22: The Game of Successio

Once the chalice made its way towards my lips, Sebastian's cold fingers left mine, much to my relief, and I began sipping at the liquid slowly, allowing it to trickle down my throat. I then set the chalice down on the table and soon realised that instead of engaging in a discussion, the entire table had their eyes on me. Once they were satisfied that I'd had a sip of blood, they began looking away, finally conversing, regarding the issue of succession.
Xavier's father was the first to speak, saying, "Well, I think that this should be done in a democratic manner, like how the humans choose their leaders. I believe we should have a fair vote."
There was much chatter around the table and Sebastian uttered under his breath, "Well that is moronic."
Eventually, a true rebuttal was made to the argument of democratic voting. The rebuttal was made by a woman with the brightest blue hair I had ever seen in my life which seemed to be the exact same colour as her eyes. It was striking, standing out against her dark skin and, admittedly, I found myself engrossed in her unique beauty.
"I don't think such an idea would be applicable to this situation. We have here a total of twenty-one vampire noble families. There is no way a vote would even be possible with so many candidates eligible for the current situation we find ourselves in." She said, and then sat down immediately. Xavier's father sighed, and then leaned back in his chair before engaging in his own little discussion with his wife.
The next to suggest something was Trent Smith who was not received well amongst the nobles. "Well, I think we should-"
"Oh God! Is Trent thinking again!"
And this was where everything began to turn into absolute chaos, and for a moment, the vampires looked no less chaotic than members of parliament.
"Are you kidding me, that's a horrible idea!"
"Measuring what!"
"How the hell are we supposed to assume who the oldest bloodline belongs to!"
And the chaos continued for a solid hour, with Sebastian and I silently watching it all ensue like observers of an extremely comedic and idiotic movie. Eventually however, Meera had decided that she'd had enough of this tomfoolery and stood up again. This time, however, she was not nearly as civil as she'd been before. Instead, she broke her golden chalice on the table, making the thing shatter to pieces. Blood splattered everywhere, staining those closest to her but never touching Meera herself.
"Silence!"
The entire room fell silent and immediately, all eyes were on Meera who waited a moment- personally I thought it was just for dramatic effect- and then she began to speak.
"You all are clearly incompetent fools. All of the methods you have given are either stupid, ineffective or simply lack the logical expertise we vampires pride ourselves in having. So, it seems I am going to need to make this decision. Now, we have used the ancient vampire law once before to decipher a ruler to the throne in the past. I don't know if you recall King Elios. He ruled for a good few centuries and held the record for being the vampire who has been in ruling for the longest period of time. So, I thought that if the ancient law we used then gave rise to such a great ruler, it could do so again-"
"But Miss Balakrishnan, we no longer follow the ancient Vampire Law, we-"
"I'm sorry Katherine, did I ask for you to speak, or stay silent?" She asked with a raised brow. Admittedly I got chills for Katherine who shrunk back into her seat. Xavier's mouth pulled a smirk which I quickly caught and then he let it fall away when he saw my eyes on him.
"Right, as I was saying, we will be using the ancient Vampire Law in this decision. I have done quite an extensive amount of research into it and have found only one way to guarantee an eternal monarch-" again, she paused for dramatic effect before she continued, "The Game of Successio."
Not one soul made a sound. In fact, it seemed everyone at the table held their breath simultaneously, including Sebastian who had now, slowly begun to develop a deep look of horror on his face. I wondered, for a moment what the hell the Game of Successio was and why it had such a strange effect on the whole table.
The silence, was, however short-lived when, all of a sudden, the table had its own verbal explosion. The nobles shouted and protested, some even stood on their chairs in hysterics. The only people who seemingly kept their cool at the table was me, Sebastian and both the Howard and Chase families. I had a valid reason to keep silent though, and it was a simple one: I had no cooking clue what was going on. The others, however, seemed to be silent to preserve their air of eloquence and prestige at the table.
As expected, Meera could only handle the chaos for a few moments before she silenced everyone. It was clear that as this point, she was beyond frustrated at the pure, unrelenting idiocy of the nobles.
