The Third Step: Chapter Forty-Nine

“So, you do not wish to join the Sekhem Court. Yet you have nearly killed one of our best young masters, caused large amounts of property damage, and forced yourself into a meeting without even bothering to show a modicum of respect,” Prince Dhruv said, looking at the fox with a level gaze that barely concealed the fury underneath. “In the name of the Sealed Primes, please tell me why we should not simply kill you here, or better yet, turn you into one of my children?” 

I stared at the Prince and ran through what I knew about that particular threat. No two Sekhem legacies were exactly the same, but they all had certain themes in common: bodily empowerment like the Khet, power over blood like the Ib, stealth like the Shuet, regenerative abilities like the Ka, more powerful mana like the Sah, the power over names like the Ren, the blood-mind abilities of the Ba, and the ability to grow these manifold gifts – a vampiric legacy feature almost exclusive to the Sekhem.  

But like all great things in life, it was a double edged sword. There was a certain hierarchy enforced in Sekhem transformations, a price for their power: servitude. My mind, body, and spirit would fall entirely under Prince Dhruv’s control until he died or fed me some of his own blood. That was no doubt the real intention behind the threat. 

“I’ll give you three reasons,” I said and flipped my palm up. A tiny portal sparked to life, and for an instant, a deadly power filled the air. It was seventh gate, but… broken. Not in the same sense as the Princelings of the Sekhem Court, who had used the Heaven’s Gate Elixir or something similar to break into seventh gate. No, this power was deadly and self-destructive, dangerous to the person who used it. 

The Ascending Death Crystal. I hadn’t thought about it since the Idyll-Flume in anything more than passing. If I absorbed it, I’d instantly ascend to true seventh gate, but would put my life on a timer, one that even someone like Meadow or Orykson would be hard pressed to undo. I let a streak of confidence enter my voice as the butler and the Prince stared at the portal and the power flowing from it. 

“First, if you move to kill or turn me, I’ll use the Ascending Death Crystal,” I said. “Do you think you can kill me or turn me before I can pull that into my spirit? Even if you managed to instantly alert the rest of the Court, I’d still be dead, not a servant.” 

“You’re bluffing,” Prince Dhruv said. “Nobody would throw their own life away like that.” 

“You’ve threatened to turn me into, in essence, a slave to your whims,” I said coldly. “Try me. But I’m not done yet. The second reason you will not kill me is because you aren’t strong enough.” 

I gestured to the tiny portal in the palm of my hand. 

“I can escape this room in less than a second. I would be able to reach the territory of the Ria-Dorji Fishing Company within a minute. Are you confident that you can kill me in one second? Are your gate crawlers good enough to re-open my passage before I can be in the territory of another power capable of rivaling you?” 

“Another bluff,” the Prince said, waving his hand dismissively. “The wards on this room are built to stop teleporting out. Don’t think just because you’ve got a demiplane storage device hidden somewhere that you can trick me.” 

There was some truth to that – the wards on this room were impressive, and I knew I’d not be able to teleport in or out. If I needed to steal from him, then I’d be in an awful position. But my connection to Dusk was still intact, a flaw in the wards borne of overconfidence – he had several storage items in this room, and wanted the convenience of having them work. But that left me the chance to escape into Dusk. It was the only reason I’d followed him, honestly. If he’d tried to bring me to a cell that was truly and fully warded, I’d have just left.

His insistence that I was bluffing was starting to wear on me, though. 

“Do you have a truth potion?” I asked. Behind Dhruv, the butler blinked in surprise at the random turn in the conversation.

“Pardon?” 

“Do you have a truth potion?” I repeated. “You keep saying that I’m bluffing, but I’d be happy to prove that I mean every last word of it.” 

“I see. I must admit, you are committed. What is your third reason?” 

“I owe three favors to the Analyst, the man who was once known as the Undying King. Tell me, Prince, do you want to inherit my debts to a real Occultist? Because if you kill me, or if you turn me? I can guarantee that you’ll get a visit from someone with real power.” 

I tried to keep my emotions under control, but the abuse of the citizens, the forcing me to fight them, and the sheer disdain they held was really angering me. My control slipped, and I accidentally to inject the word ‘Prince’ with enough derision that it sounded more like an insult than a title, and packed so much scorn into the word ‘real’ both of the times that I used it that the Prince’s own control over his body slipped, which caused his eyes to glow blood red for a moment. 

“Once again, I invite you to bring me a truth potion to confirm that I am not lying,” I said. “Or, if you’re done throwing around useless accusations about bluffing while you posture and pretend position and power, we can discuss this like adults.” 

