(no subject)
Author: savingdaisydiva
Square: Vilify
Characters: Kanaya, Kanaya's ancestor
Words: 881
Notes: Some blood, major headcanon?
The torches set in their iron sconces cast shadows upon the Baroness’s guests making their exact features hard to distinguish. They often glance at the bare plates before staring back at her. Baroness Vespetine Duskbane finds their shadowy company better-the dim light works both ways. Her guests are her peers, nobility only through the words of the Empress and not by blood: she can’t stand the barbarians with higher blood that looks down upon her with smoldering disdain. The savages barely notice that her blood is so rare, most of the time, but her peers respect her jade blood. For now the guests are silent but their hunger and impatience is thick in the air.
Vespetine stands, smoothing out hand-made skirts that ruffle and bend with every movement. She feels the silent questioning gazes that follow her every movement. She barely looks at them when she nods to the two guards at the door; they bow and leave briskly to bring the intended for the meeting. Only then does Vespetine turn to address her waiting guests.
“My apologies for making you travel so far and with so little warning, it is unforgivably rude but as I told each of you I felt that this social gaffe was necessary.” Vespetine’s voice is calm, emotionless, but each word is said with such enunciation that each of her guests lean in closer to try to discern the meaning. “As many of you know, I have been out of touch for quite some time. Valcum, as you all know, is quite isolated from the outside world when the cold seasons set in-a few of you have the same problems in your own settlements.”
Several of the guests nod to themselves before exchanging glances with each other. She can read the mood well enough: they are growing impatient with each word she says. Well, they say among to each other in hushed tones, what is the point? The point, she knows, is that they don’t understand. These are the closest to her in blood and rank yet they are just as ignorant as the rustbloods or the sea dwellers in their underwater palaces.
Then, when she hears the footsteps of the two guards bringing the sacrifice she allows herself a quick inwardly satisfied smile that still fits with the expression of a benevolent hostess. With every step the arguing of the guards with the rustblooded slave drifts into the dining area. Her guests, their annoyance forgotten, look confusedly at each other.
“I didn’t-look, please, she must understand-no, I didn’t! Please, please, please I didn’t mean to, I didn’t-”
Vespetine guesses when the cries will become silent and speaks up again, louder than the first. “We, my fellows, as a society are at a cross roads. Alternia has a new empress, one who will reign for many sweeps. The question is, will we grow as a society or become stagnant in our cultural identity? Will we still be barbarians living in hive-caves, afraid of the fiery sun? Or, perhaps, we will grow. When you see blood, what do you see? Rank? Power?” With each word she speaks her voice increases in volume-but her audience’s attention clearly wavers from her to the noises outside. Only now does her expression change from the calm façade of a hostess.
Then the slave is silenced, just before the door opens into the dining area. The guests stare silently in shock as the two guards drop the body at the feet of Vespetine before bowing and taking their leave. The slave’s symbol is nowhere to be seen on her body but her maroon blood dripping onto Vespetine’s skirts tell the story. She reaches down, lifting the slave’s body by a horn just so the guests can see the wound on her neck more clearly.
“With each sweep that passes, savagery and barbarism is rampant. They blame it on the hemospectrum. If I, a jade-blood, do this then it must be morally fine. Is that not correct?”
Vespetine kneels as the dumbstruck dinner guests silently watch her. Tilting the head back, she licks the wound once before pressing her mouth to the wound to lap at it as if it were fine wine. Vespetine drops the body suddenly and stands proud.
“If this is correct, then I am the most civilized troll on Alternia.”
-
The Blood Baroness is mentioned many times in Kanaya’s novels, non-fiction and fiction both. The storytellers always say how this mystery noble established the fable of rainbow drinkers: how this nameless killer’s deeds were so dreadful that her symbol, blood color, and name were stripped from the records but the memory lived on despite the Empress’s attempts to stifle it. Kanaya herself thinks that the Empress allowed the memory to live as a parable, but it’s none of her business.
She doesn’t really think the Blood Baroness is anything more than an old story about some noble before Alternia became an empire. She only knows of it through her research of rainbow drinker lore-a baroness whose matesprit died becomes fascinated with civility but takes blood purity too far. Some of her stories speculate more but Kanaya avoids them. After all, she’s admittedly more interested in the fiction rather than the fact.