Chapter 65 – Downfall of the Prince

October 10, 2004 = Sunday

~Eliza Flores~

As I neared Lacroix tower, a feeling of apprehension came over me. How exactly did LaCroix keep me from shadow-stepping into the tower? And for that matter, did my shadow powers even work within the tower?

Deciding the only way was to try, I made a small blade that was easily concealed in my hand, and kept on walking. I was steps away from the door when my blade dissolved into nothing against my will, telling me I was right about LaCroix shutting down the shadows for my use. Without them, I would be more vulnerable, and more importantly, stuck if I got in a bad way.

Still, I needed to do this in order to get my life back and there was no telling if he could shut down my powers in the city if he had more time. It felt like it was now or never, and that only meant I had to press forward, rearm myself as best I could, then attack.

Going inside, I was met with the sight of Chunk, the security guard, at the front desk. I'd been fortunate in avoiding him, but it appears my luck had finally run out. He saw me before I even opened the door, straightening up and smiling before it become pained with realization. I could guess at the why, but decided I had to confront the guard to be sure. Putting on my best happy face as I approached, his pained smile deepened and he looked afraid as he glanced up at a camera.

"I'm sorry, crumb cake," he said, trying to return my smile without the pained look that accompanied it. It was clear he was afraid, but it wasn't of me. "I-it's nothing personal you understand, but...Mister LaCroix, he tells me I can't let you in here anymore, and uh, I'm supposed to escort you out. I hope you understand."

"Chunk," I told him, leaning over the counter to check out his belt and saw his gun in its holster. "I need you to leave, and leave your gun behind. You don't want any part of what's to come."

"Aw, c'mon now, just leave okay?" he begged me, and it was honestly refreshing not to be feared by someone. "I don't wanna have to use force, but I am authorized to do so. Please don't make me do this, missy."

"I have to," I told him, then decided it was best to try and save his pathetic butt. I hit him with dominate, his face going slack even as he stood, hand going to his gun, but he stopped once I fully had him under. "Now, leave your gunbelt on the desk and call whomever is in charge and tell them you quit. If they ask why, say you don't want to hurt your pudding bear."

"Okay," he said meekly as he unsnapped his gunbelt and put it on the desk. He then dialed a number, which I recognized as being Walsh's.

"Put it on speakerphone," I commanded as he hit the last button. Chunk did as commanded, and soon Walsh's voice came over the speaker.

"Walsh," the elder kindred said in a tired tone.

"Mister Walsh, sir," Chunk said in a meek tone. "I quit."

"What?" Walsh spat, seemingly surprised by the guards words. "Why?"

"I don't want to hurt my pudding bear," he said in his meek tone.

"Is she there now?" Walsh quickly asked, and I picked up Chunk's gunbelt and checked his gun, finding it was a Glock like the one I had once before.

"I am," I told the scourge. "LaCroix is a traitor, Walsh. Get in my way, and I'll kill you as well."

"Big talk from an outnumbered foe," he replied, then his tone softened as he tried to reason with me. "If you have proof of LaCroix betraying us, bring it to me and I'll take care of it."

"We both know I'll never survive to Trial," I told him. "LaCroix will have me killed if I tried."

"So you'll kill the head of the Camarilla?" he asked me. "There's no coming back from that."

"Leave," I commanded Chunk, deciding Walsh was stalling me. Everyone was likely on the Camarilla's floors, so I had some time. Chunk bolted for the front door with my command, and I slung his gun belt over my shoulder for easy access. "So what's it going to be?"

"You really think you can take on three hundred ghouls along with me and my deputies?" he asked. "Especially since we have blocked all powers of obtenebration within the building?"

"Don't need those to be deadly," I told him, then hit the hang up button. There was no telling how long I had before they sent people down to attack me, so I ran for the elevators and hit the up button.

