Wish upon the Stars chapter 519

"This is a terrible idea." Said Zeke stormily. "Like, I know those  are kind of your wheelhouse, but in a short lifetime of terrible ideas,  this is easily the most terrible. I TOLD you we shouldn't mess with him.  I told you we should avoid him, daughter or not, and now you're taking a  fucking day trip onto his ship. The Vampire is the most dangerous  S-ranker in the universe. If he decides to kill you, I have zero chance  of helping. Your mother either."

I shrugged. "We need to  talk to Bethy and Gabe. And realistically if he wanted to kill us, the  ship and everyone on it wouldn't be an obstacle. Besides, mom says its  fine."

He threw his hands in the air dramatically,  whirling and stalking off, muttering in a perfectly audible voice about  idiot nephews with death wishes. I took it from that exchange he wasn't  coming with us. I turned to my mom, who was standing next to me. "He IS  just being dramatic right? Because getting eaten is not high on my  priority list. Like...at the bottom. If not lower."

"You'll  be fine." She said with a laugh. "My father and Morgan are old rivals,  though the power difference has become a bit exaggerated. The old  Vampire doesn't eat baby cultivators. He's also not as prone to murder  as he likes to let on. Besides, I doubt you'll see him. I'll be splitting off to meet with him about the conclave. Even if you did, he's not so bad. Making a point to kill annoyances just keeps other people from annoying him. "

That  was the least reassuring reassurance I'd ever heard. But it would have  to do. Since he wouldn't be around we could just focus on having fun  with our friends. That did raise another question though."We have  permission to board right?" I asked, looking at the absolutely massive  coffin shaped ship floating in the void of space. We were currently in a  small shuttle taking us between the ships, though small might have been  a misleading statement since it was big enough for Zeke to go to  another room to sulk. The rest of us were standing next to a transparent  field looking out at the ship. My mom, sister, Callie, and I.

My  mother nodded. "Of course. THAT might get you killed. One doesn't  trespass on The Boneyard. Most S-rankers would be too scared to try to  break into that place."

I sighed internally. The Boneyard.  It reminded me of some of the stuff Bethy said about her dad and how he  leaned into edgy stereotypes sometimes. A giant coffin shaped ship  named The Boneyard certainly fit the bill there. From beside me Chelsea  whistled as she looked the thing over. "That's...unique. You make it  sound like it's old and well known. What is it made of exactly?"

"Stygian  Tungsten." Said mom with a chuckle. "A-rank. Finding enough S-rank  material to make a ship that size is problematic. I've only ever seen  one or two S-rank ships. Still, that one is heavily enchanted, and the  metal it's made of is one of the hardest A-rank materials in the  universe. Of course, a lot of the Impact was shunted into the  enchantments so people like you can actually walk around in there, so  that makes is substantially more durable."

I knew that  shunting Impact like that was possible since it was what they did with  the Necromedes, but hearing that it made the thing more durable was  interesting. I hadn't really connected the fact that Impact made you  tougher to what it would do to the material the ship was made from, even  independent of the enchantments.

It didn't take long for  the shuttle to enter the docking bay of The Boneyard, the ship we were  using was pretty fast and we weren't too far, at least relatively  speaking. When we touched down, we were immediately inundated with a  massive swarm of...flying kittens. I laughed, rolling my eyes as I let  Bethy bat at me from a dozen angles before she reincorporated into her  normal form.

"Ta-dah!" Said the tiny Vampire. She was  wearing a purple velvet ballgown with black trim today, and a black  headband with a purple flower on it. Tracey and Aida were standing off  to either side, letting their mistress have her fun, and Gabe was  leaning against the wall looking amused. When he saw my mom though, his  eyes went wide and he stood up ramrod straight.

"Star  Queen." He said formally, kneeling quickly and lowering his head. "This  lowly crusader bids you greetings. Apologies for not receiving you in a  more proper manner."

Bethy just rolled her eyes. "Don't be  so stuffy, Gabe. I'm sure she doesn't want people fawning over her like  that. It gets super old. You're Chelsea's mom huh? Nice to meet you.  I'm Bethany, but everyone calls me Bethy! My daddy owns this ship!'

My  mom laughed. "I'm well aware, young lady. Please, Crusader Brightlaw,  rise. She's right. I feel no need to debase hard working members of the  church with my very presence. And an Adamant too. What a rare path. I'm  impressed with your resolve and courage. Not many are willing to take  such a risk, and you've already come so far and been through so much. I  wish you luck on your journey."

I was pretty sure Bethy  new Chelsea was my sister, but I suspected she ALSO knew she wasn't  supposed to mention it. Despite her eccentricities Bethy was whip smart.  She liked to be underestimated, so it was always hard to tell how much  of her crazy was intentional to throw off her enemies."

