Chapter 4:
"Jalaqier!" the kind voice of a woman echoed through the dark halls.
The diminutive Aeldari snapped his head in the direction from whence it came. He scurried back as swiftly as his small legs would allow. Without a moment's hesitation, he weaved his way through a forest black leather and green serpent tails as he darted through the women of his father's harem and their sslyth guards. They were clad in silk, sheer, and jewels.
Seated above them all was a frail woman, whom had the tan of her skin withered in the Dark City but was still noticeably more blush than any Drukhari. Dressed in a form fitting violet-blue gown she smiled down at the child scrambling up the stairs. Jalaqier jumped into her lap where the human woman cradled him.
"Yes mommy?" he questioned.
The kind woman painted a sweet smile over her face, but she could not deceive her child. Mommy's sad.
"Jalaqier," she paused to take a breath and compose herself, "I've got something I need to tell you. Your brother _, he's-he's gone…missing."
The little half-aeldarling gasped.
"We should go look for him!" he proclaimed as he sprang to his feet to attend to the task. But his mother held firmly to his hand and reeled him back in.
"No!" she snapped. Then she looked down and back at her son's eyes and continued in a softer tone, "No. You're a very brave boy, but the city is a very very dangerous place. Your brother is-," she couldn't bring herself to say it, "your father is out looking for your brother."
"Daddy will find him."
Tears rolled down the woman's face as she meekly smiled and kissed her son's forehead.
"Listen closely little pup," she gently spoke to her son, "stay away from your father for a while. He's very upset and under a lot of stress right now. Don't go bothering him. Your brother was all he had left of your Auntie Aureliel."
Mommy's talking weird. He had a lot of aunties, but the one everyone kept talking about was Aureliel. Jalaqier never got the chance to meet her. She was _'s mother. Father kept a big painting of her on the window in his chamber.
Big brother is so cool. He would do this thing that made lights glow in his eyes and sparks would fly from his fingertips. When Jalaqier he wanted to be just like him. _ was a warrior, an incuba if he remembered the word correctly.
The doors of the harem's garden flew open. Dressed in his spikiest armor and covered in blood, Jalaqier's father stormed past all his aunties even as they extended out their arms to touch. As he ascended the stairs, rivets and plates clanking and crunching with each step, Jalaqier's mother stood between him and the towering, lean menace before them.
"Master?" she anxiously questioned.
"I will speak to my son," he growled.
With a hesitant bow, Jalaqier's mother stepped aside. His father bent down to be at eye level with his son. Father could often be terrifying but there something especially unnerving about him now. He twitched with a barely restrained fury as his long white hair hung before his face.
The Drukhari lord seized his offspring in his hands and held him tightly. Even more terrifying was the sorrow Jalaqier saw in the black pits of his father's soulless eyes. Daddy never cries. He made plenty of people cry, but he never did so himself.
"My son," the Drukhari spoke in a low plea, "despite being half-blood, you are now my trueborn son."
Jalaqier heard those terms all the time but he didn't understand them. He knew _ was "trueborn" but he didn't think that applied to himself because his mommy was a monkey. This was all terribly confusing to the young child.
"Master-," Jalaqier's mother insisted.
The dark lord rose to his feet. With one hand he seized the back of her head and pulled her into a kiss. With his other he held tightly to her waist. Initially Jalaqier's mother held up hands in silent protest but ultimately acquiesced. She reached for his belt but he stopped her and shook his head no.
"How can a simple monkeigh remind me so much of her?" he asked. Jalaqier's mother didn't reply. His father looked back towards little Jalaqier. "Take him to my chambers and lock yourselves in. Do not open the door for me. Do you understand?"
Jalaqier's mother nodded "yes".
"Good. Now go!" his father commanded.
His mother scooped Jalaqier up in her arms and briskly walked out of the garden. They were accompanied by a pair of snake-man guards. Just before the door closed behind them, Jalaqier saw his dozens of aunties crowd around his father, peeling away his armor and stripping him of his clothes.
"Master," they all cooed.
"Take-take the pain from my heart!" he shouted.
