Post by Hematite on Oct 10, 2014 2:33:10 GMT
Since he's officially dead now, I figured I could safely share his story. Enjoy
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I am what the dead have made me. Both undead and the spirits of the Underworld have served to forge me into the weapon that I must be in order to serve. My tale is a tale of three awakenings. One, the embrace to give me my weapons, two, the realization to set my course, and three, the return to unleash my fury. And now that I have been unleashed, the betrayers of their father shall know no quarter or mercy. The fires of Prometheus, stoked by the dead and the fury shall rain down and devour them whole.
I am Dante. That is not who I was born, nor was it who I was embraced. That identity was not taken until my 200th year on this earth. I was born in the great city of Florence in the year of our Lord 1244. I was born a very different person than I am. My people were a prominent merchant clan that made most of Italy great. But they were also liars, deceivers, cutthroats and betrayers. I was born Niccolo Giovanni.
Born into the prominent Giovanni merchant house, I was born into wealth. Unlike many of my family, I could never summon the mercantile disdain and distance that many Giovanni felt so easily. I could not remove myself from the causes of my time. I was passionate about my city of Florence, even when it conflicted with my ancestral home of Venice. This made me something of a black sheep of the family, never completely disowned but usually kept at a distance.
For most of my life, the greatest conflict in the Italian city-states was that between the Guelphs and the Ghibellines. The Ghibellines were foul traitors and heretics who supported the power of the Holy Roman Emperor over the Pope. Fortunately fair Florence was mostly free of these heretics, being firmly under Guelph rule as I grew. Having no desire to follow the mercantile career set out by my family, I sought my prospects in the Florentine militia at the age of 12, beginning as a piper, then becoming a spearman at age 15. By 1258, my glorious city had succeeded in expelling the last of the Ghibelline heretics from our walls. But this was not to last.
During this time, the Ghibelline treason had control of Siena, and in 1260 they put into motions their designs on Florence. Even with the aid of Sicily and a disorganized band of German mercenaries to shore up their numbers, the Ghibellines only managed a paltry force of 20,000. Once they had arrayed their forces on the field they began with a paltry trick of changing uniforms and mounting noncombatants on pack animals to attempt to make their army look bigger than it was, but this trick was so old and predictable that we laughed in our camp. Our forces numbered 30,000 infantry, 3000 cavalry and a further 5000 archers and crossbowmen. We had superiour numbers and a superiour position on a hilltop. The Ghibelline traitors had no hope of victory. Come the morrow we would wipe the heretics from our region and free our sister city of Siena from their rule.
That night before the battle I was called to attend the Condottieri himself in his tent. This was such a singular honour that I was stunned. This was the supreme commander of the Florentine forces. What he wanted with a 16-year old infantryman I could not guess. At the appointed time I appeared in my finest dress uniform, buttons polished to within an inch of their life and sweat running down my brow. After the formalities of salutes and stances, the Condottieri looked me up and down, appearing to survey me for something. After leaving me to sweat in silence for 10 minutes, he informed me that his standard-bearer had taken ill and he would need a replacement, and my name had been brought forward for that honour. However astounded I was at this honour, I managed to stammer out an affirmative reply before saluting and leaving with the Quartermaster to take the standard. Looking back on this I now see the influence of my family and the power of the Giovanni name, but the 16-year-old me could only see the glory and the honour of such a charge.
As the sun rose on the battlefield the next morning, I stood, smart in my gleaming uniform, the proud flag of Florence held in my left hand. As the battle commenced I had a perfect view for our grand victory from atop our command hill. At first the battle appeared to be going our way as expected. We won the initial crossbow volley and our knights were sweeping through their infantry like skittles. Alas, it was not to be, for we had nurtured the serpent to our breast, and as the day wore on, it prepared to strike.
At approximately 3 hours after midday, I saw a small force under the banner of the knight Bocca degli Abati returning to our command. Of course no one suspected anything until it was far too late, as Abati had a long and honourable record in the service of Florence. As he approached our command lines he was let right through until he gave the command and his retinue laid about with swords and spears. Completely unprepared the reserves fell before his forces and he charged me directly. The last thing I remember before blacking out in pain and misery was the sight of him, this man we trusted with a knighthood and command of one of our divisions, his face a blank mask of hatred as he brought his sword down on my left arm.
The next thing I remember was waking in a family owned hospital in Venice some 3 months later. Apparently however much of a black sheep I was, I was still valuable enough to the family that they stationed another agent within the Florentine army to watch me and keep me safe. After I had been felled by Abati’s treachery, this agent had apparently spirited me away from the battlefield and performed enough triage to keep me from death long enough to summon family doctors who could do more. With my beloved Florence fallen to the Ghibellines, the agent had taken me by carriage back to Venice and the bosom of my family, keeping me safely drugged all the way.
Upon discovering what had happened, that the treason of one we trusted, and a knight at that, was responsible for our humiliating defeat at Montaperti, I fell into a deep despair. How could I trust anything again? I had believed in the true divinity of the Papacy and the divine city of Florence. And yet we were betrayed and struck down by treason from one blessed and anointed in Rome with the blessing of the Holy Father himself. How could I place any trust in God or State after this?
