Chapter 85 – Accident.

The banquet hall was full.

Vampires from every house, matriarchs, minor nobles, ladies-in-waiting, guards with their weapons sheathed so as not to offend anyone. Crystal goblets. Silver trays. Serving girls moving with short steps between the tables. Red crystal lamps hanging from the ceiling.

And in a corner, against a column, a group of six vampires who were doing a very bad job of pretending to drink wine.

Kaela was holding the goblet with two fingers and hadn't even brought it to her mouth in the last ten minutes. She was leaning against the column with her back too straight and her brow furrowed.

Celia was next to her, holding the goblet more properly and sweeping her gaze across the hall like she was measuring something.

Eris, sitting on the edge of an empty table she shouldn't have been using as a seat, was swirling her goblet lazily.

Virelle was watching a serving girl walking past with a tray of little tarts with too much interest.

Lisette was twisting a golden strand of hair around her finger. And Rosalind, standing on the other side of Kaela, kept looking at the horizon even inside the hall.

"Still hasn't come out?" Kaela asked under her breath.

"No," Celia answered.

"It's been an hour."

"Forty minutes."

"Feels like an hour."

"It's not an hour."

Kaela clenched her teeth.

"How much longer are they going to make us wait?"

"Whatever the queen decides."

Kaela huffed and finally lowered the goblet to chest level. On the other side of the column, Eris swung a leg dangling in the air and didn't even bother looking at the rest of them.

"Kaela, relax. You don't have to bow to anyone yet."

"I'm not nervous."

"You're red."

"I'm not red."

"You're really red."

"Eris."

"Kaela."

Kaela turned her head toward her with clenched teeth.

"Eris, if you mention my face again in front of the whole hall I swear I'll…"

"Enough," Celia cut in, in a low voice. "Quiet."

Kaela shut her mouth all at once. Celia hadn't raised her voice. She never did. But when she used that tone, it was better not to argue.

Lisette let go of the strand for a moment.

"What if he really is still a boy?" Lisette asked.

Silence.

Virelle turned her head. Rosalind didn't even blink. Kaela closed her hand around the goblet a little tighter than she should have.

"What?" Kaela snapped.

"I mean," Lisette continued, calmly, "when the queen announces him. What if he comes out with a boy's body?"

"He's going to come out with a girl's body," Rosalind assured without turning her head.

"How do you know?"

"All the ladies in the royal wing say the same thing."

"The ladies lie."

"Not about this."

Kaela closed her eyes for a second.

"I prefer that he come out with a girl's body," Kaela murmured.

"Why?" Eris asked, without looking at her.

"Because less shame."

"Shame for who?"

"For everyone."

"For you."

"For everyone."

Eris swirled her goblet slowly, no further comment. Lisette tilted her head.

"It wouldn't be that shameful for me to serve a boy," Lisette let out with innocence. "It's a body. It's just a body."

Virelle looked away from the tray of tarts and turned her head.

"It's not just a body, Lisette," Virelle corrected. "It's the consciousness inside. If the one breathing inside was born a man, he's a converted man."

"Right."

"And the converted are different."

"Different bad?" Lisette asked.

"Different."

"That's not an answer."

"It's the only one I have."

Celia jumped in with her flat voice.

"The converted develop faster. It's been proven. They absorb the knowledge of the human body, the memory, the reflexes. In some cases, in months they match what a pure one does in decades."

"I know," Kaela growled.

"I'm just saying."

"I know, Celia."

"And even so, you prefer the pures."

"I prefer the pures."

"Why?"

"Because they come from a clean womb and there's no old will inside fighting."

Rosalind turned her head slightly this time.

"Kaela," Rosalind warned calmly. "Watch your voice."

"I'm not shouting."

"You're raising your voice."

"No."

"Yes."

Kaela lowered the tone without wanting to admit she'd raised it. Lisette twisted another strand.

"I don't see the difference," Lisette murmured. "In the end, in both methods, there's a man involved."

Silence.

Celia turned her head toward her very slowly.

"…Lisette."

"What?"

"You don't say that out loud."

"Why?"

"Because the other method uses the man's material. Not the man."

"And the difference is…?"

"That in the other method the man stays alive. And doesn't replace anyone."

"He's still a man involved."

"Lisette, no."

"It's a logical question."

Eris let out a short laugh.

"Lisette has a point."

Celia turned her head toward Eris.

"Eris, don't help her."

"But she does."

"Eris."

"Listen. Taking the man's body, putting royal blood in him, letting the old mind dissolve while the new one is born. That's replacement. Yes. But it's also replacement when you use his seed to make something be born that isn't him. In the end, in both cases, the man disappears. Only how long it takes changes."