I waited impatiently for the elevator, but the moment the doors opened I was met with a five person squad. I rushed them, dropping the key as I kicked the first man coming out with raised pistol into the rear of the tiny room. Taking him by surprise, I was able to use my potence to overpower the next man in line and break his gun arm, throwing him out of the elevator as the next two came out of their shock and began firing blind in a desperate effort to hit me.

Blind was the operative word as I dove to the side and elbowed the last soldier in the gut, this one a woman. She crumpled at my blow, then I mule kicked one of the guys firing blind into the control panel to knock him out. The only man left standing dropped the magazine out of his gun and reached for a spare, then began to search for me. I pounced him as he slid his magazine home, knocking him out before he could so much as squawk.

With only one person left conscious, I turned to the woman panting in the corner of the elevator and picked her up by her uniform. I used dominate to pacify the woman, then auspex to see that Walsh indeed was readying Mueller's ghouls to assassinate me should I overpower this squad.

Sighing, I leaned up against the wall of the elevator and studied my options. Without my shadows, I was really down against their superior numbers. If I spent too long going up, they might think I was coming up the stairs, and if I used the elevator, I was going to get shot and burnt to a crisp when they commenced World War Three inside said elevator. No matter how fast I shot out, I was going to take several bullets before I could get among them which would be deadly as they were all equipped with incendiary rounds to be more effective against kindred.

I needed to get off the elevator without a battle breaking out. Looking at the woman next to me, I briefly entertained the idea of dressing up in her uniform and trying to pass myself off as her. The problem was I needed to return with the squad so they didn't think me a spy. I couldn't do that if any of them were awake as they'd know it wasn't me.

"Unless..." I began to say then thought it over. If I went as just me, I'd be caught in a flash, BUT, I had diablerized Andrei and acquired his powers of vicissitude. I could mold myself to look like her, wear her clothes and armor, and they wouldn't easily know. Of course, once she woke up, the gig would be up, then I smiled.

Or was it? Vicissitude worked both ways, meaning I could mold her face to look like mine. I could make her to look like me, but she might be able to sway one of the soldiers guarding her later that she was indeed their ally when she started to rejuvenate her body.

Unless she wasn't able to.

That thought brought me up short. There was a way of making it seem as if I were down and the soldiers were returning from the battle successful. And it wasn't as if I would be ripping her life away from her; she was a ghoul. Her life as she knew it had been taken already, I would just be restoring it, in a way.

"Strip," I told her, then began removing my own clothes. Thankfully we were about the same body type and height, even if I were a bit thinner overall and less busty, and her hair was auburn dyed to black, judging by the roots, where mine was just black.

Suiting up in her uniform, and her in my clothes, I thought my choice over. It was a good idea, in theory, but if this bid failed it would leave her with more questions than answers. Still, it wasn't as if I had a lot of choices in the matter as I blended out my hair in what I hoped was a successful imitation of hers. The glasses and helmet would help hide my face, so I didn't have to work too hard, and the differences in our bodies was hidden by the armor.

It was when she was dressed as me that I began to make the needed changes to her. I darkened her hair out fully and thinned her out some, mostly by shedding muscle as the woman had abs you could wash clothes on. I also made her talk, copying her voice as best I could, and used my auspex to know a few things like how I was supposed to address my comrades and superiors.

Once she was a life-like model of me, including my death-like palor, I began to pull her compatriots into the elevator. Only the one with the broken arm started to rouse himself, and I laid him back out with a right fist.

With everyone in the car, and the doors closing, I took the entranced copy in my arms and I bit into her neck. She never made a sound while I drank, then collapsed in my arms when she died due to the blood loss. I laid her out on the floor, but was shocked when the elevator dinged and the doors opened after only a few floors.

Jean was just as shocked as I, her nose sniffing telling me she was trying to get the lay of the fight coming to her. I didn't give her much of a chance to fight as I reached out and drug her into the elevator and pinned her to the wall.

"Jean!" I hissed at her. "It's me, Eliza!"

"Are you ferking nuts!" she exclaimed. "You have a blood hunt on your head and you're waltzing right into the lion's den?"