It took me a further 3 months to recover. My left arm had been severed at the elbow. It was a clean cut and had been safely disinfected, but with such a grievous injury, my career as a soldier was over before it could truly begin, even if I could bring myself to take up arms in a cause again. For the first 2 months I sat and wallowed in that despair, simply waiting to die, having no desire to live in a world with nothing left to believe in. I needed honour as other men needed meat and drink. Then near the end of that winter, a new realization came to me, something for a desperate man to cling to. I was not completely forsaken. There was something left that had never abandoned me and even now continued to look out for me despite all I had done to run away from them. I resolved then to rededicate myself to my family. The Giovanni had proven themselves more honourable than any God or State. Clearly only they deserved my loyalty.
After my recovery, I threw myself upon the mercy of the family elders and begged forgiveness for distancing myself from them and spurning their previous support and training. I was ready now to live for the family. And my loving family welcomed me back among them and began my proper mercantile training in earnest. As it was no longer possible for me to continue in my military career, my family organized a proper education. I was taught to read and write, taught of history and science, of mathematics and commerce. For the next 5 years I poured myself into these studies, determined not to let my family down a second time.
When I was 22, I was finally put to work to begin to pay back all of the kindness my family had shown me. I was given control of a small money-lending business catering mostly to sailors and other rough sorts. When I was given the business, it was deep in debt itself, and sunk deep in depravity and dishonour. Going over the books upon taking control it quickly became clear that this business would collapse soon without a drastic overhaul. The previous operators had been running mostly protection rackets of the local inns, docks and brothels and completely ignoring their primary function as a lender. I had no moral issue with debt collection, provided the debt was legitimate. In that case it was us pursuing the dishonourable wretches for the return of our property. I immediately shut down the rackets, making valuable friends and contacts amongst the local businesses, lowered our interest rates to something slightly less usurous, and within 2 years had the business back in profit by bulk marketing and repeat business rather than squeezing every penny out of each customer. This was rather unorthodox behaviour for a money-lender at the time, and drew a great deal of interest, even from the great banks.
I ran this business for 4 years and passed it back to another up and coming family member when I was offered a better position at a larger Venetian bank, attempting an experiment to see if the principles I had made work with a small money-lender could be made to work on a larger scale. I graciously accepted and began to apply my ideas. Little did I know that I was now being watched by the other side of my family. For years I had heard the rumours about my family. We were in league with the Devil, nigrimancers and vile witches who enslaved the dead to do our bidding. Like any sane man of the age I scoffed at such rumours, taking them for nothing more than bitterness from our mercantile rivals. I could not have been more wrong.
Shortly after I began to show success in the money-lending business, I had begun to court my cousin Serafina. I knew the elders approved of family marriages and I needed a wife to deal in respectable circles. Serafina was bright and happy, passionate and deeply loyal to the family. She made a good match. We were married one year later. Her father being my uncle, such financial matters as necessary were dealt with far more cordially than usually happened outside the family.
Over the years we were wed however, I began to notice a curious condition in her. As I aged, she seemed to forever remain the same. At first I put this down to her extensive cosmetics routine; by this time I was quite wealthy and always saw she had the best, but by the time I was nearing 30, she still appeared to be the 17-year-old girl I had married. Even after our son Domenico was born and she returned from her year’s seclusion with him, she persisted in her youthful vigour. I could not understand it, however I did have a great deal more important matters on my mind, and had no great desire to second-guess my good fortune of a youthful wife.
It was on the eve of my 32nd birthday that my wife finally revealed her secret. She was hosting a small family party for me at our villa. However, when I arrived home, I did not recognize any of the people there. They had the look of our family, but in a distant way, as if viewed through frosted glass. Their faces were all too perfect, almost waxy like comedy masks. I gave an involuntary shudder upon viewing them but forced it down, my sense of hospitality and etiquette overriding any uncertainty. Dinner was unspeakably forced and awkward, and I could not help but notice that none of the guests ate a bite, but did drink copious amounts of a thick red wine that I could not remember adding to our cellars.
Though all present were a bit stiff and formal, there was one upon whom all the attention was focused. This woman introduced herself as Misina Giovanni, my wife’s aunt. I had heard my wife mention an aunt Misina before but had never met this woman. Indeed that had never struck me as odd, but now that I thought back on it, I could remember many occasions when my wife had made sojourns to visit this aunt, and yet I had still never met her after 9 years of marriage. My wife spent most of the evening fawning over her, and the others seemed rather content to allow her to hold court, always looking to her for approval before voicing any real opinion.
