Bab 18: The edge of life and death
'They won't stop talking, will they?'
Those were the thoughts of Valentina as she tapped her foot impatiently on the muddy soil beneath her feet. The boots she was wearing made a repeated squish-squish-squish along with her foot tapping and those around her were beginning to get on their last nerve.
There was a lull in conversation and Valentina suddenly looked up excited and glanced over at Esmé smiling, only to see the Grand Empress Dowager looking back at her exasperated.
"Lukresh, if you're done being more annoying than I thought possible, could you shut your foot up for a second? We're trying to finalise things and you can go off and flirt or whatever soon enough."
At that, the Archduchess frowned and glared at her pink skinned companion.
"Easy for you to say, you've been telling me that for days. Then, we finally wrap things up, the job is done, and you force me to stay in this meeting for literal hours. Don't you think you're trying my patience just a little too much?"
It's not that she really had a say in things. If Esmé asked her for something, she basically had no choice. Usually the two worked readily together and without issue, but the last few days had made Valentina far more irritable than normal. She recalled Dahlia's last words to her over and over and she was stressed out from it.
'She said there was a timeline at home that she had no control over. Combine that with her wanting to escape and I can safely guess she's in an awful place right now. If it weren't for this mission, she'd already be with me.'
Trying to avoid making a sound with her shoes, she switched her fidgeting over to her finger as it tapped away on a crossed arm. Imagining that it was her own incompetence that was causing Dahlia to suffer even a second longer made her heart ache and the more she thought of it, the angrier she got.
It was another fifteen minutes until she suddenly snapped in the middle of one secret service member's report.
"Just get to it all ready! You're talking about events as if we didn't witness them first hand. Skip the details we know and just relay important information of knowledge gained while we were in the field."
The soldier looked terrified by the sudden outburst and, after pausing to look for affirmation from the Empress Dowager, he cleared his throat and skimmed through his 100 page report, relaying only what he thought was indispensable.
At this point, Valentina had gone back to zoning out and thinking about more important things. Well, more important in her eyes. It had been six days since the night of the debutante and the mission they had been on was incredibly important. An assassination attempt was held by a large organization on a council member within the Theocracy. When things went south and the assassins got caught in the act, they had turned tail and run to the Kallisto Empire and specifically to the Luckresh Grand Duchy.
Not only was it a threat to public safety and international affairs, but because it involved assassination, Valentina had been made involved. Ever since her family was eradicated, she made an effort to be part of the investigations for all assassin related matters, so long as it was on a large enough scale.
If she was being honest with herself, she would have agreed that this job was made for her. At the moment however, being honest with herself was not a priority. As the soldier's report continued to be summarised at as fast of a rate as possible, her eye began to twitch and she cast her eyes back to her companion.
"Kallisto, just get me a copy of this report and I'll read it thoroughly later. I'm not absorbing anything anyways so I'm leaving early. I can't take this anymore."
Esmé rubbed the bridge of her nose and it looked like she clearly wanted to tell the vampiress to piss off, but she was getting sick of her behaviour by this point and was starting to think getting some space between them might do some good. So after a sigh, she looked apologetically to the soldier before flicking the air in front of her causing the sound of shattered glass followed by a silvery world appearing suspended in the air.
"There you go, just as you desired your grace. I even took the extra effort of sending you to the Lionysus estate like I'm sure you want, right?"
Valentina paused as she looked at herself. She was in her military special ops apparel. It was thin and skin tight with a heavier coat on the outside due to the near freezing weather at night. Although it was hardly appropriate for going out, what actually made her hesitate was how poorly groomed she was.
For the last six days, they had been on this operation non stop. Valentina's clothes were mostly intact, although mud, sweat, and blood were all soaked into the fabrics. She also assumed she probably smelled like a pigsty. Despite a couple seconds of hesitation, she eventually came to terms with how she looked, figuring Dahlia would come first.
She nodded to Esmé just before hopping into the spacial fissure in front of her.
"Thanks Esmé, and sorry. I know I was a bitch in the last few days. I'll make it up to you later!"
For her part, Esmé just sighed and waved her away in good nature.
"It's fine, just don't make a habit of this. I used to be an idiot like you, so I can sort of get it. Just hurry up, or I'll second guess making this fissure for you."
Hearing that, Valentina jumped into the silver space without hesitation, not wanting to waste any more time. She didn't even spare a proper goodbye as she was already busy thinking about how to approach the Lionysus family with her intent to suddenly take their daughter away.
The sky was clear and stars twinkled in the night sky when Valentina arrived. There were some lamp posts along the street, but they were quite dim. Long ago, the Lionysus Barony had been famous for its glorious lights at night. They had been a symbol of the family's wealth as well as their light based aspects. Now with so little money left, the lamps had grown dim and flickered, long past needing to be replaced.