"Like I have a choice!" I hissed at her. "Like you said, the prince has called for my death. If I don't get it called off, they'll eventually kill me."

"Like slaughtering your way through Mueller's ghouls is any safer?" Jean asked me.

"Only one is dead, and that's because I intended it that way," I told her. "If you hadn't noticed, I rearranged her face to look like me while I look like her."

"How did you do that?" she asked as she looked at Morrigan more closely.

"I diablerized Andrei," I told her. "The prince already pardoned me for it, too, but now I can craft flesh at will."

"Handy," she said as she took it in. "So, you're going to pass this clone off as you? If Keith takes one look at her, he'll know something's off by her aura."

"Was that the guy who picked up on my diablerie?" I asked and she nodded.

"Keith loves to use his auspex," Jean told me. "Gives him an edge as he can tell your mood and even your secrets with a glance. He's going to know she's dead with a look and that you're kindred."

"That's why I was going to embrace her," I told Jean who stood there slackjawed.

"Embrace..." she began to say. "And what if you died? Who's going to look out for your kid?"

"I..." I began to say, then realized she was right.

"If nothing else, I'll do it," Jean said as she knelt over the clone. "At least I'll still be around to help the tyke out."

"But won't the Camarilla come after you?" I asked her and she scoffed as she poured blood down the woman's throat.

"We Gangrel left the Camarilla as a clan six years ago," she told me as she waited for her to wake up. "Like the Giovanni, we really don't have to get permission to sire more of our kind."

"But I thought the Camarilla ruled everyone?" I asked, but Jean shrugged.

"There are cracks," she told me. "Like most of us, Gangrel don't sire in the city and that's as far as the Camarilla governs. What happens beyond the city limit is beyond their purview. Besides, the Giovanni practice their own form of crowd control."

"Swell," I said, then Morrigan, the woman I had turned into my clone, surged to life. Jean was ready, a stake already in her hand and laid her back out before the clone even knew what was happening then stood next to me.

"And so it goes," she said as she looked at the carnage left behind from my attack. We didn't get a chance to do more as at that moment the doors opened on the Camarilla floor and Jean took front and center.

"Whoa whoa whoa!" she yelled as she stood in front of me. "Hold fire!"

"Baker?" Walsh shouted at us. "Did you see Eliza in their?"

"Yes sir!" Jean said as she stepped out with her hands up. "It's all under control."

Feeling this as my cue, I picked up the clone's body and carried her out, but all the guns shifted to me. I held resolute, but this time it was Mueller who gave the order.

"Guns down!" he shouted in his thick German accent at the assembled soldiers. Taking a look around, I could tell he had enough to gun me and Jean down without a problem. "Who is that with you, fraulein?"

"Eliza Flores and you're soldier, Morrigan," Jean responded. I let her take care of this to minimize chances of being discovered, but mostly she wasn't blowing my cover in case Keith was listening in. "Your soldier was already dead when I got the situation under control, so I embraced her. I also have this," she said as she held up the key to the sarcophagus, "Which I think is what the prince is after."

"Good, good," Walsh said as he moved closer. "Jean, you and Morrigan bring Eliza and the key. We're going to see the prince right now."

"Sure," Jean said as she began to follow Walsh not towards the elevator, but down the hall. I wasn't sure what was going on, but decided to just play along. Keith fell in with us, constantly looking at me when he thought I wasn't looking but he didn't say anything. Mueller shouted orders for the other four men from the elevator to get taken down to the locker rooms and tended to, then rushed after us.

"Come to have a few words with me for stealing one of your ghouls?" Jean said, falling behind to get between me and Mueller.

"You can have her," he groused as he followed along. "My concern lies in the presentation of the key to the prince."

"I got it, you didn't," Jean said flatly. "Your squad lost."

"But they made her over-confident, ja?" he asked, but I swear Jean growled at him.