"…I hadn't thought about it that way," Virelle admitted.

"Nobody thinks about it that way," Eris answered calmly. "That's why it's more fun to say it."

Kaela clenched her teeth so hard her jaw creaked.

"Lower your voices," Kaela ordered. "All of you. If a matriarch hears you, heads are going to roll before dessert."

"Nobody's listening, Kaela," Eris insisted.

"You never know."

"We're at a column, with the serving girls cutting us off, and there are seventy conversations happening at the same time. Nobody's listening."

"Lower your voices anyway."

Lisette blinked, twisted the golden strand again and lowered her voice obediently.

"Quiet. Very quiet."

Rosalind turned her head toward the main dais.

"She's moving," Rosalind warned.

They all turned.

At the back of the hall, on a raised dais, Queen Elyra was sitting on a throne of dark wood with red details.

At her side, Iris. One step behind the queen, a guard with a spear planted on the floor. Elyra raised a goblet toward one of the matriarchs and smiled.

Kaela gripped the goblet harder.

"She's going to speak."

"She's not going to speak," Celia answered.

"She's going to speak."

"She's just greeting."

"She's going to…"

BOOOM!

The entire hall shook.

The goblets shook on the tables. A silver tray fell with a metallic crash to the floor. A red crystal lamp swung dangerously.

And from deep within the castle, climbing up the walls like a hot vibration, a red, electric wave spread out.

The wave crossed the ceiling. The stone columns creaked. Small cracks opened in the decorated plaster and the lamps shook.

Little by little the wave faded, and after two seconds the noise exploded.

Vampires shouting orders. Guards drawing weapons. Chairs being pushed back. Nobles grabbing their ladies-in-waiting by the arm.

A broken goblet. Another broken goblet. A third broken goblet.

Kaela already had her hand on the hilt of the sabre at her waist.

"What was that?" Kaela asked, her voice low but clipped.

"I don't know," Celia answered.

"An attack?"

"It doesn't seem like it."

"What do you mean it doesn't seem like it? It shook the whole castle."

"It didn't sound like an outside attack."

"Then what did it sound like?"

Celia didn't answer. She was watching the main dais.

Kaela turned her head too.

On the dais, Queen Elyra hadn't moved a centimeter. She was still sitting there, goblet in hand, looking at the cracked ceiling with an unreadable expression.

Not surprise. Not fear. Something else.

Iris, at her side, had her eyes open wider than usual.

'That energy…' Iris thought, her chest tight.

Iris knew that energy.

She had felt it before. Exactly once. In a laboratory, quite a while ago, when someone had been torn out of the body she had been occupying for years.

Iris turned her head slightly toward Elyra.

Elyra was already looking at her.

Neither of them spoke.

They didn't need to.

'Why?' Iris thought, without moving a muscle in her face. 'Matt had no reason to do that. Not today…'

Elyra didn't think the same.

Elyra was thinking many things at the same time, and none of them was fear.

'He separated,' Elyra thought, her heart beating faster. 'He separated again.'

Elyra tightened her fingers around the goblet and her heart beat once more, a little faster.

Kassandra, matriarch of House Ardent, walked up to the dais at a calm pace, passing between the noblewomen running from one side to the other as if the only person who wasn't in any hurry was her.

Kassandra was tall, with red hair, in a dark red dress and a lace fan she was never seen without.

"Queen Elyra," Kassandra greeted, tilting her head slightly. "Everything in order?"

Elyra set the goblet on the arm of the throne. Only then did she move her hand. She clapped twice, hard.

CLAP! CLAP!

The hall froze.

Seventy heads turned toward the dais at the same time.

Elyra smiled.

Elyra had the best smile in the kingdom when she wanted to lie with elegance.

"Ladies," Elyra announced in a clear voice. "There is no attack. There is no invader. Everything is under control."

Silence.

"It has been a small accident," Elyra continued, and the word small was held with an impossible calm. "By my heir. Who today, as all of you will know, is preparing a special surprise for his presentation."

The guards who had started moving toward the door stopped, hesitating.

Elyra made a gesture with her hand toward them.

"Stand down."

The guards straightened up.

Elyra looked at the hall again with that smile no one knew was real anymore.

"Everything is going according to plan."

Kassandra raised an eyebrow and hid half a smile behind the fan.

"Well," Kassandra murmured in a voice low enough for only the queen to hear. "It seems your heir has a rather… notable amount of mana."

Elyra smiled sideways.

"You'll meet him soon."

"We'll meet him," Kassandra repeated, and her fan closed with a barely audible click. "The current body. Is he still… a boy? Or is he already a girl?"

Elyra held Kassandra's gaze a long second.

"That, too, you will know soon."

