The Cursed: Threads of Destiny

Šero - II

The closer he gets to the plane that will take him home, the more he thinks that letting Morgan deal with the King’s council was a bad idea. It has nothing to do with his competency to accomplish the task—he has no doubt that he will handle everything as smoothly as he has taught him. He thinks back on his breakfast in the dining hall of the palace and his pupil’s tendency to be pulled towards the soon-to-be beta of the ruling pack. He has been down this road, and it is an exhausting one, because neither of them will die anytime soon and all there will be left are the memories. He feels instinct to pull him, knowing that he’ll fall. Broken bones heal with time, but the memory will be burned in his brain as a warning. He needs to grow and so Šero must let him fall.

He knows that his kind are non-decaying, walking corpses, but sometimes he looks at Morgan and his eyes really do look dead to him. He hollows himself out until the last moment before allowing himself to fall so under the ground that he agrees to sustain, however that maybe. Šero took to vampirism ‘beautifully’ as his mentor used to say. Almost as if he was waiting for this moment in his life. But the part of his life that left him feeling unfulfilled and begging for humanity, he dares not visit again. It is his responsibility that Morgan becomes the perfect leader, and he believes without a doubt that he will be a better one. He was chosen by his master, and even he turned out to be a pretty decent leader. Still, he worries like the idiots he mocks for worrying.

“Arthur,” he says to his second-in-command, who follows him up the stairs to the airplane, “Tell them to pour the wine Morgan gave me.”

“As you wish, Your Highness,” he says.

When they are seated and the wine is poured, he looks out the window just as Morgan bows as deeply as he can while standing. He always finds that strange. There is rarely an instance where he has seen his pupil bow so deeply, almost as if he is apologizing for something. Their eyes meet as he looks up and Šero nods back at him in acknowledgment, silently ordering him to head back inside. He lifts his gaze and finds Zach at the door, in the shadows, watching and waiting. Zach is reckless, as he should be for his age, but trustworthy and determined, as the King put some kindly in his official statement informing the people about the change in the structure of authority in the palace.

The wine is sweet, might be too much for some, but Šero has a sweet tooth, so it doesn’t bother him. He hides his smile when he sees Arthur almost spitting the wine out before setting the glass back on the table. Morgan had led him to believe that he had prepared this bottle personally, but never directly admitted it. He shrugs, noting to himself to ask Morgan about it later, before clearing his throat.

“What did the treasurer say?”

“He said that we have been paying all the taxable funds and that there had not been a misunderstanding on either side until the King informed you about the pending taxes,” Arthur says, pulling up documents on his holo-phone, “The receipts have been signed when the funds were paid and collected by both our treasurer and the palace. The funds were either embezzled by one of our own or—”

“—or someone from the palace is pulling our leg.”

“Yes, to put it simply, Your Highness.”

“Ask Morgan to investigate discreetly while he remains in the palace and keep him updated as and when we acquire new information. We must seek out the traitor, if one exists, from our ranks.”

“As you command,” he says.

Šero doesn’t speak for the entirety of the flight. They need to analyze all the transactions over the last two decades, create a list of suspects, get their facts straight. He wouldn’t put his subjects above betraying, but stealing money seems such a tedious task—he’d rather someone poison or stab him—not to mention, entirely unimportant. They live for so many centuries and although stealing money is a fun little activity, nothing can compare to a carefully executed stabbing. So, class, what does that tell us? He thinks, sighing in relief as they land. He has never been agreeable to sitting in one place for long periods of time.

It tells us that it’s not the money, it’s the motive behind the stealing, he thinks, answering his question. He had been a teacher before the role of leadership was thrust onto him, and he could not quite let that part of him go. His students were of varying social status, but whether they were petulant aristocratic bastards or unruly peasant bastards, he genuinely enjoyed the power of a teacher in shaping a child’s perspective. It was like pulling a single thread to control the future. Perhaps I’ll start again after Morgan’s ascend, he humors himself, descending the stairs of the airplane and walking towards the car that will take them back home.

There is a line of attendants and his close subordinates, waiting as the car stops. When he exits, they bow according to their respective standard from high to low. He had proposed, when he ascended, to remove the use of different standards. Everyone has a role and no role is more important than the other. His advisors had very diplomatically answered that what he said was true and that it is the very reason they need these standards. Standards build systems and systems bring stability, although fragile. They said that the standards were not to define someone’s importance, but to define the role itself. Of course, everyone is important for a functioning society, they said. He understood their argument to a certain extent, but there was—and still is—so much he disagreed with, but he stopped arguing. Perhaps that is why he must step down from his role. If he cannot argue to bring change, then there is not much left for him to do except small niceties and diplomatic talks.

He gives them a small smile of acknowledgment and a nod as he walks into the castle. It was not older than him, which he’d found a little strange when he was informed about it. Definitely more modernized with hints of history, as compared to the King’s palace, which is heavily adorned in history. The King has always been nostalgic. The building itself, however, is very intricate. When the west was floating in Rococo elegance and pastels, the commissioner of this castle wanted to stick to the complexities of the styles from her time.

To make the task more difficult for the builder and the architect, the commissioner had requested a blend of different styles, starting from the domes and mosaics of Byzantine in the center with the open interior spaces of the Gothic around the middle and finishing with ionic columns inspired from Ancient Greece with the defensiveness of the Romanesque style. To say it was a disaster of a project to build was an understatement. The architect surely had several mental breakdowns before they finished their drawings and the builder several more when they finished making. No wonder it was a while before the coven had moved to this castle.

But Šero never found himself complaining. If one focuses only on one particular style at a time and not the building as a whole, then they can forget for a single moment how much of a clusterfuck it really is. A nice addition of the underground homes was made later by the succeeding leader. He had, respectively and deliberately, not made any additions to their establishment, fearing that the whole building would collapse on them if he moved even one stone. Additions are encouraged, even as the end of his rule comes closer, because they are like leaving your mark on history. It is like screaming ‘I exist’ but a few centuries in the future. Although he himself remains uninterested in leaving a mark, he hopes that Morgan will because, with him, the coven will enter a new age.

“It is a pleasure to have you back, Your Highness,” Wilbur says, trailing behind. Arthur does not hide his disdain behind a practiced mask, instead lets it exhibit in the shade of his scowl. He had never liked the fellow.

“I was only gone two days, Will,” he says, feeling strangely tired all of a sudden.

“And the days have been long without you, my lord,” he says, with a polite smile.

Šero chuckles, finding his words entertaining. If he did not know any better, he would’ve thought he was flirting with him. Although he disapproves of it, Will’s nature is flirtatious. He finds people that flirt with anyone they can, incapable of sincerity. And although that thought is uncompromising, he cannot bring himself to think otherwise.

“Where is the charming heir of our coven, if I may ask?” he asks, tilting his head in curiosity, “I do not see him.”

“I ordered him to stay back to strengthen our relations with the palace,” he says.

“Truly?” he says, his eyebrows raised in surprise.

“Yes, it is about time we put our differences aside,” Šero says, nodding.

“Well, an apt move, my lord,” Will says, “Although, I cannot imagine being him, among the frenzied werewolves. They are sure to exhaust him.”

He chuckles again, and says, “We all must do what is necessary.”

“Indeed, my lord,” he says with a smile, “I wanted to-”

“Sorry to interrupt you, Wilbur,” Arthur says roughly, with a mocking smile, “But His Highness must rest so that he may resume his work.”

“Of course,” Will says, his smile unwavering, “I hope to speak soon, Your Highness.”

“Sure, Will,” Šero says, walking away with a polite smile with Arthur right behind him.