After the dinner concluded most of the guests departed, but Misina remained behind in the sitting room to take a glass of brandy with us. After she had taken the chair furthest from the fire, and the servants had poured us each a generous measure of my best plum brandy, my wife and I sat across from Misina as she began to talk. At first I began to laugh at what she spoke of, tales of ghosts and death-worshipping vampires as if I were a child, but then I noticed my wife looking at me and a sudden shock hit me. She already knew. My Serafina would have been the first to laugh at absurdities like these if they were truly jokes, but she was simply staring expectantly at me. I put down the brandy and fiddling with my family ring for comfort listened to what Misina had to say. She talked for a long time, revealing the true history of our family from its origins as the Jovians in Roman times to our worship of Dis Pater and control over the dead through our art of Nigrimancy and all the advantages that had given us, to our recent (267 years ago recent) induction into clan Cappadocian and what that meant for us as a family. When she revealed that my wife had been one of her ghouls for many years, since before I had met her in fact, it all made sense at last. Misina was over a hundred years old, which in a time when the average life-expectancy was 40 was truly amazing to consider, seeming an eternity. She concluded her explanation with an offer to take me on as well, to grant me the Proxy Kiss and welcome me into the true family. And should I prove myself, she said, I might even earn the embrace.
I was stunned speechless. This was all a bit too much to take in at once. On the other hand it was actually quite simple. My family had never let me down and I had sworn never to let them down in turn. Over the years of work for them I had seen some highly dishonourable business practices, but they seemed quite willing to try other ways where these methods were shown to be ineffective. Even if the rumours of our dealing with the dead were now proven to be true, I still had the confidence in my family to believe that there must be valid reasons for these arts and that we could practice them in honourable ways. I was not concerned with the blasphemy of it all; after all, God and the Church had abandoned me and proven themselves false and profane in my eyes 16 years ago. In the end the choice was simple. The family had never abandoned or betrayed me. The family wanted this future for me. I trusted my family. I accepted and drank of Misina’s blood that very night.
The next 40 years were something of a blur. I was inducted into the true nature of the family. When time came, Niccolo Giovanni and his wife Serafina were allowed to publically die and we retreated into the shadows of the great family mausoleum. Our son grew into an admirable merchant sailor following in the footsteps of Marco Polo, forging connections to the East. As time passed, I lost touch with him, and to this night have no idea as to his eventual fate, though a lack of formal death records imply to me that he was inducted as well. I threw myself into my new studies with a fervour I had not believed possible in myself before. The blood pumping through my system focused my mind to a needle’s point, removing all distractions as long as I had it, and Misina ensured I never wanted for supply. I became an accomplished Nigrimancer, both in the mortal arts we had practiced previously and in the new vampiric arts of Mortis as practiced by our Cappadocian patrons. I wrote several important treatises on how some of our more esoteric arts might be converted to the new paradigm and vice versa for the enrichment of all. While the specific mechanics of the magic were never my greatest specialty, I had a gift for organization and looking at problems in different ways that the great scholars found immensely useful, often extrapolating some random ideas of mine into great workable theorems.
The power of the blood also allowed me to engage in physical pursuits I had left behind with the loss of my arm. I trained with several prominent Cappadocian knights as well as the warriors of my own family. It felt good to wield a sword once again, though I was still at a disadvantage due to the loss of my arm. And with the gifts of the blood, I was more than a match for any ordinary swordsman even so. My wife was my eternal companion through these nights, continuing as we had begun, our love for each other only strengthened as time went on. She was my rock, always reliable and there to support me through any problem.
And such was my life until the summer of 1312. One night in July I was summoned before Misina and told that I had proven myself so admirably that I had drawn the attention of one of the great among our parent clan. Lady Constancia herself had read some of my work and personally requested that I be granted the embrace and sent to work alongside her once my basic training in vampiric ways was completed. I had certainly heard of Lady Constancia, and was deeply honoured. That night I left the world of the living forever and became what I am. Due to family tradition, I could not be trained by Misina, and thus after my embrace had to leave for a time, training under the tutelage of other family scholars. This meant leaving my wife for a time which was difficult, but I promised that I would return for her when I was able and would see her earn her place to join me in the endless nights ahead. My training took a further 5 years, and in 1317 I traveled to the great temple at Mount Erciyes to begin my new life under the great Lady Constancia.
I found her a demanding mistress, but at the same time the experience was invigorating. She pushed me to new heights of understanding and inducted me into mysteries the like of which I could scarcely have imagined. Over the next 125 years I traveled back and forth between Venice and Erciyes, acting as an informal liaison between our Nigrimancers and the greatest Mortis practitioners of the Cappadocian clan. Even the great Japeth, prodigal childe of Cappadocius himself visited us regularly, as did Ambrogino Giovanni, perhaps the single greatest Nigrimancer of my family. If I thought I had worked hard before, it was nothing compared to what I did now. There was room for nothing else in the world of service to Lady Constancia. I rose quickly in her esteem, bringing fresh ideas and organization to her research operation and, according to her, cutting her research time for most projects in half.
It was during this time that I was first exposed to the fears and resentment for my family within the main branch of the clan. I was honestly shocked. I could not understand what these great men and women believed they had to fear from us. My family wanted nothing more than a mutually beneficial partnership with the Cappadocians, a greater understanding of our arts for all concerned through mutual research and sharing of resources. When I heard Lady Constancia or the others speak of the treacherous nature of the Giovanni and how we could not truly be trusted, it was all I could do to restrain my Beast. With the exception of a few minor incidents where I had to be restrained though, I learned to restrain myself enough to restrict my objections to vehement verbal protests and convincing arguments for my family’s trustworthiness.
