for him, set her hand on his shoulder, and pulled him in until he was snug against her side, her arm wrapped around his shoulders. "There have been balls such as these before your time, my little Ventrue, where this display also occurred. Always, such lascivious delights followed times of stress, when Kindred battled Kindred, and Dolareido suffered."

"Understandable, for people to relieve stress this way." He looked over his shoulder at the werewolf in the corner. Another Kindred, a woman, had come to join them, and she was leaning in to suck on the werewolf's breasts. The Uratha was definitely drunk, and being taken advantage of, and loving every minute of it, based on the noises.

Vampires, standing around in leather, corsets, fancy suits, revealing dresses, while their sources of food squirmed in pleasure as they gave their blood to the fangs awaiting them, all to the soothing yet jovial sounds of string instruments, violins and cellos and double basses. If a crueler, twisted soul was Prince, he could imagine there'd be far less moans going on around him, and far more screams of despair as kine were Kissed to literal death. Much preferred Antoinette's version.

"One of the few things the Prince and I agree on." Jacob. Old eyeless came up to them, grinned one of his trademark twisted grins, and gestured to one of the thralls being drained, a male, who also had a vampire's hand wrapped around his shaft. "I encourage this! Kindred are animals, beasts, and the beast in us all craves satisfaction."

"When is the last time you engaged in such animal lust?" Antoinette mimicked his hand gesture, and returned his smirk with her smile.

Jacob's grin faded, and a pause followed that forced a wince from Jack. Dancing on a dangerous topic, and the Nosferatu didn't appreciate it. But after a few seconds of deafening silence from the man, he smiled, and shrugged.