“We make nice, and if we can all stand each other for more than an hour, we decide what to do next. Together.”
Emmett Delacroix

---

Date ?

GM: Freedom tastes good.

For the life of him, or perhaps the death, Emmett Delacroix cannot taste anything else. He does not taste his spit, phlegm, or tongue. His mouth doesn’t have that dry and stale sensation from not brushing his teeth last night (he rarely did, after leaving home). There’s just nothing.

But freedom has a taste.

And it is sweet indeed.

Spectral voices whoop and cheer into the starless night. Em would say it’s cold, but he doesn’t feel cold, and he’s not sure he’ll ever feel hot too. He does feel damp, at least, from the miserable black rain that seems to eternally pour over everything. Storm clouds rumble ominously overheard as tongues of lightning flicker through the gloom. They seem almost more like after-images than actual lightning: there’s something nothing bright about them. Just part of the sky that’s not as dark.

Black and gray stretches for as far as Em can see, interrupted only by the brilliant colors of his conjured fireworks. A woman’s voice from among the spectral throng hisses, “Kill the lights! There are things out there!”

“She’s right, kill the damn lights!” Fizzy echoes.

Emmett: He kills them.

GM: With the sole color in the achromatic hellscape extinguished, the group’s spirits seem to descend. Literally. Buildings rise to meet them. They look blasted apart and abandoned for years, like bombed-out shells from a World War II newsreel. Em’s not sure where they are. It doesn’t look like the Quarter anymore, and the buildings aren’t skyscrapers like in the CBD. The half-rotted, skeletal structures could be anywhere. Could have been anything. Garbage and debris choke the water-run streets. It looks like Katrina just hit.

Em’s feet make contact with the uneven ground with a light splash. He looks around at the other escapees.

Turner is there. Outside of her prison, she looks even uglier. She’s been shot in the head. The back of her head. There’s a gaping hole with dangling flaps of skin, skull shards, and attached, half-pulped brain matter, which also crusts her blood-matted hair. She’s dressed in a dark pocketed Blackwatch uniform with the company’s black-starred logo and heavy-looking combat boots.

Courtney looks much like Em remembers from behind the glass, but even in an achromatic world, her skin is looks deathly pale. Dark blood steadily drips from her slashed wrists. They’re vertical rather than horizontal cuts. The non-Hollywood way to kill yourself. Instead of her old stripper attire, though, she’s dressed in a simple tank top and denim skirt. She walks barefoot.

It’s been a while since Em saw Fizzy. He looks like shit. He’s covered in still-bleeding stab wounds, lots tiny ones, the kind you get from a shiv in prison. He’s dressed in an Orleans Parish Prison inmate’s uniform. Em knows how those things feel, even if it’s weird to see this one gray instead of orange. They’re always too big, like clown suits, always with holes or missing buttons, and only sometimes without stains Em didn’t want to know the origins of. The underwear was usually even worse. The ‘Jackie Chan’ slide-on shoes are uncomfortable and look like they pinch Fizzy’s large feet.

The first of the wraiths Em doesn’t recognize is a bombshell. She’s gorgeous. She looks around Em’s age, with a slim figure, long hair whose color is hard to determine in a colorless world, and large breasts that might be implants but are just within the realistic frame of possibility to be natural. Her pretty face is deathly pale, like Courtney’s, and dark blood drips from two deep puncture marks along her neck. Her eyes look slightly puffy as if from crying, and her running mascara gives her permanently black tears. She’s dressed in a clingy, low-cut mini-dress that’s slightly rumpled, and strappy platform-less high heels.

The second of the strangers is a man who looks maybe a little older than Em, with boyish features emphasized by his large eyes, thick eyebrows, and frazzled hair. He’s around the same height and slightly thicker than Em, though that isn’t hard. An addict’s dark circles ring his eyes. Blood drips from a puncture along his arm. Em knows the many needle marks and splotchy discoloration of a junkie when he sees one. The man’s dressed in plain jeans and a t-shirt. He’s also barefoot.

The last stranger is a teenage girl with a wide face, firm nose, prominent eyebrows, and mid-back-length hair that’s streaked through a lighter color towards the ends. Her hair looks a little rumpled, and her skin a little pale, but Em can’t see any readily apparent cause of her death, though her eyes are also puffy like the first stranger’s. She’s dressed in a long-sleeved tee, jeans, and socks without shoes.

Seven left, including him.

Seven out of the mob that destroyed Bobbi Jo and tore through that dread house.

Turner looks around them.

“So, what the fuck now?”

Emmett: Em himself doesn’t look so bad, in his opinion. He’s always looked good in gray. Death becomes him.

Except for the arm. Can’t do much about that.

He clears his throat. “I think we could do with a round of names, for a start. That’s the first thing they took from us. Names, death, and calling.”

He flourishes his gangrenous stump. “Emmett Delacroix. Killed by the state for crimes I did not commit. And there are people still alive who I have business with.” He raises an eyebrow at Turner. “Would you like to introduce yourself, or would you prefer me to do the honors?”

GM: Turner snorts. “You wouldn’t know honor if it punched you in the balls.”

“Oh, hey. That reminds me.”

She punches him in the balls.

It hurts, but not as much as it feels like it should. It’s like getting punched in the arm or leg.

Emmett: He grimaces, but raises an eyebrow and says, “That’s Turner, everybody. And that’s how she shows affection.” He smiles and looks at Courtney with a reassuring grin next.

GM: “Yeah, real affectionate, just like you’re real innocent.”

Emmett: “Oh, who would want to be innocent before they died? That’s like coming to the party sober.”

GM: “I was innocent. Of shit to deserve this, anyway.”

“I was loyal to my boss. Through thick and thin. I was loyal. She gave me this souvenir.” Turner sarcastically pokes her blown-out head.

Her colorless eyes brim with anger. “Since you asked about calling. Mine’s revenge.”

Emmett: “Then we’ve got at least one thing in common,” Em says, nodding. “I owe a few people some quality hauntings, too.” He looks again at Courtney.

GM: “Courtney. Y’all can probably tell how I died.” She holds up her vertically slashed wrists with an empty look. “Did it to make the nightmares stop.”

She doesn’t say anything a moment longer.

“Honestly, just survive. Maybe revenge on the guy who sent me here. And my bitch mom. Why not.”

Emmett: “Survival is legit,” Em reassures her, offering her his good hand. “We died once and wound up here. Reckon none of us are looking to find out what’s waiting on the next level down.”

GM: “What is this, fucking group therapy?” Turner snorts at Em’s motion.

Emmett: He waits to see if Courtney takes his hand before replying.

GM: She gives it a curious look, but finally takes it.

Emmett: “We were able to escape,” Em says, “Because we stuck together. You weren’t real fond of that plan, I recall, but we did it anyways and here we are. If anybody wants to go their own way, chance things on their own, I’ll be the last to make ’em stay. But the way I see it, all we have is each other.”

“We’re stronger together than alone. So sure, I’ll say the mushy gushy shit nobody else will. Because nobody else will. So my thinking is, we talk, we make nice, and if we can all stand each other for more than an hour, we decide what to do next. Together. And we survive, and bring the monsters that put us here through seven kinds of hell. Unless that sounds too soft for any of y’all.”

He throws in a little special effect, too. Nothing too flashy, just enough to punctuate his stump speech. Green flames blossom from his mouth as he says Hell, twist into a small campfire that crackles in the middle of their little circle. The light paints their faces.

He squeezes Courtney’s hand, and looks to the girl with marks in her neck. “We can see how you died, too. But I bet your name is something special.”

GM: The other ghosts stare into the fire. The green pallor it casts over their faces looks downright ghoulish, but it’s color, in a world that’s nothing but blacks and grays. Em sees the same look in their eyes as when Tante called him ‘sandman.’

“That all sounds… good to me,” says the teenager.

“I mean, fuck… what’s even out there?”

Emmett: “I’m the last to know,” Em says. “Other than vampires and other ghosts and the people who deal with ’em. But I know at least one of us who knows more.”

He makes eye contact with Fizzy.

GM: Fizzy looks back at him. “What?”

“You want me to go? Okay. Fizzy. Stabbed to death by some shrimp in the big house.”

Emmett: He smiles. “When you were cussing mad at me, last time we talked, you mentioned things. Thrall markets. Obli. Oblivion.” He lets the last word hang in the cool, lifeless air, lets it trickle down the spines of those assembled. “You’ve been dead for a while, Fizzy. S’pect you’ve learned some things.”

GM: The huddled wraiths don’t say anything at that hanging word.

But the fire seems a little smaller.

A little fainter.

A little less green.

“I dunno how long I’ve been dead for,” Fizzy says. “In case you missed it, time don’t mean a whole lot here.” He looks at Em. “And I was just a thrall, before the…”

He looks around the group.

“Oh, that’s rich. Y’all don’t know a fuckin’ thing, do you?”

Emmett: “I don’t,” Em says cheerfully. “Except that it’s better to know more.”

GM: Fizzy looks at the others. “Anyone who’s not fresh outta their caul, raise your hand.”

Only the other man does.

Most of the others look confused. Turner just glares.

“Oh, boy,” says Fizzy.

“Look, y’all want to know the 101 about being dead, there’s someone with answers who can really help you,” says other man. “Lots of answers.”

“I’m Roger Mayfield. Heroin OD, if you couldn’t tell by my arm. There’s other ghosts out there. Wraiths. Most of them’ll try to enslave you, just like the vampires did, but worse.”

“But there’s a group. The Undying Knights of St. Balacou.”

“I’m one of them. We’ve all been killed by vampires.” He looks at the woman with the bleeding neck, then back at the others. “And even you haven’t, you’ve all been enslaved by vampires. Spent a while in those glass cells, waiting until they’d do God knows what to us.”

“Or maybe you got to enjoy some time outside a cell, chained up and whipped like dogs.”

The hate in everyone’s eyes is palpable.

“My boss was a vampire,” says Turner. “They have this whole ‘Masquerade.’ Not to spread it around, what they are. Fuck that.”

“Fuck that,” Roger echoes. “If any of you hates vampires, wants revenge, the Knights’ll have you.”

Emmett: “One visited me in prison,” Em adds in. “Fucked with my head and turned it inside out until I couldn’t remember anything she did to me. And they’re powerful people, too. One that did it to me was a Malveaux.”

“The Knights, you know how to contact them?”

GM: This guy’s taking over. He’s gonna be the boss if we don’t slow him down.

Emmett: I’m on it. Don’t worry.

GM: “Yeah. I’ve met their leader. He’s seriously scary.”

“Where do we sign up?” asks Turner.

“Yeah, where?” asks the woman with the neck.

“I can get us-”

“Ain’t the Knights renegades?” Fizzy interrupts.

“Yeah, the Hierarchy doesn’t much like them. You got a problem?” asks Roger.

“Fuck no,” says Fizzy. “Hierarchy soulforged my brother.”

“Sorry.”

“Half wanted to do it myself.”

“Guess that’s brothers.”

“Yeah.”

Emmett: Em holds up a hand. “This is interesting and all, and we all want to know more, but y’all are talking about a lot of shit the rest of us still don’t know.”

GM: “Yeah, what’s the Hierarchy?” asks the teenager.

Emmett: “Let’s finish sharing names. I see some faces without ‘em still. Then we can learn, I don’t know, ghost history. Ain’t like we’re short on time, in the short term at least.”

GM: “I’m Ginger,” says the woman with the bleeding neck. “Y’all could normally tell by my hair, but… everything here’s in black and white. Besides fires and fireworks, I guess.”

“I was drained by a vampire. They did it to me lots of times before that, and normally it feels real good, but that time… not so much.”

Emmett: “That’s real fucked, Ginger,” Em says. “Do you know anything about the one that did it to you?”

GM: She shakes her head. “I don’t even know his name. But he and another one looked like they were gonna have a fight. And the one who… killed me, looked really torn up.”

“I guess they wanted to make it a fair fight. He drained my… best friend, right in front of me. Then he drained me. Because I wasn’t ‘her.’ Those were the last words I heard. ‘She ain’t her.’”

Emmett: He looks at her, his expression somber but sincere.

“And what do you want to do about it?”

GM: “Getting even would be nice, so the Knights sound just fine to me.” The woman glares for a moment, but then her expression shifts to one of worry. “But I’d really like to find my friend. Her name’s Melody. She was always there for me. He killed her and I don’t know what happened to her. I don’t know if she’s a… ghost like me, if the vampires in that house got her, or something else happened to her, or… what. I don’t know.” Ginger looks almost ready to cry.

“You stick by friends,” says Turner.

Emmett: “So we’ll find her if she can be found,” Em agrees. “Name like Melody, somebody ought to know what happened to her. We’ll see about it.”

He looks to the teenager.

GM: “Hannah Burroughs,” she says. “I died from… sleeping pills. Suicide.”

“I didn’t think you could still overdose on those,” remarks Ginger, dabbing at her eyes. Em doesn’t see any tears, though.

“You can’t,” Hannah answers. “OD enough to kill yourself, anyways. You have to mix them with other meds. I… did the research. And had some anti-anxiety meds.”

Emmett: “I’ve considered taking that road myself, more than once,” Em says. “But I would have found even more reason not to, if I had known what was waiting for me.” He smiles sadly at Hannah, and offers her the same hand he gave Courtney. “I can’t imagine you’re happy with what you found, either. But I’m still glad to meet you, Hannah.”

He glances around. “I should have asked earlier… ghosts have tricks. Y’all know that already, and you know mine.” He points to the waning campfire, and pokes it with a shadowy stick, making it billow back into substantiality. “Useful thing to share with each other, I figure. Know what we’re capable of. Especially if they can be taught.”

GM: Hannah takes his hand. “Wait, you asked what we all wanted to do.”

“I want to help my mom.”

Emmett: “I did,” he says, grinning. “And that’s a damn fine thing to want, I think.”

GM: “What I did… it’s gonna destroy her. Completely destroy her.”

Hannah looks like she’s about to cry too.

“I don’t know why I did that. It was so selfish. Just so selfish.”

Emmett: “Living people make selfish choices,” Em says, squeezing her hand. “I made plenty of my own. Fizzy’ll tell you that for free.” He looks around. “But to my way of thinking, if there’s any such thing as a new beginning, this is as close to it as we get. What happened, happened. It’s led us all to the same place, and that’s here. Now.”

GM: “I’m trans,” Hannah abruptly says.

“I hid it from everyone. I took the pills, after I was outed. But… fuck, what’s it matter now?”

Emmett: He smiles and says, “It means what you make it mean. You don’t have to keep secrets anymore.”

GM: “Means we’ll call you ‘he,’ I guess,” Turner shrugs.

“Oh are you fucking SERIOUS!” Hannah flares.

Emmett: He looks at Turner sharply. “Enough of that. She’s dead. Let her be who she wants to be.”

GM: “My boss killed a tranny once. I helped clean it up.”

Emmett: “You want to stay with us, you’ll avoid starting shit over nothing.”

He looks around. “Unless anybody else thinks this is worth fighting over, after what we’ve been through together.”

GM: Hannah throws a punch. Turner catches it, twists her arm around, and drives her face-first into the ground, knee on her back.

“No wonder you wanted to be a girl,” snorts the ex-Marine.

Exclamations go up from Ginger and Courtney. Fizzy and Roger both seem to consider what’s happening, then just cross their arms.

“Lemme—GO!” shouts Hannah.

“Say you’re a boy and I’ll let go.”

Emmett: Em looks Turner in the eye. There’s something dangerous there, something that cares not a whit whether he’s right or wrong. Something that knows only that it has to win.

“I know you like throwing your weight around, and I know you’re tough. We all know it. But you doing this is making us divided. It’s causing problems. And I think it’s sad that you’re trying to be more like your boss.” He glances at Roger, knowing Fizzy probably won’t be a good bet. “You think the Knights are interested in dealing with somebody that doesn’t know how to avoid starting arguments over nothing?”

GM: Roger just watches.

Turner drives her knee harder into Hannah’s neck.

“So the tranny my boss and me killed, she, and by ‘she’ I mean ‘girl pretending to be a boy’ was just fucking ugly. The hormones never work out right. Explains why you’ve got such a thick face, I guess. It was really funny how we killed her. Joked about whether it was a hate crime. I got to see her pussy up close when I was getting rid of the body, we stuck it in ice for a while, and boy. I just about lost my lunch. Do you still have a cock? Hey, why don’t you show us, since you’re so okay now with who you are and shit?” She grabs at Hannah’s pants and starts tugging them off.

Hannah gives a shrill scream. The ground screams too. It’s a dreadful, hair-rising sound that seems to come from all the earth at once. A black void yawns open. Hannah plummets through, still screaming. Some part of Em wants to jump too. There’s something in there. Something that calls to him.

Then the ground slams shut.

“Huh,” says Turner.

“What the hell did you do!?” Courtney exclaims.

“Oh, that’s just great, now there’s six of us!” glares Ginger.

Emmett: “Take out her anger at being trans on the kid, looks like,” Em says coldly. “Well, looks like the kid escaped. Maybe she’ll come back. Maybe not. But now there’s one less of us. Thanks, Turner. Good work.”

GM: “Weakest link,” shrugs Fizzy.

Emmett: “Sure, but now somebody else is.”

GM: Turner frowns.

“That wasn’t me.”

Emmett: “No, it was the kid. Escaping you.”

GM: “No. Saying that shit.”

Emmett: “What?”

GM: “I mean, don’t get me wrong, if you’re born with a dick you’re a boy, end of story.”

“But it doesn’t make any sense I’d say that out loud. Doesn’t help.”

Emmett: “Uh huh. Shadow?”

GM: “Shadow, what?” Turner glares. “There’s a lot of shadows around here, in case you missed them.”

Emmett: He looks at Roger and Fizzy. “You two know anything about that?”

GM: Fizzy shrugs. “Evil voice in your head. Everybody got one.”

The rest of the group surveys one another slowly.

Emmett: “Try to keep a handle on it, next time,” Em says, a bit calmer now. “It gets the better of you once, whatever. It keeps causing problems, you become a liability. And whatever else you thought of her, she hasn’t been one so far.”

GM: “And I’ll say the same to you, shitface. If it can get the better of me, yours’ll have you bent over taking it up the ass and begging for seconds.”

“He’s right, though,” says Roger. “The afterlife’s hard. We can’t cut anyone slack for their Shadow.”

“Everyone has one. They never shut up. Never stop trying to turn things to shit.”

Emmett: He don’t think much of you, does he?

GM: I don’t feel like he’s very good at the whole ‘thinking’ thing.

“I’ve had one. Telling me how worthless I am,” says Courtney.

Turner frowns.

“Where’s the other girl?”

“Other girl?” says Courtney.

“Yeah. The one who got out with us.”

The ex-Marine slowly surveys their lifeless surroundings.

“We were eight. Not seven.”

Emmett: Em’s frowning too. “Which of you hissed in my ear? About the lights?”

GM: There’s blank looks.

“I know I did,” says Fizzy. “Was right to. There’s things out there, which would see.”

“But things that might’ve grabbed one of us in the dark too,” says Turner.

“So we were boned either way,” says Courtney. “Oh my god.”

Emmett: “But there was a woman who said it first,” Em says. “Okay. So. New rule. Watch each other. There’s six of us. Watch your partner. Like kids in summer camp. Em eyes Courtney. “I’ll look out for you, if you look out for me.”

GM: “We need to get to the Knights,” says Roger.

“They have experience with this shit. And they have people who can weaken your Shadow, when it’s getting strong.”

That’s exactly what they wanted to hear, gotta give him that.

“Okay. Lead the way,” says Turner. “And we’ll watch each other, in pairs, until then.”

Guess that makes Roger here the leader.

Emmett: He nods, making the decision cooperative. “Turner and Mayfield. Courtney and me. Fizzy and Ginger.”

He frowns at Roger. “I’m all for going, but there’s things to know first. How long have you been with them? How do they treat newbies? And how much of our afterlives belong to them once we join up? I want to survive, but I want to be free, too.”

He also glances down. “I also think the right thing to do is wait nearby, see if Hannah comes back. I’m not optimistic, but it’s possible. It’s what I’d hope y’all would do for me. I won’t split the group over it, though, if I’m outvoted.” He doesn’t sound hopeful, but it’s the right image to send.

GM: “How long?” says Turner.

“Time don’t really matter here,” says Fizzy.

Emmett: “Let’s combine the two. Just long enough for Roger to answer some. If by the time we run out of questions, she ain’t here, then there’s probably not much to be done.”

“So, Sir Mayfield. What’s the story with the Knights?”

GM: The group seems to consider and then accede to that with a few murmurs.

“Every one of them’s a wraith, like us, who’s been hurt by leeches,” Roger says. “We want revenge. Against all leeches. You help other wraiths get some payback, they help you get yours. We protect each other against the Hierarchy and other wraiths that want to enslave or fuck us up.”

Emmett: “The Hierarchy. They’re, what. Ghost government?”

GM: “Yeah,” says Roger. “They’re everything wrong with government in the Skinlands, that’s the living world, but a hundred times worse. A thousand times worse.”

“They’re built off slavery. Brand new wraiths, enfants, people who’ve just died, get snatched up and sold as thralls. Slaves. They have wraiths, called reapers, who patrol the Shadowlands—that’s the bright and sunny corner of the afterlife we’re in here—looking for new wraiths to harvest. They clap them in chains soon as soon as they find them to sell at the thrall markets.”

Emmett: Em nods. “I’ve met some of those. Before the vamps whistled me up.”

GM: “You’re lucky to’ve escaped.”

Emmett: “The Knights—I was joking earlier, when I called you sir, but how much protocol do they have? Is it like the army, or more like a freedom fighters thing?”

GM: “Real freedom fighters are armies,” says Turner. “There’s a reason discipline and command structures exist, you know. Because it fucking works.”

Emmett: He shrugs. “So it’s a good question.”

GM: “Well, we have a leader who calls the shots. He’s been dead hundreds of years. Knows more about killing leeches than anyone. On ‘operations’ where we’re doing that, he expects wraiths to follow a command structure. But outside of that, your afterlives are yours. He’s not interested in telling everyone what to do. Just killing leeches.”

Emmett: Em nods in response to that. “Sounds pretty damn reasonable. What kinds of ‘operations’?”

He glances around, and invites others to ask, if they have questions. This isn’t just for him, after all.

GM: “Killing leeches,” Roger repeats. “Especially ones like the Giovannini who enslave wraiths like we all were. That’s the main thing the Knights exist for.”

Emmett: “Giovannini,” he repeats, tasting the word.

GM: “Sometimes we sabotage their quick—that’s human—slaves and allies. Try to draw them where we want them. Or set them after other leeches, to do our dirty work.”

“But mostly we just want to make them pay.”

Emmett: “You like them, a lot,” Em notes, looking him over. “That’s clear. How did they earn your loyalty?”

GM: “Hierarchy reapers got me, after I died. Were going to sell me on the thrall markets. Or soulforge me.”

“The Knights raided the convoy. They do that, sometimes, to pick up new recruits. Saved my afterlife.”

“The Giovannini got me later, when I was out on my own. It’s dangerous out here. There’s reaper patrols, Giovannini, spectres, all sorts of fucked up things.”

Emmett: “Spectres?”

GM: “That voice in your head. Your Shadow.”

“It’s always fighting you. Always trying to take control.”

“A spectre’s a wraith who’s finally lost that war. Whose Shadow is in control all the time.”

Emmett: Huh.

Interesting.

GM: Told you. There’s a lot more I can do to ruin your day than just talk shit.

And I will push you out of the driver’s seat if I don’t like where our afterlife is headed.

Emmett: Now, that’s just a toxic relationship.

GM: “Are they that bad?” asks Ginger.

“Worse,” says Roger. “The Hierarchy kills them on sight. It’s the one thing they have the right idea about.”

“I hate the Hierarchy. But I’d rather be a thrall than fall into spectre hands, any day.”

“All they exist to do is torture and destroy. They’re lost. Gone.”

“How’s someone become a spectre?” asks Turner.

“Their Shadow wins. Lots of ways that can happen. Though if you kill a wraith, that’s one of the fastest ways to do it.”

“So we can die?” Turner asks again.

“Yeah. Kill someone and they might come back. Or their Shadow might take over for good. That’s death for the dead.”

Emmett: “You said the Knights have wraiths who can mess with the Shadows,” he muses. “What’s that about?”

GM: “They’re called pardoners. I don’t really know how they do it, but they can rip out parts of your Shadow. It stains their hands. Turns them black.”

Emmett: “Sounds… painful.”

GM: “Yeah. It really hurts.”

“But less than the alternative.”

Emmett: Em files that away. “Do you know anything about where Hannah might be? I got sucked into a hole like that, before the Giovannini got me. Just before, actually. I had, like, this vision. A nightmare. My Shadow seemed real excited. Is that normal?”

GM: “Yeah. They’re called harrowings. That’s what happens when it’s trying to seize control.”

Roger’s pallid face seems to darken. “Sometimes it wins. Takes away another piece of you.”

True facts. I can drop you into another if I get cheesed off.

Emmett: Don’t get cranky, Gaspy. Who’s my little Shadow. Coochie-coochie-coo.

“So that’s where she is now?” Em asks, leaning in. “A… harrowing? Where will she be when its over?”

GM: “Your guess is as good as mine. They’re crapshoots.”

“Depends how well she does.”

“Or how bad.”

“So is she gonna show back up?” asks Courtney.

“He just said he don’t know,” says Fizzy.

“So it’s a waste of time for us to stick around, then,” remarks Turner.

“You’re the reason she’s gone!” glares Ginger.

“And if you have at least half as many brains as your boob job, you’ll want me rather than him around when we run into reapers or spectres or what the fuck ever.” Turner rolls her eyes. “The Knights are sounding better and better than you losers by the minute.”

Hey, Turner, do you have another cunt down there, or just the one in your head?

Emmett: Right?

GM: “Screw you then, go off with the Knights if that’s where you want to be so bad.” Courtney.

“Oh look, another useless person running her mouth. Glad to.” Turner looks at Fizzy. “Fizzy, you don’t look half-useless in a fight, if you want to come with me and Roger.”

Emmett: “Well, sounds like you won’t have to pick,” Em says brightly. “Knights seem like the way to go, Roger. Thanks for being patient.” He looks over the rest of them. “We can’t force you to come with us, and I don’t think any of us want to. But it sure sounds better than the alternative.”

He glances at Roger. “If there’s nothing we can do for Hannah, than Turner’s right, about at least one thing. There’s no sense waiting.” He eyes her. “Unless she feels like accepting responsibility, of course. But that’s not her style. So, let’s go.” He claps his hands together. “It’ll be nice to be part of something again.” He reaches out to Roger, offering him his hand.

GM: Turner grabs Em by the scruff of his shirt and yanks his face up to hers.

“I’m starting to get pretty sick of your bullshit.”

“You or the other literal dead weights don’t appreciate having a Marine at your backs, you can stay here and rot.”

“I got your back,” says Fizzy.

Emmett: He looks at her, looks up at those furious, violent eyes. And he smiles a Cheshire smile. The whole world vanishes behind it. “Elaborate, please. What bullshit? The bit where it was my plan that got you freed? Or the part where I pretend you aren’t acting like a child because you’re embarrassed your own Shadow got the better of you? I mean, hey, it happens. We all have bad days. I just hope you can hold it together long enough to actually get to the Knights, without losing your temper like a brat halfway there. I mean, you sure kicked Hannah’s ass, and I know you could kick mine.” He tilts his head. “I bet your Shadow really wants you to, too. Come on, Marine. Show me what Semper Fi means. You’re being real faithful, right about now. Or are you man enough to stop having a fuckin’ period?”

He doesn’t look away from her eyes. He wants to see everything inside them.

Emmett: He considers conjuring the noise of a mic dropping. He thinks better of it.

Who says he never learns?

GM: A noise plays.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wF7eUPb3-_g

YouTube

Sound Library

Mic Drop | SOUND EFFECT

Emmett: Whoops. Goddammit, dude.

He coughs, looking abashed. “Ah. Excuse me.”

GM: The words catch in his throat.

“What the fuck was that?” says Fizzy.

“Oh, that was me,” Em hears himself say.

Emmett: He conjures the word ‘SHADOW’ in big, flaming letters on his own forehead.

Or tries to.

GM: There’s no reaction on anyone’s faces.

“I’d say it was a sound effect to accompany completely humiliating Turner in front of you all like a little bitch,” he goes on, “but it’s not tasteful to brag like that.”

“Oh, did I? Whoops.”

Emmett: He tries to screw up his face and cross his eyes. He is not optimistic.

GM: There’s no reaction from anyone else.

“But I suppose it’s more tasteful than, you know, beating up the trans kid and sending her into god only knows what kind of nightmare.”

Emmett: You get that this isn’t making me want to rely on you more, right?

Although. Good point.

GM: “If she even survives.”

Emmett: He looks at Roger. Roger knows. Roger might be able to tell.

GM: His vision remains where it is.

“Semper fi. What a joke. Last I remember, we all fought as hard as any Marine and bled like any Marine to win free. We should be brothers, sisters, after that. And Turner’s the one throwing all of that away over what? Pronouns? Way I see it, she thinks she’s better than us.”

“I say she’s not. I say we’re all equal after what we went through. And I say we don’t need the Knights. Or Turner. Who’s with me?”

“I am,” says Courtney.

“Me too,” glares Ginger.

“Me not,” says Fizzy.

“Everyone who counts, then,” says Turner. She’s still holding up Em by his shirt.

Emmett: “SHADOW!”

GM: The words die in his throat.

“Guess it’s your call, Roger,” says Fizzy, looking at the other wraith.

“Who you wanna bring back to the Knights?”

Roger looks between the two groups.

Emmett: Roger, don’t be fucking stupid.

GM: “You and Turner,” he says.

“Smart choice,” says Turner.

Emmett: Goddammit. Goddammit. Somebody THINK.

GM: She yanks Em closer.

“Sempi fi.”

Emmett: I was just TRYING to go with the Knights two seconds ago.

GM: “You’re right. It was your plan that got us out.”

Emmett: THINK.

GM: “So for that, I won’t stomp the shit out of you like the kid, and send you off to some nightmare I’d bet my life savings you deserve. Don’t expect to be so lucky next time though.”

She shoves him away.

“Don’t expect there to be a next time,” says Em. “Come on, guys.”

Emmett: DAMMIT.

GM: “…don’t we want to wait for Hannah?” asks Courtney.

Emmett: THINK.

GM: “You’re completely right, Courtney,” says Em.

“We’ll wait. Because she would for us.”

Ginger nods firmly.

Emmett: What. The Fuck.

GM: Fizzy rolls his eyes.

“Good luck, losers.”

Emmett: Fizzy.

GM: He, Turner, and Roger all set off.

Emmett: Fizzy, you know what a piece of shit I am.

GM: Em and his two companions are left alone.

The conjured fire crackles.

Emmett: Fizzy, THINK!

GM: “Didn’t like the vibe I got off her anyway,” says Ginger.

“I know lots of trans girls,” says Courtney.

“I mean, whatever. Be who you want.”

“Yeah,” agrees Ginger.

Emmett: “FUCK!” he snarls. “Shadow!”

GM: His voice dies in his throat.

We never were too good at learning from experiences, were we?

I’m in the driver’s seat until I decide to let you back.

Emmett: Hey, Gasper. If this is how you’re going to play things, I’m never going to work with you. I’m going to find the first pardoner I can and have you ripped out of my asshole.

GM: Ha. Good luck.

Emmett: I don’t know much about how this works, but I’m pretty sure you can’t keep me out forever.

GM: You go ahead and bet on that then.

Emmett: Why, though? We had a good thing going. What the fuck do we gain from this?

GM: Me, actually. I don’t want a pardoner. You were thinking of one.

Plus this was fun.

Emmett: It’ll get us assfucked by a spectre. And I was thinking of one. Now I WANT one. You see how this works?

GM: And, you know, things would’ve change with the Knights. We wouldn’t have been in charge. He said what, his boss was centuries old?

Emmett: Oh, great. Now we’re the king of jack and shit.

You. Suck. At this.

GM: We’re the king of three wraiths. Hannah will be back.

Emmett: One of them. IS. US.

GM: Roger wasn’t ours. Turner wasn’t either. She hated our guts. Fizzy was just waiting to go south. There was that whole ‘got him and his brother killed’ thing.

Emmett: He could have been, and we could have found shit to work with. And she was powerful. We could have used her. You fucking moron. You’re doing the same thing you did whenever we had a chance in life.

GM: But Gasper said it himself.

He’s Em.

Emmett: I’m not less mad at you because you’re me, you bleeding cunt.

GM: Maybe you missed the part where she was hitting us in the balls.

These three, they’re nice and weak.

Emmett: Oh, did that hurt you? It tickled me.

GM: They’re dependable. They won’t survive without us.

Turner? She knew she could.

Emmett: Gasper, you can try and spin it no matter what, but you fucked up a chance for us to get actual resources and power. I hope you like driving. I’m going to enjoy kicking the back of your chair until you crash.

---

Previous, by Narrative: Story Twelve, Caroline I
Next, by Narrative: Story Twelve, Celia I

Previous, by Character: Story Ten, Celia XIV, Emmett IX
Next, by Character: Story Twelve, Emmett II

“I love you, my sweet, precious Caroline.”
Abélia Devillers

---

Monday night, 7 March 2016, AM

GM: “Claire Malveaux’s death must be seen to,” Maldonato begins as the elevator doors open to his office. Caroline sees three ghouls awaiting them with expectant looks: Congo and two large, bald, exquisitely muscled black men in black suits. Their postures and demeanors seem vaguely foreign.

“Mr. Congo, you may contact Bishop Malveaux,” the seneschal continues as he proceeds towards the door. One of the ghouls opens it. All three follow him out. The building’s austere hallways seem all but vacant at this late hour. “Inform him that he is to coordinate efforts with Miss Malveaux to preserve the Masquerade in light of Claire Malveaux’s death.”

“Very good, sir,” Congo states. He removes a phone from his breast pocket. Talks into it. “The bishop is not in Perdido House.”

“Locate him.”

“At once, sir.”

One of the guards opens an elevator.

“Set your affairs in order, Miss Malveaux,” Maldonato states to Caroline as it begins its descent. “You may soon be absent from the city at large for some time.”

“Tell no one of whom you are. Your sire shall determine the circumstances under which to publicly disclose that information.”

The doors open to the Paulson Investment lobby. They get into another elevator. They’re joined by a ghoul who looks in her mid to late teens. Her milk-pale facial features are beautiful and unblemished, while her gaze is placid and tranquil. She’s garbed in a flowing white gown that strikingly contrasts her waist-length raven hair and gives her an almost ethereal appearance. Even with her newly-sensitive hearing, Caroline can’t hear the ghoul’s footsteps.

“Your Requiem may now be in danger, Miss Malveaux. Kâmil, Giselle, you shall see to her physical protection and attend to whatever needs she may require. Remain unobtrusive, but her security takes precedent over her secrecy.”

“Yes, effendi,” replies one of the male ghouls.

The female ghoul mutely bows her head.

“Do not engage with NOSTF,” Maldonato states as the elevator continues its descent. “Hound Doriocourt remains the most knowledgeable of our prince’s agents regarding their activities. She shall coordinate efforts with you when she is available.”

“If you should desire, Mr. Congo may arrange secure temporary accommodations in Perdido House for you until a more permanent haven space is available. Report to my offices at 11:30 tomorrow night.”

The doors open to Perdido House’s parking garage. A large black SUV has already been readied. A driver gets out with a thick, double-breasted coat that he fits onto Maldonato’s tall frame. At Caroline’s inquiry as to why he names her mother ‘fallen one’, the seneschal replies, “We have spoken enough of the past for one night, Miss Malveaux. It is now time to prepare for the future.”

Caroline: The Ventrue doesn’t argue with that. The truth is it doesn’t really matter.

“And the two of them,” she gestures to the ghouls he’s assigned to her, “should others ask questions as to their presence?”

GM: “You may answer those queries however you deem most conductive to your and our prince’s interests, Miss Malveaux. You have my trust in this manner.”

The driver opens the SUV door.

“There are matters to which I must attend. Mr. Congo shall arrange any further resources you may require.”

Caroline: “Safe journey, seneschal,” Caroline replies.

GM: “God go with you, Miss Malveaux.” Maldonato enters the SUV along with the driver and the other dark-skinned ghoul. Caroline briefly thinks she sees another outline inside, but it’s only for a moment before the SUV drives away.

Congo offers Caroline a cellular phone number before inquiring if there is anything further she may require.

Kâmil stands silently to attention. Gisèlle awaits with her head demurely bowed.

Caroline: The Ventrue watches the vehicle leave in silence, starring after it as it leaves, then turns her attention back to the ghouls.

“No, thank you,” she replies to the ancient ghoul. “You’ll reach out when you have more information on where to begin with Claire’s death?”

She wants to choke up over it, over callously commenting on her murder of her mother, but that’s not something she can do any longer. Not if she’s going to be the prince’s childe.

Good Ventrue don’t show their emotions like that.

GM: “His Grace would seem to wish you and the bishop to begin yourselves, madam,” Congo answers. “I shall notify you when I have reached His Excellency and arrange a meeting at your soonest conveniences.”

Caroline: Caroline nods. “Then I shall await your call.” She looks at the other two ghouls. “There are still some matters I need to see to back at the Giani Building while we wait. Unless that will be a problem?” she asks.

GM: “Our time is yours to allocate, bayan,” answers the deep-voiced man.

The girl silently dips her head in seeming concurrence.

Caroline: “Excellent.” The heiress left Fuller instructions to remain nearby when he dropped her off. She sends him a text that she’s ready for pickup now and turns to study the two ominous ghouls while she waits.

Her eyes settle on the pale woman in white, so pale as to almost appear to be a ghost. “You’re one of the ones they call filles à la casquette, aren’t you?” she asks.

GM: The girl dips her head in another nod.

Caroline: “Other Kindred tell stories about you. The younger ones, at least. I’m sure you know.”

GM: There is another mute dip of the head.

Caroline: She turns to the larger black man. “And you are also known to me by reputation. One of my ghouls spoke very respectfully of you.”

GM: “I am honored, bayan,” the large man answers.

Caroline: “That’s Turkish, isn’t it?” Caroline asks.

The Ventrue doesn’t speak it, but it’s relatively few languages she doesn’t speak some cousin too. Identifying them is more of a process of elimination.

GM: “It is, bayan. I had privilege to serve among the Black Eunuchs of the Exalted Ottoman State in my mortal life.”

Caroline: “Perhaps some night you might speak of it?” Caroline asks. “I know less of Ottoman history than I might wish.”

GM: The large ghoul inclines his head. “Your desire is my will, bayan.”

Caroline: It hadn’t been a focus for her, an item deemed valuable enough to spend time on. Much like Turkish. Arabic and Spanish both saw almost half a billion speakers—including influential OPEC members and a growing demographic of voters, even in Louisiana.

French was a given—one could not be a member of the Louisiana white elite without speaking it, and Italian she’d picked up during a summer in Europe, rather than through study.

But how often did you run into a Turkish speaker? Not frequently in the West, despite Turkey’s growing relevance in the region.

She knew Ferris thought it was interesting, for that reason. He’d said it was also a ‘secret’ language spoke by many Kurds. Something about immigrants to Turkey—of which there were many Kurdish refugees—having to learn the language, and many of them taking it back with them to Iraq and Iran, where the locals didn’t speak it.

GM: And he’s probably the only person in the Giani Building who might also speak it himself.

It’s not overlong before Fuller arrives in the SUV. Congo asks for a mobile number he may reach Caroline at, then takes his leave as the three enter the vehicle. Fuller silently takes stock of the two other ghouls but asks no questions besides, “The Giani Building, ma’am?”

Caroline: “Yes, Brian,” Caroline replies, sliding into the backseat. “Has there been any word from Ms. Morrow?”

GM: “No, ma’am. Ferris is on it, but has a lot else on his plate.”

Caroline: Caroline nods. “Have Widney take it over when we get back. Tell her to pull the security cameras and badge in and out logs.”

GM: “He’s already ordered her to, ma’am. He’s been giving a lot of orders.”

The ghoul’s tone doesn’t sound disgruntled. If anything, it’s approving.

Caroline: Caroline runs her tongue across her teeth, behind the ghost of a smile. “These are Kâmil and Giselle,” she fills in to the question the ghoul is too polite to ask. “I’m uncertain as to how long they will be with us, but for the moment extend them every courtesy.”

GM: “My pleasure. Sir. Ma’am.”

Kâmil responds with a brief pleasantry. Gisèlle offers a mute inclination of her head, though shorter than the one to Caroline.

Caroline: The Ventrue wonders, passingly, if the Fille à la Cassette is mute, but it seems impolite to ask.

The rest of the journey doesn’t take long. Caroline asks questions. Fuller answers them. She gives guidance on things she wants done. About half them she learns Ferris has already started on.

It’s refreshing initiative.

GM: “I said your people needed a chain of command,” Fuller answers in response to some of Caroline’s questions. “He’s well on his way to setting one up with himself at the top. Suits me fine. I don’t want to cat-herd a bunch of whining civilians. No offense, ma’am. Knew some of his boys from my gym, too. They said good things.”

Caroline: At the Giani Building, Caroline doesn’t bring the ghouls up to her apartment. She doesn’t even bring them to her notional ‘public’ office on the roof.

Instead they head to what Green mockingly ‘christened’ ‘the war room’. Well, rooms.

Once an interior apartment with too few windows (including an awful and dreary bedroom without any), Caroline’s had the space turned into an operations center for herself and her people. The front door has quietly been replaced with a steel one behind a wood veineer. Even more, an actual steel door bar sits beside the door, ready to be slide into mounted brackets on the inside to provided added protection to those inside. The living room windows—facing a brick wall—have been similarly fitted with steel shutters inside hidden behind thick curtains.

A large table sits in the center of the room, with whiteboards installed on both opposing walls. A desk sits in front of each of the two windows, with a bank of computer screens facing into the room, away from them. About half the screens show surveillance footage from the Giani Building. Some are of the lobby, others of each of the hallways. Others still show the inside of otherwise normal seeming apartments, including one in which a heavily pregnant young Latina sits on the sofa watching TV.

Neatly printed on a corner of one of the whiteboards are a series of words in two columns. One of the columns contains many very familiar words to the ghouls. ‘Kindred. Torpor. Toreador. Ventrue. Vidal. Savoy. Kill. Masquerade.’ The list goes on. Their paring words are far more mundane.

There’s a picture of Audrey in the top-center of the opposite board, along with a timeline of events of interest in the last 48 hours.

The kitchen island is dominated by phones and other tech. The only food in clear evidence is half-full coffee pot in the corner, the Keurig beside it, and the brown-black splotches of dried coffee beside both.

The door to the bedroom is closed.

GM: “A most impressive effort for a Kindred of your years, bayan, if I may presume to speak freely,” Kâmil states as he looks the room over.

Gisèlle’s pale, slow-blinking eyes sift through the ‘war room’s’ features. The casquette girl remains silent.

Caroline: Caroline looks over to where Widney sits in front of the computers. “Show them,” she says simply. The ghoul is too smart to argue. She strikes several keys in sequence and the harsh white overhead lights go out, replaced by blues and light dark violets.

Both whiteboards are almost covered in writing, as is the desk’s surface. The contents of the columns on the board have shifted to entirely new ‘mundane’ words.

There are significant outlines for a variety of plots. “Thank you,” Caroline replies to the seneschal’s servant. “It’s a work in progress.”

The Ventrue walks over to each of the boards in series, quickly reading anything new, especially about Morrow.

Other ‘topics’ of interest on the boards include a branching series of plots related to concealing Claire’s death, lists of hunters identified by Ferris, and lists of Kindred, both in the city still and those he identified as having been destroyed, along with the dates of each destruction.

“I had hoped that I could kill most of her hunters and flip Claire into selling out the others,” she admits coldly to the seneschal’s new ghouls. “Her death was never part of the plan, and it got me off script. Even then, I’d hoped that I could conceal it for a little while longer, but with one of my people suddenly turning up missing this evening… well… I expect the cat’s out of the bag on that one to the non-kine players by now.”

“Ms. Morrow was not deeply involved in my operations, by intention. The details of what happened last night were never briefed to her beyond her own small part, but she knew enough to know that I had something major planned, that required everyone on deck and a lot of weapons, and that it was mostly successful. It’s also possible she was able to,”

She looks away from the board and towards the two, “it’s possible that she’s off being a junkie, thinking simply to sell that information to someone that offered her something good if she reported on me. It’s also possible she’s been in someone else’s pocket for some time.”

“This is not a room she notionally had access to.”

GM: After last day and the better part of this night, the projected reports are quite full.
Widney and Ferris’ people observed no unusual recent behaviors or association on Audrey’s part. Voluntary ones, at least.

Drew Harrington recently passed on a tip that Audrey has been arrested by NOPD for a variety of charges relating to her criminal activities. Somewhere down the line she doesn’t seem to have used (or received) a phone call to get in touch with Caroline’s people.

Ferris’ people couldn’t have picked a better time to start working for Caroline. Ben Chandler and Margaret Ramsey, working alongside Green, found bugs planted on a number of their peoples’ cars.
Physical bugs have not been planted in the ‘war room’ or Caroline’s or Natalia’s haven. Fuller’s armory, however, was bugged, and wiretaps have been placed on phones.

Roger Ferris personally saw to Caroline’s family. He has mixed news.

Orson spends most of his time at home these days. As the ex-CIA agent stated, “The heart attack took a lot out of him.” He’s taken up gardening.

Father Connelly has also passed away, leaving Adam (now the sole Father Malveaux) to largely administer the archdiocese. Priests such as Father Patterson, whose reassignment Caroline well recalls confronting her uncle with, have scented weakness and are making a power play. The most eventful event in Orson’s day was talking with Adam about the Vatican representative who will be paying a visit to New Orleans. Depending on what the representative reports back to Pope Gregory, Orson may be “asked” to resign the archbishopric. As Caroline well knows from her religious upbringing, bishops serve at the pope’s pleasure.

Caroline’s father appears to still be in Washington D.C., although Ferris has obviously not been able to observe him as closely as either of his brothers.

Matthew Malveaux’s day was comparatively mundane. He went to work at the family company’s offices in the CBD, spent an afternoon golfing with some associates, had dinner at Commander’s Palace, and retired for the evening to the Roosevelt Hotel. Half a city away from the Lakeview mansion he nominally cohabits with his wife, which Caroline knows to be fairly normal for them.

Luke also went to work at Malveaux Oil’s offices. He spent the afternoon working on wedding plans with Cécilia, which has occupied much of his time. He later went out drinking with friends and canceled a planned dinner with Talal al-Saud, whose company he has been known to entertain, when Cécilia was sick. He went to bed at his apartment in the CBD.

Ferris reports with some interest that Cécilia, Adeline, Yvette, Yvonne, Noëllle, and Simmone all spent the day at their mother’s house in the Garden District. It occurs to Caroline that while she didn’t ask him to snoop on the Devillers, when she ordered him to follow the movements of “my siblings,” he took that to include Abélia’s other children.

Cécilia and Adeline dropped professional and personal commitments. The three girls enrolled at McGehee all called in sick. Simmone, of course, has not been enrolled at McGehee for most of the school year. All of the driving-age womens’ cars were parked in the driveway, and the house’s grounds were bristling with bodyguards. Somewhat suspicious, but as Caroline recalls Abélia saying, Simmone “can’t handle” being around unfamiliar men carrying guns.

If Ferris has drawn any conclusions as to why the Devillers are evidently so spooked, he does not include them.

Caroline’s youngest brother, meanwhile, is still in Baton Rouge. Due to both distance and his own severed ties with the Malveauxes, Ferris is unable to provide as complete a record of Gabriel’s daily activities.

Her final brother, as far as she knows, remains in the grave.

Autumn is still looking into suitable degenerative conditions (and physicians). None of the ones she’s gone through so far are good enough for her, “if this is supposed to explain a pretty sudden death.” Caroline did not brief any of her people on Claire’s death, and Ferris, in fairly typical fashion for the ex-CIA agent, does not seem to have told Autumn more than he thought she needed to know.

Ericson has not done any of the work Caroline assigned her, and has left a disgruntled phone message citing her extensive professional and familial commitments (even if she is grateful for the Ventrue’s help in landing her job). It is plain that Caroline’s former fencing partner does not view herself as the Ventrue’s servant.

Indeed, now that Caroline considers it, Ericson seems like she has been avoiding her ever since the engagement with Caitlin Meadows. The ghoul seemed terrified of how willing she had been to throw her life headlong into danger on Caroline’s behalf.

A mother shouldn’t have done that. Not one with young children who needed her.

Roger Ferris shows up towards the tail end of Caroline’s report-reading with further news. It does not escape the Ventrue that, much like Audrey, she had yet to tell her newest ghoul where the war room was. Ferris has to be explicitly ordered to deliver his news within the presence of Maldonato’s ghouls, who Caroline is positive the ex-CIA agent does not trust.

First, Carla Rivera has seemingly disappeared. Ferris interviewed various building staff, who testified the woman has been intensely distressed and showing up late to work (or missing it altogether) since the disappearance of her brother Diego. This recent absent stretch is long even for her.

This has alarmed Jack Kinney and Shelby Wright, who Ferris overheard talking about the disappearances of Mark Kavanaugh and Jason Dabney. Two PIs hired for a job in Abita Springs who never came back.

Ferris gave them some cash to buy their silence and quiet objections for a while longer. It’s something to deal with later, but in his eyes, not now.

He awaits Caroline’s instructions expectantly as to what that should be.

It’s midway through that report when she receives a text message from Cécilia.

Simmone having anxiety attack. Maman not feeling good. Can you come help?

Caroline: The Ventrue reads through each board and takes Ferris’ report without comment before turning her attention to the two ‘guest’ ghouls.

“If possible, I’d know if Ms. Morrow’s betrayal was engineered by agents of the prince, or if her loyalties now lie with Mr. Savoy or his agents. This is the second time she’s fled to report on my activities.”

She turns to Widney, “Either way, start liquidating assets related to her. Quietly. Cut off all access to any significant accounts.” She turns to Fuller, “if she returns I want her detained indefinitely—though I don’t think she’ll be that foolish.”

Ericson’s petulant refusal to work grates against her nerves, but she’ll deal with her later.

She plugs back a text to Cécilia.

GM: “She was arrested, ma’am,” Ferris repeats. “Not impossible she still betrayed you. But if she has, it’s not worked out for her.”

Caroline: “I suppose the bugs coincidentally appeared only in areas she had access to, and her decision to leave the building, not making a call, and her previous flight after meaningful events are unrelated?” Caroline observes.

She doesn’t seem interested in arguing the point.

GM: Ferris shrugs. “We’d need to interrogate her to get the full story. Detaining her and liquidating associated assets until then is the right call.”

“I’ll get on it, ma’am,” Widney states, drawing her fingers across a tablet.

Fuller nods at his order.

Caroline: “She was always a weak link and likely spy,” Caroline clarifies. “That was intentional—better the spy I could see coming—but she’s worn out her welcome here, which means she’s worn out her use to them.”

“If she’d resisted their temptations, that would have shown her value in the long term. In succumbing she had value too—but that always had an expiration date.”

“Loyalty and discretion valuable beyond talent.” She lets that observation hang in the air with her other ghouls.

She turns to Ferris directly. “We’re on a hold for the moment, until we hear back from the prince’s agents, regarding coordination on the family and Claire. I expect that soon. I want you here to manage the ‘body’, security here, and any other integration with their cover-up—to say nothing of further investigations into Ms. Morrow.”

“I’d like a way forward we can present on the cover-up as a whole that’s plausible and involves the minimum of interference with the family directly, and still think long term medical issue and sudden deterioration or fatal complication is… ideal. Tulane Medical is likely off-limits, but University Medical Center may be more available.”

She glances at the seneschal’s two ghouls before continuing, “Have Autumn broaden her search to include complications that might arise from treatments, especially drug combinations. There’s a lot there, so if you need to bring in a medical consultant, do so. Widney will make whatever resources are necessary available.” The last seems more for Widney’s benefit than Ferris’, though she doubts the younger ghoul would argue with the ex-CIA agent.

“If that presents a possibility of malpractice, and a patsy medically that can take a more public ‘fall’, that might even work best. I don’t expect we’ll be able to completely fool her compatriots, but if we can make the original illness convincing enough, the plausibility that a Kindred introduced a new medication could be used to point… well, every direction except ours.”

Caroline knows well enough from her own limited experience just how complicated interactions between various medications can be. Fatal complications are rarer, but hardly unknown, and sometimes people just get unlucky. Particularly severe reactions to one medication or another, and those interactions snowballing. Especially in older patients that have multiple prescriptions.

It’s somewhat terrifying—and pathetic—how fragile human beings can be.

“In the meantime… there are some affairs I need to put in order,” Caroline continues, reflecting on fragility.

“I’m bringing Green, leaving Fuller, Widney, and Autumn to coordinate. Call me if something significant changes.”

GM: “We may be of assistance, bayan, where Tulane Medical Center is concerned,” answers Kamil. “Our faces and master are known to the Krewe.”

Caroline: Caroline turns to the ancient ghoul. “It is not my preference to sully either name with this matter, if possible.” She runs her tongue across her fangs. “But keep the door open, if required,” she directs Ferris.

GM: “I would counsel you, bayan, that the Krewe’s cooperation may better facilitate your plans,” Kamil states. “They monitor Tulane Medical Center the most closely, but they have agents placed within every major hospital, given the relevance of such sites to the Masquerade.”

“That is not to say carrying out such an operation without their knowledge is impossible. But it would seem to make an obstacle of what might be an asset. The preservation of the First Tradition is their foremost concern.”

Caroline: The Ventrue runs her tongue across her fangs again in thought. “I would not look that in the face then. I shall await Mr. Congo’s call however, before I invite others into our conspiracy.”

GM: “As you say, bayan,” the deep-voiced ghoul states.

Ferris has a shrewd look in his eye, but says nothing within Kamil’s and Giselle’s presences.

He and the others repeat their acknowledgement of Caroline’s orders.

The Ventrue departs with the two elder ghouls and Green to see her sisters in a black SUV. Caroline sits in back. Green drives.

Caroline may be content to wait for many things, but her family is not among them.

---

Monday night, 7 March 2016, AM

GM: It’s an 11-miute drive from the Giani Building to the Walter Grinnan Robinson House where the Devillers live. The 1859-65-built historic home incorporates a sophisticated blend of Greek Revival and Italianate styles with a Neoclassical cast iron fence, and is one of the largest properties in the district. Large enough to house each member the prodigious family in comfort and privacy.

True to Ferris’ earlier report, there are numerous parked cars outside. Jeremy May and Daniel Hayes, among other security personnel, are on guard. They wave Caroline’s car in without pause.

Caroline: Caroline waits for Green to park, then turns her attention to the two elder ghouls before getting out. “Several of my sisters are uncomfortable around armed men ever since one of them was shot,” she tells Kamil. “I mention it only to ask that you be mindful of your actions and inactions around them on that account.”

She turns to the casquette girl. “And I ask that you not, barring emergency, seek to use the gifts of the blood on an of them directly.”

GM: Kamil inclines his head. “I do not require weapons to fight, bayan, should the need arise.”

While all manner of firearms or blades might hide within the large folds of his dark suit, the casquette girl’s thin white dress looks as if it has little room for weapons.

She dips her head in mute acknowledgement of the order.

Caroline: “The mortal security is fair game—and in fact I would be more comfortable if you were willing to discretely verify there was no ill intent or tampering with them while we’re here.”

Her blue eyes glitter darkly in the car’s interior. “I suspect your touch with such things to be far more nuanced and elegant than my own.”

GM: The casquette girl dips her head again, then tilts it towards the car’s window as if to question ‘now?’

“Can you fucking talk or what?” Green snaps.

The casquette girl only placidly stares at Caroline.

Caroline: “When you’re three hundred years old you get certain allowances,” Caroline interrupts her own ghoul knowingly.

GM: “My parents said being old gets allowances too. They said a lot of bullshit.”

Neither of the elder ghouls reply.

Caroline: Caroline laughs darkly. “You might take notes, Ms. Green. It takes a special kind to survive centuries.”

She turns her gaze back to the elder ghoul. “As the opportunity presents itself, Gisèlle. I expect to be here until we receive the call.”

GM: The casquette girl dips her head again.

Caroline: The Ventrue slides out of the SUV and heads towards the house.

GM: Hayes and May exchange some perfunctory words with Caroline as she gets out, the latter drawlingly remarking on how he’s still waiting to show her a good time at the shooting range. The front door opens without resistance at her approach.

Caroline: She laughs passingly at May’s flirtation, trying to keep the doubts Gettis’ ‘resurrection’ has planted within her at bay, but isn’t slowed in her entry.

