" You will feed or you will die" the elderly, white haired sage, Mildred screamed at Ariel.
Ariel was kneeling on the hard floor of the dungeon, his hands chained to the wall behind him. An unconscious boy lay on the floor by his knees. it was all he could do to avoid sinking his canines into the boy's pulsating neck. He could hear every beat. As he contemplated what the sage had said he looked at her grey -white glowing hair and thought to himself "you're one to talk, if it was so easy how did your body get so old"
For you to understand the context a little legend into the origins of a race of genetically mutated , blood thirsty and vicious immortals who call themselves vampires or better still van-pyre, in their ancient language meaning from- pyre( The first of their kind). Ludwig pyre was a deity to vampires. It was believed that his spirit chose a fortunate vampire once every hundred years and descended upon them giving them the sage spirit and the sage mark of a bat on their wrist, along with the ability to reproduce with a Human mate. Sure enough once every century the mark appeared, upon a full moon and the vampire with said mark becomes the sage and leader of the species, and within their century of reign could concieve one child, with a Human who is bled to death soon after and the blood stored and used to create sunblock, a serum modern vampires sipped all day to protect them from the harmful ultraviolet rays of the sun. sunblock could also be made with the blood of the human used for the initiation of a new vampire which will be explained shortly. When a sage finally concieves, the child who is now the prince or princess, remains mortal until their 18th year where they have to killfeed or in plain terms feed on a victim's blood and till they are dead. Any killfeed is further drained to make sunblock serum. For this ritual the initiate is locked in a dungeon and starved of blood for 7days so they wouldn't be able to surpress the urge to killfeed.
It's also important to note that vampires after this initiation become deathly allergic to garlic, ginger, onions and a host of other spices used to make human meals, and as a result are weaned off human food a year to their initiation, and avoid it all together from that point forward for the risks.
Another interesting point which is very relevant to the thought Ariel had earlier is that every vampire had to killfeed at least once a year to avoid the age changes that come with growing older. So the older a vampire looks, the less amount of killfeeds they've had .They would never die still if they never killfed, they'd just be older, slower and weaker. There were alot of vampires who abused this and had a bloodlust just for the extra strength and speed.
The new sage always migrated to a new place to claim a fresh territory . This new place became the headquarters of the vinity, a vampire Congress of past sages who ruled the species. This migration was believed to aid the sage build a new regime in a place where other strong vampires hadn't territorized which was a term for when a strong vampire lays claim and runs a particular city . This ensured the sage was the strongest and most important vampire whererever they chose to territorrize.
It is also important to note that the sage mark occasionally chose a new bearer before their 100 years were up and more than 5 vampire births have been recorded in a single century.
Sage Mildred's century was almost up when she had her son Ariel. In the past it was a big disgrace to miss the fertility window and not procreate while a sage. Such a sage wasn't allowed a seat on the vinity. That wouldn't have been enough to compel Mildred to take a human mate and subject him to unnecessary killfeeding if the international decree on human relations hadn't been ammended to outlaw sage abstinents (a term for vampires who refused to killfeed out of compassion for humans). According to the ammended international decree on human relations signed in 1591, sages were forbidden from total abstinence upon pain of being put to the stake ( the only way to kill an immortal vampire was to drive a wooden stake through their heart).
Mildred had put this unnecessarily act off till her 90s. It was no wonder her son Ariel was surprised at the irony of his holy, pristine abstinent mother forcing him to killfeed .
He looked up at her clearly frustrated face, and with one last grunt of deviance nodded his affirmation. Another vampire lifted the body of the boy , placed the neck close to his mouth, and with one last deviant look towards his mother he sunk his elongated canines into the pulsating neck and sucked with the quickness of a hungry hyaena. The feeling of fresh warm blood after days of starvation was incredible. At this point all his inhibitions were gone. His hair stood straight and his eyes turned blood red. He felt a surge of energy and the boy began to shake and go very pale. Before long he'd broken his hands free of his bonds and like a rabid animal tore into the boy's flesh, squeezing the throat as he sucked the life out of the boy. He sudden became overcome by a feeling of ecstasy and with one great pull, tore the boy's head from his neck. Darkness came slowly over him and he hit the ground face down on the boy's torso.
Mildred was bewildered. Her son had collapsed while feeding. His eyes had turned blood red and his hairs stood straight, all signs pointed to one thing only, Ariel was a Drac. She knew the other members of the vinity would mock her for this. Now she'd wish her son was never chosen as sage inorder not to prolong their Drac lineage.
