Prologue: A gAthering of BeAsts

1

Sample

file

Vampire: The masquerade

2

Prologue: A gAthering

of BeAsts

Prologue: A gAthering

of BeAsts

ela Lugosi’s dead, and so am I. But what’s left of Bela is rotting in a pine coffin somewhere, while I have the opportunity to sit here on the balcony, enjoy my drink and look at you. Correct me if I’m being presumptuous, but I suspect that I have the better end of the deal.

I can tell by looking at you that you’re not comprehending. Of course you’re not — these are cynical, rational times, and you’re not going to believe that I’m a dead man just because I say so. A century ago it would have been different — well, it was quite different the last time I had this little talk with someone — but this is the age of facts. And the facts are that corpses don’t move, don’t walk, don’t talk. I’m terribly sorry, my dear, but I have a surprise for you: This corpse does.

So sit down. Please, I insist that you make yourself comfortable. Pour yourself something to drink, preferably from the bottle on the left — the stuff on the right is an acquired taste. It’s going to be a long evening, and you’re going to need a stiff drink or two, I suspect. After all, in the next few hours I’m going to explain to you in excruciating detail why everything you think you know about life and death is wrong. In other words, you don’t know a blessed thing about the way the world really works, and I’m going to open your eyes.

But I’m afraid, my dear, that you’re not going to like what you see.Sam

ple file

Prologue: A gAthering of BeAsts

3

WhAt i Amefore we go any further, allow me to tell you that you’re getting an un-precedented opportunity here. My

kind doesn’t talk about itself to your kind — not now and, for the most part, not ever. We’ve spent five centuries weaving a stage curtain that we call the Masquerade to hide the real show from you, but in the end it comes down to one simple fact: We vampires don’t want you mortals knowing we’re out there. It’s for the same reason the wolf doesn’t want the sheep knowing he’s around. It makes our work so much easier. And so, for example, though we do indeed possess the sharpened canines with which dime novels and the cinema have branded us, you mortals will not see them unless we choose to reveal them. Like so.

You’re looking pale, my dear. That will never do if we’re going to be seen later — allow me to take care of looking pale for both of us. Still, I must admit I’m disap-pointed that you seem so disturbed by the notion of my being a vampire. Take a moment and compose yourself, if you can. Truth be told, I’m afraid that’s the least of the shocks waiting for you tonight. Please, don’t waste time trying to come up with a rational, scientific explanation, because there isn’t one. It’s just what I am. What many, many of us are — too many, by some accounts.

Sample

file

Vampire: The masquerade

4

Damnation, are you truly that much of a fool? Sit back down. I said sit. Now watch. Hush, stop screaming. No one will come to rescue you, and no one will call the police — not in this building. Discreet neighbors are a blessing to one in my condition. It’s positively Victorian the way they ignore anything not directly in front of them.

So, at last you have your proof. Now do you believe me? Yes, it is blood in the other decanter; served cold like that, of course, the stuff loses much of its taste. You can try it if you like, but I don’t recommend it, no. You’re not set up to enjoy such things, at least not as presently configured.

Don’t get ahead of yourself guessing my intentions, my dear. If I were going to act according to your beloved clichés, you would be dead right now. I am a predator, after all, and you and your entire species are my prey.

Beginnings

suppose we should begin with the basics of the whole thing. I am in fact a vampire, brought into this state of existence in the Year of Our Lord 1796 by a woman who was introduced to me as a quote-unquote “lady of the evening.” The gentleman who introduced us — one of her servants, I later discovered — had an odd sense of

humor. But I digress. Yes, I do drink human blood. Without the nourishment it provides, I

will wither away; with it, I will live forever. Yes, forever. Unless destroyed — and de-stroying one of the Damned is no mean feat, I can assure you — we vampires are every bit as immortal as the legends say. Only the sun, and the emotions it engenders, remain forever foreign to us; we Kindred can drink in the nights of countless ages, can remain unchanging while all that we know crumbles to dust around us and is replaced by another stage-set that in turn crumbles to dust, and so on.…

Ah, once again, I lose the way. Blood, yes, blood. I can get by on the blood of animals — most of us can, except the true elders of our kind — but such a diet is unpleasant. Unpalatable. No, we all want to feed on the best vintages, otherwise one goes around all the time with a dull ache in one’s gut that just never goes away. It gets worse the hungrier one gets, I might add; a vampire who goes too long without feeding is liable to demonstrate a regrettable lack of self-control.