GM: Caroline was last inside the house several moths ago to celebrate Christmas with the Devillers. Some of the home’s exquisite features include moldings enhanced with 22 carat gold leaf, marble mantles, custom designed rugs, 19th century-painted ceiling murals, a staircase formerly in the Library of Congress, 16 ft. ceilings, and spacious, spectacular grounds with a beautiful pool and elaborate ironwork. She’s passingly acquainted with the home’s history as the original residence of an Antebellum tobacco magnate.

Caroline: She remembers even then being shocked by the wealth on display. The Malveaux family is wealthy by any objective or subjective measure. Unimaginably wealthy by the standards of most people. But there’d been something so impossibly elegant about the Devillers’ house. Something that almost laughed at other attempts to match it.

GM: Jocelyn had gushed about the historic property when she visited with Caroline, and the family had all happily entertained her request if she could take pictures. But the Ventrue wonders if her former lover would say that tonight. Like their one-time relationship that’s now so tinged with bitterness and regret, the house is not what it once was. Family pictures, which now include Caroline, hang askew. Furniture has been moved. Rearranged. All wrong. Tables at improper angles. Chairs facing away, or set out in the middle of nowhere. The times in none of the clocks match. Electric cords are unplugged, or crushed beneath table legs. Some of the drapes are only half-done, stretching over the windows like lolling tongues. Rugs seem too long or too short. Some of the ceilings feel taller or shorter than others. The length of the stairs up to the family bedrooms seem uneven. Everything about the house feels off.

Wrong.

Two white-furred persian cats stare at Caroline from the second floor. They feel like they’ve been sitting there for hours. She reads the names on their collars. ‘Mr. Shah.’ ‘Marie.’

They don’t hiss. They just open their mouths and soundlessly fling themselves from the railings.

Caroline: For a moment, but only just, Caroline wonders if someone has attacked the home, if it’s been invaded. The thought of someone rampaging their way through the home, terrorizing her sisters, stops her mid-step.

But she remembers Cécilia’s comments from earlier. About the home. About how much of their mother had sunk into the home. How much it was a reflection and expression of her.

It tells her all she needs to know about how much her actions have cost her. How much Caroline’s actions have cost her.

She sees the cats jump, remembers Simmone’s affection for them, and snatches them out of the air before they crash down almost on instinct.

GM: The taller Kamil reaches out for one of them as he sees Caroline do so. The Ventrue and ghoul both catch the cats. The felines rest in their grasps for a moment, then begin madly hissing, scratching, and biting. Caroline mostly doesn’t feel it past her dead skin. The ghoul evinces no pain either as he sets the one marked ‘Marie’ down.

There’s a loud crash. A toppled grandfather clock rests by Giselle’s feet, who isn’t where she was standing a moment ago.

She looks from the clock and to Caroline.

Caroline: Caroline doesn’t try to hold the angry feline, releasing it as the crash sounds. She grits her teeth at the sight. “Cécilia!?” she shouts into the house. “Adeline?” She stalks forward.

GM: The ghouls follow her. Kamil frowns, rests his arm against the banister, and just as quickly pulls away.

Caroline: She turns her gaze back to him at the sudden motion.

GM: There’s a painful snap and crash as a broken-off section of banister hits the first floor. Kamil might have broken his neck if he’d been leaning on it for any longer.

Caroline: She pauses, bites her lip.

“You do not appear welcome here,” she says at last. “This may be rude to ask, but please wait outside. There is no harm awaiting me within.”

GM: “The same conclusion had occurred to me, bayan,” the ghoul nods.

There’s only a slight pause at Caroline’s order.

“As you wish, bayan. We shall see to the trustworthiness of the guards and await your return.”

Giselle silently dips her head and follows him out.

It’s as the ghouls leave that Caroline hears Cécilia’s voice call, “Caroline? I’m in Simmone’s room!”

Caroline: The Ventrue darts up the stairs towards it with the grace of a ballerina.

GM: Grace to far eclipse any ballerina, if she’s to be precise. Simmone’s bedroom on the second floor closely if not identically resembles the one Caroline saw in the LaLaurie House, down to the same Into the Woods and other theater posters, pink-sheeted bed with its fluffy comforter, and collection of stuffed animals. All that’s different is the bedroom view out over the home’s garden and swimming pool. Cécilia sits on the on the bed, dressed in a nightgown, sleeping robe, and slippers. She’s cradling a nightgown-clad Simmone on her lap, who is crying and wailing piteously in French,

“Je veux maman! Je veux maman! Je veux maman!”

(“I want Maman! I want Maman! I want Maman!”)

“Oh, Caroline, I’m so glad you’re here,” Cécilia says as she looks up from in between words of comfort. “She’s had a horrible nightmare. About Maman.”

“Ecoute, Simmone, Caroline est là. Tu reverras maman très bientôt, je te le promets,” Cécilia assures Simmone in a gently cooing voice, as if the ten-year-old were actually a much younger child.

(“Look, Simmone, Caroline’s here. You will see Maman again very soon, I promise.”)

Caroline: Caroline swallows her own fear about their mother and hides the bitter aftertaste behind a gentle smile. “Oh, on,” she slides into the room towards her youngest sister and finds a spot in the bed on the bed next to Cécilia. She extends a warming hand to take one of Simmone’s own.

“C’est terrible. Voulez-vous m’en parler?” she asks softly.

(“That’s terrible. Do you want to tell me about it?”)

GM: “E-elle est morte! Elle MORTE! Maman est morte!” Simmone wails, tears running down her face.

(“S-she died! She DIED! Maman DIED!”)

Cécilia dabs at her face with a tissue. The wastebin is very full.

Caroline: Caroline squeezes her sister’s hand. “Ça a dû être terrifiant! Puis tu t’es réveillé et elle n’était pas là. Je suis tellement désolé, Simmone,” she answers, her tone understanding.

(“That must have been terrifying! Then you woke up and she wasn’t here. I’m so sorry, Simmone.”)

GM: “Je veux Maman! Je veux Maman! Je veux Maman!” Caroline’s newly-youngest sibling sobs.

(“I want Maman! I want Maman! I want Maman!”)

Caroline: The Ventrue brushes hair from the girl’s tear-streaked with her free hand. “Elle ne peut pas venir tout de suite, chérie. Elle fait quelque chose pour moi.”

(“She can’t come right now, darling. She’s doing something for me.”)

She bites her lower lip in concern as Simmone sobs.

GM: Simmone tilts her head back and gives a wordless, high-pitched shriek:

“EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE-EEEEEEEEEEE-EEEEEEEEEE!!!!”

“Caroline, there’s some-”

“EEEEEEEEE-EEEEEEEEE!!!!!”

“SLEEPING PILLS on the”

“EEEEEEE-EEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!”

“-DRESSER, can you please get those?” Cécilia asks, trying to talk over the noise.

“Cécilia? Que se passe-t-il!?” comes Adeline’s voice at the scream.

(“Cécilia? What’s happening!?”)

Caroline: “Cauchemar,” Caroline’s voice cuts through the shrieks for Adeline.

(“Nightmare.”)

She turns her attention back to Simmone, laying one cool hand on the girl’s cheek and turning her gaze towards Caroline’s own.

“Simmone, je ne veux pas partir comme ça. S’il vous plaît,” the Ventrue doesn’t quite plead.

(“Simmone, I don’t want to leave like this. Please.”)

GM: The ten-year-old’s ear-splitting shriek subsides into low sobs.

“Je… v-veux… Maman …

(“I… w-want… Maman…)

“The dresser, please, Caroline. She needs to sleep,” Cécilia says in English.

Caroline: The Ventrue instead wipes the freshest of Simmone’s tears away. “Je sais. Mais pour ce soir, juste une fois, vas-tu te contenter de moi?” she asks. (“I know. But for just tonight, just once, will you settle for me?”)

“Je vous tiendrai jusqu’à ce que vous vous endormiez, et je vous promets de ne plus laisser de mauvais rêves s’approcher,” she offers with a faint smile. (“I’ll hold you until you fall asleep, and I promise not to let any more bad dreams come near.”)

“Cécilia peut s’allonger de l’autre côté si vous le souhaitez, et nous pouvons vous entourer d’amour.” (“Cécilia can lay on the other side if you like, and we can surround you in love.”)

“Je chanterai même si tu veux. Vous souvenez-vous quand nous avons chanté ensemble pour maman?” (“I’ll even sing if you like. Do you remember when we sang together for Maman?”)

GM: “O-Oui…” Simmone sniffs.

“Cela semble être une merveilleuse idée, Caroline—entourons-la d’amour. Que devrions-nous chanter?” Cécilia says, scooting back across the bed as she pulls Simmone along with her. She smiles as she runs a hand through their sister’s hair.

(“That sounds like a wonderful idea, Caroline—let’s surround her in love. What should we sing?”)

Caroline: The Ventrue props herself up on the other side of Simmone, her long legs stretched out before her but still sitting up next to her.

“Des demandes?” she asks Simmone. (“Any requests?”)

When the younger girl expresses none Caroline begins softly, but more deeply than her typical soprano, slowly meandering through the lyrics like she’s taking a stroll through the park.

“Tiens-moi près et
tiens-moi vite
Le sort magique que
vous lancez
C’est la vie en rose”

“Quand tu m’embrasses,
le ciel soupire
Et bien que je ferme
les yeux
Je vois la vie en rose”

“Quand tu me presse
contre ton cœur
Je suis dans un
monde à part
Un monde où les
roses fleurissent”

“Et quand tu parles, les
anges chantent d’en haut
Les mots de tous
les jours semblent se
transformer en
chansons d’amour

“Donnez-moi votre
cœur et votre âme
Et la vie sera toujours
La vie en rose”

(“Hold me close and hold me fast
The magic spell you cast
This is la vie en rose ")

(“When you kiss me, heaven sighs
And though I close my eyes
I see la vie en rose ")

(“When you press me to your heart
I’m in a world apart
A world where roses bloom”)

(“And when you speak, angels sing from above
Everyday words seem to turn into love songs”)

(“Give your heart and soul to me
And life will always be
La vie en rose”)

---

---

---

GM: Caroline first heard the Louis Armstrong rendition of the song from her dad’s records. But it’s one thing to hear it from the famous jazz singer’s warm, scratchy, deeper tones in English, and another to hear her higher rendition in melodious-sounding French.

Cécilia adds her voice to her new sister’s. It’s a warm voice with a bright, full timbre, but softer and less piercing than Caroline’s, which she recalls her choir instructor saying could potentially assert itself over a whole orchestra. The contrast between their voices isn’t as marked as Caroline’s song with Abélia’s was, but neither are the pair’s vocal types identical like Yvette’s and Yvonne’s. Instead, the Ventrue’s duet with Cécilia reminds her of a beach’s low-lapping waves at high tide. Each one looks similar enough, but follows steadily after the other, and slowly laps at Simmone’s distress like gentle waves washing over a sand castle.

“Donnez-moi votre
cœur et votre âme
Et la vie sera toujours
La vie en rose.”

(“Give your heart and soul to me
And life will always be
La vie en rose.”)

“That was beautiful, Caroline,” Cécilia remarks quietly after their youngest sister’s whimpers for Maman have ceased. She looks at Simmone’s sleeping face for a moment longer, then back to Caroline’s.

“Maman told me about how you sang for Simmone after Luke proposed. But it’s one thing to hear about it, and another to hear it.”

Caroline: “I’m glad you enjoyed it,” Caroline whispers back. “And gladder she did.” The Ventrue looks down at the sleeping Simmone. “I did too.”

GM: Cécilia looks back at their sister. “This isn’t Simmone’s first meltdown, as I’m sure you know. But that’s actually another plus to having you in the family now. I was just going to give her some pills, this has happened so many times. In fact, I even did, not that long ago. She still woke back up.”

Caroline: Caroline looks at the older of her sisters. “It must be difficult being so many things to so many people, Cécilia.”

GM: “It is, sometimes. But I think I have an easier time than some people.” She lays a hand on Caroline’s. “How did things go at Perdido House?”

There’s worry behind her eyes, but hope too. Even expectation. After all, Caroline is here.

Caroline: “We should talk outside,” Caroline replies quietly, gesturing towards Simmone.

GM: Cécilia glances back down at the sleeping ten-year-old. “You’re right, now that Maman isn’t here. It’s so easy to take all of the little things for granted.”

She rises, follows Caroline outside of Simmone’s bedroom, and quietly closes the door behind her.

“Well?” she asks excitedly as they walk towards the stairs.

Caroline: “He didn’t say no,” Caroline answers with barely contained excitement, like a teenager asked out by the presumptive prom king.

“The seneschal sent me off to help deal with the Claire stuff, and sent a pair of his servants to help.” Her footsteps are as silent as death. “I think things are about to change. For the better.”

Finally.

“What happened here though?” she asks, gesturing to the wrecked home.

GM: “Caroline, that’s wonderful!” Cécilia exclaims, hugging her. “I’m so happy for you. I knew this day, or I suppose night, would come.”

Caroline: The Ventrue can’t keep, and doesn’t fight, the smile on her face. “It’s all coming together. Right at the edge of falling apart. I guess no change comes without pain. But it’s worth it.”

GM: “Absolutely,” Cécilia nods. “So what’s going to hap… actually, no. I’ll let you tell the full story to Maman and me.”

Her good humor seems to fade as she looks down the staircase over the disordered home.

“Simmone wasn’t wrong. Maman died. We all had nightmares when it happened. Though she told me it almost certainly would. Philip wouldn’t abide her presence in Perdido House.”

Caroline: Caroline’s expression tightens like string suddenly pulled taunt. “He hurt her?” Then, a moment later, “She came knowing he’d hurt her?”

GM: “She knew you would need her,” Cécilia nods. “You’d know better than me exactly how it happened, but all of us felt it when she died. It’s why the house is the way it is. It’s why Simmone is the way she was. Maman is part of the house, part of us, and we are part of her.”

“You are part of her, too. It’s almost finished.”

Caroline: Caroline grits her teeth. “I did need her.” Without the distraction, to say nothing of the memory games…

Still, she didn’t want this. Hadn’t expected this cost.

“What does that mean for her? For us?”

GM: “It means a lot,” Cécilia says slowly. “I’ll explain everything in a bit. Everything that I understand, at least. But first… we need to bring her back.”

Caroline: “How?” Caroline’s answer is immediate, unhesitant.

GM: “Let me show you.” Cécilia starts down the stairs.

Caroline: The Ventrue follows tensely.

GM: “I could have started hours ago. But it’s important that you be here for this. So you can learn how to do it, too.”

Caroline: Caroline tilts her head. “This has happened before?”

GM: Cécilia nods. “Yes. Maman doesn’t put all of herself into her bodies. They aren’t exceptionally hard to destroy, if she isn’t trying to keep them intact—which I don’t imagine she was in Perdido House. That wasn’t a battle worth fighting, or perhaps even possible to win.”

Caroline: Caroline laughs darkly. “I’d argue in this, as with many things, she won that battle before she walked through the door.”

GM: Cécilia only smiles. “Yes.”

“None of her bodies are great losses, in of themselves. She’s only sad for the pain their destruction can cause us. Maman is so much more than the vessels you’ve seen. Those are more like, I suppose you could say hand puppets, than what she truly is.”

Caroline: “I’m sorry it hurt you all,” Caroline replies. “I had no idea he’d react thusly. Or that they had history.”

GM: Cécilia shakes her head. “Oh, you don’t need to be, and I hope you don’t blame yourself. Maman knew you needed her help. And you couldn’t have known about their history.”

Caroline: She doesn’t argue the point. Not with Cécilia. That battle, much like Abélia’s, was won and lost long ago.

GM: “In any case,” Caroline’s new sister continues, “her bodies hold only a small portion of her. More of it is in the house,” Cécilia gestures at their surroundings, “and in… us.”

Caroline: Caroline listens attentively.

“She wasn’t gone. I think… I don’t think the seneschal realized she was always there with me, even after he… well, made his point.”

There’s some grim satisfaction in getting the better of him.

GM: “She is in all of us,” Cécilia nods. “Our lives are her lives. And her life is ours.”

“It’s harder for her to act through us than it is through her body, though. All seven of us would need to be present for her to be capable of the same things, if her body wasn’t available.”

Caroline: The Ventrue nods in understanding as she continues to follow her oldest sister.

GM: “Her body can channel more of her, but not all of her. The house can contain more still, and is especially useful because we can all spend time here without it being suspicious. It’s our home, after all.”

Caroline: Caroline pointedly doesn’t ask the obvious question. The one that should be burning.

What is she.

She’s Caroline’s mother, and that’s enough.

GM: “There’s nothing wrong with being curious.”

Cécilia smiles at her.

“I’ve said our lives are one. With a little time and effort, you can learn to, I suppose open yourself, to me and the others, too.”

Caroline: “I just…” Caroline shivers, “don’t want to appear ungrateful.”

GM: Cécilia stops in mid-stride to take Caroline’s hands in hers. “Oh, no! There’s nothing wrong with questions. Whatever makes you happy, Caroline. Maman wants us to be happy. I want you to be happy.”

Caroline: There are words Caroline wants to say, but bites back. About how happy the family has already made her. About how this was what she always wanted. A family that genuinely wanted her to be happy, that she genuinely wanted to be happy, and that she didn’t have to hide from.

She bites them back almost out of reflex. Silence reigns for a moment after Cécilia’s declaration.

Finally, she battles through the walls between the truth and the open air and finds her voice. “I know, Cécilia.” She squeezes those holding hands. “I know. Old habits die hard though, even harder than Mother, and this is all… it’s so new that it seems like a dream. I don’t want the dream to end.”

GM: Cécilia smiles beatifically at her new sister as they continue to hold hands.

“You don’t need to be scared anymore, Caroline. Not while you’re here. You are home, and you are loved.”

Caroline: “I know,” she answers.

GM: “Say,” Cécilia continues with a more playful look, “if all of this feels too heavy, what do you think sounds better after I get married to your brother: Cécilia Devillers-Malveaux, or Cécilia Malveaux-Devillers? I want to take his name, but I couldn’t bear to give up our family’s either, so that seems like a good compromise.”

Caroline: Caroline’s serious expression cracks, then collapses into a smile, and finally explodes into genuine laughter.

“I think it sounds like you’re going to curse your children terribly when they’re learning to spell their names. Or, I suppose, they’ll curse you.”

GM: Cécilia softly laughs back. “They’ll have you to help them learn to spell. You’re so smart, it’ll be as easy for them as tying shoes.”

Caroline: “Oh, of course, it’ll be my problem.” Caroline rolls her eyes in mock irritation, then gives another little laugh.

“I really can’t wait to meet them, Cécilia, and to see what the future holds.” Her gaze sweeps back towards the direction they were headed. “But that future requires some works yet now to buy it.”

GM: “I can’t wait for us to meet them either,” Cécilia smiles back. Her gaze follows Caroline’s deeper into the house, then returns.

“But tell me first, I really would like your opinion: which name do you think sounds better?”

Caroline: “Malveaux-Devillers,” Caroline answers. “It lets him have primacy will always reminding everyone of who you are. And it rolls off the tongue more easily.”

GM: “Mal-Dev. Dev-Mal,” Cécilia says experimentally. “Yes, I think you’re right. It starts more softly. Yvette liked Devillers-Malveaux more, I suppose that’s no surprise.”

Caroline: “She’s possessive,” Caroline answers.

GM: “Yes, she is,” Cécilia nods. “There’s a bit of Maman in each of us.”

Caroline: “In more ways than one?” Caroline observes. There’s a twinkle in her eye.

GM: “In many ways,” her new sister smiles. “You included. You have her dutifulness, I think, most of all.”

Caroline: “The seneschal named her fallen,” Caroline abruptly slips out.

GM: Cécilia looks confused. “That’s strange. I suppose the logical question to ask is by what metric?”

Caroline: “He wouldn’t speak of it, he simply labeled her ‘the fallen one.’”

GM: “I’m not sure why he’d call her that. But then, as you’ve deduced, they have history together. Maman has said she knew him in the Old World.”

Caroline: “More games, maybe,” Caroline speculates. “His plots run deeply. I didn’t want to keep it secret, the ideas he set spinning.”

Caroline: Cécilia nods. “We can ask Maman if you’re curious. Now, so far as-”

She trails off as she and Caroline see Giselle through the front door’s paned glass. The casquette girl is standing on the front porch. She wordlessly points at several of the guards.

Caroline: Caroline nods, and mouths as very clear ‘later’ to the elder ghoul.

“Several of your people and I are going to be having very pointed conversations,” Caroline explains for Cécilia’s benefit.

GM: “Is someone there?” Cécilia asks, looking through the door’s glass.

Caroline: “One of the seneschal’s people. I asked her to examine the security people.”

GM: Cécilia looks directly at Giselle.

“I don’t see anyone. She must be hiding herself.”

“I’m so glad you thought to investigate the guards, in any case. Security isn’t really my or Maman’s area. If you don’t think they’re trustworthy, then by all means, do whatever you think is best to keep everyone safe.”

Caroline: “I have no intention of letting anyone harm any of you,” Caroline answers firmly. “We’ll see what she found. We should see to matters here, though… I don’t know how much longer I’ll have tonight.”

GM: Cécilia nods as they start off again into the house. “Yes, of course. Do you have any idea when it’ll be safe enough for the girls to go back to school?”

Caroline: Caroline bites her lower lip. “One of my people, whose opinion I greatly respect, once said all protection, all physical security, was ultimately not a question of whether you could make someone perfectly safe, but whether you could make it so costly to harm them as to make it prohibitive.”

“I don’t think I could ever be comfortable with the idea that someone, anyone, could hurt any of them… or you,” she admits.

GM: “We’re safe as long as we’re here, Caroline,” Cécilia states emphatically. “I don’t want to see any of the girls hurt either. If you think the world is still too dangerous outside the house, we’ll withdraw them from school. We can get everything we need delivered here, and there’s obviously plenty of room. It’d be only a little inconvenient. There’s things they’d be sad to miss out on, of course. But they’ll accept it if Maman says it’s to keep us safe.”

Caroline: “I can’t hide all of you here forever,” Caroline answers firmly. “And even if I could, I will not fight this far and further to rob my sisters of their lives and lock them in a cage like glass dolls.”

She looks at Cécilia. “I can’t promise that no harm will come to them—or you—beyond these walls—but I know that harm will come if they never leave. Even more, it’ll attract attention, which will only tighten the noose.”

“For now, I’m going through the existing people. Anyone that I don’t like the look of we’ll get rid of, and I’m going to move some of my people over to fill the gaps. People I trust, and that have a little more idea of what to look out for.”

“After that… I want them to return to their lives. And if anyone tries to touch them… well, they’re already hard targets, ones of mostly vindictive value, and ones that whether someone hits or misses will have bring down an ungodly firestorm on whoever does it.”

“That’s more than they had yesterday. Or any day in the past.”

Cécilia nods. “I think Maman would be very pleased to hear those words from you.”

“Let’s see that she does.”

---

Monday night, 7 March 2016, AM

GM: It’s not a far walk to the house’s library. Cécilia pulls out one of the books. The shelf ponderously swings open, revealing a stairwell that descends underground—a notably unusual feature given that most houses in New Orleans lack conventional basements.

The steps appear to be made from a dark, solid material Caroline cannot identify—stone, rock, or tightly-packed soil. There’s no design or ornamentation to them. They seem raised from the living earth itself.

The bookshelf swings shut behind Caroline as she follows her sister in. There are no lights, but Cécilia doesn’t stumble or lose her way. Caroline’s eyes cannot pierce more than several feet into the gloom. The tunnel-like stairwell is utterly silent save for the soft pad of Cécilia’s slippered feet and the sharper click of Caroline’s heeled ones down the steps.

Caroline: It’s unnerving not being able to pierce the gloom for the vampire with perfect nightvision, but Caroline continues down behind Cécilia.

GM: The pair emerge into a yawning, hollowed-out chamber bereft of ornamentation or decor. It’s at least as large as the house’s atrium, but Caroline cannot say how far it goes on. She can’t see walls or ceilings. Just more gloom.

A pentagram is drawn across the floor, not with any marker or extraneous material, but dug into the ground itself. The scent of long-dried blood from within the grooves is impossible for the vampire to miss.

It stands out less, though, than the recently-dried black blood smeared over the outside floor. Abélia’s severed head lies on the ground, along with her headless body. The former grins macabrely up at the ceiling with unseeing eyes.

Caroline: Caroline looks away from the corpse. Not because she hasn’t seen plenty, but because seeing Abélia—or at least what she perceives as Abélia—in that state is a sharp stab equally humbling and shameful.

That she had to suffer to help Caroline… and that she would.

She knows the body shouldn’t be here. But then, where should it be? She knows it vanished, and all such things go somewhere.

GM: This has happened before? Caroline had asked.

Cécilia said it had happened before.

And ‘it’ did go somewhere.

All of those ‘its.’

Caroline has read accounts of how Joseph Stalin would cram scores, even hundreds of people into cells meant for only a handful, packing humans in like sardines until so much as moving their hands was impossible. He didn’t need to torture them. Not actively. He just left them alone, to thirst and starve and shit. Inevitably, one person in the immobile mass couldn’t take it anymore and would start screaming. Then the people next to him would scream. Then the people next to them. Then everyone in the entire cell, all those dozens, all screaming. People could supposedly hear them from miles beyond the prison. They described it as the most ghastly, soul-chilling sound they’d ever heard.

The other ‘its’ don’t scream.

They’re well past that state.

Some have had their guts and heads split open. Others have that their limbs or faces gnawed off. Some have their throats slit. Some look like they were exploded from within. Some look like they’ve simply rotted apart. Some are thin. Others have grotesquely swollen, pregnant bellies burst open like gory pustules.

There are tens.

Dozens.

Scores.

More than Caroline can even see.

Black, tar-like residue coats the corpses everywhere like a morning dew. Omnipresent. They’re haphazardly stacked and piled high like so many logs of kindling. They don’t make Caroline think of sardines, though. More like shed exoskeletons—or half-devoured insects wrapped in the sticky folds of a spider’s web. The closest thing she’s seen to it are pictures of the Holocaust or German massacres on the Eastern Front.





The oddest thing is the smell.

The Ventrue would expect it to be overpowering. To send Cécilia retching on her knees, and Caroline to perhaps even long for the physical catharsis. The corpses don’t smell awful, though. They smell like her new mother’s perfume. Violet, creamy, and faintly cool.

Caroline: Caroline reaches out, but doesn’t quite touch them. Instead she covers her mouth with her other hand. “My God…” she whispers.

GM: Cécilia lays a hand on Caroline’s shoulder.

“Maman’s bodies aren’t very durable. They burn out, or simply give out. This is where they all go.”

She looks between Caroline and the piles of corpses.

“Obviously, none of the others know about this place. They’d be scarred for life, if they saw.”

She considers her new sister concernedly.

Caroline: “She’s suffered…” The Ventrue touches one of the husks. “So much.”

She looks back to Cécilia. “I won’t tell them.”

GM: The husk’s skin feels thin and brittle, like old clay. It crumbles apart beneath Caroline’s touch, even light as that is.

“She tells me it doesn’t hurt that badly, most of the time. I hope she isn’t only saying so to comfort me.”

Caroline: The Ventrue has had her own experiences with agony. With wounds that should have killed her. With bullets and blades and whips and fists. With unspeakable agony both alive and dead.

“It’s different,” Caroline reflects. “When it can’t really do more than hurt you. Pain is… manageable. The terror associated with it isn’t there. I’m sure what she goes through has its own flavor, but it isn’t quite the same as when I was human.”

Which doesn’t mean it hurts any less.

GM: Cécilia squeezes her shoulder.

“I’m sorry you’ve hurt.”

Caroline: Caroline gives a reassuring smile. “I wouldn’t be here if I hadn’t. I just mean… it probably does hurt her… but not in the same way it might hurt you. Still… so many times.”

She looks away from the husks.

“How do we bring her back?”

GM: “Blood,” Cécilia answers somberly.

She reaches among the husks and withdraws a dark-hued, ancient-looking ceremonial dagger.

“I’ve said our lives are one, Caroline. That connection works both ways—for good and ill.”

Caroline: The Ventrue nods.

GM: Cécilia draws the blade’s edge over her palm. She squares her jaw as red wells from the cut, then turns her hand over and lets blood dribble into the pentagram’s grooves.

“There are advantages to this, but there are drawbacks too.”

Caroline: “You should have let me,” Caroline protests as the scent of her sister’s coppery blood fills the room.

GM: Cécilia shakes her head as red continues to well from her palm. “I know being cut doesn’t mean as much to you, Caroline. But the transformation isn’t finished yet. I’m not sure your blood would satisfy.”

Caroline: The Ventrue bites her lip, but doesn’t argue.

GM: “Did you notice, how Adeline didn’t come running when you said Simmone had a nightmare?”

Caroline: Caroline nods. “They don’t all know yet.”

GM: “Yes. They’re still growing to accept you as part of our lives. Simmone was so out of it already, I don’t think she questioned what you were doing here. Not to mention you’ve gotten to know her better than Adeline. She wouldn’t have wanted to cuddle up with someone who wasn’t family.”

Cécilia winces as she digs the knife’s edge in deeper and walks to the pentagram’s next point. She lets more blood dribble into the grooves.

Caroline: Caroline grits her teeth as she watches Cécilia bleed.

GM: “The…” she starts, “largest advantage to our connection with Maman is that she’s all but indestructible, as far as I can tell. It doesn’t matter how the seneschal, or anyone else, kills her bodies. She will always return.”

Caroline: “What did she do before you?” Caroline asks.

GM: Cécilia kneels to paint her blood in the space between the two points.

“I think she simply had to make do without. That’s why we’re doing this, tonight. So she can come back. If we didn’t, she would take longer. Much longer. I’m not sure how long. Years. Maybe centuries.”

“She might have been able to circumvent that restriction by putting less of herself into her bodies. That would probably give them a longer lifespan, too. But she wouldn’t be able to do as much through them. Prices to all things.”

Caroline: Nothing is ever really free. Sometimes it simply isn’t you paying the price.

GM: Cécilia walks to the pentagram’s next point. She grimaces again as she slices the blade across her uncut hand, then lets the blood pool.

“Maman…” she starts falteringly, “might also have been permanently diminished, if she’d been destroyed then. Or perhaps banished from our world. I’m not sure what would have happened.”

She sets the knife down for a moment to apply pressure to her cut hand, but winces at that.

“We are her anchors. We focus her power and keep her essence tied to the physical world. It doesn’t matter how many of her bodies get destroyed, so long as we live. Or exist, in your case. She will always return.”

“But as I’ve said, that connection cuts both ways.”

Cécilia then tells Caroline their mother’s weakness.

Her true weakness.

“It might, maybe even probably would, be enough to permanently destroy her. Without any chance of coming back.”

Caroline: Caroline listens gravely, but shakes her head.

“That won’t happen.”

GM: “I hope you’re right.”

Caroline: “Me too.” The talk was even bleaker than Cécilia bleeding herself.

“All the pentagram has to be filled?” she asks.

GM: Cécilia nods with a faint wince. There’s eight major points left.

Caroline: “How many times have you done this?” Caroline asks her sister.

GM: “More than I can remember, honestly,” Cécilia answers.

“Maman doesn’t let me scar, and it normally doesn’t take very much blood.”

Caroline: “It just hurts,” Caroline answers.

GM: Cécilia nods.

“It’s worth it, of course.”

Caroline: “Do you want help?” Caroline asks.

She knows well how much self-control it takes to bite into your flesh, to draw blood. It’s the difference between waiting for the nurse to give you a shot and jamming the needle into your flesh. That natural aversion that’s so hard to overcome.

GM: “I… yes,” Cécilia nods, gratefully. “It’s going to take a lot of blood, this time. Maman can’t make do with a lesser body, not with Gettis on the loose.”

“A lot of blood.”

“The more that’s shed, the faster she can come back, and the stronger the body.”

Caroline: “Does she heal these, when she comes back?” Caroline asks. “Can she?”

GM: There’s uncertainty across Cécilia’s face for a moment.

“I hope so. I don’t usually cut myself very deeply. Maman normally has some sense of when a body is going to break down.”

Caroline: “You start rebuilding the next early.”

GM: Cécilia nods. “Yes. Sometimes, I can space it out over time.”

“Other times, actually most of the time, there’s a component to the ritual she hasn’t told me. She says she wants to keep my hands clean. My soul clean.”

Caroline: Caroline nods in agreement. With their mother.

She takes the knife from Cécilia and lightly tests its edge.

GM: It’s quite sharp, despite its apparent age.

Caroline: “If it doesn’t have to be this blade, a needle would be far more effective in the future. And less painful,” Caroline observes. “And less dangerous to you.”

“If it has to be a blade, sharper is better. A razor is best. It cuts deeper, further into the blood vessels. A scalpel would work best, but even a straight razor, box cutter, or hobby knife might work better.”

Not that she intends on letting Cécilia do much more of this.

“You won’t scar?” Caroline asks again, just to be sure.

GM: “I don’t know,” Cécilia admits. “Maman isn’t a healer. I’ve not needed to cut myself that deeply, in the past.” She gives a faint smile. “Clearly you know much more about this sort of thing than I do.”

Caroline: “Does it need to be the knife?” Caroline asks instead, at that answer.

GM: Cécilia considers. “I don’t think so. We don’t have any scalpels in the house, but we have plenty of shaving razors.”

Caroline: Caroline shakes her head. “I don’t want to risk scars.”

GM: “There’s always scar revision surgery, if it comes down to it. We did that for Yvonne.”

Caroline: “What happened there?” she asks, pointing to one of the nearby bodies.

GM: Cécilia looks away. “What hap-”

Caroline: Caroline raises the woman’s wrist to her mouth and opens two perfect little holes with the blades as sharp as any razor where she used to have eyeteeth. Blades specifically designed to create deep bleeding wounds.

“Cup your hand?” she directs without hesitation orienting Cécilia’s wrist so the blood runs down and pools into her palm.

GM: “Oh!” Cécilia exclaims, giving a little start as Caroline’s fangs penetrate her. It’s a milder reaction by far, though, next to when she used the knife.

But what’s comparatively gentle for Cécilia is less so for Caroline.

It’s only the faintest of tastes. The inevitable contact between canine and blood without any effort to suck the latter.

The Ventrue almost doubles over from the nightshade-like whiff of poison she scents running through her sister’s veins.

Caroline: She spits the poisonous residue in her mouth into the darkness away from them in a very unladylike manner.

GM: Cécilia examines the already welling wound appreciatively. “Oh, I see. Thank you, Caroline. I suppose it’s no s… are you all right?” she questions as the Ventrue spits.

Caroline: “It’s fine,” Caroline answers, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand.

GM: Cécilia’s face shows realization.

“You almost tasted my blood. I’m so sorry I didn’t warn you.”

Caroline: Caroline gives a weak smile. “I didn’t warn you either. But I don’t think you’ll be winning any prizes at a vintage club.”

GM: “True. I suppose that makes us even enough,” Cécilia smiles back. Her face grows graver though as she explains, “Maman doesn’t want any Kindred using us as vessels. Our blood is poison. They’ll be killing themselves if they try.”

Caroline: “Good,” comes Caroline’s smug response. If she’d had any intention of drinking from Cécilia—if she hadn’t specifically been trying to avoid doing so—there’s no way she could have avoided at least one mouthful of poison.

She doesn’t imagine most of the family’s dangers are from other vampires specifically, but it’s good to know any foolish lick that stops one of her sisters on the street will get… far more than they expect, even if it is everything they deserve.

GM: “Maman’s laid protections on us against common attacks. Feeding, disciplines, ghouling… I don’t know that they’ll apply to you, though, given that you’re already Kindred.”

Caroline: “I keep a sword for most of those problems,” comes Caroline’s dry reply.

GM: Cécilia gives a faint laugh. “Yes, I suppose you wouldn’t need them as much anyway.”

Caroline: She guides Cécilia’s blood-filling hand around to each point in sequence.

“They’re still dangers. I’ve had vampires that wanted to feed on me, even after I was Embraced, and enjoyed the non-too-subtle touch of more than one discipline. But no lick on the street is likely to get the better of me in that way.” Especially not now, with the power she’s ripped from the bishop’s blood, and with her sire’s protection.

She remembers the last group that tried jumping her on the street. Remembers them getting burned at the trial like the trash they were. After she beat them into torpor.

GM: Kindred fangs can leave very, very deep punctures. They have to, after all. Caroline can well attest as to her (and any Kindred’s, except maybe thin-bloods’) ability to totally exsanguinate a vessel through those two points and some slowly determined sucking.

Cécilia doesn’t make do with a cursory drop. She lets a lot of blood flow. A lot of blood. She starts to look woozy, almost inebriated, and very, very pale. She eventually forgoes standing altogether and gets down on her knees.

“Maybe… Maman could help there… if you could still… find it… use…”

She gestures as if to finish the sentence.

Cécilia slowly runs her hands over the lines between each of the points. She gets it everywhere. The punctures are deep, but not very wide. It takes a long time.

Caroline: The Ventrue carefully monitors Cécilia as she bleeds. Most licks, she imagines, get pretty good at judging blood loss. She likes to think her background gives her a further leg up. They hit a point after which she looks at her sister and simply declares, “Enough.”

GM: Cécilia dully shakes her head.

“I don’t know… this is enough… for a… good body…”

She slowly rolls back the sleeve of her sleeping robe, fumbles for the knife, and starts searching for an artery.

“Need… to keep the others… safe…”

Caroline: Caroline snatches the knife from her sister’s hand with all the effort it would take to snatch it from a child’s.

“It’s enough, Cécilia,” she says more forcefully. “I’d sooner array all my ghouls around the family in a ring of steel than let you spill another drop.”

“You’ve done enough,” she continues more softly, as she reaches and cuts away a strip of her sister’s nightgown sleeve.

GM: Cécilia weakly shakes her head again.

“I… know you don’t… want me… but it won’t… be enough… this… is worth it… to have… Maman… full strength…”

Caroline: Caroline uses one hand to lift Cécilia’s gaze to her own.

“Not with you in trade,” she answers. “I wouldn’t let any vessel give this much if I wasn’t trying to hurt them.”

GM: “Carol… they, we need her…” Cécilia protests. “I don’t know how long… the house’s… will last…”

She dumbly reaches for the knife.

Caroline: “Far less long than it will without you,” Caroline almost snaps.

She bites her lip as she eyes Cécilia’s still-bleeding wrist. She doesn’t know how much longer they have down here, and doesn’t trust an improvised bandage given the depth of the wound.

She takes Cécilia’s wounded wrist in one hand, tucking the knife behind her and out of Cécilia’s reach, then mentally prepares herself for a moment. This is going to hurt. But what had she told her sister? Pain is different when it isn’t going to inflict permanent wounds.

The Ventrue swipes the scrap of robe across Cécilia’s wrist to wipe the wound as clean as she can, and immediately, cobra-quick, leans in to lick the wound closed.

GM: Caroline is fast enough to not only get the two punctures, but the knife slashes across Cécilia’s hands as well. Kindred ‘saliva’ truly does possess miraculous properties, though when she considers it next to what vitae can already do, she supposes its relative efficacy is consistent.

“Oh, Caroline… you didn’t have…” Cécilia starts. “Thank you… but we need… I don’t keep the others safe… like Maman…”

Caroline: The Ventrue spits again, hacking up the poison even as it burns. Poison born in the darkness. But then, she’s no petty creature of darkness either, is she? The strength of two ancient evils runs within her. She’s stained her soul black enough as it is.

Let the poison have what it can take. She’s a creature of poison in a way few Kindred ever are.

Besides, whispers the poison, isn’t it your fault Cécilia is here doing this tonight in the first place? Your fault Simmone woke up in terror. Your fault Abélia ‘died.’ And you can’t even make it right. Cécilia has to. She has to suffer for you.

Caroline tries to ignore the voice in her head keeping score with her mother and sisters. The ways they’ve saved her already. How poorly she’s repaid them in turn. She tries, but the voice cuts through all the same. Claire’s voice always did.

She looks back up at her sister. “Don’t you?” she asks without irony.

“You’re the only one who knows the truth, about everything. You’re the bridge between her, me, them, and everything else in the night. You’re the one here tonight when she can’t be, and the one who’s taken care of them for years. Who kept them here, safe through the day.”

“They need you every bit as much as they need her, now as much as ever.”

The I need you goes unsaid.

GM: Cécilia looks at Caroline for a moment with drooping eyes, then slumps against her sister’s shoulder.

“You’re… you’re right… I’m just scared for them, if… Gettis… or… other… Maman has enemies…”

Caroline: “I know,” Caroline replies, laying a hand on the back of Cécilia’s head to hold her. “But you don’t have to be afraid. He does.”

“Because he’s not in the shadows anymore. He’s not safe. The sheriff and the hounds will hunt him. The prince will hunt him. And we will hunt him.”

GM: “But what… if he… if something… comes for us…?”

Caroline: Caroline looks around the basement. “Looks like there’s plenty of space to stack their bodies down here.”

GM: Cécilia gives a faint laugh. “That’s… morbid…”

Caroline: “I mean it, Cécilia. Anyone who comes for any of you, anyone who even tries, anyone who even thinks about it. I’ll bury them in a shallow grave just like I’m going to bury Gettis. But not before I pry a scream from him to match every one he ever inflicted on Simmone in kind.”

GM: Cécilia gives another faint, half-coughed laugh.

“It’s no wonder… Yvette looks up… to you. There a lot of… Maman in you… both of you…”

Caroline: “In all of us, Cécilia,” Caroline answers.

GM: “You’re such a… good sister… Caroline. I feel like… you were just waiting… to be…”

Caroline: “Maybe I was. But I am now.”

GM: “It’s nice… having someone I can be… open with… about everything…”

Caroline: “Yes,” Caroline agrees. “Yes, it is.”

GM: Cécilia weakly motions at the pentagram.

“Let’s… try now…”

Caroline: Caroline props up her sister from the side, letting Cécilia lean on her. “What do we do next?” she asks.

GM: “Trid… eka… gramm,” Cécilia murmurs. She leans heavily on Caroline. “Draw… extra lines… no blood…”

Caroline: Caroline takes the knife from where she put it and studies the pentagram for a moment, outlining in her head where to put the next lines before she accidentally defaces the oh-so-costly pentagram.

GM: It takes some time to carefully draw the extra points, but Caroline’s hand is nothing if not steady. Cécilia waits patiently, tells Caroline to “say the words as I say them,” and then crawls up to the pentagram’s edge as her sister finishes.

“Mater… autem diligunt te. Mater… venerit ad nos.”

(“Maman… we love you. Maman… come back to us.”)

Caroline: Caroline kneels beside her sister and does as she instructs, her own voice steady beside Cécilia’s wavering one.

“Mater… autem diligunt te. Mater… venerit ad nos.”

(“Maman… we love you. Maman… come back to us.”)

GM: The response is immediate.

The red blood turns black and rolls across the extraneous indentations, filling all thirteen. The pentagram’s center space turns pitch black too. Then the other spaces do, seeming to fall away into a starless void one by one.

But that void is not empty.

A shape slowly approaches from within. Huge like a lunar eclipse drawn impossibly close to earth, and swollen like the abdomen of some monstrously bloated spider. The chamber plunges into near-darkness as sight warps, sound shudders, and wetly dripping rents open in the air behind the pentagram, as if reality is bleeding from the presence’s arrival. Its grotesque bulk seems at once behind, below, above, and adjacent to those rents, impossible for Caroline to perceive in its true size and dimensions, yet hedged in by the pentagram. Enormous tendrils like a spider’s disjointed legs or a kraken’s tentacles swim against the barrier.

Cécilia reaches forward to rub her hand over the blood-inscribed pentagram—a catastrophic decision if there is also a binding circle in place, Caroline knows, that would ruin the binding and allow a summoned entity free reign to do as it pleased.

Caroline: Caroline received only brief but all-too terrifying glimpses of Abélia’s might in the past. Of course calling her forth would be a summoning. Hasn’t she ever seemed to exist halfway in another world? Still, to see the ritual of her return so nakedly exposed for what it is plants questions.

Questions about where it is they call her from. Where she came from. Even what she is. This warper of time and space, rewritter of history, implanter of forbidden lore.

Questions aplenty, but no doubts. Abélia is less than—or more than—human, but then isn’t Caroline? Does it make her less capable of genuine affection? Less caring of those she loves?

Caroline doesn’t think so, and she doesn’t stop her sister from shattering the binding. Cécilia doesn’t bind Abélia. She releases her.

Caroline does not desire to change that.

GM: An earthquake-like shudder wracks the earth beneath Caroline’s knees, the air around her ears, as if the very elements are moaning in protest against the presence’s arrival. Color leeches from Cécilia’s blonde hair, pale skin, blue eyes, rose sleeping robe, leaving only muted grays. The Ventrue looks down at her own hands and sees a shot out of a black and white film. Caroline’s, her sister’s, and all the room’s shadows flicker like guttering flames, then tear themselves free, racing towards the omnidimensional heart of darkness at the center of the pentagram. The churning, whirpool-like maw swallows them greedily, seems to swell vaster still, vaster than even the boundary-less chamber can contain, and then explodes. Darkness seeps over everything like a foul black tide. It seeps into Caroline’s clothing, her hair, her orifices, the pores of her skin, and deeper still. She can’t see anymore. There’s just black.

But still, somehow, there is another blackness. Even deeper.

Cécilia’s blood.

It rises from the pentagramaic grooves, swelling into an amorphous, gelatin-like shape and form. But the process is not like it was in Maldonato’s office. The shape jerkingly shudders, twists, explodes, and collapses as if it’s being run through a meat grinder. Pale skin grows, stretches, pops, and runs like melted wax. Bones snap, crunch, and shatter. Organs wetly burst like overripe fruits. Eyes pop. Matted black hair blossoms from lymph nodes heart vessels like rapacious weeds, then sizzles away beneath running stomach acids. Suffering flesh weeps red. But there is no red and there is no flesh. Maman wouldn’t have any of them if Caroline were to cut her open, and she can’t see anything anyway, just a writhing, even blacker shape in the gloom, a roaring midnight tide downpouring into a too-small, too-brittle vessel.

The Caroline opens her eyes, and it’s all gone. The room and its occupants have color and shadows and all those things that everything is supposed to have again.

Caroline’s new mother, garbed in the same navy-midnight dress, strides out from the pentagram. Her expression melts as she looks upon the two sisters.

“Oh, my poor, sweet Caroline,” she croons. “Oh, my poor, dear Cécilia.”

She sinks to her knees and cradles the pair’s heads against her bosom.

“You have hurt, for me. You have feared, for me. You have suffered, for me.”

Soft hands stroke Caroline’s and Cécilia’s hair.

“My precious, darling daughters. No treasures among Solomon’s riches or the Templars’ hoards could be as priceless to me as you.”

Cécilia, still so pale from her bleeding, all but melts into Abélia’s embrace. Caroline can see the relief in her still-drooped eyes, the childlike instinct to curl up against someone older, someone wiser, someone who loves you, and to let them simply take care of you.

“Maman… you’re back…”

“Of course I am, sweet child,” their mother purrs. “No force within creation may keep me apart from you who are my blood.”

Cécilia offers no reply. She simply lies against Abélia and lets their mother hold her.

Caroline: Coming from someone else, perhaps anyone else, Abélia’s words might seem patronizing. Mocking. Even ridiculous.

They don’t from Abélia.

Perhaps because it’s been so long—if ever—since Caroline heard unadulterated praise. Perhaps because she’s so tired of being worthless in the eyes of others. Perhaps because it’s Abélia, because the monster clad in her sister’s dark blood, has been so good to her, has given her no reason to doubt her genuine affection.

Because she walked into Perdido House with her, knowing what would happen. Because she was her shield against the seneschal’s rape of her mind. Because she showed Caroline the truth when everyone else cloaked everything in only lies. Because she adopted Caroline when she had literally nothing else, and has given her a family that loves her.

And maybe because the dark cynical voice in her head, that whispers not to trust, not to believe, and not to hope in Claire’s most patronizing voice is nowhere to be found around her.

She doesn’t melt into her mother’s arms. She’s not weak, not hurting, not afraid, in the same way that her sister is. Not now. But she does glow under her attention, under the soft touch of this otherworldly entity of ineffable size and darkness that she calls simply:

Mother.

GM: “Adoption?” Abélia chuckles, running her hand through Caroline’s hair.

“No, my dear. I do not believe in adoption. I find it piteous, even tragic, that mortals would willingly accept a figurative cuckoo’s egg into their nest and raise the chickling as their own.”

Caroline: “Metaphorically,” Caroline clarifies, with a hint of a smile.

GM: “A mother cannot adopt her own blood, dear child. The very notion is superfluous. You are of my blood. Our blood. Your sister has told you thusly: your life is my life. My life is your life. No cuckoo’s chickling may share what we share.”

“You have joined our family later than your sisters—but then, has not Simmone after you? She is no less our blood than Cécilia.”

Caroline: “I didn’t mean to convey any doubts as to that,” Caroline defends. “Only my gratitude that you were there when I was at my worst. Regardless of the circumstances.”

GM: Abélia chuckles again.

“You do not doubt, my dear. You have doubted many things, and rightly. But this I know you do not.”

Caroline: “Not you,” Caroline answers.

GM: Her hand brushes the Ventrue’s cheek as her dark eyes meet Caroline’s pale blue ones. Then she says the three words Caroline had yet to hear:

“I love you, Caroline.”

“I love you with all of my heart and all of my soul. I love you for all that you have been and all that you now are. It gladdens me that you are of Caine’s blood as well as mine own. If the world burnt to preserve our family’s lives, then creation would be so much the better. Let the kine die in droves to slake your thirst. If their blood makes you strong, then the trade is a worthy one! To know you are strong is pleasing to me.”

“I love you, my sweet, precious Caroline. There is so much about you that is so worthy of love.”

Caroline: Caroline glows under Abélia’s words.

Her mother’s praise is better than presents under the tree on Christmas morning. It’s better than her acceptance into Clan Ventrue. It’s better than her sire’s taciturn acknowledgement of her.

It’s her heart’s desire.

It’s an unfamiliar feeling that swells in her breast and nearly brings bloody tears to her eyes.

“Thank you,” she replies, her voice choked with emotion. She leans into the hand cupping her cheek. “I love you too, Maman.”

And I will make you proud.

GM: Abélia smiles benignly as if to say Caroline already has.

“You are one of us now, my dear. One of us in every way. My rebirth has completed your transfiguration.”

The raven-haired woman’s eyes shine.

“You can feel it, can’t you? I hope your new name is pleasing to your ears.”

Caroline: The heiress smiles. “I feel… better than I have in… ever,” she admits.

And she does. Like she can be who she really is.

No. That’s not quite right.

Like she actually is who she always has been.

“Malveaux-Devillers.” She runs the name over her tongue slowly. “Yes, I rather like it.” Her blue eyes glitter. “I mean, I’ve been using it my entire life, so I’d hope so.”

GM: Abélia’s dark ones twinkle.

“Some things never fail to bring us joy, when we but pause to think of them.”

The content smile spreads.

“Daughters chiefly among such.”

Soft yet heavy footsteps sound from the stairs.

Abélia looks down at Cécilia, silent but for the steady intake of her breath. Her eyes are closed.

“Your sister has given so much of herself for us, I suppose it is no surprise Hypnos has claimed her. Come, let us see her to bed.”

The faceless servant emerges from the gloom. It silently bends to pick up Cécilia’s sleeping form between its arms.

Caroline: “I’m worried about her,” Caroline answers, watching carefully as the faceless servant takes up her sister. “She takes on too much.”

GM: “You and she are the responsible ones in the family,” her mother smiles, brushing a hair from Cécilia’s face as they proceed up the steps. “It is little wonder you are so close. I am gladdened that you shall now be able to alleviate her labors—and she your own.”

“But burdens shared are not always burdens halved. Is there a course with your sister you might counsel, Caroline, to ease those burdens’ weight?”

Caroline: “Only caution, Maman,” Caroline replies. “Left to her own devices this night, she might have bled herself dry, might still be bleeding, in her desire to protect her sisters.”

GM: “Yes, we must see to it that such a thing cannot occur again,” Abélia concurs. “There are components to the ritual I have withheld from her, in a decision that was perhaps selfish and unwise. But they are components you, perhaps, may be better-suited to perform.”

Caroline espies it out of the corner of her eye just as the cold chamber recedes into the gloom.

Claire’s last clothes.

On one of Abélia’s husks.

Caroline: “Even without, if my blood can substitute, that is a far better option,” Caroline answers. “She…”

The Ventrue’s voice dies as she spots the clothing.

GM: Abélia and the faceless man pause in their ascent.

“What is it, sweet child?”

Caroline: She looks back to where she saw Claire’s clothing.

“I thought I saw something,” Caroline answers, turning back to face Abélia. “But it wasn’t anything that mattered.”

GM: Caroline’s new mother smiles as she lays a hand upon her shoulder.

“All that matters, my dear, stands before us here.”

---

Monday night, 7 March 2016, AM

GM: It’s not a long walk to Cécilia’s bedroom, even in the large house. Abélia resumes as they make their way,

“I fear that this body, for all the selflessness of your sister’s sacrifice, is less than my prior ones. It shall not last for a great many workings, nor withstand my greatest workings without equally great harm. I shall confine myself to the house to better conserve its strength.”

Caroline: Caroline frowns. “Could I make a stronger one? With enough of my blood? I can give far more than she ever will.”

GM: “Yes and no, my dear.”

“Your blood shall suffice as well as Cécilia’s to create future receptacles for my essence. Better, in fact, for the reasons you have observed.”

“You could pay the price to create another body for me now, were you inclined. However, it would avail us but little. Much of my essence is housed within this body. For that essence to be released, this body must be destroyed.”

Caroline: Caroline nods. “Something for the future, then… can your current body be fortified?”

GM: Abélia smiles at Caroline’s quick grasp of the consequences. “Clever girl. The bishop’s soul has only further expanded your mind, has it not? He was always a bright one.”

Caroline: “And honed my senses. It was necessary,” Caroline echoes her previous comment on the matter. “The seneschal’s plan alone will fail.”

The Ventrue looks at her mother. “But you knew that.”

GM: Abélia smiles contently.

“It fills me with pride how you continue to increase your powers, my dear. Adeline shall not rest so easily upon her laurels as the family’s ‘smartest’, now.”

Caroline: “I don’t expect he will be the last,” Caroline concedes.

GM: “Whom shall you sup upon next? It is never too early to start laying one’s plans.”

Caroline: “Someone mightier,” Caroline answers. “The bishop helped, but he wasn’t enough. Not for what I need.”

GM: “Hmm,” Abélia says thoughtfully, “a true elder, perhaps. By this city’s reckoning, at least. Whom among their ranks have most displeased you?”

Caroline: “She already met her end,” Caroline replies savagely.

GM: “Yes, it is a shame her Blood could not have been put to better use. I know of but few Cainites who might have brought you closer to the Dark Father.”

“Utham would never conceive of such a thing, of course, even though her soul might have strengthened his.”

Caroline: “Of the remaining…” Caroline muses. “Much depends on how the cards lay when the seneschal and the prince have cast them. There are only so many pieces I can pull from the tower before it crumbles.”

GM: “Indeed, my dear. Better that we push it ourselves so you might seize the choicest pieces ere the tower crumbles.”

Caroline: “I would sooner remake it in my image than tear it down. Chaos breeds violence.”

GM: “All succumbs to ruin in due course, dear child. Chaos is ineluctable.”

“Alder John occurs to me as an elder who dwells in comparative isolation from that tower, nevertheless. You are not overly fond of him, are you?”

Caroline: “No,” Caroline agrees. “I am not.”

An understatement.

“But if I were to choose a name from those in the city—that I know of… Opal has made herself the prince’s foe, and Chastain seems poorly of use of her blood these nights.”

GM: Abélia halts immediately.

Caroline: Caroline pauses. “Or have I misjudged things?”

GM: Her mother’s dark eyes silently roam hers.

“You know not what you say, dear child,” she finally states. “There are truths concerning one of the Cainites whom you name that must, and shall, be made clear to you.”

Caroline: “I am a humble vessel for such truths,” Caroline replies.

GM: Her mother’s smile returns.

“There is little in you that is humble. Your pride gives me much to take pride in.”

Caroline: The Ventrue’s grin is positively wolfish.

GM: “It has been starved for so long, hasn’t it, like a radiant flower denied sun and water? Starved and denied by those who presume themselves your betters. It shall pleasure me immeasurably to see that pride blossom in more verdurous conditions.”

Caroline: “They’re coming. Perhaps even here,” Caroline answers. “I can feel it, like the first drops of rain from a summer storm. I just wish it hadn’t taken so long.”

GM: “You have eternity, my dear,” her mother replies contently. “Take heed from this: an immortal’s ambitions may never outlive her.”

