Post by The Mouth on Jul 19, 2014 16:24:37 GMT -8
3rd of June, 2013
Liverpool, England
Say what you will about the fuckers, the Sabbat know how to party.
Except replace ‘party’ with ‘blood explosion extraordinaire’.
Grigori has brought me as ‘Devon Phillips, neutral blood dealer’ - Something I can deliver on. I brought a sample of something special with me.
This is extremely chancey. Grigori has no love for me, but I’ve sold him on the Great Game; Grigori loved playing spymaster and he gets to do it with me all over again. I think he’s been a little bored; but when we are done he knows he has to get me before I get him. We both know the stakes and we both know the rules and I do believe we are looking forward to another scrum, him and I.
Right now we are going into a dole housing unit. Abandoned to urban blight years ago it is a favoured hang out of local gangs, hoodies, raver babies, and anything else under eighteen and looking for an Anti-Social Behaviour Order. Tonight, in a section cleared in the top three floors a new Archbishop will be crowned.
Grigori briefed me before we even got on the boat to get here. “You’re not with a pack. It shows. Someone will pick a fight with you. Avoid frenzies, they are contagious. There will be a Sacrament; you will drink. There will be challenges, do not interfere. In fact expect at least one to be made against you. If you antagonize one of a pack expect the whole pack to come after you. Don’t preach that Cammie rahat you might still believe in; in fact look real bored about the politics.”
So here we are. I can hear, fuck that, feel the music through my shoes. I’m dressed in a high-end Armani suit from twenty years ago; comfortable, worn, unremarkable in most business settings. Here I could get less attention if I was on fire. The black enameled Haliburton case doesn’t help me much. I look like a bad movie cliche of a drug dealer, which suits me just fine.
My new face itches. Grigori re-arranged the bones on my cheeks slightly, altered the jaw, moved my ears a fraction of an inch and I was a new man. And it hurt, as bad as anything. Grigori assured me that given time I could return to my normal self, but for the moment I was good to go.
We enter the front lobby, tagged and black lit like art school clowns threw up all over the place. Cartoony letters claiming space for such and such and then written over by who and who; the walls mark out several weeks of teen peacocking. Mostly young males displaying bright feathers to attract vulnerable females to grind against them.
Kids these days.
We go up through the lower floors; the bottom being a shooting gallery and medical station. Large raves have those in this day and age; mostly detox and hyrdation. They call aid cars if they think someone is in serious trouble. Tonight the calls are going upstairs for the harvest.
If this was a Camarilla meet then the ghouls and childer on the outs would be on the floors directly below their Elders and masters. They would also be shooting up and shagging like rabbits. Was never my scene but if you didn’t participate every now and then it would get reported back that there was something amiss; Vampires have to spend blood to simulate sex - Ghouls not doing so could be seen as Vampire imposters.
Instead I’m struck with this floor having all of it’s walls knocked out, structural supports clad in concrete and steel, the whole top three floors open up. On the floor is some or of complicated gas jet system; as I watch the flames seem to have a randomized timer cranking gas into them and the flare with a roar. Some poor bastard who was jumping over them is engulfed briefly and shrieks with the terror of the Rotschreck.
In the middle of the room is an ornate footed bath tub. Next to that is a honest to God iron cauldron, a massive affair. I watch as as two licks walk up to the cauldron, talk to the, I don’t know, cook? and nip their wrists. Their blood spatters into the cauldron and the creature, because nothing that hunched and hideous stirs it gently with a ladle. There is no flame under the cauldron but the blood inside steams slightly.
Magic. Or a heating coil, but I don’t spot a plug in anywhere.
The tub is massive. Ominously there is a rack above it, welded out of scrap steel with chains, barbed wire, and meat hooks hanging off of it. Not… Good.
Devon Phillips has seen all this before, got to be cool.
“Vycheslav, this is Devon.” Grigori is introducting me to a skeletally thin nude collection of scars and bone piercings. Second thought, those are his bones. Even coming out his todger; yeah. Around him are a collection of simpering females, ghouls by the look of them, all a little too perfect and uniform.
“Devon? Hmm. I am the steward for our new Archbishop. Grigori assures me your wares are to die for…” Vycheslav has multiple vocal cord sets tuned in harmony with each other. Not creepy in the slightest. Yeah.
“And I probably would if my clients did not approve, Herr Vycheslav.”
“Ah, a Prussian?” He caught the accent right away. German, eastern, pre-world war two. Upper crust. I worked on this for weeks.
“Ja. But I am more of an international merchant these days.”
“Phillips isn’t very German…”
“But it is very American. And thus global.”
“Tell me what you do, Mr. Phillips.” Vycheslav leans back and his beavy of women form a bench for him to lay upon.
“I know blood. I make small changes to affect flavor, quality, narcotics. I have special vintages that I keep track of generationally; and no I will not share my sources or methods. Just my product.”
His couch arches to press itself against his body, the spines and barbs piercing through the latex and flesh of the writhing furniture. The women, despite the pain, arch and try to press their bodies into as much contact with Vycheslav as possible.
“Fine then… Let me sample your product.”
“Excellent. I have an acute understanding of both the science, medicine, and mysticism regarding blood. What I have achieved is to capture the terroir of a given region and time. Today I brought a sample of Catalonian; in estrus with a hint of mescaline.”
I open the case with a special key and pull out a cut crystal goblet that will hold roughly an ounce of blood. I then pull forth a vaccum vial and a hypodermic. Extracting the blood I place it in the globlet in a fine stream.
“Here.”
I hand Vycheslave the small glass and he sips. His eyes roll back as he swirls the blood around his mouth. “Not pure Catalonian…”
I frown slightly. “Well, allowances for modern drift. I assure you…”
“Yes yes. I can taste the estrus, the and mescaline adds a slight hint of citrus. Very good Mr. Phillips. Do you have any more? And how do you keep the blood warm?”
“I do have more. And warm? That is part of my proprietary process.”
“Very well. I will take another sample to the Archbishop and see if you continue to impress. I…”
“Who is this creature, Vycheslav?” the voice is imperious, shrill, and angry. I turn and see an obese man, in his thirties, wearing blood spattered GAP gear. His fangs are out, and he walks towards us with a shuffle waddle.
I raise my eyebrow in response.
Vycheslav sighs. “My apprentice. He’s quite good. Gathered all the materials for our Ritae tonight. He has,” the sneering contempt could float the HMS Victory, “connections with the mortals.”
I shrug. “So do I. They help me be places I could otherwise not be. But they are tools. Nothing more, nothing less.”
“They can be more.” The reply from the fat one is petulant.
Still looking at Vycheslav, “Is this one considered an adult?” Vycheslav nods.
I set my case down. I then whip around and slap the offending screecher across the face. “Silence, you petulant childe. Do not drag me into your squabbles.”
It felt like hitting jello stiffened with lead shot.
The fat one grasps his cheek with a pudgy hand, and his eyes start to glow red. “Monomacy!” he shrieks. Vycheslav erupts from his couch, ripping himself from the flesh of his women who moan in pain.
“Oscar, no! Ramirez has said there is to be no challenges!”
Grigori adds in, “No challenge. Devon isn’t an initiate; he cannot be allowed into the Monomacy.”
Oscar is panting. “Then I shall have satisfaction! If he isn’t part of the Sabbat then I shall reclaim his blood! I wi-” And that is when I shoot Oscar in the eye.
Seriously, no one was looking at me, so when I calmly pulled out my compact .45 and put it in Oscar’s face there was a little bit of shock on everyone’s part. Including mine.
Oscar’s left eye exploded, vitreous humors splattering across his face and vitae misting out from the exit wound in his skull. He howled, claws forming from his fingertips as he swings at me. Fucking lovely, a Gangrel.
Clearly this is a lethal fight, so I shoot him again… With no effect. Then I have 5’6” of fat fury swing at me. Swaying back I feel the claws bite flesh across my belly. I try to bring the gun back to station but Oscar grabs the barrel and wrenches it from me. Clattering to the floor I dive to retrieve it, rolling on my back as I scoop up the pistol.
Looking up between my legs I see Oscar leaping at me. I call upon my Blood for a little speed and pop Oscar in the face. He lands on me, stradling me, and his claws plunge into my chest, then out again. The wounds close almost immediately; god bless my Ventrue lineage.
Using my heightened reflexes I jam the gun under Oscar’s jaw and pull the trigger; the large calibre hollow point lifts a chunk of skull up and out as it clears the vacuum that is Oscar’s skull.