During this time I regularly requested that my wife be permitted to join me in the Great Temple of Erciyes, but each time it was denied. She had earned the embrace herself soon after I did and was on other important assignment elsewhere. We saw each other when we could, but it was not often enough for either of us, and secrecy forbid either of us from sharing too deeply with the other what we were doing.
And so my life continued until the fateful night of April 5, 1444. On that night I awoke to see the Lady Constancia holding a silver blade to my throat, the edges dancing with the blue flames of Corpsefire. She bore a look of such rage and instability on her immaculate face that I could barely describe, let alone understand. She proceeded to tell me in a mix of raging screams and cold and calm vitriol of what had occurred the previous night at the Monastery of St. Timothy’s. I lay there in broken silence as she told me of the great betrayal of my family and the war they had declared on our parent clan. At first I wanted to object. I simply couldn’t countenance such a gross act of betrayal with the family I had grown to know and love, the family that had always stood by me even when everything else had proven false. It took a great deal of time for Lady Constancia to convince me of the truth. After she had thoroughly probed my mind, ensuring I had genuinely known nothing of this treason, she threw me into a warded cell in the dungeons of her palace.
It took me several more nights to come to terms with what I had been told. I had refused to serve those who would countenance betrayal before, and knew the right path once again. But once again I had to choose to cast aside everything that I was, my family who were all I had left. It took me 7 nights to come to terms with my choice, to cast aside everything I had to preserve my tattered honour. Once I was resolved I begged my jailor for an audience with Lady Constancia to plead my case. Out of respect for 125 years of loyal service she granted this request, though she made it clear she had not yet decided whether or not to have me destroyed.
I abased myself before her feet and said words that could never be retracted. I forswore my family and cast aside my name. I disavowed all allegiances and loyalties to them in any way. I cast aside my name and sought to take a new one. I swore an oath of eternal vengeance upon those who would take my name and blacken it with such betrayal. I vowed that I would see every Giovanni who was even remotely involved in this conspiracy or in the later purge that was happening as ashes at my feet, including the Great Augustus himself. I vowed that until such time as it has been cleansed I would be a Giovanni no longer. Niccolo Giovanni was dead. I stood before her with a new name. It had taken me some time to consider my new identity but there was only one name that truly spoke to me of the nature of betrayal and of my new existence at once. There was a man who had written of my life without ever realizing it, not even knowing my name. A man who told of the damnation of traitors beyond all others, condemning them to the central mouth of the three-headed dog in the 9th Circle of the Inferno, including the traitor who had cut off my hand all those years ago. A man who had traveled to the depths of the Underworld and returned as I had. I stood before my Lady Constancia reborn under that name. From that night to this one, I am Dante.
From that point on I cast my lot completely in with the Cappadocians and their Lamia warriors as we fought the Giovanni’s treacherous purge. Over my time at Erciyes, I maintained myself in the peak of a warrior’s perfection, and put to use the secrets I had learned from my tutors for the noblest act of all, the destruction of traitors. I felt no remorse for each Giovanni traitor that fell beneath my blade or was overwhelmed by my Athanatoi. However the greatest test of my loyalty was still to come.
The years after 1444 were something of a blur of violence and slaughter, but at some point we received intelligence of a list of those who were involved in planning the great betrayal. I saw two names on it that made my dead heart leap in my chest.
Misina Giovanni
Serafina Giovanni
Seeing those names made a lot of things suddenly clear in my mind. I flashed back to Misina’s vague letters about important family business preventing me and my wife from being together, and Serafina telling me that she couldn’t tell me the project she had been embraced to work on for the family, but all the while trying to persuade me to leave my work in Erciyes and return to Venice with her. She was trying to bring me back home, to involve me in this treason. Yet I also remembered the resigned look on her face as she spoke to me the last time we had seen each other. She knew me well enough to know I could never be involved in something like this. This explained the blood tears in her eyes as we parted for the last time. She knew she was saying goodbye for the last time.
However I felt though, it made no difference to my purpose. These women had lied to me and betrayed me. They would fall as many other traitors had fallen before me. Knowing these two better than perhaps anyone else could, I organized our intelligence and discovered the route they would be taking. I arranged an attack force to ambush them on the road from Venice north into France. It was a small attack force, comprised of only myself and two other Cappadocians as well as a small cohort of Athanatoi and several wraiths. Our intelligence suggested they would be travelling alone, with only a small retinue and much of our forces were needed elsewhere.
As we hid in the Shadowlands, waiting for the coach to come into view, I had no doubt that I could do what was necessary. She was not my wife. I was not Niccolo Giovanni any longer. I was Dante, an instrument of vengeance, merciless force of destruction.