"They were nothing, period!" Jean almost snapped at him, bringing our procession to a halt. "She won! You lost, and I've got the prize to give the prince."

"And what would you trade it for?" Mueller demanded of her. "Another petty gun? Rent for a year? I can pay you far more."

"So you can get the prince's favor?" Jean asked. I shrank back at seeing her pale hands shift into claws, knowing Jean was close to going full out Gangrel on Mueller.

"Eliza isn't staked," Keith breathed, so softly I don't think Jean and Mueller paid him any attention even as he scrambled for his sheathed sword. "She's pulling a fast one!"

With that last exclamation, I dropped my clone and squared off with Walsh and Keith, the former grasping for his sword as the latter pulled his free. I planted a boot in his face before he could get settled on his feet, pulling his sword free from limp fingers as he went flying. That left me and Walsh, and he certainly didn't look ready as he drew his sword.

"Surrender," he started by saying.

"I should say the same to you," I told him as it sounded like Jean and Mueller were getting down and dirty behind me. "The prince betrayed us to the Kue Jin!"

"Then why didn't you bring it to me!" he wanted to know.

"Because, if you knew the prince, a Ventrue, had betrayed us to the enemy and his second was also a Ventrue, would you throw that accusation out so casually?"

"I..." Walsh started to say, but the dip in his sword told me plenty. "Keith? Get on your bloody feet and tell me if she's lying or not!"

"She's...not...lying," he got out as he tried to reset his nose. It finally popped back into place and he let out a howl. Reaching down with my hand, I fixed it and stopped the flow of bleeding. Keith gave me a scowl, but backed off.

"Hold still," Keith commanded, as he peered into my aura. I had a distinct feeling of what he was looking for, and I let him watch the scenes between me and Ming Xiao, up to and including my killing her. When it was done, he looked at my meetings with the prince, and then shook his head.

"First off, Ming Xiao impersonated Nines at Grout's mansion," Keith laid out. "Obfuscate can hide a person, but it can't make them imitate a person so precisely."

"And the prince?" Walsh said, putting the tip of his sword on the floor.

"His attempts to hide the truth were flimsy at best," Keith continued. "I'd have to read his aura to be sure, but I believe he has betrayed us."

"FUCK!" Walsh yelled, then buried his sword into the wall in a fit of rage. "This will ruin us!"

"Let me deal with it," I told Walsh as I tossed Keith back his sword now that I wouldn't need it. "If you can, drop the spell that prevents me from using obtenebration and just let me work."

"The lynchpin for that will be in the Prince's office," Walsh said. "But, I think you are right. We need to hold a Trial for the Prince, then figure out who is going to lead the city."

"The city will be mine," I told him, and Walsh looked at me with a mixture of awe and I think fear on his face. "As the most powerful kindred in the city, it's my right, is it not?"

"You aren't more powerful than me," Mueller said from behind me. He was still on his feet, but looked a little chewed around the edges. How he looked so well after a Gangrel attack could only be attributed to his power, as it seemed he tired Jean out as the Gangrel backed off, her hands returning to normal.

"Really?" Walsh said, as he wrenched his sword free. "Let's test that, shall we?"

In another moment Walsh had buried the sword into the wall behind Mueller's head, seemingly without harm until Mueller fell to ash. That left Jean, Walsh, and Keith to deal with, and Jean was decidedly on my side. Walsh let go of the sword, then shook his head.

"I've been waiting almost sixty years to bury a sword in that Nazi's neck," he finally said.

"I think a lot of American kindred felt that way," Jean told him. "I certainly didn't build planes for the war effort to reward him."

"I didn't think you were that old," Walsh told her. "You were a Rosie Riveter?"

"Worked at Radioplane building their target drones," Jean replied with a smile. "I was eighteen at the time."

"And I was invested in Northrop," Walsh said. "We appear to have reached an impasse with our oaths. I can't remain the scourge and not arrest Miss Flores, nor can I stand by and do nothing."