Caroline: “Will they?” she asks in sudden concern. “Get old? Die?”

GM: “Of course not, sweet child,” Abélia answers consolingly. “I would not have your sisters face so ignoble a thing as old age. We love them with all of our hearts. Why should we ever wish to let them go?”

“Why should so distasteful a thing as death spell an end to our family?”

Caroline: The Ventrue lets out a breath she didn’t realize she was holding.

“It shouldn’t,” she replies firmly. Perhaps selfishly. Gratefully.

GM: “Some of their futures pose a greater dilemma to me than others. Simmone has told me many times that she does not wish to grow up, and I do not wish to be without a child upon my knee.”

Caroline: A forever child. Not a fate Caroline would ever wish, but she can see it in Simmone. She recalls Pearl’s herald in a similar role and distantly wonders how the ‘girl’ feels about that.

GM: “Cécilia and I discussed, what did she call them, ‘hormone blockers’ to delay the onset of womanhood pursuant to more permanent recourses. ‘Blockers’, however, are apparently unable to prevent further height growth. More is the pity. Simmone’s time to remain a child is swiftly elapsing.”

“Cécilia told me you once studied to become a physician. Are you aware of any medicines that might forestall further growth?”

Caroline: “The opposite,” Caroline answers quietly. “High hormone doses have had success in stopping growth, but brings on the onset of puberty more quickly.”

GM: “Your sister mentioned hormone blockers accelerated growth for girls. It appears we shall have to turn elsewhere than the sciences of mankind.”

Caroline: “Not only accelerates, but perpetuates. The longer she’s on them, the taller she’ll grow.”

GM: “Simmone’s continued childhood remains a pressing matter, to be certain, yet not one so pressing we need it address tonight,” Abélia states as the four enter Cécilia’s bedroom. It’s a clean and neatly organized space, with family pictures (that include Caroline) and a few pieces of art to liven up the walls. The faceless man lies Cécilia down upon the bed. Abélia sits and strokes her forehead.

“She is such a role model to your sisters. So responsible. I must not forget she is still a child, too.”

Caroline: “And vulnerable,” Caroline answers. “Or, perhaps, fragile is a better word.”

GM: Abélia smiles down at her daughter wistfully as the faceless man silently withdraws from the room.

“As to your prior question, my dear.”

“Much of my essence is bound within the house, your sisters, and you. My present vessel’s rate of decay may be postponed by remaining close to those things. Less puissant and less frequent workings of power may also prolong its lifespan.”

Caroline: Caroline muses, “Would it be better then if I slept here, during the day?”

GM: Abélia gives a fluttering laugh. “Such a quick mind. Your sister and I had intended to ask you that very same thing, sweet child, though the extension of my present body’s lifespan was not among our reasons.”

Caroline: “But it would help extend its lifespan,” Caroline presses.

She pauses. “I had not intended to—I didn’t want to draw more attention to the family, but…”

GM: Abélia cups Caroline’s chin beneath her hand and raises it to meet her eyes.

“Blood defends its own, Caroline. There is no truer demonstration of love than sacrifice. I dare any power that names you foe to assail you within these walls. This body is less than I am wont to inhabit. But my power here remains strong, and I shall defend my young with ferocity to match any lioness.”

“No force shall harm you here while I yet draw breath to seek its annihilation. This I swear.”

Caroline: Caroline lays a hand on her mother’s arm. “I have—had—no doubt of my safety. But I would bring no others to the doorstep of my mother or sisters without cause.”

GM: Abélia’s dark eyes glint.

“Blood defends its own, my child. Your battles are our battles.”

“Now,” she continues as if the matter is settled, “as to interrupted matters.”

“This body shall join the husks below the house in due course. A gradual death is kinder upon your sisters than a sudden death, as are less frequent ones. Most of my vessels’ deaths go unnoticed, save within the darkest and most slumbering corners of your dreams.”

“What I have perhaps erred in not telling your sister,” she strokes Cécilia’s head, “is that blood alone is a paltry sacrifice before other offerings. I must be fed, my dear. In lives. Almost any mortal’s or night-folk’s shall do. A handful of blood from you or your sisters may then restore me to my full puissance in a new body.”

“The sacrifice must be slain within the circle you saw below and dedicated specifically to my name. Any other corpse is of limited but not nonexistent use. I require less blood to reshape an existing body than to fashion a new one from nothing—or to be precise, from the blood shed in my name.”

“The blood shed by your sister is the whole of my present body. For that reason, it is a poor vessel. Blood is a lesser sacrifice than a life.”

“You, however, could shed such a degree of blood without lasting harm, were you unable or unwilling to sacrifice a life in my name. What is death to the kine is starvation and torpor to you.”

Caroline: Caroline considers for only a moment. “You were wise not to tell her. Cécilia would do anything for her sisters. For you. I don’t think she’d even hesitate, if it came down to it.”

The Ventrue looks down at her sleeping, oh so pale sister. “But that’s not a burden she should carry.” She looks back at their mother. “Not when I’m here.”

GM: Abélia smiles that same serenely content smile as she strokes Cécilia’s and then Caroline’s cheeks.

“No treasure among Solomon’s riches or the Templars’ hoards would enrich me as greatly,” she repeats.

Caroline: What’s another murder? Nothing, for her family. She can think of plenty of people that need killing, and no better reason.

Part of her quakes at how readily that decision is made, but here, now, in this house, it’s a very small part indeed. Like an ant trying to make itself heard before an elephant.

“Speaking of,” Caroline continues after a moment, “the seneschal instructed me to put affairs here in the city in order, for a period. I don’t know how long.”

GM: “Perhaps that is little surprise,” her mother reflects. “What affairs would you see to here, dear child—and which ones might your sisters and I aid you in?”

Caroline: Caroline muses for a moment. “Large items are managing the cover-up of Claire’s death, especially the transition between the seneschal directing my ‘coordination’ with the bishop and handing off the effort entirely.”

“Cleaning house here with the physical security. I’ve already set one of the seneschal’s agents to investigate them. I’m going to shift some of my people over to take the lead on overall security. It’ll also provide an opportunity to fold in some recent assets I’ve acquired since Claire’s death and keep them engaged if I’m gone any extended period.”

She muses a moment longer, her fist before her face, “Inserting tendrils and control over the Malveauxes. I don’t know that there will be immediate interest in conceding that domain to me, but when I win that battle I’d be ready to take action immediately.”

GM: Abélia nods. “Yes, my dear. After the bishop is found to have met final death, to be certain—and you may invite scrutiny as someone who sought to gain from the crime if you appear too interested in his holdings too quickly.”

She smiles proudly as she cups her hand along Caroline’s cheek.

“But nor is my daughter one to wait upon the beneficence of another. She will claim what is hers, and allow others to think it was bestowed by their hands.”

“The security means naught to me while our family is gathered in this place. They are there for your sisters’ peace of mind. Do as you will with them.”

Caroline: “I don’t fear for them here,” the Ventrue replies. “Nor can I truly protect them out there if someone is willing to die for it. But I can make the cost of doing so high. Make them force themselves in the open. Perhaps buy time for them to get away.”

GM: “Little may turn aside a determined will,” Abélia concurs. “Take whatever measures you see fit.”

Caroline: The Ventrue nods. “As for the Malveauxes, I think another making a move on them—or being thought to—may encourage them properly.”

GM: “What a splendid thought, my dear. What Cainites would you strike a blow against who might also harbor plausible interest in the family?”

Caroline: “Pierpont McGinn’s growing interest in kine politics is well known, and he is not a piece simply removed by the prince in response,” Caroline offers. She does not comment on the many slights she’s endured at his hand.

“The same might be true of Marcel Guilbeau, eager to sink his teeth back into the state’s politics.” She doesn’t use either Kindred’s titles with her mother.

“A would-be prince—but not obvious foe to the prince—is an ideal candidate, I think, since it makes it less simple to simply harm them for him,” Caroline muses.

GM: “Plausible motives, my dear. What gain would you seek by sowing discord between either of these Cainites and the prince?”

Abélia seems content to leave prolonged discussion on that matter to the future, however, before bringing up others.

“Why, I see you’ve brought a fille à la casquette with you! They are such precious things. Do take care of her, Caroline. If you must sacrifice one of Philip’s servants, sacrifice the Nubian.”

“I shall prepare a secure haven in anticipation of your return. I can hardly wait for you to meet your other sisters as their sister—Yvette and Yvonne have been so distraught over that unfortunate business with Sarah. But there is little they will not forgive among family.”

She strokes Cécilia’s hair, then states, “There is one final matter before you leave us, dear child.”

Abélia bares a smooth, milk-pale breast. Black blood wells from the nipple.

“Do you thirst?”

Caroline: The truth is she always thirsts. It’s always there, lurking in the background. She can feel the Beast stir at the sight of the blood, feel it scenting the air, its senses—her senses—sharpening even past the razor’s edge they already at.

She shoves back at it, jerks the choke chain tight around the monster’s throat as she keeps her hold on the slavering Beast, lest she become one.

Caroline swallows.

“Constantly,” she admits, her eyes fixated on the leaking blood despite her efforts, her teeth coming to points. “But not such that I’d harm you.”

“You need your strength, the others need your strength.”

GM: Abélia runs a finger along Caroline’s protruding fangs, her face as tender as when she stroked Cécilia’s hair. She lifts her new daughter’s chin to meet her gaze.

“What is every child’s foremost need? What is every mother’s foremost wish, but to place food on the table by the sweat of her brow?”

“I shall suffer none of my daughters to go hungry. Let me provide for you, sweet child. Let me sustain you.”

She cups a hand around Caroline’s neck, encouraging but not forcing the Ventrue’s lips closer towards the sanguine welling.

“Let me feed you.”

Caroline: Abélia wants to do it. Caroline wants the blood. Down to her bones, she wants the blood. Why am I resisting?

Because she doesn’t want to appear weak? Because this idea that she shouldn’t be ashamed of a want is so new? Because she doesn’t want to hurt the people she cares for? Because it’s an act of intimate vulnerability she’s so accustomed to hiding?

But then, would she hesitate to offer anything to her child, if she had one? Wouldn’t it hurt her more if they turned from what she offered? Doesn’t she want to be close to Abélia? She already knows she wants the blood.

The Ventrue bends her neck and drinks.

GM: It’s not like any prior feeding Caroline has experienced. There’s no penetration or horizontal suction: she need merely wrap her lips around the breast’s tip and suck. Gravity aids the natural flow, and Abélia cushions her hand around the back of Caroline’s head to keep her close and the breast snugly in place. It feels less like she’s taking and more like she’s receiving.

Taste floods her mouth.

Where her sire’s blood made her all but gag at the burning strength, as if she were unworthy, her mother’s as the inverse: a whirlpool that irresistibly drags everything in. It tastes like midnight. It tastes like the ocean’s deepest, blackest depths: bone-crushingly heavy, and yet welcoming, as if she were a diver in a suit. It’s sweet like honey, thick like molasses, and fast-flowing like water. It rolls down Caroline’s gullet in a thick, warm stream, and the Ventrue has the sudden, id-driven thought that it’s been months since she ate anything this solid. That she should be starving to death. Abélia runs her other hand through Caroline’s hair and whispers,

“Fill yourself, my child… my sweet, precious child… Maman is here. You are safe, you are loved, and you shall not go hungry…”

Caroline: At Abélia’s urging, she doesn’t. The blood—if it even blood—flows, a seemingly unending stream of bliss, an inky darkness that is satisfying like no other vitae or blood ever has been. Satisfying in a way that makes everything else less satisfying just for its existence.

She has no doubt that Abélia would let her drink her fill, and part of her wants to. But not all of her. Not as much as part of her wants Abélia strong. Needs Abélia to be strong.

There are limits to her own desires, her own needs.

She pulls away, savoring the last drops, and looks up at her mother.

GM: Abélia gently dabs Caroline’s lips and wipes her fingers against the vampire’s tongue, ensuring she gets every last drop.

“There, sweet child… you are sated? You are strong?”

Caroline: “Yes, Mother,” the Ventrue answers, the darkness still fresh on her tongue. “Strong enough, for what is to come. Strong enough to make you proud.”

GM: “You already have, my dear,” Caroline’s new mother smiles beatifically, cupping her cheek.
“You already have—and do.”

---

Monday night, 7 March 2016, AM

GM: At the Ventrue’s behest, Abélia answers and discusses several remaining matters before she takes her leave.

The ritual to summon her, she clarifies, must be performed within the Walter Robinson House. It doesn’t have to be performed within the specific chamber where Caroline and Cécilia did so, but that room is preferable for obvious reasons.

“Your younger sisters are not yet ready to know of such things.”

Caroline: “Will they, eventually?” Caroline asks.

GM: “That shall depend upon them, my dear,” her mother answers.

“If Simmone is to remain a child forever, she shall not. If I believe the knowledge would unduly burden the others’ souls, they shall not.”

“Cécilia has always been the responsible one. The role model. The eldest. I have inducted her alone into the truth thus far.”

Caroline: “Yvette.” Caroline speaks her sister’s name as half-question, half-suggestion.

GM: Abélia smiles proudly. “Her temperament is well-suited to such knowledge, is it not?”

Caroline: “It could be, and might temper her more… reckless impulses,” Caroline agrees.

GM: “Yet to tell her, as you have observed, is to tell Yvonne. No secrets exist between them. Do you believe your other sister ready for such knowledge?”

Caroline: The heiress reflects for a moment. “Not certainly. And I’m not certain she ever will be. She seems to be other side of the coin from her twin, at a glance.”

GM: Caroline’s new mother pats her hand.

“We need not decide such things at once, dear child. We have all the time in the world.”

Leaving the matter of the twins be for now (“I should also value our Cécilia’s counsel”), Abélia continues that the ritual to reconstitute her body may also be performed upon the Walter Robinson House’s exterior grounds (“not that I expect you or Cécilia shall have cause to do so, my dear… but as a matter of academic interest”)—and within the LaLaurie House.

“Our home away from home,” she smiles.

When Caroline asks if the sacrifice needs to die at a specific point, her mother answers that they do not. The sacrifice must merely be killed within the circle and their life specifically dedicated to Abélia’s.

“There is truthfully no need to even say any words aloud… they merely aid in focusing the spirit.”

Caroline’s sisters are not returning to their normal routines. They have already taken the rest of the week off from school and work.

“They shall remain here until I am at the height of my powers once more.”

“But it shall hardly be a joyless time for them… and I can hardly wait for you to spend the day with us, my dear. Such delights do I have in store for you all.”

Caroline: “I’m rather poor company during the day,” Caroline observes.

GM: Abélia only smiles and strokes Caroline’s cheek.

“Trust Maman, dear child.”

Caroline: “Always,” she agrees.

GM: Her mother’s face is radiant.

“I love you, my sweet Caroline. Being loved agrees with you. I’m only sad it couldn’t have happened sooner.”

Abélia then lifts Cécilia’s sleeping head, presses her daughter’s mouth to her breast, and nurses her on the same midnight blood. Color starts to return to Cécilia’s too-white cheeks.

Caroline: The Ventrue watches with interest, watches the life return to Cécilia with evident relief.

GM: Yet even as it does, Abélia’s breast visibly rots, cracks, and blackens before Caroline’s eyes. Her mother makes a tsking sound and tucks the corpse-like breast away, then tucks Cécilia beneath her bed covers.

Caroline: Caroline needed little more incentive to restore her mother to her full strength. But she has it.

GM: It’s a short walk to Simmone’s room. Abélia lies upon the bed and pulls Simmone into the crook of her arm.

“I shall have this body slumber now, to further slow its decay. Simmone shall awaken in Maman’s arms to find her nightmares long banished.”

Caroline: The Ventrue nods. “How long does it have?”

GM: “Potentially a great deal of time, my dear, if it were to perform no other workings and slumber continuously with you and your sisters by my side. But circumstances are unlikely to be so forgiving.”

“Much awaits for you to do now. If you have need of me before dawn rises, return here. The house shall know.”

Abélia draws Caroline close and plants a tender kiss upon her forehead.

“Go… and know your Maman loves you. Know you have always made me proud.”

There’s no transition from wakefulness to sleep. With those words, Abélia’s body abruptly goes as inert as a discarded puppet. Even its expression is still frozen in the same tranquil smile as it slumps back onto the pillow. When Caroline looks down, she sees no shoes or feet protruding below the hem of her mother’s dress.

Caroline: Caroline lingers for a moment to watch Abélia with Simmone. But only a moment.

The night waits for no one.

Not even her family.

---

Previous, by Narrative: Story Eleven, Caroline XVI
Next, by Narrative: Story Twelve, Emmett II

Previous, by Character: Story Eleven, Caroline XVI
Next, by Character: Story Twelve, Caroline II

“Show me you are loyal.”
Augusto Vidal

---

Monday night, 7 March 2016, AM

GM: Abélia’s corpse is missing from the floor where Caroline last saw it, as is her mother’s severed head. Even the blood on her dress is gone, though she cannot say when that occurred.

Maldonato takes her from his office to a private elevator. He swipes a magnetic card to Perdido House’s top floor. The elevator thrums beneath them.

The elder vampire does not speak.

The journey feels as if it takes a thousand years.

Caroline: Perhaps the silence is intended to give her an opportunity to collect her thoughts. If so, it is misplaced.

Despite everything else, she’s still relieved to see the body missing, and for different reasons received she will not greet her sire soaked in blood.

The seneschal’s interaction with her mother raises many troubling questions, but few new ones. Fallen one. Not a term of endearment. And yet that relationship was not her doom.

A lost son. Her materialization from Caroline’s shadow. Her existence in Caroline’s blood. And yet, doubt with her mother does not plague Caroline. Interest certainly, but never doubt.

There’s enough of that from her ‘father.’

GM: The doors open to darkness. The sweeping foyer is unlit. It is bereft of people. It looks like a tomb.

There’s little decor. No chairs. No tables. No pictures. No plants. No rugs. There’s black marble veneers, some classical-themed carvings. but someone would have to physically tear them from their moorings to get rid of those. The cavernous yet empty chamber reminds Caroline of an elephant graveyard: huge bones bereft of the skin, muscle, and sinew necessary to grant such majestic creatures animation. The atrium is thick with the smell of dust. It doesn’t look like even janitorial services have been up here.

Caroline: At first she wonders about the private elevator. She understands when they emerge. No one can see this.

As destructive as the rumors are of his impending torpor… this is far worse.

GM: There are insects. Roaches. Some ‘fresh’, some withered exoskeletons, all motionless and dead. There’s even the tiny skeleton of a mouse or rat, with a few sorry bits of decayed gristle.

Caroline: Spies, Caroline’s mind fills in.

GM: There are no cobwebs, though. No light, insectile scitterings audible to Caroline’s newly-sensitive ears. Even the vermin here are all dead.

The pair’s echoing footsteps feel like the only sound for miles around. Maldonato does not ascend the staircase, but proceeds down a barren hallway to an unmarked set of wooden double doors. He looks at them but does not knock or reach for the handles. Several moments later, they swing ponderously open on squeaking, neglected hinges.

Caroline stares out across a sweeping executive boardroom, the kind of room that breathes of wealth and privilege—or at least once did. It’s as dusty, empty, and unlit as the rest of the floor. Mortal eyes would be able to make out more than pitch darkness, though, from the meager moonlight that shines through the man-sized window. Rain slides down the dark glass like sullen tears.

She recognizes this place. She remembers the conference table, long enough to seat a score of people, although now its chairs are all gone. The same sword rests upon the table’s dusty surface, pitted and corroded to little more than slag on a hilt. It doesn’t look like it’s ever been moved.

Caroline: The state of the chambers sends Caroline’s heart plummeting. This is not the palace of a prince… except that it is. It’s a reflection of the ‘kingdom.’ Ancient, crumbling, its best years far behind it. Most importantly, it’s been allowed to fall into that state. Decrepit.

Of all the terrors she’d expected to find within Perdido House, this is… in some ways worse.

GM: A solitary chair, tall and thick, an almost anachronistic throne, sits at the table’s head. Its back faces the empty spaces where other chairs would be, as if uninterested in anything its nonexistent occupants might have to say. The throne-like chair silently broods upon the cavernous window and the glittering cityscape that stretches beneath it.


The penthouse view from so many tens upon tens of floors is breathtaking: the entire kingdom laid out like a string of glittering jewels. Under the full light of day, in a conference room full of busily working professionals, it would be a proud sight.

But it’s not. Not either of those things. The view feels brooding. Covetous. The viewer has climbed as high as they may within this city. There is nowhere to go, to plummet, but down.

One might almost wonder whether the building’s—city’s—master even exists. Caroline may have seen him in the flesh, but her kind have no end of ways to deceive one’s senses. She only saw him but once. Perhaps tellingly. One would not wish to subject such a ruse to needless opportunities for scrutiny.

Caroline: She has to, has to focus on something that might offer some kind of hope. The bleakness of the room, of the chamber, of everything she’s seen is oppressive.

This was the fate of this lord of the damned?

GM: Perhaps Vidal died or passed into torpor long ago. Perhaps his continued existence is but a fabrication to keep the fallen prince’s enemies at bay—a gambler’s bluff, so like another slain elder’s continued existence. Maldonato said her allies would wish to maintain the fiction she yet ‘lived.’

Perhaps New Orleans is but a kingdom of smoke and mirrors.

Caroline: Those thoughts pass through her mind, but only fleetingly. The seneschal can be as cruel as any other Kindred, especially when he believes it ‘necessary.’ But while there might have been cause to lead her on were that the case, she can’t find cause to bring her all the way up here for the cruel reveal.

GM: Maldonato does not speak. No words pass in the dead and stale air. There is no sound but the pattering rain and angrily rumbling thunder.

The throne slowly turns.


In St. Patrick’s Cathedral, he was tall, dark, and terrible in his purpose, the fury of heaven matched with the fire of hell. Where Matheson was merely dignified, the arriving prince had surveyed his subjects with the bearing of an emperor. His raiment was a midnight-black suit of the finest cut. Not so much as a crease was visible, making the garment seem cut and spun from the night itself. His pristine white undershirt and and blood-red necktie brought to mind the ermine mantles worn by kings of centuries past. A gold signet ring set with a ruby adorned his finger. The blood-red gem seemed to almost pulse and glisten, hungrily devouring nearby light.

Those trappings are present. But it’s the difference between a throne room filled with cheering throngs for a royal coronation and a years-abandoned one filled with naught but cobwebs and dust. His tall and broad-shouldered frame is folded into a brooding posture, and the shadows about his face are long, black, deep. His crisp Mediterranean features resemble a statue by one of the old masters, not brought to life, but left to crumble and gather dust far from the praising voices of those who might remark upon its majesty. The face is so still Caroline almost wonders if its owner truly is a statue, mockingly dressed, even decorated with a black van dyke mustache, and deposited upon a throne.

One has but to look into the eyes to know that fancy for what it is.

The eyes dominate the shadow-cragged face: cold, fanatical, implacable. Those who stare into them overlong feel dizzy, their mouths warm with the taste of blood. The eyes are primal and inhuman and they are strong. They have seen the passing of kings. Kingdoms. Civilizations. All they knew of the world of their birth swept aside by time’s inexorable march.

He may be dead. His palace may be ruined and rotting. His foes may plot his downfall. Even anticipate it.

But all who gaze upon his face know at once:

He, and no other, is their prince.

Caroline: It would be easy to be disappointed.

Of all the places, of all the ways she might have fantasized about this meeting, this is far from all of them. In a crumbling hall, in a faded chamber that exists more as an echo of greatness than anything resembling it.

Perhaps in some ways she is. But those ways don’t matter. This ruined hall doesn’t matter. The long shadows that crawl across him don’t matter. All that matters is that he’s here, and she’s here before him at last.

GM: The prince and seneschal meet one another’s timeless gazes. No words pass between them.

Finally, Maldonato’s voice is the first to break the silence. It feels like someone has walked across a grave.

“Miss Malveaux, you may inform His Majesty of whom you are.”

Her sire’s dark gaze falls upon Caroline. There is no recognition. There is not even curiosity.

Caroline: The Ventrue can’t help it, at least for a moment, getting drawn into that gaze. She barely hears the seneschal’s words, but barely is enough. She goes to her knees smoothly before the seated prince, white gown brushing aside the dust around her, and reaches for her voice for a moment before she finds it with a sharp breath that is deafening in the still room.

“Your Majesty, I introduced myself once before as Caroline Malveaux, childe of René Baristheaut, childe of Robert Bastien, childe of Lothar Constantine, childe of Dominic de Valois-Burgundy, childe of Gaius Pedius Marcellus, childe of Alexander, childe of Ventrue.”

She gives only the briefest of pauses.

“An introduction I understand is barely worthy of remembrance… and blissfully so, for it was a lie. The line of Ventrue I trace my blood through is not Alexander’s, but Tiamat’s.”

“The blood that runs through my veins… is that of the mightiest and most enduring Camarilla prince in the New World. That of the Prince of New Orleans, Augusto Vidal.”

“Sire.”

GM: Something recognizable finally enters those dark and inhuman eyes. Something Caroline has known well herself, far too well, during the mere months of a Requiem that feels like years.

Puzzlement.

Caroline: The vastly younger Ventrue can sympathize, but remains silent.

GM: There is something else, too. Disbelief. She cannot b…

“Miss Malveaux speaks truly, my prince,” the seneschal answers. “Emmanuel Costa was not the last mortal upon whom you bestowed the Dark Gift. Merely the last mortal upon whom you bestowed it knowingly.”

“I absconded with your vitae without your knowledge. I bestowed it upon a young woman of great promise and faithful service as she lay dying. She stands before you now—and she is of your Blood.”

Silence fills the air, like the calm before a storm.

Then, like a breached levee when Katrina made landfall—that storm breaks.

It feels almost inevitable when it happens. The room’s shadows, thick and heavy as corpse shrouds, surge to life like baying, ravenous beasts. A flood of darkness streaks towards Caroline and the seneschal, black as night with shock, rage, and betrayal.

Maldonato raises his hand. Darkness rises to meet darkness like two crashing ocean waves. The great table is swept into the air, cracking apart into color-leeched pieces that fly every which way before disintegrating into dust. The ruined sword hits the hardwood floor with a clatter.

Caroline: Caroline twists away cat-quick. Away from the clashing elders and the destructive power they’ve unleashed.

This wasn’t how it was supposed to be.

GM: Oily darkness washes over the Ventrue like a thirsty tide. Its waves swim with rending talons, ink-slathered tentacles, and bogeyman’s grasping hands—a child’s night terrors given horrifying semblance and animation. Caroline feels as if she is suffocating, drowning, going blind, and being swallowed into some terrible beast’s gullet all at once.

Yet even as she assailed from without, she is assaulted from within. Fire burns through her veins, white-hot with a mindless fury at once echoed and opposed by her Beast’s instinctive terror. The monster doesn’t even know whether to flee or fight.

In that moment of indecisiveness, she clamps down, grinding it under heel. She can’t give in. Won’t give in. Not now. She’ll face the darkness as herself.

But not by herself.

The dark is not empty.

It seeps in through her skin.

And it sings.

It croons to her with dead children’s sweet, strangled voices.

doomed, doomed, doomed you are
come so far
fallen far
fallen star

strangled child
died in your crib
choke your baby
why why why
no one wants you
only us
killer, killer
father’s dead
father’s ours
coming for you
soon soon soon

mother will eat you
daddy’s dead
daddy’s us
come this way
sister, sister
please please pray

daddy, daddy, kill me now
daddy, daddy, I’m going to hell
mother, mother, what to do
mother, mother, I see you

brother, brother, here you come
brother, brother, so much fun…

Caroline: Caroline clenches her teeth at the taunting, twisted song, as it plays off her fears and doubts, fights even as she drowns in it, as it bubbles up around her and engulfs her, seeping into every opening, invasive, penetrating, piercing. They’re just words. But they’re not just words.

GM: They’re not. They’re black and bleeding and painful, like a foul cancer welling in one’s throat. For the darkness is hungry. Wailing cries and other, far less human sounds shrieks in Caroline’s ears as she leaps, twists, and ducks to avoid the worst of the pain. She’s not even sure if she’s trying to avoid a physical adversary or obstacle, but the whirlwind-fast Ventrue feels little worse, even as the blackness drowns her surroundings… little worse, but for several hairs that fall from her head. She doesn’t know how she can see the drifting strands, but she can. They’ve been leached of all color, as if run through a black and white film.

Then, abruptly, the storm of shadows halts. Sight returns, and after a moment, color. Half-animate shadows, grotesquely out of alignment from where they should fall, slink back into place like a child’s imagined monsters retreating back under the bed.

Several slither away from Caroline, their umbral appendages positioned over the Ventrue as if shielding her.

Maldonato stands where Caroline saw him last. His arms are defensively outstretched, but slowly relaxing as the shadows recede.

Vidal broods from his throne. Fangs jut from his mouth as he palpably wrestles his Beast. His black gaze burns like a white-hot, half-forged spear as it stabs between his lover and his childe.

Four hissed words escape his lips.

“I—swore—an oath!”

His voice sounds like it hasn’t been used in years.

Caroline: Caroline says nothing to that. It’s not her place to explain the actions of her sire’s lover.

She can feel his rage, feel it in her blood, in that ethereal connection to him she’s experienced only once before, the night of the trial, at George’s accusations.

Still, despite his fury, despite the all-consuming darkness unleashed, despite the fangs and rage, she can’t muster fear within herself, not of him. She wonders, academically, what the darkness might have done to her, if it might have destroyed her without her action and the seneschal’s attempts to shield her, but it’s only academic. The Beast might fear, it might cower, might flee, but not the woman. She’s come too far, given up too much, to get here, to be afraid.

She is, however, angry. Disappointed. Hurt. To come this far, to give up everything she’s given up, of all the ways she’d dreamed this meeting might go… this is worse. Selfish, proud, even arrogant. Dismissive. Caring about her only insofar as her existence is an affront to his dignity.

It’s all just so… familiar.

GM: “You did, my prince. You honored that oath even as I betrayed it,” Maldonato answers. “My unlife is yours to judge for this crime, as is Miss Malveaux’s. If you would hear a full accounting of my actions before rendering your verdict, I remain yours to command in this and all things.”

The words are calm, not soothing so much as steady. Familiar. Caroline can feel the rage blazing within her sire’s dead heart diminishing… though not dissipating.

There is a curt nod.

Caroline: Caroline says nothing. It’s not her place to speak. Not even when her life is offered up.

GM: The seneschal steeples his slender fingers.

“Then there is much that must now be explained—to Your Majesty and Your Majesty’s childe.”

The tomb-like room looks shredded as though a hurricane raged through it. There are no chairs upon which to sit, nor even a table to seat them around, not any longer. Maldonato continues to stand as he recites,

“You remember the years preceding and following Thorns as well as I do, my prince, though your childe knows them not. They were dark and terrible years.”

“Do we say merely that we had seen our sires, broodmates, your childer, and multitudes of further Kindred, some we named friends, others we named foes, fall to the Inquisition and Anarch Revolt? Such a statement is akin to saying Miss Malveaux was raised without a sire: factually accurate, yet insufficient to convey the reality of an experience.”

Caroline: Childer. Caroline files the information away. And a destroyed grandsire—and the seneschal’s own. But no childer of the seneschal’s own.

Two titans with no legacy but their deeds.

GM: But their deeds, and her.

Caroline: Perhaps that was enough, for immortal beings. Perhaps it was enough for centuries. But the state of this room, and those beyond gives mute lie to the claim it is enough tonight.

GM: “Perhaps instead we should speak in anecdotes,” Maldonato continues. “How I could observe the shape of my sire’s beard, a lengthy and silver article he was wont to stroke in contemplation, as the flames consumed his body. The hatred in the eyes of so many men of faith as they spat and called us devilspawn. Our disbelief at the news that Gratiano the great rebel had slain his sire: could the Tremere’s feat be repeated? It seemed as incredible to believe as another empire’s conquests surpassing Rome’s. Yet such things could and did re-occur. Great, then, was my relief at the news my sire’s grandsire had escaped the slaughter: I recall as you brushed the redden tears from my eyes.”

“I remember the fury within yours as Tyler’s lover shot her handgonnes into our master’s chest: your shout as he staggered and fell, then recovered, and how you did not laugh when the others did as they proclaimed such weapons impotent against our kind.”

Caroline: It’s difficult to imagine the seneschal, the stoic and implacable statue weeping. It’s perhaps even more difficult to imagine the prince, his face still set in such a furious scowl, capable of such a tender act.

But then, time changes everyone. How long has it been since she sat on her bed and wept tears of self-pity for herself and the monster she was turned into, since she cried over one of the terrible acts she performed, since she sobbed over the loss of her mortal life with her family, or even since she wept in joy?

It is not so difficult to imagine the ways in which the elders of centuries ago might have been more human: she can imagine it only months ago.

GM: “I remember a mother fleeing a doomed village, still a child herself by the reckoning of today’s mortals, clutching a wailing infant to her breast. I remember your indignation as her attacker pulled her down, stopping only to dash the babe’s head beneath his heel, so that its mother might see and know despair before he took her life. I remember our instinctive offense that he did not even stop to drink the blood spurting from her throat before your sword parted his head from his shoulders. I remember how the misery and ignoble deaths of those two were but a speck against the hundreds who died that night, and their own deaths but a speck against the multitudes we had seen perish, and the infinitude that would follow. I remember the sheer pointlessness of the atrocity steeling your resolve, and how you declared that for all the doubts you harbored concerning the Camarilla, its alternative was worse.”

Maldonato pauses.

“Anecdotes are but singular bricks within history’s great house. But perhaps from some anecdotes, your childe may at least approximate that house’s size and shape.”

Caroline: The heiress glances between the two ancients, trying to imagine that time of fire and blood. It’s a hopeless attempt, she decides, after a moment. The past is only every recognizable to those in the present as shadows and words. The feeling of a time cannot be understood through them.

The seneschal’s words, however, do paint a picture she’d already framed. ‘Men’ bound by their belief in the lesser of evils, no matter how great.

GM: “We had hoped Thorns would bring peace, but such a notion was misplaced. There was not peace before. There would not be peace again. Do you recall Marius’ words, who was older then than we are now? I recall them exactly.”

“‘I know I am a killer, a drinker of blood—and that the only true blood is the sheer power of life, the struggle to climb over the kicking bodies of the wretched, their mad eyes like windows into broken souls. And the color of that blood is green—the color of life, of renewal, of nature. Of all that is natural: the urge to push out and expand. Once upon a time blood’s color was gold; but that too is a myth. There was no golden age—ever. There is only the drive to expansion. The quest for the new; the desire to stay alive.’”

“‘I watch as my archons begin anew to hatch their endless plots against my foes. The Camarilla. The Sabbat. The Anarchs. The Inconnu. The Lupines. The Awakened. The other night-folk. The mortals. The Antediluvians, the clans and covenants, the countless endless factions, bound to the wheel of history, turning around and around with the inertia of a collapsing sun, rolling over everything with a mindless and pounding repetition.’”

“Time ill begets peace,” Maldonato states.

“Always was there some new crisis. Some new mission. Some new war. The Promise. The sack of Rome. The Hunedora incident. The Italian Wars. LaMont’s betrayal. The Wars of Religion. The resurgent Anarchs. The feuding princes. The Morisco revolts. The Sabbat. When would it end?”

Caroline: Some names familiar, some otherwise, but she can see well enough the thread they follow.

GM: “Perhaps it was naive to expect peace even had we laid down our swords, but I entreated you to no less ardently. Your heart was finally moved when the last of my mortal bloodline was extinguished for the crime of their ancestors’ faith. I was weary of war. You were weary to see me so.”

“What irony, then, to arrive at such a sentiment upon the eve of our greatest war.”

Caroline: Caroline can hardly imagine how weary they might be, must be. How weary even months have left her. How jaded and cynical.

GM: “‘First came the Greycoats to eat all my swine,
Next came the Bluecoats to make my sons fight,
Next came the Greencoats to make my wife whore,
Next came the Browncoats to burn down my home.
I have naught but my life, now come the Blackcoats to rob me of that.’”

“I know not the poem’s author, yet I can find no apter a summation of that terrible conflict. The casualties of the World Wars were paltry by way of comparison.”

Caroline: Caroline frowns at that statement. The World Wars consumed more than a hundred million souls, on a scale she can barely imagine.

GM: “You are surprised, Miss Malveaux. The absolute numbers of deaths caused by the World Wars is higher. The relative percentage is lower. Less than ten percent of the German Reich’s population perished in the ‘wars to end all wars,’ or 17% if one includes German nationals who perished on the Eastern Front. The Thirty Years’ War decimated some 33% of the Holy Roman Empire’s population. The majority of these deaths were caused by starvation and disease rather than armed conflict, though such conditions would of course not have existed during a time of peace.”

“Yet there is perhaps little point in comparing such statistics. At Tulane University, I once had perchance to listen to testimony from a survivor of the Holocaust. He asked rhetorically what purpose is accomplished through comparing suffering. What purpose, indeed?”

Caroline: “As you say, Seneschal,” Caroline agrees mildly. One in three dead—numbers she can hardly imagine.

It’s somewhat easier now, given the recent deaths surrounding her.

GM: “I shall not detail the Kindred vagaries of that conflict, save to say we had seen enough war and bloodshed by its conclusion. We had long since seen enough, and could endure no more. I succumbed to torpor.”

“The timing was at least then fortuitous. Whatever your sire’s brother-in-blood saw in that war, whatever truths I believe he glimpsed at the heart of the Jyhad, broke him as well. My torpor, the installment of a new justicar, and your cousin-in-blood’s Embrace finally convinced the Camarilla your service was done.”

Caroline: And brought you to the New World? Caroline fills in.

GM: “I awoke nearly a century later at your side. The world moved slower then. It was not so different from the one I had left behind, though different enough to prove stimulating rather than overwhelming, as I fear it became for Primogen Chastain. We were free at last from responsibility and obligation. How would we spend eternity?”

Caroline: A point she’s considered—how much easier it must have been to endure torpor and reenter the world before the ‘modern’ era.

GM: “The past century had been kinder to you than the preceding ones. The kindest of any, perhaps. I would have counseled you to take your own rest… but there was no need for you to do so immediately, was there?”

“Time is a nebulous thing in the sleep of ages. Yet you had spent thousands upon thousands of waking nights alone—too devoted to leave my side for long. My heart was touched, yet also saddened to see you had not reconciled with one who might have eased your loneliness.”

“Perhaps you have felt the recent stirrings in your blood and believed them Magdalena’s, echoing from a kingdom far across the sea.”

A considering frown flickers across the prince’s deathly still face.

Caroline: Magdalena. Another Ventrue elder? The name is foreign to her, but if he was to mistake her own feelings for that of the mystery Kindred, they shared blood in some way. She tilts her head in contemplation. Caroline had never considered Vidal’s affection might be drawn to another.

Another childe, perhaps? Something that might be jealousy stirs, but only faintly. Like shadow cast on a moonless night.

GM: “Perhaps you might have seen her again, in time. The nights ahead were ours. I was, for once, eager to see what they held.”

“So too, I believe, were you. What time we had before New Orleans was put to good use. I remember your initial offense at my cousin’s presence, and how you were sufficiently moved by the grace and quiet dignity of her bearing to swear a boon in apology—you, to a heathen Muslim. The denizens of this city call you tyrant, but they have known so little of whom you are.”

Caroline: We see only what we’re allowed to see, Caroline thinks, but the thought is there and gone just as swiftly.

She’s being allowed to see now, isn’t she? A peak behind the curtain.

GM: “I remember, too, the promise exacted between our sires. Both were naught but ashes and dust, yet that vow endured beyond even their Requiems, and become far more than even they might have anticipated. It did not take me overlong to conclude how I wished to spend eternity. It would be your turn to rest now, so that we might undertake that last and greatest journey together.”

A shadow falls across Maldonato’s face. But it is not cast from any unnatural manipulation of the surrounding gloom this time.

“Then the Camarilla came.”

Caroline: The reluctant prince? Surely not.

GM: “Nastasio spoke to us of service, duty, and reasons we were needed in the New World, among them administering a city. I voiced my reservations. He suggested you serve as prince on a provisional basis until the colony of La Nouvelle-Orléans was stabilized.”

Maldonato offers a thin, sad smile.

“I knew you well enough to know you would do no such thing. And you knew I would not allow you to serve as prince alone.”

Caroline: Caroline keeps her expression blank, even as the history and tragedy of this pair is laid out so starkly. A pair bound together by the will of their sires, scarred by centuries of war, and now carrying the weight of the throne upon their backs, as they have for centuries.

Ancient, cut from a different breed than the modern Cainite, both in potency and character.

GM: “We set sail for the New World. Our history and that of New Orleans becomes synonymous at that point, at least in the minds of your archdiocese’s common subjects. Your childe has received an incomplete but sufficient education in the city’s history that I need repeat little of it.”

“Pacifying the colony, however, proved a far more burdensome task than either of us had anticipated. In pitched battle, the dregs of the Old World were little match for us and O’Reilley’s professional military force. But it is one matter to win a battle and another to occupy a hostile territory. Many conquering empires have paid bitterly to learn that lesson. The United States is but the latest one.”

“Stamping out the insurgents and would-be princes took decades. I found little suspicion in such at the time. You would not lay down your sword until it was no longer needed, but your throne would be insecure for so long as the threat of torpor loomed. Loom it did. I saw how the nature of this campaign aggravated you, these rebels whom you could not defeat in pitched battle. I felt your irritation and shortness of temper at subjects who continually strove to sabotage what we labored to build.”

“Perhaps, had the Baron arrived from Haiti some years earlier, he would have found in you a more conciliatory prince. Perhaps he would not have. His faith was unfamiliar to you and my grandsire’s blood did not run in his veins. I believe rebuffing his initial overtures was a grave mistake that might yet cost us everything. But this counsel is not new to you.”

“You Embraced Emmanuel Costa to be your heir, and for a time your youngest childe showed great promise. Yet Du Valle turned him against you and perished himself before he could be put to the question. I did not think to question Boulet’s actions at the time, given the gravity of his sacrifice and the depth of his sire’s grief. The later irregularities in her behavior now lead me to believe other forces were at work.”

Caroline: Caroline listens attentively, especially as history moves closer to the present. Some of these names are familiar to her: most are not.

Some names, however, have faces. She remembers Costa’s face from the coin’s vision. She remembers the supremely cold execution of her brother-in-blood by the prince before her.

GM: “Your Majesty executed Costa for his treachery. Sick from so many centuries of failure, you swore upon all you held sacred that you would never Embrace again. Though I believed your decision made in haste and anger, I find no fault within it. Nor, at the time, did it appear to pose a significant impediment to the archdiocese’s stability. We had a preponderance of potential heirs to choose from. Alejandro, next mightiest among your clan, and Catholic despite his allegiance to the Invictus. Constantine, Sanctified and a bishop. Matheson, young but promising in his attentiveness to the workings of the modern world.”

Caroline: All gone. Destroyed or banished. The names conjure up a time she can barely imagine.

Matheson as young and in touch with the modern world is particularly striking. A lesson, perhaps, in how quickly the world moves.

GM: “Yet I counseled you not to select one of your clan as your successor. There was another whose worth eclipsed them all in my eyes.”

Maldonato smiles distantly.

“It was not for her age, faith, or intelligence that I recommended Maria Pascual as your successor, even though she eclipsed the others in those qualities. Perhaps I saw something of Fatimah in her, and the curious manner in which they could be at once modest and proud. My cousin is modest for the very manner in which she wears her pride so radiantly, for it is a pride in her beliefs and accomplishments rather than her own person, as fine a distinction as that may be. Maria took immense pride in herself, though was always the soul of modesty in denying she took any such pride.”

“Many would have found such pride offensive, had it been worn openly. Maria’s sensibilities were too gentle to do any such thing, though we always knew that pride was there beneath the self-effacement. She made it almost a game for others to draw it out. Few who played were anything but bewitched. Myself included.”

Caroline: The young Ventrue is like a stone, still, silent. She tries to keep her focus on the value of these words, in the insight into the minds and workings of the seneschal and prince, of how they came to be here—but it is not easy to hear she is not a second choice, or a third, or even a forth or fifth, and to listen to praise heaped upon those that came before as she measures their names—still remembered these nights—against her own paltry history.

GM: “The two were opposite faces of the same coin, as well, in their treatment of others. Where both were beloved by their friends and kin, Fatimah’s farmindedness and beneficence has made friends of foes, while Maria’s fierce devotion towards her friends drove her towards relentless opposition of her foes. Where my cousin is regally distant, Maria was intimate and close. It would have brought me much happiness for them to have known one another.”

Caroline: And other turns history might have taken. Two ancients discussing others destroyed before her mother, or even her mother’s mother, was born. If any of those named had survived, Caroline might yet live. Or, perhaps, she would never have been born.

GM: “But little enough good is served in discoursing on the turns history may have taken.”

“Primogen Pascual’s acquaintance with Maria, too, was equally long and rich to any she might have enjoyed with my cousin, and one in which I am also grateful to have been included… but these remembrances are of increasingly little value to your childe. With Pascual settled as your successor, the last of the rebels defeated, and the city’s material prosperity at its apex, we ruled the Antebellum nights in easy splendor.”

Caroline: Caroline can too easily imagine the throb of irritation each time the seneschal refers to her as his childe.

GM: “It was a romantic period I believe Maria and Primogen Chastain were uniquely suited for, even if it was far less than idyllic for those upon whose suffering it was built. Perhaps little wonder, then, that so many among the Camarilla continued to rebuff the Baron—he who associated so freely among those mortals we considered the lowliest of the low.”

Caroline: A gentle way of referring to slavery, but it’s easy to forget how gentle even slavery might have seemed to those that watched a third of a country starve, freeze, or get hacked apart.

GM: “The Civil War bought an end to our easy summer dream. In a stroke, Alejandro, Constantine, and Matheson were eliminated—Alejandro by assailants for whom the benefit was plain, yet whose crime we could not definitively prove, and whose help and aligned interests we could ill-neglect in a time of occupation and hardship. Constantine allegedly fell to Loup-Garoux in a heroic tale of sacrifice by Mr. Guilbeau that I have found scant evidence to substantiate.”

Caroline: The third feeding on childer like a pedophile luring children into his van.

GM: “Matheson’s proclivities, too, I believed coincidental. I well recall the terror in his eyes at your wrath, and the nakedness of his pride as he begged for clemency at your feet. Those who prey upon those smaller than they are easily made small themselves, it often seems. Perhaps I, too, considered him too small to devote any further consideration to.”

“Or perhaps, in truth, I devoted little thought to the circumstances of three would-be successors’ downfalls when we had intended none to be your successors. Maria still occupied that role, and if she wished to step down from her immediate political duties in the aftermath of the Civil War’s cultural destruction, who among us could blame her? She and Primogen Chastain had poured their very souls into the city. Its pain and loss was as their own.”

Caroline: Caroline has different memories of Matheson. She remembers picking herself up off the floor. Remembers him looking down on her even before he put her there.

GM: “Yet taken as a whole, Maria’s behavior was cause for concern. Her use of hard-won prestation to grant the Giovannini access to the city. The increased Setite activity in the Quarter. The inexplicable actions of Robert O’Connor, whom we had believed under her thumb. Her grant of domain to Roger Halliburton, whose political downfall she had helped us engineer.”

Caroline: Caroline fights to keep the frown off her face. Does that mean?

But it’s not really that unbelievable, is it? That they might have killed off another powerful Kindred towards their own ends? She knows full well the seneschal is capable of dealing with perceived ‘problems’ in a very permanent way.

GM: “Our suspicions were aroused—but too late. It was not until we discovered the daughter of Dionysus lairing in the heart of Maria’s domain that we realized the graveness of the danger.”

“Perhaps Maria knew not what she was. We had believed her destroyed in that last, ghastly war—destroyed at our own hands. She professed to have renounced the Sword of Caine, but we knew the matter of her sect allegiance was immaterial. Her immediate destruction was necessary.”

“Yet our power was not what it once was. The Union’s military occupation was over, Halliburton’s pawns in city hall were removed, and his authority as archon stripped from him… yet the Baron’s power waxed ascendant, and we had sealed his eternal enmity through our crackdowns following Reconstruction—a decision I believed to have been unwise. He had grown tired of fruitlessly seeking peace with us. With his aid, we might have excised the cancer eating at our city’s heart. Instead, we faced another knife at our throat.”

“We moved our own blades into position as carefully as we could, but too late. Maria was slain, and Dionysus’ daughter vanished. In a stroke, our plans had been thrown into disarray, for Maria’s most suitable replacements had been removed before her. Too late did we realize the nature of this Jyhad.”

“Primogen Chastain alone had sufficient experience, puissance, and trustworthiness to truly succeed you as prince, as distasteful as you found granting your throne to a Kindred not of the faith. Yet she succumbed to torpor within the year—a development she had long forseen and planned for, yet whose timing could not have proven more disruptive.”

“We were forced to settle, then, for a lesser heir: Robert Bastien. The sheriff was loyal, promising, and had earned much esteem in your eyes: though you never told him so, I believe you had come to regard him as the childe you had never sired. We began to groom him in earnest for your throne.”

“Yet Bastien would be your heir for but a score of years before his own murder at the hands of witch-hunters, which we did not for a moment believe coincidental. I remember well your rage at his final death, and those actions you took in retribution, though I counseled you otherwise. I grew concerned for you, my love. I knew your body and mind were weary, but only then did I realize how time’s passage had abraded your soul. It was long past time for you to take your rest.”

Caroline: A systematic program of elimination, of every possible heir, one by one. The revelations of just how far back it all goes chill Caroline.

Powerful elders, established ancillae, those chosen and groomed to rule for centuries slowly wiped out, until an unwanted childe is all that’s left? She’s expected to succeed where they all fell?

GM: “Five score years ago did I speak those words. Torpor’s specter loomed ever closer, your heirs were removed, and this Jyhad was deeper than Nastasio had prepared us for. Drastic action was required to preserve your legacy: under no circumstances could Antoine Savoy be permitted to claim the throne.”

“I contacted the Baron and made a final effort to broker peace.”

“His response, and your own, eclipsed anything I had anticipated. It seemed we would achieve more than peace: we might, in fact, win this Jyhad in but a handful more strokes, unwilling though I was to pay its price. Deep was the irony that you had found common ground at last with so bitter a foe.”

Maldonato lapses into momentary silence.

“Whether the cause was betrayal or sabotage, that peace, too, was not to be.”

“The question of your successor remained unresolved, but only a fool repeats the same stratagem and expects a different outcome. We would not take another heir into our confidence. Our designs for each one had been discovered despite our efforts at secrecy. There were but three potential leaks that occurred to us: yourself, myself, and our chosen heirs. We would find those heirs, now, in secret. More would arise in time. We would watch from a distance. We would confound our enemy through our apparent inaction and perhaps force their hand.”

“Our immediate choices were all flawed. Francesca Dumont and Dominique Toutain, proud heirs to their sires’ legacies, yet heirs to their hatreds and grudges. Donovan, our new sheriff, capable and bound to you in blood, yet still his sire’s childe. Accou Poincare, eldest among them and a former prince, but aligned with the Invictus. Clarice Barabet, Maria’s protege and successor, until seduced by Antoine Savoy. Coco Duquette, an Anarch, yet whose loyalty was but one draught less certain than Donovan’s. I do not believe Micheal Kelly ever realized the price his sire paid so that he might exist.”

“We watched them all. We labored, silently and subtly, to increase their suitability as heirs. The 20th century passed by into the 21st. Harm befell none. None suffered the fates of their predecessors. Some, such as Donovan and your clanmates, increased in suitability. Others, such as Poincaré and the late bishop, decreased. None, to my mind, were ideal. I wondered if this, too, was the work of other hands. I wondered if our plans were known despite our efforts at secrecy. It seemed improbable, yet we are both long inured to belief in coincidence. The present state of affairs was more beneficial to our foes than us: no clear heir had emerged.”

“I sought, then to upend the rules of this Jyhad. I would tell no one of my next plans: not even my prince. I had also learned the folly of placing our eggs within one basket, and cast my gaze wide… upon Seth’s children rather than Caine’s. Some were little more than infants. Fewer eyes would rest upon their actions. I watched them from a distance and intervened but rarely. I feared to reveal my hand in this latest phase of the game.”

Caroline: The young Ventrue reflects on her sister’s words. Been involved with you for more than a year. Evidently the seneschal’s attempts hide his intentions were not as effective as he might have hoped. It begs the question: why did Abélia even know about the seneschal’s plans, and how did she contrive so carefully to put Caroline in his path—and within her own grasp.

The easy answer would be that her mother had something to do with the culling of past ‘heirs’, but Caroline doubts that immediately: the seneschal is well aware of Caroline’s relationship with her now mother: if she was his avowed foe Caroline would not be standing here before the prince, she’d be getting cleaned up off the floor with a dustpan.

GM: "Yet the Jyhad itself changed, too, with the turning of the millennium. The chronological distinction is arbitrary, yet there is much power and consequence in symbols. Was I, too, moved by the same eschatological fervor that did not die with the passing of the 21st century’s first years?

“Sect wars swept the Eastern Seaboard. Xaviar renounced the Justicarate upon claiming to have witnessed the impossible. Hunters wielding extraordinary powers proclaimed themselves the Earth’s inheritors. Silence fell upon Russia’s Brujah Council. The Kindred of the East descended upon the West Coast. Blood stained the Middle East’s hot soil, and the Banu Haqim spoke of a rising ancient in Alamut. Even within our own city, the last generations made themselves known, Birds of Dis were reported in increasing numbers, and Malkavian seers prophecized doom. Could the Final Nights be upon us? The Sabbat claimed they were. Fear gripped me that time was running out. I returned my gaze to the children I had watched for so much of their lives, and the oldest two who had just reached their ages of majority. There was no time to consider the younger ones: our heir would be found in either Rebecca Whitney or Adam Malveaux.”

Caroline: Caroline pays close attention to talk beyond New Orleans—her knowledge of Kindred beyond the Crescent City is painfully limited. Final Nights? It’s a pointed reminder of how blind she is to this world.

The names that slip from the seneschal’s lips as his first would-be heirs are both a surprise—and not. Rebecca Whitney, domain of Matheson or not, fits the pattern. Well-bred, beloved, talented… and dead. She wonders if it was the mysterious enemies that culled her, or if she rejected her Requiem as Caroline so repeatedly considered in those first, desperate, awful nights as an unliving dispenser of suffering to the world.

Her cousin, however, is a surprise, especially as he is still among the living. She imagines his piety and calm demeanor would have played well with her sire, and with the seneschal—which begs the question of why he wasn’t Embraced, of what flaw he might have shown that she did not to Maldonato’s judging eye…

GM: Caroline finds her assessment of the pair vindicated as Maldonato continues, “Both showed much promise and potential. In the first, I saw charisma, grace, and poise. In the other, I saw faith and moral authority. In both, I saw intelligence, drive, respect for tradition, and loyalty to the dictates of their families. Though both were young, they might have been groomed and made suitable for their intended role in ways their older relatives might not.”

“Yet neither, to my estimation, were guilty of any wrongs so terrible as to warrant the Embrace. In the end, the question of whose life to sacrifice was decided by convenience. When another conspiracy moved to grant Rebecca Whitney and a handful of others the Dark Gift for their own reasons, I saw opportunity to conceal her origins beneath another Kindred’s Embrace. She would be the figurative cuckoo’s egg, raised in secrecy and safety from our enemy, yet able to move freely among our kind’s society while learning its ways and customs. I would find pretext to associate with her so that she might know me as more than a stranger. Only once I deemed her ready to face the dangers and assume the burdens of her intended role would I reveal the truth of her lineage and bring her before you.”

Maldonato lapses into another brief span of silence.

“Yet that was not to be. Her purported sire gave her the Embrace, turning the intended lie of her lineage into truth. I see my error whenever I look upon her face. I think of the rich life she and her family might have led were it not, perhaps, for my involvement—and unquestionably were it not for my failure to prevent her sire’s Embrace. I see a father driven half-mad in mourning for his daughter, counting the procession of all lives and deaths since her own. I see a brother robbed of his marriage, his future, and his worth as a son in his father’s eyes. I see a niece raised in fear, loneliness, and without a mother under the shadow of her aunt’s death. I see a daughter, sister, and aunt whom I had come to know and care for, murdered for no greater purpose than another’s selfish whim. Though she knows not my role in her Embrace, I know her sire and I to be co-architects in her suffering and damnation.”

Caroline: The words tear at Caroline, more for what they don’t say than for what they do. To groom an infant, to watch them grow, with the intent of taking their life with some purpose, only to see it end more senselessly must have been a dagger to the ancient Moor’s sensibilities. She can easily see why he might have proven reluctant in the aftermath to continue with her cousin.

But not so reluctant with her.

