CHAPTER 141: FOR THE FIRST TIME...

*BANG!!!*

*DUUUM!!!*

The last view anyone had of Kerwin Leopold was of him unleashing his canopy of water and now his form was completely shrouded in the darkness of the ~Black Hand~ spell as well as the dust that had billowed out from the powerful contact the spell had made with the ground.

And then the darkness began to fade and the cloud of dust began to disperse to reveal Kerwin on one knee with his head bowed and one hand raised. It was the hand he had used to cast his defensive spell.

Kerwin’s eyes rolled up in his sockets and he looked at Caius who was calmly observing him. He bowed his head over again and his raised hand fell to his side, dampening any hopes there might have been that he was about to counterattack.

"Shit," he said in a voice lower than a whisper. But everyone heard it clearly and the hearts of the Council members all sank.

Kerwin had put his all into that final defensive spell. Whether he had intended to go that far or not, the fact that the Black hand continued to descend and impose tremendous pressure upon his shoulders left him with no choice. Every inch that the Black hand descended had sapped him of more and more of the little bit of physical energy he had left.

Now he had managed to remain on one knee rather than get flattened against the ground but he didn’t even have the strength to keep his body in that position or do anything at all, really.

The hearts of the Council members sank even further as Kerwin’s body went limp and he fell with no control over the direction of his descent.

*Thud*

His back hit the ground.

The Duel was over.

The chain of their Vow melted away from around Caius’s heart then as he no longer had any obligations or stipulations to abide by.

On the other hand, the chain transformed around Kerwin’s heart turning from just a deterrent against breaking the vow he had made and into something of a leash. A leash that had been handed to Caius as per the terms that had been agreed upon.

Caius felt it then.

He felt the flavors of the thoughts of every single one of the Vampires that belonged to the Leopold Coven regardless of distance. He felt as they all felt the right to command and control their fates fall into his hands in an even stronger hold than a Creator had over their Spawns.

He looked at the Council members and could feel their seething at this outcome. And then he felt their acceptance. There was no resistance they could make. Divine power that had made their existences possible compelled them to accept their fates.

Caius retracted his Noble Authority now. He was nearing his limit and no longer had a use for it. Not against this bunch anyway. Whatever strength they possessed, from this moment on, would serve his goals and nothing else.

With the Noble Authority gone and the Duel over, the Lord’s Prerogative that had limited Kerwin Leopold to the Third Circle was finally lifted. He regained his actual Magical and Physical strength and lifted himself off the ground by sheer force of will. No spell required.

Kerwin didn’t get to his feet. With a sullen expression, he fell to one knee with one arm across the leg whose knee was not touching the ground, bowing his head at Caius.

The Council Members followed his lead. The only one not to take a knee was the one Vampire woman who had been struck by Tenth Circle Quality Mana and was still comatose by the wall.

Caius smiled.

For the first time in the days since he had acquired the title, he finally, truly felt like a Vampire Lord.

And then he looked over at Arlette and raised a hand to her. She had already been stepping closer but sped up until she was holding the hand so he could pull her into his arms.

They smacked their lips together then in a hard kiss.

Despite the supposed ease with which Caius had won the Duel and escaped those terrifying blasts of Tenth Circle Magical Energy, Arlette had still been worried. With all that worry now gone and this crazy ruse finally at an end, she let her passion flood out of her so hard, it filled her head with a haze as she pulled herself closer into Caius’s body.

Caius held her waist with one hand while the other went low to the rise of her ass. For a moment, he forgot they had an audience. And then when he remembered, he didn’t separate their lips because he couldn’t care less.

The men looked slightly uncomfortable and looked to be trying to avert their eyes. The women stared so hard, they appeared to be ogling the kissing duo. A couple of them even angled their heads like they were trying to look around Arlette’s body and see Caius’s even more clearly.

It’s crazy what a handsome face can do. In a second, they seemed to have forgotten their Coven was just conquered and their lives had just been threatened if their Coven Leader had not gone along with this boy’s—their new Lord’s—wishes.

Even though the vow they were now bound by to forever be his subjects inspired acceptance, the men still struggled with it. The women seemed ready to care very little about it.

Kerwin cleared his throat trying to call his new Lord to decorum. Arlette now had her leg wrapped around Caius in a very suggestive way and Kerwin could not help but feel insulted.

He had just been forced into making a Vow whose consequences he was now eternally bound by along with his Coven and he had had his strength suppressed so he could be trampled upon and defeated. And after all that, he was now being forced to watch the perpetrator of it all suck face with the human woman whose reason for being here he still didn’t quite understand.

He used to have a limit for how much disrespect he could accept and a few minutes ago, he would have been well past that limit by this point. Alas, post subjugation, all he could do was try and plead with his Lord’s sensibilities.

Caius ignored his first throat clearing.

So Kerwin tried again and this time, Caius opened his eyes to look at him, finally separating his lips from Arlette so he could speak.

"I don’t believe I’ve ordered you to watch," he said, "If you’re watching, you’ve chosen to. And if you’re choosing to stare, why should I care that you’re feeling uncomfortable? Just turn your eyes away, you fricking perverts!"

With that, he took Arlette’s lips and continued where he left off.

Alas, the matter was far from over with Kerwin and the council members.

Looking away barely helped with the awkwardness when they could still hear the sucking sounds. They could still hear the moans and even the sounds of fabrics as Arlette and Caius ran their hands all over each other’s clothed bodies.

So again, Kerwin cleared his throat and when he was ignored, he decided he might as well speak.

"At least let us leave and give you your privacy..." he said.

Caius hadn’t actually ordered them to remain kneeling. However, courtesy demands that when subjects bow to their Lord, especially for the first time, they must wait to be released from their positions. That courtesy bound them like law, locking them in place for the Men to be annoyed by what was happening mere feet from them while the women continued to gaze curiously. Their curiosity only grew stronger with each second that passed.

Caius took his hand off Arlette’s ass and pointed a finger. They all subconsciously leaned toward it expecting it to wag upward and indicate they could stand to their feet but instead, it wagged from side to side indicating ’No’ and keeping them where they were.

He wasn’t exactly an exhibitionist. He certainly wasn’t planning on taking things with Arlette too far while the eyes of men were on them (The eyes of the women were fine). But he did want them to stay.

They had matters to discuss.

And once he had indulged in Arlette’s lips as much as he and she wished to, they would get to it. Until then, they could all enjoy the show.