Running through the center of a mansion there was a hall.

It, much like the mansion itself, was furnished lavishly. Great tapestries and oil paintings hung from the well-lit walls. Rich carpets layered the smooth stone floors. Servants rushed every which way, attending to the massive manse’s every need.

But there was something…off about the place as well.

The servants were a touch too hurried as they bustled about the halls. Their bodies were a touch too thin, too haggard. Even as they worked, their eyes never left the ground. And though the carpets and walls resembled those of any other Aristocrat’s manse, the torches burned with eerie lime-green light, and oily black metal held them aloft.

Black and green. Death and soul.

The ancestral colors of Cell Nycta.

They made Alyss’s stomach churn. She hated her family colors. She hated the way the servants flinched as she walked past them, and most of all she hated the thin veneer of wealth and luxury that smothered the place.

For she knew of the cells and torture chambers that hid just out of sight. She knew of the filthy hovels and cramped corridors that served as housing for the slaves. She knew of the grotesque, stinking breeding chambers that they were forced into. Most of all, she knew well the screams a slave produced as their soul was ripped from them.

She knew from personal experience.

Alyss traversed the halls as quickly as her legs would carry her. She didn’t seek to linger here a moment more than necessary, and she could not be late to her summons. One did not keep Lord Nycta waiting.

Thankfully, she was almost at the Lord’s solar.

Unfortunately, loitering right outside the solar was her older brother Sylvas. A tall, thin young man, barely out of his teens. Barely older than her. But they were worlds apart in status, something a young Sylvas had made abundantly clear to her as a child.

After all, Sylvas was pure-blooded.

He was attractive, much like the father they shared. But Sylvas’s beauty was sickly, slimy. It was the beauty of a freshly perished corpse. Cold and clammy. He leered at her, undressing her visually with equal parts disdain and desire. She observed him.

~~~

Geist

~~~

Thank the Gods. Alyss hadn’t seen him for years, but he was still only named. He lacked a title, meaning he hadn’t managed to coalesce his core. No doubt Lord Nycta wasn’t pleased about that, but at least it meant Sylvas wouldn’t dare to hurt her too badly.

Mentally bracing herself, Alyss made to stride right past him, but was unsurprised when he caught her arm. He tightened his grip, squeezing painfully. She winced slightly, not from the pain itself, but because she knew she had too.

Too little of a reaction, and Sylvas would be infuriated, and hurt her more. Too much, and he’d become sadistic, and do the same. She had to strike just the right balance between submission and indifference. She kept her eyes down as he spoke to her.

“Little sister, little sister,” he sang sarcastically. “Little half-breed slut. Where are we off to today?”

His shade coiled around him as he spoke. Alyss’s Blessing allowed her to ‘see’ the powers of others. Blessings represented immaterially, like ghosts behind their bearers’ backs.

She hated it. More often than not, the manifestations weren’t all that helpful, and only served to set her teeth on edge.

Sylvas’s shade was literally a phantom, though. A long, thin, all-grey woman whose face was perpetually stuck in a silent wail. The shade hugged her Blessed protectively, long uncut nails caressing Sylvas’s face. She snarled at Alyss challengingly.

Believe me, sister, you’ve no competition here.

“Lord Nycta has summoned me, brother.”

“Mmmm, mmmm,” Sylvas hummed, nodding twice, hand sliding unpleasantly up her arm. Then he paused, and raised a finger, as if an idea had just occurred to him. “Wait a minute! No, he hasn’t.”

Her brother’s grip tightened. “No, no, you can’t fool me,” he said, mockingly. “You’re a half-breed. The great Lord Nycta would never require the presence of someone like you. No, no, no. You must be mistaken.”

“Let me go, Sylvas,” Alyss pleaded, firmly and quietly. He ignored her.

“No, no…,” he murmured, then snapped his fingers. “I know! Why don’t you keep me company, instead? Why, it’ll be just like the old days, you remember those, don’t you, sister? You, and me, all alone, in your room, you pretending you didn’t like it, crying, all whilst I–”

Alyss’s skin crawled, and she yanked roughly free from his grip, leaving deep red blisters on her flesh. She couldn’t help it. Sylvas beamed at having achieved his desired response, like a child receiving a brand new toy. He’d won again. He didn’t try to molest her a second time, but laughed coldly as she retreated from him.

Cheeks burning, eyes itching, Alyss opened the door and entered Lord Nycta’s solar.

Thankfully, the Aristocrat’s office was large, and he was too far from her, and too busy with paperwork, to notice her distress. As she composed herself and approached his large, antique desk, Alyss took a moment to examine her father.

Arthas Nycta was a beautiful man, of that there could be no doubt. His allure beggared belief.

With long, silky dark hair bound up behind his neck, tall cheekbones, a refined nose, and thin eyebrows, he was probably one of the most comely men in the world. The very image of a cultured, noble Aristocrat. He possessed an ethereal grace that made him seem more than human, which, she supposed, he was.

Arthas was an Immortal, and despite his beauty, his shade never failed to terrify her. It was a gangly, grinning skeleton with far too many teeth, black, burnt bones and green runes that glimmered uncannily inscribed upon them. Its eyes glowed with the same unearthly lime-green light, a light that its masters’ shared. Black smoke polluted its body, wafting off it in great waves.

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But the most unsettling thing about it was its size.

It was tall, too tall, so tall its head scraped the top of the twenty foot high office. It towered over all those within. Its proportions were all wrong, too, arms elongated such that its knuckles dragged gratingly across the floor, fingers like wicked swords poking meters out from them.

