Head and Shoulders

"Wait, we're going into the King's palace?" Chris asked, with unconscious Olivia in his hands.

"Of course! Start using the one head you have!" Ember scolded Chris. "I understand you might have been too preoccupied with using Beatrice's gifts on Samantha, but from this point on you have to pay attention if you don't want to have the one head you still have left separated from your overtrained shoulders!"

"Several of the White Masks were from the palace!" Chris exclaimed. "I do not expect these tiny little masks that blonde sex addict gave us to be of any use."

"They will work just fine," Ember said. "Don't worry, I wasn't serious about going to see that decrepit drug addict! We're going to the High Priest. And he couldn't care less about what mask you wore, wear or will wear."

"Your robes before," Chris continued, "You're one of the High Priests priestesses!"

"How observant."

"But then… Beatrice," Chris stuttered as he looked at the succubus's back, her tail, her little bat-like wings on her back as if witnessing them for the first time.

"Oh, I'll leave the explanation to the High Priest! He'll love to tell you that over and over and over. Why spoil his fun?" Ember chuckled. "Rather, why not tell us a little more about those White Masks?"

"They changed often. Most of them used voice-change magic. The whole point was that nobody would know exactly who they were. Though some were more conspicuous than others."

"Felicia," Beatrice, Carl, Liam, and Jeremy said in unison.

"But just by their body shape alone, we counted at least… Was it fifteen?"

"Sixteen," Carl said. "Not that it matters much. Some were glorified bodyguards for the real important people."

"One name we did find out thanks to Carl," Chris said. "Samira, the third princess."

"Another one," Beatrice felt like she had her fill of princesses just with Bloody Mary alone.

"And what a piece of work," Carl added.

"Compared to that blood-thirsty psycho, Mary?" Beatrice asked.

"Samira is nastier in more subtle ways," Carl said.

"And sometimes not so subtle," Chris said with a pained voice.

"So that's two princesses already," Beatrice counted. "Then was the whole royal family involved in that Forge deal?"

"Maybe?" Chris could only guess. "Maybe most of them knew but just didn't care?"

"Samira isn't someone I would recommend messing with," Ember said. "We'll have a talk with Felicia instead. None of you knew that she could summon demons?"

"WHAT!?" All four eunuchs exclaimed and stared at Ember with their jaws dropped.

"Figured as much," Ember concluded and walked forward, ignoring them. "It does seem almost unbelievable. Though she had a few niche uses for the Guild, what you told me about the demons just doesn't make sense."

"No doubt that she was the one that made them appear," Beatrice said. "Whether she could control them or not…"

"And whether the other involved parties even knew of this," Ember wondered. "Hard to imagine that Belmot would. And if his Purple Capes did not know, then Felicia is in for a time of her life at their hands, hehe. Oh, we're pretty much here!"

Beatrice remembered that one of Lucarad's places of operation was some deep underground chamber, so it made sense they'd reach it faster than the actual palace. But as Ember took a turn into a narrower tunnel, Beatrice hoped that the tittle of a High Priest would offer Lucarad with something more spacious than a couple of dreary stone chambers.

After a couple more turns and a flight of stairs, Beatrice got a feeling that Ember was literally taking them to that very chamber. The oval chamber with a stone altar in the middle where Beatrice first appeared in this world. Her first worshippers. Her first orgy. Her first cum rain.

When Beatrice saw a single wooden door just ahead of Ember, there was no longer any doubt.

"We're baaack~! And we brought company!" Ember cheerfully exclaimed as she pushed forward the squeaky door and triumphantly walked through. "I'm sure you'll find a place in your hearts for a new potential fucktoy—"

Ember froze in place, and a second later Beatrice saw why. Just a glimpse of dark red was enough. The succubus quickly rushed through the opening and stood beside Ember to get a better view.

A dozen mutilated bodies sprayed across the stone floor in a pool of blood. And high upon the oval wall another body hung lifelessly with his arms straight above his head, nailed through the palms of his hands. He wore gold and purple robes, stained in rivers if half-dried blood. And between the shoulders, where the man's head was supposed to be, a misshapen skull was pushed into the bloody neck stump of the corpse.

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