Warriors of Poseidon 04 - Atlantis Unmasked

of him. Vonos, Primator in Chief. That fool Barrabas had been content with the weak title of senator during his term as head of the Primus. But no human appellation would serve to describe Vonos, the most powerful game player that vampire kind had ever known. His first act as newly installed leader of the Primus had been to pay a social call upon the human leaders of the Senate and the House of Representatives.
     
    Each one of them still cringed when they saw him walk by.
     
    Vonos lived for political power. All other pleasures withered with time. As one who had survived centuries‟ worth of lifetimes, he, more than others, lived for the game. The animalistic lusts and need for violent feeding on both blood and emotion that consumed so many vampires as they aged had somehow passed him by. Perhaps the austerity in which he‟d lived his life as a human had followed him through death and beyond. He‟d never know; at any rate, it was an intellectual exercise, no more. He had no need to analyze the reasons why he was superior to others of his race and age. He was content merely to accept it.
     
    However, he contemplated with no little nervousness the arrival of one who was beyond analysis. The goddess of Chaos and Night had ordered him to remain in waiting for her, so that they might discuss strategy. Unfortunately, Vonos could think of many, many things he‟d rather do than discuss strategy with Anubisa.
     
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    Like having his fangs ripped out of his jaw with pliers, for example.
     
    It was not merely that she was emotional, as most women were. Nor that she had the power to force him into an existence of never-ending pain and agony with no more than a thought.
     
    No, the primary problem he had with Anubisa was that she was completely and utterly irrational. She would discard or demolish a decade‟s worth of careful planning on a moment‟s whim. The obsession she had with the Atlantean royal family bordered on insanity. Although, perhaps insanity composed the very essence of one who ruled over Chaos, and any other action on her part, indeed any other form of reality, would be counterintuitive.
     
    Dangerous to wonder. Dangerous even to think such thoughts. Especially now.
     
    His only warning of her arrival was the abrupt temperature change in the central chamber of the Primus. Silver-white frost formed on the teak desktop in front of him. So she was making an entrance this time. That, in itself, was information. A clue to her mood. A possible indicator to whether he would survive the encounter or not, the risk he took every single time she came to him.
     
    But reward never arrived without risk, and he had gambled throughout his centuries with political power the scope and breadth of which had toppled kings and crushed dictatorships. He considered Anubisa to be his greatest challenge.
     
    Bowing his head, he waited. It was always difficult to gauge the level of subservience that would appeal to her vanity on any given occasion. If he bowed too low, or fell to the ground prostrating himself, she was as likely to crush him as unworthy of her time as to reward him for his fealty. If, however, he did not show the level of humility that she considered proper . . .
     
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    Well. He had heard that one such still hung, skinless and screaming, in a very deep cavern.
     
    Something in the air pressure of the room changed, and he knew she‟d arrived. “You wear it well, my Vonos. The evidence of your ascension in power as my right hand,” she said. Hers was no ordinary voice, but of course one would not expect ordinary from a goddess. Within the tone of it, which rang so melodiously on the surface, the crashing cymbals of cowering death danced and gibbered like a corpse on a hangman‟s scaffold.
     
    Even he, undead for these thousands of years, felt the flesh rise along his spine as though trying to escape the room from the mere sound of her words.
     
    “Thank you, my lady.” He finally dared to raise his head and look at her. Her unearthly beauty far surpassed any that a mere mortal woman had ever known. Hair so black that the reflection of light caressed blue highlights into it curled down to her hips. Her face was perfection as sculpted by dark angels cast into hell for blaspheming their natural talents.
     
    As always, her beauty failed to touch him. His taste had never run to the female,