Oscar goes limp and I roll him off me; all of ten seconds have passed. I get to my feet and stare at a somewhat shocked Vycheslav and Grigori. He is starting to pick up that I might be a wee bad ass, the Grigori. Vycheslav is surprised that things got that out of hand that fast.
“My apologies. I do not take well to threats.”
“No, you clearly do not, Devon- Your Emminence!”
Vycheslav is on his knees in a flash, as is Grigori. I turn around to see a woman, afro-caribbean, small, about 5 foot tall, and slender. She is wearing a robe and is looking deeply pissed. “Vycheslav!”
“Your Emminence.”
“What have I told you about Grigori’s ideas of fun and games?” She speaks with an odd accent and her small body makes a powerful voice. She is a war leader and now Baron of her realm, not a woman to be trifled with.
“That they were neither fun, nor games.” Grigori winces slightly at Vycheslav’s indictment.
“And I believe I said no Challenges tonight.”
“That you did, your Emminence.”
“Than why aren’t on the rack you designed and celebrate the feast with your beauties and cap it off with your hearts blood?”
Sigh. Time to get involved. “Your Emminence. This filth threatened me with the Final Death after Vycheslave denied his ‘monomacy’ challenge. I apologize for the disturbance.” I click my heels and give a slight bow.
The force of her gaze is palpable on my scalp as I maintain my bow. “And you are?”
“Devon Phillips, I was hoping to show my wares as a… Vendor? for your event. The over jumped waste of vitae Oscar thought I was taking his position with Vycheslav; he threatened me. So I responded with non-lethal force. He did not return the courtesy.”
“Vycheslav.”
“It is as he says. Your Eminence.”
There is a pause. I can feel her looking at me, measuring me. “Is he going to participate in the Rites this evening?”
“He says he will up to a point, your Eminence,” and Vycheslav is a dirty fucking liar, because I promised no such thing.
Her reply? A non-committal ‘hrmph.’ Time to roll the dice again.
I stand up straight and look her in the eye. I know she is Lasombra, I am in her place of power. Luckily the music downstairs is so loud that the gun shots didn’t do much to startle the kine. It mostly disturbed a couple of the attendees; some of whom were heading this way.
“If you command it of me; I will share in your rites. But I must, for the sake of my interests, insist on being apolitical; as much as a Kindred might be. If this is not acceptable, then I ask for your mercy in striking down a member of your sect; either way I shall forfeit any charge for my expertise or wares this evening.”
Her lip curls in a smile at my boldness. “And his pack, what of them?”
I shrug. “I pray they have better manners. If they have an issue it shall be settled after tonight. It would be the height of discourtesy to create more distress for your ceremony. If they insist on pressing the matter tonight…” I lock eyes with her, and with absolute sincerity I finish my statement “Then I shall be considerable less restrained than I was with Oscar.”
She giggles, like the girl in her late teens that she appears to be. “That was restrained Mr…?”
“Phillips. Devon Phillips, your Emminence.”
“Call me Archbishop Ramirez, Mr. Phillips. I shall sample your wares, and you will entertain me this evening…”
“Yes, Archbishop.”
She whirls, the robes flaring out about her, her voice, a low soprano rings out to the corners of the room. “Oscar has violated my orders and provoked an attack by this non-Believer! He is not of the Sword, but acted in accordance with it! I say on this night that any may claim satisfaction against him, this Devon Phillips! But if you lose… You will share Oscar’s fate.” She turns to the kneeling Vycheslav, “String him up Steward.”
“Mr. Phillips, you will assist him.”
She leaves to finish her preparations, and Vycheslav and I remain in our positions for a moment. I knew the look in the Archbishop’s eyes: Boredom having been relieved. I was going to have every penny ante tough guy in the house on me, I was already hurt, and those claws were going to be a bitch and a half to heal up.
“Vycheslav, how many more am I going to have to take down tonight?”
He stands up and grabs one of Oscar’s arms. I bend down and grab the other. “Oh, no more than 2 or 3. I’m sure you will manage. All told, you did her a favor. Oscar’s sire needed a way out from the little shit and I wanted to train someone else a little less high strung. Of course Oscar’s sire will make a pro-forma pass at getting permission to fight you. He’ll wait until you’ve fought one or two more. Then he will beg the Archbishop for a challenge by proxy… The Archbishop will turn him down; saying she values your services. He will posture a bit, make a little hassle for you, then you pay him off and all is well.”
I look at him for a moment. “My. Good to know. How very…”
Grigori hisses at me “Don’t say Camarilla!”
“Politcal of you.”
We drag Oscar to the tub with the hooks. “Any way we can wake him up?” I ask.
Vycheslav smiles at me. “Of course. Do want to pay the freight?”
“How much?”
“Just a small favor, in the future.”
Internally I sigh. “Do it.”
We heave Oscar to the tub. Vycheslav uses hoists on the chains and jams the hooks through the bones in Oscar’s calves, then hoists him up. “I shall go and speak to the Blood Witch. Wait here.”
I wait. In ten minutes a small crowd of posturing childer are pestering me, asking me who I am, who do I think I am, and whether or not I’m going to join the Cause.
The last one gets a “Fuck your cause. Stick a dick in your crusade too.” - While leaning and softly pitched for the young woman’s ears.
She shrieks and screams “I’m gonna kill you motherfu-” She cuts off suddenly because the iron wood knife I palmed is pinning her heart. She’s paralyzed almost instantly.
The crowd pauses. Some of them can’t even see what it is I’ve done because it looks like a hug. I spin around drop her in the tub. I turn to the nearest of the punks and catch his eye. “Hook her up,” and the Command ripples across his body as he stiffly lifts a leg and pulls the chain hoist to lift her up.
I go back to looking at the crowd, now thinning out as they slink into a retreat. There are four of the original dozen or so left, and the one lifting the girl up into the air. That one is sobbing; he might have known the woman; more likely he knows that he is dead or the next best thing for getting rolled so easily by me.
The Sabbat are very big on their idea of natural selection.
The four that are left appear to be in a gang; or maybe this is a pack. “So, you ladies and gentlemen part of a pack?”
“No… Not yet,” snarls one of the women. She’s tall, muscled, real amazon type. The other girl is more girly but less prone to keeping up her appearance, she has a punk-ish look to her but she doesn’t maintain the mohawk. It was an unfortunate thing to be Embraced missing hair. But less so in the Sabbat given all the Fleshcrafters available.
“You need the Archbishop’s blessing.”
Amazon nods. She is the alpha, the ratty girl is her beta. The other two are followers.
“So, you can come at me, swarm me over. Which will do you no favors. Or you can find the dumbest piece of sheiss in the room and send him my way to get put on a hook. Then you can get my card and I can give you some work with Grigori over there.” I nod over at Grigori. Grigori nods back. “You get a rep for being tough minded and flexible, get a few names under your belt, and then the Archbishop will see you get what you need.”
She looks me up and down for a moment. “And if I don’t?”
I give her the full smile, with the fangs. “Then I stop playing so nicely.” She doesn’t back up, just. But her two toadies do. She will beat them later for it.
She nods. “Fine. We’ll talk to Grigori later.”
“Excellent. Now, shoo now. Find me my next victim.”
The Amazon smirks and she wanders back to chat to the various other pack leaders. I check my Haliburton. I wait. Twenty, then thirty minutes pass. A man walks out of the crowd and up to me. He is shirtless, displaying a perfect phsyique, all ripple and toned musculature, an ivory Adonis. Dark haired, he has a sword slung low on his hip, and only one thing mars his otherwise perfect face; a dueling scar. German then, embraced just before World War II… And a Ventrue.
Look. It’s something we just know. I’ll try to define it: Ventrue are embraced from power brokers; so are Losambra. The difference is that Losambra are powers behind the throne. Ventrue are the throne. We have it beaten into us that our prey exclusions aren’t a weakness, they are a strength. We feed off one type of human because, on some level, we choose to. Additionally it is often pointed out, in a somewhat dark fashion, that Kindred vitae is always fair game.
We walk knowing that we can take any hit that comes at us and in a literal sense sway the hearts and minds of friend and foe alike. Unlearning that arrogance is one of the things Selim beat out of me but it is a point that is inescable to the trained eye of a martial artist. Such as a practitioner of the mensurschlagen, or ritualized German sword dueling.