"This isn't your fight," I told him. "Right now you have a few hundred potential masquerade breakers running around this building that need to be dealt with."

"And I am the one that caused it, so I must be the one to deal with it," Walsh said as he wrenched his sword free again.

"If we gather them in meeting hall six, the problem can be solved by morning by using the Jonestown tactic," Keith told Walsh.

"Make it so," Walsh said, then turned to me and proceeded to give me the directions to the prince's office by way of stairs. All that was between me and the prince now was the sheriff, and that he was standing guard outside the access to the prince's suite.

"You deal with your problem, we'll deal with ours. And if it so happens, we'll carry on if you should fail," the scourge said in closing.

"Why should I fail?" I asked them as I ghosted backwards to the door.

"You have to get through Kondo, first," Jean told me.

"Kondo?"

"The sheriff," Jean told me. "Easily twice as old as me and powerful as all get out."

"How powerful can a gangrel get?" I asked her, but she shook her head.

"He's a Nagloper," Jean told me but it didn't ring any bells. "Think of them as an offshoot of the Tzimisci. They love to disfigure their foes, but I know Kondo is a master of animalism, too."

"Animalism?" I asked and Jean gave me a wicked smile as she handed me the key for the sarcophagus.

"It allows more bestial kindred to call on animals for help, even supernatural animals," she told me. "He can call spectral wolves to attack you, bats to distract you, or even steal blood from you."

"Great," I muttered. "Don't suppose he'll go down easy?"

"Considering we know he's every bit as tough as the talk makes you out to be?" Jean asked, and I groaned. I was so screwed. "Just remember, he's still a kindred. Blades are still your best bet and favors his left side when using a sword."

"Easy peasy," I said, then tried to pull a blade from the shadows. Of course it didn't appear and Keith tossed me his to make me feel like an even bigger fool.

"You'll need it," he told me as I caught the weapon by the hilt and twirled it in my hand.

"This wouldn't even be a fight if I had my full powers," I groused as I shouldered Keith's sword.

"Gangrel laugh in the face of adversity," Jean said with a grin.

"Clan swap?" I quipped to make the starlet laugh.

"Go get him, tiger," Jean called as I ghosted back through a door to face a set of stairs. I climbed slowly up to the roof access, which was actually a fancy way of saying just short of the penthouse suite the prince used for his personal space.

Coming out of the door, it was easy to see the suite access for what it was, a mansion overlooking the city. I could see the lure of such a thing, but after tonight, it would be mine and not his. I was going to claim everything he had and make it mine; the suite, the tower, the city and his bank accounts.

All mine.

All that stood in my way was Sheriff Kondo, who as I approached sniffed once before pulling the big bastard sword off his back. Figuring the jig was up, I dumped the helmet and glasses I was using as a disguise and let my face return to normal, further signifying I was in fact who he thought I was. It was also with a smile I set the key to the sarcophagus down beside me, as if a reason to kick this fight off.

With a silence that was uncanny, he made a superhuman jump raising his sword high overhead to chop me in two, or would if I didn't roll right. I came up as he wrenched his sword free from where it cleaved through several inches of concrete and feigned a lunge, and he knocked my faux lunge aside as I put a military styled boot into his chest and threw him as hard as I could towards the edge.

The sheriff landed just short, coming to a stop right at the edge. He looked at the edge briefly before turning back to me, then charged forward. He took several strides before readying his swing, then prompty vanished. Since it was a trick I had once used myself, I threw myself to the ground and felt a brief tug of my hair as I became one with the stone infused concrete.

Rolling forward, I managed to get ahead of the sheriff's next swing; a downward chop. Getting back to my feet, I looked into his eyes and saw the determination there to take me down as he again charged.

Expecting him to try his teleportation trick again, I stood my ground as I waited. He crossed the ground in a few strides, taking a swing at me. I used my sword to bring his sword safely over me, but a quick twirl had the fight back on quicker than I could press an attack.

