NOTES: This is a continuation of my 'One Lifetime' fiction where Lenore survives. Reading that one before proceeding would give additional context to this story although it is not strictly necessary.
Lenore dipped her foot into the cold waters of the enormous central fountain in the castle courtyard. Somehow it remained intact through all the mayhem of Isaac's takeover. But not every section of the castle had been so lucky, she noted as she appraised the wreckage and the carnage around her. During the past three days since that fight, the night creatures seemed to have been busy; all of the bodies had been disposed of and most of the debris was removed. The monsters were even mending the damage caused to the buildings.
She shifted her gaze to where Carmilla's quarters once stood. The top half of the tower where the chamber was located had completely blown apart with the floor below now exposed to the elements. She felt a sorrowful ache for her fallen sister. Carmilla for all her faults had always protected Lenore and perhaps even loved her, in her own curious way.
Lenore reverted to observe the fountain once more when she heard footfalls behind her that were headed in her direction. She was familiar enough with its rhythm and the tempo to recognize its owner.
"Good morning", she greeted without turning around.
"Good evening Lenore", Hector greeted back as he came to stand by her side. "I see you are finally out of your room".
"Well I wanted to avoid that bastard. Where is he staying in the castle anyways?"
"Striga and Morana's chambers".
"Of course he helped himself to it", Lenore scowled, "So what have you been doing for the past three days".
"Well.. Mostly showing Isaac the lay of the castle.. Helping him with some affairs.. He wanted some pointers".
"On what?"
Hector gave her a nonchalant shrug, "He wanted to know what are the specific lands that were controlled by your sister council. If you had any vampire outposts in those lands.. how many vampires might be present in each one of them?". Hector reached out with his fingertips to the spray from the fountain's not so insignificant waterfall, before adding," And he also wanted to know how we maintained lines of communication with those units. I told him that I did not know the answers to most of those things."
"Right,. Pity he killed all of the vampires in the castle who could have helped him with that", Lenore replied.
"You're not dead. Besides a dozen vampires or so did survive the fight. They have been locked up in the cells below."
Lenore turned to face Hector, now curious, "How did they survive?"
Hector shifted and sat at the edge of the fountain facing her, "I believe they hid themselves during the fight and pleaded for mercy when it was over".
"Cowards", Lenore hissed, "Well they could be just guards, don't know if the useful ones survived".
"But you would know most of those details. Won't you?"
"Of course", Lenore flipped a lock of hair behind shoulders, "I know about everything around here". Hector gave her a pointed stare. "Don't give me that look, if the King wants something, he can ask me himself", Lenore responded irritated.
Hector sighed before he reached out to grab her wrist and tugged at it to make her sit down beside him. "Helping Isaac would allow him to trust you. I thought you wanted to keep doing what you do." Hector stated before releasing her hand.
"I do. But it would be best to let him stew for a while". Hector appeared to wait for her to elaborate further.
"I have been thinking" Lenore started before pausing. And she had been thinking a lot the past few days, regarding the changes that were happening or bound to happen shortly, due to this regime change. Morana and Striga hadn't arrived yet, which meant that they had learnt of the battle and abandoned the castle for some safer pastures. They probably thought that she was dead as well. This meant that Styria was without a standing army right now. Granted that Isaac's monster army would be a capable replacement. But their numbers have also dwindled significantly due to the battle as well. She noted that there must have been a massacre in Carmilla's chambers due to the size of the recoil from her death.
"That Isaac would be out of his depth shortly", Lenore completed with an introspective expression on her face.
"What do you mean?"
"Well Isaac's army doesn't need blood or food, which is good. But it's numbers would need to be increased soon as they need to stand in as Styria's army, else we shall be invaded from the north and the west. For that we need fresh corpses. You'll have to tell me if any of these corpses from the battle are salvageable but mostly we may have to get the bodies from the different parts of the kingdom. I assume Isaac wouldn't want to kill anybody, so we need to contact all our vassals and inform them to get the corpses of everyone who dies to the castle preserved in ice. But the vampire vassals may have now heard about Carmilla's death, which means..".