Great. Now I have to kill the guy. He’ll know me as a Ventrue; he will peg my accent as off; and I will not use the right sword style for a Prussian trained swordsman.
Good thing I brought a sword with me.
I turn and am somewhat surprised that the sadly weeping fledgling is curled by the tub. I tilt my head slightly. “What is your name boy?”
“J-Jerry.”
I look at the girl hanging from the hook and back to him. “Who was she?”
“M-my girlfriend. They took us at the same time. T-t-two months ago.”
“I see. She adapted better than you. Women often do. You couldn’t save her, and just now you know you couldn’t save yourself either.”
J-Jerry just nods.
“Well then. Fetch my sword, boy. Serve me and live. Lay here and die.”
Jerry nods again, getting to his feet. “Go ask Grigori where the coat room is. It should be there.”
Jerry scampers off.
The bare-chested Ventrue approaches now, having witnessed my little exchange. In German he asks, “Strange choice in squires.”
“I do what I can,” also in German. “He is not for your life. He may not be for mine, either. But I will give him the chance to learn.”
“Bah. He is weak. Worthless. You dilute our vitae by letting him live.”
“Ah. So he is yours?”
“Yes. I lost a wager, and was forced to make him. The woman he was with, she was something.” His eyes flicker to the woman on the hook.
“She was weaker than he by far. She wouldn’t have the courage to string him up and sever her last connection to the old life. She would have gone mad eventually, from the guilt.”
A smile spreads across the perfect lips of the stranger. “But such a madness can be made into something great.”
I sigh theatrically. “That is what every poor shithead villain thinks. I could respect your sect more if it wasn’t always chasing the tail of human morality with false idols made of Paths of Enlightenment. It makes you weak.”
The smile turns to a scowl. “Weak!? We have freed ourselves from the morality of the human and made a new road to chain the beast.”
“It weakens you to other influences. I’ve heard that the Sabbat has an Inquisition. To find and hunt apologists, undeniable. But primary to hunt those who serve infernal powers. The Anarchs and the Camarilla have no need for such things; mad dogs are found and shot. Murdered quickly and efficiently for there is no pile of bodies to hide their work. You Sabbat… You were fools enough to invite them in. Attempting to divorce yourself from you human origins you let the demons in with you.”
He hisses at me. “I am Viktor von Graff, and while I will not challenge you to a Monomacy, if you claim to be a man of honor, you will duel me, here and now.”
“Fine. Swords?”
Viktor smiles slowly. “Of course I am accepting of that. Are you sure you want to to it now? You must be exhausted from your other fights.”
“No. From your bearing you are a Knight, a Templar of the Sabbat.”
He looks serious now. “I am. I have served Archbishop Ramierez, faithfully, as one of her champions for nearly a decade. I have fought three Monomacy duels in her honor and I serve her faithfully, curr.”
A curious process in my Embrace, similar to the one that left my heart beating, my body luke warm, and as I’ve been told, my aura bright is an insight. When I hear a statement or see an action taken by someone I can pick it apart; almost instantly.
Like now.
He says he serves faithfully. But he is a man of honor; men of honor don’t boast about their loyalty to strangers. They don’t have to. Also, he is picking a fight when his Archbishop made it clear that she wouldn’t appreciate serious challenges. She wanted me harassed, not dead. If I got dead then bully for the victor; but her upper court should know better. In fact he admitted that he knew the girl and Jerry, so likelyhood is that he sent the young ones to wear me down.
Because I am a foreign agent with unknown connections whose humiliation would reflect in a negative light to other foreign powers who might seek alliance in Ramirez’s court.
He waited, and probably Dominated his Childe to be a weak willed pissant so that he might intervene with his rights as a Sire taking precedence to the will of his Archbishop; honor would demand that his faithful service be repaid by granting a death-duel over his right to reclaim his Childe’s vitae, punish his childe, or whatever.
After all, he was a man of honor. He’d proved it in duels. Right into the dark heart of the warrior culture of the Sabbat.
My my. This is some long term planning. Takes out the neonates and the Ancillae almost immediately. This guy is a ranked Ancillae already, so his handler had to have been around him during his Embrace…
“Say, dear chap, were you part of the delegations that were sent through in the 1850’s to marry off Victoria’s children?” His eyes widen and I realize that I’ve gone back to good old Brittain in my language and accent.
Habits. Get you killed.
“You are an imposter!”
“No. Not in the slightest.” slipping back into my German. “I speak many languages, flawlessly. I am here to sell my wares. And it takes one, to know one. Sir.”
“Bah, I am no imposter. I am a Von Graff, of Clan Ventrue.” He is imperious, regal.
“Name your sire.”
“What?”
“Name. Your. Sire.”
“Lord Chatham, of Glenbrook. Childe of…”
I cut him off. “Yes, yes. I know the line. Except Chatham was in Ireland in 1848 dealing with the collapse of the Herds there due to the Famine. He was in Torpor from 1850 to 1910 when a Sabbat assassin got to him. So, clearly, not your sire. Because you were Embraced in the late 1850, judging by your sabre.” I look a little more closely at his face. “Your scar was made by a working blade, a soldier’s sword. Not the fancy razor blades they used later, distinct puckering on the edges, a little less precise. So, you got that pre-1860’s when they switched sword styles.”
Von Graff looks at his sabre, then at me. “How did you…”
“The basket design is general issue to cavalry troopers in the 1850’s. I know things. It’s my job. Other things I know. Shortly after your Embrace by a nameless Sabbat Ventrue you tracked down Chatham and posed as his Childe. He was in Torpor, and had been visiting abroad so that was easy enough. You murdered a member of the local Prussian guard, took his place with some flesh crafting; you are a little too perfect. Then you spent the next fifty years tracking down Chatham; which you completed in 1910.”
“Lies. I am Viktor von Graff, childe of Chatham, embraced in 1908 when he came out of Torpor. I learned of the righteousness of the Crusade and joined it, betraying my sire in his apostasy.” He stands up straighter. This is his tell; he acts too much the part of the honor bound Ventrue.
“No. You are a common Prussian soldier embraced after trying to ape his betters with a sword duel. You stole the life of someone else. And you have been working for someone other than the Archbishop for years, doing their dirty work. My guess is a faction within the Sabbat, unsure. Could be you work for the Nosferatu with Yuria, this is it’s kind of…”
Fear. Viktor just showed fear. Oh shit. He works for it, as a direct agent.
Oh Grigori, I could kiss you.
Grigori had spotted the little destabilizing elements in Ramirez's camp, had concluded that someone was deliberately throttling the ambitious Losambra, and that if anyone attacked Ramirez in Liverpool they needed her to be isolated.
Yeah. Serious Jihad.
We’d been talking softly, but my glance at Grigori told me all I needed. He was whispering in Vycheslav’s ear, and Vycheslav was very intent on me and Viktor. The whole court was.
“You know Viktor, I never told anyone where I was from. Or my bloodline. In fact, all they know is that I speak German with a distinct Prussian accent and that I am a high end dealer of a product in demand. Hard to catch me with that. I was vetted by a known spymaster; but I remain an outsider. My word doesn’t mean much here.”
Viktor smiles, then spits at my feet. Loudly he proclaims, “You are a liar and a thief. My blood is mine to do with as I please. I will have my satisfaction.”
J-Jerry walks up with my sword case. “And I will have mine, you jumped up pissant common curr. You cannot serve two masters so I will do what I can to relieve you of both.”
I open up my case and pull out 38 inches of polished steel. A faint rippling in the steel across the broad fuller construction highlights the spider lily maker stamp above the cross guard. It is perfectly balanced, light, fine pointed to pierce armor. I am facing an opponent who has intrigued for over a century, has fought duels, and will be trying to kill me with a hideous vengeance just to let his master’s plan play out a little longer.
For my part, I spent years in the London courts and then was Embraced in Seattle. Let’s see how this plays out.
Viktor unbuckles his sword belt draws his sabre. It is a soldier’s weapon, curved and deadly efficient when used on horseback. Fortunately for me it Von Graff is not on a horse. I put glove and gauntlet on my left hand with the vambrace and assume the high eagle.
“An ancient style. Foolish.” Victor comes at me, his sabre held parallel to the floor, the tip dips and he goes to open me up. I bring the longsword down in a two handed grip not at him bit his forearm. There is a resistance, like half frozen beef, then nothing. There is a clatter as I follow through to the side as his sabre, his hand with it, hits the floor. I whirl and Viktor dives to retrieve his blade.