As the coach rounded the final bend, we moved into position, ready for the attack. It was as we had suspected; they had a minimal retinue both on the material plane and in the Shadowlands. The signal was given and we struck at once in a vicious pincer movement, destroying or banishing their wraiths in a few desperate seconds of vicious before surrounding the coach, our Athanatoi making short work of their mortal retainers. Returning to the Skinlands I took quick stock of our remaining forces. Our wraiths were gone as was one of our own number. We had 3 of the original 7 Athanatoi remaining. However every one of their mortal and ghostly slaves were either dispersed or lay dead at our feet now. It was time for long-awaited vengeance.
As I ripped the coach door bearing the hated Giovanni crest open to reveal the two women, however, something changed. There they sat, prim and proper high class ladies in their dark dresses preparing to fight as best they could, but one look in their eyes said they expected to die. And yet, looking in their eyes, I knew something was wrong. Serafina had never given a look like that in her life. I tried to cry out that it was a trap, but my companion charged into the coach, heedless. As soon as he crossed the threshold, the entire coach exploded in crackling otherworldly energy. I was thrown back, stunned. I forced myself back into focus and looked up to see two women approaching from out of the trees, black dresses scarcely brushing the ground. There was no doubt this time; I would know these women anywhere. This was indeed my sire Misina and my wife Serafina.
Scrambling to my feet I looked around and saw the devastation the trap had wrought. I was alone. My companions, the wraiths and all the remaining Athanatoi were gone, yet with a quick expenditure of blood, my wounds closed and I stood to face the women proud and tall. My wife I knew had joined me in physical pursuits and was quite skilled with the sword. Misina on the other hand had always been far more feminine, preferring to work through others save with her sorcery. Indeed as they approached, I saw the fine blade in Serafina’s hand and noticed her skirts were divided for better mobility. She was more than a companion and co-conspirator on this mission. She was a last line of defence for Misina, a hidden bodyguard whom no one would expect.
As the women closed the distance, Misina started to give some speech about how the old must give way for the young and how our time had passed. But as she got close enough to see my face she stopped, mid-sentence, a look of rage crossing her face while one of horror flowed across Serafina’s. I reached up and realized my masked helm was gone, knocked off in the blast of the false coach.
“So it is true,” Misina said, her voice the deadly cold of the razor’s kiss. “I had heard rumours, yet until this moment I had chosen to believe that you had died. Now you take even that comfort from us, forcing us to acknowledge your treason to your family Niccolo. Well, it ends here. I could not bear the shame were this to become known, so you must die here and now.”
With that she spoke a brief invocation and reached out her hand, and I felt a tugging at my very essence as she attempted to rip the soul from my body. Knowing there was no true defence against this attack, I could only steel myself to resist it as best I could. In what could well have been my last few moments on this earth, I looked at Serafina, and saw the blood tear roll down her cheek. She did not attempt to stop Misina’s attack, but she did mourn for me. Cold comfort is better than none.
A few moments later the attack ceased and to my surprise I found I was still in my body. I had resisted her pull, my will bolstered by what I knew I was doing and the knowledge that there was at least enough left of the Serafina I knew that she would mourn me. I looked up at Misina and grinned darkly.
“Bad luck,” I said. “First lesson I was taught all those centuries ago in the Florentine army: never neglect your defence in favour of an all-out attack.” With that I charged, burning all of the energy from my blood I could toward my preternatural speed. Before she could even react to attempt to dodge my assault I had brought my blade down into her neck, blue Corpsefire flickering along the edges as my sire met the end she very richly deserved, beautiful alabaster face turning to ash before my eyes.
Looking up I saw Serafina standing before me, sword held outstretched and ready, ruby tears glistening in her eyes as I felt them well up equally in mine. As both of us began to circle, looking for an opening to begin the duel we knew was now inevitable, Serafina cried out, damning me for forcing her into this position, cursing my disloyalty. Each word tore pieces out of my heart, her condemnation a far more effective weapon than her blade. Then we clashed together, blades dancing in a blur of steel and blue fire. The two of us were equally matched, I had seen to that over the years, always wanting her to stand as my equal.
As we dueled a realization hit me, more surprising than anything I had yet experienced. I could not do it. I couldn’t kill my love. Even after everything she had done, even while she was actively attempting to kill me, I couldn’t strike her down, deprive the world of her beauty and vitality. Unfortunately the same time I had that realization, a light came to her eyes and I knew she had realized my weakness. She began to leave herself undefended more and more, opening herself to killing blows she knew I would not take in favour of stronger and faster strikes. Slowly but surely she was wearing me down, and both of us knew it. The Corpsefire still flickered around my blade, preventing me even from attempting to strike for torpor, and trained as I was without a left arm, I had long since ceased carrying swordbreakers or secondary weapons. I knew if we continued much longer Serafina would strike me down, so I decided to risk everything on one final gambit.
Leaping back I threw down my blade and stretched my arms out wide. “Serafina, my love. I think you have realized by now that I can’t kill you. However much I am disgusted by the treason you were part of, however much you might deserve a traitor’s death, and however much I believed I had hardened my heart against you in preparation for this mission.” Serafina hesitated, sword falling back down into a passive stance as she approached. Seeing my one and only chance I pressed on. “Serafina, this isn’t you. I can make them understand that as I do. Come with me back to Erciyes. I have allies among the highest ranks of the clan. I can vouch for you. Whatever evil you have wrought does not have to be the end. You can redeem yourself. You know I will not let anyone harm you, anymore than I can harm you myself.” I was pleading now, desperation obvious in my voice. “Fina, I love you more than anything else in either world. Please, I beg you, take this chance with me.”