That was the last time Jalaqier saw many of his aunties.
Mother did as father commanded, barricading the doors of the chamber. She lit a candle and tucked her son into his father's gargantuan bed blanketed in the pelts of dozens of species, sentient or not, from across the galaxy. The heads of father's trophies lined the walls. Some were hideous monstrosities and others were distressingly similar to his own and his mother's.
"Good night sweet prince," his mother told him as kissed his forehead.
She then went to the cabinet and pulled out a glowing purple bottle and a syringe full of shimmering green. Jalaqier watched as his mother injected the green stuff into her arm and chugged the bottle. Then she sat down, rested her head on father's desk, and cried herself to sleep. That night there were blood curdling screams and jackalous laughter heard outside the door. Those sounds always emanated from the city but that wasn't supposed to happen inside the spire…at least not until the warriors returned from a Karlei Lai.
As sleep overtook him, Jalaqier saw the dim reflection of tears on his mother's face in the flickering candle light.
"My love, please…" she muttered.
Then Jalaqier succumbed to sleep. In the quiet of his mind he heard the sultry whisper of an ethereal voice for the first time.
"Mine…"
"Mine! Mine! Mine! He's mine! She can't have him! Jalaqier, please! Wake up!" another feminine voice shouted.
Jalaqier slowly opened his eyes. As the haze in his vision cleared, he saw a distraught Yr'lendriel before him.
"Jalaqier!" she wailed as she threw herself on him, "Oh, my mongrel. What happened to your beautiful face?"
"Heh," he snickered, coughing up blood, "you think my face is beautiful?"
Yr'lendriel frowned and looked away.
"I-uh…it doesn't matter, you half-breed idiot! You're bleeding," she said as she tenderly stroked his broken face. She puzzled over the predicament then snapped her fingers as her eyes lit up with realization. The dark princess undid her collar and pulled her top down her shoulders, revealing her bare neck and the top of her breasts.
"Choke me," she told him.
"What?" Jalaqier muttered.
"You're hurt. You have to rejuvenate. Take the pain out of my body."
One thought dominated Jalaqier's thoughts: What the fuck are we doing? All of it, every aspect of his life, of their absurd culture came crashing down on him. Here was his social superior willfully submitting herself to physical harm by his own hands for his benefit out of her perverse sense of affection for him. It was an affection that she only knew how to express in objectification and domination. Yet he knew no other way to reciprocate it.
"Learn to laugh at it and you'll be free," the high pitched ethereal voice spoke to him again.
It's all a joke. Jalaqier felt a hearty laugh well up in his belly. As it rose up his esophagus, he felt the drain of the hunger on his soul dissipate. She Who Thirst's grip was releasing on him as the laughter gathered in the back of his throat. But Slaanesh would not be silenced so easily and her words cut straight through to the darkest regions of his heart.
"Fuck this bitch!"
The laughter dissipated into a garbled growl as he opened his mouth. His pitch black eyes leered forward with the murderous glee of a rabid predator. Fuck you, whore!
Jalaqier lunged forward, seizing Yr'lendriel by the throat, pinning her the floor. Slaanesh howled in delight as Yr'lendriel desperately gasped for breath. The half-breed smiled sadistically from ear to ear as he watched the trueborn harlot writhe under his power. But between her pained gasps, he heard Yr'lendriel's coos of desire. Through both her pain and pleasure, Jalaqier psychically fed on her whirling emotions. As he fed, his body snapped his broken bones back into place and knit together his rended flesh.
"You filthy degenerate slut! You like it when this mongrel puts you in your place," he snarled at her.
"Ugh! Uh huh!" she moaned between gurgles, her eyes rolling back into her head as her tongue hung out of her open mouth.
Jalaqier loosened his grip, sliding one hand down to the base of her neck as the other tore away her clothes.
"Fuck you!" he roared, raining spittle on her face.
"Fuck me!" she cried as she kicked off the armor around his waist.
