Supreme Hunter of Beautiful Souls

Chapter 589: Order of the First Blood

Elizabeth remained standing for several seconds, as if the room itself had pulled away from her. The chair behind her was still out of place, her hands were clenched hard enough to make her gloves creak, and her red eyes stared at Liza with a mixture of disbelief, pain, and anger. It was not only the political revelation that struck her. It was the brutal reconstruction of a memory she was still trying to protect.

"He sought them out," Elizabeth said, her voice too low for an accusation and too heavy for a question.

Liza held her daughter’s gaze.

"Yes."

"Before everything."

"Yes."

"Before you were trapped in that hell. Before I was hunted. Before the clans went mad. Before the children died."

The queen closed her eyes for an instant, but did not look away.

"Yes."

Elizabeth let out a short laugh, without any humor. The sound seemed to break something inside the room. Violet lowered her gaze out of respect, while Amelia slowly closed the folder, leaving one finger between the pages so she would not lose the point. Irelia watched Elizabeth with an expression softer than before. Sylphie, for her part, seemed deeply disturbed by her pain, perhaps because she understood far too well what it was to discover that a protective figure had made decisions capable of destroying an entire life.

Kael did not interrupt.

There were moments when speaking too soon merely robbed the person of the right to feel the impact.

Elizabeth took a deep breath, trying to recover her composure, but her voice still came out trembling.

"I defended him."

Liza lowered her gaze.

"I know."

"Even after everything. Even after being hunted by my own relatives. Even after almost dying. A part of me still thought that, if he was being controlled, perhaps somewhere inside him he had tried to resist for us."

"He tried to resist afterward," Liza said carefully. "That is also true."

Elizabeth looked at her with pain.

"But afterward."

Liza did not answer.

Because, once again, there was no answer that made that smaller.

Kael finally spoke, his voice low and controlled.

"Elizabeth."

She turned her eyes to him.

"This does not erase what he may have been to you before."

The princess went still.

Kael kept his gaze steady.

"It also does not diminish the crime. Both things can be true at the same time. He may have been your father and still have opened the door to something monstrous. You do not need to choose between pretending he was innocent or erasing everything you felt for him."

Elizabeth pressed her lips together, and for an instant she seemed to hate the fact that those words made sense.

"That is horrible."

"Yes."

"You speak as if you are used to it."

Kael released a short sigh.

"Powerful families are rarely clean."

Liza then observed Kael with deeper attention, as if that sentence said more about him than about Vlad. He did not explain. He did not need to. Everyone at that table carried some kind of inheritance too difficult to fit inside a diplomatic conversation.

Amelia resumed reading the folder, perhaps to give Elizabeth a few seconds of silence. Her eyes moved quickly over the documents, and her expression became even more serious.

"There are recurring mentions of a name," she said. "I do not know if it is the real designation or merely an operational cell. Order of the First Blood."

Violet stiffened almost imperceptibly.

Liza nodded.

"That is what they call themselves in the internal records we managed to recover. Publicly, they never used that name. They operated through commercial houses, alchemical circles, private laboratories, and clan counselors."

Irelia leaned slightly forward.

"Are they vampires?"

"Some," Liza answered. "But not all. That is one of the reasons I called Kael. The Order of the First Blood is not merely a vampiric faction. There are humans, rogue witches, alchemists, and possibly entities from lineages we have not yet identified."

Sylphie narrowed her eyes.

"They wanted to control vampires, but they are not only vampires."

"Exactly," Liza said. "To them, our kingdom would be a tool. A source of soldiers, spies, agents, and assassins almost impossible to trace, all bound to a chain of command they believed they could steal."

Kael rested his elbow on the table and touched his fingers to his chin.

"And Vlad thought he could use them before they used him."

Liza nodded slowly.

"That was his arrogance."

Elizabeth closed her eyes.

"And our punishment."

The sentence came out low, but everyone heard it.

Liza trembled almost imperceptibly, but it was enough for Kael to notice. The queen was controlled, imposing, and cold, but there was an open wound beneath every answer. She was not merely denouncing a husband. She was burying what remained of him with her own hands in front of her daughter.

Kael returned his eyes to the folder.

"You asked the Kingdom of Witches to keep Vlad imprisoned."

"Yes."

"I can take that to Eleonor. But if he is an accomplice, we are not talking only about preventive custody. We are talking about trial."

Liza agreed.

"I know."

"And if there is a trial, the details may become public."

"I know that too."

Elizabeth opened her eyes and looked at her mother.

"Mother."

Liza did not look away.

"If I hide everything to protect his name, the Order will continue using silence as shelter. If I expose everything too soon, part of the kingdom may split in half. That is why I need time. Vlad imprisoned in the Kingdom of Witches gives me that time."

Amelia closed the folder and pulled it closer.

"Politically, it makes sense. While he is under Eleonor’s custody, no clan can rescue him without declaring hostility against the witches. And no clan can accuse Liza of political assassination against her own husband."

Irelia added:

"It also prevents radicals from turning him into a symbol of resistance."

"Exactly," Liza said. "Alive, distant, and inaccessible. That is the safest state for everyone, for now."

Kael observed her in silence.

"You know Eleonor may agree, but she will want full access to the documents."

"I expect that."

"And Elion will want to dismantle every piece of the magic used on him."

Liza hesitated for only a fraction of a second.

"That worries me more."

Sylphie looked at Kael.

"With reason."

Kael did not deny it.

"Elion is meticulous when something irritates her."