I stretched out my hand to her, waiting desperately for her reply as she slowly took one step toward me, then another. She reached out her hand, almost as if to take mine, then dejectedly let it fall back by her side. “I cannot do that. I am my family. I would not know who I am without them, Niccolo. The family is greater than either of us or what we may want ourselves. I cannot come with you.” Then a new fire lit her eyes as she offered out her own arm to me. “But you can return with me. Come back to Venice. I have my own influence with the elders, even with Grandfather himself. If I vouch for your contrition, they will welcome you back Niccolo, I know they will. Together we will finish this purge of the old and corrupt Cappadocians and with you by my side we can sit near the top of the brand new Giovanni Clan. Just think of that Niccolo. The Giovanni Clan, standing tall and proud, equal of any of the other 12 despite their age.” I heard a desperation in her voice now that almost matched my own a few moments ago. “Take my hand and return to Venice with me, and we can be together again, never again parted. We will tell the elders that you never truly betrayed us, that you were my agent all along, feeding me intelligence from within Erciyes itself. With Misina dead there is no one left to contradict this tale. We’ll simply say she died in the first assault from your forces.”
At this point, however, Serafina realized she had said the wrong thing and her impassioned speech about our new future together trailed off into nothing. She looked into my eyes and saw the truth. She saw my disgust at this plan. “I am sorry my love,” I said. The next words to leave my lips were the hardest I’ve ever spoken. “I cannot come with you. I could not live like that anymore than you could live without the family. You would make my existence a lie, devoid of truth and honour. I would rather you took my head here and now. So strike fast and true my love. I will not fight you anymore. We have nothing further to say to each other.”
There were no tears with this final speech. We were both long past the point of tears. Serafina approached, lifting her sword as if to strike. My eyes never left hers. She leaned in and kissed me one last time, and as she pulled away whispered in my ear, “Our paths have reached an insurmountable impasse. I see that. I must go my way, and you must go yours. And yet I will retain some glimmer of hope, for even the most circuitous and wandering traveler can find his way back to the road again in time. I hope we meet again in time, my love, but not too soon. For the hope I have for our future, I give you your life tonight. Don’t seek me out again though. If we are meant to be together again in time, we will be. Know though that I do not share your weakness Niccolo. However hard I can and will strike you down if you come after me again. I strongly advise you go to ground, for your allies will soon be finished and you’ve cast aside your family. Farewell my love.”
With that she quickly slashed her wrist and drew her blood circle, stepping through the newly made door into the Shadowlands and vanishing from my sight. It was nearly a full hour more before I moved again, stepping over to pick up my discarded sword and returned it with difficulty to my sheath. Slowly I began to make my way back across the country to Erciyes. I could have summoned one of my wraiths to deliver a message quickly and gained help, but I needed the time alone that the travel gave me. There would be a purpose of this long journey. I had confronted myself and found him wanting. Niccolo Giovanni could not strike down his wife Serafina. Very well. Then my path was clear. Over the 2 months of my return journey to Erciyes, I cast aside every bit I could of Niccolo Giovanni, doing everything within my power to become Dante in truth as well as name. I knew this might be a futile gesture, unable to predict how I might act should I meet her again, but it steeled me for the next step.
Upon my return to Erciyes I delivered the report that it was an ambush, that Misina was killed and that Serafina escaped. To this night I still do not know if the Lady Constancia knows the truth of what happened, but she has never mentioned it to me. She simply nodded and accepted the report. I was not worried about Serafina speaking in detail of what had happened to the Giovanni either. It would be as damaging to her name and prospects as it was to mine. No Serafina would do the same as I had, deliver a bare report of the facts and move on with the war. She was always solid and practical like that.
The war progressed badly after that, our conflict shadowed by the greater war raging of the Anarch revolt. Curiously the Giovanni never allied themselves with the other Anarchs rising against their elders. If they had I’m certain we would have fallen far sooner. Nevertheless, the war was not going our way. All those who we might have called on as allies were consumed with their own struggles, and our own forces were scattered and disorganized. The Cappadocians had never numbered a great many warriors outside the small number of Lamia left fighting. It became clearer and clearer that we were going to lose.
In the final nights of the war, Lady Constancia gathered her council to her to discuss a desperate, zero hour strategy. She said that she had discovered a way to take a small number of us and hide us away in the deepest depths of the Labyrinth within the Underworld. No Giovanni would venture that deep and there we would wait. We would preserve ourselves long enough for the Giovanni to believe they had won and grow complacent as we had done. And when they had grown fat and decadent, we would return and purge their treason from the face of the earth. It was truly a desperate gambit, and not an easy strategy to countenance as it meant sending our best warriors and scholars away, effectively leaving the rest of the clan to die, for Lady Constancia revealed that she could take no more than 50 of us in this great working. After it was decided that she would go ahead with this scheme, I was most surprised to find my own name on her list of those who would go with her.
