The smaller vampire tried to pop his head into the middle of the group again. "I'm glad to see you, my prince, but I still have something urgent to speak about with my king," he protested. The other vampires patted him on the shoulders and shooed him away with promises of listening to his story once they'd completed their talk. Layel finally sighed and trudged back to Priscilla's room to get out of their way.
The other two vampires watched him go. "He's a good man, our Layel is, but sometimes his priorities get a little out of order," Cillean explained the dismissal. "We'll have to be very soothing and conciliatory when we do break to meet with him again, though, as we are staying in his house and one shouldn't be too rude to his host. Even when they are hosting you because they've been ordered to," he added.
The others agreed as they trotted out to the formal parlor. It was a small home, but, as one of Layel's jobs was to serve as a resource for vampires in need and to maintain his home as a safe house for his people's use, it was equipped with a few extra rooms a normal house wouldn't need. There were some fairly tame rooms like several extra guest bedrooms, but the most unusual aspect was the rarely utilized single-cell dungeon.
That very same dungeon came to mind again as Aeron was plied with sausages and some snacks called blood bits that he politely refused. "I said earlier that my plan had been to do something like a quick search and rescue trip, but that plan was derailed. Some of my people came to send a message to me yesterday." He offered the missive for them to read it.
My liege,
I feel I must inform you there are problems that have developed that may go badly for you. One of our former initiates has been removed from the order of wizards and cast out of the Domed City. It appears that this initiate, formerly called "Darien", is trying to stir up trouble. One of our people was sent to observe his activities after his banishment and found that he spoke with blatant rebels and plans to concoct a crazy story claiming that we, of all people, are anything less than your loyal subjects and instead frame us for his seditious acts. I am sure you will, as always, deal with these rebels with the wisdom you have always been well known for.
Your loyal subject,
Gruzelvelt
Head Scribe of Domed City
They all looked at each other. They were a group that had withstood many waves of political intrigue and withstood the ebb and flow of power. There was something suspicious already in getting a letter from a wizard, but a wizard elder directly contacting the crown prince when the wizards had made a decades-long attempt to separate themselves as thoroughly as possible from the other species and cities of their world was beyond suspicious. Then again, it was easy to be too cynical and risk dismissing a legitimate message just because the circumstances of said message were unusual.
The question they were all thinking of was what to do with such information.
"I'll admit I visited the dungeon before I spoke to you two," Aeron said. They waited. "I spoke to your little inmate. His story is that his people framed him for their own misdeeds, and he maintains his innocence." They all knew what a man might say while imprisoned wouldn't necessarily be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, but usually someone skilled in interrogation could piece together the truth from the lies a mouth might say, combined with the truths their body language would reveal. Once a person had gotten to be a hundred, they usually had enough experience piecing together truths in their back-stabbing and dungeon-using world, and everyone in the room was well past that milestone chronologically. Even if their true ages did not match what they would be in human years, they still had grown in some experience over time.
Cillean shrugged and stood to lead the way to the dungeons.
The prince ignored that and Aeron clapped his hands so the holding cell melted into a living room with a river stone fireplace sandwiched between rough-hewn beams. They stood on the far side of the room facing the dungeon cell's door and its occupant.
"What does he have to tell us that was important enough to whisk us all here," Cillean asked, pointing at Darien. The wizard was sitting on the single chair in his cell and glaring at them.
The prince shrugged. "He made some claims that the wizards are trying to set up a revolution."
The dragon prince and vampire king looked at each other. "I think this goes without saying, but he's probably just making up juicy stuff to say to try and worm his way out of the trouble he's caused," Cillean said. "I know it's not the nicest thing ever that we put him in a cell, but we did want to make sure his story checked out. I didn't expect you to get a jump on us and interrogate the kid," he added.
Darien grumbled at being called a kid, but the centuries old creatures in the room ignored his protests.
Daerick frowned. "We already know there has been some group causing trouble. To be told it's the humans isn't very shocking. I was leaning towards believing the kid," he added.
"I just like to be thorough in these uncertain times," the prince said. Aeron did agree that that intelligence sounded genuine, and if it was the truth the news wasn't surprising. "We already have widespread unrest and many groups unhappy with me as the next king. I've been assuming that anyone who hasn't actively given me their support is