"... Again, I asked for silence. I know it's risky to introduce the Game of Succession, especially because of the extremely deadly outcomes it had when we tried to implement it six centuries ago, but it is our only option-"
"No, it is not, and you know it." It was Liam who spoke, surprising everyone at the table, including Sebastian. "The Game of Successio was banned all those years ago because it almost wiped out the entire second generation of nobles. In fact, the only two nobles who survived those games was Xavier and me. Since then, the first generation of nobles have been trying to restore the second generation of vampires which was hell considering how long it takes vampires to mature within their early stages of life. And now that the second generation is ready to create the third, you'd like to wipe us out again. That's all too suspicious, don't you think, Meera."
I stared between the two of them. Meera had surprisingly stayed silent the entire time, allowing Liam to speak.
It was then that I finally understood just how big of a threat Xavier and Liam were. If they'd survived something that had wiped out an entire generation, then they had to have been extremely strong. It made me wonder again, what this Game of Successio was. It had to have been quite lethal.
I was about to ask Sebastian about it, hoping again, that he'd have it in him to talk to me, when Meera began replying to Liam who had clearly made a good point, according to the silence at the table.
"I am aware of the outcome of the previous Game of Successio, but the failure of the Games does not only rest on our shoulders, it rests on yours as well. We required there to be only a single victor to take the throne, but you both refused to kill each other. Thus, you left us no choice but to deny either of you the title of King."
At this point my mouth began to hang open in shock. Xavier and Liam seemed to despise one another. So then, why did they save each other from death. That, however, was not the worst part of it all. The worst part was that they both were supposed to have been the rulers of the vampire kingdom. Quite frankly, the two of them seemed invincible to me and I wondered whether I'd actually really have any chance at attaining that crown.
"The Game of Successio *was* flawed, yes, but we will work hard to fix it so that there are less fatalities this time around."
"*Less fatalities*? I am sorry, but there should be no fatalities. The Game of Successio is a game of slaughter. You all think that the noble children are some sort of disposable little toys that you can use as you please. If one dies, you just fornicate and create a new one. That's how lowly you think of us. Xavier and I aren't like you, and the rest of the noble second generation aren't either... well at least *some* of us aren't. But that's the problem, isn't it? We are not like you, and so you are trying to get rid of us until you have your own perfect second gen-"
But before he could continue speaking, his father stood up and slapped him across his face, rendering the whole room speechless. Liam looked up at his father, with his mouth gaping and his eyes filled with hurt.
"That's enough of that, stupid boy," his father said, "you should have died along with the rest of the other nobles, you ungrateful son of a bitch. Of course, you're replaceable, of course-"
But I couldn't take any of this anymore. I'd been used to the feeling of being hated and shunned, I just didn't know that Liam had been going through the same thing. And so, without thinking, I threw my empty chalice at the head of Liam's father. And it seemed all of hell froze at that point. Even I froze, mortified at what had just happened. Sebastian let out a low, long sigh and mumbled, "I should've known."
Liam's father began to turn towards me slowly, anger etched onto every single one of his features as his blazing eyes met mine. Once again, I was in trouble.
"You bitch. What the hell did you just do?"
"Father you better not say anything to her," Liam warned him.
"Oh, are you protecting her? This isn't the first time, Liam. I can't believe you actually give a damn about this werewolf trash."
"Father, stop."
"No no, I won't stop. You remember Lila don't you. Pretty thing. She was even prettier dead which is-"
"I'm sorry sir, but I think you've forgotten your manners at home. Would you mind fetching them and then coming back here." It took me a while to realised that those words had left my mouth, and when I did, I could no longer hold back the fire brewing under my skin as I felt my one eye change to a deep scarlet.
"You treat your son like he's some type of worthless object. I think the only trashy person here is you... and your wife of course. You can't even be grateful that your son is a decent person, which is understandable considering you don't know what 'decency' truly is. You nobles think you're so high and mighty, but you're all utterly miserable fossils roaming the Earth. Perhaps forever has been too long for all of you. You've forgotten things like love, compassion, empathy, kindness and respect, things which some of your children value."
By the time it had left my mouth, the entire room had become speechless, including Liam's father who just stood there. Liam, on the other hand looked at me in a way I'd never been looked at before, almost as though he were staring at someone who'd saved his life. Admittedly, it did a good job of calming the nerves that were now beginning to brew in me. This was not a good idea, and as if to prove me right, Sebastian stood up next to me, furious beyond anything I'd seen him before. He then gripped at my arm, pulled me close to him, and that's when his hand collided painfully with my cheek.
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Merry Christmas everyone!
Stay safe! Stay healthy! Sending my love!