The estate wasn't far away from where she had appeared, with the front wrought iron gate being only a few dozen metres away. Before barging in though, she took a moment to take in the place. She wanted to get a read on her partner's living conditions before trying anything.
Looking things over, she could immediately understand some things. If the flickering lamp posts weren't already a sign, the rest of the estate was. At first glance everything seemed alright, but given a slightly more critical inspection one could see that the family's prestige was built on painted over cracks.
The gardens met current trends, but the plants were always too extreme and gaudy to 'show wealth' or were inexpensive. It was clear they were trying too hard. Meanwhile the metal gate could be seen to be old and rusting, with only a recent coat of paint hiding its age. The more she looked, the more these hidden flaws kept showing. She assumed it wouldn't affect Dahlia too much on its own, but she was beginning to get a read on her parents' personalities.
Deciding to bypass security or any form of decorum, the Archduchess just hopped the gate and began making her way to the main building. As she got closer, she paused and decided to finally gather some information. Something about this place made her feel uncomfortable, and she was beginning to get anxious. She was born with an incredible sense of smell and although faint, she could smell blood and infected wounds in the air.
'What the fuck? Do they keep and abuse slaves here or what? Everything here just feels off. It doesn't help that I've noticed they have magic sensors everywhere. The degree of security they have and the accompanying paranoia is making my alarm bells ring.'
Taking a deep breath and trying to ignore that scent for the time being, she began to summon her mana. Unlike what was traditional in her family, she had settled on a slight variant of the family schema. Where 'Vampiric Bloodlord' was incredibly powerful and almost exclusively suited for combat, her version 'Vampiric Bloodlust' sacrificed power for hexcraft and more diverse usage. One of the most important of those was her ability to track people.
After a moment, her sleeve was overflowing with long thin crimson tendrils. They didn't have features and looked like small snakes or extra large worms. As they fell to the ground, they writhed around for a moment until she gave them the mental order.
'Go. Locate and mark every individual in the house.'
That's all it took and suddenly the clumsy looking tendrils raced off with a silent and terrifying speed. With this many they couldn't receive complex orders, but this would be enough for now. With the size of the building and the amount of people present, it only took a couple minutes before Valentina received a 'fully scouted' message, along with a sudden burst of information.
When the spell came to completion, every blood leech would disappear within their located target and mark them with an invisible hex. Unless they were aware or particularly vigilant, it was almost impossible to notice but let Valentina track her targets from up to leagues away for days.
Focussing on the hexes spread throughout the manor, she quickly got a gauge on what was happening. It was so late into the night that most people were asleep. There were some servants and guards, but for the most part the main house was empty. Searching through a bit longer, she found one person on the third floor and two on the first floor that stood out. They were spaced away from other servants so she assumed they would be the family, but…
That scent was coming from where the two on the first floor were and a sudden fear made her stomach drop. Where before she had maintained her stealth to not alert the guards, at this point she no longer cared. With all the speed she could muster she rushed towards that putrid smell. Noticing a window high on the wall, she threw a spear of blood at it and it shattered the glass while the blood warped and caught the shards, not letting any shrapnel potentially hurt Dahlia.
She leapt up to the thin window and dove through, looking closer to a cat than a human, and as she landed on the other side, she froze.
'No. No no no. What is this? Why? I was gone for less than a week…'
In front of her, the girl she thought of as her hope and future lay on a bed, torn to shreds and nigh unrecognisable. She rushed to Dahlia's side and her hands were shaking as she reached out to her. Her usual unerring decisiveness was nowhere to be found and the shock was making it almost impossible to process information right now.
It took nearly half a minute of panic before she actually fully realised she was still alive. Something that she should have noticed immediately was completely missed by her while she was consumed by her fears. Now that she was looking closer, a wave of relief washed over her, but it hardly made her relax.
Dahlia's condition was critical in the most extreme sense of the word, and was currently treading the edge of life and death. The thought that she could have still been stuck in a meeting for hours made a lump form at the back of Valentina's throat.
'If I waited for the meeting to end, she may have actually died. The fact she's even alive now is remarkable. Her resilience must be far above the norm…'
The injuries on her had been treated by what looked like a professional, but the tools used were limited and not an ounce of magic healing had been done. Valentina was fuming when she thought about it. Sure, healers were in short supply, but they performed triage. Had the Baron and Baroness stepped forward and been honest with the situation, there would have certainly been a healer here days ago.
Starting to snap out of her daze, Valentina started going over her own checklist, all while trying to determine what had the highest priority. The cuts, and broken bones were treated with mundane medicine, but that's all they needed for now. Later on, magic would be used, but for now there were much higher priorities.
The wound on Dahlia's arm had been cleaned up, but some of the flesh further away from the initial injury was beginning to necrotize. The infection was likely in the lymphatic system and would soon spread to the rest of the body. Meanwhile, the bloody gaping injury in her stomach was dreadful.