Caroline has had months to come to terms with her own death, with her Embrace into the ranks of the Damned. She reconciled—had to reconcile—with her own sins long before her sire’s blood touched her lips, with the bloody stains on her hands she couldn’t wash away from the sight of God that made her fit for this fate. It doesn’t make it easier to hear how innocent and unsullied another was in their Embrace. Especially not that other, for the Ventrue has no doubts as to whom the seneschal speaks.

The pieces fall readily into place: Becky Lynne Adler is, or at least was, Rebecca Whitney.


Everything fits too neatly. The sparing of the Armstrongs despite their illicit Embrace. Adler’s strong feelings on Caroline’s relationship with Sarah (my, how the younger Ventrue’s ties to her niece must have clawed at her). The timeline of her passing and Adler’s Embrace.

Adler, ahead of her once more. Enjoying not only a Requiem wrapped in all those things Caroline’s has not been, enjoying the benefit of awakening alongside others, of forgiveness of her Embrace, of a sire that sheltered, provided for, influenced on her behalf, and taught her. Adler, the seneschal’s first choice for her sire’s childe.

Caroline bites her lower lip. There’s some consolidation in the fact that she actually received her sire’s vitae, that she’s standing here before him tonight, but recalling what she knows of those circumstances and the fact that she wasn’t the first choice, Caroline can’t help but wonder: was she the last?

GM: Maldonato pauses briefly again and continues, “I showed her and those who had kept her safe clemency when they were brought before us. Such restitution was small and cost me little enough. Rebecca’s fate thereafter is its own tale, yet one that proved of great consequence to my future plans.”

“I feared my intentions were known to our enemy, and that my attempts at secrecy had availed us naught. To commit to another childe’s Embrace would have been the height of folly. I could not condemn Adam to damnation when the same fate as Rebecca, Maria, Robert, and too many other lost heirs would almost certainly have awaited him as well. No longer could I continue to play into our enemy’s hands—indeed, the folly of my prior actions seemed all-too plain in hindsight. I had spoken of my most recent plans to none, yet this had seemed of little impediment to our enemy. I wondered, then: were my actions truly my own? Was I myself manipulated as I had manipulated so many others?”

“I could not continue to act blindly. I would remedy that state before even considering whether to bring another childe into the night—indeed, it was a concerning apparent lapse in judgment that neither of us had reached such a conclusion already.”

“I would begin my investigations by examining the actions of the ‘Armstrong Five’s’ sires. The coterie’s mandate to apprehend their consanguineous parents in atonement for their illicit Embraces served as convenient pretext to make them my agents in this matter.”

“All five neonates suffered greatly in their pursuit of their mission. Yet they succeeded far in excess of my expectations—and far in excess of those who had expected the sheriff’s office to handle the matter. Matheson proved the only one of the Armstrongs’ sires whom they were unable to tender to your justice, yet the intelligence they obtained on his actions would have been difficult for even the sheriff to acquire.”

Caroline: Caroline keeps her expression still. Dead, like a corpse, as the lionization of the ‘would have’ and ‘should have’ been heir to the prince continues. How unlike her own disasters with René, her blundering and stumbling, and the desperate last second hope that a washed-up old ghoul would save her."

But I did get to the bottom of what you did, didn’t I, seneschal? With her mother’s help to confirm it, but even before, she’d smelled out the rotten nature of her ‘Embrace’ by the prince. The lie Maldonato had told even within that great truth he’d confided in her on the eve of her execution.

GM: “The invidia in your eyes ill becomes our prince’s childe, Miss Malveaux. If you were to inquire as to the full tale of their coterie’s first nights from any of the Armstrongs, their answers might paint a narrative of terror, suffering, and loss far more than pride in meeting a distant and inscrutable figure’s expectations. Five sires are not so easily apprehended as one.”

Caroline: “Veritas is a panacea, seneschal,” Caroline agrees. "Perhaps theirs may yet be shared, still I do not expect their failures to be my comfort. "

“You have known me, and of me, Your Grace. Even had my mind not been laid bare, if I an so transparent now I must be have been then. I would not belie my nature, not to the elder that gave me my Embrace,” she nods to the seneschal, “nor to the prince whose blood runs through my veins.” Her gaze settles upon her silent sire in turn.

“I am not, and have never been, content with my achievements. Always there has been something I might have done better in, some flaw that marred them I might have corrected. I cannot then lie and claim to be accepting of my shortcomings. My only comfort in failure has ever been the impossibility of success. To hear then of the success of others cuts all the sharper—both for the failure and the self-deception that comforted me.”

“I beg then, forgive me one correction. It is not envy, seneschal, which afflicts me. I stand before the prince, and have been privileged these last minutes to hear secrets that most in the city would kill for—insight into rulership of the longest praxis in the New World. The blood in my veins would be the envy of all but the eldest or most foolish Kindred, and twice before have I known the mercy of the seneschal—staying the hand of my oblivion.”

She pauses before continuing, “I do not envy her for taking another path, I only begrudge exposing my self-deception.”

“I might lament lost time and missed opportunities, that my instruction came at the hands of lesser than my sire, that they had cause to see me in weakness and blindness. I might desire that things could have been different, that this night could have arrived earlier, or under different circumstances. I certainly regret that my ignorance caused any additional hardship for His Majesty—to say nothing of suffering to a great many.”

“Mostly though, I wish that I might have come tonight in only triumph.”

GM: “If the world were as we could have it, Miss Malveaux, you should not have had to come before us tonight at all. But the world is instead as our limited minds and hands must build it,” Maldonato answers.

“Enough,” hisses the prince.

His gaze burns between the two like black fire.

“I have granted you leave to deliver an account of your actions, Philip—a greater privilege than many criminals within my domain receive. You shall finish, without further digression—yours or hers. Then I shall render judgment.”

The words seize upon the two’s dialogue with a vice-like clamp, imposing order and stricture—yet the hands that wield that vice continue to slowly clasp and unclasp like gnawing jaws. Their owner’s face remains still as a grave.

“As Your Majesty commands,” the seneschal replies calmly.

Caroline: The younger Ventrue doesn’t quite wilt under the prince’s burning gaze, but she falls as silent as death before his fury, the spark of life in her response to the seneschal snuffed out in an instant. She folds her hands before her as the seneschal begins his tale once more.

GM:“In the course of the Armstrongs’ investigation, they discovered the hand of another perpetrator behind their sires’ actions. By their report, Sarah Cobbler claimed to have arranged the five’s mass Embrace for her covenant’s purposes. Perhaps she truly was sincere in those stated reasons. Your Majesty invoked the lextalionis upon Mdm. Cobbler and she fled the city. The majority of your subjects believe her part in our city’s history to end there.”

“This development was pleasing to me, for fewer eyes would rest upon Mdm. Cobbler outside of New Orleans. I arranged for the hiring of Monty Lestrange, who respected his employer’s desire to remain anonymous. I believed his connections to his clan’s Thought Police would be of great utility in apprehending Mdm. Cobbler. Mr. Lestrange and his coterie tracked their erstwhile clanmate to Houston, for she had evidently not wished to roam far from her ‘experiments.’”

“I shall spare Your Majesty further details of Mr. Lestrange’s mission, save to relate that he was successful and retrieved the answers I had so ardently desired. Mdm. Cobbler, too, had acted at another’s behest—another whose manipulations I believed we could trace at last. As the 2004th Year of Our Lord passed into the 2005th, a terrible yet desirous anticipation crept upon me that this Jyhad had reached its endgame.”

Caroline: Sarah Cobbler? Another unfamiliar name, but then the Dragons as a whole are a mystery to her. It’s difficult to imagine anyone manipulating such disparate Kindred as Matheson and Baker’s sire, but she supposes she’s seen stranger bedfellows.

GM: “In my preoccupation, however, I neglected—fatally—to consider affairs beyond New Orleans. Had I done so, I would have realized the Nights of Turmoil were beginning to senescence as fears of imminent Gehenna proved seemingly unfounded. We had little reason to believe as much in New Orleans. Not as Owls stole forth from the world’s dark places in ever-increasing numbers, and not as those with gifts of foresight warned us of doom, all the more loudly and desperately. Doom was descending upon New Orleans—but it was a singular doom, one whose worst devastation would be localized to our city.”

Maldonato stares upon the ruined sword, now resting upon the floor.

“Katrina’s tale is Your Majesty’s to tell, for my role within it is ancillary to yours—nor was I the one to pay the greatest price.”

“All of us bore witness to the storm’s destruction. I need not reiterate its consequences upon either Kindred or kine.”

Caroline: Caroline is both grateful for the abbreviation, and curious as to that tale. Perhaps another time. There have been secrets enough tonight.

GM: “Yet some good may have been achieved amidst the tragedy. An heir to my prince’s throne could, I believed, be Embraced at long last.”

The tale is not for her after all, though she’s certain the seneschal has included details for her benefit.

“I did not endeavor to repeat the circumstances of Miss Whitney’s immediately. Other matters occupied my attentions—the archdiocese lay in ruins. There was little point in grooming an heir when there was yet no kingdom for that individual to be heir to.”

“It was not until five years later that Your Majesty repealed the moratorium on new Embraces. Perhaps then I might have brought Adam Malveaux into the night… but for how other children I had watched had come of age.”

“I was mindful of resting so many hopes upon a single individual. I had cast my gaze upon many.”

“Savannah Malveaux, his sister. Far had she risen in spite of the obstacles in her path.”

“Robert Argabrite, heir to another old legacy, before he proved lacking in judgment sufficient to retain it.”

“Stephen Garrison, one of the most promising of all, before Primogen Duquette claimed him for her own.”

“Herman Lewis, who had overcome great hardship, yet in whom I found too great an anger to be suitable.”

“Mark Mullman, resourceful and innovative, but not destined for the Kindred.”

“Dustin Reffett, before he proved unequal to his own expectations.”

“Emily Rosure, beset by hardships of a different manner than Mr. Lewis’, yet unsuitable for the night.”

“Mr. Taylor, who had worked his way from nothing to everything by the sweat of his brow.”

“Jermaine Washington, who had done much the same before his untimely demise.”

“Alice Guillot, brave and determined, heir to a family legacy of much interest.”

“The St. George children, promising in their own manners, yet also unmeant for the night.”

Caroline: More and more names and faces. She’d once seen Abélia as a massive tentacled creature, or a serpent, her coils wrapped around Caroline in wroth, but she can see too well the truth: the seneschal’s own shadowy tendrils around every aspect of life.

GM: “I watched all these souls, and further ones still. Some for the whole of their lives, some for but brief episodes. I had little desire to bring any of them into the night. I had followed Miss Whitney’s developments no less attentively than any of theirs, and I had seen well the suffering and sorrow that her Embrace had wreaked upon so many lives—her own not least of all.”

Caroline: Surely you never believed the Embrace would do anything less. She cannot claim her Embrace has brought only sorrow, but she knows well just how much destruction she has unleashed upon everyone in her life.

GM: “Yet Miss Adler had risen to become an exemplary childe in spite of her sire’s initial indifference and maltreatment. I had not followed the course of her Requiem so closely for reasons of mere sentiment. As she rose in the esteem of our society’s eyes, she stood as evidence that my chosen methodology could bear prodigious results. I had but to repeat that methodology upon another individual—and ensure they received another sire’s vitae in the stead of Mr. Matheson’s.”

“As Hurricane Katrina’s tenth anniversary approached, I could wait little longer. Your Majesty’s reputation had suffered much in the eyes of his subjects. Information was being leaked from our camp to Antoine Savoy, who would not long sit idle upon it, and the Baron had seemingly returned from final death itself. Rumors truer than their disseminators knew were already circulating that Your Majesty’s time would soon be done.”

Caroline: She doesn’t need the confirmation to know how true the rumors are. The opening of the elevator’s doors revealed as much quite clearly, much to her sorrow. Part of her had still hoped it was only a rumor.

GM: “Then were two young women of great promise and potential nearly murdered within a police station.”

“I shall not reiterate Sheriff Donovan’s investigative findings—nor the urgency made necessary by the awakening of so great an evil. The time for waiting was now past. I reviewed the lives of the children I had long watched, weighed the consequences of their deaths, and began my final preparations to bring Adam Malveaux into the night.”

Caroline: The surprise hits Caroline like a punch in the face, and for once she’s grateful she’s taken a more than a few of those. She’d assumed that night sealed her fate.

GM: “Concurrently, René Baristheaut returned to New Orleans upon the centenarial anniversary of his sire’s final death, ostensibly to pay his respects to Sheriff Bastien’s memory. I had not expected to see his face again, but his explanation for returning to the city was plausible enough. For all his grievances against Your Majesty and his sire, he had departed the archdiocese as a hound in good standing. I granted him permission to remain.”

“His heart was at once much changed and little changed. Only later would I become aware he had also approached Mr. Savoy.”

Caroline: Caroline wrestles with her eagerness to learn more, with her desire to urge the seneschal to say more, as they get closer and closer to the present. Her mother may have shown her the truth, but there are many other secrets related to her Embrace—and she’d have them all.

GM: “Another of the children whom I had watched, meanwhile, ventured into Mr. Savoy’s territory to celebrate a mortal festival. Such was little enough cause for concern under normative circumstances—anonymity was always the childrens’ greatest shield.”

“Recent events, however, had left me ill at ease. I tasked an agent with following this child’s movements, and issued him strict orders not to reveal his presence outside of his preassigned cover.”

Caroline: This much Caroline knows.

GM: “Mr. Baristheaut crossed this child’s path during the festivities and absconded with her to the Dungeon to satisfy his base urges. This my agent failed to prevent.”

Caroline: Razor sharp images carve through Caroline’s mind. Memories, pieces of them, dredged up by her mother. Tortures best forgotten—or never imagined.

GM: “Your Majesty and I have both long since been inoculated against belief in coincidence. Of all the agents I might have chosen to shadow the child’s movements, this one was also a spy whom I had contrived to place within the Dungeon’s lower circles. He reported that Mr. Baristheaut believed the child dead and had tasked him with disposing of her remains.”

Caroline: Caroline shivers involuntarily. The memories what she endured scrap against her consciousness like hot irons, searing everything they touch, leaving fresh wounds. At some point it’s all a blur of pain, of agonies, tortures of the mind, body, and spirit that even with her mother’s assistance she can only remember in pieces, slivers, flashes.

More than the pain, more than the specifics, she remembers the sounds and smells, so unlike anything else. The raw wet tearing of flesh, the sharp crack of bones, the sizzle of flesh bubbling, and the smell. God, the smell of blood and burning flesh and filth.

She remembers reading somewhere that memories are most firmly tied to smell. She can believe it. She focuses on the seneschal’s words, trying to pry herself from the memories. Just follow the words, and she does, back away from the depths of hell to the present.

She emerged, that’s what’s important, even if she can’t say she survived.

GM: Though neither elder evinces any apparent reaction to Caroline’s too-vividly recalled pain, there is perhaps some mercy in that Maldonato does not pause in his narrative. The words are easy to grasp and follow, like a waxed rope.

“My agent reported that some spark of life yet persisted with the child’s breast. He was unable to extract her from the Dungeon before its denizens absconded with her. His cover remained intact and he was able to deliver a full report of what had occurred. The trap set before me was plain.”

“It proved well-laid.”

“I made what provisions I could in the time afforded me and descended into the Dungeon. I slew those of its inhabitants I judged deserving of death and did battle with its mistress. Neither fortune nor Your Majesty were there to aid me in our second conflict. I could not destroy her within the heart of her realm.”

Caroline: Caroline too remembers this. The horrific, cataclysmic duel between the two elders, if only from the coin. Her other memories are more… muddied, dulled.

GM: “Another did so in my stead.”

Caroline: There’s nothing dulled about her memories there.

Caroline remembers rising, remembers walking fighting to them on shattered feet, parts of her grotesquely falling from between her legs. Remembers taking up the sword at the seneschal’s urging in bloody, slick, flesh-less hands. Remembers the terrifying visage of the seneschal’s foe, her too late realization of her once-victim’s intent.

She remembers the grim, terrible, satisfaction in ending that thing. The devil incarnate.

There were far worse things she could have done with her last moments of life.

GM: “I had not trusted to hope that the child would still live by the time I reached her. She had. My strength was spent. She took up my sword and ended the daughter of Dionysus’ evil with a stroke.”

Caroline: She deserved it.

There’s a fierce satisfaction, still, in that memory. She could claim it was for destroying an ancient darkness, claim it was for the good it did for the world to remove that monster, but she knows that’s a lie—or at best a half truth.

She wanted revenge on that terrible thing, wanted to make her pay for what she’d done to Caroline. Wanted to kill her killer.

Didn’t she?

GM: “I returned to my haven with the child. A great crime had been redressed. Antoine Savoy was deprived of one of his most potent allies.”

“Yet the victory had not come without cost. The child lay dying. Neither my powers nor the arts of medicine could preserve her life after the torments she had suffered.”

“Caution pulled at me. My interest in her was known to our foes. I could not say if the daughter of Dionysus was alone in her possession of that knowledge.”

Caroline: Then why not make me your own? Caroline wonders still.

She can see how he was manipulated, pushed into her Embrace. She can even see her mother’s hand at work in it—the light touch he’d never even noticed. Successes here and there to catch his eye perhaps, and the push that brought him into the Dungeon.

But if he harbored doubts, if he had any question, why not simply Embrace her of his own blood, rather than use the prince’s?

GM: “The question within your eyes is plain, Miss Malveaux. Perhaps your sire’s understanding of events may be furthered were it articulated and answered.”

Caroline: “By your leave, Seneschal.” She uses the brief formality to buy a moment to frame her question.

“It is plain I was not your first choice, seneschal. In my memory it is just as evident doubts existed even that night. So why, given those, even with the determination to extend my existence, grace me with the prince’s vitae, rather than your own, or even any other’s?”

GM: “Your sole continued existence is an unworthy trade for the multiplicity of lives you have since taken, Miss Malveaux,” Maldonato answers. “To say nothing of your immortal soul’s damnation.”

“Perhaps others of our kind might have granted you the Embrace and considered it a kindness. I do not.”

Caroline: Caroline nods. “In the absence of purpose, there would be no purpose,” she fills in.

It’s a crushing weight, but one that clarifies the seneschal’s often cruel intent oh so perfectly.

It would never have been enough for her to succeed as one of the damned. It would never be enough to simply eke out an existence as another Kindred in the city.

GM: “You had demonstrated your worthiness to our prince’s Blood through acts of great courage and valor. Had I not Embraced you as you lay already dying, another soul would have been forced to pay for my decision with their life. For all my suspicions and fears of manipulation—that have since proven founded—your Embrace under our prince’s vitae was and remains a lesser evil to the alternatives.”

Caroline: The smallest price to be paid, for his own conscience as well. It’s not as though she can argue: her life was over the moment René absconded with her—that it became the seneschal’s to spend was a minor point.

“I understand, Seneschal,” she agrees.

GM: “It is ever a prince’s destiny to chart their course through such dark waters.”

Caroline: Caroline turns her gaze back to the prince, judging his reaction to this intermission.

GM: Caroline has seen more expression and vitality in tombstones.

" وَمَكَرُواْ وَمَكَرَ اللّهُ وَاللّهُ خَيْرُ الْمَاكِرِينَ?" Caroline replies to the seneschal.

And the unbelievers plotted and planned, and Allah too planned, and the best of planners is Allah.

“For all the plots and plans, of all the paths laid out before me, those not across the bloody rocks but instead the soft sand, here I am.” Caroline’s eyes soften, in her dead waxen face, “I’d like to hope that though we may be beyond the grace of god, we are not beyond his will.”

GM: “Such is the core of the Church Eternal’s belief, Miss Malveaux. Yet we have tried your sire’s patience long enough upon this second digression.”

Caroline: Caroline falls silent once more.

GM: “I had previously arranged for an intermediary to consult with Mr. Ghiberti regarding the alleged properties and construction of the True Vessel,” Maldonato continues. “He obtained further information from contacts among his clan. I crafted a lesser copy of the artifact to contain Your Majesty’s vitae. A sample was not overly difficult to procure. As Miss Malveaux lay dying before me, I sealed her damnation and granted her the Embrace—Your Majesty’s Embrace.”

“I arranged for René Baristheaut to receive the blame for Miss Malveaux’s Embrace, thereby concealing her origins while simultaneously granting us pretext to remove this newest thorn in our side. I instructed my agent to deposit Miss Malveaux at Louis Armstrong Park, where the Armstrong Five had awoken eleven years ago.”

Caroline: Just like that. She keeps her mouth closed.

GM: “This would both further obscure her origins, driving others to seek connections that did not exist, while also, I had hoped, providing an established coterie with reason to take her in. The Armstrongs would sympathize with her plight and have ready cause to assist her in Mr. Baristheaut’s apprehension.”

Caroline: But that didn’t happen. What might have been. She can imagine a tie to Adler guiding her in her first nights, or perhaps Baker by her side. Ties she discovered far, far too late. Only recently, in fact.

How many missteps might have been avoided, how many failures undone? This entire disastrous death sentence—she’d have never thought to spy on her coterie-mate’s sire.

It’s fruitless thought she readily abandons.

GM: “Alas, such did not come to pass. Perhaps we may attribute it to the fallen one’s manipulations, seeking to further isolate Miss Malveaux in anticipation of their own meeting, or perhaps Mr. Savoy’s. I am ever uninclined to trust the vagaries of chance.”

Caroline: Or perhaps trusting to the hope she would happen to meet them and they would take her under their wing was a long shot. Kindred society is not known for its kindness to newcomers, though she can imagine how distant that experience might have been to the centuries-old seneschal.

Perhaps she might have done more, might have advertised her Embrace’s details, might have made deeper connections, but those nights seem so far away, and they were so desperate. She recalls how she dreaded nearly all of her meetings with another of the Damned.

GM: “I sent my agent to the Cayman Islands, for his life was now in great peril. An old friend would shelter him there. Prospero has little stake in this city’s Jyhad and had provided me with sagacious counsel upon many prior occasions. Your Majesty’s known mistrust of the Caymans’ prince would further obfuscate the nature of my agent’s actions and his relationship with us.”

Caroline: Caroline doesn’t grin at this, but it’s still satisfying to have it confirmed she’d teased out that link.

GM: “I thereafter contrived to watch Miss Malveaux from a distance, much as I had always done. Perhaps my caution might have achieved less than I wished, when others suspected or were already privy to the true circumstances of her Embrace. Yet anonymity would remain her greatest shield within our kind’s society. Any number of Kindred might have sought to commit foul amaranth upon her soul, so close to Caine and yet so vulnerable, or exploit her towards any number of further purposes.”

Caroline: A mistake, she judges. She’s fairly certain at minimum Savoy knew of her origins, of her likely bloodline. She doubts he was alone. Keeping her away and ‘anonymous’ was a shield only so long as all those other players thought she might play a better part at their table.

GM: “I have elaborated my reasons for wishing to hide Miss Whitney’s true bloodline from her, had she been Embraced by Your Majesty’s vitae. Those reasons were no less true for Miss Malveaux, yet there was a further one.”

Caroline: She thinks on how closely the French Quarter lord played his hand with her, how carefully he attempted to recruit her. So patient, so available, so ready to aid her in any time of need with any task, or answer any question.

She too shivers at just how easily he might have leaked what he knew of her to less…. favorably inclined Kindred, had he believed her past his reach.

GM: “Character is not developed in ease and quietude. Only through experience of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened, ambition inspired, and success achieved. I would not have Your Majesty’s only childe raised in a Requiem of luxury and indolence as were Prince Vitel’s.”

“Even your guiding hand, harsh though I know Mr. Costa found it, would have been insufficient to teach Miss Malveaux the Requiem’s most essential lessons in the time allotted to us.”

Caroline: She wonders if the seneschal knows just how close Savoy came to turning her. How desperately she considered some nights confessing all she knew to him.

GM: “She would face the night alone, bereft of a sire’s guidance, of a sire’s identity, of knowledge of what she even was. Naught would be given to her that she did not first earn for herself.”

“She would endure the hardscrabble Requiem of the lowliest Caitiff, so that she might know the suffering Your Majesty’s most ignoble subjects face nightly.”

“She would feel the weight of the headsman’s axe upon her own neck, so that she might know what it is to place that axe upon another’s.”

“She would face the cruelties, manipulations, and tyrannies of our kind at her most lost, desperate, and vulnerable, so that she might know the Camarilla for what it is.”

“She would face the temptations and poisoned kindnesses of Antoine Savoy, so that she might be understand the threat he poses and be inoculated against it—or, had she succumbed, been destroyed by mine hand while the damage she might pose to Your Majesty’s reign was yet minimal.”

“Mr. Savoy’s nature is intimately known to us, Miss Malveaux. Presume not that we are ignorant of the attentions he showed you.”

Caroline: She knew some of what he would say here, but it does not make it easier to hear. That all of her suffering was intentional, that he fully appreciated all she would ensure.

At the same time, she cannot pretend to have suffered as some have. She might have known a Caitiff’s scorn as a sireless fledgling, alone and without aid, but she was still Caroline Malveaux. She might too have known naught of her birthright, but she still wielded it as a hammer against those that opposed her, wittingly or not.

GM: “The Requiem of Your Majesty’s last childe would be a crucible. In fire would she be either destroyed or tempered—as was Miss Whitney before her.”

“Now, at last, she stands here before you.”

Caroline: As the seneschal’s calm, measured voice fades from the chamber, the full weight of his recitation falls upon her. It pushes down on her like a load of bricks, crushing her, grinding her into paste. Not only what he’s said, but what he’s left unsaid. The implications of his logic—so cold, so calculating in its mercy and purpose—and the weight of his decisions. And… more. The pieces of the game that goes so much further than he’s said, but that she does not doubt he must be able to see. She can see it, now, in shadows and reflections only. The ways in which they were each pushed and pulled to this point, towards this end—or another.

She can see the hand at work in the past, removing his choices, striking down could-have-been heirs for centuries, slowly eating away at the heart of the prince’s power. To weaken him? Perhaps, perhaps to undermine his praxis or destroy him, but perhaps not. Perhaps towards another goal.

She can see the hand at work in how it worked upon the seneschal’s mind. How it fed into his worst paranoia. How it pushed him from considering choices among the Damned to considering something she now knows he’d never have done on his own: towards the grooming and Embrace of an heir from among the living. That action she can now see him so adamantly against, so at odds with his moral principles of ‘greater good.’ Not just the taking of a life, but the damning of a soul.

Caroline can see it in Rebecca Whitney’s Embrace, in the way in which she was snatched from him at the last moment, how he was not only denied his prize, but how he was forced to watch the destruction of her life—and also the destruction she wrought. How that failure stayed his hand for years, how it broadened his gaze, and also how it haunted him night after night to have watched a mortal he groomed from infancy become one of the damned. He might have said that failure alerted him to his adversary’s plans, wakened him to their knowledge of his intentions, but it did so much more than that, didn’t it? It prepared him, groomed him, for Caroline’s own Embrace.

An Embrace that could never have happened in 2005—not only because she was still a child, but because of his reluctance, his caution, his careful planning. Would he have ever considered to Embrace a dying woman on the spot? She imagines not—that he would have forgone the opportunity rather than take the risk.

She recalls well her sister’s words, on how close Abélia has been to Caroline for some time, since well before her Embrace. What part did she play in all of this? Caroline can only imagine for now, but no doubt her hand was in play: how could it not be? She sees her mother’s interest in daughters, not sons, and the seneschal’s fixation on Caroline’s male cousin. Sees the effect the police station had on Caroline, sees how it sent her into a spiral. She doesn’t think Abélia laid her own daughters at the feet of Gettis—his shooting smacks of another influence—but she can well imagine that Abélia wished Caroline there, that night, for whatever might have come.

Caroline sees the manipulation of René, his recall to New Orleans, his abduction of Caroline—she cannot forget how she was drugged that night—that was too intentional to be the product of chance. Did her rescue of Sarah and her sister bring her to the attention of another, or had her death that night been planned from before? It’s hard to say—but in this game of inches played across centuries it is far from the least plausible thing. She remembers the piece she received from Kelford, her false sire’s declaration to his Requiem-long ghoul: “it’s time.” No—René did not return to New Orleans after the shooting by chance.

Her abduction, her trip to the Dungeon, and her descent into its depths flash before her, painful bloodstained pieces of the puzzle. She could have just as easily died at René’s hands—and yet it was not to be. She was pulled deep, deeper, deeper still, into the blackest part of that pit. She remembers her suffering there—but also her preservation—like a worm on a hook, skewered but not shredded. She knows others were not so lucky: remembers watching limbs hacked off others, watching them be fed their own fingers, watching them feast on each other’s flesh because to do otherwise was to invite worse, watched them strangled with their own entrails and sewn back together with each other’s limbs. But not her—no, for all her suffering, she was… whole. Whole enough. Whole enough to tempt the seneschal, not only into his descent, but into what followed.

Caroline, who like so few in this age knew her way around the seneschal’s blade. Who checked all the other boxes for the seneschal—of breeding, of education, of devotion. Caroline, given an opportunity to take up his blade. And more still. She sees the guilt he carried for a decade for his failure with Rebecca, with allowing one of ‘his’ children that he’d so carefully watched to suffer such a fate. The fault he placed upon himself, clouding his judgment. This Kindred so devoted to the highest good, the greater good, who still risked his own so-precious existence as a check on darker forces to descend into his foe’s place of power to ‘rescue’ Caroline—a gamble against the longest of odds.

She sees everything that fed into her Embrace, when all the blood had been spilled and it was only the two of them. The grievous wounds that distracted the seneschal, that nagged at his attention. The awful state of Caroline, past not only medicine but also magic to save, with so little time to make a decision. Such an opportunity for the seneschal—an excuse to create a childe, to give the Embrace, without having to so callously take a life as he had planned. The temptation it presented—to both lessen the guilt he still felt for the destruction of Rebecca’s life—for was he killing Caroline? Wasn’t it a lesser evil to take the life of an already dying woman than to ruin another family?

And the timing of it all—might he have done any of these things were it not so late in the game, were he not so desperate, so out of time? The terrible state of the prince speaks for itself. Centuries of planning, decades of manipulation, and a perfect storm of events that night to bring it to a head—to force him into Caroline’s Embrace.

Caroline, who’d always wanted a mother that loved her. Caroline, who’d always desired a sister. Caroline, who all her life sought to please her father, to earn his attention. Caroline, from power and privilege. Caroline, with her hands already stained with blood, who had already shown any that could see into her soul how deep its stains ran, who would sacrifice almost anything. Caroline, whose mother happened to be the most powerful hunter in the state? Caroline, who could appeal so easily to Lou. Caroline, who even so tempted would still so seek to please her ‘father.’

It’s all too much, an overwhelming vision of her life and death and Requiem all plotted out, manipulated, contrived. Her head spins. She feels sick, used, tainted, trapped. Did anything she did ever matter? Did she ever have any choice at all, or had another seen which fork she would take in every road, and contrive them to lay before her? It’s wrong—so wrong, so perverted, a step into the domain of God.

She’d hoped the ‘truth’, full and complete, might give her peace. But it’s all the more horrifying—and not only for the seneschal’s callousness.

GM: Time seems to hang all-too still as Caroline contemplates those by turns unsettling and tragic twists of fate before Maldonato resumes,

“Miss Malveaux’s suitability as a childe, when collated against Miss Whitney’s, has oft proven fitful.”
“I have tasked her with her a series of labors to redress the poor judgment she displayed with Mr. Matheson.

“She has slain Claire Malveaux, her mortal mother, and obtained intelligence on the Baron’s activities by which we may thwart his latest design.”
“She has proven but partly able to divorce herself from her mortal life, and has accepted the fallen one’s blood for her own.”

“As an individual, I have seen much of Your Majesty’s last childer in her. I have seen courage and resolve to eclipse Miss Whitney’s. I have seen self-pity and -preoccupation all-too alike Mr. Costa’s. I have seen loyalty to withstand Mr. Savoy’s wiles. I have seen doubt distance her from Your Majesty’s faith.”

“I have seen in her a resentment and hunger for affection that others might manipulate towards their own ends. I have seen her resist the daughter of Dionysus’ same manipulations, and rid Your Majesty of a great foe, when all hope appeared lost.”

“I believe her less stable of temperament than either Adam Malveaux or Sarah Whitney, and less inspirited by thoughts of obligation and duty.”

“I believe her possessed of greater drive, ambition, and her own manner of sacrifice than either. I believe her capable of surpassing both of Your Majesty’s unrealized childer in greatness.”

“I believe time and careful cultivation may bring out those best traits within her and abate those most deleterious ones. Time do we have.”

“I have spoken much of the need for an heir to Your Majesty’s throne. With such an heir in place, there is yet little need for an immediate successor.”

“Even if a perfect childe of Miss Malveaux’s drive, Miss Whitney’s poise, and Mr. Malveaux’s faith stood before us, such a childe would be too young and inexperienced to rule the archdiocese alone. I shall not see Your Majesty’s domain become as Prince Jackson’s or Prince Panhard’s.”

“Yet an heir is a potent symbol. Once Your Majesty is able to enter the sleep of ages, I believe the archdiocese’s most stable course lies in the continuation of my reign as acting prince until such time as Miss Malveaux is suitable to take the throne.”

“In truth, such a change in leadership would impact the city but little. Your Majesty has long since delegated the majority of your responsibilities as prince and retains the office in but name only.”

“Yet there is power in names and symbols. The ‘rumor’ spread by Mr. Smith has already transformed the archdiocese’s sociopolitical landscape. Knowledge that Your Majesty’s bloodline maintains an unbroken rule over the city shall do much to maintain stability while circumventing the issues endemic to my assuming the title as well as duties of prince.”

Maldonato’s voice grows soft.

“Their existence has ever been a source of consolation and comfort to me.”

His gaze is tender as he looks upon the prince’s impassive, stone-like visage.

“I grow weary of this burden, my love. I desired it not when Nastasio first approached us. We have crossed an ocean and witnessed an age’s passing at his behest, and I still desire it not. There are worthier pursuits we have long postponed that the duties and responsibilities our present positions make untenable.”

“I am patient. Should you see fit to let your childe’s Requiem persist past this night, she shall eventually understand that patience comes easily to our kind. One’s desires and ambitions cannot outlive one who is immortal.”

“I am prepared to rule as regent in Miss Malveaux’s name, and to train her in the duties and responsibilities of a prince’s office, for however long should prove necessary until she may assume the throne herself with minimal disruption to the archdiocese’s continued stability. I do not fear time’s passage. I regret only those actions I may commit that shall impede the journey I have long postponed.”

“Yet such concerns for my own soul are subordinate to those I have for another’s. Your rest is long overdue, my love. Long overdue, long deserved, and long needed. You have changed in the time since assuming this city’s throne, and I do not believe its burdens have been kind to you. I would see them removed from your shoulders. I would see you granted peace.”

“You know as well as I that such peace is not assured. Time is running out. Motes of sand remain in the upper chamber of the hourglass that measures Your Majesty’s reign. The archdiocese’s threats must be dealt with while Your Majesty’s strength remains available to us. Our mission and mandate from the Camarilla persists, even if the one who bestowed it upon us is now long since dust beneath Aajav’s fangs.”

“Miss Malveaux has seen and remembered more to this Jyhad than I should have wished. But perhaps that, too, is necessary if we are to face the trials ahead. They are many.”

“Antoine Savoy plots incessantly to undermine Your Majesty’s temporal influence. The Baron, while so many overlook him, gathers his strength to meet us upon more esoteric battlefields. The Setites stir with new ambition in the aftermath of the daughter of Dionysus’ destruction. The Clan of Death pursues an agenda we still but ill understand. Nathaniel Blanch seemingly prepares to re-enter the Jyhad. The Anarchs roil with discontent and perceived hypocrisy among their leaders. The Tremere march heedlessly forward in their own private war. The Invictus assesses how they might make the city theirs. The primogen eye the fulfillment of their longest-held desire.”

“Birds of Dis descend upon our city in numbers not seen since Katrina. Kindred from Houston, Haiti, and Baton Rouge find ever greater reason to watch our city and involve themselves in its affairs. The magi see a city they may realize in their own image. The moon-beasts hunger for Bayou St. John and renewed war against their foes. The restless dead and those who tend them agitate in rebellion against Stygia’s governor. The wild ones stir in trepidation. Witch-hunters dream of a city cleansed of its Kindred presence. The infernal beckons to those seeking power in these uncertain times. Eyes high and low rest upon Perdido House in anticipation of monumental change they know is soon to occur.”

“Beyond our city, I hear of wars ravaging the Middle East and involving our kind on a scale unprecedented. I hear of a new regent guiding the Sword of Caine’s path, whose grip is surer and whose aim is deadlier than Galbraith’s ever was. Perhaps we may feel that sword’s bite in the coming years. Greater purpose lay behind last Carnival’s packs than merely partaking of the city’s pleasures.”

“I hear tale of distant domains ruled by the clanless, the last generations, and even those who serve, and I wonder how much of our dominion over the night take for granted. The very nature of Scourge Meadows’ mission renders it impossible for her to ever declare success.”

“I hear tale of witch-hunters descending upon our kind with renewed fervor, utilizing powers and technologies we are ill-equipped to understand. I hear of the young rising up against the old, and cities ruled by princes who have known the sun longer than they have the night.”

“Time never ceases its march, yet I find myself contemplating with oft frequency whether its pace may soon outtake us. The Jyhad is changing. The world is changing.”

“When one looks upon New Orleans, one sees a city teeming with energy and vitality. Many proclaim that the tragedies and disaster of ten years ago would hardly seem to have struck. They say the city has moved on. I do not believe this to be so. I believe the city to have been irrevocably transfigured—and that even creatures as static and long-dead as we may share in that metamorphosis. It is time for us to set our affairs in order, cease fighting the tides of history, and see whence our futures might carry us.”

“When I was as new to the night as Miss Malveaux, my sire’s grandsire told me of how he was prepared to slay the tribe of his birth down to the last man, woman, and child. He ended half of their lives before his sire commanded that he stop. In committing one atrocity did he spare the survivors a worse fate at his sire’s hands: a fate he would have been helpless to forestall. In committing one evil did he avert a worse evil. A beast he was, lest a beast he became.”

“My ancestor committed that massacre long ago, yet I feel his destiny coursing through my blood and guiding my steps and actions even to this present night. Here, at last, do we stand.”

“My actions are my own. I have broken Your Majesty’s sworn oath and covenant with God and usurped your prerogative as prince. I have betrayed the trust Your Majesty placed in me. I have damned Miss Malveaux’s soul and robbed her of her life’s most precious joys and gifts. I bear responsibility for the suffering she has caused so many others.”

“I harbor no regrets over my actions. I mourn the harm they have caused to others and the stains they have left upon my soul. Yet were they within my power to undo, I would undo them not. I have committed evil so that a greater evil might yet be averted.”

“Yet amidst such evil, I also see much good.”

“Know this, my love: you kept your oath. Whatever others may believe, you know that no dishonor has stained your dignitas, nor undermined the obedience you owe God. Know this, Miss Malveaux: your sire did not abandon and condemn you. I stole that knowledge and choice from him. You stand here before one another, each innocent of the crimes inherent to your blood as sire and childe. You stand as free of that original sin as did Adam and Eve before sampling Eden’s forbidden fruit.”

“In your reunion, I see a sire who may find the childe and heir he has long sought, and a woman who may find the father whose love she has long wished for. I see the potential for a prince to preserve his legacy, and for a childe to attain the greatness she has long yearned after. I see a measure of redemption for both of your souls through one another. But that is no longer for me to determine.”

“You have heard my tale of the circumstances that have brought us to this point. My secrets are laid bare. My hand may no longer compel what proceeds from here. It is your prerogatives now, to speak, to decide, and to answer:”

“What will you do?”

The seneschal’s voice dies at last, like the slow descent of an autumnal tree’s final leaf. The landscape before Caroline and her sire is dead and barren—yet hearkens to a promised spring.

Caroline: Caroline’s gaze fixes in her sire, in his own ancient, dead gaze. It’s like staring into the abyss, into the infinite. It captures centuries, perhaps more, within its unflinching pitiless eyes.

She can see reflections of herself in his eyes, in his skin. She knows she looks like a corpse this night, the Beast so close to the surface, robbing her of what shreds of her humanity remain.

She knows, better than any, all she’s sacrificed to make it this far, to stand before him.

There’s irony in the seneschal’s questioning of her loyalty, of her duty. Everything—save perhaps the moments since her mother’s embrace of her into a new family—has built towards this moment. Every sacrifice, every demand met, every humiliation suffered, to bring her a step closer to a Kindred she’s met only once before, and in scorn, when she was nothing but a un—then barely—released fledgling.

He is not everything she’d hoped. While she wears the injuries to her soul as open wounds, his are scars so deep she wonders what might remain within him, how he claws himself from the abyss each night in this mausoleum.

The seneschal’s own wounds confirm what she’s long feared—that his rule approaches its end, that his fate is the long sleep, that the time they have is so terribly limited within the context of a Requiem.

The disappointment is not with him—any more than the disappointment a child might feel over learning the truth of Christmas is with their parents. It’s the death of a dream, of an innocence—what little may be pried from a murderer like herself.

She wants to weep in the moment, she wants to rush to him, to beg him to accept him, to say anything other than the harsh pronouncements he’s offered since learning of her existence. Can he ever know everything she gave up to come this far? Everything she endured? Does he know how his silence, his stoicism cuts her even now? Still, she composes herself, perhaps aided by how little of her is human tonight. The Beast that does not quite rule her soul has no room for self-pity, for weakness, or for doubts.

Should she speak? Leave was given to the seneschal to explain his crime, not to her to make her plea, but every moment of silence stretches a lifetime.

GM: Her sire’s black gaze has come at last to rest upon her.

No sound disturbs the still and dead air, save the crashing rain and ominous rumble of thunder.

Caroline: “I beg you, Your Majesty, forgive my presumptuousness,” Caroline begins, when the silence becomes too overwhelming. “I have waited… it seems an eternity, since my Embrace, for this moment.”

Her blue eyes bore into his dark ones. “I am not so presumptuous to gainsay the words of my creator—especially as kind as they were, for all of their stark revelations. Perhaps the seneschal knows me better than I know myself—he has looked upon me for long, and more than once within me, into my mind. The first lies we tell are, I think, to ourselves. Even were that not true, I lack the perspective and accompanying wisdom of a centuries he possesses.”

“Still, there are parts of the tale that he has yet left for me to tell, if it pleases Your Majesty.”

GM: The prince’s response is like an answering crack of lightning from the troubled skies beyond the window. Stark, and for all its illumination, perhaps fatal.

“Proceed.”

Caroline: “I awoke into this existence knowing only that the last of my previous existence had been moments of terror and pain. My first in this one was overwhelming thirst and barely contained rage I had never before felt. In those first moments my first acts reaffirmed for me that which I had become, though I knew not how or why—a monster to match my most monstrous deeds in life.”

Caroline remembers that night, remembers the taste of her first victim’s blood in her mouth, remembers her horror later when she realized what she’d done. The memories are bitter, as much for how far she’s fallen from that night as for her first taste of corruption. Does she even remember many of her victims in modern nights? How many have names she even recalls? Meaningless questions. She’s not here for kine. She bores on, leaving pieces of herself behind as she goes.

“The details may resemble those of thousands of other Kindred across history—I will spare them—but in my first nights I maimed, I fought, and I killed. I felt the touch of the sun and the agony of wounds that would have killed me in life. I learned something of my nature, if not what I was in truth, before I was found and brought before the seneschal and sheriff to face execution.”

More bitter memories, there are so many—it feels this entire sojourn into the past is one into pain and disappointment. Into failure. It’s hard to face her past, the array of choices that in hindsight were so foolish, so reckless. She wants to strangle that version of herself, trying so hard to ‘save’ Paxton, bringing her first victim to the hospital, coming before Orson to help Aimee. She can feel the Beast devouring her self-loathing, how it grows strong from her distain for that still human Caroline Malveaux. Let it, she does not have the strength to fight it now.

“Perhaps I would have welcomed it. The seneschal is correct that I loathed what I had become. I raged petulantly against God Himself for what had happened to me. I hated myself for the harm I inflicted on others. I agonized as I watched my mortal life disintegrate night after night beneath fresh lies—and as I watched those closest to me hurt time and again by my new existence and the costs associated with it. I had no sire to explain my Requiem to me, or the laws of the city, or any other aspect of existence among Kindred. Instead I was counseled by a ghoul—that my very existence was poison, that the best I could hope for was to be destroyed before I caused overly much harm, that the moral choice was to destroy myself.”

She can barely even remember those thoughts—and for the better.

“The only purpose I found in my existence was in the impossible charge laid before me, to hunt down a century old hound, my murderer and purported sire. My missteps were many—and costly. They bought me the ire of the sheriff, the disdain of the Sanctified, the scorn of the Anarchs and the outright hunting by a krewe of them—more enraged and reckless as they became with each defeat I dealt them.”

There’s some satisfaction in some of these memories, the Beast can agree. The thrill of throwing down those lesser that sought to harm her. Of smashing Bliss into a torpor she’d never awake from, of cutting apart not one or two, but three attackers like the trash they were. Dark thoughts that keep the Beast from her mind now, that keep her in control.

“I found little comfort in others of my kind, and few inclined to grant succor to one laboring under a death sentence that rapidly approached: I counted my remaining existence in nights before the sheriff’s justice descended upon me. I received lessons in beatings, in whippings, in tortured mortal associates, murdered mortal family members, and in the inartful delivery of severed heads of those dear to me still.”

Hard nights, hard times. The bite of McGinn’s whip held in the hand of his slave—after he forced her to strip before them. Begging for succor from the sun after he held her there through the night. The taunts of the Nosferatu hacker. The selling out by the Hidden Clan to McGinn, the setup with the bikers. The memory of blows from Matheson for each ill-received answer—a cover for his attempt to all but rape her. Jessica’s head in a box. Westley… hard times that made her harder, that beat what mercy and goodness might have been left in her out. For the better, right?

“I knew not worth in my Requiem, but I would have my justice against my killer, against the one who so callously destroyed my life. He, at least, would never do so again. I would do something of worth, something to offset the terrible toll of my Requiem, endured perhaps by me but paid for in the blood and lives of others. Looming final death gave me clarity, a desperate recklessness in my pursuit of my supposed sire.” Desperateness and recklessness, the hallmarks of her Requiem.

“And along the way I accumulated reasons I might go on, that I might not greet the sun following the fulfillment of my task. Some were pleasures—the company of another—but most were burdens I could not easily lay down. Lives I had shattered that I sought to piece back together in something resembling their previous state, souls I had stained with my own vitae that I was now responsible for. Pride too had a part. The scorn of others, their doubts, their judgement of me called to something in me, demanded that I prove them wrong. I had never been a nobody. I could not bear to be remembered—or worse not remembered at all—as a failure. Still, I think even the night following René Baristheaut’s capture, that sole night of my Requiem in which I did not labor under the seneschal’s death sentence, I remained possessed by doubts. How could any moral person—or even one pretending at it—justify this existence?”

But she did, she continued to justify it, as she has night after night, taking lives, ruining lives, hurting people because it’s what she is. The purring Beast inside reminders her of that much.

“That night proved tumultuous. Mr. Matheson’s secret was laid bare before me in the most personal of ways, and I agonized over what I might do with this poisonous knowledge. The seneschal resolved both matters when I was brought before him to face accounting for the careless handling of such a sensitive and shameful matter.”

“In his grace he revealed, in the moments before what was to be my execution, the truth of my blood—that I was not the childe of the criminal René Baristheaut, but instead that your majesty’s blood ran through me. I begged to come before my sire, but the seneschal relented only that he should hold my sentence in suspense for one year, that I might prove more value than nuisance.”

A tease, enough to keep her twisting on the hook like a worm, the darker part of her whispers.

“The seneschal did not lie, but within the truth he presented was a lie planted that I did not immediately discern. In those following nights I set out to prove I could be of value to your majesty, convinced my sire would not have abandoned me without some greater purpose, that I had endured all I had by the prince’s will.”

Foolish girl the dark whispers. She can’t deny it, and why should she? Only that darker part of her has gotten her this far. How much did goodness buy her?

“I set out to make something of my Requiem, however humble it might be. Nothing had changed—not for the better. I remained a sireless fledgling, now laboring once more under a death sentence. My mother’s secret was exposed, and now Requiem was not dependent not only upon my own actions, but upon her own continued cooperation with the sheriff. His own affection for me was not improved by the interactions my liaison between them required. Mr. Matheson now held numerous boons over me, and I had given him great offense. More, I discovered standing among others in Clan Ventrue writ large could scarcely have been worse. I knew nothing of what that legacy meant prior to my meeting with Mr. Matheson, and in my early nights had given offense to a great many luminaries among it within New Orleans. Perhaps some of it was unavoidable—some met and conspired with René Baristheaut, also of their blood, while I hunted him—but I much of the blame was mine alone. Finally, there was the task laid before me—that I should uncover some secret of equal value to Mr. Matheson’s from among the prince’s foes.”

No great victories here, no great successes. Her successes have been humble.

“Surely, my errors to date, my failures, where why my sire had not spoken to me but officially during my release—and how I treasured that memory. Surely I was not worthy of him. These things I easily believed, having seen your majesty once now, in dark glory, at the trial.”

Foolish gir- She doesn’t let it continue. This is her tale now.

“I don’t know when, exactly, it was that the lie started to unravel. Perhaps as I learned more of the clan that was my birthright. Perhaps when Mr. Savoy sought to wrap his coils around me ever tighter, his every word so carefully chosen. Perhaps when I looked upon the relationships between other childer and their sires.”

How jealous she’d been of them.

“It started, I think, as a dream. A pleasant fantasy—certainly my sire would not have abandoned me in the night. He would not have cast me out to stumble and fall, to bloody myself before the captive audience of the all night society. As I berated myself for every mistake that might mar me in your eyes, so many made in ignorance, I wanted to believe it was the will of some third party that I found myself alone in the night, only hoping my victories, such as they were, might bring some pride to my sire.”

“Knowing, all too certainly by his silence, they did not.”

These lows were not so long ago, when she had nothing to go on for except a desperate dream of getting out from under the seneschal’s sentence, of rising from the lowest of the low among her kind, from taking her rightful place. That he did not see fit to attend the completion of her agoge had been such a blow. She remembers raging with bitter tears, in private, after everyone had left and she didn’t have to keep the mask on anymore. It had been such a familiar experience, so like her childhood. Never good enough.

“Perhaps, as the seneschal alluded to, Mr. Savoy might have eventually manipulated my desire for affirmation in time against my sire. The secrets I knew, and who I was, I knew could be potent weapons wielded against the prince. I will not deny the temptation was there. I think for a time pride held be back, that I would not be proven unworthy of my sire. That I would not settle for a pale imitation, a pretender. So too, wisdom—what future might I have if I went over? I knew I would ever be a liability, a threat to him even if he proved victorious—especially if he did.”

She recalls the argument with her mother, now dead and gone, on this point. Recalls not being able to explain to her the truth. She wonders if that was the beginning of the end of the hope of saving her mother’s life.

“But so too, something more. I would not stab my f—my sire in the back. I would not be a cowardly weak slinking thing that needed praise and affirmation, and wilted without them like a flower in the dark. If it was to be your majesty’s will that I should go through this, I would trust in it.”

The curses herself for the misstep even as she pushes on with her explanation. She’s waited her entire Requiem to speak with her sire. She will not be derailed now.

She continues, her voice strong and clear. “Was it though? I thought time and again on it—on what motive there might be for my creation, for my particular initiation into this existence. Surely there was a reason, but I couldn’t find it, not for my utter blindness that had done so much damage. Not for my abject weakness that whored me out to very petty tyrant in New Orleans. Surely there were better ways, if a brutal education and proving ground was what was desired, one’s more in keeping with the traditions I learned of within Clan Ventrue.”

“It began to come together—if not by my sire’s will, then how and why?” Her gaze sweeps to the seneschal. “I knew not if it was possible—and that doubt for months kept me from certainty—but if my sire didn’t know, it would explain much. I thought of my sire, so dignified, so proper, so worthy in my brief meeting, and whether he would delegate my destruction to another for my failures. I could not see it—that he would permit that act to another.”

Her gaze sweeps back to her sire. “The night that truth was confirmed for me was the night any thought of ‘betrayal’ died. It was the night that I resolved, however desperate I must be, that I would stand before my sire, that whatever else came of it, he deserved to know the truth.”

“That injustice, I had seen. I had… committed, of a fashion. The murder of a child without the consent or even knowledge of their existence for the father. My reasons were my own, and my crime less than the seneschal’s own, even if they were just as selfish. There was cruel irony in my circumstance—reason enough to believe in God.”

“If I viewed myself as a victim of the seneschal’s plot, if I felt self-pity and anger, I knew I was not alone.” It’d been before Christmas. Before she’d ruined her name, watched her life fall apart. Thank—not God—Abélia for that. If the truth had not come out, she doesn’t know if she would have had the will to push through that particular trial.

“It is not given to me to pass judgment on what he did—to me or to your majesty. He has given his reasons, and though I might not have done the same, I cannot say what the proper path was, how righteous or terrible his act.” She pauses for a moment before continuing, “nor, I find now, do I care.”

It’s not entirely true. She wishes she could let go of the anger she still feels over all of the lies, but it still burns, and perhaps it always will. Some wounds are too deep to close.

“Whatever the reasons, whatever the methods, whatever the past holds is immaterial in truth.” That much is true. “Those months are gone. What might have been with my sire is gone. What misfortunes were suffered, what lives were lost… it’s all gone. Even what relationship might have existed between the seneschal and myself is gone, forever tainted by the lies that existed between us.”

A cruel barb, but as true as the one’s he laid into her character. She remembers how naively she believed him a moral beacon among the damned. Even until this meeting, she’d thought more of him, thought the excuses he might offer more convincing than the truth has proven. She doesn’t hate him, but she doubts she’ll ever forgive him.

She continues more softly, her monologue coming to a close, “All the future for me, whether I might measure it in seconds or years, flows forth from this moment. I have had only dreams of what that might hold, I dared not hope. In those dreams however, I would spend what time may yet remain with the sire that might yet guide my next steps, that I might make proud, that I might be worthy of. That future, unlike the past, may yet be written by your majesty’s will.”

The young Ventrue falls silent.

GM: Time stretches. Neither elder speaks. Rain screams and crashes against the cavernous window. Thunder rumbles angrily overhead. The occasional fork of lightning distantly flashes, its harsh glow eliminating the harsher crags of the prince’s face.

Caroline cannot say what he might be thinking. Perhaps his love can. Perhaps not even he.

It’s an alien face. A marble statue in both pallor and animation: as bleached as white stone and equally still. Dark fire burns behind the glass-like eyes: the fury of heaven matched with the torments of hell, and a promise damnation that would feel all-too real even were Caroline not damned herself. To stare into its burning depths for overlong is to tempt destruction. There is no possibly mistaking it for the face of a living man.

And yet, it is not so different from Caroline’s.

Past the soul-melting fire, within the reflective sheen of the white glass, she sees herself. Another marble automaton. Another soul stained black by hard choices, by pursuit of power, by her own vitae-baptized damnation.

Another monster.

Time stretches. Neither moves. Neither breathes. Neither blinks.

Then, a rasp. A voice like grinding stone, scorched by fire.

“Show me you are loyal.”

The statue’s offered wrist gleams like marble against the feeble stars. Two points of red well from white.

Caroline: Caroline stares at that wrist. Her sire’s words are a knife running through her hopes for this night.

This night has not been as her dreams might have had it. There has been no joy in her sire’s eyes, no pride, no forgiveness, no embrace of the lost childe. And this… this had certainly not been in any of her dreams. She knows what waits in his blood. She’s felt it often enough from other powerful Kindred, and rarely by choice.

Even more, she knows what waits in his vitae, vice that of the petty tyrants of the city. It is no faint tie, no collar she might casually remove, or that might quickly fade. It is decades, perhaps centuries tied to him, pulled around by it like an eager puppy. Nor is it her first taste of him.

She knows how that second sip makes her feel around Jocelyn, how it draws her to her paramour time and again. How hard it is to resist the Toreador’s desires.

Hasn’t she shown her loyalty? Isn’t she here, tonight, and not in the Evergreen? It does more than sting, his doubt. His demand. She, who’s spent most of her Requiem trying to stand before him, and he, who has done nothing for her. Less than nothing, for his frenzy moments ago that might have claimed her unlife, had she been less swift, or the seneschal less selfish.

But then, of course he doubts. Doesn’t she recall the fate of his last childe? She’s seen it, the betrayal, the rebellion, the execution. How could she expect him to trust, to believe, when she’s seen how deeply the game is played among elders—how many hands were at work in her Embrace? She knows it is the bond working already upon her, that first sip subtly tipping her towards the most favorable conclusion.