There are other tell-tale physiological signs of my condition. My heart does not beat; the strength of my will alone suffices to force the blood through my body. My internal or-Sam

ple file

Prologue: A gAthering of BeAsts

5

gans, by all accounts, have long since atrophied into vestigial husks, but that won’t matter to a coroner, as once I am truly killed I will rapidly decompose into dust. In the meantime, however, I’m not troubled by such trifles as breathing, extremes of temperature and the like. My skin is cold, unless I take the effort to warm it. Doing so takes effort, though, and the expenditure of precious blood. Regular food is an abomination unto me, and it doesn’t sit for more than a few seconds in what remains of my stomach. Even with eternity stretching before me, my dear, I have better things to do with my time than to crouch over toilets, heaving ashes and gobbets into the bowl.

In layman’s terms, then, I am no longer human. For all intents and purposes, I am sim-ply a blood-drinking, ambulatory cadaver, indistinguishable from any body in a morgue unless I am moving about. I save the niceties like warming my flesh and remembering to blink for company, such as yourself.

Say thank you, dear. Keeping myself fresh and rosy-looking for you is costing me more than you know.

Ah, we return to the drinking of blood, the defining act, as it were, of my state. Yes, I am afraid it is a necessity, though one can leave one’s prey alive. All that requires is a lit-tle self-control and a touch of effort to close the wound — and no, we don’t all drink from the neck. You can cross another cliché off your list. The problem with leaving one’s prey alive, however, is that unless one has certain…protections, she remembers. Such breaches of the Masquerade are not looked on kindly by the vampiric powers that be. Oftentimes, it makes more sense simply to kill.

my Drinking ProBlem

he crux of the matter, really, is that drinking blood not only allows me to perpetu-ate my existence, but also provides a sensation unlike anything else this world has to offer. What is it like? My dear, words cannot describe it. Imagine drinking the finest champagne and the sensation of the most sensual lovemaking you’ve ever

experienced. Overlay that with the rush the opium fiend feels as he takes that first breath on the pipe, and you begin to have some sense, some tiny, infinitesimal sense of what it feels like to drink the blood of a kine — excuse me, a living human being. Your modern-day addicts will lie, steal, cheat and kill for their little tickets to Heaven. Mine is better, and it makes me immortal besides. Can you imagine the deeds I might commit to feed that hunger? Don’t bother speaking possibilities; the truth is worse than you can Sam

ple file

Vampire: The masquerade

6

imagine. And I am considered to be a gentleman of my kind. Now imagine, if you will, some of my relatives, the ones who aren’t so nice as I.

They can — and do — commit acts that even I don’t wish to consider.

And here you are, poor little mortal, learn-ing how fragile your whole existence is.

Are you starting to be afraid yet? You should be.

the first fAtAl siP

n most cases, one receives one’s first drink of blood on the night one be-comes a vampire — one of the “Kindred,” as we like to call ourselves.

The process is called “The Embrace,” and has two distinct and rather difficult phases. The first is simple: The vampire who wishes to create progeny drinks every last drop of blood he can from his intended “childe.” This is no different from normal feeding, save that one doesn’t need to worry about erasing the memory or disposing of the corpse afterward, and that one gets a very full meal indeed. The difference comes afterward.

Once the last bit of blood has pulsed its way out, the “parent” vampire — the technical term is “sire,” not that you care yet — then returns some of his ill-gotten gains. He bites his lip, or wrist, or what-ever, and allows some of his blood to pass his victim’s lips. Assuming that the mortal

Sample

file