I wait, let him stand. “Jerry. Collect my hand. I keep what I cut.”
Viktor is enraged. “That is not how men of honor fight!”
I grin, fangs out, feral. “Who said I was a man of honor? That seems more to be your little game.”
Selim taught me early on that honorable men only win against other honorable men. In a fight, you win. Or you die. So, win.
“Mr. Phillips!”
I snap to attention and turn to the left. The Archbishop is standing there with her hair braided elaborately, deep henna stains on her dusky skin in a white shift. “Jawhol, Archbishop Ramirez?”
“Fight him on his terms. Give my Templar his hand back.”
“Ja, Archbishop Ramirez. Jerry. His hand.”
Trembling, Jerry gives Von Graff his hand back. Vitae is oozing from the wound and Viktor hand Jerry his sabre for a moment. I wait a moment and see the flesh mend, a moment later Viktor is flexing his right hand. Jerry scuttles away.
“Mr. Phillips, please continue.”
We square off again. Viktor is all too aware now that his experience is on the Sallee and he hasn’t really ever had a fight like me. He will try a trick, and he’s just old enough…
I attack, grabbing the mid-point on my blade and driving it into his clavicle. He twists slightly, and my blade binds against his bones. With blurring speed he buries his sabre in my gut, I can feel the blade pull against my clothes on my back.
The crowd gasps in amazement at this reversal of fortune.
Oh yes, the burning. Son of a bitch, poisoned his weapon, smeared the poisoned blood on one side. Not like the lighting is great in here, so he could hide the flat by turning it carefully.
See, that is an intrigue move.
I call on my blood to aid my Ventrue heritage in ignoring what he has done, then I intrigue myself.
I slump in apparent pain and terror, a wheeze coming from me, gripping onto the sword in him to stay standing. “You bastard,” I manage to force out. “You poisoned your sword.”
Grinning, he whispers back, holding me in a sort of intimate embrace. “As you said, we are not men of honor.”
He shoves me clear, pulling his sabre from my abdomen, and I barely manage to pull my sword free.
I stagger back, barely upright, my steel covered left arm covering my wound, my sword held limply in my right.
Triumph in his eyes and he swings in for the kill, a flat beheading stroke.
The look on his face when I spun to the side with the overhand chop… I will treasure it.
The scream and smell of burning meat will haunt me.
Richter was a pal and enchanted my sword so that with a thought flames would erupt on it doing horrific things to, well, everyone it hit.
Viktor’s arrogant confidence was gone as he clutched the charred stump of his arm.
I raised the blade high and stalked towards him.
“Mr. Phillips!”
I stop, “Jawhol mein Archbishop Ramirez,” I growl out. My Beast is on the verge of frenzy; a cowering foe in front of me and blood and burned meat in my throat, thick and cloying.
“I said, on his terms!” She is ticked.
“Ja. He poisoned his blade, and struck first. He did not announce this fact.”
There is silence.
“He did what?” The ripples are moving through the court now.
“The man of honor cheated. Jerry, bring the blade to Vycheslav.”
Jerry rushed out, a look of awe on his face. He grabbed the arm and the sword. “Leave the arm Jerry. I keep what I cut.” I don’t take my eyes off of Viktor.
Vycheslav examines the sword and tastes the blood. “Your emminence, there is a trace of Assamite venom on this blade.”
Ramirez goes still, in that way that Elders can. “Viktor von Graff, have you been holding back on us?”
“N-no, your Eminence, it is a trick by the outsider!”
“I think not, Viktor. Your honor was so highly prized by me that I offered you allowances I denied to others. Yet… A poisoned blade?”
“Nein; your Eminence! I don’t-”
“Viktor. Tell her who you work for.” He catches my eye in his desperation to not look at the Archbishop. “Tell her.” The command rips out and Viktor screams “Licinius Paulus!”
The Archbishop steps back, looking like she was slapped. “Licinius? Who is -”
A figure flickers into view; a blur whose steel whips out and disappears before any one can speak further.
Viktor’s eyes bulge out has he tries to speak but his head is sliding from his body before he utters another word. “Assassins!” Vycheslav screams and the room plunges into darkness and chaos.
I go flat on the floor and douse my blade, cloaking myself in the shadows. Muffled shrieks, the sound of metal meeting flesh and bone. This goes on for a few minutes then silence. The darkness lets up.
The first thing I see is Jerry huddled around my sword case peering from the interior of the cast iron bathtub. The second is an inky shadow moving over the sides of the tub. Everything gets awfully surreal when the DJ’s downstairs trigger some sort of roar from the kids dancing below.
The air is filled with dust and the smell of blood. Of the forty some odd licks in the room we seem to be down by fifteen; Vycheslav is climbing up from a pile of bloody limbs that were his women; they formed a human shield on him when the assassins struck; Margritte and Grigori are huddling together. Grigori lost a foot apparently, Margritte is looking for it and gives a happy cry when she locates it a moment later.
The pack of fledglings I dealt with earlier seems intact.
The liquid pool of shadow reforms into the Archbishop; to remain a Bishop for a while longer while she rebuilds her forces. This attack on the eve of her triumph will likely cripple her for a decade or more; it is highly probable that there will be a follow up attack.
She looks around at the decaying corpses and ashes mixing with spattered vitae.
“They took my Ducti! My priests! My bishops! WHERE ARE MY BISHOPS!”
I see the frenzy take her and she flings Jerry to the side and rips into the two licks on the hooks. Oscar’s head goes flying across the room to land with a wet crunch. The female is just gutted and her heart shredded in rage filled talons.
She desecrates the remains for a few more minutes, then turns. Her hair is wild, tight braids having failed her rage, vitae spattered across her white shift.
She turns and sees me standing with my sword, taking in the room. She points at me so swiftly that an arc of blood flies from her hand to spatter my cheeks. It takes everything I have to not flinch.
“What was your part in this?”
Don’t blow cover yet… “I owed Grigori a favor; he wanted me to kick over a can or two. He knew Vycheslav had a jealous apprentice; we knew that someone was manipulating your court. Clearly Viktor was part of it, and we spotted how he was doing it. So, I played stalking horse… I would tell you more but the name he mentioned; that triggered the attack. That name has been protected a very long time.” I keep up the accent; difficult with the Archbishop’s full attention.
“What name?”
“The one that Viktor…”
She starts shaking “Viktor said nothing! You told him to name his master and his head fell off!”
I stop. Clearly, Viktor has given a name, but now I couldn’t recall it myself.
“Your Eminence; I merely exposed a plot. The assassins were already here. At the height of your ritual they would have struck; probably while you were least able to respond and everyone was blood-drunk. My pushing Viktor’s arrogance and sense… Son of a bitch.”
Grigor pipes up with, “What now Devon?”
“The whole time he thought he was going to win. The whole, fucking time. Even after I took his arm the first time. If it looked like I was winning they would have acted sooner, but I fooled him. And them. They panicked and had to wait for orders… Which means their handler wasn’t here and then was.” And I know how the handler did it, too.
“Your Eminence; count the ashes. Count the bodies. You’ll find that only ten of your most loyal supporters fell; the other five are dead as well, but have been for months if not years. They spread everything around so much to conceal the true number of dead; probably carrying the ashes of their victims with them this whole time.”
She nods to Vycheslav who then starts whispering orders. He looks at his women, and I swear I see a bit of blood well in his eye, then he is off trying to determine the true losses presented.
“Mr. Phillips. You are not a friend to me. Nor my sect. What has been done here will be answered with blood, but not yours. Should you find those responsible, call and I will ring down a vengeance on them. Until then…”
She gestures to Grigori. “Get him away from me. I no longer see any amusement in him.” Grigori nods when he suddenly picked up and wrenched down as Ramirez viciously rips his neck open. He gurgles on his own vitae as she whispers in his ear then drops him.
“A pleasant eve, your Eminence,” as Margritte and I gather Grigori up.
Margritte and I carry him through the savage party downstairs; none of the kine the wiser of the monsters organizing vengeance and death above.
Jerry is following me like a puppy, carrying my sword case, because I needed to inherit him, apparently.
As we load Grigori in the car I finally ask him. “What did she tell you at the end Grigori?”
He coughs wetly and manages to get out “Good job Grigori. Don’t fucking do it again.”
Another thing that will haunt me is Grigori’s smile at having played the Great Game and having won the day; more so that my own grin matched it.