It was parry and thrust back and forth for several passes, but it was a fight I knew I would lose. Even with celerity I could barely block his attacks and try to counterattack without nearly getting chopped in two when he knocked my sword aside without thought.

Making a decision, I backed up several steps instead of pressing my attack, then threw my sword aside. I knew that I wouldn't be able to use it as effectively as the sheriff could, and it was an area I would have to improve myself on later.

The sheriff saw me toss my sword aside and smiled, then came in with a big chop. I smiled at the simplistic way the sheriff chose to end my life, activated my celerity and potence, then raised my hand to catch the sheriff's arm and stop it mid-swing. The attack stopped, I then reached forward, grabbed the sheriff by the lapels of his heavy leather coat, and yanked him forward as I fell back, getting my feet underneath his gut and tossing him clear of the building as my back hit the ground.

The sheriff looked surprised as he went soaring, leaving his big bastard sword behind as he disappeared below the edge of the building. Rolling onto my feet, I thought I had won the fight as there was no way for him to get back up to the roof before the prince could be dealt with.

Picking up his big bastard sword, I was just about to turn away from the ledge when an impossibly large bat soared into the sky over the tower. In its feet was a car that it tried to drop on me, but I managed to roll free from where it landed before it landed on me.

When I got back to my feet, I couldn't find the bat in the sky anymore so I tried to run for the door as I figured I would be safer inside. I was at the base of the stairs when the car landed on the staircase, blocking the door with thousands of pounds of bulk. I watched the bat circle once before it dove out of sight again, and I backed off into the center of the roof access area to await the next attack and the door where the sheriff would enter from once he climbed all the stairs.

The next time the bat came into sight, I activated my celerity and dropped the sword as the bat was too far out of reach to be accessible that way. Drawing the large pistol on my hip, I took careful aim and led the my desired target before gently squeezing the trigger. The gun kicked hard, knocking my aim off as I began to frantically pull the trigger as I struggled to get the gun back on target for the big bat's eyes using the bullet's streaks of bright red to aim by.

It seemed to work as the bat roared as it was hit, pulling up to circle as it lost all of it's orientation. It made one lap before it lost altitude in its circle, then crashed into the side of the penthouse suite.

Sensing my opportunity, I grabbed the sheriff's big bastard sword and ran up to the blinded creature as it struggled back to its feet. When it did, I saw that I had been wrong about the nature of the bat, as its face was scarred by my bullets with a clear lack of blood. It then began to shift, before turning back into the sheriff, who was still blinded.

Not waiting another second for the kneeling sheriff to recover, I brought the sword that ended my sire's life a mere two weeks ago on the sheriff's own neck to thunk solidly into the concrete as it had once thunked into the floor underneath my sire. It had the same effect, and the sheriff crumbled into ash without a word.

Leaving the weapon behind as I retrieved the key, I then moved to the car and climbed up it. Seeing no way through, I used my potence to wedge a space between it and the wall so I could get the door open enough to slip the key through following it with my body seconds later after ditching the vest so it didn't catch.

Entering the hall, I found it almost a disappointment to see it empty. It almost seemed anti-climatic to not find the final door to my salvation guarded even if it was by Mueller's ghouls. Still, until I dealt with the prince my life would always hang by a thread, my name marred by his accusation as he sent hundreds of kindred along with their ghouls to kill me.

Opening the door on the brightly room, the prince was noticeably seated in his chair behind his desk, a crystal decanter of blood and wine glasses set up on his desk. He took one look at me, then shook his head as he poured himself a glass of blood.

"Like sire, like childe," he said as he sat the decanter down. "I should have killed you that night. How could someone as low as you, a Lasombra, injure me? You might have thought you've taken everything away, but I still have the sarcophagus!"

"But I have the key," I said as I held it up. The prince took a sip as he eyed the key, then laughed as he sat his empty glass down.

"You've done all the work for me, once again!" he laughed, finally standing from behind his desk. "So much to learn. I thought I had lost it all when Beckett left, but no, here you've sailed on a Gehenna wind, bearing my salvation. The key to my future."