Whoever was taking care of her clearly struggled with this. She could see sections of flesh had been repeatedly cut back, likely trying to excise the infection, only for it to come back. Now where the infection had spread was no longer able to be removed, at least not with the equipment scattered about.
By this point, Dahlia's entire abdomen was on the verge of killing her. Black veins could be seen in multiple locations and discoloured flesh was everywhere. It was far worse than nearly any injury Valentina had seen before, with the exception of a couple wounds in war.
She glanced up at Dahlia's face as well, hoping to at least get a sense of reassurance before she began treating her, but instead she was met with a swollen and stitched face, wholly unrecognisable to what had been their last meeting. Worst of all, both eyes showed signs of damage, though that would be looked at later.
Tossing her coat aside, Valentina leaned over Dahlia and began her own personal operation. She wasn't a healer by any stretch. At least not to the degree where she felt she deserved the title. But the aspect of blood always contained the attributes of life and death, and curing blood poisoning and infection was well suited to her skillset.
Unlike most magic she cast, this time she took her nail and brought it along her forearm, creating a long thin cut like a scalpel. As she began to bleed, she poured every drop into Dahlia's wounds and began to manipulate it remotely so that it would seep in and mix with her body. After a couple minutes of carefully adding blood and getting a proper amount mixed in with Dahlia's own blood, Valentina began the second step.
Her style of healing was invasive, painful, and slow. The gentle glowing hands of some healers left her feeling discontent with her own abilities, but now was not the time for reservations. Dahlia was so deep in a coma right now that Valentina bit the bullet and used her abilities without anaesthesia. She could only hope the girl didn't go into shock and die from the treatment.
Seconds became minutes. Minutes became an hour. The Archduchess was sweating as she put all her energy and focus into cleansing Dahlia's body of the impurities within. Moment by moment, her condition was visibly improving, but she refused to stop until she was certain of the girl's safety and guaranteed recovery.
Birds were beginning to sing outside the broken window when Valentina finally sat back. Every single source of infection had been removed and set aside in a disgusting pile a few steps away, and Dahlia had been stitched back up with incredibly thin crimson stitches formed by the vampiress' aspect.
Looking at her, she still looked absolutely dreadful and Valentina's heart ached, but seeing that she was now merely unconscious and recovering instead of being in a near death fever made her breathe a sigh of relief.
She moved forward, looking at the girl with gentle eyes and she tugged a sweat soaked strand of hair away from her face.
"You rest well. I don't want to move you until you recover more. And when you do wake, I'll be sure to have you tell me who did this to you so I can make them suffer more than the hells themselves could cause."
While she started with a low loving voice, she had ended in a growl. Now that the shock was out of the way and the initial concern had been taken care of, Valentina was finally alone with her thoughts and as she thought about someone doing this… well, to say the Vampiric Devil would return would do no justice for the impulses she had at that moment.
It had been a minute after she spoke and went down this vengeful mindset that suddenly a new voice came up from the corner of the room.
"I can help you. At least a little. Tell you what happened and who did this. I could tell you more than that, but I imagine that's not my place."
It had almost come out as a whisper. The Baroness was hugging her knees in the room's corner, dark circles under her eyes as she looked at her daughter without taking her eyes away.
'The hell? Was she here the entire time? I remember my hex saying there were two nearby but I totally lost track…'
Valentina looked over the woman again quite critically. She was clearly exhausted and coated in dried blood. The resemblance to her daughter was undeniable so it wasn't hard to determine what was going on. Despite understanding though, Valentina was surprised at both the degree to which she went to keep Dahlia alive as well as her skill in medicine. If the Baroness had proper medicine and equipment, there was a good chance Dahlia would have eventually recovered.
"You said you can help. How much do you know and what do you expect in return?"
Sabrina smirked. Was it that obvious she wanted something? Shaking her head, she just smiled sadly.
"Don't worry, I know everything. I'd like to give it to you for free in a show of good faith, but instead I'm going to have to ask for amnesty. Give me that, and I'll give you everything you want without any say otherwise."
Valentina raised an eyebrow at that. It was a tempting offer, but something about the situation was bugging her.
"I guess it depends. What do you want me to pardon?"
PERTIMBANGAN PENCIPTA 
AngelAsphodel
AngelAsphodel That was a looooooong chapter. Hope you enjoyed! Finally the two are reunited and, although there'll still be some waiting until Dahlia is recovered and they get to be all lovey-dovey, it makes me happy that I now get to take a break on writing Dahlia's suffering. The poor girl has had enough!
I'm going to be busy tomorrow, so I figured I'd release this now and then try to get another update out on thursday. Who knows how things will actually work, but that's the plan.
As always, have a wonderful day~
Hadiah
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