Sown within its chest was a bone-white box that pulsed with power. She didn’t need to observe the man. His title announced itself to the world around him in a funeral dirge, in the laments of the damned, in the desperate pleas of those he’d forever enslaved.

~~~

Soultaker Angmar

~~~

Arthas’ giant shade contorted around Alyss as she approached, spindle-like fingers of black bone poking and prodding, producing phantom sensations in unwanted areas. It probed her very soul. She fought hard against the urge to shiver with revulsion.

Finally setting down his pen in a nearby holster, Arthas Nycta leaned back in his chair, steepling his fingers. He fixed his occult stare upon her, and spoke.

“Daughter.”

Alyss said nothing in reply. She knew better than to speak without prompting. His gaze rising to the ceiling above, he spoke calmly and considerately.

“I will be blunt. From the moment you were born, you disgusted me.”

He raised an eyebrow.

“I’d had far, far too much to drink that night, and there was something about this whore–your mother, that is–that just, just…” Arthas waved his hand lightly, searching for the appropriate words to describe the worst day of her mother’s life.

“I have always appreciated mundane women far more than the Blessed whom I can so easily control. And the way she fought…the way she struggled…the way she resisted…”

His unnatural focus returned to Alyss. He smiled. He spoke of raping her mother as if it was a treasured, wholesome memory.

“Well, it lit a fire within me.” Arthas rapped the thick wooden desk twice with his knuckles, nodding slowly to himself.

“I never imagined such an affair would result in pregnancy, of course. I was so revolted when I discovered it, I almost had her killed on the spot. But…something stayed my hand.”

He chuckled softly. Alyss wanted to puke.

“To this day, I couldn’t tell you what it was. Perhaps it was the desire to take her again. Perhaps it was the thought of watching her forced to bear the child of the man she so despised.” He chuckled lightly once more. “Truly, I cannot say. I killed her in the end, anyway. But I digress…”

“As I say, you disgusted me. When she birthed you and I beheld your mewling, pathetic form, I was overcome with the desire to kill you as well. It took every scrap of will I had to stay my hand. You were a disgrace to the Cell. A disgusting half-breed tarnishing my noble line.”

He shrugged.

“But I had already gone this far. And, as you well know, daughter, I have never been one to waste an opportunity. Perhaps, I thought, my blood was strong in you despite your parentage. So, I put you to the trials. To the Darkroom.”

Despite herself, Alyss closed her eyes for a moment upon hearing the word. Arthas pretended not to notice. But she knew he had.

“To be honest, I didn’t think you’d last an hour, much less a day. A part of me had hoped you wouldn’t. Even when you triggered, I never, never imagined I’d legitimize you.”

Arthas fixed her with another warm smile. It was relaxing, welcoming. The kind of thing that would make a lover’s heart melt as they beheld it. The same one Alyss saw every time she looked in the mirror. It was why she didn’t smile anymore.

“Oh, my daughter, you simply could not imagine my pleasant surprise when your brother told me the news. When he described to me the nature of your Blessing. How ironic, hmm? That my blood would run stronger in you than any of my pureborn heirs.”

Arthas sighed contentedly. He turned to stare out the window.

“Oh, my child. At last, the world is waking up. At last, plans laid centuries ago are beginning to come into fruition.”

Alyss felt a chill run down her spine. Her father never shared with her his plans. Whatever was happening, it must be big. And that wasn’t good news. Not for her, not for anyone.

The world suffered when Angmar smiled.

Arthas stroked the fine, expensive glass that separated his solar from the outside world. He watched the bloodied, broken slaves as they toiled beneath his feet. Then he spoke once more.

“I have decided upon your future, daughter. You shall go east, to Talos. The Coterie holds the latest round of the Agoge in the capital of Uther’s territory. You shall take part. You shall succeed.”

Arthas’ haunting grin as he looked back at her mirrored that of the lich that was his shade.

“Time and again, I have failed to implant an agent within the Coterie’s upper echelons. Time and again, they have refused my pureborn heirs the right to join their ranks.”

“But they will not refuse a Forsaken. You will pass the Agoge, you will infiltrate their organization, and you will gain access to their hallowed institute and learn their secrets. You will grow in power and in knowledge.”

Alyss held her breath tightly, not trusting herself to breathe. This was her chance, her only chance. For the first time, she would be allowed out of her family’s sight. For the first time, she would be beholden to no one. For the first time, she could know what it was to live a normal life.

Perhaps, she could even escape. The Coterie was powerful beyond belief. If she played her cards right, perhaps they would help her. But it made no sense.

Why would Father give her this chance?

“When you condense your core, I shall send you south and Sothoth herself will tremble before your might. Billions of dead Spawn will fuel your growth into a raging inferno. You will become the first in history to surpass the Body stage. You will become the glorious weapon with which I finally unseat that Regis rat.” Arthas spat the last words. Then he fixed his eyes on her once more, and her heart sank at his next words.

“After you have become Immortal like me, you will marry War.”

Ah. There it is.

There would be no daring escape. No cunning vanishing act. The Coterie would never support her against the Horsemen. There would be nowhere she could run too, no place she could hide. War was relentless, and his cruelty was legend. She wouldn’t even have the courage to try.

Dispassionately, her father continued.

“Your marriage to the heir of Syn will unite our two families, and the children you bear him will shake the very foundations of this world. Together, Syn and Nycta will rule all land north of the Stain, turning the Aristocracy into a Monarchy with our family at its head. Our combined might will make even Old Europe and the Empire bow before us.”

His viridescent gaze bored into her soul. His shade’s bones rattled with deathly glee.

“You, my daughter, are the future of this Cell, of this nation, of this world.”

Arthas paused, before chuckling one final time, as if the thought had just occurred to him.

“So in the end, I suppose, I am grateful to that whore.