Irelia murmured:

"Meticulous is a kind word."

Amelia, still with the documents before her, turned a few more pages.

"You said there were two reasons to call Kael. The first was Vlad. What is the second?"

Liza intertwined her fingers over the table again. This time, her posture changed. The matter was still grave, but it did not carry the same intimate weight as Vlad’s betrayal. It was something larger. Older. More structural.

"The second reason is hunger."

Kael raised his eyes.

Liza continued:

"The massacre, the radicals, and the Order’s manipulation exposed a weakness that has always existed. The treaty with the Human Empire and the blood trade agreements bought stability, but they did not resolve our nature. Animal blood keeps bodies alive. Purchased blood keeps society functioning. But many vampires, especially ancient lineages, feel as if they are being fed ashes."

Sylphie frowned.

"So the hunger is not merely physical."

"No," Elizabeth said, still shaken, but gradually recovering her voice. "It is instinctive, magical, and ancestral. Blood carries memory, mana, vitality, and bond. Ordinary artificial feeding does not touch all those layers."

Kael grew thoughtful.

"And the radicals use that."

Liza nodded.

"They say the kingdom is being domesticated. That vampires were made to hunt, not to buy sealed vials of human blood approved by treaties. They say the hunger is proof that we have abandoned our true nature."

"And the Order offered Vlad a false solution," Kael said.

"A solution of dominion," Liza answered. "Recover absolute control over the lineages, feed hunger through conquest, and restore an ancient hierarchy by force."

Sylphie closed her hand over the table.

"That is horrible."

"Yes," Liza said. "And seductive to those who feel hunger as a daily humiliation."

The silence that followed was different. It was not the shock of Vlad’s betrayal, but the uncomfortable understanding that the problem would not end merely by imprisoning the guilty. Even if every member of the Order were found and executed, there would still be thousands of vampires living on the edge between civilization and instinct.

Kael looked at Amelia.

"You understand where she is going with this."

Amelia nodded.

"She wants an alternative."

Liza looked directly at Kael.

"Blood can be created. Refined. Altered. Queen Eleonor has enough magical knowledge to explore this. The Kingdom of Witches has alchemists, biomancers, lineage scholars, and access to forbidden techniques that we do not possess or cannot use without causing internal panic."

Kael went still.

"You want the witches to create blood for vampires."

"I want them to help create something capable of sating the hunger without requiring hunting, massacre, or political dependence on the Human Empire."

Irelia observed the queen carefully.

"Do you realize how delicate that would be? If the Kingdom of Witches becomes the supplier of the substance that controls vampiric hunger, many clans will call it a leash."

"I know."

"And some witches will call it a weapon."

"I know that too."

Kael stared at Liza.

"Because it would be a weapon."

The queen did not retreat.

"Yes."

Her honesty made the room grow quieter.

Kael placed his hands on the table.

"A substance capable of satisfying vampires could also be used to control distribution, create addiction, poison lineages, or weaken entire clans."

"Yes."

"If it falls into the wrong hands, it would be worse than the current dependence."

"Yes."

"And even so, you want to try."

Liza held his gaze.

"Because the alternative is to wait until the next crisis, the next Vlad, the next Order, the next massacre. I would rather create something dangerous under surveillance than pretend an ancient hunger is not rotting my kingdom."

Kael remained silent for several seconds.

Sylphie watched his face. So did Irelia and Amelia. Elizabeth, still standing, seemed divided between the pain over Vlad and cautious hope before her mother’s proposal. Violet remained motionless, but her red eyes followed Kael with absolute attention.

Finally, he spoke.

"I will take the request to Eleonor."

Liza breathed almost imperceptibly.

"Thank you."

"But I do not promise approval."

"I did not expect a promise."

"And if this moves forward, there will be conditions."

"Which ones?"

Kael raised one finger.

"First. No unilateral control. Neither witches nor vampires. If this is created, it needs joint supervision and open records for both crowns."

Liza nodded.

"I agree."

"Second. No testing on prisoners, servants, children, lesser lineages, or anyone without clear consent."

Liza’s gaze grew heavier.

"I agree."

"Third. Elion does not touch the project without supervision."

Sylphie turned her face toward him.

Irelia blinked.

Amelia seemed to consider that the most sensible clause of the night.

Liza was silent for an instant.

"Is that truly so necessary?"

Kael, Sylphie, Irelia, and Amelia answered with the same look.

Liza understood.

"I agree."

Kael lowered his hand.

"And fourth. I want complete access to the investigation into the Order of the First Blood. No summaries. No edited versions. Everything."

Elizabeth looked at her mother.

Liza answered without hesitation.

"You will have it."

"Then we have a basis for conversation."

The tension did not disappear, but it changed shape. The room was no longer merely reacting to the past. For the first time since the beginning of the meeting, there seemed to be a real possibility of action. Dangerous, complex, and full of traps, but still action.

Elizabeth slowly sat back down.

Her expression was pale, shaken, but firmer than before. She looked at the folder, then at Kael.

"And what about my father?"

Kael did not answer quickly.

When he did, his voice came out calm.

"I will ensure he remains imprisoned until we know exactly what he did, what they did to him, and what still remains inside him."

Elizabeth nodded, swallowing the pain.

"And if he is guilty enough to be condemned?"

Kael held her gaze.

"Then he will be condemned."

Liza closed her eyes for a second.

Elizabeth did too.

No one in the room celebrated.

Because some victories felt only like choosing the less mortal wound.