Pentergost grinned at himself in the mirror, his wet skin pulled to the sides and revealing his gummy mouth behind the tentacles forming his lower face. Today was the day at long last. Today was when he would finally succeed with his Phylactery plans, he could feel it. It had been six months since Gith became Pentergost’s bodyguard, and they had been steadily growing closer. But for once, she was not what he was thinking about. Pentergost believed he had found the right combination of alloys to be able to transfer a being’s soul into a separate object. They would perform the ritual on a slave today to test it. Although, Pentergost found himself somewhat uneasy about this choice. Maybe it was the effect of gaining a certain fondness for another such slave, but Pentergost found himself slightly reluctant to perform the experimental ritual on anything other than a mindless, docile animal to start with. Many of his nobles had begun talking about Pentergost behind his back, calling him weak and losing his edge. How he had laughed when his spies had told him this, soon all of those nobles would see just how powerful and smart Pentergost was, for he was going to invent immortality. A soft knock on the door broke Pentergost out of his thought, and then made his mind fall into a cascading abyss of emotions when he saw it was Gith who walked in, wearing a beautiful, ceremonial dress instead of her usual leather armor. Pentergost wondered at this momentarily, but was then distracted by the flowing white gown that hugged her form tightly and made Pentergost’s eyes wander, but he recovered as fast as he could, 
“Ah, good you are here. I am ready to head to the laboratory now Gith. Let us go.”
She smiled ruefully at him, and took a step closer. Something was off. 
“That’s great. There’s just something I wanted to talk to you about before we go…” She took another step closer. Pentergost felt his heart beating faster and faster. The way she was looking at him now reminded him of the expressions of the teenage Elthine looking for their primal mates. 
“I, uh… Yes Gith what would you like to talk with your Emperor about?” Pentergost realized he was stammering, and cursed himself mentally, but couldn’t stop himself. His body was trembling.
“I don’t know if I can keep on being your guard sir”, another step closer and now Pentergost could smell her scent, a mix of fragrant berries and somehow sweet sweat, “Because I… have feelings for you Pentergost.” One final step closer and she was face to face with him, her breath hot in his wet face, with wide open eyes. “I can’t help it, I think we are destined for each other.”
Pentergost’s mind was racing, he could handle death threats and assassins, commanding armies and overseeing an Empire, the manipulation of the mind and soul, but for some reason this woman had made him speechless. He wanted to forget his species and embrace her in his arms, take her the way an Elthine would and lay with her for the night. His Empire could wait for her. Pentergost softly reached out one of his hands to touch her face. It looked almost luminescent in the shaft of sunlight shining down from above, her face softly glowing with her delicate yet strong features and high cheekbones. 
“I…I feel the same way my dear Gith, you make me better. I need y-”
Pentergost felt something punch into his chest with a strange, chilling sensation, and suddenly warm liquid began to run down his body. He looked down and saw Gith pulling a long serrated knife out of the left side of his chest. He saw the long blade leaving his body and the blood gushing out after its absence but did not feel anything other than the trickle of blood. He looked back up at Gith shocked, and saw her face without the mask. She wore a hard expression, one filled with disgust and hatred that twisted her beautiful features.
“You disgust me you filthy squid! Today, you die along with your Empire, for now it is our time!” She lunged forward with the knife again, and Pentergost tried to move, to summon his psionic powers to completely obliterate his attacker, but felt no response. His body was not listening to him and neither was his mind. He powerlessly watched as Gith ruthlessly stabbed into his abdomen with four quick stabs, and felt the sensation of being pierced over and over before his knees gave out and he collapsed to the floor. All of a sudden, with Gith standing over him, his body finally caught up to what had happened and he felt the wounds begin to burn with an insane, burning pain. Each breath he took spurted more blood out of his body, thick blue liquid collecting around him in a pool, the five stab wounds on his front burning with immense fire, shutting down the rest of his body. He felt as if his chest and abdomen had just been ripped open, the muscles cramping down around the wounds, worsening the pain and stopping him from moving. His vision began to go black and his hearing seemed to contort into a strange echoing sensation.

Pentergost never thought he could love someone, such a feeling was beneath him. And yet, as he lay there in a pool of his own blood with the beautiful woman appearing sneering down over his shocked face, he realized he did love one thing. He loved Gith. The last thing Pentergost remembered before losing consciousness is the feeling of wet mucus striking his cheek, then slowly running down his face to join with the sea of blood around him.