For 500 years we lingered in our Underworld prison, allowing the energies of the Shadowlands to permeate us fully. It drove more than a few of us mad in the end. Lady Constancia completely changed, becoming the terrible Unre that she is today. I however remembered. I remembered our purpose and what we had to do. I will always remember. Now that we have returned, we will have our vengeance. This new world was confusing at first but a few things were clear. The Giovanni are still here. The Giovanni are allied with this new order, this Camarilla by treaty and by deed. It is clear then our place. Our place is with the enemies of this Camarilla. This Sabbat will do nicely to aid in the destruction of the Betrayers of my name.
--------------------------------------------------
I am what the dead have made me. Both undead and the spirits of the Underworld have served to forge me into the weapon that I must be in order to serve. My tale is a tale of three awakenings. One, the embrace to give me my weapons, two, the realization to set my course, and three, the return to unleash my fury. And now that I have been unleashed, the betrayers of their father shall know no quarter or mercy. The fires of Prometheus, stoked by the dead and the fury shall rain down and devour them whole.
I am Dante. That is not who I was born, nor was it who I was embraced. That identity was not taken until my 200th year on this earth. I was born in the great city of Florence in the year of our Lord 1244. I was born a very different person than I am. My people were a prominent merchant clan that made most of Italy great. But they were also liars, deceivers, cutthroats and betrayers. I was born Niccolo Giovanni.
Born into the prominent Giovanni merchant house, I was born into wealth. Unlike many of my family, I could never summon the mercantile disdain and distance that many Giovanni felt so easily. I could not remove myself from the causes of my time. I was passionate about my city of Florence, even when it conflicted with my ancestral home of Venice. This made me something of a black sheep of the family, never completely disowned but usually kept at a distance.
For most of my life, the greatest conflict in the Italian city-states was that between the Guelphs and the Ghibellines. The Ghibellines were foul traitors and heretics who supported the power of the Holy Roman Emperor over the Pope. Fortunately fair Florence was mostly free of these heretics, being firmly under Guelph rule as I grew. Having no desire to follow the mercantile career set out by my family, I sought my prospects in the Florentine militia at the age of 12, beginning as a piper, then becoming a spearman at age 15. By 1258, my glorious city had succeeded in expelling the last of the Ghibelline heretics from our walls. But this was not to last.
During this time, the Ghibelline treason had control of Siena, and in 1260 they put into motions their designs on Florence. Even with the aid of Sicily and a disorganized band of German mercenaries to shore up their numbers, the Ghibellines only managed a paltry force of 20,000. Once they had arrayed their forces on the field they began with a paltry trick of changing uniforms and mounting noncombatants on pack animals to attempt to make their army look bigger than it was, but this trick was so old and predictable that we laughed in our camp. Our forces numbered 30,000 infantry, 3000 cavalry and a further 5000 archers and crossbowmen. We had superiour numbers and a superiour position on a hilltop. The Ghibelline traitors had no hope of victory. Come the morrow we would wipe the heretics from our region and free our sister city of Siena from their rule.
That night before the battle I was called to attend the Condottieri himself in his tent. This was such a singular honour that I was stunned. This was the supreme commander of the Florentine forces. What he wanted with a 16-year old infantryman I could not guess. At the appointed time I appeared in my finest dress uniform, buttons polished to within an inch of their life and sweat running down my brow. After the formalities of salutes and stances, the Condottieri looked me up and down, appearing to survey me for something. After leaving me to sweat in silence for 10 minutes, he informed me that his standard-bearer had taken ill and he would need a replacement, and my name had been brought forward for that honour. However astounded I was at this honour, I managed to stammer out an affirmative reply before saluting and leaving with the Quartermaster to take the standard. Looking back on this I now see the influence of my family and the power of the Giovanni name, but the 16-year-old me could only see the glory and the honour of such a charge.
As the sun rose on the battlefield the next morning, I stood, smart in my gleaming uniform, the proud flag of Florence held in my left hand. As the battle commenced I had a perfect view for our grand victory from atop our command hill. At first the battle appeared to be going our way as expected. We won the initial crossbow volley and our knights were sweeping through their infantry like skittles. Alas, it was not to be, for we had nurtured the serpent to our breast, and as the day wore on, it prepared to strike.
At approximately 3 hours after midday, I saw a small force under the banner of the knight Bocca degli Abati returning to our command. Of course no one suspected anything until it was far too late, as Abati had a long and honourable record in the service of Florence. As he approached our command lines he was let right through until he gave the command and his retinue laid about with swords and spears. Completely unprepared the reserves fell before his forces and he charged me directly. The last thing I remember before blacking out in pain and misery was the sight of him, this man we trusted with a knighthood and command of one of our divisions, his face a blank mask of hatred as he brought his sword down on my left arm.
The next thing I remember was waking in a family owned hospital in Venice some 3 months later. Apparently however much of a black sheep I was, I was still valuable enough to the family that they stationed another agent within the Florentine army to watch me and keep me safe. After I had been felled by Abati’s treachery, this agent had apparently spirited me away from the battlefield and performed enough triage to keep me from death long enough to summon family doctors who could do more. With my beloved Florence fallen to the Ghibellines, the agent had taken me by carriage back to Venice and the bosom of my family, keeping me safely drugged all the way.