Grabbing  Callie and I, she started pulling us. "Oh, I'm so excited you're here! I  can't wait to show you around. This place is so boring and stuffy  usually, but there's so many neat things to see. Now that you're here I  just know we're going to have lots of fun. Donuts and Poptarts will be  so happy to see you too. They're out roaming the ship, I've got them  tapped into the local shadow plane. Callie especially will be a treat  for them. Poptarts absolutely adores you."

Callie blinked  in surprise. "He...does?" She gave me a questioning look, and I just  shrugged. I had no means of communicating with Bethy's cats. If she said  one of them was a Callie fan, they must be."

"Of  course!" She smaller girl said cheerfully as she dragged us out into a  huge open chamber. "You're his favorite person. Donuts is more of a  Benny fan." I blinked, unaware the cats even knew who Benny was. Huh. As  she dragged us onto a dirt road, I got a better look around, and I  revised my 'huge chamber' estimation to 'absolutely gargantuan'.

The  whole place was probably about the size of Rajak, albeit mostly open  air. It reminded me a lot of Bethy's domain actually. Bloody sky full of  dark cloudy with a blood red moon. The light spilled down over black  grass and I could see castles out in the distance surrounded by small  towns. I was kind of gobsmacked, but eventually managed to get out a  question. "What...IS this place? Like what are all the castles."

She  just shrugged. "Oh this is where I grew up. At least most of the time.  Technically daddy owns the Sanguinis system, the Queen gave it to him  for services rendered or something, but he likes to stay mobile. Each of  us kids have our own castle here, though most of us share with our  mothers. Mommy still lives in mine now that I'm out and about, but I  don't think she's here right now. It's a shame, because I'd love to  introduce you guys!"

I  wasn't sure what to expect of Bethy's mother, actually. She talked  about her dad a lot, but I hadn't heard her mention her mom. "Is your  mom a Vampire too?"

Giggling,  she shook her head. "Silly, only Larks get to be Vampires. None of our  mom's are. No, she's a fae. A Maenad specifically." I had no clue what  that meant, but Chelsea, who wasn't trailing far behind us let out a  squeak of fear. Bethy gave her a bright smile. "Oh, don't worry. She  doesn't eat guests. Anymore. Mostly."

At  my glance, my sister looked around worriedly, then lowered her voice,  layering it with Stealth. "Maenads are wine nymphs. They're the original  party animals, and are always looking to have a good time. Which in  their case often means eating people who come to their parties. They're  known to devolve into a frenzy of slaughter and bloodshed as they revel  in debauchery."

I  swallowed hard, but glancing at my mother, she didn't seem worried. If  we were in danger she'd have mentioned it. Though I supposed that would  be recursion, and anyone associated with a high powered Ascendant like  Morgan Lark would be able to handle theirs.

It  did explain a lot about Bethy though. I wasn't sure how racial traits  mixed, but a lot of her personality made a lot more sense. No wonder she  was so focused on avoiding her bloodlust, it must be even worse than a  normal Vampire.

As  we walked, I decided to start telling them about my plans. "So I came  to see if you guys wanted to travel with us. We're heading for the  Empire to join up with one of the noble armies. Get some training before  the big war. I've never had much formal combat instruction, just lots  of sparring with Abel and some others. They've taught me a lot about  fighting, but that's not the same as war."

She  brightened. "Oh, I bet they have super cute outfits! I can put my hair  up in a ponytail and be like. 'Attention!' And everyone will be like 'Oh  no it's Captain Bethy, she's so serious'." Callie and I both looked at  her in disbelief. On the list of phrases I expected to hear in my life.  That one didn't make the top million, especially not from hardened  soldiers. But whatever her reasons were it sounded like she wanted to  come. I glanced over at Gabe.

"How  about you man? You in?" I wasn't sure how his whole Adamant deal would  mix with training like that, but he was kind of made for breaking lines,  so if nothing else I was sure he'd be damned useful. Plus it would be  nice to have more friends around.

He  shrugged. "I would normally be heading back to the Holy Dominion. I'm  not exactly top of the food chain, and the Bishop I report to would be  expecting me. But since we're standing in the presence of a Saintess and  she seems fine with it there shouldn't be a problem. The only people  likely able to countermand her permission would be the Popes, and none  of them probably know I even exist."

My  mother just chuckled. "I can take care of that much, I assure you.  Consider yourself reassigned to my daughter's honor guard with Callen.  In any case, I'll leave all of you to entertain yourselves. I have my  meeting with Lark. I'll come collect you all when it's time to leave."  She beamed at Bethy. "It was lovely meeting you, dear."

"Thanks,  you too!" Said our friend exuberantly. Then she turned to the rest of  us. "So, we have a while before we need to go? Because there's so many  things I want to show you. Daddy has this hilarious room full of  skeletons that play their own ribs like xylophones."

That  did sound pretty fantastic. With my non Bethy captured arm, I reached  back and dragged Chelsea up to walk with us and my sister smiled at me  happily as she got sucked into the vortex of fun and crazy that was  Bethany Lark. This was a rare opportunity, getting to see inside a ship  that most people would never set foot on, and I wasn't going to waste  it. This was going to be a good day.