Does it matter? She knows she’ll drink. It’s a small price compared to those she’s paid already. It’s not the steep price that stings any more than the tag on a piece of clothing has ever slowed her down, it’s the meaning behind it.

Caroline slides to her knees before the prince and reaches for the offered wrist, for the so intoxicating smelling vitae.

GM: The younger Ventrue all but gags at the taste. It burns her tongue like magma and pours down her throat with all of the heaviness of steel. If Jocelyn’s blood was a tap faucet’s, and the sheriff’s a river’s angry current, the sanguine offering before her is a storm-tossed lake. Her nerves sharpen. Her senses heighten. She feels strong. Calm. Unstoppable. Detached, yet a whole of something greater.

The font of liquid gold ends all-too abruptly. Shadows stir, seeping over her sire’s motionless form like a hungry cloud. His black-burning gaze is the last of his features to vanish. When the darkness recedes, his ruined throne sits empty. Caroline is left alone in the desolate chamber with the seneschal.

His level voice preempts the silence.

“Well done. I had feared much was lost.”

Caroline: Caroline looks from the empty throne to the seneschal. She unconsciously reaches with one hand to her lips, wiping whatever traces of vitae remains into her mouth. “Where…” she pauses, composing herself. “Was he ever here?”

GM: “Doubt not your senses, Miss Malveaux.”

Caroline: She falls silent. The seneschal has taught her, more than anything, to doubt everything.

GM: He turns to depart. “Come. There is much to set in order.”

Caroline: The young Ventrue rises, the taste of the prince’s blood still upon her lips. She feels drunk, heady on the potent vitae and moment both. Has she gotten everything she wished or seen everything she feared? Has she achieved her dreams or wandered into a new nightmare?

Her gaze lingers on the ancient Moor, trying to use him to orient herself, to stop the spinning. His words strike home.

Much to set in order. She thinks to Claire, dead but not forgotten. She thinks to Abélia, and what it means to be one of her daughters. She thinks to her vanished sire and where he has gone. She thinks to the many enumerated threats to her sire’s rule. Her future rule.

Yes. There is much to set in order.

But perhaps now, they can begin.

---

Previous, by Narrative: Story Eleven, Jon Epilogue
Next, by Narrative: Story Twelve, Caroline I

Previous, by Character: Story Eleven, Caroline XV
Next, by Character: Story Twelve, Caroline I

“We are all of us less than we strive to be.”
Philip Maldonato

---

Monday night, 7 March 2016, AM

GM: It’s not a long drive to Perdido House. But it feels like it is.

It feels like a drive that’s lasted her entire unlife.

It feels like an unlife that’s lasted so much longer than the paltry sum of months it’s really been.

No one talks much on the drive over. No one talks at all, in fact. There’s nothing to talk about. Not right now.

Eventually, Caroline’s car approaches a familiar soaring black and gray steel monolith that surveys the city beneath it like a grim sentinel. Fearsome gargoyles jut from crenelations, baring their claws and fangs to the night sky with muted howls.

Perdido House looks as vast, terrible, and foreboding as ever—a fitting reflection of the master who dwells within. Yet tonight it is not merely those things. Tonight it also seems to hold… anticipation.


Caroline: It seems a constant that every trip to the building is a matter of life and death for Caroline. Or at least, death or undeath. She thinks back to her visit visit in the ‘custody’ of then-Father Malveaux. There’s some symmetry now.

She has nothing to say to Fuller. There’s nothing to say. If she makes a mistake tonight he’ll likely die—as will her other ghouls. If she succeeds… well. There’s a question.

On one hand, a terrifying oblivion she can well imagine. On the other, a future she imagines any neonate in the city might salivate over. One she can still barely imagine.

GM: Driving into the underground parking garage still remains all-too akin to descending into the belly of a great beast, past an iron-grilled jaw filled with checkpointed teeth. Armed, grim-faced, and black-uniformed security guards inquire Caroline’s business. Fuller says something back. They wave the car on through.

The interior lobby is a harshly lit black marble affair whose brutally straight angles and severe, minimalist decor brings to mind the fascist architecture of decades past. Bulky men wearing black suits, opaque sunglasses and ear radios stand in silent vigil, modern palace guards within their master’s castle. Coldly professional secretaries at the receptionists’ desk direct visitors to their destinations. Save for an iron statue of a man on horseback brandishing a sword (El Cid, Caroline identifies), the entrance hall to Augusto Vidal’s court is austerely decorated, yet projects an oppressively inescapable atmosphere of power and wealth.

She talks to one of the secretaries. Says some words. An elevator ride and some walking later, and she’s in the office of Maldonato’s herald, Robert Congo. His skin is deep black and his hair snow-white. He has a deeply lined face, prominent nose, and thoughtful dark eyes. He wears a subdued dark gray suit with gold cufflinks that remind Caroline of his master’s.


“Greetings, Miss Malveaux. What business would you discuss tonight?” the ghoul patiently inquires.

Caroline: The heiress has met the ancient black man before. More than once, in fact, though never informally. Never without a prearranged meeting with a specific purpose. It’s just as well—her purpose tonight is not with this man.

For the first time since her Embrace, she wears a stark deviation from her typical wardrobe. A callback to another time, what seems like a lifetime ago. To her first meeting with the ancient Moorish seneschal who would damn her.

Conservative without being boorish, the brilliantly white gown covers her right shoulder and is pinned in gold, leaving bare her left shoulder and both of her oh-so-pale arms. Framing built into the gown ties it tight around her waist, while the cut leaves it clinging to her legs, framing her form without exposing it lasciviously.

The Ventrue’s pale skin is only a slight shade off from that of her dress, only separated by the lustrous brilliance of the gown her own dead flesh lacks. Even precisely applied makeup can’t hide the Beast lurking ever closer to the surface of the young heiress—though its clear she’s tried. Caroline is as carefully presented as she’s ever been.


“Mr. Congo,” she greets the elder ghoul. Her eyes take in the tiny wrinkles around his eyes that were never so clear to her vision before, the tiny stray threads beginning to peak out of the familiar suit, the tiny abrasions on the edges of his fingernails from when he last clipped them—recently.

“You’ll have to forgive the presumptuousness of this, but some months ago the seneschal asked something of me. It has become somewhat time-sensitive.”

GM: “Seneschal Maldonato has informed me of your task, madam,” the ghoul replies. “Are you here to report its completion to His Grace? He shall receive you but once.”

The words are mild enough, but there is a quiet finality to them.

Once and if Caroline answers yes, she can never go back.

Caroline: But once, for failure shall be met with final death. A threat he has held over her head her entire Requiem. Doubt gnaws at her. Is this the right path?

She doesn’t know. It’s another blade, less final but no less cutting. Doubt. The slow knife that cuts her down bit by bit, cuts at what makes her herself.

It’s too slow tonight.

“Yes,” she replies, the word firmly spoken perhaps a bit more quickly than her last ones. Her own blade striking before doubt can cut her down.

GM: Congo picks up the black STE phone on his desk. He holds it to his ear, then states after a moment, “She is ready, Your Grace.”

There is another pause.

“Very good, Your Grace.”

The ghoul’s deeply-set eyes meet Caroline’s. Then he says something she has never heard an elder’s herald say, or at least not to her:

“He will see you immediately.”

Caroline: The heiress is grateful, for once, that her body is a corpse. For the lack of sweat. For the lack of weakness. The machine-like answer demanded by her mind demands no human weaknesses to betray her doubts.

“Very good,” she replies to the herald. Her voice is flat, trying to conceal the apprehension. The fear. And, yes, the eagerness behind it.

GM: There’s walking. An elevator ride. More walking, down cold and featureless gray corridors. They arrive at a door. Congo knocks lightly against it.

Caroline: There’s no drawn breath. Caroline is as still as a statue.

GM: A single word echoes from behind the wood:

“Enter.”

Congo opens the door.

The seneschal’s office is changed from when Caroline last saw it. The Lancea et Sanctum holy symbol mounted to the wall opposite the door is still present, as she suspects it shall always be. The room’s wall paneling remains a dark and somber brown wood interspersed with tall, full bookshelves. The previous palm and Spanish moss bonsai trees have been exchanged for a weeping willow and cherry tree. The blue and white Islamic vases remain, but the orange and black Greek vases have been replaced with red-patterned Chinese ones.




The same two paintings are still present. David Chase’s The Moorish Warrior, and the calligraphic wood carving interwoven with arabesque floral patterns. Traditional Islamic art does not depict the human form for fear of being idolatrous: abstract geometric patterns instead predominate. Caroline, fluent in Arabic, recognizes the characters: La ghaliba illallah, or Only God obtains victory, repeated twice.



Caroline: The Ventrue takes in the office, faintly surprised at the changes. She’d expected that the seneschal would be a creature of habit, wedded to the past and familiar. She also takes it in with new eyes. The Moorish Warrior—fitting for the greatest swordsman she’s ever seen, Kindred or otherwise.

GM: Philip Maldonato sits behind the same Victorian oak desk from which he first surveyed Caroline, at least as one of the Damned. His surroundings have changed, a little, but the elder Cainite himself looks untouched by time. The same tall height. The same mere hint of wrinkles from age around his deep-set almond eyes. He wears a double-breasted gray suit with a navy tie and matching handkerchief in the front pocket. A silver pocketwatch on an attached chain and cufflinks of the same material offer several further concessions to the past. A gold signet ring set with a sapphire and traced with Arabic script rests upon one of his long, slender fingers.


He does not look up from his desk. He already is.

Caroline is reminded of their ‘last’ meeting beyond Perdido House in that timeless garden. He looked as if he could sit upon its bench for a thousand years. He looked as if he had been sitting upon its bench for a thousand years.

He still looks like he’s sitting there. He still looks like he’s waiting.

Time passes slowly among the dead, it seems.

Caroline: She resists turning her gaze to him for as long as she can as she studies the room, but it’s as inevitable as the rising of the sun. He looks the same… but not to her. She doubts he ever will. He’s no longer the seneschal, the gentle but firm hand of the prince. He’s not the same man who accepted her confessions and hung the blade above her neck. He’s not the seneschal holding court.

He’s something else. There’s a shadow to him hidden behind his eyes. A darkness lurking there. He’s a liar and a manipulator. A butcher and a killer. He’s the Kindred who damned her not only to walk among the dead, but who threw her into the world blind to it all, to stumble and fall, and fail, and to suffer in ignorance. He’s the Kindred who brought her into this world, but couldn’t even do so with his own blood. Who chose to make her an orphan and a bastard to her own sire in the same stroke.

And he’s also the Kindred who descended into the Dungeon to save her life. Who risked his own, centuries-spanning existence towards some inscrutable purpose. Who suffered pains on her behalf she can well imagine. Who showed her unthinkable gentleness for their kind as she lay dying. Who gave her a second chance when all others must have been howling for her head.

Her eyes settle on his. Her savior, her murderer, her may yet be savior or destroyer: Philip Maldonato—a name that’s as much a lie as any he’s told.

GM: As the elder Cainite’s timeless gaze meets Caroline’s, she sees little of Antoine Savoy’s geniality and good humor. Its wooden-hued depths seem a veritable forest, grown unfathomably tall, thick, and unnavigable—and as perilous to traipse through as a thicket of sharpened stakes.

Nor does his gaze gloss over hers, as Ferris’, Widney’s, and his own ghoul’s did. They seem to attentively note every detail of Caroline’s new eyes—every bit of blue that once was green.

The moment hangs suspended like a snapshot of eternity corked in a bottle.

Finally, he speaks.

“Please be seated, Miss Malveaux.”

The soft click of the door behind them seems almost inaudible.

Caroline: “Thank you, Seneschal.” The short walk to the desk seems like miles, but it passes in an instant. She pulls out a seat and smooths her dress as she sits, never taking her eyes off of him.

GM: “Time has not been kind to you, Miss Malveaux,” he states.

Caroline: “I don’t expect that you believed it would be, Seneschal,” she replies measuredly.

GM: “Time lays waste to all things, but we fight it for as long as we may.”

Caroline: “You knew, Seneschal, there would be a price to pay for what was asked. I would not lay that cost at the feet of time.”

GM: “Time’s soles may bear many names to those trod underfoot.”

He regards Caroline pensively, then states,

“Tell me of your Requiem since our last meeting, Miss Malveaux.”

Caroline: Caroline bites her lower lip and tightens her grip on the chair’s arms. Tell me of your Requiem. It’s so patronizing, so demanding. Part of her wants to lash out at him. Wants to tell him, you are not my sire, to scream, you lost the right to ask me that when you threw me out.

She swallows that part of herself. She tries to move past the anger and pettiness.

What does he want to hear? How she begged and sniveled before other Ventrue for acceptance? How she crawled around on her knees seeking favors? How she’s ended lives and raped minds, and build her pauper’s throne upon a still-growing mountain of corpses and ruined lives?

“Claire Malveaux is dead,” she finally manages. “As are many of ‘her’ hunters, though not all. Some I have, others are beyond my reach, in league with Mr. Savoy under the influence of a very old ghoul hunter.”

“The most recent name he operated under was Richard Gettis, but he’s had many others. He’s been undermining Prince Vidal’s hold on the New Orleans Police Department for decades by inducting members of the force into his own internal organization with the stated goal of destroying Kindred. ‘Gettis’ and members of this organization were at the heart of Claire’s influence in New Orleans, though not the full extent of it.”

She manages to keep a mostly straight face through the ‘report.’

Claire. Not ‘her mother.’ Just ‘Claire Malveaux.’ Her ‘stepmother.’ Not the woman who brought her into the world. Not the mother who willingly exposed herself and betrayed her secret to Caroline. Not the woman who knew the cost of it, but also that it might save her daughter’s unlife.

GM: Something seems to flicker within Maldonato’s eyes at Caroline’s stoic recitation.

“Tell me of your mother’s death, Miss Malveaux,” he requests.

Caroline: “I planted a trap for her hunters. A lure, to draw them into the open for destruction at the hands of my ghouls,” Caroline recites, her voice flat. “Whether she saw through it, or simply had her own agenda… when I went to visit her that night, she sought to trap me.”

She has to keep her voice flat, has to keep it to facts. Has to maintain her composure.

“I believe her in league with Mr. Savoy—directly or indirectly. Whether simply due to his history with hunters, or due to some other means of influence… perhaps my brother. She expressed her intent to ‘release’ me once Mr. Savoy was the prince.”

She’s rambling, she knows that, but she doesn’t want to think on that night. She doesn’t want to remember her mother consumed by darkness. She doesn’t want to remember murdering her.

“She failed to contain me,” she abridges.

GM: “I am certain the temptation to join Mr. Savoy’s political bloc was great,” Maldonato states.

Caroline: Caroline’s smile is not kind. “There’s a reason he’s winning. Several, in fact.”

GM: “What worth do you then find in Prince Vidal’s cause, Miss Malveaux?” the seneschal inquires.

“Sheriff Donovan has made a place for himself at the side of his sire’s rival. Mr. Savoy was doubtlessly prepared to offer our prince’s childe a similar place, and would have derived no small pleasure from the irony.”

Caroline: The Ventrue pauses in thought for a long moment before giving her answer.

“He tried,” she replies distantly. “Repeatedly, and I expect at some cost. He made overtures, made time, arranged meetings, offered concessions… Claire even ran a scheme, either at his urging or his direction, to push me into his arms under the belief that the bishop was threatening me and had raided my haven.”

GM: “Small reason to begrudge a patron such as he, in the eyes of many. Your treatment at the hands of our prince’s agents has been little kinder.”

Caroline: “It would have been the smarter move,” Caroline replies, still distant within her thoughts.

“The sheriff hates me, the bishop hates me. The prince… well. You know better than I, don’t you?”

The Ventrue turns her head, abandoning for a moment formality with the elder Kindred.

GM: Maldonato rests his steepled fingers upon the desk’s surface.

There’s a look on his face she hasn’t seen before.

Surprise.

Caroline: Her blue eyes bore into his.

“So, tell me, Seneschal, why am I here?”

GM: Malonato doesn’t rise from his seat. One moment he’s there. The next he’s not. He’s standing, an ancient-looking book clasped in his hands. It wasn’t there before either. He mouths an incantation. Caroline doesn’t understand it. It sounds only partly like Arabic. It isn’t loud, but it echoes strangely and makes her ears throb with pain.

The Ventrue’s shadow swells like a constrictor swallowing prey. Swallowing light. The room’s flicker erratically. The limbs of Caroline’s shadow writhe like joint-less, flailing tentacles, then vanish, swallowed into an expanding formless gloom that occupies not two dimensions, but three. It swallows all. Even itself. Caroline’s nightvision can no longer make out anything inside the darkness.

Then, splotches of white. Not light. Not light at all. Formless. Sourceless. The pale underside of some monstrous sea beast’s grasping tentacles, alien flesh that has never felt the sun’s rays within its abyssopelagic home. The gloom ripples and washes over the room like a foul black tide. Lights die. Colors fade. The cityscape beyond the window winks out. The shuddering realityscape seems little more than a glass tank, and its cracking glass insufficient to hold its occupant’s grotesque bulk.

Then the lights are back on, the Islamic vases are blue, and there’s a city past the window. Everything is back to normal. Caroline’s shadow has coalesced into a discernibly humanoid shape. The darkness is a woman’s gown and hair. The whiteness is her milky skin.

“Uthman,” smiles Abélia Devillers. “It has been far too long!”

“I never expected you to receive me again, if I’m to be quite honest… another thing to thank this sweet child for,” Caroline’s new mother remarks happily as she settles her hands on the Ventrue’s shoulders.

“You just bring happiness everywhere you go, my dear,” Abélia continues with a fluttering laugh. “Saving innocent children from tragic ends, and now reuniting me with old friends…”

Caroline: Caroline has the feeling she’s been caught up amid something older, and darker, and more twisted than even the diablerie and matricide she’s committed. But then, that’s what she’s become, isn’t it? She’s made her choices. She tries to relax under Abélia’s hands.

“Don’t be upset, Seneschal. She only confirmed what I’d dearly hoped, but not quite dared to believe.”

GM: Maldonato holds out his hand, from which a curved scimitar now rests. He silently advances upon the midnight-haired woman behind Caroline.

She recognizes that sword. She couldn’t make out many details when she first saw it. But she remembers how the hilt felt in her ruined, blood-crusted hands. She remembers the whoosh as the crescent blade cleanly severed their foe’s head. As the cold steel looms large in her vision, she could swear she can hear the hoary Malkavian’s death scream again, a blood-curdling sound more animal than human.

Caroline: The heiress knows full well what he’s capable of with that scimitar. She knows how hopeless any conflict with him might be.

It doesn’t stop her from standing, from wrapping one hand around her ‘mother’ and ushering her behind her.

GM: Abélia seeps behind Caroline as readily as a flitting shadow—her own shadow.

Maldonato raises the sword high with both hands, his tall frame and long arms bringing it well above Caroline’s and Abélia’s heads, then brings it down.

Caroline: Caroline is fast. She knows how swift she is. Academically, she knows there are probably faster Kindred in the city, but she’s only ever seen one.

Unfortunately, the seneschal is that one. She knows there is no comparison. Perhaps she’ll be able to close that gap one night: Kindred throughout the city would envy her Blood’s closeness to Caine if they knew of it. But she doesn’t know how long away that night may be. Hundreds of years? A thousand? Until then, it’s a contest between a tortoise and a hare, a gap she cannot leap. Not yet.

It doesn’t stop her from trying. She can’t run. Won’t run. Even if her gown and shoes didn’t impede her movement, even if she could run, even if she wasn’t in some twilight realm, she wouldn’t leave Abélia behind.

It’s hopeless. But she tries to catch the blade between her palms as it comes down.

GM: Caroline’s hands snap out, faster than any mortal could see. They clap against air. The vanished blade reappears against Abélia’s neck, stopping far less than an inch short of the midnight-haired woman’s throat.

“The lifeblood of she who denuded your sister stains this blade’s edge, fallen one. Is your thirst for vengeance yet satisfied?”

The words are as hard as the scimitar’s steel, and only scarcely less sharp.

Caroline: Caroline pauses, the moment caught in the balance. If he’d meant to strike to kill he could have done so… and there is much she doesn’t know.

Fallen one?

GM: Abélia tilts her nose, smelling deeply of the blade, and then gives a fluttering laugh.

“Oh, my dear Uthman, that’s such ancient history!” she exclaims. “What need have I to dwell on past slights during this time of joy… when I have a new daughter, one for whom I would sacrifice myself… and she so readily for me?”

Abélia’s dark eyes sparkle as they settle upon Caroline’s. She does not move her neck from the steel.

“You are everything and more that a parent could wish of their child, my dear. Claire and Nathaniel hardly deserved you.”

Caroline: The words send a shiver of pride down Caroline’s spine, even as she eyes the seneschal.

GM: “All you ever wished for was love—love to receive, and love to repay in kind. And how you do!”

Caroline: It’s almost taunting. It might be from someone else, but from Abélia the words don’t sting.

GM: They don’t. They sound completely and totally sincere.

Caroline: She opens her mouth, but what is there to say? That Abélia hasn’t treated her like trash and thrown her away? That she’s right? An entire life and unlife of never good enough, until Abélia.

She eyes the scimitar. That close, he’ll have to draw it back to strike. Have to change direction. That will be her moment, when as fast as he is, the seneschal will have to slow to a moment in which it stops.

GM: Maldonato’s gaze remains fixed upon Abélia, unyielding as the steel in his hand.

“Then your thirst remains unquenched, fallen one. Greater is the pity for your daughters. Even your son’s sins might have been wiped clean through their souls.”

Caroline: Caroline isn’t gullible enough to believe there will be no strings attached with Abélia. She doesn’t trust that much, but the seneschal’s words grind on her.

“Don’t be upset that she picked up your refuse and found value in it.”

GM: Abélia’s smile doesn’t fade. But her next words are utterly without mirth.

“I have no son.”

Maldonato’s gaze moves between Caroline and her new mother. Next to John Harley Matheson’s marble-like pallor, the old Moor’s darker skin looks alive enough, but he remains utterly motionless. He doesn’t resemble a statue so much as a snapped picture. So does Abélia. The scimitar still rests against her neck. The three of them seem frozen in the tableau from some surreal drama, all-too obviously inhuman to their audience’s eyes.

“Love holds little regard for truth,” the seneschal intones.

Caroline: “What truth did you share with me, Seneschal?” Caroline asks. “That you made me with your hand and the prince’s blood, like a childe in a test tube? That he doesn’t even know I exist? That you threw me into the world and set me against one the prince’s servants called friend? Into the teeth of the Ventrue, the Sanctified, and the hounds at once.”

She shakes her head without ever taking her eyes off his. “The only answer I don’t have is why.”

GM: “To do otherwise would have doomed you, Miss Malveaux, and seen you slain or stolen as the other heirs to my prince’s throne I have sought and failed to cultivate. Do not mistake your suffering as evidence that its alternative would have been kinder.”

The seneschal’s voice remains as unwavering as his motionless blade’s steel, but his eyes re-fix upon Abélia.

“Truth persists, fallen one, even as love denies and memory betrays. You do your daughters an unkindness in denying their brother. Blood shall always tell.”

Caroline: “Heirs?” Caroline almost spits the word. “A pauper cannot be a prince, Seneschal. Your way beggared and whored me to every petty tyrant Kindred in the city—before it and you destroyed all that I was.”

The accusation lands without venom or anger. Only pain.

GM: “Oh, can you not see the hurt in my daughter’s eyes, Uthman?” Abélia entreats. “The words ‘for your own good’ have brought happiness to few children indeed… happiness as I seek to bring to my own.”

“What happiness has the blood upon your hands purchased? What end has it effected? What good has it achieved and not merely seen slip from your fingers?”

The raven-haired matron gives a fluttering laugh.

“Little wonder, perhaps, that Kant is so welcome to your sensibilities—good intentions are all that matter within that system of ethics, are they not? Why, they say the the bricks along Hell’s road are stamped with those two words: ‘good intentions.’ For my own part, I have always paid greater heed to a journey’s terminus than its beginning.”

“Where one begins a journey determines its terminus, fallen one,” Maldonato answers. “And we are all of us less than we strive to be.”

Caroline: “There’s the seneschal I’ve come to know,” Caroline replies quietly.

GM: There’s another fluttering laugh from Abélia.

“The ill-informed see him as the velvet glove to soften Augusto’s iron fist, don’t they? Ah, they are but different faces to the same coin, my dear. Men of duty, resolved to do what needs to be done. Men who justify their actions through the ever-present specter of a worse alternative. Men unwavering in their convictions, who would sooner break than bend… men who expect the impossible of their children, and punish those children for failures instigated by their parents.”

Abélia’s smile widens.

“They are a perfect match for one another, are they not? And the city’s Cainites declare them so different.”

Caroline: “I wouldn’t know,” Caroline replies softly.

She eyes the scimitar.

“Am I to be slain now, Seneschal, for some failing? Association with some ‘deplorable’ being to your sensitivities? Am I another failed project?”

GM: “Your fate remains within your own power to determine, Miss Malveaux, as it always has.”

Caroline: “No answers. No surprise.”

GM: A frown mars Maldonato’s still face.

“Have care with your words, Miss Malveaux. However much her presence has given me cause to overlook, coarseness of tongue shall ill convince me you are suitable to present before our prince.”

Caroline: “I have ever been transparent before you, Seneschal,” Caroline replies. “What is it you desire? Another mother’s life?”

She can’t keep the bitterness out of that comment, though she tries.

GM: Hurt flickers across Abélia’s face at Caroline’s acknowledgement of that ‘other’ mother.

Caroline: “I have sacrificed all that I was on the altar of your approval, Seneschal. My pride, my dignity, my family, perhaps even my soul. I sold myself out to those that sought to use me as a vessel for knowledge and bowed before my tormentors and licked their boots for approval as a proper Ventrue. Destroyed all that Caroline Malveaux was in the eyes of all but my sisters and mother. I turned from the offers of the prince’s rivals, returned with their secrets both, and killed my then-mother.”

“I stand on a mountain of corpses offered to the Masquerade and demands of your office. Time has not been kind—no, but nor were my duties. Certainly you have lived long enough seneschal to know what you demanded was no easy task—mind, body, or spirit.”

She pauses. “So here we stand, tonight, blade in hand once more.” She gestures. “Genuinely, what more can I offer, Seneschal?”

GM: “More shall always be expected of you, Miss Malveaux,” Maldonato intones gravely. “Your brother-in-blood found your sire’s expectations too great a burden to bear. Mine own hand is far gentler than his.”

Caroline: The Ventrue patiently awaits the seneschal’s next words.

GM: None appear immediately forthcoming.

Caroline: “We were talking, Seneschal, won’t you lower the blade and let us continue?”

GM: The sword lowers.

Abélia’s severed head hits the floor with a gory thump.

Caroline: “No!” Caroline’s shriek is painfully loud.

GM: Black blood spurts from the corpse’s neck as it topples backwards onto the floor.

Caroline: She never even saw the blade move. She sinks to her knees to catch the bleeding corpse, heedless of the blood staining her white gown. Grief spreads across her face and she stares up at the seneschal with hate in her eyes.

The expression lasts only a moment before something much darker overtakes it: pure rage. The monster inside comes screaming out as she throws herself at the seneschal, covered as she is in her mother’s blood. There’s not even a wordless cry, just a blur of unliving flesh as she dives at him.

The Beast doesn’t care about his age. The Beast doesn’t care about the sword. The Beast doesn’t care about the prince. It only cares that the human had a moment of weakness, of pain, and it has a way out.

And the human… the human only cares that for the second time in as many nights she’s watched her mother die—and been to blame for it.

GM: The fury burns like a wildfire: red-hot and utterly heedless. Perhaps it gutters out in an instant. Perhaps it roars and burns for hours. Whenever it finally does, Caroline finds herself seated upon her previous chair. The seneschal regards her solemnly from behind his desk.

“Would you still serve our prince, Miss Malveaux, when a second mother is that service’s price?”

Caroline: The Ventrue looks around, looks down for the body, for the blood. Her heart doesn’t beat, but if it did it would be racing.

GM: Abélia’s head has rolled to a stop by the door, its expression frozen in a ghastly smile that shall never relax. The rest of the blood-streaked corpse lies unmoved.

“I do not desire an heir who answers affirmatively out of fear for her continued unlife,” Maldonato continues. “If it is your wish, you may accept exile from New Orleans and make your Requiem wherever fortune carries you. Those of your sisters who are soon to attend university, I am certain, would welcome your presence at Wellesley.”

Caroline: Caroline stares at the severed head, her voice still low with rage. She wants to demand an answer, knows he won’t give one. She wants to lash out, but knows just how pointless it is. She might as well throw herself against a mountain.

“I think we both know that’s nothing but a dream,” she replies. “Even if you could tolerate my failure, neither the sheriff nor the French Quarter’s occupant could ignore my existence.”

Her fingernails bite into her palms painfully, but she needs that pain to keep clearheaded, to control herself.

“But I have only ever been honest with you,” she replies pointedly.

“You ask if I would trade my mother, the only being who did the same for me in my Requiem, who saved my life, for a prince that doesn’t know of me, to be heir to a crumbling kingdom beset by foes, for a seneschal who was not content to take everything from my mortal life…”

The fingernails bite into flesh as she grinds out the words.

She finally tears her eyes from the severed head to meet his gaze.

“Do what you must.”

GM: “I need do but little, Miss Malveaux, if such a destiny is not to your liking. You have cited many valid reasons you would feel no loyalty to our prince. Should you wish to leave the city, Sheriff Donovan and Mr. Savoy are both beset by more pressing concerns than hunting down a willing exile.”

A pause.

“Nor do I believe you stand a viable chance at claiming your sire’s throne without his acknowledgement. Blood alone is insufficient to crown a prince.”

Yet, even as the seneschal speaks, a second voice echoes within Caroline. Not within her mind, like Poincare’s telepathy. It thrums through the very blood in her veins, pulsating with instinctive knowing:

he’s just testing you, my dear… all just another test…

Caroline: Caroline tries to keep her voice steady as she looks at the ancient Moor.

“Do you think me so lacking in loyalty or possessed by ambition, Seneschal? A pitiful creature it would make me, to turn my back on anything and everyone for the possibility of power.”

GM: good…

Caroline: “And easier avenues there are too it than through your gauntlet, had I been so inclined. Secrets to shake what is left of this city freely spilled. To throw in with any other faction.”

“God knows your own servants did all they could to encourage it. I needed no prompting from Mr. Savoy and my mother’s hunters to know they hate me, or to be tempted by his promises and offers of protection from the doom you have hung over my head every night of my Requiem.”

“But despite every bullet in the back, despite every petty taunt, despite starting with literally nothing but the blood you put in my veins—despite your ally’s attempt to feed on me like a kine, his beating of me, his invasion of my mind, and your invasion of my home. Despite the sheriff staking me for a lark and the bishop ruining my name among Kindred and kine. Despite the the impossible demand that I raise my hand against Claire—who revealed herself to me knowing it would cost her life—here I am. Despite the lies about who I am and who I was, the questions I couldn’t even ask, here I am, your demands fulfilled, Seneschal.”

“I am who you thought I was, who I have always been.”

“If that falls short your measure, so be it, but I have been and am the best opportunity you’ve ever had and—unless there is some trump card hidden up your sleeve in these nights, Seneschal—I’m likely the best you ever will have.”

GM: “Your second mother yet lives, Miss Malveaux,” Maldonato states. “The destruction of her corporeal form poses little more inconvenience to her than a serpent’s loss of its shed skin.”

Caroline: Caroline looks back to the severed head, her bloodstained hands.

“That was cruel.”

GM: “It was,” the seated vampire concurs.

Caroline: “Did you learn what you wished, Seneschal?”

GM: “I did, Miss Malveaux. I must learn more still, for much I had accepted as given has been called into question. Will you consent to grant me access to your thoughts?”

oh, yes… we knew this would come…

Caroline: “I can’t stop you,” Caroline replies calmly. “But I would ask what it is you hope to find?”

GM: “Fullness of understanding.”

Caroline: “You might wander the desert for forty years if you seek that within me, Seneschal,” Caroline replies.

GM: “Perhaps for longer yet, Miss Malveaux,” Maldonato answers contemplatively. “I do not seek understanding of your soul, however, but of events to which you were witness and participant.”

Caroline: “Better rummage through my mind?” Caroline asks.

GM: A frown creases the seneschal’s face. It’s only a slight change in expression—like that first crack in an earthquake’s yawning fissure.

“I have warned you once against coarseness of tongue, Miss Malveaux. Discourtesy ill becomes the Blood of any prince.”

Caroline: The heiress reaches back out through her blood, grasping for her mother. Asking for help, for guidance, even as she smooths her ruined and bloodstained dress.

“My apologies, Seneschal.”

“And again, for the answer, as much as it may matter, is no. I would not invite you in, Seneschal, though we both know I could not resist you any more than I could prevent your strike.”

GM: sweet child… what aid would you have me grant…?

Caroline: He can’t see it…

GM: “I am afraid your answer matters little, Miss Malveaux, beyond what peace of mind free assent might have granted you. The needs of the archdiocese outweigh your desire for privacy.”

Memories suddenly begin to well within Caroline’s head, like pebbles caught within the ebbs of a fast-flowing current.

“I said I don’t need it, Caroline. It’s just easier-”

“He has to die.”

“God knows I’m not advocating you should trust any of them, Caroline. They’re all just different flavors of poison-"

your flesh is my flesh, my dear… I feel another within us… what would you have me do…?

Caroline: Deception… I need to spin him something else…. drop my own tale for him.

GM: “Now all that’s left is to wait, and watch how the dice fall-”

“You’ve done your part in drawing him out. Generals lead from the rear-”

“Killing him is only the start. I need to frame the scene-”

“I’m not putting you in the same room as my people, Caroline-”

little time remains, my dear… the more we wait, the more our foe sees… I shall not decide your battle tactics for you…

Caroline: Gunfire. Screams of pain. A glare from her mother, shock, outrage playing out across her face. More gunfire being exchanged.

“It had to be this way.” Men dying, betrayed from among their number on screens. “You ungrateful… What have you done!” “They had to die, Mother, for you to live.” Sorcery in Claire’s hands. A trap springing to life. “The stake will be removed when Savoy is prince.” Pleading. More men dying. Gunshots tricking down. “Don’t make me do this…” Darkness. Claire’s horrified expression.

A meeting with Ferris. “Something went wrong, but we mopped them up anyway. Took two prisoners too.” “I don’t think she ever saw it coming.” “The barrier…” “Was going to trap you no matter what you did when you refused to defect.”

“Still have to sell it to the bishop…” “Easier to ask forgiveness from him than permission.” “Partycrashers…” “…be anyone, but my money would be on Savoy. He’s been keeping a close eye on you…”_

A meeting in the rain. “Even loyalty has a limit, Roger. You’re living like a criminal…” “Can’t be bought…” “…To a person or to a job? She can’t do the job you were hired to do anymore…” “We’re done…” “…daughter?” A glare. “Benefits to it. I don’t expect she’s offering that, is she?” “Slave to…”

“Two even have children…”

“She’ll thank you in the end.”

Meetings. Planning. “Gettis is crafty…” “Depends on you on the inside, Roger…” “Frame them for….” All the work that goes into such an operation, just slightly tweaked…

She draws on the worst, most bitter memories of her existence, flavoring in feeling here and there. Drowns her mother’s death in all she felt then, before Abélia appeared, muddies the edges of memory, makes them sharp and painful. She paints with broken glass, and she bleeds along with it.

She tries not to focus on the black tint to the blood.

GM: It’s easy enough not to.

Easy enough, against the soft and pale hands so tenderly guiding her own.

Memories flash through her consciousness, faster, too many to process, like the fast-flowing stream is emptying out into a great lake.

Caroline: Caroline tries to catch them as they go, to tweak each detail that needs to change. She grinds her teeth as the strain builds, trying to keep up, to stay ahead…

GM: Just as suddenly, that strain ends. The flow dies. She is back in Maldonato’s office.

Caroline: She hates it, in part. The lying to him. She hadn’t lied earlier when she made the claim. On the other hand, he’s brought this upon himself by delving into her mind not only without her permission, but in direct opposition to her wishes. She didn’t lie to him. He lied to himself.

At least that’s what she tells herself.

GM: The elder vampire does not immediately speak. His gaze is pensive. Reflective. Even… tired.

“Your mother’s life was forfeit ere her secret was exposed, Miss Malveaux. Yet it was not my wish that she should meet her direct end at your hands. I am sorry.”

Caroline: Caroline says nothing for a moment. Many things come to mind. Petty retorts or taunts, and less pretty recriminations and blame that speak to the very real wound, however well-covered it is by Abélia and her new sisters.

What’s the point, though? He knows what he’s done now better than anyone, and if living it through her eyes did not sting enough no words will.

Finally she settles on the mundane. He didn’t have to apologize, and to refuse it is nothing but petty. “Thank you, Seneschal.”

The words cost nothing. They mean nothing. She’s just numb to it, to all the horror—most of it staining her hands. She’s not even certain it was the worst thing she’s done.

GM: “Do you still consider Claire Malveaux to have been a mother to you, Miss Malveaux?” Maldonato inquires.

Caroline: “That is a complicated question, Seneschal,” Caroline replies.

“Yes, I think so,” she continues after a moment. “We were not close, when I was young. Everyone said I was my father’s daughter. I probably knew her better these last six months than my whole life.”

GM: “For some, the Embrace is a curse and wholesale ruination of their mortal lives. For others, it opens their eyes to aspects of the human condition they would otherwise have never experienced,” Maldonato states. The words are not new ones.

The words are not new ones, until he amends, “For some, the Embrace may do both these things.”

Caroline: “I suppose it was very foolish, to get closer. To believe there might be an ending other than tragedy,” Caroline admits. “To hope. She wasn’t so blind.”

She knows she should feel melancholy. Should hate herself. Should be less calm. It just all seems to distant. It’s only the latest thing she’s lost. And that night, unlike many before, she gained something.

GM: “Some biblical scholars have observed that its cultural prohibitions are not without secular basis,” Maldonato states. “Shellfish, which dwell in the bottoms of marine environments, subsist upon dead rather than living organisms and posed a greater health risk for ancient peoples to consume. Leviticus thus prohibited the Israelites’ diet from including water-born creatures without fins and scales.”

“Kindred scholars have debated many topics concerning the Testament’s prohibition against ‘dwelling among’ mortals. In the modern era, even declared atheists have come to believe in that prohibition’s secular value.”

“So too, it would seem, may even those mortals who uphold the Vigil.”

Caroline: Caroline is contemplative. “I don’t believe I have endured a long enough Requiem to speak intelligently on the matter,” she admits.

“I could say that it was the loss of those mortal ties that cut keeper than any torment another Kindred conceived, but… so too could I claim it was the few that remain that have given me the greatest cause to plow forward each night, to carve out a better Requiem. How much of that is a reflection of ‘youth’ and my particular circumstances, well. As I said, Seneschal.”

GM: “What effect have you observed the continuance of those ties to have upon the mortals in question?” Maldonato inquires.

Caroline: “Varied. When within my control, not definite. When beyond it… never positive.” She looks at him seriously. “As with most of a Requiem, I would observe that God may have Damned us, but it is we that make our existence, and each other’s, hell.”

GM: “The Beast has ever abhorred the company of its own kind.”

Caroline: “We are petty and terrible things,” Caroline agrees solemnly. “Haunted by greatness, I think, more than possessing it. A fitting punishment.”

GM: “In Claire Malveaux, I see a woman possessed of many foibles,” the seneschal begins. “I see a woman whose relationship with her daughter was marred by mutual resentments and words left unsaid. I see a woman whose Vigil and pursuits of power stained her hands red with sin, and made her into what she most feared to become. I see a woman motivated to secure what she considered the best possible life for her children, even at great cost to herself, and by whose sacrifice and mercy her daughter stands before me now.”

“I have seen love drive many souls to folly. I have seen love cause suffering to many for the sake of few. I have seen love drive individuals guilty of the darkest sins to acts of altruism few would have believed them capable of. In Claire Malveaux’s love for her daughter and family, I see perhaps all of these things.”

“Love would seem as complex and multinuanced an emotion as any, and perhaps more so than most. Yet it is a comforting thought that some measure of grace may be found within it.”

Caroline: The words bite at Caroline, tear at her, ripping out bleeding chunks. Her expression sets grimly.

“We all make our choices, then we have to live with them, Seneschal. I wonder which is worse.”

GM: “Only by not mourning what we have lost do we lose it in truth,” Maldonato answers.

Caroline: “Have you ever had to murder someone you cared for, Seneschal?” Caroline asks. “To watch the light fade from their eyes, and to see the terror creep into it?”

GM: “I have, Miss Malveaux. I was alone among my sire’s childer in pledging my sword to the Camarilla.”

Caroline: Caroline nods. “That must have been difficult.”

GM: “It was a difficult time. Yet such may be said of all times.”

“Your mother’s continued threat to the Masquerade, Primogen Opal’s planned treachery, and further circumstances concomitant to your Embrace and Requiem all promise much hardship in the nights ahead. But those battles are for another night.”

Maldonato rises from his seat.

“Come, Miss Malveaux.”

“It is time we saw your sire.”

Caroline: The Ventrue may be dead, but she can almost feel her pulse quicken, feel her senses sharpening, at the seneschal’s pronouncement.

Her sire.

The prince.

She remembers him not from her ‘Embrace’, not from the lessons any Ventrue should learn from their sire, not from nights spent together. He’s always been something… distant. Grand and majestic.
She remembers the first time she saw him—what seems like a lifetime ago. Sweeping into the cathedral like a god cloaked in night.

Since then—even before—he’s been a mythic figure, an untouchable one, something distant and upon a pedestal. Something to be desired, perhaps even worshiped, but never attained. Even as she sacrificed… everything. Friends. Family. Future. Mother. Father. Even her soul to get here… like a faithless priestess, she never expected to get here. In some ways, it’s more terrible than never making it. She knew the price of failure, knew what awaited her. For the first time she has an opportunity to consider the price of success.

What he will think of her.

What he might say of her.

What he might do with her.

What he might ask of her.

She can’t help but frame him in terms of her own father, of his demands and expectations. Of her failure to meet them. As she was not perfect in life, so too has her Requiem been far from flawless. Her bought education, her modest agoge, her paltry domain. Her failings and debts. She’s seen how he reacted to his last childe. She knows he doesn’t know of her existence. That he might might reject her brings an almost mind-numbing terror for a moment.

She shoves it aside and gathers herself. Whatever comes will come. Whatever he thinks he will think. It’s far too late for regrets now, and doubts are only blades to fall upon. Whatever else she may be, whatever he might think, she’s Abélia Devillers’ daughter. She’s a killer of millennia-old Kindred. Despite all odds, despite everything to the contrary, she’s here now. She has not pulled herself from the gutter to fall to despair now.

She rises to her feet, straightens her back, and holds her head high. Her voice does not waver.

“Lead the way, Seneschal.”

---

Previous, by Narrative: Story Eleven, Celia X, Estrellado I
Next, by Narrative: Story Eleven, Jon Epilogue

Previous, by Character: Story Eleven, Caroline XIV
Next, by Character: Story Eleven, Caroline XVI

“You see me. Not clean lady, not foreign, me.”
Estrellado Ortzi

---

Tuesday evening, 1 March 2016

GM: The offices of Ware & Lebowski occupy a high floor in a CBD skyscraper. They look nice, though like a lot of businesses, they’d evidently rather not hire a full-time janitor. That’s where Partners in Grime comes in. The middle-aged, short-haired woman who greeted Estrellado without saying hello (or referring to her by name) leads her through the office, post-business hours, and explains where she’s supposed to clean and how. Estrellado isn’t sure who the woman is or what she does at the law firm. She hasn’t even given her name. She just says things like, “Don’t touch anything inside the fridge, we’ll know if you stole any food,” “Make sure the trash is empty, even if the bin isn’t full. And make sure you change out the bag, some of you get lazy or think you’re saving the environment by dumping trash from different bins into the same bag.” “Scrub the parts of the toilet underneath the rim sink, our last cleaner skimped on that and we fired her.” “Change your mop water often. This place needs to be spotless.”

It goes on for a little while. They pass a few attorneys who look like they’re working late.

“Do you understand all of that?” the woman finally asks Estrellado in a very slow and patient voice like she’s speaking to a four-year-old.

Estrellado: If Estrellado is bothered by the way the woman speaks to her, no hint of it appears on her face. She follows along behind her impromptu tour guide and nods her head at all the right moments, a vague, simple smile in place.

“Si, seniora,” she says once the question is asked. “La basura, el bano, no como la comida. Si, comprendo.”

Somewhere in her mid-40s, the maid wears her age just as well as the uniform her boss has provided her. Charcoal slacks, charcoal top, both made of material as durable as the woman to whom they adorn. Black, they have found, all too often shows the residue of their work, but the gray hides all sorts of stains. A golden crucifix hangs just below the neckline of her shirt, the only ornament she allows herself. Thick, black hair pulled back from a weather-lined face, and in her hands the equipment she needs for the job: a veritable treasure trove of cleaning supplies.


(“Yes, ma’am. The garbage, the bathroom, don’t eat the food. Yes, I understand.”)

GM: The woman looks irritated.

“You’ll speak English and only English while you’re in these offices. Am I understood?”

Estrellado: Her vague smile never falters. She dips her head.

“Yes, thank you.” An accent might be more noticeable if any of the words contained more than one syllable.

GM: The woman doesn’t stick around, or for that matter say goodbye. Estrellado is left to go about her assigned tasks. The firm looks mostly empty at this hour. There’s an overweight and tired-looking woman at the reception desk who’s sipping a Diet Coke with an unhappy expression as she pinches her nose. “All right. You know what. You’re grounded for a week. No more fights at school, Zach,” she declares before hanging up.

Meanwhile, two late-working lawyers walk past Estrellado as though she’s invisible. Or at least, they seem to, until she feels a hand caress her bottom. One of the men winks at her.

Her cleaning supplies await.

Estrellado: Estrellado must be used to such things. The casual dismissal without so much as a goodbye. The inattention from the men, then the quick hand that sneaks across her rear. Who could blame him? It’s a shapely rear, made for grabbing. A solid handful, as thick as the rest of her: not so thick as to be overweight, but certainly the body of a woman somewhere past her prime. Heavy breasts that have fed who knows how many children sway beneath her shirt, her stomach rife with stretch marks from multiple pregnancies despite how toned she has kept it with years of yoga and Pilates. For all that, though, Estrellado is a handsome woman.

Her cheeks redden at the bold touch regardless of how fitting it may be, and once the men have moved past her she crosses herself, murmuring a silent prayer to the Lord above for tempting one of His flock.

Still, she glances over her shoulder as if she can’t help herself, then quickly away again once he has seen her looking. Seed planted, the maid begins her task. She finds the janitorial closet to fill her bucket with water, slaps on a pair of yellow rubber gloves that end just shy of her elbows, and gets to work.

Start high, work low. Wipe the dust and debris from above onto the floor to be swept and mopped away. That’s how it goes and that’s how she does it.

GM: It’s repetitive work, but it smells less than cleaning the toilets, and it’s less intensive than vacuuming. She works for a while. Back and forth, back and forth, dunk, wring, back and forth. The water in the mop bucket turns darker. A few people pass by without looking at Estrellado.

Eventually, the lawyer from earlier passes by again.

He doesn’t say anything. He just looks at her while she works, as though observing an animal in a zoo.

Estrellado: She makes sure to change out the water frequently, as requested. She’s a professional, after all. She doesn’t even look upset about the work, though once or twice when no one’s looking she might give herself a little boost of speed, careful to stay out of the way of cameras or other prying eyes.

But the eyes find her eventually. They always do, even in this face, this body. Estrellado looks up to see the man staring. She looks away just as quickly, focusing on her task, confirming that any smell coming off of her is well and truly hidden, sucking it in like others bring in their breath.

She doubles down on her task. As if she cannot feel the eyes on her. Wary, like the sleeping animal who knows it’s being watched, who expects the zoo-goer to tell it to wake up and do something interesting.

GM: The zoo-goer’s stare lingers.

Looking wary or faking sleep just makes it worse.

“Come clean my office when you’re done there,” he says. “It’s carpeted, but don’t bring a vacuum. Use a broom and dustpan.”

Estrellado: “Yes, thank you.” She nods agreeably, the same words she had said to the woman earlier in the same deferential tone, accent hidden by the short clip of her statement. The response had been almost awkward before; now it is downright out of place, as if it is the only thing she knows to say in this tongue. She pauses, brows knitting together as she puzzles out further words with which to communicate.

Eventually she gives it up as a bad job altogether, simply nodding again and watching him walk toward whichever door it is so she knows where to find him.

She continues her work once he is gone, sweeping and mopping until the floor shines.

GM: The man gives Estrellado a look, but it’s partly amused. He turns and leaves. His office is a little ways off.

Some more time passes until she’s finished mopping. It’s a good job, not that anyone will ever tell her so.

Estrellado: Nothing by half measures. A wise man had once said that. A white man, probably. She’d heard it on the news, maybe seen it on TV; regardless of how it had come across her ears it had certainly stuck, and Estrellado beams at the floor that is now clean enough to eat off of.

She rinses the mop, wrings it dry with strong, sturdy hands, and rinses the bucket as well. Cleaning gear at her side, she moves across the wet floor with practiced ease, making sure to tidy along the way so she does not need to double back. Garbage bins emptied, bags replaced, tables and chairs wiped down, spare papers sorted into things that are useful and garbage, the latter disposed of, the former tucked away in their proper location after her eyes have scanned the page.

She does not leave her would-be suitor waiting overlong. She knocks on the open door just below his name plaque, taking it in at a glance, and pokes her head inside to seek him out. She hefts the dustpan, the broom, the other supplies.

“I clean?” Her tone lifts at the end. She gestures toward his desk, the assorted furniture, the walls, the floor.

GM: Eugene Lebowski, reads the name on the door.

The man who must be Eugene is sitting at his computer behind his desk. It’s a nice desk in a nice office, with full bookshelves and framed degrees and awards. There’s a good view over the rest of the CBD from the window.

Eugene looks Estrellado over. His eyes reach her face, then drift back down to her chest.

“You clean,” he responds with a faintly amused tone.

“Use a brush when you do the floor. Not a broom.”

“Do the floor first, too.”

Estrellado: Eugene Lebowski. And Lebowski is one of the names on the firm. A partner, then? Junior partner? Nice enough office, anyway; she doubts that they’d waste the view on someone who isn’t bringing in the big bucks. She thinks the other Lebowski might be older than this one, which would make him… a son? Nephew? Connected, anyway, that’s all that matters.

Estrellado dips her head in acquiescence, moving into the room with her supplies. She starts to lay down a small cloth to preserve the carpeting so she can set her things down when his words interrupt her. Floor first? Surprise flits across her face. She makes an abortive gesture to the walls, the bookshelves, his desk, and finally just nods her head, rolling the cloth and stuffing it back into her uniform pocket.

A brush on the floor. She has one, like all of the maids at Partners in Grime, and she gets to work. Hands and knees. She starts in one corner of the office, back to him, bent over to scrub at the floor with the tiny brush that she knows isn’t really doing anything to help clean the carpet fibers. Is it a show he wants? It’s a show she’ll give him, and a show she’ll get in turn. She turns it on, that inner charm, that thing that makes people see her how she wants them to: just a maid with admittedly poor English skills, the perfect person to whom he can speak with no fear of her repeating anything he says. The poor woman probably doesn’t understand him anyway.

GM: It’s not long before the turned-away maid feels a hand on her rear again.

It’s passive at first, like earlier, then starts to hungrily squeeze her glutes.

Estrellado: Estrellado falters in her movements at the touch before doubling down, scrubbing vigorously at the floor. Heat floods her cheeks.

GM: Another hand starts to squeeze and massage her breasts.

“You like that?” murmurs a voice in her ear.

The hand on her ass doesn’t let up.

Estrellado: She finally pauses. Wide eyes stare at the wall in front of her rather than risk a glance back at the hungry predator behind her. She wets her lips with her tongue, searching for her voice, for the English words. The woman’s speak English or else threat looms in her mind, but still the words don’t come. Mutely, she nods her head, fingers moving to the cross at her throat. She touches it for strength.

GM: “I thought you did,” murmurs the voice. His hands continue to fondle her.

“You used to be beautiful. I can tell. You’re still very pretty.”

Estrellado: Her lashes flutter at the compliment, not that he can see with her face turned away. Beneath her shirt her nipples stiffen at his touch. She’s just a woman, after all, she can hardly control herself around such an important man. Her neck turns, eyes flicking toward the door of his office. She murmurs a string of words that sound like, “yes, thank you.”

GM: “Aw, yeah, you like that…” the important man murmurs. He pulls her up from the floor and back against his chest. His hand continues to make steady kneading motions along her breasts. Estrellado can feel a bulge against her rear that isn’t coming from his other hand. He starts to kiss the side of her face.

“What’s your name, hm?”

Estrellado: She follows his lead, rising as he wishes, holding herself still in front of him. Her eyes dart again toward the door, nervous that anyone can walk by and see. His touch elicits soft noises from her, the kind he wants to hear.

“Es… Estrellado,” she tells him, tongue curling and tapping against the back of her teeth to roll her R, then flattening out for the double L / Y sound. Then, perhaps assuming he cannot make the same sounds, she says, “Star.”

GM: “Star,” he repeats as he kisses and caresses her. “What a pretty name. Just reflax, Star. Lean into me. I’ve got you.”

Estrellado: Estrellado does not fight against him. She knows how it is with these rich, powerful men: submit or they make things worse. They complain. They get her fired and she has to start all over again at the bottom.

“La puerta,” she gets out, pointing at the door. Her heart thumps inside her chest, blood rushing through her body. It colors her cheeks, warms her skin where he touches her, stiffens her nipples and that other thing down below, that tiny little bundle of nerves between her legs. “La puerta,” she says again, “por favor.”

(“The door. The door, please.”)

GM: “Hm, what’s that, Star?” he asks, tilting her read to kiss the other side of her face. His hand pulls away from her breasts, but only long enough to snake its way up her shirt. He starts to pinch and tug her nipple from underneath the gray fabric.

“I’m afraid I never learned Spanish. It was high school French for me.”

Estrellado: Estrellado’s head drops back against his shoulder when his fingers slip beneath her shirt, leaning into him as he had previously requested. She bites her lip to keep quiet when he pinches and tugs, breath coming in short, uneven gasps. She struggles to find the word.

“Gate,” she says finally.

GM: “Gate?” he asks, his other hand leaving her ass to stroke her hips. It slowly draws closer to between her thighs.

“That’s a good girl, Star,” he smiles as her head rubs against him. “Lean into me. I’m here.”

Estrellado: “Si, si, la puerta.” She points again at the door, rifling through the vocabulary lessons she had taken as a child. Finally, it clicks. “Door? Por favor.”

GM: “Door. Oh, door.” The man chuckles and tussles her hair. He turns and takes a few steps backwards, half-pulling her along with him. Star feels his beard brush against the back of her head. His hand leaves her leg to close the door.

“That was smart of you to notice, Star. You’re very thoughtful.”

Estrellado: The tension leaves her body. He might catch the smile, the relieved sigh, before she falls right back into what he was doing a moment ago. Pliant, willing, like a good maid. She nods her head at his words.

GM: His hand makes its way back up her shirt.

“Aw, yeah, you’re really enjoying this,” he smiles. “I bet you’ve had a rough day, haven’t you, Star? Maybe we should sit down.”

He pulls her along with him to his leather swivel chair, back still against his chest. He sits down and pulls her onto his lap.

“You like that, being off your feet?”

Estrellado: He doesn’t need to do much tugging to get her to follow him. She traipses along behind him, then sits, thighs spread to the side to give room to his hand, head resting gently against his shoulder.

Another nod at his question, a murmur of those three English words she sticks to. Yes, thank you. She presses her lips together as he fondles her, fingers curling into her thighs.

GM: “It’s good for you to relax like this, Star. You’ve earned a break.” He pulls off her shoes, then her socks, and pulls her legs onto the chair so she’s sitting on his lap cross-legged. He starts to tickle her bare feet with one hand while his other kneads her breasts.

Estrellado: Thick thighs cross over his lap, body curled against his as she watches this man—this strange man—touch her in a way she must not have expected. The words wash over her, their message or tone setting her at ease. And then the onslaught of sensation, the tickling, the fondling. Estrellado giggles. It’s not the giggle of a schoolgirl but rather the giggle of an older woman, throaty and surprised all at once, cut through by a delicate exhale when his hand returns to her breasts. She shifts, hips wiggling as he tickles her, pressing and rubbing against the firm length beneath her as if she simply cannot help herself.

GM: His manhood is very stiff beneath her. She hears his smile in her ear. “Aw, yeah, that laugh. You’ve got beautiful laughter, Star. There’s a lot of life in your laugh.”