This was a command he would happily obey. The thought of defiling her for all the court to see only made him hunger for the tight clutches of her pussy. He wanted to see the twisted joy on her face as he pumped her womb full of his inferior seed. The shame, the scandal, the degeneracy of it all made his cock throb hot and hard.
"Give this monkeigh loving slut everything she wants," Slaanesh whispered to him.
Then they were dosed in freezing cold water. The two lovers separated and frantically covered themselves in an instinctive urge to get warm. Jalaqier instantly went limp. The gathered crowd all laughed at their discomfort as Máuo-Feìmí smirked with an empty bucket in his hands.
"All right children, that's enough," he chirped.
Yr'lendriel sprang to her feet. She bared her teeth like an enraged gyrinx. Serrated, sharpened claws held before her face.
"How dare you hurt my mongrel!" she screeched as she lunged through the air at the arbiter.
Máuo-Feìmí sighed as he activated his shield again. Just as the incubus had before her, the dark princess bounced off of the wall of green light, tumbling down the steps. The laughter of the onlookers rose to a cackling pitch.
"Are you done yet?" Máuo-Feìmí snarked, "You two can play out your adolescent voyeuristic, sadomasochistic fetishes later. I won't kink shame; some people like it vanilla. But some of us have got adult responsibilities to attend to. The archon has been kept waiting by your antics."
Both Jalaqier and Yr'lendriel grimaced at the arbiter's words but neither could speak against them. With a huff, Yr'lendriel picked herself off the ground and stormed down the hall with her arms crossed and nose in the air. Jalaqier staggered to his. He looked down at the tattered remnant of his armor.
"I'm hardly presentable," he said, hoping his chaperone would acquiesce to his unspoken request.
"All things considered, it won't help," Máuo-Feìmí snapped back at him. He proceed to walk up the stairs, calling back to Jalaqier with a taunt, "Come here, mutt."
Jalaqier sneered, but that was all he dared do. Retaliation against the arbiter had proven comically futile. So again, he obeyed like a dog brought to heel.
They traversed all the way to the height of the spire, where its peak jabbed at all the other spires that lined the interior of the spherical station that orbited a dying star. They were a veritable forest of black needles jutting up from the ungainly urban calamity that was the Dark City of Commorraugh. At the top of each resided the self-styled overlords of a seemingly countless number of kabals: all of which lived by the code of "survival of the fittest." In comparison to other spires, the Kabal of the Savage Hunt found themselves shaded by many others.
The pair approached the great stone doors of the archon's abode guarded by his sslyth guards. Drukhari are too treacherous and arbitrary to serve as reliable watch dogs. So the wiser overlords outsource the work to more reliably "suggestible" xenos.
The doors opened and the two entered. Inside lay the harem's garden. Jalaqier knew this place intimately well. He'd spent most of his childhood in this room. Quite out of step with the rest of Commoraugh, this slice of paradise was kept unsettling pleasant.
It was well lit with the soft glow of artificial sunlight. Alabaster cobblestones lined the floor as exquisitely carved pillars upheld the veranda. Verdant flowering trees of a hundred different worlds lined the pathways. Lounges draped in the finest silks from across the galaxy dotted throughout, alongside mounds of currency from multitudinous civilizations.
Most Drukhari would consume and dispose of their "treasures" in the crudest, most ephemeral manner conceivable. On first blush, the gilded cage of Archon Lau-Fey's harem must have seem heavenly by the eyes of most slaves. The archon did always prefer to keep his "treasures" as pretty as possible for long as was reasonable…and he always took the most beautiful for himself.
These "courtesans" frolicked in the relative bliss of their stations. Slaves of various xenos and even halfborn Drukhari tended to their every whim. Fanning them with palms, filling their wine, providing entertainment, and other menial tasks the archon deemed to "imperil their beauty".
In the center of the great chamber sat a glorious fountain. Jalaqier remembered how he played in its water as a child. Those were simpler days; happy days before cruel reality set in. The centerpiece of the fountain was a meticulously kept statue of a woman. More precisely an Asuryani woman who was once the sole consort of the archon and this entire chamber was built solely to her benefit. You must have been some woman, Aureliel.