The Sabbat
By Ben Vaughan
Liverpool, England
Say what you will about the fuckers, the Sabbat know how to party.
Except replace ‘party’ with ‘blood explosion extraordinaire’.
Grigori has brought me as ‘Devon Phillips, neutral blood dealer’ - Something I can deliver on. I brought a sample of something special with me.
This is extremely chancey. Grigori has no love for me, but I’ve sold him on the Great Game; Grigori loved playing spymaster and he gets to do it with me all over again. I think he’s been a little bored; but when we are done he knows he has to get me before I get him. We both know the stakes and we both know the rules and I do believe we are looking forward to another scrum, him and I.
Right now we are going into a dole housing unit. Abandoned to urban blight years ago it is a favoured hang out of local gangs, hoodies, raver babies, and anything else under eighteen and looking for an Anti-Social Behaviour Order. Tonight, in a section cleared in the top three floors a new Archbishop will be crowned.
Grigori briefed me before we even got on the boat to get here. “You’re not with a pack. It shows. Someone will pick a fight with you. Avoid frenzies, they are contagious. There will be a Sacrament; you will drink. There will be challenges, do not interfere. In fact expect at least one to be made against you. If you antagonize one of a pack expect the whole pack to come after you. Don’t preach that Cammie rahat you might still believe in; in fact look real bored about the politics.”
So here we are. I can hear, fuck that, feel the music through my shoes. I’m dressed in a high-end Armani suit from twenty years ago; comfortable, worn, unremarkable in most business settings. Here I could get less attention if I was on fire. The black enameled Haliburton case doesn’t help me much. I look like a bad movie cliche of a drug dealer, which suits me just fine.
My new face itches. Grigori re-arranged the bones on my cheeks slightly, altered the jaw, moved my ears a fraction of an inch and I was a new man. And it hurt, as bad as anything. Grigori assured me that given time I could return to my normal self, but for the moment I was good to go.
We enter the front lobby, tagged and black lit like art school clowns threw up all over the place. Cartoony letters claiming space for such and such and then written over by who and who; the walls mark out several weeks of teen peacocking. Mostly young males displaying bright feathers to attract vulnerable females to grind against them.
Kids these days.
We go up through the lower floors; the bottom being a shooting gallery and medical station. Large raves have those in this day and age; mostly detox and hyrdation. They call aid cars if they think someone is in serious trouble. Tonight the calls are going upstairs for the harvest.
If this was a Camarilla meet then the ghouls and childer on the outs would be on the floors directly below their Elders and masters. They would also be shooting up and shagging like rabbits. Was never my scene but if you didn’t participate every now and then it would get reported back that there was something amiss; Vampires have to spend blood to simulate sex - Ghouls not doing so could be seen as Vampire imposters.
Instead I’m struck with this floor having all of it’s walls knocked out, structural supports clad in concrete and steel, the whole top three floors open up. On the floor is some or of complicated gas jet system; as I watch the flames seem to have a randomized timer cranking gas into them and the flare with a roar. Some poor bastard who was jumping over them is engulfed briefly and shrieks with the terror of the Rotschreck.
In the middle of the room is an ornate footed bath tub. Next to that is a honest to God iron cauldron, a massive affair. I watch as as two licks walk up to the cauldron, talk to the, I don’t know, cook? and nip their wrists. Their blood spatters into the cauldron and the creature, because nothing that hunched and hideous stirs it gently with a ladle. There is no flame under the cauldron but the blood inside steams slightly.
Magic. Or a heating coil, but I don’t spot a plug in anywhere.
The tub is massive. Ominously there is a rack above it, welded out of scrap steel with chains, barbed wire, and meat hooks hanging off of it. Not… Good.
Devon Phillips has seen all this before, got to be cool.
“Vycheslav, this is Devon.” Grigori is introducting me to a skeletally thin nude collection of scars and bone piercings. Second thought, those are his bones. Even coming out his todger; yeah. Around him are a collection of simpering females, ghouls by the look of them, all a little too perfect and uniform.
“Devon? Hmm. I am the steward for our new Archbishop. Grigori assures me your wares are to die for…” Vycheslav has multiple vocal cord sets tuned in harmony with each other. Not creepy in the slightest. Yeah.
“And I probably would if my clients did not approve, Herr Vycheslav.”
“Ah, a Prussian?” He caught the accent right away. German, eastern, pre-world war two. Upper crust. I worked on this for weeks.
“Ja. But I am more of an international merchant these days.”
“Phillips isn’t very German…”
“But it is very American. And thus global.”
“Tell me what you do, Mr. Phillips.” Vycheslav leans back and his beavy of women form a bench for him to lay upon.
“I know blood. I make small changes to affect flavor, quality, narcotics. I have special vintages that I keep track of generationally; and no I will not share my sources or methods. Just my product.”
His couch arches to press itself against his body, the spines and barbs piercing through the latex and flesh of the writhing furniture. The women, despite the pain, arch and try to press their bodies into as much contact with Vycheslav as possible.
“Fine then… Let me sample your product.”
“Excellent. I have an acute understanding of both the science, medicine, and mysticism regarding blood. What I have achieved is to capture the terroir of a given region and time. Today I brought a sample of Catalonian; in estrus with a hint of mescaline.”
I open the case with a special key and pull out a cut crystal goblet that will hold roughly an ounce of blood. I then pull forth a vaccum vial and a hypodermic. Extracting the blood I place it in the globlet in a fine stream.
“Here.”
I hand Vycheslave the small glass and he sips. His eyes roll back as he swirls the blood around his mouth. “Not pure Catalonian…”
I frown slightly. “Well, allowances for modern drift. I assure you…”
“Yes yes. I can taste the estrus, the and mescaline adds a slight hint of citrus. Very good Mr. Phillips. Do you have any more? And how do you keep the blood warm?”
“I do have more. And warm? That is part of my proprietary process.”
“Very well. I will take another sample to the Archbishop and see if you continue to impress. I…”
“Who is this creature, Vycheslav?” the voice is imperious, shrill, and angry. I turn and see an obese man, in his thirties, wearing blood spattered GAP gear. His fangs are out, and he walks towards us with a shuffle waddle.
I raise my eyebrow in response.
Vycheslav sighs. “My apprentice. He’s quite good. Gathered all the materials for our Ritae tonight. He has,” the sneering contempt could float the HMS Victory, “connections with the mortals.”
I shrug. “So do I. They help me be places I could otherwise not be. But they are tools. Nothing more, nothing less.”
“They can be more.” The reply from the fat one is petulant.
Still looking at Vycheslav, “Is this one considered an adult?” Vycheslav nods.
I set my case down. I then whip around and slap the offending screecher across the face. “Silence, you petulant childe. Do not drag me into your squabbles.”
It felt like hitting jello stiffened with lead shot.
The fat one grasps his cheek with a pudgy hand, and his eyes start to glow red. “Monomacy!” he shrieks. Vycheslav erupts from his couch, ripping himself from the flesh of his women who moan in pain.
“Oscar, no! Ramirez has said there is to be no challenges!”
Grigori adds in, “No challenge. Devon isn’t an initiate; he cannot be allowed into the Monomacy.”
Oscar is panting. “Then I shall have satisfaction! If he isn’t part of the Sabbat then I shall reclaim his blood! I wi-” And that is when I shoot Oscar in the eye.
Seriously, no one was looking at me, so when I calmly pulled out my compact .45 and put it in Oscar’s face there was a little bit of shock on everyone’s part. Including mine.
Oscar’s left eye exploded, vitreous humors splattering across his face and vitae misting out from the exit wound in his skull. He howled, claws forming from his fingertips as he swings at me. Fucking lovely, a Gangrel.
Clearly this is a lethal fight, so I shoot him again… With no effect. Then I have 5’6” of fat fury swing at me. Swaying back I feel the claws bite flesh across my belly. I try to bring the gun back to station but Oscar grabs the barrel and wrenches it from me. Clattering to the floor I dive to retrieve it, rolling on my back as I scoop up the pistol.
Looking up between my legs I see Oscar leaping at me. I call upon my Blood for a little speed and pop Oscar in the face. He lands on me, stradling me, and his claws plunge into my chest, then out again. The wounds close almost immediately; god bless my Ventrue lineage.
Using my heightened reflexes I jam the gun under Oscar’s jaw and pull the trigger; the large calibre hollow point lifts a chunk of skull up and out as it clears the vacuum that is Oscar’s skull.