"They may rebel against Isaac. A human.", Hector finished for her.
Sure Isaac could send in his army to cow them into submission. But that would only reduce the force of his army even further or worse put the lives of human subjects at a needless risk since they would be caught in the cross fire. Also multiple mutinies across the country were not good for its stability and Isaac would not be able to handle it all at once.
Hector seemed to have come to the same conclusion. "And also he is at a further disadvantage of not knowing the people or the vampires he is negotiating with. But you do", he spoke before noticing that she wore a self-satisfied look on her face.
"Well that is my specialty", Lenore grinned.
"So you think he definitely would have to reach out to you for help", Hector said eyeing her, a smile tugging on the corners of his mouth as well. His silver locks whipped around his face from the wind, Lenore wanted to reach out and run her hand through it.
"Yes, for that reason and also because I don't think your friend", She made a funny noise at the last word, "would know anything about actually ruling a nation".
Hector responded quickly in Isaac's defense, "He was one the main generals at Dracula's court and he oversaw the war effort. Since then he has led an army to defeat the vampire queen of Styria. Give him some credit Lenore".
Lenore rolled her eyes, "Waging wars is not the same thing as governing a nation Hector. Besides his army consists of the undead. You don't have to worry about their food supply.. don't have to care if they have a suitable place for encampment during the day away from the enemies or whether they are getting sufficient rest before a fight... you are not bothered by whether the artilleries are maintained and the weapons have been restocked. There is nothing administrative involved in commanding an army of those bloody creatures. So not exactly a job that gives you the skills you need to run a nation like Styria."
"Well... in that case we can go to him and offer your help… He would appreciate that." Hector replied looking thoughtful.
"Help is often appreciated more when it is asked for, rather than when it is offered Hector", Lenore felt a strange uncharacteristic need within her, she got up suddenly and stepped into the fountain. Her blue dress, dampened into a deep rich shade below her knees.
Hector twisted to face her, "Is that another snippet from your vampire wisdom?"
"That one is human", Lenore caught Hector's right hand with both of hers pulling him forward.
Hector hesitated surprised, "What are doing Lenore?"
"I want to climb up the heads of the statues in the fountain and sit on top of it. Always wanted to. But my sisters would have never let me live it down if I did something like that", Lenore tried heaving him up again.
"Alright...", Hector rose up humouring her and stepped inside the fountain before adding, "Let us not allow Isaac to struggle for too long before helping him though."
She internally disagreed with that. She was quite happy to let that pompous bastard be miserable for a while before swooping in. But Hector might be insistent on helping his friend.
Hector was too nice.
"Fine. Only because I don't want the country to suffer. And also because he is going to have so many issues, what with rebuilding his army, putting out mutinies, keeping the supply lines and trade routes open, having the warehouses guarded.. with no prior knowledge of the land and it's culture.. he is going to be overwhelmed very soon and request you to check with me. So it won't be long. Don't worry." She finished with a wide gleeful smile.
"You don't have be so happy about it you know. Or at the least, try not to look so happy about it when he does ask for help", Hector chided her. But he appeared to be trying not to smile himself and failing spectacularly.
"Well what did he expect? That you can kill the ruler of a country that you have no idea about and then everything will fall into his lap and he would be the new king of a happy kingdom right away", Lenore waved her hand for emphasis, still grinning.
"Lenore".
"Fine. Fine. I'll try not to smug about it", Lenore acquiesced before pulling him forward.
NOTES:
I wrote this story because I have issues with Isaac being the new King of Styria when he has no clue about statecraft, the man is going to have so many problems. All the more reason to have kept Lenore alive. I feel like the showrunners don't know about the problems that might occur when a coup takes place or don't care about the worldbuilding enough to bother. Eitherway Lenore dying messes up a lot of things for Styria.
All comments and criticisms are welcome.