A Wolf's Howl, A Fairy's Wing

Fifteen minuets later, Emma, Lars, Emily, and her group of slaves entered the control room. It was a large room which likely use to be some kind of silo. Large slabs of stone were plastered to the walls and covered with sigils showing the view through some poor ghoul's eyes.

Tens of first-ranked male and female vampires were gathered here, each controlling one or more second-ranked ghouls through sigils on their hands that were connected to those on the walls.

The large group was naturally noticed quickly by the vampires closest to the entrance. One male vampires in particular made some unfortunate assumptions when he saw their leaders escorting two beautiful human women.

Assumptions he would soon regret.

Standing up from his seat in front of one of the screens, he walked up to them with lustful eyes. "Hey Boss," he addressed Lars, full of excitement at the prospect of what he was imagining, "did you bring some bitches as reward for our hard work?"

He stopped in front of them, being respectful of the second-rankers present there, but his greedy eyes wandered over Emily and Emma's bodies as his excitement visibly rose.

Lars, as a sociopath, really couldn't care less about these people, so he smirked knowingly, but kept quiet, waiting see how Emily would handle this. Emma, for her part, looked at the man with a hint of pity, but also remained quiet.

As for Emily, well, her lips formed a small, yet very dangerous smile. "Oh my," she purred, while covering her mouth with one hand and snickering a little. "I'm so glad I didn't have to go looking for a volunteer."

"Eh?" the man scratched his head, a little confused about what she meant, but then one of the second-ranked guards around Emily stepped forward, and suddenly grabbed this man by his throat. "Ghhh, wha— what are you doing…?!" he sputtered while trying and failing to pry those powerful fingers of his throat.

The enslaved vampire, Hendrik, picked the man up like this, and tossed him to the ground, in front of Emily's feet, where he planted his knee on the man's back to keep him in place, immobilized his arms, and stuffed some fabric in his mouth to keep him quiet.

Naturally, this entire scene had quickly gathered the attention of every vampire in that room. They looked at their leaders with confusion while the captured man's muffled screams filled the room. Who were these women, and why was their colleague being manhandled like that?

Fortunately, Emily wouldn't keep them in suspense for long.

"Alright everyone, listen up!" she exclaimed, her malevolent eyes promised violence as they swept over the gathered vampires while her voice, empowered by aetherium, carried itself to every inch of the room.

"My name is Emily and this is my sister Emma," she continued after getting everyone's attention. "First of all, let me assure you all that your very lives are currently balancing on a razer-thin edge, and if I see any of you interacting with those sigils in front of you before I allow it, that razors edge will slice you through instantly.

There's no need to look at these limp-dicked guards of yours for help. They are now all under my full control, and even your commander has switched sides."

Confused and fearful gazes now swept over the second-ranked guards that used to protect them, and noticed their empty gazes and robotic movements. They also noticed Lars was missing those same signs, but his expression was full of indifference and didn't seem intend on interfering.

They all decided to do as she said for now. While they weren't very familiar with Arcanists, they could guess from the circumstances that these women were no less powerful than their guards, making that group more than capable of slaughtering this entire room without breaking a sweat.

"S— Switched sides? Whose side are you on? W— What's going on?" one very brave woman asked while shrinking a little in her seat when Emily's eyes focused on hers.

"Glad you asked," Emily grinned maliciously. "We take this base in the name of our husband, Erik Gunnulf, son of Runa Gunnulf, former leader of the Enclave. And when the time comes, he will hand it back over to the original leader of the Dominion, Liv Frost."

Surprised and fearful whispers spread across the room, but they were quickly silenced again when Emily continued. "So now you people have two choices, either you do as we say, don't fuck us over, and ride out our presence here in relative safety until Liv arrives, at which point you can throw yourself at her mercy and hope for the best."

"Or you pick option two, which is far less friendly… but since I know mere words won't exactly convey the message I'm trying to bring across, I will use our friend here as a prop." At that point, she indicated towards the squirming man releasing muffled screams that was being held in place by the enslaved Hendrik.

She conjured ten pitch black orbs around herself, and grinned devilishly while panning her gaze over everyone int he room. "Now, I want you all to watch closely what happens when you piss me off. And if I see any of you look away from this…" her voice lowered into a threatening growl, "you will be next."

What happened next was the cruel, prolonged torture of this vampire who dared assume she and Emma had been brought there for sexual relief. The cloth in his mouth was removed so that his screams of agony could echo across the entire room.

The only person in the room to have her eyes closed was Emma, who also used aetherium to block her ears from the screams. She didn't intend to stop her sister, but she didn't like it either, and certainly wasn't going to watch or listen.

All the others in that room were different, however. It had taken no more than a minute of this scene for their fear towards Emily to skyrocket.

Half of them were shaking in their seats with tears in their eyes as they forced themselves to watch, fearful of the consequences if they looked away. The other half looked on with relative indifference to the man's fate, but the message that it was better not to try anything and simply hope for the best was firmly engraved in their minds.

Most of them remembered Liv as a relatively kind and fair leader, so perhaps their fate wouldn't be so bad when she came back. As for Sigurd? None of them really expected him to last very long without his ghoulish army.

Thus, fifteen minutes later, after the man's screams had finally died down and his body had turned into a blackened slab of meat, a deep and nightmarish fear of his torturer had settled deep in all of their minds.

Even Lars looked at her with a lot more wariness than before, suddenly not even considering trying to see if he could go against this covenant he agreed to.

Seeing that everyone had gotten the message she was trying to send, Emily grinned. "Good… Let's get started, shall we?"

————————————

Meanwhile, Erik was sitting in a relatively intact room in one of the few hotels of Kirkenes and smirking playfully at an enraged Anne.

It had been about twelve hours since he came here, and in that time he had done very little. The only thing he did was drop Olaf and Frostfang off at their places of residence so they could recover for the fight to come.

Or, at least, so that Frostfang could recover. Olaf was of no consequence in the coming battle.

After that, he simply took up in this hotel room and waited to hear from Emma and Emily in a slightly anxious state. Although he portrayed a casual attitude, he couldn't deny there was a kernel of worry within him, despite knowing they would be fine because of the precautions he and Elora took.

Not that he would have stopped them otherwise.

Erik may be a dominant force in his marriages, but he still tried to give them their autonomy, and didn't want to restrict their freedom—at least outside of the bedroom.

Thus, when they decided to take this task upon themselves, all Erik could do was prepare them as well as he could and send them on their way, promising plenty of rewards if they succeeded.

Luckily, the bond still kept him informed of their well being, even if they couldn't be in constant communication anymore.

Meanwhile, his inactivity had caused a little tension among the Enclave leadership, however, and they had sent Anne to talk to Erik about it, fearing Viljar would be to lenient. Frostfang was still sleeping, so they hadn't bothered him yet.

"Why are we just sitting here?!" Anne roared at casually lounging Erik. "You said you had a plan, but we've done absolutely nothing for more than half a day already! Meanwhile, the Dominion is clearly up to something! Their army is like a beehive of activity and we're still just sitting ducks for when whatever they're planning comes to fruition!"