Cathedral (Cradle of Darkness 1)

One who from that day forward no longer sat his throne.

One who abandoned us all for… a Pearl.

***

Jade

The evil had not been exorcised, but it had been shifted just enough to make it tolerable. Unsure if that was the proper description, I ignored the sounds of construction, ignored that simply approaching the passageway to such a place made me sick to my stomach. And I entered the Cathedral, though I’d sworn to myself I’d never do so again.

A new freshly-turned servant waited, and unlike the previous history of flagging, stupid, rude, and wasted baby vamps, this one knew me by sight. “My lady.”

To the pretty girl I turned over a snow-white coat, my pair of crystal-encrusted Louboutins clicking over fresh marble floors when I walked past. Marveling. The whole vestibule for my favored entrance had been redone, the center table boasting a massive spray of fresh flowers highlighted by electric light.

Unnerving.

The massive, spiked wooden door between this false façade and the altar to the undead throne had somehow survived my onslaught, rehung and waiting, should I dare push it open.

It wouldn’t do to be seen hesitating before a servant, yet still my hand met the wood and I failed to push.

“He’s expecting you.” Kindly offered, extremely nervous, she tapped a message into her tablet.

The he in question had not been told I’d been coming. Not even Malcom knew I was here. But Vladislov was a veritable God. And only Gods knew what Gods could see.

Hinges sang, well-oiled as I bore my weight against something it would take ten mortal men to move. And then I was home.

The Cathedral.

I might have thought I was Alice stepping through the looking glass, this world so different, far removed from the one I’d known.

Yet almost the same.

Stone, candelabras, the scent of beeswax and incense and oil. But bright with electric light. Under my radically expensive shoes some cracked stones remained, highlighted by new, fresh blocks of rock. As if the building itself was testament to what had happened here. And what could happen again. The walls were… changed? They were the same? Mirrors and paintings—a painting of me wearing white—and tapestries and literal cave drawings all brought in to highlight a throne that my father had sat.

Had ruined.

That had been taken from him on a whim.

And that sat empty.

He was waiting for me, the girl had said. But he was not here.

How I had suffered in this room once upon a time. Not just the day my brains had been dashed against a wall, but for decades afterward when I had been brought low and shamed. And that throne sat empty.

And he failed to appear.

So I dared.

Much.

I dared my life to climb the steps of the dais as I had as a child, to put my hands to the armrests I’d swung from all those ages ago. And I sat my ass in that seat.

Head steeped in my hands, exhausted from the work of it, I found a minuscule slice of rest in my exploit. This wasn’t play. I wasn’t queen. I’d never rule, and I hated most of the survivors who’d been forced to rebuild what I’d demolished.

“It suits you.”

I didn’t look up, not with my head spinning as it was, but I did answer my grandfather. “Coming here was a mistake.”

Footfalls I heard as he climbed the steps. “One of many you will make, and learn from. Mistakes define what we are. Each worth so much more than any victory.”

Was that so? Well then, I was rich in experience and saccharine in the smile I offered. I couldn’t put my finger on why, but I was angry with this man. This thing who’d hung my picture on the wall. This force that had upset my life and left me with glowing red eyes. “I don’t know what to do.”

“Well… I’m so unaccustomed to honesty when it comes to our kind where do I even begin to answer?” The teasing, it was so Vladislov.

Sagging back, boneless and finding the seat infinitely uncomfortable, I snarked, “My guess would be that you demand I stand from your throne. Perhaps you tear off a limb or two, drive home the point that this was no place for Darius’s whore daughter to rest.”

It was always that waved brown hair I noticed first. Perfect in the unison of its movement. Then it was the ugliness of his beautiful voice. “But you currently sit the throne. Should it not be you who command me?”

I’d play this game. “I command you to release Malcom from his vow.”

“Done! See how easy it is to rule as queen?”

He had to be joking! Had to be. For if he wasn’t, I might bring down this entire new building and piss on the ashes. But the bastard was adjusting his cufflinks and so goddamn full of himself he may as well have burst from his seams.