“Tell me about yourself. I’m very interested. You’re such a hard worker. I bet you’ve got a family you’re providing for, am I right? A little girl or boy who you’d do anything for. Maybe several. You work your fingers to the bone for them, don’t you, Star?”

He still tickles her feet, a little, though his touch lightens so she can more easily talk.

Estrellado: It’s difficult for her to speak with her attention divided as it is between his hands and the body beneath her. Her task is made all the worse by her limited grasp of the English language, though at least he does not keep her giggling away on his lap. But she nods her head, chewing over the words.

“Si. Mis hijos, estan mi familia, mi vida.” There’s a fondness in her voice, even if he doesn’t understand the words. “Dos.” She holds up two fingers, then counts aloud, hesitant. “Two. Boys. Estan en…” she trails off, then says, “Baton Rouge. La universidad.” That word, at least, is easy enough to understand: university.

GM: “University,” he repeats, hands still steadily kneading her breasts. “I bet you must be very proud of them, Star. I bet you’ve worked so hard to get them where they are now. Everyone says Mexicans are lazy, but they’re some of the hardest workers I know.”

“For that matter, are you Mexican? Or are you from somewhere south?”

Estrellado: Estrellado laughs. “Estoy de Guatemala.”

GM: “Guatemala. My tropical little Star,” smiles the man. He sniffs her hair.

Estrellado: It smells like coconut and something citrus. The scent might take him right to the beach, the tropical little paradise. Maybe he can even hear the waves crashing on the sand. Estrellado smiles at him, nodding her head. Yes, she is a hard worker, proud of her boys, his little tropical Star.

GM: “Mmm, you smell very nice, Star,” he murmurs, taking another moment to breathe in her scent. “I love a woman who smells good.” His hand actually pauses around her breast as he does. Then it leaves off as he reaches into his jacket pocket, removes a wallet, and presses her a handful of $20 bills into her palms.

Estrellado: She blinks down at the bills in her hands. On his lap as she is she cannot quite turn to face him, and it seems the words have been stolen from her throat because she does not ask. Her fingertips touch the bills as if marveling at their texture.

“¿Que es esto?” she finally gets out.

GM: “Sorry, Star?” he asks.

Estrellado: A moment of silence, then, “What this for?”

GM: “Because I like you, Star. You’re a hard worker with a pretty laugh who smells very nice.”

Estrellado: A hard worker with a nice ass whose feet he likes to tickle, who doesn’t complain too much when he pulls her onto his lap.

She blinks back what might be tears, nodding her head, murmuring a string of words in Spanish that convey her thanks and gratitude for his generosity. Her voice is thick with emotion.

GM: “Oh, it’s okay, Star. You’re very pretty. People should do nice things for you.”

Estrellado: The bills disappear into one of the many pockets of her uniform with another word of thanks, fingers touching the cross that hangs from her neck. A quiet moment passes, a moment where she doesn’t know what to say; this was not the turn that she expected. Silent, her back rests against his chest once more.

GM: His hand strokes her hair. “I want you to look pretty, Star. Open the bottom cabinet on my desk. There’s a surprise for you inside.”

Estrellado: Estrellado leans forward to open the cabinet door in question.

GM: Eugene strokes her back as she does. Inside she finds a French maid’s costume, black and lacy white with a low hem and high skirt. There’s also some stockings and black high heels. They smell faintly like the same cleaning supplies she uses.

“Very sexy, isn’t that, Star? I’d love to see you with it on.”

Estrellado: Color rises to her cheeks at the sight of what waits for her. She closes her eyes for a brief moment before nodding, understanding now that this is simply the second part of a transaction that she has already accepted from him.

She could give the money back. Leave. Let someone else take this account in the future.

Someone else who will be subjected to the same things, she thinks. She swallows, says a silent prayer to the Lord, and finally nods once more.

“¿Ahora?” A pause, then the question repeated in English. “Now?”

Now, she means, or later? His own home where they’d have assured privacy?

GM: “Now,” he says. “I want you to look sexy, Star. I bet you do too. When was the last time you felt really sexy?”

Estrellado: Before her husband died. The words clench in her throat.

Estrellado slips off of his lap and reaches for the garments and props, rising with a sweep of her eyes around the room as if searching for a place to change.

GM: Eugene just smiles and turns around in his swivel chair.

“I promise I’ll only peak a little,” he says teasingly.

Estrellado: She makes quick work of her uniform, stripping from her shirt and pants to stand in just the bra and panties she wore beneath. Neither one of them looks as if they belong with the uniform he provided. The panties, at least, will not show beneath the hem, and Estrellado keeps those on but removes her bra, tucking it beneath her uniform top and pulling the costume on over herself. She turns away from him at his comment, entire body flushing, and deftly pulls the stockings up her legs. The elastic band snaps tight around her thigh. Then the heels. Her size. Why is it all her size? Does he do this with every woman who comes to clean, or is this one of those Halloween one-size-fits-most getups?

After a brief moment of consideration she pulls her hair free from its tie, running her fingers through the top of it to tousle her locks and give it a little volume. Finally, she turns around, clearing her throat.

GM: Eugene swivels back around. He grins from ear to ear.

“Wow, Star. You can really knock ’em dead.”

Estrellado: She crosses an arm in front of her stomach, hand clutching her other arm, shoulders lifting as a shy smile crosses her face. Her lashes flutter.

She glances at her cleaning supplies, then him.

“I clean?”

GM: He laughs.

“Take off your panties, first. I can still see those.”

Estrellado: Estrellado glances down at herself. Flushing, knowing that he won’t turn away again, she reaches beneath the hem of her skirt to grasp her panties and slides them down her stocking-clad legs and to the floor, stepping out of them with her heeled feet. Her movements are slower than they strictly need to be.

GM: “Oooh, yeah,” Eugene grins. “You’re so sexy, Star. And bashful. It’s cute. You’re a real treasure, you know that? I feel like I’m the first man to discover you. I bet most men don’t see what I see, when they look at you. The bright, beautiful Star who’d do anything for her boys.”

Estrellado: For all that this has caused undue embarrassment, his words hit home. Another nod, a soft and earnest smile. Just for him. Because he discovered this beautiful Star beneath the drab outerwear and yellow gloves and scent of bleach. She gestures toward the walls, the desk, the bookshelves, taking a handful of tiny steps backwards to stand adjacent to her supplies. She doesn’t have the “feather duster” of the proverbial French maid, but she does have something similar. She bends at the waist, giving him a glimpse beneath the skirt, as she picks it up.

GM: Eugene gives an appreciative whistle.

“Good idea, Star. I suppose you should do some actual cleaning, now that you’re here.” He chuckles. “And in uniform.”

“Walk around a lot, please. I want to see the way those shoes makes your hips sway. There’s nothing to make a woman feel sexy like a good sashay of her hips, is there, Star?”

Estrellado: She does not disappoint. She toes the careful line between the bashful woman he has met at the sexy maid of his apparent dreams, never blatantly showing off any of her bits again as she had moments ago. Her hips sway as she walks around the office in her heels, cleaning while she goes. The areas she dusts and wipes are spotless in no time; even when playing this role for him she still does her job, listening to him speak, nodding her head in agreement with his words. When she catches him staring—which is often—she blushes and looks away, only to look back again when she thinks that he isn’t.

GM: Eugene mentions how much he appreciates Latina women. They’re hard workers, and they care so much about their families.

“One of my daughters is half-Latina, actually,” he mentions absently as he watches her work.

He is very hard by the time she’s done. He pats his lap invitingly.

Estrellado: Daughters. With an S. Multiple. The word might give her pause, but if it does it’s brief. She glances at his hands as she nears him, looking for a ring.

Once she reaches him, though, she doesn’t drape herself over his lap. She still has a desk to clean. She stands in front of him, back to him, bent slightly while she dusts and wipes down the assorted knickknacks and surfaces. Her eyes rove the assembled papers as she straightens and tidies and otherwise makes herself look busy, teasing him with her nearness and the round swell of her rear beneath the skirt, barely visible with her half-bend, without acknowledging what she does.

GM: Estrellado sees a ring. There’s also a picture on the desk she cleans, showing Eugene at the beach with a blonde-haired white woman around his age, a brown-haired older girl, and a darker-haired younger girl.

Eugene squeezes her ass with both of his hands, this time, then leans close and rubs his cheek against it.

“Such a firm, shapely rear…”

There’s a number of papers on the desk. Estrellado sees several references to a ‘Sleepless Investigations.’

Estrellado: This would hardly be the first married man to fool around. Men have needs, and if they’re unhappy at home… well, at least she knows that her womb will not quicken. Her child-bearing days are over with her boys in college. Less messy to do it here, with her, than it would be if he found a random girl on the street. She barely pays the photo any mind, and when he touches her again, when he presses his cheek against hers, she hardly pauses in her work. She giggles, the sound warm and inviting, and leans further across the desk to reach the other side, bent at the waist. She’s very thorough. The hem slides further up, exposing more of her tan skin.

Maybe her skin serves as enough of a distraction to get her a better read on those pages, too, to find out what the law office wants with a Kindred detective.

GM: It looks as if they’ve hired Sleepless to do investigative work for them. Gathering information clients and persons of interest to clients, by the looks of things. They’ve paid the detective agency very generously. Estrellado espies the names ‘Bernard Drouillard’ and ‘Thalia Ocampo.’ It looks like there might be even more, but Eugene runs his hand along her ass’ bare skin and pulls her onto his lap.

“Let’s play a game,” he smiles.

He removes a quarter from his wallet.

“For every quarter you can catch, I’ll order you something off Cadabra. Does that sound like a fun game, Star?”

He chuckles. “And you can keep the quarters, I suppose. Good for laundry.”

Estrellado: The name Drouillard is familiar to her, though she can’t place it off the top of her head. Cop, she thinks, but she’d have to look into that further. Ocampo… something in politics, city council? She commits the names to memory, letting go of the pretense of cleaning once Eugene has her back on his lap. The hem rides up her thighs, bare skin against his lap.

She listens to his proposal. He wants to play catch? She seems to consider it, then nods when he laughs, her smile lighting up her features. She likes games, that smile says.

“Catch,” she repeats the word. “Con mis manos?” She holds up her hands, brows lifted.

GM: He smiles and nods, running a hand through her hair. Estrellado feels his hard cock against her again. “Like that, Star. You catch the coin, and I’ll buy you something.”

“Let’s start you off pretty easy…”

He holds up the quarter, then flips it into the air above them.

Estrellado: Estrellado watches the coin shoot into the air, flipping over and over itself before it hits its peak and begins its descent. She positions her hands beneath it.

GM: She catches it cat-quick. “Well done, Star!” Eugene exclaims, giving her head a proud pat. He pulls open Cadabra’s app on his phone. “What’s something you could really use right now?”

Estrellado: Estrellado beams at him. She watches his fingers tap across the screen of his phone—thanks for the code—then watches him navigate to the shopping app. She taps on the screen if he lets her, scrolling to find the bottle of perfume she’d had her eye on for some time now. One of those old-fashioned glass bottles. Pretty. Vintage. Like her.

GM: He smiles back, lets her, then tells her to hit the ‘Buy with One Click.’ icon.

“That’s very pretty, Star. Just like you.”

He gets out another quarter, asks, “Ready?” and flips it after its predecessor.

This time it hits the carpet with a thump.

“Aw, good effort,” says Eugene as Estrellado’s hands clap after it. He gives her back a consoling rub. “Don’t worry, though. I’ve got at least another quarter left…”

He produces another one and flips it into the air.

This time Estrellado goes after it with a vengeance. It’s barely left his hands before it’s in hers, cat-quick.

“Very good, Star!” Eugene exclaims, giving her head another pat. “What should we get you this time?”

Estrellado: Estrellado considers the question, eyes darting between the coin in her hands and his open phone app. She scrolls, murmuring something under her breath in Spanish, and finally hits the electronics button at the top of the screen. For a long moment she stares wistfully at the selection of cameras before she navigates away. She hits the L key and lingerie auto-completes in the search function, bringing up a page of scantily clad models. Her cheeks flush. She starts to navigate away but pauses before she can complete the gesture, finally pointing at a burgundy set.

GM: “Naughty Star,” laughs Eugene. “Very naughty.”

“I think we can still get you this, but you’ll have to let me see you in it. Deal?”

Estrellado: She gives him a sly smile, then taps her chin as if she has to consider it for a long moment, before finally nodding.

“Deal,” she echoes.

GM: Eugene laughs again at her expression, then hits the ‘Buy with One Click’ button.

“Okay, Star, I’m running low on quarters, but let’s see how you can do when I up the ante. You can ask for something extra nice if you catch this one…”

Eugene produces another quarter and tosses it into the air. Just as Estrellado grabs for it, he gives her bottom a sharp pinch.

The surprise nearly makes Estrellado miss the coin, but she still snatches it out of the air.

“Bravo, Star!” Eugene remarks, clapping his hands appreciatively.

Estrellado: “Aie!” she exclaims at the sudden pinch, waiting until she has caught the coin to turn accusing eyes toward him. “Dios mio.” She looks more satisfied and pleased with herself than truly upset at his attempt to distract her.

GM: Eugene chuckles at the noise she makes. “Yes, you’ve earned something special for that catch. What should we get you, Star?” He pulls up his phone again.

Estrellado: She scrolls. She points at a pin, a butterfly with blue and purple wings. Shyly, she points at her own chest, as if showing him where she’d like to wear it. Perhaps he noticed her lack of jewelry, the simple cross she wears around her neck. Another tap on his phone has a new category pulled up. She considers her options and finally taps on a pair of heels. Red-bottomed Louboutins.

GM: “Very sweet, Star. And very sexy. You’ll look beautiful in both of these,” says Eugene as he places the order.

“Hmm. You’ve cleaned my office and caught my quarters. What do you think we should get up to next, pretty Star?”

Estrellado: The rest of the office is mostly clean, too. She only needs to take the trash with her on the way out the door to deposit in the dumpster and do a quick stop in the bathrooms to finish what that wretched woman had said earlier.

Now, though, she’s on the lap of a man that’s very happy to see her, and she’s pleased with her haul. Lingerie, heels, and a promise that he wants to see her again, plus the two other trinkets. She shifts on his lap, rubbing against him, the hem of her skirt not even pretending to hide what lurks beneath. She flicks a tongue across her lips, shyly turning to look at him over her shoulder. Her brows lift, eyes darting toward the desk. As if she cannot believe what she’d just “suggested” she glances away.

GM: And the money, too.

Eugene laughs. “You have a very naughty mind, Star. But you’re so bashful about it. I bet there was at least one man you made very happy, when you were young.”

“That’s still there. It just needs something to coax it out…”

Estrellado: Estrellado nods her head at his statement. She had been very happy once. Her husband had made her so happy. She reaches for a pocket that doesn’t exist in this new uniform he has put her in, searching for a photo that is halfway across the room in the pile of her clothing. Out of reach, and despite his kind words she does not think he’d like her to get off of him to retrieve it.

“Mi esposo,” she says in lieu of the photo. “Matteo.” She touches her heart, a fond smile on her lips. “Y usted? Esta feliz?”

She shifts, watching his face. Slowly, she reaches to touch his face, the question in her eyes that she cannot find the words to.

“Happy?”

GM: “Matteo. I knew there was someone.” He smiles, but it dips a little at her question. “My younger daughter has run off. There’s a lot of stress in the family, over that.”

Estrellado: She glances again at the photo on his desk. The quick look she’d taken earlier had made her see them as children, but maybe she hadn’t wanted to really look into the life of the man who seems content to throw away his marriage on a fling with a maid.

GM: “They’re older now,” he says. “Both in college. Or at least one is.”

Estrellado: She nods at his explanation. That makes more sense. Is that why he’d brought in Monty? Maybe it’s a personal thing rather than a business thing. She studies the face in the photo and commits it to her memory, before finally turning her attention to the man beneath her.

Times like these she could curse herself for not learning the language fluently. She’s sure he doesn’t want some broken, half-formed words, but it’s all she has to offer. She murmurs them in Spanish, voice conveying what her vocabulary lacks: sorrow at the loss of his daughter, assurance that she is safe and will come home, a brief prayer to the Lord to watch over her. She touches a hand to his shoulder, expression earnest.

It’s less the words than it is the emotion behind them that she lets do the work for her, sending it out of her in a wave of solidarity. She knows what it’s like to lose someone. She’s a mother too. He can talk to her if he wants, unburden himself. She’s already listened to the rest of it, played his games, knew exactly what she was getting into when she came into his office earlier. Now here she sits, a friendly ear if he needs it.

GM: His cock isn’t hard anymore, but he nods gratefully at her words, even half-coherent as they are. The emotion probably shows on her face.

“She was always getting into trouble,” he says. “Intoxication, bad grades, you name it. We tried to keep her on the straight and narrow, had her room together with her older sister, but it wasn’t enough. She took off. My other daughter blames herself. She’s taken it worse than I have, it actually feels like.”

“My wife, her stepmother, was always very kind to her. She didn’t want for anything growing up. I’m not sure where we went wrong.”

Estrellado: It might not have been anything they’d done, she knows. It could just be something else. There are lots of reasons that people go missing, not always by their own free will.

She lets him talk, lets him unburden himself. Hesitant hands slide around him, prepared for him to push her off if he’d rather not be touched, but until that time she nestles against him. Pulls him close, lets him rest his head against her. I’ve got you, like he’d said to her earlier. The delicate touch of her fingers trail up and down his back, movements slow and soothing.

GM: It’s a little odd, with her dressed in the French maid costume, but Eugene doesn’t push her off and seems to enjoy appreciate touch. He mentions how he had his younger daughter during a not-quite affair with his housekeeper—“my wife and I separated, then decided we’d give things another shot. She happened in between then. Lisa always loved her like her own daughter, though. I just don’t understand why she was always acting out. Her sister turned out very successful.”

He also mentions that his name is Stan, not Eugene, actually. “Lebowski just retired. I got his office. They still need to put in the new lettering.”

Estrellado: She doesn’t comment on the fact that she would be the second woman he’d be seeing behind his wife’s back. Though she supposes that a child from a housekeeper isn’t necessarily “behind her back.” Does he have a thing for women in uniform? She keeps it to herself. Her fingers work down his spine while he talks, gently gliding over the muscles, down, then back up, until one hand cradles the back of his head where it rests against her bosom, nails lightly scratching at his scalp. The other continues down his back.

She makes the right noises at the right time in lieu of words, soft, crooning things that let him know she’s listening, that she feels for him, that she understands his pain. She thinks she might understand where the girl is coming from, why she’s acting out, but she keeps that to herself too rather than try to explain in broken English.

When he’s done, or when she thinks he’s done, she finally speaks. “You okay. Family okay. Hija, daughter, she okay.” Estrellado taps his chest. “Strong heart. Latina? Strong. Como se llama?” A pause. “Nom… ah, name, her name.”

GM: “Strong heart.” He smiles. “I guess you’re right. She has that. Gets it from her mom, like you say.”

“Her name’s Summer.”

Estrellado: Summer. She nods. Smiles back at him. Her hand moves from the back of his head to her chest, fingers closing around the golden cross. She whispers something in rapid Spanish that sounds like it might be a prayer, Summer’s name among the blessing she asks for from the Lord. When it’s done she bows her head for just a second. That coconut and citrus smell drifts towards him again, the suggestion of better times.

GM: Stan is quiet for the prayer, bowing his head in tune with Estrellado’s words. He strokes her hair when she’s finished.

“You’re so kind, Star. And so pretty. And such a hard worker. You’re a real treasure, you know that?”

Estrellado: Estrellado smiles at the words. She leans into his touch. If this is what he needs to forget his missing daughter, to feel better for an evening, she won’t be the one to tell him he’s wrong. Lord knows she’s made enough poor choices in her lifetime. Her eyes close at the gentle caress, then reopen to glance towards his lips. She flushes, dropping her gaze.

GM: His lips meet hers as he pulls her close, arms encircling her. His hands stroke up and down her back.

“Oh, my kind, pretty Star… you need a man who’ll treat you right…” he murmurs between kisses.

Estrellado: Heat meets his words. Her prior shyness bleeds away once their lips meet, taken over by the latin fire he had been searching for. She might not have words for him, but this? This she can do.

“Si,” she murmurs, “por favor. Muestrame.” Does he understand her? Does it matter? This language is universal. Her hands start at the top of his shirt to loosen his tie, then the buttons on his shirt. One by one she pops them free.

GM: The shirt comes off as he unbuckles his pants. He doesn’t pull off her clothes, just hitches her skirt above her thighs. He sweeps back the assorted objects on his desk, helps her onto it, and takes her there. There isn’t a ton of room: Estrellado hugs herself against him as he thrusts into her, still standing. His balls steadily smack against her thighs.

“That’s it… that’s my shining Star…” he breathes, still running one hand through her hair.

He pulls down the front of her costume to get a good look at her tits. He rubs his face against them, tongue flecking out to lick and suck her nipples.

Estrellado: Her thighs spread around him, hem hiking up to expose the wet, glistening sex waiting for him. As soon as he’s inside her back arches, arms holding herself tightly against him, mouth at his lips, his cheek, his neck. Her breath is warm against his ear when she repeats a handful of exclamations in her native tongue, urging him on. She isn’t shy about sharing her enjoyment. She wants to rake her nails down his back, wants to sink her teeth into the pulse point that jumps out at her, but the thought of where she is, whose name had been on the papers that were just shoved aside so casually, keep her from taking him into herself in another way. So she writhes and she gasps and she grinds against him until she finds release, a shuddering, needful thing that brings on a fresh round of Spanish cries as it flows through her body.

GM: It doesn’t take Stan much longer to find his own release. He pumps faster and then comes inside her, hugging her tight against his body. His cum starts to leak out as he pulls her back onto the chair with him, still holding her close as he breathes in the scent of her hair.

“Oh, Star…”

Estrellado: Thighs already sticky with the fluids leaking out of her, Estrellado curls atop his lap with her arms around his back, face pressing against the hollow between neck and shoulder. His repetition of her name receives another string of breathy, murmured words against his skin, lips soft where they brush against him. His name passes from her lips amid the rest of them, a breathy sigh that conveys her satisfaction.

GM: “Star, Star, Star. What are we to do with you?” he smiles as he holds her. “I’ve ruined your workday. The rest of it is going to seem so boring after this.”

Estrellado: That’s certainly true. She hardly imagines snooping through another office or planting a device will give her the same sort of enjoyment that this did. If only she weren’t worried about getting caught by one of the licks who apparently has dealings with him, she’d make it even better for both of them.

She giggles at the words, nodding her head in agreement, and finally asks, “What are you want to do with me?” Her brows lift.

GM: “Mmm, I wouldn’t mind doing this again, but I’m not as young as I used to be,” he smiles.

“You were so wet. We didn’t even need lube.”

Estrellado: Another giggle, a string of words that might give him credit for making her that way if her tone is anything to go by. She runs a hand down his chest, then leans in to nibble at his ear.

“Next time, go again?” A gesture with her hands that shows him what she’d like to try next time, though her eyes quickly dart away and pink splashes across her cheeks.

“Meantime… you,” she points at him, as if there is any doubt who she is speaking of, “need relaxing.” Her fingers brush against his shoulders, the top of his back. “Here, tight.” They slide lower, down his traps. “Here, tight.”

GM: He laughs. “Again, next time.”

“You want to do something about that tightness, Star?”

Estrellado: “I? Oh, no, no…” she trails off, looking around the office as if a table will magically appear. She shakes her head, glancing back at Stan. “Necessita un masaje de profesion. Pues… tel vaz en mi casa… no, no, no…” Casa, at least, is an easy one that even non-Spanish speakers recognize as “home” or “house.”

GM: “A house might be tricky. My wife lives there,” he chuckles. “Maybe a hotel room.”

“We could do this in an actual bed. Order room service. Would you like that, Star, someone else to do the cooking for once?”

Estrellado: Estrellado would, anyway. She considers the question, hesitation evident in the way her gaze shifts, shoulders lifting… and finally, finally, she gives a tiny nod, as if he’s presenting her with some shiny toy that she fears he’ll snatch away as soon as she reaches out to touch it. Still, there’s an earnest sort of hope and desire in her eyes when she finally looks back at him, a shy smile giving lift to the corners of her mouth.

GM: “See? That’s my shining Star,” he says, stroking her lower cheek with his fingertip as if to feel her smile. “You really are a treasure…”

Estrellado: A glance at the clock on his wall tells her that she needs to finish the rest of this job. She’s already spent quite a bit of time in here with him. She says as much, interspersed between tiny little kisses across his cheek and lips, murmured Spanish phrases about what she’d like to do to him next time when they have more room to play. Deft fingers re-button his shirt and straighten his tie, and finally, not yet moving from his lap, she asks when he’d like to see her again.

GM: Stan doesn’t look as if he wants her to go, not after her teasing touch and teasing words, or the taste of her tongue in his mouth when he leans in for a deeper kiss. But his own glance at the clock seems to resign him as to that fact.

“Hmm. How about when your presents arrive, Star?” He gives her the date, a few days away.

Estrellado: Another nod at the date, readily agreeing to the meeting. A final kiss, fingers sliding through the back of his hair, wordlessly letting him know that she’s looking forward to seeing him again. At last she slides off of him, moving around the desk to pick up the items their tryst had displaced and setting them back in their rightful place. She changes back to her uniform and sees herself out with a parting smile, moving on to the rest of the law offices.

GM: He’s right about one thing.

The rest of her cleaning won’t be anywhere nearly as fun.

---

Wednesday evening, 2 March 2016

Celia: The office where Jade meets the pair of brothers is cramped, a space leftover from their days of not having enough. She’d offered once to get them something bigger, to give them more room to stretch out for their things, but the oldest had just given her a look and said something about “knowing where everything is” and “less room for bugs.” She doesn’t know who would bug them. For all anyone else knows, they’re simply a pair of brothers that work for their mom at her bail bond office. No one knows that they work for her, that she has a second pair of ghouls beyond the first two that accompany her around the city. Lucky for her she found triplets, she supposes; lucky for her that they don’t seem to mind passing for their youngest brother whenever she needs them to accompany her. The middle one even seems to get off on it, playing up the “dumb lovestruck fool” that his little brother becomes around her. He might have been just as star struck if it weren’t for their regular meetings.

She wears Jade’s face instead of Celia’s when she visits, takes a seat on the leather couch against the wall and crosses one leg over the other. The middle brother closes and locks the door, the older one swivels to face her, his back to the wall of monitors where he does most of his work. The blue glow of the screen lights him from behind, throws a sort of halo around his body that shrouds his face in darkness. It might be unnerving if she couldn’t see perfectly well in the dark. She thinks he’s more at home with computers than he has ever been with people. Reminds her of an old friend that way, though she’s never said as much. She thinks the pair might get along.

Jade fixes them with a smile.

“Good evening, boys.”

GM: It also probably doesn’t help that like his brother, he’s only a shadow of the other, better thing.

Well, maybe that’s not fair.

Ghouling seems to bring out the worst in people. Or at least make it easier to see the worst in them. After all, if they were something really special, they’d have gotten the Embrace.

As long as they sup from her wrists, they can never be her equals.

But they can be such useful servants.

Reggie looks a lot like his brother. One can debate whether he’s older or younger or co-equal when they’re all triplets, but there’s no doubt that this is the man to Randy’s boy. The first of Randy’s fraternal siblings is a young man with the same black hair and rectangular face, though that’s where similarities end. He’s taller than his brother, with a broad chest and powerful slabs of muscle visible beneath the tight shirt that he wears—and no doubt that’s why he wears it, and why he makes a show of flexing whenever the pretty Toreador appears. Tattoos disappear beneath the sleeves and neckline of his shirt, swirls and whorls of dark ink across his dark skin. His brother might be able to pass as white, but there’s no doubt as to Reggie’s black heritage. Some might say that’s why she prefers his brother; he, at least, can walk beside her in public.



Rusty’s less of a looker. He’s shorter and rounder than his brothers, though not so far gone that anyone would call him “fat.” Comfortably plump, maybe, with the sort of physique that speaks to long hours in a chair and yellow-tinted glasses perched on his nose that he says “filter out the worst of the blue light.” A smattering of stubble covers his lower jaw. For all that, though, he doesn’t look like he’d meet girls in wet basements, whatever one might say about his other flaws next to Celia’s old teacher. He’s also the only one of his siblings who Jade has ever seen wear a necktie.



“Evening, Jade,” says Reggie, plopping down next to her on the couch. He wraps an arm around her shoulder like it has every right to be there. Perhaps he’d be less bold if it wasn’t so dark. Perhaps he wouldn’t be.

“So what can we do you for tonight?”

“Evening,” Rusty just says instead. He looks like he’s resisting the urge to roll his eyes at his brother.

Celia: Jade, he calls her. Not mistress. Not the simpering from Alana, the cute nicknames from his younger brother. She doesn’t swat his arm away. Leans into it, even. Not a giggle, no, just a smile at this bold, bold man who positions an arm around her shoulders as if she couldn’t put him on his knees with a look.

“I’ve a need for your particular skill sets.” Her eyes flick between the two of them, though it’s Rusty that she addresses more than Randy. “Intel. And a missing person.” She doesn’t know why she cares about the man’s missing daughter. Not for the girl herself, surely, but the fact that he’d been… decent enough. A cheater, to be sure, but aren’t they all? Easy to picture her mom in that role, baring her soul to some maid in want of anyone else to speak to about a missing child. Easy, too, to earn his affection and let it lead her to bigger things if she’s so inclined.

“Sleepless Investigations is looking into Drouillard and Ocampo, possibly at the behest of Ware & Lebowski. I want to know why. Don’t tip off Monty or his people.” Possibly easier said than done, but she’d prefer the Kook not know that she’s shadowing him. It’s not like she hasn’t had them do it before. And if someone else is interfering with the police… well, she can think of a few people who would like to know.

“Missing girl, college-aged. Summer Greer.” She’d had to pull Stan’s last name from the law firm’s website earlier this evening. It wasn’t as if he’d offered it. “And these.”

She pulls two items from her purse: a golden name plate, the kind in all the fancy offices, with Stan’s name across the front of it. A second, smaller bauble appears with it. A paperweight maybe, or just some generic kitschy piece of decor that’s meant to be placed on a desk or bookshelf.

GM: “I sure bet you need my particular skill sets,” says Reggie. One of his hands starts to play with Jade’s hair.

Rusty refrains from rolling his eyes.

“Sleepless is interesting,” he says. “They’re the best in the city. Their guys don’t come cheap.”

“They get the best rep,” says Reggie. “There’s another guy supposed to be at least as good as them. I’ve heard about him from some cops.”

“Who?”

Reggie thinks. “It’s on the tip of my tongue.”

Rusty snorts. “Yes. Sounds like some guy.”

Reggie shrugs. “Missing college girl. Probably as easy to find her as get in her pants.”

Celia: Amusement curls her lips at Reggie’s statement.

“Still bang a lot of co-eds, do you?

GM: “Not really,” says Reggie. “Just a fact that the easiest place on earth to get laid outside a brothel is an American college campus.”

Celia: “I might argue it’s easier. You don’t generally have to pay for it at college.”


GM: Rusty looks at the two items. “You want those bugged?”

Celia: “Yes. Video and audio on this one,” she taps the nameplate, “and audio by itself is fine on the other.”

GM: Rusty nods.

Celia: “How soon?”

GM: “Installing bugs doesn’t take long,” he says. “It’s getting the target to accept the bugged object that takes more time. In the old days, you usually had to plan a break-in. These days, it’s more common to mail them something as an accidental delivery, a free promo offer, or what have you, and get the target to place it where you need it.”

Celia: “Placement is handled.” She thinks, anyway. Maybe it’s a longer shot than she anticipates.

GM: “Okay. We can have these bugged by tomorrow.”

Celia: “Perfect. I’ll be by to collect them tomorrow evening. Let me know what you find about the rest of it. Low profile, gentlemen.”

GM: “Always,” smirks Reggie.

---

Thursday evening, 3 March 2016

Estrellado: It had taken some time for her to decide what to wear. What Star would wear, given the circumstances. Not her uniform. Not something that could be seen as too sexual. Star is 40-something maid, not a debutante. No gowns, no spiked heels, no flouncy dresses. Something elegant. Classy. Not above her means, but not so brazen as to suggest poverty. No one likes the idea of poverty. No one gets off to that. Power, certainly, but there’s a delicate balance to be struck, and when she had looked at herself in the mirror before leaving to meet with him she thinks she had found it.

Long sleeves that end at her wrist, chest and shoulders bared by the neckline that begins just above the gentle swell of her breasts. It falls almost to her ankles but hugs every delicious curve of her body, accenting the parts that he had been so enraptured by during their last meeting. A gentle flare to the skirt once it passes her knees that she hopes to show off if they ever get to twirling. Light makeup that gives lift to her eyes, a spot of color on her cheeks and lips, lashes darkened by a coat of mascara. All of it applied with a deft hand that merely suggests the presence of cosmetics rather than announces it. The golden cross sits just below the hollow of her throat, two small studs in her ears. Heels and a purse complete the look. And underneath… well, that’s for him to discover later. The dress looks new. Like maybe she’d bought it for him because she hasn’t had anyone else to dress up for. She leaves her hair down, long and thick and black tresses falling in a wave halfway down her back.


Uncertainty. That’s the word that she channels when she looks for him in the French Quarter’s hotel lobby. He’d decided on this spot because of the crowds, she thinks, because the two of them could lose themselves among the sheer amount of tourists that come and go. If they are seen together—and why would they be, when she thinks that he will confine them to a room?—then no one will have any idea who they are. Just another rich man with a mistress on vacation.

Is that what she is? Is that what she has become, a mistress? Some amusement crinkles the corners of her eyes at the thought of jumping from maid to mistress. She’d thought it before and there it goes again in her mind: he has a type. First the housekeeper, then the maid. How many of them does he keep sequestered in different hotels, how many women warm his bed and let him slake his lust before he goes back to his wife?

She lets the thoughts run through her, lets them show on her face as she slips into the mask she’ll wear tonight, steps into the headspace of Estrellado Ortzi. Uncertainty and hesitance, overdressed, undeserving. Forty-something maid, this week’s passing amusement for the rich, white lawyer. For all his kind words he will use and throw her away.

Maybe she shouldn’t have come.

The woman who would be Estrellado swims to the surface. She steps into the role as if she were made for it, dark eyes searching the lobby for Stan, her recently retrieved gifts heavy in her bag.

GM: Estrellado gets more than one appreciative look and occasional whistle on her way over to the hotel. The clothes clearly make the man, and the woman too.

It’s been said that the French Quarter begins in the lobby of Hotel Monteleone. This venerable New Orleans hotel sits majestically at the foot of Royal Street and proffers a point of departure for all things New Orleans, including Jackson Square, Bourbon Street, the French Market, and the Riverwalk, where steamboats still glide along the Mississippi River. The only high-rise building in the interior of the French Quarter, the hotel boasts the eclectic flair of Beaux-Arts architecture that has made it a historic landmark, acknowledged by the Historic Hotels of America as well as the National Trust for Historic Preservation.



“Shine ya shoes, pretty lady?” calls a towering, bull-shouldered shoe-shiner from a stand just outside the hotel.


“Guarantee you can see ya face in da buffed point, or ya money back.”

Estrellado: The looks and whistles make her flush, but at least no one here is grabbing her ass or making a pass at her. Not that she’s unhappy with how things worked out with Stan; she might have been a little more irritated if he’d turned out to be some sort of sleazeball, but he’d been… kind. Unexpectedly. There’s little enough of that in the world.

She stops when the man hails her about her shoes, looking down at the heels she’s click-clacking along in. There isn’t much to shine. She says as much to the man, gesturing with her free hand, a question in her eyes as she lets out a string of rapid-fire Spanish.

“¿Hay suficiente para brillar?” She makes a rubbing motion with her hand, pointing at the thin band of her shoe.

(“Is there enough to shine?”)

GM: The shoe-shiner is built like a haystack, with a neck like a fire hydrant, and upper arms like chunks of sewer pipes. His small eyes are an electric blue set in a coffee-colored face, crowned with oiled canerow braids and a occasional porkpie hat. He wears an oversized gray smock over a Hawaiian sirt, its pockets stuffed with brushes and buffing rags, ribbed with black and oxblood stains. The drawers under the two elevated chairs on the stand are loaded with bottles of liquid polish, cans of wax, and saddle soap, toothbrushes and steel dental.

The man gives a simple nod at Estrellado’s words. She isn’t sure if he understands Spanish. At her motion, though, he nods again and says,

“Dere ain’ as much, ma’am, but I’ll buff it clean ’nuff ta see half ya face in.”

Estrellado: Estrellado smiles prettily for the man. She glances at the time, pleased that she’d arrived early enough to give herself this small treat. It’s not often she has other people cleaning for her. She finally nods, accepting his hand up onto one of the seats.

“Yes, thank you.” Back to that old phrase.

GM: Estrellado thinks she recognizes the man’s face as he helps her up. It was over the news, once, the bloodthirsty ex-cop who savagely mauled Vera Malveaux’s (wife of billionaire Matthew Malveaux’s) face and did 15 years in Angola for it, all for no particular reason.

Estrellado: Estrellado is a firm believer that once someone does their time they should be forgiven for their past sins. He’d served his years. She doesn’t say anything about his brutal history when he takes her hand, doesn’t shy away from him or clutch her purse for all that he might make a woman like her a little nervous. She sits back on the chair, watching him work.

GM: The man retrieves several rags, brushes, and wax containers from his stand. He starts the shine by brushing Estrellado’s in clockwise motions to get rid of any dirt and crud, then wipes it clean with a dry rag. He applies some polish, using a toothbrush to get it along her shoe’s thinner heel, then works his buffing brush with an impressive speed and rhythm. He wipes the excess polish off with a rag, then finally applies a drop of water to the shoe with his finger. He uses the polishing cloth to rub a tiny amount of polish into the water droplet, then robs it along the shoe in fast, small circles to get that signature ‘spit shine’ look.

“$7, ma’am,” he smiles when he’s done.

Estrellado: Estrellado beams down at the shoes when he’s done with them. They, unlike her dress, hadn’t looked new when she’d put them on, but now that they’ve been cleaned and shined they might as well be. Indeed, when she holds her foot just right she can see the reflection of her face in it, as promised.

She laughs at the sight, pointing down at it, chittering something in Spanish at him.

“Mira! Mi cara.” She circles a finger around her face, pointing again, clearly delighted. After a moment she picks up her purse and pulls free a ten dollar bill to hand over.

Estrellado: Payment rendered, Estrellado takes his offered hand once more to climb down from the elevated chair. Once her feet are firmly on the ground again she rises to the tips of her toes and kisses both sides of his face. Her lipstick leaves not a single mark behind.

“Son encantadores,” she says again of her shoes, delight in her eyes at the simple transaction. “Muchas gracias. Dios lo bendiga.”

GM: The man might not understand Estrellado’s exact words, but their emotion more than shines through. So does the cash she presses into his hand.

And the kisses against his cheeks.

The man actually blushes and touches the spot.

“Ah, de nada, ma’am, if dat’s how ya say it? Ya welcome, ma’am, ya mighty welcome,” he beams. “Anytime ya want ya shoes shined, I be right here. Hippo Broussard. Big Mon Broussard.” He points at himself as he says the name.

Estrellado: She nods at him, at the Spanish words he gets out. De nada indeed. She repeats the name he’d given her, the syllables rolling off her tongue, lightly accented as they come from her lips in a way they hadn’t from his.

“’Ippo Broussard.” She tries it out, the H dropped, a long E sound at the front, the R’s rolled with a tap of her tongue against her teeth, savors the sound of it as she might a fine meal. She touches a hand to her chest, “Estrellado Ortzi. Star. Mucho gusto, Senior Broussard.” And offers the same hand to him, the one she’d given him twice now—on her way up and on her way back down—though this time to shake. She mulls over her words as she takes his hand, finally, haltingly, offering a shy smile as she stumbles over the English.

“I see you next time, Senior Broussard.” A dip of her head and she’s gone, smiling broadly at the ground where her heels click click click. When, mere steps later, someone asks why she’s smiling—as if she needs a reason—she points down at her shoes and says, “Mis zapatos son brillantes gracias a Senior Broussard. Mira, lo ves?” At their blank look, she says simply, “shoe shine,” and points the way she had come to send Broussard his next customer.

GM: Hippo’s hands are large, thick, and callused, and the way he shakes it as he nods and smiles reminds Estrellado of how someone might handle a newborn kitten. She doesn’t doubt he could crush someone’s hands, though, if inclined to.

The passerby looks down at Estellado’s shoes, says, “Uh, gracias,” and heads towards the shoe-shiner.

“You should speak English when you’re in America, lady,” says another passerby.

“’Ey. Watch what you say ’bout da lady,” calls Hippo.

At the very large man’s very confrontational tone, the guy quickly walks off.

Estrellado: For all that he’s supposedly a hardened criminal who attacked a woman with no provocation, Estrellado thinks she might like the ex-cop turned shoe-shiner. She winks over her shoulder at him and gives a little finger-wave as she turns into the hotel proper, stepping at last into the lobby where Stan had said he’d meet her. Some color rises to her cheeks at the thought of it, wondering if people know that’s why she’s here, if they see through the nice clothes, the shiny shoes, to the middle-aged maid beneath. If they look at her and see someone who doesn’t belong in a place as nice as this. But, no, how could they? She looks like any other denizen of the Quarter, dressed up for a night on the town. She hardly wears a sign around her neck that screams “mistress.” Estrellado doesn’t even know if that’s what this is. Meeting someone twice hardly counts as being a mistress.

Still, the word is better than the alternative.

She pushes the thought from her mind, the bland smile that comes with it, and lets her eyes roam the lobby for her date.

GM: Stan had said the lobby at first, then corrected himself that they should “definitely go to the bar” instead. The city’s only revolving bar, the twenty-five seat, bright circus-clad Merry-Go-Round turns on 2,000 large steel rollers, pulled by a chain powered by a one-quarter horsepower motor at a constant rate of one revolution every 15 minutes. Originally installed in 1949 and renovated in 1992, the current carousel top features fiber optics that create the appearance of stars in the night sky, complete with a regular shooting star that races across the ceiling. One shooting star crosses the room at regular intervals. Notably, the Carousel’s bartenders created the Vieux Carré and Goody cocktails. The sum of all these features has made the ironic bar, and its hotel, a favorite spot in the Big Easy for both its locals and tourists alike.


Esprellado espies her date at one of the rotating bar’s seats.

That word is also better than the alternative.

---

---

Estrellado: Her eyes dart to a clock on the wall as she moves into the bar, wondering if she’d spent too long lingering outside at the shoe shine. But, no, she isn’t late; he’s just early. Like minds in that regard, then.

Her heels herald her approach, hips swaying with every step that she takes in that clinging black fabric. It’s a small step up onto the rotating floor of the carousel proper, moving slowly enough that even in a skintight dress and heels she has no trouble navigating the ascent. It puts her off to one side of him. Her date. She tries it out, lingering over the idea of dating. When she’d lost Matteo she’d thought that she would never date again. She’s barely had flings. With the boys out of the house though… Well, who could blame her?

It’s a fond smile that finally spreads across her lips as she moves along the back of the seats to reach his side, running a hand along the back of his shoulders as she passes him to take the chair just past him. She slides smoothly into place, one ankle crossing over the other.

“Buenas noches.” A brief pause as she tries the phrase again in accented English, the words more clipped than they’d be with a native speaker. “Good evening.”

GM: Stan turns from his seat at her touch.

His eyebrows shoot up when he sees her.

“Wow. Star, you look… lovely. Just lovely.”

He raises her hand to his lips and kisses it.

“Buy a lady a drink?”

Estrellado: She’s not immune to the compliment. Two spots of color appear high on her cheeks, smile spreading across her face as he raises her hand to his lips. She flushes and looks away, lashes fluttering as she takes a shaky breath in before she looks back.

She nods at his question, her eyes scanning the bottles behind the bar. The green one with the skull on the front catches her eye. It takes her back to another time, another man. Memories that aren’t hers. She brushes them aside, no more than cobwebs in her mind.

“Sazerac?” It’s a question, but she’s heard that the Carousel Bar makes a mean one.

GM: He nods. “You eaten yet? They’ve got some good entrees, too.”

Estrellado: Estrellado shakes her head. She hasn’t eaten yet. She should, though, no matter that it might not go down the right way.

She considers for a moment, as if chewing over the words, and finally takes the plunge into the unfamiliar language. Hard to be on a date if she refuses to speak the language.

“We eat. What do you, ah…” a pause, searching for the word, “recommend?”

GM: He asks for their ‘bar bites’ menu.

After a moment he asks, “Would it help if I read it?”

Estrellado: One neatly manicured nail—that’s new, she hadn’t had them done at the office—slides down the menu, lips moving soundlessly at the words. Her nose wrinkles at something. She nods at his question, relief in her eyes.

“Yes, thank you.”

GM: He does so.

Though he asks first if she wants to hear the small plates or entrées, to narrow it down.

Estrellado: Small plates, she tells him, but once he gets going she makes a motion for him to continue all the way down, her eyes on his face, watching his lips form the words.

GM: The couple sitting behind Stan make sneering expressions at the Latina woman who needs her date to read the menu.

Stan, unseeing, works his way down from the Shrimp Pot Stickers to the White Truffle Fries.

Estrellado: Any flutters that had begun in her stomach die at the sight of their curled lips. Her gaze drops.

GM: Stan pauses.

“Would it be better if I picked?”

Estrellado: She starts to make a motion with her hand, then finally nods her head. Her eyes find his face again, pulling a smile from somewhere despite the mockery behind his back.

“Yes, thank you.” A brief pause, then she touches her fingers to where he holds the menu in his hand. “Trust you, pick well.”

GM: The well-dressed man behind Stan opens his mouth and moves his middle finger back and forth towards it, pantomiming sucking a dick. As if to say that’s the only reason Estrellado is here. His date laughs like he’s the funniest guy on earth.

“Okay, I’m a fan of the Crawfish Pie,” says Stan. He places the order.

Estrellado: Her eyes flick past Stan to the man and his woman. The expression on her face doesn’t change, but she sends it out of her in a wave: the crushing despair and guilt, the gut-clenching, sweat-inducing dread of having someone find out your secrets. Maybe it’s the reason he mocks the Latina woman with her white date, the need to feel superior, like he’s never done anything wrong. But this is a cold, cruel world, and she knows more than anyone that they’ve all sinned, knows that his mockery is a desperate attempt to put the attention on anyone else that isn’t him. She hits him with it, pushing her emotions into him, making it resonate through his body until he just can’t take it anymore, until he has no choice but to open his mouth and confess his dirty, filthy sins. Right here in the bar.

GM: Sweat suddenly beads on the man’s forehead. His eyes dart to and fro before he blurts out,

“I did it. Okay? I stuck the pillow over your grandma’s face, because I was just so fucking sick of throwing money after her when she was gonna die anyway.”

His date’s mouth falls open. So does Stan’s.

Estrellado: Estrellado clutches at Stan’s hand, eyes widening at the display behind him.

GM: “W-what!?” gasps the woman he’s with.

Estrellado: She’d thought it would be something… less. Cheating, maybe. Knocking someone up. Not this delicious little tidbit. She hides her amusement behind a mask of shock, as if she can’t believe what he’d just said.

GM: The man blanches. His mouth works several times before he gets out,

“I was kidding. Bad joke.”

Estrellado: “Asesinato,” Estrellado whispers to Stan, voice just loud enough to carry. He doesn’t need to speak Spanish to understand what that means.

“La mató.”

(“Murder. He killed her.”)

GM: His eyes cut to her. A few other people do too.

Then he looks back at the couple. Several other people are watching.

The woman doesn’t say anything. Just stares at her date.

“Look, I’m sorry. It was a really bad joke,” he says, laying a hand on her shoulder.

She slaps it away.

“Don’t touch me,” she hisses.

“Look, I said it was a joke, all right? Just… lighten up! I was only kidding!”

Estrellado: And because Estrellado is apparently a vindictive bitch, she hits the woman with something similar. Another wave of emotion, a suggestion to get mad. She can almost see the red, swirling rage inside her chest, the wounded betrayal, and she strokes a mental hand along it as if feeding a fire. She makes it burn so brightly.

GM: The woman slaps him full across the face.

Even more people turn to watch.

Estrellado: Estrellado covers her mouth with her hand.

GM: The man touches his cheek. “He-”

The woman throws her drink over his face.

Then she grabs someone else’s drink and throws it over his chest.

“Carrie, what the fuck!?”

“You did it!” the woman shrieks. “I always knew! You, fucking, _bastard!”_

“I didn’t! I swear! Can’t you take a fucking joke!?”

Estrellado: She wonders if someone should call the police on the confessed murderer. Maybe security to get the raging woman out of here. She doesn’t say anything though, just watches with barely concealed horror as the scene plays out in front of her. She clutches at Stan’s hands.

GM: “Take this!” she grabs someone else’s plate of food and chucks it at his face. The man gives an alarmed cry and tries to dodge, but it clips him over the head and sends food spilling everywhere. People are gawking. Some get out their phones. The bartender tries to verbally defuse things.

“Oh, fuck you all!” the woman spits. She turns on her heel and storms out of the bar.

Estrellado: Estrellado watches her go. Seeing the phones makes her release Stan’s hands immediately, her eyes turning back to the man once the woman is gone, as if waiting for him to murder someone here, too.

GM: The man looks unsure whether to pursue her or not, then gives a forced-sounding laugh and says, “Bitch can’t take a joke.”

He gets up and leaves. The bartender is talking into the phone in a low voice.

Stan looks back at Estrellado once the couple are gone.

“Wow. I’ve never seen anything like that.”

Estrellado: She nods her head in agreement, clearly at a loss for words.

GM: The loudly gossiping patrons around them express similar sentiments. It’s clear no one will be talking about anything else this evening.

Estrellado: Estrellado makes the sign of the cross over her chest, quietly sending a prayer to the Lord for the poor, murdered woman.

Only when things have calmed somewhat does she turn to Stan, pointing at his empty drink. An unfortunate casualty in the incident, its contents splashed across the man’s chest.

“Okay?” she asks.

GM: “I guess it’s the viewing price,” he jokes. “I’m almost tempted to go after her and offer the firm’s services. She might be more likely to face a sentence.”

Estrellado: Her brows lift. She taps a finger on the bar, looking out the door where the woman left.

“¿Por que? Why? He confess murder, no?”

GM: “Well, I said might. If there wasn’t an investigation into the grandma’s death, all he did was make a bad joke. But slapping him and throwing that plate was battery, if he chooses to go to the cops about it.”

“If she goes to the cops, he’ll probably just deny it and they’ll be out of luck if there’s no other evidence. That might even be what it was. Just a really bad joke.”

Estrellado: Bad guys usually win. Someone else had told her that a long time ago. No, not her. That’s someone else’s memory, too.

She frowns, finally turning her eyes back to his face. She opens her mouth as if to say something, then closes it again. She swallows, then nods at his words.

“Bad joke, maybe,” she finally says.

A beat of silence, as if she isn’t sure where to take it from here. She thinks to change the subject, maybe make her own bad joke, but neither of those seem right.

“You take cases like that?” A vague gesture toward where it had gone down. “Criminal?”

GM: “I don’t personally, but there are people at my firm who do. If those two want to be careful they’ll speak to lawyers.”

Estrellado: “What do you take?”

Before he has a chance to answer her question, Estrellado shakes her head. She glances again at the door where the woman had left from, then back to Stan.

“You want find her? I help.” A question, though. She’ll leave it up to him if he’d rather track down a potential client than spend his time here with her.

GM: He shakes his head. “She’s probably long gone by now. I’m here to relax, anyway.”

Estrellado: She’d be lying if she said she wasn’t pleased with that answer, both for her own vanity and to deny the woman competent legal counsel. Not that she can’t find it elsewhere if she’s so inclined. Not her problem anymore, though.

The chair, she realizes, is bolted to the ground. Probably to prevent people from toppling off the edge of the rotating platform. Since she can’t scooch it closer to him as she might want to she settles for swiveling in her seat, rearranging her body to cross one knee over the other. The material clings to her thighs. A murmur of something beneath her breath, a string of Spanish words that convey she might be sounding something out, before she speaks again.

“Then we relax.” Her eyes slide down his form, settle back on his face. She offers a tiny smile, as if she knows exactly how she’ll help him relax, and immediately drops her gaze after the brazenly suggestive look.

GM: Stan’s gaze doesn’t drop. His eyes roam her shapely form, perhaps wondering how the cleaning lady he met previously could be so… transformed.

“You know, we could just get room service…”

Estrellado: Her head tilts to one side, tongue slowly running across her lower lip before she bites down on it. A tiny gesture. Her eyes dip to the floor. When she lifts them again she’s looking up at him from beneath long lashes, a spark of something in her dark eyes.

She gives a slow nod.

GM: He chuckles and takes her upstairs. It’s a standard hotel room, clean and neat, with a king bed and nice view of the French Quarter. He pulls the blinds shut and starts kissing her, his hands hungrily cupping her breasts and squeezing her rear.

“God, you look hot tonight…”

Estrellado: He certainly wastes no time jumping right into things. Estrellado pulls him close, fingers already working at the buttons on his shirt, the buckle of his belt. Her lips part beneath his, the tips of her nails scratching gently across his back, his chest, his stomach. Whatever part of him she can reach. She’s careful not to leave marks behind that his wife might find. Desire curls in her lower abdomen, sets her nerves alight as some other part of her mind considers the locale: the wall? the bed? the floor? Were he a decade younger she’d have them try all three.

“Espera,” she murmurs against his lips once her fingers have made short work of his belt and the zipper at his fly. She stretches a hand behind her back, reaching for the zipper of her dress. She tugs. The suddenly loose material spills across her shoulders, sliding down her chest and arms. She shimmies out of it, left in nothing but the heels, bra, and panties.

GM: Stan’s breath comes hot and heavy as Estrellado pulls off his clothes. He waits long enough for her to pull off hers. His eyebrows shoot up.

“Wow. I swear you got even sexier than when I last saw you.”

He pulls her to the bed, exploring her mouth with his tongue as his hands appreciatively trace her tan skin. Her stretch marks aren’t that visible, there’s still a youthful bounce to her breasts, and there’s definitely less pudge than when he saw her last.

He unhooks her bra and kneads, squeezes, and sucks her breasts. He marvels at how much “having a man” does for her.

Estrellado: Smoother skin, a tighter body, firm where she needs to be with nice handfuls of flesh everywhere else. Her thighs are still thick, her ass still round, but now they’re paired with a flatter stomach, perkier breasts. Everything tucked and tight and trim, in its place. She looks like the “after” to her body’s “before” in some miracle infomercial that promises results in less than a week.

Her panties slide down her legs with a deft flick of her wrist, landing on the floor beside her discarded bra. She flips the pair of them so she’s on top this time, thighs spread to either side of his waist, head tilted back as he pulls a nipple into his mouth. A string of Spanish words leave her mouth, their meaning lost in translation but their message clear: more.

GM: Stan gives more, sucking and squeezing her breasts until her pink little nubs feel ready to burst with pleasure. He gropes the bedside table for the condom he’s evidently thought to bring this time, and looks like he hates every millisecond that it takes to slip the thing on. He fills her thighs and lets her ride him like a stallion until he blows his load and her juices get all over them both. He doesn’t last as long as Matteo did, but Matteo was a lot younger than them both.

“…wow,” he pants.

Estrellado: It could have been the sex. The way she rode him and took exactly what she wanted from him, grinding down on him to hit that spot inside of her over and over again, no thought given to how loud she gets inside the room of his hotel. She doesn’t need to mind the secretary or the other late-night workers, doesn’t need to worry that she’s in someone’s office. Half-formed phrases and expletives pass from her lips, a mixture of English and Spanish, and by the time they’re both done she’s a panting, quivering mess above him.

Or it could have been the fangs. The quick nip at his throat, the heady red liquid drawn into her mouth in the guise of a lingering kiss. She doesn’t take much. A mouthful. A second. A third. Enough to leave him hard without that vacant head-rush he’d get if she took too much, a flick of her tongue against the holes in his neck to seal them shut before her mouth returns to his, swallowing his cries.

Her chest rises and falls in time with his, heart thudding against her ribcage. Only once she feels him begin to soften does she shift, claiming the spot on the bed beside him, an arm across his chest, a leg across his thigh. She nuzzles his neck, trailing soft kisses down his skin. If he were to look over and catch her eye he’d see the self-satisfied smirk.

GM: Stan looks over, but he might not catch the expression on her face. He looks pretty tired between the hour, the sex, and the blood she’s taken. He kisses her back, more sweetly than passionately, and holds her close as he buries his face in her hair. He mumbles something about having brought her “presents.”

