11

The first thing you saw when you awoke was Brian's glassy eyes. His throat was shredded to the bone. Blood dripped from his lips, and a terrible need for that blood almost overwhelmed you. But when you tried to move, your body ached.

"Be patient," your killer said. "Your cells are still dying. It will hurt for a while."

Gore stained the killer's jaw and chest. He wore only a stained and filthy curtain, though rings glittered on his fingers. Everything in Ypotryll was old and rotten now, except for Brian's creations, scattered across one dusty table. For a moment you thought you had slept for a hundred years, but you already suspected the truth. The man standing over you confirmed it.

"Visions of splendor will not save us," Brian's killer—the vampire Ypotryll—said. "Events you cannot understand are unfolding half a world away, and they will bring about my destruction. You were stronger than Lomeyo." His dead eyes darted to the corpse. "You will serve me. You have long suspected the truth, haven't you? Now you are a vampire, a Ravnos: one of the wanderers. My only childe for many years. Though Lomeyo did not teach you directly, his actions have revealed to you our clan's power over beasts."

You just shook your head, but Ypotryll beckoned for you to step outside, into the garden. Seen truly for the first time, it was a wasteland of dead shrubs and twisted cactuses.

But the wolf was there, a lean and hungry creature, all alone in the world.

"Some things need names," your sire said.

You thought of all the things Brian had told you, all the hints about what was awaiting you one night.