I laughed at that, then shook my head. "Shut your mouth, LaCroix," I told him as he peered deep into my eyes with pure hatred.

"Give...me...the...key," he said, and I felt his will wash over me like a weak stream of water at the gym.

"Fuck you," I said which surprised him.

"I said, give me the key!" he yelled, his will stronger this time but my status as a fourth generation protected me.

"You simple minded idiot," I told him, and his eyes went up at my direct defiance. "You spent so much time looking for the sarcophagus and the key and never realized what was right at your fingertips. I'm fourth generation Lasombra, basically a childe of my clan founder. You even had to limit by ability of obtenebration just to have a hope at staying safe in your tower, to keep me from shadow-stepping right into your office and killing you and your sheriff with a flash of will."

"B-but...that's impossible!" he roared. "Your sire was Simeon Bellomo, a ninth generation Lasombra."

"He might've brought me into the fold, but you should have asked Strauss about my encounter with Lasombra," I told him, and LaCroix backed up as I got closer. "He might've told you, if you offered him enough, that Lasombra tried to escape the Void through me, enriching my blood and lowering my generation in the process. Hell, for at least one night, Lasombra himself walked the streets of your city, through me."

"H-h-he did?" LaCroix asked, and I nodded. "The Shadow that preyed on the Kue-Jin...I thought at first it was you, but it was him?"

"Give the Kue-Jin a run for their money, did he?" I asked to make LaCroix nod.

"He thinned their ranks considerably in a few hours, but since no one made claims or boasts I thought it might've been the Sabbat making a power grab," he explained.

"No, this is a power grab," I told him as I sat the key down on his desk. The moment my hand left the key's handle, I snatched the wood and gold name plate off his desk and charged. LaCroix tried to backpeddle, throwing off my initial attack as he tried to get past but I grabbed him by his silk tie and leveraged him around and into the glass hard enough it should have shattered but it held solid.

With no where to go, and a potence-fueled arm behind it, I plunged the fancy executive item into his chest and through his heart, then let the corpse fall to the floor.

"See you again when I have your trial," I said smugly, then walked over to the phone. It was an old school style that lacked any type of dialing mechanism, so I lifted it off the cradle and put it to my ear.

It rang twice before being answered by Walsh's crisp voice. "Yes, sir?"

"Walsh," I said and I swear I heard him sigh in relief. "I need the deputies to come and take LaCroix into holding until his trial tomorrow night. Inform the city, and attendance shall be mandatory for all kindred. Those that don't attend can consider themselves uninvited from my city whose continued presence is cause for a blood hunt."

"Yes, sir," he said. "May I assume the sheriff has been destroyed as well?"

"He has," I told him. "I beheaded him myself. The position is yours if you want it."

"I do," he said in a drawl. "I'd be happy to dispense your will on the city. If anyone should ask, are we staying in the Camarilla or are we returning to Anarch control?"

I sighed at that, but as I gave it a thought, the Camarilla wasn't really all that bad. If not for the prince, I would have had a chance to grow and prosper. Though the Anarchs weren't all bad, they did little to keep the peace as they seemed to embrace individual responsibility.

"We'll stay in the Camarilla, for now," I told him. "That means we uphold the tenants as before."

"Will do," he said before hanging up.

I sat in the leather chair behind the heavy oak desk and looked around at the room. It would be better lit by just the fireplaces, I thought as I sat there. It certainly had an air of exuberance to it that made me pour myself a glass of the prince's preferred blood type into the crystal wine glass.

Leaning back in his chair, I put my booted feet up on the desk and sipped at the bland human blood. The deputies took that time to arrive, and I motioned them in then pointed to where the prince slumped against the glass.

"Take him to wherever Walsh holds the prisoners, and make sure he stays staked," I told them.

"As you wish, my prince," they said as the used straps to make a sort of sling to carry the prince with. It made short work of getting the former city leader out of my new office.

