A Loom of Years

Sixth Weaving
@Anne E. Fraser 2006

Once all the Princes had gathered in Munich for the emergency Council meeting, Ingrid lost no time in calling for a vote on Claude’s succession to France. Blaine thought it was rather abrupt of her–no memorial for Armand at all–but Claude himself merely sighed.

And so it was done. Claude officially became the Prince of France. Afterwards, Ingrid relented a little and permitted them to speak of Armand, to eulogize him. They toasted his memory and vowed to hunt down the rogue who had slain him. Then the meeting broke up and they mingled.

Blaine clapped Claude on the shoulder. "Sorry, old chap," he said quietly.

Claude raised an eyebrow. "I didn’t think you liked Armand," he said.

"I respected him," Blaine replied evasively. "He was a good Prince."

"Yes. I will miss him. Still, I am prepared to do my best."

"If you need any advice, my boy, you come to me."

"Thank you, Blaine, I appreciate that." Claude looked from the British Prince to his consort, who was laughing with Kalonice of Greece. "Am I correct in thinking that you and Olivia are on somewhat friendlier terms?"

Blaine leaned over and whispered, "Better than friendly, my boy. We’re sharing a bed these days."

A grin fought its way to Claude’s lips. "C’est bon!"

"Well, really, about time, don’t you think? So, when are you going to get married?"

A pole-axed stare was his answer, and Blaine laughed and clapped Claude on the back again. "Get thee a wife!" he advised, and left Claude to talk to Carmine while he, Blaine, went off to converse with Zalyina of Russia.

The return trip to London went without any broken cart incidents. Indeed, normally, Princes suffered few travelling mishaps of this sort. Blaine occasionally wondered if Nigel the mage hadn’t done something intentionally, back at that little farm. But no, surely he would not have so endangered the lives of his Prince and consort.

Would he?

Olivia, when consulted, forbade Blaine flatly to ask Nigel. "We were nudged," she said, "whether by Nigel, or some force unknown to us, it does not matter. Let us accept it and be grateful."

"Nudged," Blaine repeated.

Olivia took his unresisting hand. "Don’t worry about it," she insisted. "How many more years would we have gone on, wanting each other, casting longing looks at turned backs, not daring to speak? I love you."

Blaine grinned at her. "All right, I won’t flog Nigel," he said.

"As if you would flog anyone at all."

They kissed and went to bed.

The years passed, as years will do, and Blaine and Olivia settled down to being a real married couple. Blaine continued his excellent work as Prince; not only the vampires but most of the rest of the supernatural community honoured him. Olivia scoffed at the fact that they honoured her as well; she laughed when she was told, sincerely, that she should have been co-Prince rather than merely a consort.

Blaine did all the difficult work, according to her. She didn’t seem to realize that her presence, fiery compared to Blaine’s unflappableness, was the perfect counterpoint. They worked seamlessly together.

They were doing so in Scotland, some time after Armand’s death.. Some witches had taken exception to an enclave of vampires in their neighbourhood and had decided to launch an extermination program. The vampires, naturally, not only resisted but called upon their Prince for help. Blaine, Olivia, and their retinue had arrived in the midst of a pitched battle and had joined in. Talking to the witches was impossible in the circumstances.

Blaine’s personal mage, Nigel, had been put to work immediately. He had cast wards, protective spells, to prevent hostile magic from harming his Prince and consort. He was also working on some offensive spells, but really, the magic-users mostly just cancelled each other out. Most of the fighting was now being done with mortal weapons and vampire-werewolf-Nameless One strength. The witches had some shapeshifters on their side. Not all shifters were vampire-friendly.

"You knew," Olivia flung these words at Blaine as she cheerfully gutted a plaid-wearing Scot.

"Knew what?" he asked, in between dodging fireballs being cast at him by an ancient crone safely ensconced behind a large rock being defended by some shifters.

Olivia decapitated a were who leapt for her and stepped over the body. "You knew we’d work well together."

Blaine fought off two witches who’d gotten tired of casting spells and decided to try full body contact. Neither had full bodies left when he was done with them. Or much blood in them. Fighting always made Blaine peckish.

"Of course, darling," he replied, wiping the blood off his face.

A half-naked, crazed warrior on the other side leapt off the top of a rock at Blaine, his face painted with woad, his anachronistic kilt flapping up in the breeze of his fall to reveal that even if it was at least two centuries ahead of its time, it was correctly worn. He brandished a claymore nearly his own length and screamed "FREEDOM!" as he fell...

... right onto Blaine’s waiting broadsword.

As the strange fellow noisily expired on the ground, Blaine pulled out his sword. "So much for the passion of the... Christ!" he exclaimed as his victim reached up for him with one last gasp.

"He had a brave heart," Olivia observed.

"You were saying?" Blaine asked, kicking the fellow’s corpse out of the way.