Oscar goes limp and I roll him off me; all of ten seconds have passed. I get to my feet and stare at a somewhat shocked Vycheslav and Grigori. He is starting to pick up that I might be a wee bad ass, the Grigori. Vycheslav is surprised that things got that out of hand that fast.
“My apologies. I do not take well to threats.”
“No, you clearly do not, Devon- Your Emminence!”
Vycheslav is on his knees in a flash, as is Grigori. I turn around to see a woman, afro-caribbean, small, about 5 foot tall, and slender. She is wearing a robe and is looking deeply pissed. “Vycheslav!”
“Your Emminence.”
“What have I told you about Grigori’s ideas of fun and games?” She speaks with an odd accent and her small body makes a powerful voice. She is a war leader and now Baron of her realm, not a woman to be trifled with.
“That they were neither fun, nor games.” Grigori winces slightly at Vycheslav’s indictment.
“And I believe I said no Challenges tonight.”
“That you did, your Emminence.”
“Than why aren’t on the rack you designed and celebrate the feast with your beauties and cap it off with your hearts blood?”
Sigh. Time to get involved. “Your Emminence. This filth threatened me with the Final Death after Vycheslave denied his ‘monomacy’ challenge. I apologize for the disturbance.” I click my heels and give a slight bow.
The force of her gaze is palpable on my scalp as I maintain my bow. “And you are?”
“Devon Phillips, I was hoping to show my wares as a… Vendor? for your event. The over jumped waste of vitae Oscar thought I was taking his position with Vycheslav; he threatened me. So I responded with non-lethal force. He did not return the courtesy.”
“Vycheslav.”
“It is as he says. Your Eminence.”
There is a pause. I can feel her looking at me, measuring me. “Is he going to participate in the Rites this evening?”
“He says he will up to a point, your Eminence,” and Vycheslav is a dirty fucking liar, because I promised no such thing.
Her reply? A non-committal ‘hrmph.’ Time to roll the dice again.
I stand up straight and look her in the eye. I know she is Lasombra, I am in her place of power. Luckily the music downstairs is so loud that the gun shots didn’t do much to startle the kine. It mostly disturbed a couple of the attendees; some of whom were heading this way.
“If you command it of me; I will share in your rites. But I must, for the sake of my interests, insist on being apolitical; as much as a Kindred might be. If this is not acceptable, then I ask for your mercy in striking down a member of your sect; either way I shall forfeit any charge for my expertise or wares this evening.”
Her lip curls in a smile at my boldness. “And his pack, what of them?”
I shrug. “I pray they have better manners. If they have an issue it shall be settled after tonight. It would be the height of discourtesy to create more distress for your ceremony. If they insist on pressing the matter tonight…” I lock eyes with her, and with absolute sincerity I finish my statement “Then I shall be considerable less restrained than I was with Oscar.”
She giggles, like the girl in her late teens that she appears to be. “That was restrained Mr…?”
“Phillips. Devon Phillips, your Emminence.”
“Call me Archbishop Ramirez, Mr. Phillips. I shall sample your wares, and you will entertain me this evening…”
“Yes, Archbishop.”
She whirls, the robes flaring out about her, her voice, a low soprano rings out to the corners of the room. “Oscar has violated my orders and provoked an attack by this non-Believer! He is not of the Sword, but acted in accordance with it! I say on this night that any may claim satisfaction against him, this Devon Phillips! But if you lose… You will share Oscar’s fate.” She turns to the kneeling Vycheslav, “String him up Steward.”
“Mr. Phillips, you will assist him.”
She leaves to finish her preparations, and Vycheslav and I remain in our positions for a moment. I knew the look in the Archbishop’s eyes: Boredom having been relieved. I was going to have every penny ante tough guy in the house on me, I was already hurt, and those claws were going to be a bitch and a half to heal up.
“Vycheslav, how many more am I going to have to take down tonight?”
He stands up and grabs one of Oscar’s arms. I bend down and grab the other. “Oh, no more than 2 or 3. I’m sure you will manage. All told, you did her a favor. Oscar’s sire needed a way out from the little shit and I wanted to train someone else a little less high strung. Of course Oscar’s sire will make a pro-forma pass at getting permission to fight you. He’ll wait until you’ve fought one or two more. Then he will beg the Archbishop for a challenge by proxy… The Archbishop will turn him down; saying she values your services. He will posture a bit, make a little hassle for you, then you pay him off and all is well.”
I look at him for a moment. “My. Good to know. How very…”
Grigori hisses at me “Don’t say Camarilla!”
“Politcal of you.”
We drag Oscar to the tub with the hooks. “Any way we can wake him up?” I ask.
Vycheslav smiles at me. “Of course. Do want to pay the freight?”
“How much?”
“Just a small favor, in the future.”
Internally I sigh. “Do it.”
We heave Oscar to the tub. Vycheslav uses hoists on the chains and jams the hooks through the bones in Oscar’s calves, then hoists him up. “I shall go and speak to the Blood Witch. Wait here.”
I wait. In ten minutes a small crowd of posturing childer are pestering me, asking me who I am, who do I think I am, and whether or not I’m going to join the Cause.
The last one gets a “Fuck your cause. Stick a dick in your crusade too.” - While leaning and softly pitched for the young woman’s ears.
She shrieks and screams “I’m gonna kill you motherfu-” She cuts off suddenly because the iron wood knife I palmed is pinning her heart. She’s paralyzed almost instantly.
The crowd pauses. Some of them can’t even see what it is I’ve done because it looks like a hug. I spin around drop her in the tub. I turn to the nearest of the punks and catch his eye. “Hook her up,” and the Command ripples across his body as he stiffly lifts a leg and pulls the chain hoist to lift her up.
I go back to looking at the crowd, now thinning out as they slink into a retreat. There are four of the original dozen or so left, and the one lifting the girl up into the air. That one is sobbing; he might have known the woman; more likely he knows that he is dead or the next best thing for getting rolled so easily by me.
The Sabbat are very big on their idea of natural selection.
The four that are left appear to be in a gang; or maybe this is a pack. “So, you ladies and gentlemen part of a pack?”
“No… Not yet,” snarls one of the women. She’s tall, muscled, real amazon type. The other girl is more girly but less prone to keeping up her appearance, she has a punk-ish look to her but she doesn’t maintain the mohawk. It was an unfortunate thing to be Embraced missing hair. But less so in the Sabbat given all the Fleshcrafters available.
“You need the Archbishop’s blessing.”
Amazon nods. She is the alpha, the ratty girl is her beta. The other two are followers.
“So, you can come at me, swarm me over. Which will do you no favors. Or you can find the dumbest piece of sheiss in the room and send him my way to get put on a hook. Then you can get my card and I can give you some work with Grigori over there.” I nod over at Grigori. Grigori nods back. “You get a rep for being tough minded and flexible, get a few names under your belt, and then the Archbishop will see you get what you need.”
She looks me up and down for a moment. “And if I don’t?”
I give her the full smile, with the fangs. “Then I stop playing so nicely.” She doesn’t back up, just. But her two toadies do. She will beat them later for it.
She nods. “Fine. We’ll talk to Grigori later.”
“Excellent. Now, shoo now. Find me my next victim.”
The Amazon smirks and she wanders back to chat to the various other pack leaders. I check my Haliburton. I wait. Twenty, then thirty minutes pass. A man walks out of the crowd and up to me. He is shirtless, displaying a perfect phsyique, all ripple and toned musculature, an ivory Adonis. Dark haired, he has a sword slung low on his hip, and only one thing mars his otherwise perfect face; a dueling scar. German then, embraced just before World War II… And a Ventrue.
Look. It’s something we just know. I’ll try to define it: Ventrue are embraced from power brokers; so are Losambra. The difference is that Losambra are powers behind the throne. Ventrue are the throne. We have it beaten into us that our prey exclusions aren’t a weakness, they are a strength. We feed off one type of human because, on some level, we choose to. Additionally it is often pointed out, in a somewhat dark fashion, that Kindred vitae is always fair game.
We walk knowing that we can take any hit that comes at us and in a literal sense sway the hearts and minds of friend and foe alike. Unlearning that arrogance is one of the things Selim beat out of me but it is a point that is inescable to the trained eye of a martial artist. Such as a practitioner of the mensurschlagen, or ritualized German sword dueling.