Estrellado: Estrellado strokes a hand down his chest, curls her fingers through his hair. Even after the mention of presents she’s content to simply lie with him, exploring his skin with her mouth. The taste of him still dances across her tongue, sweet with affection, none of the false, fake taste so many others like her are forced to endure for this same thing. She keeps her touch light now that he’s spent.

“I, too,” she says after a moment, once they’ve both caught their breath. “Bring you present.”

GM: He gives a soft laugh as he strokes the back of her head.

“Mmm… seeing how good you looked with your clothes all off was my present…”

Estrellado: A giggle meets his words, that same deep-throated sound he’d mentioned he admires at their first meeting.

“You see that anytime,” she tells him.

GM: “Still a present…” he chuckles. “But okay, what’s the other one?”

Estrellado: A final kiss on his cheek before she rolls from the bed, rising to her feet to cross the room to where her purse had been discarded as soon as he’d begun touching her. As if she can’t stand to be apart from him she brings it back with her, sitting on the edge of the bed with one leg curled beneath her as she sifts through it. She presents them with a flourish, one box that has been neatly gift-wrapped in silver paper, a second that looks… well, it looks oblong, less neatly wrapped, but the bow on top turns it into a pretty package all the same.

GM: “What’s this? More than one present,” Stan murmurs. Something briefly passes in his eyes: perhaps concern for whether Star can afford such purchases on her cleaning lady’s salary. Still, he smiles as he unwraps the box from its silver paper.

Estrellado: The box within the silver wrapping is black, and once he opens it he’ll find a nameplate that’s meant to sit on his desk. Heavy in his hand, the base of it is the same wooden hue of the desk on which he’d taken her their first night together, the letters etched in gold and outlined in black upon its surface. His name across the front: Stanley Greer.

She smiles uncertainly at him as he opens it, tucking her hair behind her ear to give her hands something to do other than wring uselessly on her lap.

“For office. New office.”

GM: “Oh, Star,” he smiles, turning it over in his eyes. “It’s beautiful. You’re just in time, too. Someone was going to come over tomorrow to install some new letters.” His brow furrows. “But was it expensive for you…?”

Estrellado: Estrellado makes a motion with her hand, a sort of back and forth that might mean yes or no. She follows it with a shrug, a shaking of her head.

“You…” she struggles for a moment, searching for the words. “Worth. For you, worth. You see me. Not clean lady, not foreign, me.” She taps a hand to her chest to emphasize the point.

“Put on desk,” she suggests, a sly smile in place, “remember fun.”

GM: Stan laughs. “That’d be pretty hard to forget either way. But the reminder will help. Thank you, Star. It’ll look lovely on my desk.” He pulls her close and kisses her head.

“There’s a lot in you to see.”

Estrellado: Her eyes dart down her body, taking in her own nude form. She wiggles her brows at Stan once her gaze returns to his face. A lot to see indeed.

“Un mas,” she says, nudging the other toward him.

GM: Once again, she’s not sure if he understands the literal meaning, but the sentiment seems apparent enough. Stan smiles and unwraps the less neatly-wrapped present.

Estrellado: The oblong shape and messy wrapping makes sense once he opens the second gift. Unlike the first, this is clearly not something that’s new, and there’s no box to contain it. Rather it looks like something that has seen a lot of care over the past however many years. It, too, has a flat base, but it’s egg-shaped at the top. A clear coat of glass or maybe resin holds an entire landscape within: a dark blue sky with stars and a crescent moon, a field of green, a gray mountain across the backdrop with the suggestion of white, fluffy clouds.

She watches his face as he opens it, hands twisting together on her lap.


Estrellado pulls a piece of paper from her purse once the gift is open. It’s been folded many times over, its texture soft and well-worn, and there’s a flush to her cheeks that isn’t from the sex when she hands it over to him.

“En mi familia, tenemos un dicho: el observador de la luna te guiara,” she says as he unfolds it. She gestures toward the paper. Words are scrawled across the page in a looping, feminine hand, the letters carefully crafted and evenly spaced upon the lines.

In my family, we have a saying: the moonwatcher will guide you. When I came to America I was young. I missed my family fiercely, and though I found happiness here I could not forget the land where I was born or the people to whom I belonged. I felt lost. But at night, when I could see the sky, when the moon hung over the clouds and cast its light upon me, I knew that they were with me, in my heart, that they could look upon the same night sky and see the same sliver of moon that I did. And I knew, no matter how far from them I went, that they would always be with me, and I would always be with them.

“Para su hija,” Estrellado tells him once his eyes have stopped moving across the page. She touches a finger against the side of the orb and the moon lights up, casting its glow upon the mountainscape within. “La luna se guiara. Esta aqui.” Her hand moves to his heart.

GM: “Oh, Star…” Stan murmurs, turning over the glowing orb in his hands. Once again, Estrellado doubts he can understand her (spoken) words, but the sentiment behind the gift does not appear lost. Especially after the folded paper’s words on how one is never truly parted from one’s family. Stan’s eyes linger on the crescent moon, as if wondering when his daughter last looked upon the same celestial object whose likeness he now gazes upon. His eyes start to look moist. He sniffs and rubs his nose before looking back to her.

“This is your family’s? How long have you had it?”

Estrellado: Her eyes do not shy away from his face. Not this time. No, this time she holds his gaze, watches the moisture gather in the corners of his eyes. When he sniffs she only moves closer to him in answer, the pads of her thumbs soft as they wipe away the tears that have escaped his control.

“Muchos años,” she tells him, voice soft. “Long time. Since I come here. For you now.”

GM: “Oh, Star,” he repeats, turning the orb over in his hands again. “I can’t… I can’t accept these, when all I did was fool around with you on my desk…” he protests.

Estrellado: A dozen excuses come to mind. A dozen things she could say to him to make him keep it, all of them as persuasive as the next regardless of her broken English. But she’s silent, watching him, watching his face as he stares down at the gift she has given him. She draws in a breath, as if to speak, but moves instead. She’s on his lap within seconds, her body curled between his legs, her lips brushing against his neck, his cheek, and finally his mouth.

“For you now,” she says again, the words just a murmur between kisses. She puts her emotion into the touch rather than the words, the fondness she feels for him, the gratitude that he turned out like he did rather than how she expected. Her sorrow at his loss and hope that he’ll recover his daughter. She lays it out for him in soft, sensual touches and kisses, in the quiet tenderness of her fingertips and lips upon him.

She’s a maid. She knows that. Knows that she’s nothing but a distraction to him, a one or two time thing before he returns to his wife. She’s not asking for forever, just giving him right now. This moment. This peace.

GM: That, at least, he is willing to take.

---

Previous, by Narrative: Story Eleven, Caroline XIV
Next, by Narrative: Story Eleven, Caroline XV

Previous, by Character: Story Eleven, Celia IX, Jon IX
Next, by Character: Story Twelve, Celia I

“Any canvas, given enough care, can shine.”
Jade Kalani

---

Monday night, 13 February 2016, AM

GM: Jon attends Midnight Mass at Elysium. He publicly receives an ‘interim’ grant of permission to remain within the city, per his earlier discussion with the sheriff and seneschal.

Accou’s herald approaches Jon after he has left the event, and states that her domitor has procured “a potential assistant” to “help facilitate the success of your and my master’s project.” If Jon is amenable, Accou and the ‘assistant’ can meet the Tremere tomorrow evening to discuss the details. Cloe can also be present, if the surgeon would find it useful to personally inspect and interview the elder ghoul.

Alternatively, Jon and the assistant may meet tonight on their own time, away from Accou. The ghoul supplies the assistant’s identity and contact information: Jade Kalani, one of the Toreador primogen’s many grandchilder. Jade is an esthetician, plastic surgeon, and skincare specialist who has extensive experience in this area.

Jon: The surgeon is polite enough to hide his skepticism in front of the elder’s ghoul, but is amendable to meeting with the elder’s grandchilde. Another pair of hands could be useful if they’re steady.

And it would be rude to turn him down cold.

He doesn’t need to speak with Cloe until he has set up for it—further down the line, but has availability this evening to meet with Ms. Kalani. The Elysium may be over, but he expects to remain for some time yet: he has plenty of others to speak with.

GM: Rachelle coordinates the details of the meeting with the number Accou’s ghoul provides for Jade Kalani. She also asks Jon where he’d like to meet her. As a member of Savoy’s bloc, the neonate will not be welcome in any of the CBD’s off-use Elysia. They’re theoretically open to anyone, but in practice, followers of the Baron and French Quarter lord are punished as intruders if they’re spotted in the CBD except to attend Elysium Primo.

There’s always the Carnival Club (“that’s new since we were last here”) in Faubourg Marigny. Sundown’s territory is often used as a neutral meeting ground between the factions.

Though its Nosferatu owner undoubtedly hears everything that passes under its roof.

Jon: The surgeon gives a wry smile. As though the rats don’t hear most things anyway. But he agrees with the suggestion.

There’s value in being seen publicly with one of Savoy’s people.

Celia: Jade is waiting for the archon when he arrives at the Carnival Club.

There are certain games that licks play with each other: making other people wait, hazing, contacting them only through ghouls. Jade has been around long enough to play these games as well, and she’s become well-practiced in getting under the skin of the other neonates. But when an archon comes calling the games are put aside. Schedules are cleared. And neonates show up to the appointed place early, so as to not make any punctual archons wait. She took the trouble of securing a pair of seats for the two of them in a more secluded area of the club so that they need not dither before getting down to… business.

And what business it is that he has with her she does not know.

Jade has kept her nose clean, has kept herself out of trouble. In the scant hours she’d had before she was asked to meet him she had done what little research on the Kindred as she could, which mostly involved speaking to Lebeaux. The archon had made a splash at his arrival to Elysium prior, and Lebeaux had confirmed with the very curious neonate that North is, indeed, the Tremere surgeon he’d once mentioned to her. She’d thought to secure an audience with him through Lebeaux himself, but her phone had rung to summon her to this and now… here she is.

“Watch yourself, kid,” the grizzled detective had told her, “he’s friendly with your sire.” Lebeaux hadn’t had to explain which sire it is that he spoke of.

Surely if her sire had a problem with her it wouldn’t result in sending some faceless lick to deal with her. Surely their dispute could be settled more cordially, or at least more personally. She tries to think of anything she has done to offend her sire recently, of any mistakes she has made in her domain or with the Masquerade, and comes up blank.

She wouldn’t be facing the executioner’s block if it were something personal, would she? Has her sire tired of her? Has she been an embarrassment? Or—and her dead heart does that useless skipping thing it does sometimes—had her sire sent someone else to put her down for some hypothetically inflicted wrong, because that was too painful a thing to do personally?

The fact that she can clearly imagine her final death at her sire’s hands, that she would come if called even knowing what awaited her…

Surely she is mistaken. She has done nothing wrong. And if she were being punished for some transgression she doubts the archon would invite her to a neutral meeting ground.

So Jade had dressed in clothing she thought would not offend, skipping her flouncy skirts and long gowns in favor of something more utilitarian: leather leggings, black cami, and charcoal quasi-pinstriped blazer that can swiftly be removed to transition from work to play. The look is tied together by a leather belt and stiletto booties. A ring adorns her finger, the same opal sun ring she wears most every night.


Mel, Savoy, Lebeaux—they had all warned her to be careful of what she says in this place. The Nosferatu’s ears are everywhere. So Jade is still as she waits for North to arrive, keeping her fidgeting to a minimum. All the better to dwell.

Only her thoughts betray her inner turmoil.

GM: Of course, they’d also said the sewer rats have ears everywhere else, too. Almost everywhere else.

At least here you know they’re listening.

And the Carnival Club is probably the most neutral ground there is in the city. It’s been Elysium for decades. The parish’s regent is deliberately politically neutral and also the club’s owner. Anyone and anything is welcome here, except for trouble. That stays outside.

It’s the oldest of Sundown’s clubs, and the sole one in Faubourg Marigny to be declared Elysium. Jon remembers it from the ‘20s as a jazz club and speakeasy that opened with enough splash and fanfare to make many people think the then-mysterious owner, who’d popped seemingly out of nowhere and without a sire to name, was a Toreador.

To Jade, though, it’s always been what it is: one of Marigny’s premier nightlife spots.

The line isn’t as long on a Sunday night as on a Friday or Saturday, but lines don’t matter to Kindred patrons. It’s been a subject of some speculation how Sundown does it, when the bouncers are seemingly kine: perhaps some unseen ghoul watches from the shadows, perhaps monitored cameras crap out at giveaway times, or perhaps the sewer rats just know every vampire’s face in the city. Whatever the answer, there has yet to be a Kindred patron who was made to wait in line, face a cover charge, asked for an ID, or who even had their hands stamped. They’re simply ushered directly inside, past the typical throngs of jealous and impatient kine.

Inside, the Carnival Club has all the amenities of a modern nightclub with retro-themed decor. It’s a dark, velvety space filled with a museum’s worth of curios, from antique water spigots presented in a kind of shrine above the bar to a series of stunning and tasteful seminude photographs (a gorgeous woman cloaked in giant leaves) that greet visitors at the door. It has a sort of timeless feel, blending old with new as confidently as the bartenders mixing up drink orders.

The music beats hard on Jon’s and Jade’s bodies. As they push through the sweaty, twitchy throng on the dance floor, it feels like sound, not blood, gives animation to their corpses. The insistent violent rhythm makes them (or at least Jade) more aware of their insides than ever since their Embraces. They’re just two more bodies, and in the darkness nobody notices if they breathe or not.

The Tremere may see it all as a distraction, but the Toreador may never want to come down. It’s a perfect-feeling moment, unsullied by hunger, a perfect chemical high. This is what eternal life means. Freedom to dance, to party every night, all night, forever, never getting old.

Jade is swiftly greeted by Sundown’s herald, who’s variously referred to as Kaia or KKV (an abbreviation of her full name Kaia Kimberly Võ). She’s a beautiful and slim-figured Vietnamese-American ghoul with smooth pale skin, breast-length rich black hair, and smiling dark eyes. Tonight she’s dressed in a leather jacket over an off-shoulder babydoll top, black leggings, and tall silver heels. The sewer rats’ ghouls are supposed to inherit some share of their domitors’ ugliness, but KKV either hasn’t or simply hides it well.


The crowd’s din seems to muffle in the ghoul’s presence, who is friendly but unobtrusive. Jade can make her way to any one of several Kindred-reserved quiet corner spots (the club’s acoustics are well-designed), the upstairs VIP lounge (where the atmosphere is more relaxed), or simply enjoy herself on the dance floor. Back rooms are also available for a variety of purposes.

“And if there’s anything Sundown can do to make your stay more enjoyable, ma’am, just ask. Having a bad time isn’t allowed at his clubs!” Kaia smiles.

Celia: This is the kind of place that Jade couldn’t not enjoy, even if she tries. Perhaps as a breather she might have been turned off by the loud music and large press of bodies, but here and now she is a wolf among the sheep. And what titillating sheep they are, she can’t help but notice on her way across the floor. If only they were within the French Quarter, Jade might find a dance partner or two and swap more than simply fumbling hands.

She opts for the corner spot on the first floor. North can request they move if he prefer a less busy ambiance, but Jade is all too happy to watch the writhing figures on the floor. Perhaps when this is over she’ll join them. She always enjoys adoring kine. And what part of Jade shouldn’t be adored? She’s a perfect specimen.

She thanks Kaia with a smile of her own and a comment about meeting someone; she asks if the girl can show him over when he arrives to save him the trouble of the search.

GM: “Sure thing, ma’am. And can I say you look Flawless as ever tonight,” the ghoul declares with another smile.

Celia: The rats sure know how to treat a guest. Jade all but preens under the praise. She favors the ghoul with a word of thanks and a wink, then sits back to wait for her companion.

Jon: She sees the archon’s arrival before she see’s him, the bow-wave created by his movement through the crowds of dancing kine. It he’s that his head peaks out among the crowd. The archon moves unhurriedly but purposefully through them, the kine seeming to break against him and part like the red sea behind the predatory confidence of a creature that was taking lives before their great-grandparents were born.

He’s wrapped in stark colors—a dark suit offset with a startlingly bright white blazer. It might be a little overdressed for the club, but would fit right in at the Primo Elysium. There’s a statement in that white blazer among Kindred: it says that he doesn’t need to hide his mistakes because he doesn’t make them.

The suit strains against the raw power hidden beneath it, against the slabs of muscle across his shoulders and chest, the tensioned cords welded to the bone of his arms.

The second lick in is almost swallowed in his shadow, everything he is not. Petite, shrouded in black, her dark hair held back in a complex braid and her dark eyes searching the room, seemingly taking in everything.

He pauses on his approach to her—his unerring approach to her, almost from the moment he came through the door—to lean into his shadowing lick’s ear, and she nods once before slipping away as he resumes his approach, eyes the color of open skies set on Kalani’s.


GM: Jon is greeted when he arrives by Sundown. Faubourg Marigny’s regent appears as a racially indistinct gentleman of considerable good looks—not so attractive as to be threatening, but more than handsome enough to put everyone around him at ease. He’s dressed in a dark blazer and slacks, nice leather shoes, and a white dress shirt.


Like any good host, the Nosferatu doesn’t linger overlong. He simply says hello, invites the Tremere to help himself to a vessel, and to avail himself of any of the club’s accommodations for his meeting.

“I’ll look forward to this one’s release,” he smiles at Kyrstin. “Your sire’s and great-grandsire’s names are still talked about a lot, here. It’s a pleasure to see any worthy bloodline grow.”

“Thank you, regent,” Kyrstin offers with a bow of her head.

“Give a holler if your party needs anything, archon. Enjoy your stay.”

With those last words, the sewer rat melts back into the dancing throngs.

Jon: Jonathan is gracious with the Nosferatu host, offering, “The last time I was in New Orleans there wasn’t much opportunity to sample the finer things that others have built since I was last here. I was told I’d be remiss if I passed on the opportunity when it was available.”

He thanks him for his generous offer and assures Sundown he’ll call if they need anything, before continuing on to his meeting.

Celia: Jade rises to her feet as the Kindred struts towards her following his brief interlude with the club’s proprietor, gaze flowing down his body in a way that is nothing short of assessing. Dark eyes framed by darker hair finally return to his face, and she tucks a stray curl behind her ear in a move that turns her comely face younger yet.

“Good evening, Archon North. It is a pleasure to be asked to join you.”

Jon: He studies her for the briefest if moment before replying, “Your manners are superior to your sire’s, Ms. Kalani. I dare say cut more from the cloth of your grandsire.”

Celia: She wonders idly what Veronica has done to offend the archon, and how much of this meeting will be an uphill battle fighting against the preconceived notions he must have of her. She offers him a smile all the same.

“Thank you, sir. I endeavor to be on good terms with my grandsire despite the gap between the pair. I am sure he will pleased to hear that his courtesies have been well replicated in me.”

She extends an upturned hand toward the seat across from her, a silent invitation to join her.

Jon: The archon slides into the chair with the grace of a jungle cat, taking care in the deliberateness of his motions, as though concerned he may break something with a careless touch.

A moment later, unbidden, a pale and dark-haired woman in black gloves appears to deliver a pair of drinks for them. North’s is a mint julep, recognizable by both the crushed mint and spring of the same. She places a martini in front of Kalani and elegantly slides away at the archon’s nod.

“It’s unfortunate when sires and childer are estranged, but there’s no reason that should affect grandsire’s and their grandchilder,” he agrees.

“One could do worse than to model off of your grandsire’s successes—in many cities he’d be prince. But then, your sire has had their own successes.”

“The future is open to you, Ms. Kalani. I would not dictate what you would become, only express that it would be a poor reflection on both for a scion of their bloodline not to become something.”

He takes a casual sip of his drink.

Celia: A drink. Of course. She should have supposed that some frothy concoction would be pushed on her in an establishment like this. Is it rude to refuse a drink from an archon? She makes no move to touch it, though she thanks the girl who dropped it off with a dip of her chin.

Their, though. The word gives her pause, so too do the following lines. Has he been sent her to tell her she’s a disappointment?

She chooses her response with care.

“I would do them both proud, of course, and my great-grandsire as well. Roses do not bloom hurriedly; like any masterpiece, we take time to blossom. But, ah, I suppose you did not seek me this evening to hear me wax poetic about cultivation.”

Jon: Do the woman’s eyes linger just a moment too long on the archon as she departs? Does it matter?

The hint of a smile on his face is there at Kalani’s reference to roses, and gone just as quickly as she tries to move on from the topic. “A rose for the Rose Clan? I’ve often thought Shakespeare’s line inspired by one of you.”

“A flick of the nose, a bit of nuanced one, in blue blood-dominated London.”

Those blue eyes continue to rest on her. Seeing through her. Perhaps into her.

Celia: “All of the great wordsmiths and artists were blooded or bedded by our clan, to hear my grandsire speak of it. How would they have ever turned aside from such a muse?” Jade leans forward in her seat, tapping a finger against the stem of her martini glass. She is not afraid of him. Let him look. Let him stare. Jade Kalani is a stunning upwardly mobile young lick. The smile that she gives him—dazzling, truly—is fraught with nothing.

“What’s in a name,” she agrees.

She reaches, finally, for the drink. Brings it to her lips to take a sip. Jade had died before she ever was of legal age; she only has distorted memories of cheap whiskey and too-sweet rum to compare this to.

As if there is comparison.

As if this dry martini does anything but taste of ash and garbage sludge and worse, besides.

Still, she swallows it.

Jon: The Tremere says nothing of her drinking the foul mixture.

“How indeed? I would not gainsay him,” he agrees.

“Are you your own artist, Ms. Kalani?” he asks, leaning forward as he takes another sip of his drink.

Celia: “True art touches souls, Archon North,” Jade replies as she sets down her drink. There is no flash of disgust, nothing to give her away. “I would not presume to make such a claim. As to being my own artist—I suppose I can admit that I have been compared to the gods of old, Aphrodite and her like, and I am confident enough to admit it has to do more with my deft skill with a brush than something bequeathed to me by birth. Any canvas, given enough care, can shine.”

Jon: “And what are your brushes of choice, Ms. Kalani? Your canvas of choice is clear enough.”

Celia: “Do you wish for technical specifications, sir? Artis Elite, Pat McGrath, Fenty, M.A.C.?” Jade smiles at the archon. “Armani Luminous Silk, NARS, Anastasia Beverly Hills?” She lists brushes then brands, never once giving in to telling him what he truly asks.

Jon: “I’d hoped you were familiar with something with more of an edge,” he answers, his voice deep, crisp, and precise.

Celia: “A scalpel, you mean. Of course, archon; why didn’t you say? I am adept at lifting faces that need an extra touch, and sculpting bodies as if they were naught but clay. If your inquiry is whether I have been beneath the knife myself… well, sir, we roses do not kiss and tell.”

Jon: “It takes particular set of skills to make such things stick in a troublesome canvas like the Damned,” he answers.

Celia: “It does,” Jade agrees. She lets the words linger between them.

Then, “Do you have a particularly troublesome canvas, sir?”

Jon: “I might,” he answers. “More so than most, at least. Your grandsire believed you might have value in the matter.”

Celia: “I will admit to some skill in the area, archon, though if you were to be more specific I would be able to provide more insight.”

Jon: Some skill.

And where would a nice Camarilla lick learn that skill.

“Major bodywide reconstructive surgery on an elder ghoul, to include changes to the entire bone structure and numerous organs to support their new form,” he answers without preamble.

Celia: “And their new form… would be larger? Smaller?” She knows of Pearl’s disdain for her ghoul’s form, though she looks for North to confirm her thoughts.

Jon: “Smaller,” the surgeon confirms. “It goes without saying the margin for error in such a matter is zero.”

Celia: “I do not make mistakes, Archon North.”

“There’s… much to be discussed, if you’re looking to reduce. What age?”

Jon: “I think you can very well guess, Ms. Kalani,” Jonathan answers.

Celia: Jade’s smile is her only answer.

GM: Celia heard the story from Veronica. Cloe used to be six and the most perfectly angelic little cherub you could have laid eyes on.

Veronica thought it was hilarious how Pearl thought she was ‘ruined.’ Served the dusty old relic that was her grandsire right.

Celia: “You wish to return her to her age prior to my grandsire’s benevolence,” Jade says finally.

“That’s difficult work,” she continues, without waiting for his response.

“To take something aged as it is and return it to a prior state. It’s… well. You cut everything almost in half. Bones, organs… everything.” She watches his face as she speaks. She’s right, but she’d like him to confirm it.

Jon: A slight nod.

Celia: Jade considers. Her brain whirls. It’s easy to see in her eyes: what it means for her.

“I can assist,” she says at last.

Jon: She can see herself reflected in his unwavering eyes.

“Can you?” His tone doesn’t change, but he sets a hand on the table. Large, scarred, weathered.

Celia: Jade’s eyes are drawn toward the hand he offers. Her brows lift. He doesn’t need her to fix such a thing. A test? She hesitates only a moment before reaching toward him.

“Shall I show you, archon?”

“I have a place with my tools nearby, should you need demonstration.” There, too, more privacy.

Jon: An unfamiliar face greets the Toreador when he looks back up from the hand, but the voice is the same.


“If you would be a part of this, yes. Certainty is required.”

“One of mine will present you with a canvas. This is your reference. Precision is required.”

Celia: Jade’s eyes drink in the face across from her for a long moment, studying its details.

“Understood, sir. And you will understand that your… patronage would do much for someone as young as I, were we to collaborate effectively.”

Jon: This time she can see it happen, more slowly, as though demonstratively. The jawline shifts, the cheeks fall, the brow thins.

In a moment the archon sits across from her once more.

Celia: Shadow dancing, she thinks, but is not quite sure.

Jon: “If your skills are sufficient, there will be glory enough to go around if we are successful,” he agrees.

GM: Every surgeon needs an assistive nurse. It’s not like there’s anyone else he can ask.

Celia: “Then I shall be flawless,” she promises.

Jon: “I hope so. If we fail, I don’t expect New Orleans to be very welcoming thereafter.”

An understatement.

“This is a project for the entire city, the restoration of a priceless piece of its history.”

Celia: “You have my word, Archon North. I will not let you down.”

Jon: His gaze lingers.

Finally, “You are wise to keep your abilities quiet. Many of the fiends do not care for the sharing of their skills outside of their bloodline.”

Celia: Jade is very, very quiet for a moment. She is still, her eyes on him.

“Very few know of what goes on behind closed doors.”

It’s not a confirmation, though he can see it in her eyes. She does not try to hide it from him at this point. Apparently, he knows.

“Should you like to discuss further, archon, you know where to find me.” A code that’s not a code: she’s happy to discuss when the ears are not turned their way.

Jon: There’s a low chuckle this time. “Two hundred years walking the earth, Ms. Kalani. One thing I’ve learned with some certainty: don’t assume the Hidden Clan doesn’t already know any secret you’ve ever uttered aloud.”

He waives off further comments on the matter, “And what do you want, Ms. Kalani? Other than…. patronage.”

Celia: Her eyes close for a brief moment, only slightly longer than a blink. She should have known. Naive, to think that there are any secrets in this society. At least this is one of her lesser ones. And if it’s assumed she learned it from an archon… no one will have any cause to doubt the rest of her ruse.

Once her eyes open again she turns them to look upon his face. He’d give her status from the sheer fact of being seen with her, from their success on this project, but that… that is nothing compared to what she really wants.

GM: After all, there’s been one job that’s yet remained beyond her abilities.

Celia: “Show me,” she says bluntly, “I would learn from you. Assistant, protégé, tool; whatever you wish to call it.”

Jon: The Tremere pauses in contemplation before he finally speaks.

“I do not make idle promises, Ms. Kalani, so I will promise this: if you prove talented, if you prove meticulous, if you prove dedicated to the craft—if and only if these things are true, I have room for a protégé.”

Celia: It’s hardly the promise of power that she wants.

And yet… if things go well, how high will her esteem rise in the eyes of her clan? How much will her grandsire value her then, she wonders, and her great-grandsire besides? To add knowledge atop the bump in status…

“My work is nothing short of exemplary, archon. I daresay you will have no room for complaint.” A true smile stretches across her face for the first time since this meeting began. “I look forward to our lessons.”

Jon: There is no smile on the dead face before her, but his voice is not unkind when he speaks after a moment. “I have hope for you, Ms. Kalani. Prove me right.”

Celia: Jade inclines her head toward the archon.

“Thank you, sir. I shall.” A moment passes, her eyes flitting toward the dance floor before returning to his face. “It means much to me that you would seek me out for such a venture. Was there other business you had with me, or shall I leave you to your evening?”

Jon: The surgeon follows her eyes. There’s a hint of amusement in his own. “Is there other business between us, Ms. Kalani?”

Celia: “I wouldn’t presume to know the business of what brings an archon to the city, who knows enough about my station to reach out to me in so neutral a place.” There’s amusement in her eyes and voice. “Did you have a message for my master, perhaps?”

Jon: “You have a master, Ms. Kalani?” More amusement. “Tell me, who do you serve?”

Celia: She exhales briefly through her nose. It might be a laugh.

“Don’t we all serve some higher power? The lord who presides over the Quarter, of course.”

Jon: “Some, I’m told, call him ‘Lord Savoy,’ away from the prince’s Elysia,” he observes.

Celia: “Is that a question? We do indeed. I believe even the prince sees to it that he’s due his proper respect within Elysium, despite all their differences.”

Jon: “He does indeed, though ‘lord’ is a rather unique honorific, at least in this city. I wonder, did he choose it, and if so, why?”

Celia: Jade does laugh at that, though it contains no trace of irony or mockery. “He’s from France,” she says with a wave of her hand, “do they ever explain why they do anything?”

She leans in.

“If you’ve no missive I can pass along to the lord, then perhaps you’ll favor me with a dance?”

Jon: Jonathan’s mirth seems to dim. “That would be a favor.” He looks out into the crowd of kine.

Celia: “I’m young,” Jade reminds him, “I still partake in the sort of frivolity those of your age and status might deem unseemly.” She lifts her shoulders in a half-shrug, as if it doesn’t bother her if he turns her down.

The look she gives him, though, asks that he not.

Jon: He seems to reappraise her, but if he reaches a conclusion it is not apparent on his face. “There is a fine line between presumptuousness and meekness. Stray too far into one and your wings may melt. Stray too far into the other and you’ll never leave the ground.”

He rises, extending one hand to her.

“As in kine, as in kind, one is unlikely to receive what they do not seek.”

Celia: Jade shrugs out of her jacket before she takes the offered hand. It leaves her arms and shoulders bare, and the black top she has on beneath it is more club-like than the stiff formal wear she donned for their meeting. Her smile is all-too satisfied, as if she cares not one whit what he has decided about her. She does not follow; she leads him to the dance floor, parting the kine around her as if they were some sort of sea that crests upon the sand. They give where she flows, and where she flows he follows, if only for the hands that they have clasped together.

The music is not the sort of ballroom waltz or refined band that he might be used to, and yet Jade seems at home on the floor. It washes over her, lets her body move in a sensuous, promising way, though always her hand, hip, or chest remains flush against his, and she pays no attention to the horde of kine that look at the pair of them cutting their way to the floor.

She has some training in dance, it would seem, if her spry dips and pivots and shimmies are anything to judge by; that or she has taken to the learnings of her clan with gusto. What is dance if not art, after all, and what is art if not a display of skill. In this, as in most things, she is skilled.

There’s a moment when the music brings them together. A moment when her knee bends, hip lifts, and her body curls against his on the floor. They are closer together than they have any right to be. Jade doesn’t seem bothered by it. She pays no mind to the Beast who detests such physical displays. No, she comes even closer, her hands looped around the archon’s neck. She leans in. Up.

Her lips find purchase on his ear. A gentle tug with her mouth and the flats of her teeth; more forward than she has any right to be with someone she hardly knows.

And yet…

And yet there must be reason.

Jon: The Tremere moves more easily than she might have expected. There’s raw power there, slabs of muscle across his shoulders and taunt steel cords up and down his arms. He carries himself like a freight train. Like he couldn’t care less about anything in his way.

But there’s an almost unnatural fluidity behind it. No, not almost. Nothing that large should move that smoothly.

No matter the source, he moves like a jungle cat, powerful, fearless, and with an almost lazy grace.

There’s some skill there too—he’s no professional dancer—but there’s more than the average club-goer behind his motions.

And the Beast. The Beast all but swims under his skin, a shark in a sea of minnows, an overbearing presence.

She swims among sharks, but it’s rare that a terror from the deeps swims this close to the surface.

Her nip finds no purchase, sliding across flesh as hard as kevlar.

Celia: And yet she does not shy away from him. This slip of a girl—a plastic surgeon, if Poincaré is to be believed—she seems at home as close to him as she is. Perhaps she’s waiting for some display of actual power, not the play of muscles beneath skin and cloth or the bandied words exchanged in a booth. Her eyes meet his; her smile is nothing short of appreciative. Form, grace, poise; he lacks for nothing, and she is a shadow to the moves he makes across the floor.

She does not bite to claim or wound; no, her teeth seek a different purchase, and she nibbles again at his ear. A message, if only he would listen.

Jon: The surgeon doesn’t react to her nips, and while his hands are on her, hard, powerful, they don’t explore so much as handle.

If she’s expecting him to show off, she’s disappointed. She’s equally so if she expects him to react to her advances.

After several of her nips he finally leans in close, his words intended for her alone.

“You are quite lovely, my dear, and I’m not adverse to mixing business and pleasure. But you’ll have to show me that what’s inside your mind is as intriguing as your flesh.”

He slides away as the music changes, his finger tips trailing across her palm.

Celia: A thrill runs through her at the insinuation. She hadn’t been interested until he’d said it, but now that he has… her eyes sweep his form once more, wondering at the power he hides behind that crisp suit jacket.

She’s not so easy to get rid of as all of that, though. Inside her mind, is it? That’s what she wanted anyway; it only took him long enough to figure it out, though perhaps if she’d tapped his temple rather than his ear it would have sped things along. Not that she didn’t enjoy the dancing, or his hands on her, or their closeness. Not at all.

Her fingers curl around the hand he sweeps along her palm. She doesn’t presume to tug him to a stop, but she does flit after him as he begins to slip away, and she rises high enough to whisper into his ear, “Why don’t you look and see.”

Jon: Dark, cool, cold. Meticulously ordered. The mind whose thoughts slides across hers feels so much like a house of glass and steel. His mental touch is much like his physical one—hard and firm without rising to rough.

:: Rarely without permission. ::

Celia: Ice. Like someone has caught her mind in a steel trap, and if she moves the wrong way or thinks the wrong thing it will snap shut around her and snuff the light and (un)life from her eyes. Tightness coils in her chest.

Jade is cognizant of the gazes upon them, the rats who chitter-chatter, even as the iron jaws clamp down around her brain. She will not be the one to give up the ruse. Her steps do not miss a beat of the music, even as her focus slides inward to the presence within her mind.

:: My thanks for your restraint then, archon. I have a message for you alone. ::

Her hand stays in his, steadfast, leading him or letting him lead her through the dance to keep up appearances.

Jon: He settles into a comfortable lead with her, his eyes locked on hers.

:: You have my undivided attention, Miss Kalani. ::

Celia: That’s how she likes it.

:: The lord of whom we spoke earlier wishes you to know that there are Salubri within the city. ::

Jon: There’s a moment of pause.

:: That’s a very interesting statement, Miss Kalani, and a particularly interesting one for him to pass through such a young lick as yourself. ::

Celia: She smiles for him and lets him draw his own conclusions.

:: He thought you might find it interesting. Shall I tell you the rest? ::

Jon: Amusement. Interest.

:: Please continue, Miss Kalani. ::

Celia: :: He has expressed desire to assist the Pyramid in cleansing the taint. ::

A brief pause. Her eyes, though locked onto his, take in the rest of his face as well, the minute expressions that most people don’t even realize they make, the reflexive action of muscle beneath the skin. Whatever she sees there causes her to continue rather than wait for him to prompt her.

:: He has further intelligence and physical evidence should you be interested. ::

Jon: There’s something in his eyes. Not doubt, but perhaps… consideration? Contemplation? She can almost see the gears turning with her every word, feel see the razor’s edge of the sharp focus he’s brought to bear upon every fiber of her being. It abates only momentarily with her words, replaced by… familiarity. A move back to the normal.

The warlock’s laugh is deep and rich in her mind.

:: No doubt the lord of the French Quarter lays awake at night concerning himself with the good of the Pyramid. ::

It’s bait, on a hook. The kind of bait no Tremere can refuse. Not even an archon. He wonders, briefly, how long Savoy might have sat upon such a secret, waiting for the proper moment. The proper target, perhaps? He stops that line of thought before he lets the self-aggrandizement go too far.

Celia: North is not the only one who manages to laugh at the thought. The amusement from the neonate with whom he dances echoes down the line that links their minds together; it’s almost possible to imagine her eyes flashing as she lifts a hand to cover her mouth to stifle the laughter, though of course there are no auditory sounds. Outside of their connection she does not miss a step.

:: I would not pretend to know the inner workings of his mind. :: Her agreement comes easily enough, though not in so many words.

:: He has implied that he will be happy to show you what evidence he has if you are to visit. As you no doubt realize, it is a risk to carry such things upon my person. ::

Jon: And then there is this thing before him… Veronica’s childe.

He knows the harpy better than some. Knows the viciousness of her, how far the fruit fell from the tree in that one. All the cunning of her sire but none of the manners, the refinement. That one was all venom and slyness. He’d thought her a better serpent than rose—but who was he to criticize one’s choice in childer?

What then, of Veronica’s own childer? What traits made her appealing to her sire? What exactly does he have in his arms right now?

Something sharp enough it seemed to be worthy of carrying such a secret. Considered discerning enough to bait that trap for him…

:: You can tell your master that he need not have so tempted me—I could not decline the pleasure of his company—but I would be very interested in reviewing what he might have to offer on the subject when I call. ::

How wholly must she be his creature, to be trusted with something like that? Interesting that she had it on such short notice of this meeting—at her grandsire’s suggestion. That points all kinds of interesting and disturbing directions in his minds.

Ah, New Orleans. Where the game is played unlike anywhere else in the Americas.

Celia: Is he tempted? Those are words of flattery if she’s ever heard any, though she can’t help but think it is the soul-thieves who have him all a flutter. Still, Jade offers him a smile cut with promises.

:: I shall pass that along. Thank you for the dance; you’ve been lovely company. My apologies for all but mauling you. ::

She does not allude to roles played or masks worn. He seems a sharp enough sort to figure it out on his own.

Jon: The hint of a smile.

:: Lupines maul. Having been on the receiving end of both, there’s no comparison. ::

The surgeon disengages himself from the Toreador with a smile. “This was… fun. Perhaps we’ll do it again.”

Celia: He’d been mauled by a Loup-Garoux and lived to tell the tale? Dark eyes sweep his form once more, appraising the slabs of muscle contained beneath his shirt, the chiseled planes of his body. They’re all dangerous in their own ways, but this one… Hard and cold like steel, with all the refinement that comes with age, and a sharp mind—neatly packaged, all. Intimidating, certainly some might see it that way, but she has another word in mind. Even the iron trap around her mind, the sharp jaws ready to rip into her head, had been delicate, velvet-fitted scalpels. Precise. A surgeon, indeed.

Flame, moth.

“I would like that.”

Jade is not ignorant of their respective statuses. She offers him the courtesy of leaving first, lingering alone on the floor to watch the Tremere slip away.

Jon: The archon makes no great affair of his withdrawal, moving through the crowd further into the club, rather than from it.

“Until then, Miss Kalani.”

---

Previous, by Narrative: Story Eleven, Caroline XIII
Next, by Narrative: Story Eleven, Caroline XIV

Previous, by Celia: Story Eleven, Celia VIII
Next, by Celia: Story Eleven, Celia X, Estrellado I

Previous, by Jon: Story Eleven, Jon VIII
Next, by Jon: Story Eleven, Jon Epilogue

“Nothing goes as planned. Even when you win.”
Roger Ferris

---

Sunday night, 6 March 2016, AM

Caroline: There’s much to be done.

First, she wants Roger to dispose of the bodies of the hunters in a neat way, and will defer to him on it. If it causes a headache for Savoy, or at least forces him to get involved in some way, all the better. She wants the lord of the French Quarter’s fingerprints on this. Roger knows more about their operational patterns. No doubt this isn’t their first casualty.

The two that alive are turned over to her ghouls—unless he has some specific plan in place to make use of them. Their particular wounds are difficult to explain, and that many dead cops is not something anyone can readily wash away. Her initial thought is to brainwash the two living with the memory of having murdered their fellows—the group as a whole having served a small corrupt group within the NOPD whose greed eventually led them to violence against each other. It’s sure to be a story, but one the NOPD will want buried as much as anyone. Perhaps they were looting the evidence locker, or stealing from criminals they busted?

In either case, before they’re turned over towards that purpose, she needs information on, if not their other hunters, at least on their past operations. What else have they gotten up to? What else do they know? Who else have they destroyed? What vampires have compromised agents or havens? If necessary she can and will rewrite their memories before she departs to make Ferris their reporting senior, or to give them instructions from their leaders to read him in. In any case, their memories of her at the site of Malveaux’s murder are wiped.

She needs any and all documentation her mother kept her organization or ties, and on this operation specifically. She doesn’t expect much. If there is any recording of the attack on Malveaux she wants it. In particular, footage showing that she had no part in the attack is of value—she wasn’t even there when he went into the house—nor were any of her ghouls.

She is breaking for an important meeting of her own. Her first stop is her mother’s home. Her new mother. That Gettis is alive is information she’s as eager to share, as is news of her destruction of her distant ancestor. That news raises many questions, foremost among them about the providence of Cécilia’s bodyguard (and Gettis’ killer).

GM: Ferris brings up several matters pertaining to the French Quarter lord.

Savoy and Gettis don’t know Claire’s dead at this point, and have no reason to believe so. Savoy wasn’t involved in the hit’s tactical planning at all, but Gettis was, and knew Claire wasn’t taking to the field.

If Caroline desires, Ferris can resume his time-honored role as a double agent claiming to work for someone else. They won’t be able to maintain the ruse forever, but in the short term, they could.

Ferris thinks blaming the dead cops on the living cops is a good story as it pertains to the Masquerade. He doesn’t think it will fool Gettis, who knows his men and well knows such Kindred tricks. He also points out that too visible an effort to preserve the Masquerade will tip off Gettis (and through him, Savoy) that another Kindred was involved in this affair.

At this point, Gettis likely doesn’t believe Caroline was. Claire never shared her daughter’s nature with Gettis, though it’s possible Savoy did. Claire would not have told Gettis or Savoy about Caroline’s involvement in the Malveaux hit.

Ferris can interrogate the hunters for what they know. He says Gettis has certainly prepared for the possibility of his men falling into Kindred hands, and to treat all intelligence gained as suspect until independently verified. He doesn’t think it’s necessary for Caroline to make him their reporting senior—or rather, he thinks it’d be easier to interrogate them through conventional means.

As far as any documentation held by Claire, he’d guess that if there’s any, it’s in her hotel room—along with the devices where she remotely watched the hit.

“She also had another hideout in the city. I don’t know where. Could be more there.”

He does add that if he were Savoy, he’d have eyes on that hotel room. There could be risks to going back—it’s his guess how long any countermeasures placed by Claire may now last. “Risks and rewards.”

Caroline: “Plan for tomorrow,” Caroline responds, regarding her mother’s hotel room. “We can break off if needed, but if he gets in first it could be… very damaging.”

GM: “Could be a lot easier if you got back there the same way you got out,” Ferris observes. “You were in that room. Then you weren’t.”

Caroline: Caroline’s blue eyes betray nothing. “All things have a cost.”

GM: Ferris doesn’t press it, and next brings up an elephant in the room.

Explaining Claire’s death.

There are multiple reasons the sheriff didn’t attempt to eliminate her—at least, immediately—but one of the gravest was the threat to the Masquerade. She’s too public. Too important. Too connected. They have a brief window before the Malveaux family realizes Caroline’s mother is missing—and then neither of them will be able to stop the ensuing manhunt. Ferris supposes he’ll be in charge at first, but when he doesn’t produce a living Claire, he can think of ten thousand different ways this could fall out of his hands and onto the national news.

They picked a fight with the Masquerade even the sheriff didn’t want.

Caroline: Caroline is well aware of the implications of her mother’s disappearance. She doesn’t have an immediate answer, but will have one tonight. Producing a Claire will factor into it.

GM: Ferris says he’ll interrogate the hunters and hit Claire’s hotel room this morning, then asks what Caroline’s call is so far as any potential continued dealings with Gettis. They probably have until people realize Claire is missing for that too.

Caroline: Caroline doesn’t expect Gettis will buy Ferris’ coincidental survival when all of his men died, and frankly considers Ferris to be too important for the information he has about recent dealings.

GM: “Two surviving helps there,” the ex-CIA agent points out, but otherwise defers to Caroline’s decision.

Caroline: For the moment, or the night at least, she wants him to avoid the ancient ghoul, especially since she doesn’t know the extent of his abilities.

GM: “Considerable. I’ve seen him take apart younger Kindred. He’s not afraid to get his hands dirty.”

Caroline: “How young are we talking about?”

GM: “Last one we killed together was maybe half a century. Her name was Emily Thurmon.”

Caroline: So that’s what happened to Thurmon, Caroline considers.

“How old is he?”

GM: “Not sure. He’s been working with Savoy since the French Quarter lord came to power. Old enough he’ll be dust if he misses a dose.”

Caroline: “Among other things, I’ll need a list of Kindred you—or he—have killed in the last six months, along with those you have under observation.”

GM: “It’s a fair few. Sheriff used us to get rid of his enemies.”

Caroline: “Thurmon was on his hit list?” Caroline asks curiously.

GM: “She was,” Ferris states.

Caroline: Another weapon removed from the arsenal of my enemies, Caroline thinks.

GM: “We passed all his targets to Savoy. Arranged to foul a couple jobs, though Savoy let us kill a few of his people to maintain cover.”

Caroline: Caroline nods. “Can’t let your duties to your subordinates get in the way of expediency.”

GM: “Bishop’s dead. Gamble paid out for him. None of the people of his we killed were anywhere near as important.”

Caroline: “We’ll see. Anything else pressing?”

GM: “Plenty of potential usefulness or relevance. None immediately pressing.”

Caroline: Caroline’s blue eyes glitter at the prospect. “We’ll make time when the fires are out.”

---

Sunday night, 6 March 2016, AM

GM: Traffic is minimal between the CBD and Garden District at this hour in the middle of the night. No lights emit from the walled mansion where the Devillers family lives. No one answers when Caroline tries the house’s landline number or the gate’s intercom. She lacks a cellular number for Abélia, though has ones for Yvette, Yvonne, and the other Devillers children—or as Abélia might term them, her imminent sisters.

Caroline: She calls Cécilia, knowing she’s awaking her. Gettis is alive, which puts everything about one of her soon-to-be sister’s guardians into question.

GM: More than a few rings pass before a very tired-sounding Cécilia picks up. “Caroline… what is it…?”

Caroline can’t see Cécilia’s face. But she can hear how the news shocks her brother’s fiancée to instant wakefulness like a bucket of ice-cold water.

“What?”

Caroline: “I need to talk to Abélia,” Caroline answers, not bothering to repeat herself.

GM: “She’s… she’ll be at the LaLaurie House. Caroline, how do you… did something happen? Are any of the girls hurt?” Cécilia’s initially confused voice goes sharp as a tack.

Caroline: “No one’s hurt,” Caroline lies. Then, “We’ll talk about it tomorrow. Did she have Simmone with her?”

GM: There’s a pause. “Yes, Simmone’s with her everywhere. Did…”

“Cécilia? What is it…?” sounds a muffled but familiar male voice.

“It’s about the wedding.”

“At this hour…?”

“I know. I’m telling them off… go back to sleep.”

Caroline: Caroline waits for Cécilia to finish her conversation with her brother.

GM: Cécilia’s hushed voice sounds again shortly later. “Tell Maman about this. In person. Stop by the LaLaurie House. I’ll… I have a thousand questions, but I’ll hear it from her.”

Caroline: The Ventrue bites her lip. The French Quarter has eyes, but she supposes it can’t be avoided. “I’ll talk to you later,” she agrees.

She departs for the LaLaurie House.

GM: It’s a long-feeling drive back from the Garden District to the CBD, and from there to the Quarter. There’s equally little traffic even deeper into the dead of night. The city feels asleep as a light rain starts to patter down, but Caroline can only wonder how unsleeping the eyes watching the French Quarter are.

The house on 1140 Royal Street, the same street as Antoine Savoy’s own center of power, stands out little amidst its neighbors. Second-generation Creole architecture. Plain gray gray walls. Delicate iron work along the gallery’s (balcony’s) railings. Potted green plants there, like every gallery in the Quarter seems to have. Tall for when it was built at three stories.


Caroline: Caroline knows more than a little about the dark history of the house. Remembers her mother speaking of it. Remembers it at the center of a night of anguish what seems like lifetimes ago. Still, she’s never visited.

She knows the stories are far more than stories, knows the place is a pit of darkness, but finds herself unable to fear it. If this is where Abélia makes her home, she trusts whatever terrors it hides are not meant for her.

GM: Caroline almost expects there to be no visible means of egress to the house, but there’s a doorbell as modern-looking as any on the Giani Building. She buzzes it.


There’s no answer—save for the house’s iron gate silently swinging open, admitting Caroline into a deep, white portal that leads to the front door. Rain dully patters against iron as the gilded bars clang ominously shut behind her. The feeling is not unlike stepping inside an airlock—entering a source of contamination that must be quarantined from the outside world.


Two urns sit by the front door, along with a panel carving of Apollo in his chariot. Caroline pushes the second bell. The door swings slowly open on silent hinges.


The house’s interior is almost pitch dark. It doesn’t smell like Caroline thought it might, though. It’s clean and fresh. An iron-railed, winding stair (“said the spider to the fly”) ascends from the checkered marble floor to the house’s second story. Two further doors on the staircase’s left and right lead deeper into the home’s unseen recesses.

Shuffling steps sound at the edge of Caroline’s hearing. A tall, looming figure emerges from within the gloom.


The figure stares down at Caroline. It doesn’t say anything.

Maybe it can’t.

Caroline: Caroline eyes the figure. “You’re not who I thought you were.”

She finds she cares less about its identity now than before.

“I need to speak with her.”

GM: The figure does not answer Caroline’s first statement. It silently points towards one of the adjacent rooms.

Caroline: The blonde sets off.

GM: For all that Caroline has heard of the house’s cursed reputation, the indicated sitting room appears mundane enough. It’s tastefully decorated with delicate rococo furniture, persian rugs, classical artwork, and a ponderously ticking grandfather clock.

She can see her reflection in the glass. She looks like death. Her skin is lighter than her destroyed—no, annihilated—ancestor’s, but not by much. Color is equally absent from her cheeks, lips, and forehead, giving her face a curiously uniform, plastic-like appearance. Her firm jaw, inherited from her mother, has an almost cruel cast to it. Her pale blue eyes are glassy like marbles. She looks like a morbid doll. A mockingly rendered approximation of the person she used to be.

Her mother’s—first mother’s—words on her appearance weren’t so long ago.

You look… good, did you know that? Less pale, maybe.

Less of the monster tonight, I guess, than the daughter.

Caroline: She wants to look away, but she doesn’t.

This is who you’ve become, she tells herself.

GM: Staring into that reflected vision of herself brings to mind another individual’s long-dead words. Dry and croaked, like he was.

I wish there was a way to fight against it and win. But there isn’t. I’ve searched. I’ve seen. All I know how is the way to lose more slowly.


Caroline: It doesn’t matter. He’s gone, just like her mother is gone.

GM: The faceless man wordlessly points towards one of the Roman numerals on the clock. A half hour or so from now.

Caroline settles in on a couch and pulls out her phone to stay productively occupied. There’s always something to do. Something to lose herself in.

It beats losing herself. Or at least distracts from it.

She doesn’t hear the tall figure’s retreating footsteps. They’re simply gone. The Ventrue is left alone with her thoughts and her phone’s faintly glowing screen.

Minutes pass.

Then, to Caroline’s newly-sensitive ears. A faint pitter-patter, like the rain against the windows, but heavier and more sequential. She hears the faint thumping of the kine child’s smaller heart before Simmone steps into view. She’s clad in a nightgown and her eyes are rimmed with sleep.

“Caroline…? It’s really late…”

Caroline: Caroline sets down her phone, devoting her full attention to the girl. “I know, I’m sorry. Did I wake you coming in?”

GM: “No… no, mah bedroom’s…” She yawns and points vaguely at the ceiling. “Up there…”

Caroline: “Did you need something?” she asks.

GM: Simmone clambers onto the couch, curls against Caroline, and then abruptly pulls back.

“Bong sang, you’re cold…!”

She tilts her and looks at Caroline. Her still-sleepy expression is almost confused. “You look really sick…”

Caroline: The Ventrue forces a smile onto her lifeless face. “It’s been a very long night,” she says. “I just need to rest.” She forces still blood to bump through arteries, forcing an illusion of life back into her corpse.

It’s not even all a lie.

GM: Simmone looks at her face another moment. Caroline can feel it taking more out of her than last time, but the ten-year-old’s sleepy face eventually un-furrows.

“Yeah, Ah guess… why are you ’ere so late?”

Caroline: “I did something tonight, Simmone. Something… something terrible,” she admits.

GM: “You saved Yvonne’s life…” Simmone answers, as if in refutation.

Caroline: “I did that too,” Caroline agrees with a steadily fading smile, like the setting of the sun.

GM: “So… what’d you do?” she asks uncertainly.

Caroline: “I hurt someone. Someone I cared about. Someone that cared about me,” the Ventrue admits.

GM: “Was it an accident?”

Caroline: Caroline shakes her head. “No.” She shakes her head again. “No. We were fighting, about something. They thought they were doing what was right, but they weren’t. They wouldn’t stop.” She digs her fingernails into her palms. “They wouldn’t listen. She wouldn’t listen.”

GM: “Oh.” Simmone doesn’t look completely sure what to say. “When are they, Ah mean she, going to get better?”

Caroline: “I don’t think so, Simmone.” She hangs her head. “I think it was the right thing. If I hadn’t stopped them it would’ve been very bad, but that doesn’t make it any better.”

She looks at the young girl. “Something about being an adult, I guess, sometimes you have to make choices when there aren’t any good ones.”

GM: “Oh,” Simmone says again to Caroline’s answer. She looks worried, even sad for the Ventrue, though still unsure of what to say. “Well… Ah’m sure you did the raht thing. Or the most raht.”

Caroline: “I hope so.” She looks down at the girl. “I guess it shows even adults make mistakes, right?” She draws in a meaningless breath so she can sigh.

GM: “Maman doesn’t,” Simmone says. “Is that why you’re ’ere, so she can ’elp?”

Caroline: Caroline nods. “I don’t know where I’d be without her,” the Ventrue admits.

But she made some mistakes, it seems.

She looks into Simmone’s eyes. “Could you forgive me, if I’d hurt you?”

GM: “Sûre. You wouldn’t on purpose,” the ten-year-old answers.

Caroline: Caroline stares at Simmone for a long moment.

“I wouldn’t want to,” she agrees at last.

“Why are you out of bed?” she asks, changing the subject.

GM: “Ah woke up. Sometimes Ah do that. Ah ’ave… bad dreams.”

Caroline: “Did you have a bad dream tonight?”

GM: Simmone nods.

Caroline: “Do you remember it?”

GM: “It was… the shooting,” she says uncomfortably. “Yvonne and… the man ‘oo did it. ’E keeps ’urting us. ’E’s always been ’urting us…” Simmone scrunches her eyes. “Ah wish ’e’d… Ah wish ’e’d go away…”

Caroline: Caroline reaches out for the girl and wraps an arm around her. “I’ll never let him hurt any of you again,” she tells her.

GM: Simmone gladly curls up against Caroline, resting a head against her chest. “Maman doesn’t want me to sleep with ‘er anymore, unless the dreams are really bad. She says Ah’m getting old for it. Ah guess she’s right, but…”

Caroline: “She’s right to,” Caroline replies softly. “Eventually children have to leave the nest. Parents have to let them go out and experience things, make their own choices. If they don’t, they’ll end up trying to run their children’s lives forever.”

GM: Simmone thinks for a moment, then says, “But what if Ah want ’er to?”

Caroline: “What about what she wants?”

GM: “She’d, well…” Simmone trails off. “Ah dunno. Sometimes Ah want to be like Peter Pan and never grow up.”

Caroline: Caroline could grant that wish, in a twisted and perverted way.

GM: “You make being an adult sound… well, ‘ard. Ah don’t want things to be ’ard anymore. Ah just want them to go back… to ’ow they used to be.” Simmone looks a little frustrated, but more sad.

Caroline: “We can never go back,” Caroline answers. “We can’t change the past, or repeat it. There is only ever the future.”