"Behind you, darling," said Olivia, throwing her dagger accurately.

"I come, Graymalkin!" screamed the witch who’d been about to stick something poisoned and foul into Blaine’s back, falling with Olivia’s dagger between her breasts.

"Oh, good shot," said Blaine, reaching down and retrieving the weapon for his wife. "I believe we were talking about my knowing we’d work well together."

"Well," Olivia nodded thoughtfully, wiping her dagger on the witch, "I thought at first you’d just married me to make peace."

"That was, of course, primarily on my mind," Blaine confessed, finally killing the last of the shapeshifters guarding the rock. "But I did have a feeling that you and I would make a great team. Opposites and all that." He reached behind the rock and retrieved the fireball-caster, holding her up. "Well, now, what have we here?"

"You belong dead!" the crone told him.

"Yes, well, you can’t have everything, now, can you?" Blaine asked.

"Vampires are wrong for the earth!" The crone spat. "Can you not feel her weep at the touch of your foul feet? Where you walk, the grass withers and flowers die."

"No wonder I’m not having any luck with my begonias."

"There is no jest here, Prince of Death. You cannot laugh away the harm you do to the all-Mother. Go back to your graves."

"A question for you, goodwife," said Olivia, looking at the witch with interest. "If vampires are wrong, why are there vampires?"

"The darkness has its tricks and japes," replied the witch. "Always the shadows watch, waiting."

"Yes? And what about the werewolves, and the other shifters? Are they tricks of the shadows, too?" Olivia asked.

The crone’s eyes flickered to those who had guarded her rock, and who now lay dead. "They are creatures of the twilight, not the darkness. The Mother only shivers under their feet. She does not recoil from them."

"You know, I’m rather taking a liking to this crone," Blaine remarked. "Would you consider a position in my court? Nigel will look after you for us." He pointed to his own mage, who was now sitting on a fallen log, looking around at the battle with interest.

There really wasn’t much for Nigel to look at any more, actually. The vampires had clearly won the field. A few would never rise again, no matter how much blood you gave them, because once the head is severed not even a vampire can come back. One or two weres had also fallen, and the pack was howling now, mourning their loss. The eerie sound had paused the fighting, and the forces on the side of witchcraft were realizing they were defeated.

"Walk freely into the court of Death?" the crone asked. "I think not."

"What’s your name?" Blaine asked her.

"I’ll not give you my name."

"Oh, come on. I have no magical powers, I can’t use it for anything except to call you by. I’m Blaine Whyte-Thomas, this is my wife, Olivia Hanover."

"Wife! You are dead things, you cannot marry. Marriage is a holy sacrament."

"We’re married. Sorry. By a priest and everything. Mind you, he was a Druid..."

"No!" The old woman looked shocked, and Blaine realized he had just rocked her world. "No Druid would do such a thing, uniting two vampires, two of the darkness’ own."

Blaine looked at Olivia, eyebrows raised. She shrugged. She was as fascinated by this old witch’s viewpoint as her husband, but she thought it would be safer to kill the wretch than bring her to court.

"He did," Olivia said, almost gently. "We spoke our vows before him and witnesses, we are a married couple. Together we have worked hard to end the warring amongst vampires in the British Isles, and to also try and make peace with others such as magic-users and werewolves. See, look, Nigel is happy with us in court; we have other mages and witches as well."

The old woman stared at them both, then wrenched herself free of Blaine’s grasp (he hadn’t been holding her very tightly) and ran out into the battlefield.

"You call this peace?" she demanded, raising the head of the kilted warrior Blaine had killed. "Where is your peace, Prince?" She looked up at the night sky. "Come, all-Mother, strike these vile dead things where they stand!"

Nigel got up from his log, drawn by the witch’s plea to the sky, and came over to look questioningly at his Prince. Since the all-Mother failed to strike either Blaine or Olivia, the witch turned away at Nigel’s gentle touch on her arm and wept.

"Look after her for us," Blaine told his mage, who nodded. "I have peace to negotiate." This was said a bit grimly, as he stepped over corpses to speak to the leader of the remaining opposition.

The next night they found the old crone dead in a cart, of unknown causes. Nigel, looking deeply disturbed, had been beside her when she’d died.

"She looked up at me, sir, m’lady," said Blaine’s mage nervously when questioned, "and spat in my eye. Said I was a traitor to all witches and that the darkness truly had me. Then she grasped my hand and said that she would stop her own heart rather than enter the court of the Prince of Death. And... well, sir, she did. Stop her own heart."

Blaine looked sadly down at the pitiful little corpse. "A woman of strong convictions," he said.

"She would never have been happy with us, Blaine," Olivia said, taking his hand. "Let us hope she found... peace."

They buried the witch with full honours in a copse, under cover of darkness, and planted some flowers on her makeshift grave.

They never did know her name.

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