Ever Cynical

Chapter 52- Remote Voting Part One

Ludolf POV

After yet another failed investigation into the whereabouts of Simone Allard, or any of her offspring, I swiped everything off my desk in uncontrolled rage. Three hundred nineteen years I had been searching for this female, with nothing to show for it. Belsant refused to help after about a hundred years, saying if the girl wasn't my mate it was not for her to take any steps, and the Dark Witches wanted too much in exchange. I had taken to relying on humans and allied packs, but it was hard to force much from across an ocean. It left me stewing in my castle in Bavaria, Germany, not feeling very much like the powerful king I was supposed to be.

Why did I want her when I had a fated mate? Because my wolf wanted her. He would not say why, but he felt some kind of power from her, the ability to make our rule possibly longer, with strong offspring. My mate could barely survive my near-constant s****l exploits with other females, which I refused to feel bad about. My mate was boring. Pretty, but empty-headed like a doll. Simone was perfect. Gorgeous, smart and resourceful. She'd managed to elude me this long, and I just wanted her more.

An email came in from the administrators of the Elder Council. Perhaps they were finally responding to my petition to remove that damned Kieran Blake from his alpha role and disband the Immortal royal pack. I'd inherited a need to get rid of them from my father and his father before him. He'd said they were dangerous. I didn't agree with that assessment, but I knew many viewed him with an eye to replace me. Me!? Replaced by an upstart from a barely-there pack? Thankfully, he'd not seemed to care about the council so far, though this last time I'd sent an envoy he'd had the audacity to toss him off his pack lands and banish him. Pflumer was indeed an ass, but lesser packs should just tolerate it.

Slimy or not, he was my direct representative, and to take action against him was to take action against me.

To my dismay, Kieran had managed to provide a legitimate and infallible response to my complaint, and it was dismissed. Well, f**k. Without sending Pflumer on his veiled missions to stop the kid from mating, I wasn't sure how to proceed. The email from the elder council even questioned the reason why I was sending one of my people on their behalf when no such request had been made. I tapped my chin, trying to think of any suitable excuse, but could think of nothing. Apparently, Kieran had been smart enough to keep records of every visit and Pflumer's unreasonable behavior. I put my head in my hands, trying to think of some other plausible reason I could send someone to his pack.

Failure was not an option, or I was going to lose my crown to the very pack my grandfather and father had warned me to never let have power. They'd probably come back and haunt me for it.

As I sat there, my mind coming up with nothing useful, another email came in from the elder council administrators. Nobody knows who they are, for good reason.

Ugh. This time as I read, my face paled, then became purple with rage. Kieran had found his mates, a bear and another Immortal, and was applying for the empty seat on the council. We were being asked to vote remotely, and our vote would be discounted if we were found to have discussed the item with anyone. Upon reading, we were all spelled to ensure honesty. I didn't bother to read the details on his mates, I really didn't care. I was pissed that Pflumer had apparently managed to miss them, or their capture. Although a bear would have killed him, for sure. Weakling.

I immediately submitted my disapproval, and went back to thinking of who I could use to track Simone.

Feeling frustrated, I went on the prowl for some unwilling girl to take my resentment out on.

Donato POV

I was so tired of the tediousness of endless life. Well, undeadness?

Whatever. I stared desultorily at the Italian landscape of Florence outside my castle. Too bad the beauty did nothing for me.

The only one who'd given me a taste of what it could be to look forward to tomorrow, was Isabeau. Beautiful, pure, Isabeau. Just her smell was like ambrosia. Almost like a beloved, the vampire equivalent of a mate, but not enough that I could actually claim her. It was her existence that had led to me requesting the witches curse our kind. There were those that hated it, of course, but it ended up being a blessing as the world began to modernize. You simply could not blame things on other creatures or mysteries when CCTV could capture you feeding. Many vampires behave in a profoundly stupid manner when they are hungry.

I don't blame them, blood thirst when you've starved yourself is beyond painful, and you are certainly not in your rational mind. Someone you loved as a human could be in front of you and all you could see was food. So many excruciating regrets happened as a result of such circumstances and the resulting behavior, that the curse had been necessary. As hedonistic as I was, I still cared for my people.

I sunk myself into depravity regularly. I told myself for Isabeau, I could be different. Be monogamous, stop the drugs, maybe even be a father. There was a special light to her existence. She'd escaped when I'd almost had her, and four hundred seven years later, I was still looking for her or possibly her offspring. I was sure her children would have that same light, the same immortality and yet humanity that Isabeau had possessed.

