Blood Shaper

“That’s done,” Kay muttered as he tossed another ream of paperwork into his outbox. He had no idea where the idea of Earth inspired filing systems and methods to control paperwork had gained popularity on Torotia, but he cursed that place under his breath regularly. He didn’t want an outbox or an inbox to toss papers in and take them out from when he was ready to move on to the next task. Most of the annoyance he felt stemmed from not wanting to deal with loads of paperwork in general, not the specific method of organizing it, but then he’d be whining about the job he agreed to take on, which was beneath him. Complaining about how doing the job he agreed to do was likely also beneath him, but everyone deserved to have some small vices, didn’t they?

“Very good, your majesty, I’ll send that out for you.”

Kay looked up to see Miri standing next to his desk with her normal slight smile. She was dressed in clothing that was similar to the range of styles that served as Avalon’s palace uniform but in better materials, a contrast to the traditional clothing from the Isles Kay had seen her in since their arrival.

“When did you get here?”

“Just now, your majesty. I am now ready to serve directly at your side.”

“You’re done setting up everything you needed, then?”

“Your personal staff isn’t quite complete yet, there are a few roles I’d like to fill out still, but those aren’t required for day to day functioning and we’ll want specialists that will be difficult to recruit anyways, so that can wait.” Miri informed him, “But other than that, yes, I’ve completed all the preparations and dealt with the little tests Prime Minister Amanda and your spymaster laid out for me.”

“Tests?”

“Yes, the normal little things that all employees in a sensitive area have to go through, making sure I won’t take bribes, checking that I’m not an agent for another power, determining whether I have any addictions or connections that would make me a vulnerability, that sort of thing. The real tests as someone they don’t know being in close proximity to their king daily will come later, and I’m sure they won’t be nearly as obvious.” She straightened her back with a grin, “It should be a fun little challenge to spice things up.”

“You’re looking forward to my Prime Minister and spymaster teaming up to randomly test your loyalties? I can see why you expect it and I’m not going to get involved, but you’re excited about it?”

She shrugged one shoulder, “Why not? I know that I’m on the same side as them, and since they’re not sure where I stand they won’t be setting up anything too dangerous because it’d be a problem if I am on their side, which I am. It’ll be a nice diversion from what I’m sure is going to be tedious work at multiple points. Additionally, while I haven’t seen enough of your spymaster’s work to figure out if I know them or of them yet, I can tell they’re a professional, which means that mixed into the tests of my loyalty will be tests of skill, which are always enjoyable. I’ll be able to show off in front of someone that can really appreciate my talents in that regard.” Her grin grew sizeably, “And while I’m not going to get directly involved in any intelligence activities, as your majordomo I’ll certainly be involved in some light counterintelligence acts directed at and around your in particular, so it’ll be good to prove my bonafides early.”

Kay considered that and decided it was fine. “Alright, as long as there isn’t any harm directed at each other then I’ll assume you’re all experienced adults and let you get on with it. Moving on… I haven’t had a majordomo before, which you know already. What do I do with you?”

“You continue to do what you did before I started serving you, you just also keep me informed of what you’re doing and why. I in turn will do my best to remove any blockages and streamline anything you need to happen. If you need to have a meeting with someone you let me know and I’ll deal with scheduling it and informing the person you want the meeting with. If you’re going over a proposal from one of your nobles and you need documentation to verify something, you let me know what documents you need and I’ll make sure they’re retrieved in a timely manner. Tell me what you want or need, and I’ll make it happen. Within reason of course.”

Kay tapped at his desk with one finger while he listened. “Alright, I’m sure that it’ll take some practice but we’ll get there. Talk to Amanda about some of the curriculum that she and Eleniah have been setting up to make me into a better leader, I’m sure you can help with teaching me some of that where it intersects with your duties.”

“Of course, your majesty.” She bowed slightly and nodded sideways at the door. “Will that be all?”

“Send in the clerk on duty to refresh my paperwork, and then go speak to them. I don’t have anything I need done right this moment.”

“Very well.”

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

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“I am Salash the Heart-Siezer, he who brings the pain upon the enemies of-!”