“You make very salient points about not killing you,” Prince Dhruv said. “But you need us.” 

“No, I don’t. You’re convenient for me,” I said. “I can visit Wraithmist Gorge or the Soul Laboratory or Seven Falls Lake. They’re not on my way to the tournament like you are, but don’t mistake my desire to save a bit of time for dependance on you.”

“Anoth–” the Prince started to say, and I rose from the cushion. Both the Prince and the butler tensed, ready to explode into violence at any second. 

“What are you doing?” snapped the Prince. 

“Leaving,” I shot back.

“I have not dismissed you.”

“If you want the courtesy of being able to dismiss me, then do me the courtesy of not calling my every statement a lie,” I said, and this time I didn’t even try to hide the vitriol. 

“I… apologize for my insult,” the Prince said, which actually caught me by surprise. “You are right. Please, sit, and we can continue our conversation.” 

I debated leaving anyway, just to rub the Prince’s nose in. Having him devote resources to me might help Keerthana to kick his fangs in, when she broke through to seventh gate and formed her Title – something I was next to certain she would, though I didn’t know how I was so certain. 

But it would be a pain to have to go somewhere else and dive, and it would take time. Kene still had two and a half years left, so that wasn’t the end of the world, but it was a risk. I swallowed my pride and sat back down on the cushion across from the Prince. 

“Why don’t we start over, and clarify what exactly it is that you need?” 

“You have a vampiric ritual that preserves portions of the soul’s structure, keeping them safe while a person undergoes a vampiric transformation,” I said. “I need to use that to give structure to a formless-spark, helping to create an artificial soul with enough stability to separate and a legacy-based spiritual parasite while I integrate it into a body I have prepared.”

“There are issues with that plan,” the Prince said. “First, our ritual cannot sever that sort of soul bond.”

I waved my hand dismissively. 

“I understand that, and have taken steps to rectify it.” 

“Very good. Second, simply placing a formless-spark into our ritual will merely contain the spark. It will not create an artificial soul, merely a solid spark of massive potential. Truthfully, it might birth a spirit of some sort, or something new entirely. I can’t say.” 

“I have a counter for that as well. The Craftsman owes me a favor. I am going to call it in to have him complete the process.” 

“I see,” the Prince said, a frown crossing his face. “You are obscenely well connected for one so young.” 

“I got lucky,” I said with the ghost of a smile on my lips. “Given that I have accounted for those issues, what do you say about the ritual?” 

“Well, you have certainly proven your strength is enough to have merit, and the components won’t be wasted due to a lack of understanding. But there is the final issue of payment. You see, the ritual is expensive. Typically when we turn someone, they spend some time serving the one who turned them, working until the debt is repaid.” 

“That’s a price I am not willing to pay.” 

“Then let us measure it not in time, but in favors. You say you owe three for the Analyst, then you’ll owe two favors to the Court. You must admit that’s fair.”

“If it’s under the same conditions I had with the Analyst, I’ll consider it,” I said, frowning. “Did you have another payment in mind?” 

“Well, you are an Elysian Mastery Tournament competitor. If you were to make it far enough to get personalized rewards, and had those personalized for the court instead… though of course, if you fail, we would need to re-neogitate.” 

“Mm,” I said. I didn’t like that option just from a practical standpoint, but it wasn’t the worst in the world. If I had to give up the rewards, I’d do it, but I wasn’t in quite a desperate enough position for that yet. 

“Another one of the competitors in the Elysian Mastery Tournament has an earring, one that originally belonged to the court, but was lost many years ago. You could retrieve it for us.”

I didn’t even bother to respond to that one. Prince Dhruv had made it sound easy, but it clearly wouldn’t be if he put it on par with two favors. Admittedly, he didn’t know that I’d leaned on Orykson’s dislike of controlling other people as for denial on moral grounds, but even so. 

“My final offer: Blood. One of the ways we can grow our powers is through the consumption of potent blood. Your blood is already quite potent from your beast status, and there’s something… strange… with your core, and it has leaked into your bones, marrow, and blood. It’s odd, but it’s powerful, and it would make the perfect advancement material for the younger members of the court. A pint of your blood, delivered once a month, for the next fifteen years.” 

I bit my lip as I considered that particular favor. It wasn’t horrible in theory, but a decade and a half of needing to ship materials here would be expensive. Worse, it would give them more power, which wouldn’t help Keerthana.

I leaned back and considered which, if any, of his offers, was worth taking.