Towards the back stood an imposing figure dressed in black leathers and a cerulean fur cape. The lanky yet muscular wraith of a man, diligently attend to the easel before him, yet he held no palate. Strokes of red, blue, yellow, and green lined the painting. Flanked by three slaves of varying xenos species with open wounds on their outstretched arms. When the painter wanted a new color he would simply jab his brush into their wounds and use their blood as his medium. They would wince but the lifeless body of the poor green fellow on the ground had sufficiently instructed them as to the peril of vocalizing their discomfort.
Máuo-Feìmí and Jalaqier approached. As they did so, the archon set his brush down on the easel and nodded to acknowledge the arbiter.
"Hail and well met, sire," Máuo-Feìmí said to him as he bowed down on one knee. Jalaqier followed his superior's example, bowing down to one knee as he spoke. "Hail and well met, father."
The archon turned his attention to Jalaqier, his eyes running up and down the young Drukhari. A malicious squint of his eyes and "tic" of his tongue thoroughly signaled his displeasure.
"Arbiter, you may leave us. I know you have more pressing matters to attend to than babysit my brat bastard son," Lau-Fey instructed.
"Indeed I do my lord," Máuo-Feìmí replied.
He shared one last knowing glance with the young incubus before he shook his head and wandered away. The archon took a rag of flayed human skin and wiped the splattering of blood from his hands.
"Do you know why I summoned you?" Lau-Fey asked.
"No sir," Jalaqier replied.
"Of course you don't," Lau-Fey snipped, " Why would I expect anything of your puny ape brain…,"
He turned his attention back to his painting, continue the lecture over the pained whimpers of his paint slaves.
"…Dha'khar, your commanding dracon, has had much to say of your conduct."
"Has he now?" Jalaqier snapped.
"Your prowess in battle is laughable; being laughably slow and even lackluster in your strength."
"That's grok shit! I can crush a halfborn's skull with my bare hands."
"Hmm. That would be impressive…," Lau-Fey hesitated for dramatic effect then looked over his shoulder at his son, "…for a halfborn. But you're not a halfborn. Even though your blood is tainted by your mother, you're still a trueborn. What's more, you're a trueborn incubus; a warrior king of the Dark City. A disciple of death and terror. Does anyone worth a shit fear you?"
Jalaqier bit his lower lip and averted his gaze. His father huffed his disdain.
"I'm also told you don't observe the pecking order when it comes time to feast."
"Was it not you who told me, 'rules are for the weak'?" Jalaqier replied.
Lau-Fey laugh echoed throughout the gran chamber. He spun on his heels and strutted up to his son. He towered over him by more than a head and a half. The archon jabbed his finger into Jalaqier's chest as he whispered through clenched fangs.
"Alas my boy, tis true. But you forget one inescapable truth: you are the weak…,"
Jalaqier's stomach dropped and his heart stopped. Of all the cruel indignities he had suffered, his father's cold words cut the deepest. He gulped to choke back the tears he felt welling in his eyes. Lau-Fey shook his head, turned and strolled away a handful of paces.
"…and my name will no longer be safe harbor for you. You are unworthy of it, and…"
He snapped his fingers and one of the "treasures" from the last raid approached. She was pretty human beast attired in the finest silks and sheers the archon could buy. She twitched as the Drukhari lord wrapped one arm over her shoulder and laid his other hand on her exposed midriff.
"…it's easy enough to replace a half-breed."
Then he kissed the side of her neck and gently tapped her ass to send her away. The archon looked down at the reptilian fellow he had slaughtered. With a "mmm", he reached down, broke off a scaly finger from the corpse, and began crunching on it as he resumed painting.
"Lady Yr'lendriel has offered to purchase you."
What little color there was in Jalaqier's face went pale and his ears went backward.
"She can't do that!" Jalaqier howled.