The sharp kick to the back of the head of Salash the Loud and Obnoxious would have killed most people below tier four in one blow, but Salash was a tier four and happened to be a vampyr in addition to that, which meant he only toppled forward onto his face. The raised foot poised to come down and crush his skull definitely would have killed him, but the ever-present malignant thing that had ruined Martha’s existence broke past the barrier she’d erected to keep it at bay and resumed control over her magic, her body, and her minions. The composite zombie formed of hundreds of mangled corpses all rammed into each other without a single point of grace or beauty and nothing like Martha would have made if she had control of herself turned and moved away from the annoying vampyr, sparing his life.n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

The eldritch nastiness that lived in Martha didn’t even bother trying to punish her as it mentally commanded the mount carrying her body forward, it’d learned the futility of that a mere decade into fighting her for control of herself and it had stopped a decade more after that. Now it just resumed control and moved on, or cleaned up if she managed to really ruin its plans. Mildly injuring one vampyr it didn’t care about wasn’t worth it delaying its task, and so Martha’s body marched on under the will of an alien being.

Martha herself sat back to watch and wait for more opportunities to stymie the thing. Trying to wrest back control of part of herself multiple times in short succession was much more difficult than saving her strength for powerful bursts, so she hoped that nothing interesting happened too soon. She wished she could just wait for actually important moments to fight back, to ensure that she’d be in the best condition she could, but she learned as much from the twisted relationship she had with the thing as much as it did. It was a twisted, conniving thing and it was always on the lookout for the knife in the back. Simultaneously, it was so outside of the existence it had been born into that it acted like a total idiot at times. Occasionally breaking out of its grasp and lashing out in some small way made it confident that she had wasted her strength on something minor and it moved on. Biding her time for a perfect moment made it nervous, and then it started doing things Martha really didn’t want it to, like deciding to try and permanently root her out of body again.

So that was how a tier five necromancer who’d secretly ruled over an entire island chain spent her days, waiting in one of the tiny corners of her mind that wasn’t too riddled with eldritch taint and madness and waiting for a moment to strike back against her captor, tormentor, and corrupter. Her life, what little she had of one, was objectively terrible.

Which meant nothing of course, she was Martha the Empty Grave, She Who Marches Past Death, and no sniveling little eldritch infiltrator, body snatcher thing was going to make her give up. She was patient, she was cunning, and she was oh so incredibly mad. Existing in a tiny portion of one’s own mind while the rest of it was eaten away by something from beyond this realm did that to a person of course, but she was more than capable of channeling a little thing like madness. She worked every moment of every day of turning it into a specific kind of madness, an unending drive to tear down the enemy no matter what the cost was. Since ruining everything for the thing that had ruined her life was the only goal left to her it all worked out.

The thing turned her head from side to side, constantly scanning for something. The undead horde that it used as minions followed along behind it, occasionally bumping into the vampyr following along. They were all ugly things, the undead it had raised with her magic and it stoked her rage to see mashed together abominations and shambling zombies where there should have been proper death knights and other undead actually worthy of being created. She’d raised a lich once, and now her magic was being used for the kinds of rubbish you’d see in a bad story from the times before the First Grand Necromancer had risen up to battle the mutated fish people that had come from the sea to wipe all surface life away and shown that necromancy wasn’t inherently evil.

Or in a place like this where that kind of display had never happened. The necromancers she’d seen as the thing had driven her body across this cluster of continents had been pitiful. They were all hardened and bitter men and women that blamed the world around them for their own actions. Necromancy required bodies, yes, but nothing said that you had to go and make the bodies! That was murder! And stealing them from proper graves was almost as bad! The only shining light she’d seen was that one brief meeting with someone from something called the Order of Bones. It wasn’t the most creative name, but all the rumors had said that they were actual proper necromancers with morales and honor. She’d been very glad when the cloaked individual had almost immediately realized something was wrong and ran for it. She’d have been quite sad if the thing had killed yet another decent necromancer using her body.

Martha had no idea why the thing had decided to ally with the vampyr and their strange leader. The poor dear was quite mad and didn’t even seem to know it, but that wasn’t really Martha’s problem. The thing had been traveling all over the world, even to this isolated corner that didn’t seem to know the rest of the world was out there, seeking a way to finally rid itself of Martha and her interference. She clung on to her body with her mastery of necromancy, and it was seeking other necromancers to learn enough to force her out and take full control. Coming here to ally with the vampyr didn’t further that goal, so Martha was concerned. The brief flashes of communication she’d caught when the thing had spoken with her voice to the vampyr’s leader had made her flinch back from them, they were so filled with the very essence of eldritch.

Thus, Martha waited and watched, as she always did. She was an enemy of the thing that puppetted her body and to a lesser extent all other things eldritch. Ruining the things plans would likely also ruin the vampyr’s plans, odd and sad creatures that they were, and that would be a nice little bonus. Since it was looking like there might be a fight coming up, Martha started conserving her strength to really cause chaos. If she was lucky, whoever the thing had allied with the vampyr against would kill her.