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Morgan basks in the red glare of the sunset burning through the lone uncovered window. His face and bared chest smoking in the last remnants of daylight before it slips below the horizon and vanishes; the rest of him protected by artfully falling shadow; this pattern played out night after night. The world gone brighter to his unnatural eyes in that gathering dark as he watches evening traffic move through Boston’s Seaport District. Artificial light making a false starry sky of the darkened harbor farther out beyond the Waterfront.
He savors the momentary ruin of his features; the flesh will knit itself hale again shortly. But the pain of both the damage and the already begun repair are a welcome reminder of the life he led before he was made undead. Before he rose to power and prominence a second time, the whole of the corp tower beneath him bending under the gracious guidance of their CEO’s hand. Perhaps a hand too lenient as of late, given how much his own board has seen fit to defy him in recent days.
A board that, behind Morgan’s back, sent so quickly his newly acquired paramour, Winter – pilfered from a would-be power player so many floors below – on a recon mission Morgan had already denied. A venture that risks starting open war with Marrowmont. Perhaps, holed up in this fortified tower of theirs, his subordinates have forgotten how many died in the last conflict, when the Maidens drove those vampires they didn’t kill from their borders.
That they’ve heard nothing from the recon team in three days, but neither have they seen retaliation from the Maidens, sits unquiet in Morgan’s gut.
Winter, at least, bound to him, he can feel still lives. The others…
The only solace in how long his board has made him wait before approving a recovery of their missing personnel is that this proves the recon team’s mission: to assess if the Maidens are truly occupied with their own troubles; their caged beast having been freed to run rampant through their city. Its presence seemingly having made them lax to outside incursion.
Were he more like his predecessors, Morgan might well take the opportunity to descend on them with a ravening army while the Maidens’ attention lies split. The Morgan who once walked through the world mortal, under another name, still bearing a crown, would have done it. But he has not survived more than two millennia after his first death by being rash, nor bellicose. Meting out violence where it’s called for? Certainly. And with pleasure. But imprudent he is not.
“My lord,” Amari says from behind Morgan in the dark, intruding on his thoughts and setting a fleeting smile crossing his face.