"Ah uh!" his father playfully chirped as he wagged what was left of the reptilian's finger, "She couldn't do that; past tense. You see my dimwitted ape-baby, this is not the first time she's made the offer. The initial bid did provoke my ire; as I found it insultingly low for one of my seed. Though using you as the bait to ensnare the loyalty of her exceptional services did prove quite advantageous. Then your worth diminished with your prowess but she approached me again; this time offering a prince's price. Though by the stars I can't fathom what makes her long for you so dearly, it proves too opportune a purchase to recoup a failed investment."
Jalaqier covered his face in his hands. Cold panic shot through his body. Not her! Anyone but her! The thought of being forever bound to that precocious harlot made his heart flutter, and that made him sick. No longer would he have the ravenous pleasure of reaving the galaxy of its lesser races. She'd have him sealed away in a gilded cage, a toy to be delicately preserved solely to lengthen its shelf life.
"Do you think one woman will satisfy me?" Slaanesh whispered in his mind.
Frigid terror gripped his heart as the thought of his soul, immortality, and youthful beauty being drained away by She Who Thirsts. Yet there was a deeper fear within him as the horrid realization bloomed. The destiny that awaited him was that of a sentient fuck doll on whom their "master" projected profane romantic confusion. Mother's fate.
"Well, ain't that ironical?" the ethereal fool jested.
"Be silent, clown!" Slaanesh snarled.
"Laugh at the darkness and be freed."
But Jalaqier couldn't bring himself to even chuckle at this horrid turn of fate. No, the apocalypse of his existence had fallen, and the deeper is dread delved the fiercer the hunger grew. Fine! Yr'lendriel wants me to be her beast, then I'll ravage her sweet cunt every day like the dawn of Rhana Dandra.
"Though, since you are my seed, you shall be granted an opportunity at reprieve. Our diligent arbiter has informed me of an opportunity in real space. In the Koronous Expanse there's a primitive mokeigh settlement on Naduesh. Through his means we've learned of a fresh nest of the Corpse Emperor's daughters. Bring me a Sororitas worthy of bearing your sibling and I shall forestall your sale."
Capturing a so-called "sister of battle" was no easy feat. They were among the human Imperium's most elite soldiers. Fanatically loyal to their corpse-seer. Vicious, blood hungry, and breath takingly beautiful in their violence. It was no small wonder why many Drukhari would consider them "jewels among the raff". It also wasn't very often that you'd find them in such an exposed and vulnerable position. It struck Jalaqier as suspiciously auspicious.
"Father-," he started.
"You will not address as such any further," Lau-Fey interjected.
"My lord," Jalaqier's voice cracked as he corrected himself, "you place too much worth in the workings of the arbiter."
"What makes you say this?"
"He has…perversions. He tried to tell me of love and the value of a slave's acquiescence. Can we truly abide such a heinous prudishness? Does it not reek of Asuryani arrogance."
The archon sighed heavily.
"No it doesn't."
"It d-doesn't?" Jalaqier stammered.
"No, but should I be so surprised that your filthy ape brain fails to comprehend the subtle terrors of a true Drukhari?"
"My lord?"
Lau-Fey allowed a sinister glee to grow along his face.
"Terror is accentuated by the flickering hope that lingers in the heart. The sweetest pain you'll ever taste is that of betrayal; but betrayal can only be harvested from a seed of trust. Take your mother for example: I allowed her to believe that she was special to me. That deception provoked her to volunteer herself to my desires. The greatest pleasure she ever gave to me was the day I cast her aside, informing her that she'd never see her child again."
A hissed welled in Jalaqier's throat as burning hate rose in his stomach. Lau-Fey closed his eyes as he wordlessly groaned with pleasure at the memory of her pain. He slowly opened his eyes and closed his mouth into a satiated smirk.
"I long to taste such pain again," he said, licking his hand. He turned around, approached Jalaqier, and stopped to rest a hand on his shoulder, "play your part in satiating my hunger and you'll be my son again."
Father and son locked their soulless black eyes in an unblinking gaze. The former sinisterly smiled as the latter impudently sneered.
"Smile!" the archon told Jalaqier as he slapped him on the back and raised his hands to the sky as he shouted, "For the hunt begins anew! Prepare for Karlei Lai!"