"Interesting."

Kassandra tilted her head and stepped back, without dropping her smile.

Elyra turned her gaze toward one of the guards who had gone to check and was already coming back at a quick pace down the side corridor.

The guard stopped at the foot of the dais, with one knee slightly bent.

"Majesty."

"Do nothing," Elyra ordered in a low voice, before the guard said a word.

"But…"

"Nothing. Not one word. The others come back. They touch nothing. They do not enter."

The guard blinked.

"…Yes, majesty."

The guard withdrew at the same speed she had arrived.

Iris turned her head toward Elyra.

"Mother."

"No."

"I haven't said anything."

"Even so, no."

Iris closed her mouth.

In the corner against the column, Kaela still had her hand on the hilt of the sabre and her teeth clenched.

"…An accident?" Kaela murmured.

"That's what she said," Celia answered.

"It shook the whole castle."

"That too."

"Does that sound like a small accident to you?"

"No."

"So?"

Celia lowered the goblet.

"So the queen is lying."

"And nobody's going to say anything?"

"Nobody."

Kaela clenched her teeth.

"I hate this."

"I know."

◇◆◇

Matt was sprawled on the floor of the laboratory.

The ceiling had a long crack that ran from one end to the other. The black stone tables were split in half.

The colored jars had fallen to the floor, and several had broken, leaving puddles of smoking liquids.

The pure mana stones were scattered, dark, small and dead against the floor.

And on top of the circle drawn with gray chalk, which was now just a shapeless smear, there were two bodies.

Matt opened his eyes slowly.

Everything hurt.

His chest. His arms. His head. His legs. Especially his head.

'…Still alive.'

That thought took more effort than it should have.

Matt tried to move. He managed to move a hand. Then the other arm. With his mouth dry and the smell of chaotic mana burning his nose, he propped himself on an elbow and lifted his head slightly.

Next to him, on the floor, there was another body with white hair, pale skin and ragged breathing, with no clothes.

Matt lowered his gaze to himself.

He didn't have any clothes either.

'…Ah.'

The formal black suit had disappeared. The shirt too. The dark red brooch was lying a couple of meters away, whole, glinting among the debris.

Matt closed his eyes.

'Again.'

The other body coughed.

Matt opened his eyes again.

The other figure moved, rested a hand on the floor and also raised her head.

Short white hair. Red eyes open. Short breathing. Features almost identical to his, though a little different, since her eyes were more slanted. The jaw a little more pronounced and an expression serious, very serious.

Noxx.

Noxx looked at him and he looked back at her.

Neither of them said anything for several seconds.

Noxx swallowed.

"…Matt."

"Noxx."

"Are you okay?"

"Yeah. Could've gone worse."

Noxx looked away. Matt tried to sit up a little more. He propped himself on his elbow harder and half-sat up, with his back against a fallen piece of stone table. As he did it, he lowered his gaze to his chest.

He went still.

The body was still the same.

White hair. Pale skin. Features too fine. Girl's body.

'It was supposed to…'

Matt closed his eyes tightly.

Matt's plan was for Noxx to keep most of the vampire power like with Iris, however at the last moment, when the circle was almost closing, something had happened.

The power had come back.

Not all of it. But a large part. Matt had felt it rush up his spine, pushing him back into a body he didn't want.

And he hadn't been able to stop it.

Matt lowered his head.

'Damn it.'

"Matt?" Noxx asked, her voice a little lower.

Matt didn't answer.

In the hallway, on the other side of the door, a rushed voice was heard.

"Princess Matt!!"

Matt closed his eyes.

"Princess Matt, open the door!!"

Matt didn't move.

The voice struck the wood. Once. Twice.

TUC! TUC!

Then silence.

Then a harder blow.

BAM!

The lock burst. The door swung open, slamming into the wall. A guard came in with her spear at the ready, looking every which way with a furrowed brow and tense muscles.

The guard saw the cracked ceiling.

She saw the broken tables.

She saw the smoking puddles.

She saw Matt sitting on the floor, naked, against a fallen piece of table.

She saw Noxx sitting on the floor, naked, next to Matt.

The guard blinked.

At the same time, on the other side of the laboratory, the high window pushed open from outside and the second guard leapt inside, boots scraping the frame. She landed in a crouch, spear low, ready to fight.

She straightened up. She looked. She blinked.

'…What?'

The two guards looked at each other.

Then they looked at Matt. Then they looked at Noxx. Then they looked at Matt again.

White hair. Red eyes. Girl's body.

White hair. Red eyes. Girl's body.

The first guard lowered the spear slightly. Her voice, when it finally came out, sounded more like a doubt than a question.

"…Has Princess Matt… divided?"