Dracs were the exact opposites of Abstinents. They had no control over their bloodlust and always fed to the death. The irony of her situation wasn't lost on her. Now normally known Dracs are not allowed to feed directly from humans but from blood collected and preserved by other vampires.They were also not allowed to go a day without feeding on blood to keep their bloodlust saturated because while they were a big problem for humans , the true concern was that Dracs unlike normal vampires (who would lose their immortality if they did), could also feed off stale or dead blood, and in essence they could feed on and kill other vampires without a stake. They made the worst vampires. Mildred signalled for the other vampires to clean out the dead body. she knelt down beside her son and placed his head in her arms . He slowly regained consciousness, his eyes still bloodred. Mildred knew the task of training Ariel to become as close to an Abstinent as possible was going to be herculean,but the first words out of his mouth when he came-to gave her some reassurance.
"mum, what have you made me do?. I feel dead inside."
**********
Anabelle was sitting on her porch when she saw Sid and his weird friend approach. she quickly went in to grab her canteen. "where do you think you're going young lady"
"I told you my friends were coming to take me out today Dad. They are showing me the sights of our cute little town" Anabelle replied.
"I better get a look at them then" her dad started. " just incase my jewel goes missing" he laughed.
" Really dad?" " you know you just want to snoop"
" you got me dear "
They stepped out to meet Sid and Luke on the porch. "Sid..."
Anabelle stared at Luke for a while as if she tried to remember his name and then pointing at him she said "Luke, meet my big brother, Ariel. Ariel, my friends" she said while gesticulating.
"Y'all better take care of my baby girl..." Ariel started, " sis I mean. my baby sis."
They both nodded in agreement.
"I'd have your heads if anything happens to her" Ariel said. They paused for a second and then all laughed hard at his joke. Luke recognised Ariel now. He'd seen him the day Anabelle moved to fieldstown. The person he suspected was her brother. He was the perfect picture of masculinity. Tall, muscular and handsome, with deep blue eyes and very dark hair and lashes that gave him a gothic look. He had an air of foreboding about him, someone you didn't want to mess with.
Anabelle had enjoyed her picnic with Sid and his friend. Sid really made her laugh. And it was easy to let her guard down with him. It was getting late and they were ready to leave. she had to find a way to excuse herself because of what she need to do. As much as she searched for reasonable excuses none came. Then she just went with the first thought she had,"I have to run some errands"
she sat back and watched them walk out of eyesight. She got up and walked towards the nearby woods from where she'd heard someone sobbing. she followed the subs and came to a stop in front of a boy , no more than 16.
He sat by the foot of a tree with his face between his knees.
"what's the problem little guy" she said to him. He pulled himself up , cleaned tears from his face with the back of his hands, and started to walk away.
"stay" she said holding his wrist softly. " I feel your pain. my friends were mean to me too. "
"How could they , you're so perfect" he replied sobbing.
"They think I'm too pale"she replied."they also say my cheekbones make me look like a child's toy" . The boy chuckled "I'm Alice" Anabelle said" and you?"
"David " he replied
"don't worry about it David . Us victim's need to stick together. I've got your back if you've got mine"
"alright" he replied "so you don't think my ears are weird?". Anna looked at them, and surely they were long and curly and funny.
"never my dear" she put her hand on his face pulling him towards her. "look into my eyes". suddenly David caught her gaze and found himself fixed to the spot. he seemed to have lost the will to move or blink or breathe. Time stood still. she was now leaning towards his neck , and suddenly he felt the sharp pain of something digging into his flesh and warm blood squirting out , yet he couldn't move. He was in a trance. Soon he started feeling dizzy and then a sudden sound of a twig breaking caught his attention. He saw someone watching. He wanted to scream for help but he couldn't find his voice soon he felt her tongue livking his neck. she seemed to have sensed they were being watched as she turned back sharply and then again towards him. Taking his face in her hands she peered deep into his soul.He felt weightless and an overwhelming calm. A few seconds passed between them staring at each other and as he faded into oblivion he heard the faint whisper of the words "forget me"
Anabelle heard someone sneak up on her while she fed on David. she turned back just in time to catch Luke running away. How the hell did he find her she wondered. For his sake he'd better believe she'd been making out with David and not anything worse . From his point of view she figured that'd be what he saw. Moreover he'd never believe the truth if he knew anyway.She would need to keep a closer eye on him from now on. He must have made something up to get away from Sid and follow her. seemed creepy in her opinion but who was she to judge she thought.
later that day while briefing her dad Ariel how she'd managed to feed abstinent, stop herself from killing david and successfully use gaze on him to erase his memory of her , she smelled someone familiar and turning back surely there he was again. Luke, her new nemesis.