Great. Now I have to kill the guy. He’ll know me as a Ventrue; he will peg my accent as off; and I will not use the right sword style for a Prussian trained swordsman.
Good thing I brought a sword with me.
I turn and am somewhat surprised that the sadly weeping fledgling is curled by the tub. I tilt my head slightly. “What is your name boy?”
“J-Jerry.”
I look at the girl hanging from the hook and back to him. “Who was she?”
“M-my girlfriend. They took us at the same time. T-t-two months ago.”
“I see. She adapted better than you. Women often do. You couldn’t save her, and just now you know you couldn’t save yourself either.”
J-Jerry just nods.
“Well then. Fetch my sword, boy. Serve me and live. Lay here and die.”
Jerry nods again, getting to his feet. “Go ask Grigori where the coat room is. It should be there.”
Jerry scampers off.
The bare-chested Ventrue approaches now, having witnessed my little exchange. In German he asks, “Strange choice in squires.”
“I do what I can,” also in German. “He is not for your life. He may not be for mine, either. But I will give him the chance to learn.”
“Bah. He is weak. Worthless. You dilute our vitae by letting him live.”
“Ah. So he is yours?”
“Yes. I lost a wager, and was forced to make him. The woman he was with, she was something.” His eyes flicker to the woman on the hook.
“She was weaker than he by far. She wouldn’t have the courage to string him up and sever her last connection to the old life. She would have gone mad eventually, from the guilt.”
A smile spreads across the perfect lips of the stranger. “But such a madness can be made into something great.”
I sigh theatrically. “That is what every poor shithead villain thinks. I could respect your sect more if it wasn’t always chasing the tail of human morality with false idols made of Paths of Enlightenment. It makes you weak.”
The smile turns to a scowl. “Weak!? We have freed ourselves from the morality of the human and made a new road to chain the beast.”
“It weakens you to other influences. I’ve heard that the Sabbat has an Inquisition. To find and hunt apologists, undeniable. But primary to hunt those who serve infernal powers. The Anarchs and the Camarilla have no need for such things; mad dogs are found and shot. Murdered quickly and efficiently for there is no pile of bodies to hide their work. You Sabbat… You were fools enough to invite them in. Attempting to divorce yourself from you human origins you let the demons in with you.”
He hisses at me. “I am Viktor von Graff, and while I will not challenge you to a Monomacy, if you claim to be a man of honor, you will duel me, here and now.”
“Fine. Swords?”
Viktor smiles slowly. “Of course I am accepting of that. Are you sure you want to to it now? You must be exhausted from your other fights.”
“No. From your bearing you are a Knight, a Templar of the Sabbat.”
He looks serious now. “I am. I have served Archbishop Ramierez, faithfully, as one of her champions for nearly a decade. I have fought three Monomacy duels in her honor and I serve her faithfully, curr.”
A curious process in my Embrace, similar to the one that left my heart beating, my body luke warm, and as I’ve been told, my aura bright is an insight. When I hear a statement or see an action taken by someone I can pick it apart; almost instantly.
Like now.
He says he serves faithfully. But he is a man of honor; men of honor don’t boast about their loyalty to strangers. They don’t have to. Also, he is picking a fight when his Archbishop made it clear that she wouldn’t appreciate serious challenges. She wanted me harassed, not dead. If I got dead then bully for the victor; but her upper court should know better. In fact he admitted that he knew the girl and Jerry, so likelyhood is that he sent the young ones to wear me down.
Because I am a foreign agent with unknown connections whose humiliation would reflect in a negative light to other foreign powers who might seek alliance in Ramirez’s court.
He waited, and probably Dominated his Childe to be a weak willed pissant so that he might intervene with his rights as a Sire taking precedence to the will of his Archbishop; honor would demand that his faithful service be repaid by granting a death-duel over his right to reclaim his Childe’s vitae, punish his childe, or whatever.
After all, he was a man of honor. He’d proved it in duels. Right into the dark heart of the warrior culture of the Sabbat.
My my. This is some long term planning. Takes out the neonates and the Ancillae almost immediately. This guy is a ranked Ancillae already, so his handler had to have been around him during his Embrace…
“Say, dear chap, were you part of the delegations that were sent through in the 1850’s to marry off Victoria’s children?” His eyes widen and I realize that I’ve gone back to good old Brittain in my language and accent.
Habits. Get you killed.
“You are an imposter!”
“No. Not in the slightest.” slipping back into my German. “I speak many languages, flawlessly. I am here to sell my wares. And it takes one, to know one. Sir.”
“Bah, I am no imposter. I am a Von Graff, of Clan Ventrue.” He is imperious, regal.
“Name your sire.”
“What?”
“Name. Your. Sire.”
“Lord Chatham, of Glenbrook. Childe of…”
I cut him off. “Yes, yes. I know the line. Except Chatham was in Ireland in 1848 dealing with the collapse of the Herds there due to the Famine. He was in Torpor from 1850 to 1910 when a Sabbat assassin got to him. So, clearly, not your sire. Because you were Embraced in the late 1850, judging by your sabre.” I look a little more closely at his face. “Your scar was made by a working blade, a soldier’s sword. Not the fancy razor blades they used later, distinct puckering on the edges, a little less precise. So, you got that pre-1860’s when they switched sword styles.”
Von Graff looks at his sabre, then at me. “How did you…”
“The basket design is general issue to cavalry troopers in the 1850’s. I know things. It’s my job. Other things I know. Shortly after your Embrace by a nameless Sabbat Ventrue you tracked down Chatham and posed as his Childe. He was in Torpor, and had been visiting abroad so that was easy enough. You murdered a member of the local Prussian guard, took his place with some flesh crafting; you are a little too perfect. Then you spent the next fifty years tracking down Chatham; which you completed in 1910.”
“Lies. I am Viktor von Graff, childe of Chatham, embraced in 1908 when he came out of Torpor. I learned of the righteousness of the Crusade and joined it, betraying my sire in his apostasy.” He stands up straighter. This is his tell; he acts too much the part of the honor bound Ventrue.
“No. You are a common Prussian soldier embraced after trying to ape his betters with a sword duel. You stole the life of someone else. And you have been working for someone other than the Archbishop for years, doing their dirty work. My guess is a faction within the Sabbat, unsure. Could be you work for the Nosferatu with Yuria, this is it’s kind of…”
Fear. Viktor just showed fear. Oh shit. He works for it, as a direct agent.
Oh Grigori, I could kiss you.
Grigori had spotted the little destabilizing elements in Ramirez's camp, had concluded that someone was deliberately throttling the ambitious Losambra, and that if anyone attacked Ramirez in Liverpool they needed her to be isolated.
Yeah. Serious Jihad.
We’d been talking softly, but my glance at Grigori told me all I needed. He was whispering in Vycheslav’s ear, and Vycheslav was very intent on me and Viktor. The whole court was.
“You know Viktor, I never told anyone where I was from. Or my bloodline. In fact, all they know is that I speak German with a distinct Prussian accent and that I am a high end dealer of a product in demand. Hard to catch me with that. I was vetted by a known spymaster; but I remain an outsider. My word doesn’t mean much here.”
Viktor smiles, then spits at my feet. Loudly he proclaims, “You are a liar and a thief. My blood is mine to do with as I please. I will have my satisfaction.”
J-Jerry walks up with my sword case. “And I will have mine, you jumped up pissant common curr. You cannot serve two masters so I will do what I can to relieve you of both.”
I open up my case and pull out 38 inches of polished steel. A faint rippling in the steel across the broad fuller construction highlights the spider lily maker stamp above the cross guard. It is perfectly balanced, light, fine pointed to pierce armor. I am facing an opponent who has intrigued for over a century, has fought duels, and will be trying to kill me with a hideous vengeance just to let his master’s plan play out a little longer.
For my part, I spent years in the London courts and then was Embraced in Seattle. Let’s see how this plays out.
Viktor unbuckles his sword belt draws his sabre. It is a soldier’s weapon, curved and deadly efficient when used on horseback. Fortunately for me it Von Graff is not on a horse. I put glove and gauntlet on my left hand with the vambrace and assume the high eagle.
“An ancient style. Foolish.” Victor comes at me, his sabre held parallel to the floor, the tip dips and he goes to open me up. I bring the longsword down in a two handed grip not at him bit his forearm. There is a resistance, like half frozen beef, then nothing. There is a clatter as I follow through to the side as his sabre, his hand with it, hits the floor. I whirl and Viktor dives to retrieve his blade.
