Chapter 8
Meanwhile, in the Frostlands, Lilith's vampires had split off from Eldran to investigate the disturbance.
Eldran remained responsible for tracing the omen to its source. The vampires had been given a different task: identify the foreign powers pushing into the region.
Not long after arriving on Lilith's orders the previous night, Eldran had discovered a Goblin force moving into the Frostlands.
Their numbers were small, but every Goblin among them was a Veteran. It was a formidable scouting party, and Eldran had no intention of tipping them off while he operated alone.
The information was too important to sit on, so he sent a Specter to carry a report back to the Blighted Forest.
The vampires had gathered intelligence of their own over the past several days, and their report went with the same messenger.
Neither Eldran nor the vampires could have guessed that the Specter would be intercepted on its return journey—by the very Goblin force now advancing on Lilith's Territory.
Returning through Frostbound Bastion would normally have been faster, but the Goblins had entered the Frostlands from the same direction as Eldran and were operating near the Wonder. He had judged it too risky to use.
That caution had cost the messenger its existence.
The Goblins' arrival also confirmed Eldran's suspicion: other native powers had to be entering the Frostlands as well.
So he assigned the hunt for those outsiders to the vampires, who knew the region better than he did.
They understood the danger.
Rather than approach the heart of the Frostlands, they swept west along its southern reaches, putting concealment ahead of speed.
Unfortunately, that route carried them straight into the path of another vampire force.
The encounter caught them completely flat-footed.
Several dozen of Lilith's vampires now stood cornered at the foot of a snow-covered mountain, ringed by native vampires.
Strictly speaking, it only took one vampire to hold them there.
His strength was impossible to gauge. The pressure rolling off him alone pinned Lilith's vampires in place.
"How unexpected," he said. "Pureblood kin, wandering so far from home."
The patrol's leader was Lucian, a vampire count. He studied them with open curiosity.
Lilith's vampires were badly shaken.
They had witnessed Veteran-ranked power before, but Lucian's presence dwarfed any ordinary Veteran's. Even Eldran might have struggled against him.
The one encouraging sign was that Lucian hadn't killed them immediately.
Perhaps he wanted information. Perhaps he had some other purpose.
Either way, one careless answer could doom them all.
Before they could settle on a response, Lucian smiled.
"Vampires are one people. You can't fool me. If I had to guess—you were summoned by a Lord."
Every one of Lilith's vampires went rigid.
Lucian caught the reaction.
"So I was right."
The native vampire clans were unified. Their population was tightly controlled, their bloodlines meticulously tracked.
An unknown group of pureblood vampires outside that system left only one reasonable explanation.
Lucian had seen through them from the start.
"Our race is too small to waste valuable blood," he said. His corpse-pale face stayed pleasant; his tone never lost its courtesy. "I require your loyalty."
No one mistook the request for a choice.
If they refused, the well-mannered count could slaughter them before they managed any resistance.
Yet betraying Lilith was impossible.
They were Vampiric Undead, summoned from her Barracks and born with absolute loyalty to their Lord. Death would not change that.
Silence met Lucian's demand.
Several vampires closed their eyes, already resigned to dying.
Their reaction genuinely surprised him.
"You would reject your own people for an outsider who arrived in this world less than two weeks ago?"
Lucian would not have wasted a moment on them if their blood had been diluted.
But pureblood vampires had grown exceedingly rare among his people. He had no intention of walking away from dozens of them.
His smile cooled.
"You misunderstand. This was never your decision."
Lucian vanished.
Scarlet afterimages flickered through the falling snow.
A heartbeat later, a thin cut opened across every vampire's pale throat.
Like werewolves, vampires could establish blood-bound control by injecting their own blood into weaker members of their race.
Those who could endure the gift grew stronger.
Those whose blood rejected it died.
The method normally worked only on vampires of weaker or impure bloodlines, however.
Lucian placed a single drop of his blood into each of them.
Not one died.
Instead, their auras climbed.
Lucian watched with satisfaction.
He was an unbending believer in bloodline purity. He barely acknowledged diluted vampires—but toward those of pure descent, he was extravagantly generous.
What he didn't know was that his blood-bound domination held no power over servants protected by the Empress of the Undead.
The System stripped out the controlling influence and converted the blood into pure EXP.
A single drop might have seemed like nothing, but Lucian was an Elite. To vampires who had yet to rise past Recruit Rank, the experience was enormous.
One of them had already reached Tier 9 Recruit.
Lucian's blood carried him through the barrier in a single surge.
Tier 1 Veteran.
The vampires immediately resolved to turn the misunderstanding to their advantage.
They would feign submission, stay close to Lucian, and gather whatever resources and intelligence they could.
All they needed was a way to warn Lilith.
Lucian spread his hands.
"How does it feel?"
The newly advanced Veteran reacted first. He dropped to one knee.
"Thank you for your gift. I swear my life to your service."
Vampires were nothing if not intelligent. The others sensed the harmless transformation inside their own bodies and grasped his plan at once.
They knelt and pledged their loyalty.
Lucian looked pleased.
But he wasn't finished.
"If your former Lord commands our kin, your master must have summoned far more than those gathered here over the past two weeks."
His gaze traveled across the kneeling vampires.
"Take me to your Lord."
The demand sent a jolt through them.
Lucian knew far more about Lords than they had expected.
Their false submission was minutes old, and he was already asking to be led straight to Lilith.
They hesitated.
Betrayal was not an option.
Fortunately, they were all kneeling with heads bowed, their expressions hidden from him.
But they couldn't stay silent for long.
The newly advanced Veteran answered before suspicion could take root.
"Yes, my lord. Our former Lord's Territory lies on an icefield to the north. I will guide you there."
The added detail was meant for his companions.
He wasn't describing Lilith's Territory.
He meant the stronghold of Thorne and the Three Blades Alliance.
Lilith's vampires had learned its location after the last transaction between the two groups.
Under the circumstances, sacrificing Thorne and his companions was their best available move.
The Three Blades Alliance kept no conventional troops, which made the lie easier to sustain.
Their only worry was that Lucian might question the Lords before killing them. If he did, the deception would fall apart on the spot.
What the vampires didn't know was that the Three Blades Alliance had already sunk beneath the ice under its Wonder's protection.
There would be nothing waiting for them at all.