“But it’s not all bad. It may seem like it sometimes, but being an adult has its advantages.”

GM: “But Ah don’t like the future,” Simmone says glumly. “We’ve ‘ad… all this ’appen, and Yvette and Yvonne are leaving next year… and Cécilia’s going to ‘ave a baby, and it’s neat and a little weird Ah’ll be an aunt, but what if she doesn’t ’ave time for me…”

Caroline: Caroline gives a sound that might be a strangled laugh, and turns away to wipe her eyes as a sad but genuine smile blossoms across her face. She carefully wipes away the blood before turning back. The fears of a child.

“Not all change is bad. Would you have never met me?” she asks.

GM: “No… no, Ah’m ’appy for that…”

Caroline: She brushes Simmone’s hair out of her face. “I’ve been wrong before… many… many times. But I think I’m right in this, if nothing else.”

“The past, for good and ill, we carry with us. We can’t change it, nor can we return to it. Not the most terrible things, nor the best times. The future though… in it is endless possibility for good and will—and our own ability to change it.”

“When you become an adult your decisions become yours. Sometimes you make the wrong ones—or even the right ones that are still bad. But you gain the ability to make the right ones. To guide yourself down a path you want.”

“You can meet new people, and create new memories. You can become the aunt you always wanted to be for your new niece, and maybe make your mother very happy one day by giving her grandchildren as well.”

GM: “Ah guess that’s true…” Simmone nods at Caroline’s words. “Ah mean, Maman was a kid like me once, and she started to make raht decisions, like you say, and started to make them for a lot of people.”

Caroline: “And someday you’ll do the same for your daughters,” Caroline agrees.

GM: “It’s really ’ard to picture me like that. Being an aunt is easier.” She smiles. “You’re raht though, they would be girls. Men don’t run in our genes.”

Caroline: “Spoken like your mother,” Caroline answers.

GM: “She’s raht, we don’t ‘ave any brothers or uncles or anything. It’s kinda nice.”

Caroline: “Men can be nice to have around,” Caroline replies. “I love my brothers… my father.”

GM: “Oh they can be, your brother’s nice. It’s just seems like it’d be…” Simmone seems to search for words. “Ah dunno. Different, Ah guess. Ah guess there’s just good and bad things to everything. Like ‘ow Ah don’t ‘ave to go to school anymore. It’s nice getting to sleep in every day, and see Cécilia and Adeline more, but Ah miss mah friends too.”

Caroline: “Would you like to go back to school?” Caroline asks.

GM: Simmone looks uncomfortable. “Ah’m… Ah’m scared, without Maman. Ah’ve missed ’alf the year. Ah was in theater. We were doing The Wizard of Oz, and Ah was going to be Dorothy.”

Caroline: “That would have been something to see,” Caroline replies. “I’m sorry we didn’t get to.”

GM: “Well… Ah guess it’s like you said, you wouldn’t ‘ave come if you ’adn’t saved Yvonne’s life…”

Caroline: Caroline nods, then checks the clock. “Are you ready to go back to bed?” she asks.

GM: Simmone follows her gaze. “Ah guess so. Though it’s not like Ah ’ave to be up early, right?”

Caroline: “Still a good habit,” Caroline answers. “Come on, I’ll tuck you in.”

GM: Simmone holds out her arms. “Carry me?”

Caroline: A smile worms its way across the dead face. “I suppose,” she answers. “Just don’t tell your mother.”

GM: “Oh, she still carries me everywhere,” Simmone smiles back. “She says Ah won’t be too old for that until Ah’m too ’eavy.”

Caroline: That won’t be that long, Caroline thinks. Especially on an eternal, immortal calendar. She can see why Abélia does it.

“All right. Let’s go.”

GM: “Ah still do ballet,” the ten-year-old adds as Caroline picks her up. “Maman ’as mah dance teacher come by to give me lessons. You could watch those.”

Caroline: “Maybe I will,” Caroline agrees, kicking off her heels even as she hoists the preteen.

GM: “She comes bah on Tuesdays and Thursday at 5:30, for an hour,” Simmone helpfully adds as they start moving.

Caroline: “I’ll make a note.” The timing would be awkward under ideal circumstances, but maybe if she’s late arriving one night…

GM: It’s a long and winding path up the three flights of stairs to Simmone’s bedroom. “Ah thought the view was better last time,” the ten-year-old comments humorously, though it’s certainly an easier walk barefoot.

Simmone’s bedroom looks utterly unlike what one might expect of the LaLaurie House. There’s pink bubble patterns on the walls, posters for several plays (including Phantom of the Opera and Into the Woods), and a zebra-patterned rug next to the pink-sheeted bed.

Caroline: Caroline settles the girl into her pink bed and adjusts the sheets and stuffed animals to tuck her in comfortably.

GM: Simmone has Caroline tuck a stuffed panda bear named Mrs. Melons (“because Ah spilled melon on ’er once”) under the sheets next to her, murmurs a “g’naht…” and yawns as she turns over against her pillow. Caroline turns off the lamp on her bedside table. The room is silent but for the steady pattering of rain against her window.

“You’re fitting in marvelously, Caroline,” purrs a low and familiar voice.

Caroline: Caroline turns, searching for the source but not expecting to find one.

“It’s all about finding one’s place,” she agrees quietly.

GM: The Ventrue’s eyes cast towards the door, across the room, and then abruptly back to the door. Abélia Devillers stands within its threshold. Caroline’s sight cannot pierce the clinging darkness in the hallway beyond, but the swollen and melon-like shape to Abélia’s belly is unmistakable.

Caroline: Caroline stares at it for a moment, before settling her gaze back on the French matron’s face.

GM: “Your eyes are already coming in,” the raven-haired woman smiles, stroking her belly. Her voice remains at a whisper. “They look beautiful, Caroline.”

Caroline: Caroline wants to ask, but fears for the answer.

“They’re different,” she says she touches her face. “But then of course they’d be. I shall have to think on how to explain them.”

GM: Abélia gives a faint, fluttering laugh.

“Such a responsible daughter. So concerned for your Masquerade.”

Caroline: “Shall we withdraw so she can sleep?” Caroline gestures to Simmone.

GM: Abélia smiles benignly as her dark eyes passing between Caroline and her youngest. She seem to doesn’t step back into the hall so much as recede into it.

“On this occasion, you may direct your efforts elsewhere—you have so much else to do, and de Corazon’s little dream shall not suffer on account of your lovely eyes.”

Caroline: “And of the questions it may raise among the Damned?” Caroline asks.

Who are you? she wonders as Abélia so casually references centuries-ancient Kindred.

GM: There’s that same fluttering laugh.

“Most of Caine’s children are as gullible as Seth’s.”

Caroline: Caroline lets the matter go and continues in the hall with her ‘mother.’

“I destroyed the bishop. No, more. I devoured him.”

GM: “How did you find his taste?”

Caroline: “As bitter as he was in his Requiem,” Caroline answers. “But deeply satisfying,” she admits.

GM: “Bitter herbs are not without their place in one’s kitchen,” Abélia smiles. “You are pleased with your new power, I trust?”

Caroline: “It is necessary. As necessary as his destruction. Better that it should have been with purpose.”

Yes, she admits to herself.

GM: “More may yet come… give what you have taken time to digest. Whom shall you sup upon next?”

Caroline: “What may come. There’s more though, things you should know.” She waits this until they’ve moved down the hall. “Gettis is alive.”

GM: The two have already spoken of sensitive matters within Simmone’s earshot, of course, but Abélia seems unbothered and content to stroll through the gloom-shrouded halls at a leisurely pace.

“Oh, is he? I fear Jeremy may not be the sharpshooter he fancies himself.”

Caroline: Sensitive is one thing, but she would not give her ‘sister’ cause to fear the demon that haunts her dreams.

“He leads a large and powerful group of hunters within the NOPD,” Caroline continues, shocked by Abélia’s calm at learning of the deception.

GM: “That must certainly be a headache for Vidal,” Abélia smiles. “Savoy is clever to distract him with more visible threats to his influence. But that’s very considerate of you to bring me this information, Caroline. The safety and well-being of your sisters—don’t fret, more than your eyes is still to come in—was of course heavy upon your mind. What counsel would you give me towards that continued end, in light of this new development?”

Caroline: “I want to have all of their security vetted by my people,” Caroline answers, “and eventually replaced by those whose loyalty can be more firmly guaranteed. I will eventually move against Gettis directly, for now he’s lost an ally and many of his soldiers. I have two more I intend on using to create further headaches for him.”

GM: “Do we know the number and composition of his forces?” Abélia inquires. “But of course, vetting their security… I’ve been letting Daniel Hayes handle things there. He seems capable, but he isn’t family. He gets so discomfited when I don’t wish his men around. You won’t see any of them here… Simmone doesn’t like them, I don’t think, unfamiliar men carrying around those noisome guns.”

Caroline: “Moreno is also involved with Savoy, but I’m certain you knew that. Still, that danger is closer than others, depending on how deeply he is in with Savoy.”

GM: “Of course. Adeline and I will be very careful, and heed any further counsel you should give us.”

Caroline: Caroline looks at her mother, trying to figure out if she’s being patronized by the (much) older being.

GM: “One loses naught and may gain much from others’ counsel, my dear child.”

Caroline: Caroline nods. “In that vein, I thought to seek your own.”

GM: “Seek and ye shall find,” Abélia smiles.

Caroline: She outlines the potential difficulties of explaining Claire’s disappearance, and also her concern should anyone suspect her part in the bishop’s death, and inquires as to whether her birth mother’s body might be produced, and similarly if her crime might be hidden.

GM: Abélia gives a light and fluttering laugh. “If it were simple to do, my dear child, all Cainites who supped upon their fellows’ souls would do it.”

“Still… hmm. To hide so dark a stain upon yours is no small thing, but it can be done. Bring me a child. The younger, the better—the innocence within an infant’s blood would conceal your crime most totally of all.”

Caroline: Caroline stares at Abélia.

GM: “It’s rude to stare, Caroline,” the raven-haired woman chides with an indulgent smile.

Caroline: She looks away. “Is there no other way?”

GM: “Like requires like, my dear. To paint a black soul white, one must draw from white.”

Caroline: “And the body?” she asks, already knowing her answer to the question of child murder.

GM: Abélia makes a faint tsking noise.

“Quite gone, I am afraid.”

Caroline: Caroline tries not to frown too obviously.

GM: The smile returns. “Oh, but I can hardly bear to see any of my daughters unhappy. Just as an older child’s blood might substitute for an infant’s, perhaps we may find something to substitute for Claire Malveaux’s corpse… in what capacity would you desire to employ it?”

Caroline: “Her death will create a great many questions, both for the Masquerade generally, and specifically within the Malveaux family and the hunters she worked with. At minimum I’d wish to cover up the details of her death with the national media. If possible, I’d also desire to create the appearance to the various hunters that she either died a natural death or was killed by Savoy,” Caroline answers, perhaps too professionally.

GM: “Killing two birds with one stone. Very clever, my dear.”

Caroline: “Fracturing that alliance is necessary. As is securing the seneschal’s blessing, now that his demands are met.”

GM: “Oh, have you concerns that Philip may not grant it?”

Caroline: “Stained by the bishop’s blood and with a potential mess left by Claire’s disappearance?” Caroline asks in turn.

GM: “All stains fade in time, my dear. I’m certain a bright girl like you has the sense to wait until she’s cleaned up.”

Caroline: “All things with a cost, Mother. The longer I delay the more vulnerable I and everyone I care for am.”

GM: Abélia only smiles and strokes her swollen belly as the two’s meandering steps carry them past one staircase and then down another. Intricately patterned rugs, the occasional potted plant, and photos of the smiling Devillers family at various ages line the walls. Caroline sees herself in one, on a beach with Cécilia. Both hugging girls wear swimsuits and look younger than Simmone.

Caroline: Caroline stops to look at the picture. “Rewriting history, or just writing another one?” she asks.

GM: It’s not a local beach, or the Florida ones where her (old) family would sometimes go during long-distant childhood excursions across the Gulf of Mexico. The architecture is older, with as much stone as concrete, and orange shingles on many rooftoops. Caroline pegs it as the French Riviera.

“All threads of fate are intertwined, dear child. Embroider another pattern, and existing ones cannot help but be rewoven too.”

Caroline: “And what happens to Caroline Malveaux?”

GM: “Would you still bear that name?”

Caroline: It’s a meaningful question.

“It’s been mine for all my life,” she replies. “But more than a name, what happens to who I was?”

GM: Abélia chuckles lightly as she strokes her swollen belly. “Fret not, my sweet. You shan’t lose your bank accounts or any of those other trifles your clan prizes so dearly.”

Caroline: “What about my experiences?” Caroline asks.

GM: Abélia removes her hand to tenderly stroke Caroline’s cheek. Her dark eyes glint as they take in the Ventrue’s blue ones.

“Trust Maman, dear child. I desire naught but your happiness and success.”

Caroline: “I just want to understand what I am. Who I am. If I didn’t trust you I wouldn’t be here.”

Her mother never would have made such a gesture. Claire, who would have, who did, give up everything until her last moment trying to help Caroline, but only on her own terms.

Another question strikes her. “Were all my sisters born the same way?”

GM: Abélia gives a fluttering laugh as she removes her hand from Caroline’s cheek.

“Oh, clever girl.”

“They were… and they were not. Jehovah’s curse held as true for me as any mother. In pain did I bring them forth. They were not conceived as you were. But your entry into this world shall mirror theirs.”

Abélia walks with Caroline. They reach a balcony overlooking the home’s first-story interior courtyard. Rain pitter-patters against the brick floor. Camellias, rosemallows, gardenias, and other flowers bloom from pots and an earth-filled tough. Fig trees, Japanese maples, and other small trees branch above the flowers. Cushioned garden chairs and tables recline under wide parasols that keep them sheltered from the rain. A set of double french doors leads out to the street. Several further doors into the house’s depths.


“What do you think of our family’s little home away from home?”

Caroline: “It’s not what I expected,” Caroline admits.

GM: “Expectations are so often traps of our own making,” Abélia smiles. “What had you expected?”

Caroline: “Darkness. I’d heard the LaLaurie House was one of the darkest and most haunted places in the city.”

GM: There’s a fluttering laugh.

“A poor home such a house would make for my Simmone indeed.”

Caroline: “Unless bent to your will,” Caroline answers.

GM: Another fluttering laugh.

“Oh, such feats you ascribe me. Next you shall be saying I direct the sun and moon in their cycles.”

Caroline: Caroline laughs. “Only feats within your grasp. That being a mother is enough may be true, but you are far more than simply that.”

GM: Abélia’s smile returns. “Having family agrees with you, my dear. It makes you say the sweetest of things.”

Caroline: Caroline smiles too. Why couldn’t it ever be like this, she wonders, but the thought passes just as quickly.

“But back to the body,” she presses.

GM: “You spare overmuch thought for the Masquerade, my dear,” the midnight-haired woman tsks. “We shall have to broaden your mind where that little chimera is concerned, sometime.”

Caroline feels a sudden sharp pain at the back of her head. Abélia pulls her hand away. A thick drop of blood clings to her fingertip.

“One of Claire’s children would have served better, but enough of her blood yet lingers in your veins.”

Abélia’s smile returns again.

“Waste not, want not.”

“Return your haven, my dear, ere the dawn rises. The Malveaux family shall have their corpse to mourn.”

Caroline: One of Claire’s children. The words echo in Caroline’s mind. I guess that means I’ve truly left behind my mortal life.

She isn’t certain if that disturbs or relieves her. At the end of the day it doesn’t matter.

---

Sunday night, 6 March 2016, AM

GM: If Antoine Savoy’s agents notice Caroline’s car in his domain, parked on the same street as their master’s court, none visibly move to waylay her. She returns to her haven as the dawn rises and sleeps.

She doesn’t settle in to bed, close her eyes, and then wake up. She sleeps.

It does not feel restful. It feels like she is slowly sinking, as if into quicksand, and frantically for a handhold upon the shores of consciousness. Oblivion yawns beneath her. She is glad to awaken.

A woman’s naked corpse lies sprawled over the spartan room’s floor as casually as someone might have dropped a candy wrapper. Hollow green eyes like the ones Caroline used to have stare dumbly open. The face looks like Claire’s, but has a faint and disconcertingly plastic-like quality to it. It looks so much like Claire, it’s impossible to think of the corpse as anyone else’s… and yet the body is not Caroline’s (former?) mother, either, of that she is certain. It’s at once similar enough to attract and strange enough to repulse.

A black, tar-like substance leaks like drool from the naked corpse’s mouth, nostrils, nipples, and wide-staring eyes. The jaw’s lips are quirked in an almost amused-looking half-smile.

Caroline: The ‘sleep’, the body, her now-blue eyes, and the newly-heightened senses that bring it all into vivid clarity leave Caroline more than uneasy. They’re a horrifying and immediate reminder of everything that happened the night before. How she murdered her mother. How she diablerized the bishop. How she stained herself with the blackest sins of both Kindred and kine.

It’s too soon to know what she’s gained from all of this, but she knows all too clearly what she’s lost.
For there to be any gain, she needs to get to work. She doesn’t want to approach the body, doesn’t want to touch it, doesn’t even want to look at it. But she does. She moves to examine it, to determine how closely it might pass for a real one. She wipes away the black tar-like substance and closes the green eyes that stare at her.

Accusing eyes that seem to scream at her, You killed me.

GM: Claire’s corpse only lies there on the floor, almost repulsively stark in its nakedness.

As Caroline could well attest, however, the night does not slow for the dead. Her first meeting is with Roger Ferris. The ex-station chief says he has good news and bad news.

The bad news is that Claire’s hotel suite, when he went back, was stripped of all electronic devices, documentation, and other items of value. “The list of people who could have wound up with those is short. We can assume Savoy wouldn’t have known how the hit played out until Gettis told him.”

“There were eyes on that hotel. I picked up a tail. Ditched them, but wouldn’t want to go back to the Quarter. Only a matter of time until Savoy learns about last night, if he hasn’t already.”

The good news is that it “turns out our enemy’s enemy is our friend.” It’s never smart to go back to the scene of a crime, but in this case the crime scent came to them. The burned Garden District house and murder of its two occupants (a young married couple named Andrew and Heather Reid) made the morning news.

“Police concluded the scene was staged, and that a third party murdered that couple.” Ferris looks pleased. “They’re pursuing suspects in the poorer parts of the city. Vodouisant paraphernalia was found on the scene. I’ll give you one guess who’s framing the Baron’s people for this. If the sheriff sees through it, and he might suspect a bluff, doesn’t hurt someone else was there tampering with the crime scene after we pulled out.”

Ferris waits until last, however, to bring up the potentially most germane subject.

He didn’t ignore Claire’s body when he first came in. He didn’t look at it either. It was simply there to him, like any other piece of furniture in the room. Now, however, he finally looks at it. Then he looks back to Caroline.

“I will not be able to do my job effectively, Ms. Malveaux, without knowing the story behind this.” The ex-CIA agent’s tone is flat. “How was your stepmother’s body brought here and who was involved?”

Caroline: Caroline tries to keep the surprise off her face, but doubts she succeeds—at least in the face of the veteran operator that’s known her since she was a teenager—when he refers to Claire as her stepmother. She bides him to examine ’Claire’s’ sheet covered body, curious as to what he might make of it, while she takes in the details from the day. The stripping of the hotel creates problems with her plans to stage Claire’s death that’ll have to be cleaned up. She tries to keep it together as she falls away from the brief habit of calling Claire ‘mom’ and back into the impersonal.

She’s pleased that the police concluded the scene was staged, and that others seemingly meddled, while remaining concerned that in their own efforts they might have discovered something of her involvement.

She tells him in simple terms of her intentions with Claire and the necessary cover-up she’s even now putting into motion. Given Claire’s failing health and fatalism of late it’s fairly plausible others might believe her to have been suffering some chronic condition. Caroline is going to work to create a record of that, both in print and in memory with both the family and numerous doctors to explain her sudden death. There’s groundwork there she needs to set tonight with other Kindred, and the body needs to be carefully staged. Throughout the conversation she tries to feel out and build her knowledge of her relationship with the Malveaux family. If Claire is her stepmother, who is her mother? Presumably Nathan remains her father, so was he previously married to Abélia… or did they have an affair…

She tries to let Ferris fill in the gaps of her ‘knowledge’ of who exactly she is while he examines the corpse.

GM: Ferris does not drop the subject of how Claire’s naked corpse wound up in Caroline’s bedroom, and points out the thousand and one security risks he sees that could threaten her plans.

Caroline: She bids that she’d hear his thoughts on the corpse before offering her commentary on the body, and the varied ‘security risks’ associated with it.

GM: Ferris has already pulled the sheet back, but bends closer to examine it. “Feels wrong. Looks like her, but I can tell it’s not.”

Caroline: Caroline nods. “It’s a creation. A facsimile stand-in. We need to get it into place.”

GM: Ferris then returns to the subject of how it got here, whether it was seen, who made it, and whether they are trustworthy.

Caroline: She replies that no one has seen it, that it was created by someone extremely trustworthy, but that the who is a detail she’s not ready to disclose yet. There’s no chance anyone saw them arrive or depart though, or the body’s creation.

“Some secrets even I have to keep, Roger, from everyone.”

GM: “So does everyone. Including whoever made this. No one’s completely trustworthy, Ms. Malveaux.”

Ferris, in any case, has a number of matters to report.

He and his people disposed of the hunters’ and two ghouls’ corpses. The chopped-up body parts are floating down the Mississippi in weighted bags towards the Gulf of Mexico.

They did not incriminate Antoine Savoy while doing so. There were a lot of corpses, and as it’s turned out, other parties are already on Caroline’s scene. Ferris deemed it safer to get rid of the corpses as quickly and expediently as possible than to try for anything extra.

Caroline: She asks as to whether she thinks their disappearance will cause more or less problems than their staged murder.

GM: “Gettis knows why these men are really missing, Ms. Malveaux.”

Caroline: “I’m less concerned with him, in this instant, than with a dozen police officers vanishing without answer.” She muses, “Though, so long as we are not attached to it, it’s less of an issue.”

GM: “Less than a dozen. They won’t be traced to us. I’d rather keep Gettis in the dark wondering how many are captured and talking than knowing for certain.”

Caroline: It’s not the most Masquerade friendly thought she’s ever had. She nods and bids him continue.

GM: Ferris interrogated the surviving hunters. Besides the missions they worked with Claire on, they were primarily involved in operations against the Baron’s followers (some Kindred, some ghouls, and some simply mortals) in the Seventh Ward. The regent-less parish has long been fought over between Savoy and Cimitiere in a game of tug-o-war behind the screen of gang violence in a high-crime area. Vidal largely leaves them alone to bloody one another’s noses. The Baron also has no influence over NOPD, unlike Vidal. Using them against his people, already frequent targets of NOPD, risked the hunters’ exposure less.

The hunters knew enough about this op to do their jobs. They knew Bishop Malveaux was a high-profile target among the leeches, and that the operation would be a dangerous one, but that they were stacking the deck in their favor. They knew the priest’s physical strengths and vulnerabilities, though little of him personally. They knew of the plan to stage the scene and the actions that would be expected of them. They did not know that Claire Malveaux was a hunter or watching their body cameras, though they knew that their NOSTF superiors were doing the latter.

Caroline: Caroline takes note of that without any pleasure. At this rate she wonders whether there will be any kingdom left for her to inherit when she’s done.

GM: The hunters do not know any others of significant note. Gettis only told them what they needed to know and discouraged contact with hunters outside their cell. They don’t even know any other NOSTF operatives.

Their cell was involved in an unsuccessful attempt on the Requiem of Doc Xola some months back. They did not engage him directly, but called off the op after it appeared he’d compromised a mole they’d placed among his ‘patients.’ They believed the undead bokor was attempting to bait them into a trap.

Caroline: Caroline nods. “I presume some detail of the interrogation is lost in translation.”

GM: “They’re still there if you want to do it yourself.”

“There’s other news. There’s been a third attempt on your Uncle Orson’s life.”

“The first was in the hospital. Your Uncle Matthew tried to poison his food. He didn’t try again after my people foiled that, but your Aunt Vera pulled the same stunt shortly after his discharge.”

Caroline: Caroline arches an eyebrow. “That’s aggressive. Has that been common?”

GM: “Your aunt and uncle hate him, Ms. Malveaux. Always have. They didn’t want him to ever leave that hospital.”

Caroline: “Adam,” Caroline speculates.

GM: “I presume Matt also wanted to seize control of the family, though it might have just been hate.”

“Yesterday someone mailed Orson a letter laced with anthrax. Alphonse intercepted it and came to us. I’ve been working on him for a while now. More than one reason it’s for the best he didn’t tell his boss. The heart attack took a lot out of your uncle. So did the gastric plication surgery. He doesn’t get out of the house a lot now. I hear he’s taken up gardening.”

“Not sure yet who sent the anthrax. Could be your aunt or uncle making another attempt. Could be a third party. But these attacks don’t look like they’re stopping.”

“Your stepmother said she would deal with Matt and Vera. I don’t know how she planned to. It’s moot now. She was going to get around to it after we’d left your staked corpse in a basement.”

Caroline: Caroline nods. “More problems to be dealt with. I expect to have some tools available she never did. First I need to solidify my control of the family within my own circles, and that… that I expect to take a while longer. I do need to meet with both Matt and Orson as soon as possible though. Then, of course, the matter of Nathan.” It feels awkward using his name, but she has so many questions. “I don’t relish having to tell him his wife is dead, for many reasons, not the least of which is it will require more finesse than the other two, and I can’t exactly pop in on him besides.”

GM: Ferris raises an eyebrow at Caroline use of her father’s given name. “Your name’s mud with all three of them. They’re not interested in seeing you.”

Caroline: Caroline laughs bitterly. “All the more reason I need to do some restructuring.”

GM: “So’s mine. I’ve been fired from my official position in the family.”

Caroline: Caroline arches an eyebrow. “The ploy in December?”

GM: “You told Bishop Malveaux I was a rogue ghoul. He didn’t sit on his hands. Your stepmother and I thought about me trying to bluff I was still under his control, but concluded it’d have been too risky. He was too suspicious.”

Caroline: She nods. “Restructuring, as I said.”

GM: “The rest of my team’s all been fired too. It’s made protecting the family somewhat inconvenient.”

“I suspect it was one of the reasons your stepmother agreed to the hit. Bishop Malveaux’s been eager to find me. Living like I’m back in Jordan has been inconvenient.”

Caroline: “We both played the hands we had,” Caroline remarks. “Neither of those matters should be especially difficult to clear up going forward. Especially after… well, for now I need an opportunity to speak with them alone. With your knowledge of their schedules and protections I don’t imagine that will be impossible to arrange. The less immediate term matter of your status can be cleaned up following the cleanup of Claire’s passing.”

GM: “If you want me in charge of the investigation into Claire, I’d advise before. Your mother also might be able to arrange a more convenient meeting. She was a regular visitor to Orson in the hospital. He’s become fond of her.”

Caroline: “If it goes as planned, there won’t be much of an investigation,” Caroline replies. She explains in brief her intentions on covering up Claire’s death, related to creating the appearance of a long-term illness they all knew about that has taken a recent turn.

GM: “Nothing goes as planned. Even when you win.”

Caroline: “I hadn’t planned on her dying,” Caroline admits.

GM: “Neither did she,” the ex-CIA agent observes blandly.

Regardless, he stands prepared to carry out Caroline’s further instructions.

He cites several other matters, including the requested hit list on Claire’s past targets and a power play against Orson and Adam by priests within the Catholic Church, that are of relevance to Caroline’s or the family’s interests but do not require immediate address.

Widney, finally, also wanted to see Caroline. Ferris says she doesn’t have any news of consequence besides that Cécilia said she would be dropping by soon. Caroline cannot help but observe that seeing her first before anyone else was supposed to be Widney’s job—one Autumn had been vainly trying to muscle the younger ghoul out of for months.

Ferris awaits Caroline’s instructions what to do with the two captive hunters. He suggests doctoring their memories to make them “responsible” for disposing of their fellows’ bodies. Kill two birds with one stone. They can always release them later to keep Gettis in the dark for now.

Caroline: Caroline agrees with the suggestion, and makes arrangements to come before the two later in the evening to do the appropriate doctoring. She tasks Ferris with finding several of the spots in their memory she can plug in the demise of their fellows alongside their ‘criminal’ activities before she does so. She tasks Audrey with having a ‘snack’ ready before she heads off to do so.

GM: The latter ghoul fails to come through. She is not present at the Giani Building and does not answer calls or texts.

Caroline: That stops Caroline in her tracks. There’s no good reason for Audrey to be unavailable, no fresh horror that might have driven her away, no task more essential than being available right now. She is however, and has long been, the most vulnerable member of Caroline’s entourage. Vulnerable to either seduction or abduction. She taps a pale finger on a pale lip. That’s an unforeseen development. After Claire’s death she knew the mess of her plans this night might draw attention, might lead others to her door, but she’d hoped to wait it out. If someone has already drawn the connection and started moving against her…

Then she has far less time than she’d hoped, regardless of who it is that saw fit to investigate her. She can picture already nightmare scenarios, Savoy holding such power over her, the sheriff using it as an excuse to kill her, Gettis putting pieces together and taking some rash action or dismantling the world she’s carefully built—or, worse, attacking her family. Her sisters.

GM: “I’d be relieved if Gettis did something rash. Rash is messy in the short term, but easier to remove in the long term,” Ferris raises. “Wouldn’t count on us being that lucky though. Rash hasn’t him alive and independent from Savoy a hundred years.”

“Wouldn’t count on lucking out with the sheriff either. Claire always said her cooperation was the only reason he wasn’t taking off your head. Once he finds out she’s gone, you’ll be of no use to him anymore.”

The ex-CIA agent shakes his head. “Morrow being gone is bad. Bad enough ’someone’s’ already been to the crime scene and Claire’s suite. Enemies are moving, Ms. Malveaux. Best we don’t fall behind.”

---

Sunday night, 6 March 2016, PM

GM: Cécilia stops by the Giani Building a little after 9 PM. It’s an almost uncannily perfect time, giving Caroline just enough to get dressed, showered, debriefed by Ferris, and to issue orders to her ghouls. It even seems to account for the alarmingly late hour she arose for the night—another grim sign of the Beast’s ever-widening jaws clamped around her soul. Spring, that unwelcome intruder, further eats away at the time.

But her future sister, not merely in-law, may be a less unwelcome one. Cécilia arrives at Caroline’s apartment alongside Daniel Hayes, the first time Caroline has actually seen the former mercenary accompanying Cécilia anywhere. The Ventrue’s now-keener eyesight can easily pick out the faint bulge of a concealed firearm on his clothes. The large man himself is quiet and professional, like many of the older ex-service members Caroline has known in a private security capacity. Cécilia has him wait outside the door.

She doesn’t say anything once they’re alone. She just hugs Caroline. Full, long, and deep.

“Maman told me everything that happened last night,” she exclaims, stroking a hand along Caroline’s back. “Everything. I’m so sorry, Caroline. I can’t even imagine how that must have felt—and still feel. I don’t blame you at all. You had no choice. And I’m so happy, at the same time, how you’ll be part of our family. How we’ll be sisters now, real sisters. I can’t wait until we can tell the others.” Cécilia’s voice is almost gushing for a moment. Her gaze sobers, though, when she pulls back enough to look Caroline in the eye. She doesn’t let go.

“I’m sure this must be very confusing for you, to have so many awful things happen the same time as such a happy one. And to still have so many things, so much of the future, riding in the balance.” Her matching blue eyes concernedly roam Caroline’s face. “How are you… how are you holding up?”

Caroline: The former heiress dismisses everyone else from the room—her living room rather than the roof where she conducts business—and settles in to talk to Cécilia. If Caroline had any doubts about her decision to accept Abélia’s offer, Cécilia puts them to rest as surely as Caroline put down Father Malveaux the night before. The Beast hisses its annoyance, baring its teeth at the ‘kine’ that dares to touch it, but the woman whose flesh it wears is left speechless—no, breathless—by the gesture, and despite the Beast’s tantrum, she is reluctant to pull away.

Is this what acceptance feels like? The thought drifts its way across her consciousness like an idle cloud, but hits with the force of a thunderbolt, battering down and reducing to ash her fears. Whatever else Abélia is, whatever else the family she’s joined is, it is a place she belongs. It’s wonderful, wonderful enough that the nasty fears, the constant paranoia skulking about the back of her mind, are, for the moment, wise enough to make themselves scarce.

She mulls over her ’sister’s’ question for a heartbeat. She’s committed matricide and murder, diablerie and betrayal of clan and covenant both. She’s painted her soul in shades of black she didn’t even know existed until this year and fed the hellish thing inside of her. She knows how she should feel, knows how she’s supposed to feel that is. But she knows how she actually feels as well.

“I’m clear, Cécilia,” Caroline tells her sister. “I just feel… clear. Maybe it all hasn’t hit me yet, but I can clearly see what I have to do, the path forward in all the varied branches it might go. I think most of my attention is focused on ensuring it takes the right one. I don’t know if it makes me more of a monster or less.”

GM: Cécilia looks concerned, but more relieved. “Maybe it just makes you human. There are plenty of people who only grieve or let themselves collapse later, after the crisis is over. I know you’re busy with so much… I guess you can’t afford to.”

She nods firmly. “We’ll get you down that path. Then… then we can catch our breaths and let it hit you.”

Cécilia is not just here “to check in on my sister,” as she puts it, “even if that is the first reason I’m here.” There are some other things:

First, there are their other sisters. “Maman and I haven’t told them about Gettis yet. Adeline can handle it, and maybe Yvette, but the others… and Simmone, especially… it’s taken a lot of work, with your help, to get her to the point she feels safe in a room without Maman. I’m really concerned that telling her Gettis is still out, and knowing so little about him, could shatter her all over again.” A helpless look plays across Cécilia’s face. “Yvonne’s been through a lot of therapy, and Yvette’s been so angry. Well, no, I suppose we’ve all been through a lot of therapy.”

“I suppose it sounds fairly minor, next to that, saying I don’t want to lie to them. But I don’t want to put them in danger, either, if there’s any chance that their knowing might make a difference. I just don’t want them to live in fear again. What do you think we should do?”

Caroline: Caroline doesn’t think that Gettis is going to come after them immediately—he’s had plenty of time to do so until now and chosen not to. She admits to being uncertain as to his motives for his initial attack, though.

“For now, I think it’s best it stay between the three of us. I wouldn’t have woken you last night but… with everything else going on, I didn’t want you to be left in the dark about him if something else befell me.”

GM: “That’s true he hasn’t,” Cécilia nods. “It’s just hard not to expect the worst when we don’t even know why he did it. I’m already looking over my shoulder wondering if he’s going to be there…”

She shakes her head as if to clear it. “But don’t think anything of waking me up. This was an emergency. And I’m glad that I know, even if the others don’t.”

Caroline: “I’m glad you know too.” Even if the next few nights are unkind to her, that information passed on to Cécilia and Abélia might have been worth everything else. “But don’t look over your shoulder. I’m going to give him much larger problems—and have already.”

GM: “Is there anything Maman or I could do to help there?” Cécilia asks.

Caroline: “Eventually,” Caroline muses. “Right now he’s got a lot of missing and unaccounted for agents that he won’t be seeing again, and I’m going to use the ones still alive to create all kinds of problems for any he has left. He’s also just lost one of his most powerful allies and can’t know why. He has a lot to busy himself with in the coming nights. After that… well… either I’ll have more resources to deal with that matter, or it’ll be entirely left in your hands.”

GM: “That’s a grim thought,” Cécilia grimaces. “Well, good luck. And again, if there’s anything Maman or I can do, just let us know. You’re not alone anymore.”

Caroline: “I need to understand what’s going on, what’s happening to me, to us. Cécilia, I saw photos of us together, as children. Things that I have no memory of on a beach in France. Ferris called Claire my stepmother…” She bites her lower lip. “I don’t care how, and I am incredibly happy that it is, but I don’t even know who I am to everyone else.”

There’s not quite fear, or even unhappiness in the admission, but there is something that might be unease, or perhaps simply unfamiliarity with being uncertain.

GM: Cécilia nods. “I’m sure that must be confusing, not to mention scary. Maman may seem to you like she’s being vague or opaque, a lot of the time, and maybe even inconsiderate as a result. But I think she just doesn’t see the point in explaining herself when she knows everything will work out. You’ll find that things simply… happen around her, and everything naturally sorts itself out. She’s not really a ‘details’ person. She sees more than we do, and prefers that we simply… trust.”

“I guess that’s a somewhat long-winded way of saying,” Cécilia smiles self-deprecatingly, “I probably don’t know that much more than you about what’s specifically going on. But maybe there are some things I can clarify.”

“From what I understand, our mother was always your mother, and your father Nathan is still your father. Claire was your stepmother, which you seem like you’ve already figured out. I don’t expect the entire story is that complex—Maman would have gone with the path of least disruption to your existing life. Making… changes like that is a very dangerous art, and Maman has to be very careful when she does. You might think of it as re-weaving a tapestry over an open fire. Loosen too many threads, and the entire thing could unravel, or get singed… and if it caught fire, there might not even be any tapestry left. Her hands would likely get burned too, and the fire could spread from there…”

Cécilia shakes her head. “Maman would want to keep any alterations as seamless as she could, keeping as much of the existing tapestry intact as she could. That’s why Claire is still a parental figure in your life. Maman has just tweaked a few things, as opposed to trying to remove her altogether, or you from the Malveauxes. You’re bound too tightly together.” Cécilia smiles again. “And, of course, I’m sure you still want them as your family. Maman wouldn’t simply take that away.”

Caroline: The Ventrue bites her lip at the reference to flame, but nods when her sister is finished. “That all makes sense, even if it’s more than I’d thought was possible, even after all of this. I guess… I’m not afraid—trust her. You might be the only ones I trust. I’m just not comfortable with not being in control. So much has been out of my control. You think I’d be accustomed to it.” She puts on a slightly strained smile.

“And this,” she touches the corner of one eye, “was something of a surprise.” She looks at her sister, studying her with a keenness of eye she’d never had before, taking in all the perfect details. “Did you have the same experience, did any of our sisters?”

GM: Cécilia frowns thoughtfully. “Maybe. I don’t think we have. But if we did, it’s possible I might not remember.”

She looks sympathetic, then adds, “I’m sure that answer isn’t putting you any more at ease. Everything I know about Cainite society fits with what you’ve said, that it disempowers newer Cainites and takes so many things away from them. And I’m sure you’re tired of it and want to be in control of your life, now more than ever. It’s simply that I wasn’t raised knowing the truth of the world, or many of the things Maman can do. She waited until I was older before telling me. And it could cause… scarring, if things I’d long believed true turned out to be false.”

“Or at least, that’s how Maman said others might put it. But I don’t really think of it that way. It’s a false dichotomy to say parts of my life are real or not real, because Maman has or hasn’t touched my past like she has yours. All parents shape their childrens’ lives. However Maman did with ours, she did to make us happy. The truth, my truth, is whatever Maman decides is true.”

Cécilia takes Caroline’s hand. “I don’t expect you to trust her that totally, of course, not right away. We have to earn it from you first. But I hope we will, with time. I know everything since your Embrace has been so hard, and maybe your life before that was too… I want you to know the peace and happiness that Maman can bring, Caroline. From all that I’ve gotten to know of you this past year, you deserve it.”

Caroline: Caroline nods thoughtfully. “It doesn’t matter. Not really. What’s going on with our mother and I… it’s separate from everything with Kindred, even if it isn’t really. I’m just trying to understand.” The idea that she might not remember what’s happening when it’s done bothers her, but only a little. “Whatever the cost, whatever is happening, it’s a small price to pay for what I’ve gotten in return.” She squeezes Cécilia’s hand.

GM: Cécilia smiles as she squeezes it back. “And there’s so much that we have gotten in return. Can I help you understand anything more, still?”

Caroline: The once-more heiress thinks, then smiles. “I suppose I could ask for the details of how our mother does all the things she does, and what she truly is, but I expect I’ll never fully understand. Certainly not anytime soon. And I’m not certain it matters anyway. It’s like she’s always said—enough that she’s a mother to seven daughters.”

“There are some other things that you could help with, in the immediate term. Explaining… explaining Claire’s death is going to take a tremendous amount of time and effort. Especially when it comes to the Malveaux family. I’m not exactly on in the graces of the family, but you and Luke…. well. Are.”

She asks if Cécilia can help set up the meetings she needs to plant the idea of Claire’s ‘illness’ in the minds of her uncles, and also tells her sister of the mental ‘surgery’ she needs to perform on Luke as well. It’s the kind of thing that could be harmful, but that Cécilia can help ensure is as painless as possible by identifying times in which her ‘fake’ memories and alterations fit best into a coherent narrative.

GM: Cécilia frowns. “On someone who’s family, Caroline, I think there may always be some amount of harm in that… not just to them, but to you too. Would you be able to see and relate to them in the same way, after imposing yourself like that without their consent? How easy would it then be to do it again? What level of boundary would…”

She trails off. “I don’t mean to sound like I’m moralizing. I know you’ve had to make some very hard choices. But this one makes me feel very uncomfortable. Maybe we could build a narrative that his mother was hiding her illness from him, because she didn’t want to spoil the wedd…”

Cécilia’s face falls at that statement.

Caroline: The Ventrue reaches out a room temperature hand for her sister’s. “I know this is going to throw a wet blanket on everything… I can’t tell you it won’t, but I won’t let this derail or damage your wedding.” She bites her lip. “I’m going to make it right. I’ll make it right, Cécilia. I can’t fix it, but I’ll find something that makes it up.”

She isn’t sure what else to say. If she can take the family it will make things easier, make the wedding easier, but she knows the truth. Her path isn’t going to get easier. Especially not if Prince Vidal truly is going into torpor.

GM: Cécilia’s smile returns as she squeezes Caroline’s hand back. “I didn’t mean to throw a wet blanket on things, either. You already have made things up—I get to have you in our family, not to mention at the wedding. I’d consider that a more than worthy trade for any added fuss.”

Speaking of their family, she also wants to talk about their sisters’ security and physical protection. “You have the most experience here, Caroline. I’d like to draw up some kind of plan. Should we have bodyguards following them every hour of the day? It seems hard to picture Gettis attacking them at McGehee, but then, I wasn’t expecting him to attack them in a police station either.”

“You also mentioned wanting to vet the people we already have. Whatever you think is best… I’ve brought Daniel along, if you want to start with him, or go over details and coordinate further things. What can I do to help?”

Caroline: The Ventrue pauses. “Honestly, my preference would be to put ghoul bodyguards around each of you every time you step out into the open… but even if that were feasible—and it isn’t—if he’s half as old as I think, I don’t know that would do much more than inform your teams of some of the things that could come up. And even if they could help it would be very… invasive to live like that. The younger girls at the very least deserve something approaching normal. I also suspect that after the shooting his interest in… our family may have waned, when there was no immediate supernatural response.”

“That said, there are some things I’d like to do in the near term. The first is vetting everyone hired on in that capacity by the family and letting any that don’t pass the smell test go. The NOPD in particular is rife with supernaturally aware groups of varying factions, and I don’t want any of them anywhere near any of you.”

She goes on to explain that she’d like to transition the head of their various security details over to one of her ghouls, asserting that even if they’d still physically be a ‘speedbump’ for an elder ghoul, they’d at least know something of what the score was, and ways to make the girls and their varied homes ‘harder’ targets.

“Most of it isn’t even invasive, stuff you saw on your way up here that you didn’t even notice.” She has some thoughts on who would fit best, but wants to wait a couple days on that until she can be sure she’s not adding chaos without value.

GM: “All of that sounds for the best,” Cécilia nods. “I can have Daniel get you a list of everyone we’ve hired. It might hurt his ego a bit not to be in charge of the detail anymore, but I’m more interested in keeping our family safe. Maman and I can find reasons to keep them close by for the next few days.”

The next matter she brings up concerns “furnishing a room for you in the family house. I still keep one, since I’m over so often.” Cécilia smiles. “It’s not as silly as it sounds for me to be bringing this up now. It’s simply that it would be another haven for you—in the true sense of the world. As scared as I am for our sisters now, I’m not scared when they’re home. Maman is strongest there. Her… essence, has seeped into every floorboard, every blade of grass, every speck of gravel. Every mote of dust. Nothing can harm our family there, even when she isn’t home. Not without going through her.”

Cécilia smiles again. “Naturally, we’ll want to have you over all the time, so you could use a room anyway. But you might find it useful to have another haven from a security standpoint. There might, or might not, be times you’d want to spend the day under Maman’s protection. I figure having another option can’t ever hurt. It’ll be proof against the sun, of course, and none of our sisters will disturb you.”

Caroline: The shift in topic to something less bleak brings a genuine smile back to Caroline’s face. Claire’s warning about the house, once so dire, seem so meaningless now. Some small voice in the back of her mind asks what manner of corruption Abélia must be to have saturated such a dark and unholy place so thoroughly. The voice whispers frantic warnings with the speed and energy that only true panic, real fear, can bring on.

The voice is all but drowned out by the smile on her sister’s face. What little remains is only an annoying buzz.

“I don’t expect the French Quarter to be an especially friendly place for me in the future,” Caroline answers. “But it’s good to know there’s at least one place I can feel safe.” She’s happy to spend a few minutes discussing the specifics. What rooms might be available, her preferences for furniture and decorum, how often the girls are all in the house.

GM: “Oh, I meant our house in the Garden District, Caroline,” Cécilia clarifies. “The LaLaurie House isn’t… quite ready for company yet, according to Maman, though it’s coming along very well. Simmone loves it there.”

Cécilia’s even more happy to bring Caroline over to review those options in person. “If you have time these next few days, of course. Though with how dangerous things are, I figure sooner could be better to set it up than later.”

Cécilia’s last topic is cybersecurity. “I was half-asleep when you called me last night, and together with the news about Gettis being such a shock, I wasn’t thinking clearly—but we should keep conversations like that off the phone. The only real security mine has is an encrypted call and messenger app anyone could download. From what I know, it’s secure if the other person is using the same one—it’s Signal, by the way—but with news stories like the NSA wiretapping foreign leaders, I’m not sure how secure ‘secure’ really is. I’m sure their phones are harder to get into than mine.”

“Anyway, next time, just let me know over the phone that you want to meet in person. And if you ever want to get in touch with Maman faster, call or text Simmone. Maman doesn’t use cellphones, but Simmone can pass along whatever you say. I don’t need to tell you not to make it identifying around her, of course.”

Caroline: Caroline agrees about the phone call, though she has a few means and ideas about overcoming it that she’s picked from Roger’s brain over the years and bounced against Fuller’s own experiences. “I remembered him talking about how for a while the people he was hunting got away from all technology as a means of making themselves harder to track, but eventually they got smart to that and began to look for the absence. Honestly, that’s what a lot of older vampires do anyway, I think, what with being less comfortable with technology in general.”

“Burner phones are one way to keep off the radar, unless they have massive resources to track and intercept everything—NSA type things—but they can also be a pretty big giveaway if they’re used frequently, and with high level signals intelligence and enough time you can break into those too. So that brings me to… daily changing cards.”

She goes on to explain, in brief, that her ‘higher level’ agents are given a daily changing card each day with a series of ‘pro’ words that correlate to various sensitive subjects. On one day vampires might be ‘Canadians,’ on the next day they’re ‘old folks,’ and so forth. Common words are given common stand-ins. The entire cards are little bigger than an index card. Each day the cards are burned. She wants to include Cécilia in those that receive cards.

She readily agrees about Simmone as a means of contacting their mother.

GM: “Oh, that’s very clever,” Cécilia says of the cards. “It doesn’t stand out when you change the words daily, and even if someone else learns them, they’re only good for a day… I guess technology still has a while before it catches up with mundane subterfuge.”

She’s humbled by Caroline’s trust in wanting to include her, and works out a means by which she can conveniently receive the cards. She usually starts and ends her day at her Pontalba Building apartment. Sometimes she’s over at Maman’s place, or at Luke’s (or he’s over at hers). They haven’t “officially” moved in together, what with Caroline’s uncle being the archbishop—“and we don’t want to be caught living in sin.” Cécilia is somewhat concerned over how to keep the cards concealed from Luke, but that’s a long-term problem. The wedding, and their move-in date, is still the better part of a year away. For now, what would be the best daily means for by the head of the family’s security each day—if and when Caroline puts a ghoul into place.

“All of that sounds like a very good idea,” Cécilia nods. “I already feel safer.”

Caroline: The Ventrue smiles. “I like to think I can be clever on occasion.”

GM: “On many occasions,” Cécilia amends.

Caroline: “As for the cards, we print them on quick dissolving paper, so disposing of them should be straightforward. Drop them in a glass of water or the toilet and they’re gone in a few seconds. If you want we could print yours in ink that only shows up when something else is applied—like the ‘magic’ pens they sell kids. You’d have to keep one of the revealing pens, but unless someone knew exactly what they were looking for, it might look like another business card or piece of paper.”

Finally, the former heiress expresses once more how grateful she is that Cécilia is ‘in the know’ about everything. She’s so glad to have someone she can talk to, and that there’s no need for such invasiveness with her sister.

She’s also plain that this cover-up is tremendously important, life and death. She asks if the family has a place they can use as a ‘sick ward’ for Claire. Somewhere she’d ‘feel more comfortable’ than a hotel, that they can control.

GM: “Aside from Yvette’s allergies, I’m afraid we’re all pretty healthy. There’s definitely not much that gets Maman down.” Cécilia smiles at that. “Still, I could find a house in the Garden District to rent for a little while. Something nice, but quiet and out of the way. I could have my PA arrange it and pay in cash. The only wrinkle I can think of is that someone still might be able to link it to us, rather than Claire, with a little detective work. Does that sound like what you’re looking for?”

Caroline: Caroline clarifies that she’d meant a spare bedroom or such, vice a more dedicated hospital setting.

GM: “Oh, yes, we do have a spare room in the house we could use,” Cécilia nods. “But that seems a little odd Claire might choose to stay with us, doesn’t it? We were on good terms, but it’d make more sense to me if she wanted to stay with her own family. That’s what I’d want to do if I came down sick, at least.”

Caroline: The heiress laughs. “I think if you’d seen some of the internal politics you could understand it… on the other hand, not knowing what her relationship with our mother might make that complicated…”

GM: “Maman was always very friendly to her,” Cécilia says, then smiles. “Though she tries to be that way to everyone, of course. I just have a hard time seeing Claire wanting to stay with us, if she were really sick, rather than getting a place of her own.”

Caroline: “Perhaps. I could come up with an excuse for her to do it… but that may be a question for later.”

GM: “It just seems unusual to me,” Cécilia repeats. “We were on good terms, like I said, but I wouldn’t say any of the family was that close with her. But all right, if there was something else you wanted to bring up…”

Caroline: The former heiress broaches a final subject with her ‘new’ sister as their conversation starts to close. “How much was she able to tell you, about me? About how I was Embraced?”

She’s grateful for her dead and still heart as she broaches the subject. It’s several less avenues to betray just how uncomfortable she is even speaking the words.

“There’s a reason, Cécilia, a reason for all of this. For why I’m doing what I’m doing. For why I can’t be comfortable as some second-rate vampire eking out each night in their Requiem.”

She bites her lower lip. “I want to be completely honest with you, Cécilia, in a way I can’t be with anyone else. Haven’t been able to be. I have a birthright. I’m not the childe of Rene Baristheaut. I was not an accident. I think… I think our fates were linked the night Yvonne was shot, but whatever, why-ever… I can be… I should be… I have to be someone.”

She looks at her sister. “Do you know what I’m talking about? What I mean when I say I have to be something more than I am right now? More than anyone knows me to be?”

GM: “I do, Caroline,” Cécilia nods. “Maman was… well, let’s just say you’ve been very close with her in a lot of ways, over this past year. And she always said it was inevitable that charade would unravel.”

“That’s where we’re at now, isn’t it? You’re the one unraveling it, like a butterfly coming out of its cocoon. You’re ready to claim what’s yours.”

Caroline: “I want to know more, but it should wait,” she admits. “At least, until things are more stable.”

It’s a reassuring enough lie. When have things ever gotten easier?

---

Monday night, 7 March 2016, AM

Caroline: The former heiress attends midnight mass. She barely hears the sermon and leaves once it’s over. She’s just glad the bishop wasn’t scheduled to be there. She and Claire had been very careful to kill him as far in advance of his next public appearance as they could.

Speaking of…

She resigns herself to her inability to fully conceal Claire’s death on her own. The magnitude of the breach is simply too massive, the forces involved too great, and her own resources too paltry. Despite her best efforts, six months have been dozens too few to have every asset she might need or wish. She lacks the hold on the medical industry. Her position with her family is too precarious. Claire’s death is too unexpected. A million excuses—but not without standing.

The decision to consume her ancestor has made it harder than was necessary. She could have destroyed him. Could have captured him. Could have done anything but what she did. But she did consume him, and now she needs to buy time. Needs to stretch as long as she can.

The first step is planting the seeds of Claire’s declining health in the minds of her uncles and brother—that she’s been dying, and that the end is approaching. In some ways the setup, the opportunity to draw her father home, is better. She works between Cécilia and Roger to arrange those meetings with her unfriendly uncles.

GM: Ferris is unable to arrange a meeting. He’s been fired for months now, and the brothers aren’t about to welcome him back. Bishop Malveaux was quite diligent, when he couldn’t catch Ferris, about making the former security chief’s name mud with the family. Ferris also points out that the bishop has almost certainly changed security protocols around the brothers given that Ferris himself was responsible for the old ones. They’d be idiots not to have.

Cécilia says she could likely finagle a meeting with either of her uncles-in-law through Luke. But Luke’s not likely to want to bring Caroline, and once they got to the front gate, the Ventrue’s presence could lead to an awkward if not violent situation.

“Your first family has been telling… horrible things about you, Caroline,” she explains, shaking her head. “Unspeakable things. I know that shooting you wouldn’t hurt you very badly, but your uncles don’t. They’ve actually been bragging about how their guards are under standing orders to. That’s how much the bishop has twisted them… he was obsessed with keeping the family ‘his’ and keeping you away from them.”

“I’ll help however I can, of course. Just tell me what I can do.”

Caroline knows their addresses. The walled, gated, and heavily guarded redoubts await.

Caroline: The heiress pauses in contemplation. She could get to them—of that she has little doubt. With or without Cécilia’s help. But if they’ve really taken that position, she doesn’t think she can get there quietly, and quietly is a priority right now. Meddling in Malveaux’s domain before word of his final death gets out is exactly the kind of thing she can’t afford. It will stain her hands as surely as the undead priest’s diablerie stains her soul. She’d not expected her uncles to be so hostile, but perhaps she should have. The bishop made his position clear regarding her and the family.

She can wait to move on the family and create a Masquerade disaster. She can move on the family and expose herself. Poor options on either hand for the heiress, but…

She stops like she’s been struck by a thunderbolt. There is a third option. An audacious one.

She could go before the seneschal now.

It seems like suicide. What if someone scrutinizes her soul? What if the seneschal or someone else invades her mind again? He’d know in an instant. He’d know, and it would all be over. Whatever her accomplishments, whatever terms she has met, there is no place for her at her sire’s side if this crime comes out. It’d be safer to run to Savoy.

But… what reason will the seneschal have to suspect her? If she goes before him now, before Malveaux is considered ‘missing’, it’s possible the thought of her involvement might not occur to him until it’s too late.

Gettis and Savoy surely won’t be idle, either, if she gives them another three nights. ‘Someone’ has already been tampering with the scene of Malveaux’s final death. ‘Someone’ stole the documents and devices from Claire’s hotel suite, and robbed her of whatever secrets may have lain within those. And one of her ghouls is already missing. Even if it’s a coincidence, it couldn’t have happened at a worse time. She’s damned if she does wait and damned if she doesn’t wait… and the third way promised by her mother, to hide the stains upon her soul, would have damned her no less assuredly.

But Ferris is right. Their enemies are moving.

Best they don’t fall behind.

“For now, nothing,” she finally responds to Cécilia’s question. She bites her lip, her mind already racing to plan how she’ll pull off the impossible—again.

It’s a gamble. The collateral on the line is her Requiem. But the whole of her Requiem has been nothing if not a gamble.

Tonight’s odds aren’t new. She’s stared down ugly odds a thousand times before.

But if she has a winning hand…

Well.

She’s always played to win.

Widney hears her cold voice crackle to life as she hits the intercom.

“Get a car ready. Perdido House is expecting me.”

---

Previous, by Narrative: Story Eleven, Celia IX, Jon IX
Next, by Narrative: Story Eleven, Jon Epilogue

Previous, by Character: Story Eleven, Caroline XIII
Next, by Character: Story Eleven, Caroline XV