I wait, let him stand. “Jerry. Collect my hand. I keep what I cut.”
Viktor is enraged. “That is not how men of honor fight!”
I grin, fangs out, feral. “Who said I was a man of honor? That seems more to be your little game.”
Selim taught me early on that honorable men only win against other honorable men. In a fight, you win. Or you die. So, win.
“Mr. Phillips!”
I snap to attention and turn to the left. The Archbishop is standing there with her hair braided elaborately, deep henna stains on her dusky skin in a white shift. “Jawhol, Archbishop Ramirez?”
“Fight him on his terms. Give my Templar his hand back.”
“Ja, Archbishop Ramirez. Jerry. His hand.”
Trembling, Jerry gives Von Graff his hand back. Vitae is oozing from the wound and Viktor hand Jerry his sabre for a moment. I wait a moment and see the flesh mend, a moment later Viktor is flexing his right hand. Jerry scuttles away.
“Mr. Phillips, please continue.”
We square off again. Viktor is all too aware now that his experience is on the Sallee and he hasn’t really ever had a fight like me. He will try a trick, and he’s just old enough…
I attack, grabbing the mid-point on my blade and driving it into his clavicle. He twists slightly, and my blade binds against his bones. With blurring speed he buries his sabre in my gut, I can feel the blade pull against my clothes on my back.
The crowd gasps in amazement at this reversal of fortune.
Oh yes, the burning. Son of a bitch, poisoned his weapon, smeared the poisoned blood on one side. Not like the lighting is great in here, so he could hide the flat by turning it carefully.
See, that is an intrigue move.
I call on my blood to aid my Ventrue heritage in ignoring what he has done, then I intrigue myself.
I slump in apparent pain and terror, a wheeze coming from me, gripping onto the sword in him to stay standing. “You bastard,” I manage to force out. “You poisoned your sword.”
Grinning, he whispers back, holding me in a sort of intimate embrace. “As you said, we are not men of honor.”
He shoves me clear, pulling his sabre from my abdomen, and I barely manage to pull my sword free.
I stagger back, barely upright, my steel covered left arm covering my wound, my sword held limply in my right.
Triumph in his eyes and he swings in for the kill, a flat beheading stroke.
The look on his face when I spun to the side with the overhand chop… I will treasure it.
The scream and smell of burning meat will haunt me.
Richter was a pal and enchanted my sword so that with a thought flames would erupt on it doing horrific things to, well, everyone it hit.
Viktor’s arrogant confidence was gone as he clutched the charred stump of his arm.
I raised the blade high and stalked towards him.
“Mr. Phillips!”
I stop, “Jawhol mein Archbishop Ramirez,” I growl out. My Beast is on the verge of frenzy; a cowering foe in front of me and blood and burned meat in my throat, thick and cloying.
“I said, on his terms!” She is ticked.
“Ja. He poisoned his blade, and struck first. He did not announce this fact.”
There is silence.
“He did what?” The ripples are moving through the court now.
“The man of honor cheated. Jerry, bring the blade to Vycheslav.”
Jerry rushed out, a look of awe on his face. He grabbed the arm and the sword. “Leave the arm Jerry. I keep what I cut.” I don’t take my eyes off of Viktor.
Vycheslav examines the sword and tastes the blood. “Your emminence, there is a trace of Assamite venom on this blade.”
Ramirez goes still, in that way that Elders can. “Viktor von Graff, have you been holding back on us?”
“N-no, your Eminence, it is a trick by the outsider!”
“I think not, Viktor. Your honor was so highly prized by me that I offered you allowances I denied to others. Yet… A poisoned blade?”
“Nein; your Eminence! I don’t-”
“Viktor. Tell her who you work for.” He catches my eye in his desperation to not look at the Archbishop. “Tell her.” The command rips out and Viktor screams “Licinius Paulus!”
The Archbishop steps back, looking like she was slapped. “Licinius? Who is -”
A figure flickers into view; a blur whose steel whips out and disappears before any one can speak further.
Viktor’s eyes bulge out has he tries to speak but his head is sliding from his body before he utters another word. “Assassins!” Vycheslav screams and the room plunges into darkness and chaos.
I go flat on the floor and douse my blade, cloaking myself in the shadows. Muffled shrieks, the sound of metal meeting flesh and bone. This goes on for a few minutes then silence. The darkness lets up.
The first thing I see is Jerry huddled around my sword case peering from the interior of the cast iron bathtub. The second is an inky shadow moving over the sides of the tub. Everything gets awfully surreal when the DJ’s downstairs trigger some sort of roar from the kids dancing below.
The air is filled with dust and the smell of blood. Of the forty some odd licks in the room we seem to be down by fifteen; Vycheslav is climbing up from a pile of bloody limbs that were his women; they formed a human shield on him when the assassins struck; Margritte and Grigori are huddling together. Grigori lost a foot apparently, Margritte is looking for it and gives a happy cry when she locates it a moment later.
The pack of fledglings I dealt with earlier seems intact.
The liquid pool of shadow reforms into the Archbishop; to remain a Bishop for a while longer while she rebuilds her forces. This attack on the eve of her triumph will likely cripple her for a decade or more; it is highly probable that there will be a follow up attack.
She looks around at the decaying corpses and ashes mixing with spattered vitae.
“They took my Ducti! My priests! My bishops! WHERE ARE MY BISHOPS!”
I see the frenzy take her and she flings Jerry to the side and rips into the two licks on the hooks. Oscar’s head goes flying across the room to land with a wet crunch. The female is just gutted and her heart shredded in rage filled talons.
She desecrates the remains for a few more minutes, then turns. Her hair is wild, tight braids having failed her rage, vitae spattered across her white shift.
She turns and sees me standing with my sword, taking in the room. She points at me so swiftly that an arc of blood flies from her hand to spatter my cheeks. It takes everything I have to not flinch.
“What was your part in this?”
Don’t blow cover yet… “I owed Grigori a favor; he wanted me to kick over a can or two. He knew Vycheslav had a jealous apprentice; we knew that someone was manipulating your court. Clearly Viktor was part of it, and we spotted how he was doing it. So, I played stalking horse… I would tell you more but the name he mentioned; that triggered the attack. That name has been protected a very long time.” I keep up the accent; difficult with the Archbishop’s full attention.
“What name?”
“The one that Viktor…”
She starts shaking “Viktor said nothing! You told him to name his master and his head fell off!”
I stop. Clearly, Viktor has given a name, but now I couldn’t recall it myself.
“Your Eminence; I merely exposed a plot. The assassins were already here. At the height of your ritual they would have struck; probably while you were least able to respond and everyone was blood-drunk. My pushing Viktor’s arrogance and sense… Son of a bitch.”
Grigor pipes up with, “What now Devon?”
“The whole time he thought he was going to win. The whole, fucking time. Even after I took his arm the first time. If it looked like I was winning they would have acted sooner, but I fooled him. And them. They panicked and had to wait for orders… Which means their handler wasn’t here and then was.” And I know how the handler did it, too.
“Your Eminence; count the ashes. Count the bodies. You’ll find that only ten of your most loyal supporters fell; the other five are dead as well, but have been for months if not years. They spread everything around so much to conceal the true number of dead; probably carrying the ashes of their victims with them this whole time.”
She nods to Vycheslav who then starts whispering orders. He looks at his women, and I swear I see a bit of blood well in his eye, then he is off trying to determine the true losses presented.
“Mr. Phillips. You are not a friend to me. Nor my sect. What has been done here will be answered with blood, but not yours. Should you find those responsible, call and I will ring down a vengeance on them. Until then…”
She gestures to Grigori. “Get him away from me. I no longer see any amusement in him.” Grigori nods when he suddenly picked up and wrenched down as Ramirez viciously rips his neck open. He gurgles on his own vitae as she whispers in his ear then drops him.
“A pleasant eve, your Eminence,” as Margritte and I gather Grigori up.
Margritte and I carry him through the savage party downstairs; none of the kine the wiser of the monsters organizing vengeance and death above.
Jerry is following me like a puppy, carrying my sword case, because I needed to inherit him, apparently.
As we load Grigori in the car I finally ask him. “What did she tell you at the end Grigori?”
He coughs wetly and manages to get out “Good job Grigori. Don’t fucking do it again.”
Another thing that will haunt me is Grigori’s smile at having played the Great Game and having won the day; more so that my own grin matched it.
The Sabbat
By Ben Vaughan