My grandparents had been loving and devoted vampires, the type to encourage balance in all things. I think many give in to the vampiric instincts and essentially lose themselves. Since the majority were turned, it's very different from being born a vampire, like I was. How my tender grandparents had given birth to a misogynistic, racist man like my father, I would never know. He had been power hungry and destructive, even killing my mother in a rage.

I suspected he'd been responsible for my grandparents' death as well, but had no proof. The fire had been far too conveniently timed, since my grandfather had refused to hand over his crown.

I was going through my financials, with no energy at all, when an email from the elder council popped in. Oh, a remote vote. I was glad I didn't have to actually attend. Kieran Blake of the Immortals? Sad story, the Immortals. I felt kind of bad for them. My father had made it his life's mission to help alpha King Ludolf's family in their destruction, even donating his blood to the Dark Witches. It had backfired and my father had ended up dead somehow. I had never bothered with the details. He was not a nice man. I had as little to do with Ludolf's nasty pack as I could.

I guess I wasn't really nice either, but more in a hedonistic, don't really care about anything outside of avoiding discovery sort of way. I sighed, sending my approval. I had nothing against the pack, though I did find it interesting that he had two mates, a bear and another Immortal. It was probably good that they were finally getting mates outside their kind. Wait. I sat up. Thinking back, I remembered my father saying something about mates from other races... meh. He was a bigot, the progenitor of the snobbish tendency vampires had of rejecting mates from other species.

Even if he had said something specific to Immortals, it was outdated, at the least.

Not to mention, the man was evil. I wanted nothing to do with his legacy.

Belsant POV

Happy that all of my paperwork was done for the week, I cheerfully clicked on a new email from the Elder Council. Ah, remote vote. Darn. I liked seeing everyone. I was proud to be the neutral one, though I knew everyone said I wasn't really, behind closed doors. Can I just say, it's really a difficult line? There are plenty of times when I want to put how I really feel out there, but I can't risk all the witches that rely on me to keep them from persecution. We have a group of bad apples, the Dark Witches, that make it hard for the rest of us to exist.

Whenever those baddies get up to no good, we are the ones that get blamed.

I sighed, getting up and going to look out of the skyscraper I worked and lived out of in Phoenix, Arizona.

I was not unaware of the struggles of the Immortals, but I could not undo magic that I had not authored. The caster had to do it, and I had no control over Therosia Zonara and her band of hooligans. Sadly, she had far more power and ability than I did. I'd loved to have imprisoned her or something, but we all knew nothing was permanent. Her contract with exiled demons gave her the advantage in many situations. I did not dabble in dark magic. Ever.

It was ironic that as I sat thinking of the Immortals, they were the very subject of the vote. Kieran Blake had finally found his mates... ooh more than one? Very nice! He was applying to join the empty spot. He was known as an honorable and strong alpha. He'd be a nice balancer for that nasty Ludolf. He was the only one I disliked meeting in person. Always trying to grab the women. Let's just be real, I am not a fan of men. My mate is a beautiful and delicate Fae woman. I immediately approved it, and went about my day.

The more balanced our Elder Council was, the better.

Fenxia POV

I tapped my nails on my desk. Normally I'd be sunbathing, but my Beta insisted I get some work done today. It was high time I went on a tour to find a mate, but it was always tough for Werecats to feel super motivated. Plus, I was the youngest at only ninety-five on the council. I was entitled to relax, jeez! Sighing deeply, I quickly went through the need to do stuff and got it completed in record time. I was excited to be done when another email popped up, this time from the Elder Council, apparently a remote vote. I liked remote because I could just go about my day.

Meaning, I could go sunbathe and not have my Beta bug me. Naps are great, don't you know?

My pack, or pride, depending on who you talked to, cats generally preferred pride, sat nestled at the bottom of the hills near Santa Barbara. It was warm year-round without being suffocatingly hot. The view from the windows called to me as I tried to refocus on this damn email so I could go enjoy the sunshine.

Hmm, some alpha wolf was applying for the empty spot on the Council. I wrinkled my nose. I wasn't sure what Immortals were, but I would have preferred some other race, besides dragons, that already held two spots, along with vampires. Two mates, huh? I felt bitter, since I didn't even have one. Feeling petty, I voted no without reading any further.

No skin off my nose.