My office. It was all mine. Looking up at the bright lights, I decided to turn them off to stem the headache that was already building in my skull. Once I had them off, I looked at the large sarcophagus and marveled at the fuss that had been made over it. How many kindred died in the chaos the city was plunged headfirst into and how many humans were slain in the search for it when it went missing?

Going over and running a hand over the reliefs, I could sense the love and care the craftsman had taken in making this artifact, and almost feel the sense of protection woven with the locking mechanism. Whoever was to be laid to rest inside, people had cared deeply for them. Was it Messerach, the One-Eyed King? Was it some sort of Methuselah?

Well, there was only one way to find out.

Taking the key off the desk, I moved it to the sarcophagus, setting it in the depression on the lid. Turning the key produced an audible grinding sound of stone on stone, and when the key wouldn't turn anymore, gave the lid a shove with potence-fueled arms to slide the lid back to reveal its occupant, except there wasn't any one inside.

No, it was filled with clay looking bricks and wires, and it was only then I realized it was a bomb. I followed the wires to a beeping detonator, the countdown reading seven seconds. Taped to the top was a note that said 'Boom! Love, Jack' in black permanent marker.

I tried to shadow-step, but on the second try, finally realized my powers were blocked by a spell I hadn't ended. With four seconds left to go, I knew that the only way clear of this trap was to leap for it, so I turned and ran for the window using all my powers of celerity to hasten my departure with mere seconds left.

Remembering that the prince didn't even crack the window when I threw him into it, I used my potence to lend as much strength as possible as with my final step on firm ground before shouldering my way through the strengthened glass.

It gave, shattering as my shoulder punched a hole through and my potence-fueled leap carrying me clear as I turned slightly back from the force of meeting the window. I had the distinct view of seeing the bomb explode, a bright blast of light that pulsed outwards in an ever expanding globe of destructive energy.

Time was so slow that I could see the nearly instantaneous wave pulse out with several smaller waves following close behind and watch in awe as everything the wave passed over seemed to vibrate into pieces before following the wave as debris and shrapnel. The windows, as strong as they had been, shattered instantly as the blast wave sailed clean through.

Once the blast wave reached me and began to pass through my borrowed boots, I felt the intense vibration that would make ravers weep with joy. The wave crawled up my leg, the vibration so intense that my boots disintegrated and began following the wave. My feet held out a microsecond longer, before the vibration began to distort the flesh so much that it was ripped into pieces.

The vibration continued up my body, the initial vibration ripping my clothes away before the deep thrumming vibration that followed ripped my skin and bones apart as well. Once the blast wave reached my eyes, my world went as bright as the sun as my corneas were overloaded and then it went black as my tender eyes lost the fight with the thrumming vibration as my body was…

…

…

...

Author's Note: And that was the final chapter of Rise of a Shadow. I have one more addition to make to this story, an epilogue, and then we will be done and I will mark this complete.

My, has it been that long? I published my first chapter of this story in October of 2016, and now in May 2019 I am bringing it to a close. It's been a wild ride, and my once thick, luxurious hair has thinned some since I started writing this. But I have finished what I started, sixty five chapters long, and over three hundred seventy five thousand words. My, what a stretch.

I'd like to thank all my readers and reviewers from over the years, ZenoLucario, Doctor Winter, darkladyvanstar, ninja of fallen Sakura, Sagnus, DuckedHard, Engineer4Ever, NoFacesOnlyMasks, Yorkmanic88 , KillerChara, FourLivingCreatures, Addlcove, Bloodstone1950, Ayaze, kuro-tsuki-san, noone297, Sirinoeles, Vanessa Masters, chinahasbeengenerous and my many guest reviewers whose reviews I have cherished and used to help further understand the story and delve deeper into the lore than I initially planned.

And finally, stay tuned as soon I will soon post the epilogue to this amazing story.

Now, where's my hidey-hole so I can hide from the fall out? Oh, there it is. *Jumps in*