Upon discovering what had happened, that the treason of one we trusted, and a knight at that, was responsible for our humiliating defeat at Montaperti, I fell into a deep despair. How could I trust anything again? I had believed in the true divinity of the Papacy and the divine city of Florence. And yet we were betrayed and struck down by treason from one blessed and anointed in Rome with the blessing of the Holy Father himself. How could I place any trust in God or State after this?
It took me a further 3 months to recover. My left arm had been severed at the elbow. It was a clean cut and had been safely disinfected, but with such a grievous injury, my career as a soldier was over before it could truly begin, even if I could bring myself to take up arms in a cause again. For the first 2 months I sat and wallowed in that despair, simply waiting to die, having no desire to live in a world with nothing left to believe in. I needed honour as other men needed meat and drink. Then near the end of that winter, a new realization came to me, something for a desperate man to cling to. I was not completely forsaken. There was something left that had never abandoned me and even now continued to look out for me despite all I had done to run away from them. I resolved then to rededicate myself to my family. The Giovanni had proven themselves more honourable than any God or State. Clearly only they deserved my loyalty.
After my recovery, I threw myself upon the mercy of the family elders and begged forgiveness for distancing myself from them and spurning their previous support and training. I was ready now to live for the family. And my loving family welcomed me back among them and began my proper mercantile training in earnest. As it was no longer possible for me to continue in my military career, my family organized a proper education. I was taught to read and write, taught of history and science, of mathematics and commerce. For the next 5 years I poured myself into these studies, determined not to let my family down a second time.
When I was 22, I was finally put to work to begin to pay back all of the kindness my family had shown me. I was given control of a small money-lending business catering mostly to sailors and other rough sorts. When I was given the business, it was deep in debt itself, and sunk deep in depravity and dishonour. Going over the books upon taking control it quickly became clear that this business would collapse soon without a drastic overhaul. The previous operators had been running mostly protection rackets of the local inns, docks and brothels and completely ignoring their primary function as a lender. I had no moral issue with debt collection, provided the debt was legitimate. In that case it was us pursuing the dishonourable wretches for the return of our property. I immediately shut down the rackets, making valuable friends and contacts amongst the local businesses, lowered our interest rates to something slightly less usurous, and within 2 years had the business back in profit by bulk marketing and repeat business rather than squeezing every penny out of each customer. This was rather unorthodox behaviour for a money-lender at the time, and drew a great deal of interest, even from the great banks.
I ran this business for 4 years and passed it back to another up and coming family member when I was offered a better position at a larger Venetian bank, attempting an experiment to see if the principles I had made work with a small money-lender could be made to work on a larger scale. I graciously accepted and began to apply my ideas. Little did I know that I was now being watched by the other side of my family. For years I had heard the rumours about my family. We were in league with the Devil, nigrimancers and vile witches who enslaved the dead to do our bidding. Like any sane man of the age I scoffed at such rumours, taking them for nothing more than bitterness from our mercantile rivals. I could not have been more wrong.
Shortly after I began to show success in the money-lending business, I had begun to court my cousin Serafina. I knew the elders approved of family marriages and I needed a wife to deal in respectable circles. Serafina was bright and happy, passionate and deeply loyal to the family. She made a good match. We were married one year later. Her father being my uncle, such financial matters as necessary were dealt with far more cordially than usually happened outside the family.
Over the years we were wed however, I began to notice a curious condition in her. As I aged, she seemed to forever remain the same. At first I put this down to her extensive cosmetics routine; by this time I was quite wealthy and always saw she had the best, but by the time I was nearing 30, she still appeared to be the 17-year-old girl I had married. Even after our son Domenico was born and she returned from her year’s seclusion with him, she persisted in her youthful vigour. I could not understand it, however I did have a great deal more important matters on my mind, and had no great desire to second-guess my good fortune of a youthful wife.
It was on the eve of my 32nd birthday that my wife finally revealed her secret. She was hosting a small family party for me at our villa. However, when I arrived home, I did not recognize any of the people there. They had the look of our family, but in a distant way, as if viewed through frosted glass. Their faces were all too perfect, almost waxy like comedy masks. I gave an involuntary shudder upon viewing them but forced it down, my sense of hospitality and etiquette overriding any uncertainty. Dinner was unspeakably forced and awkward, and I could not help but notice that none of the guests ate a bite, but did drink copious amounts of a thick red wine that I could not remember adding to our cellars.
Though all present were a bit stiff and formal, there was one upon whom all the attention was focused. This woman introduced herself as Misina Giovanni, my wife’s aunt. I had heard my wife mention an aunt Misina before but had never met this woman. Indeed that had never struck me as odd, but now that I thought back on it, I could remember many occasions when my wife had made sojourns to visit this aunt, and yet I had still never met her after 9 years of marriage. My wife spent most of the evening fawning over her, and the others seemed rather content to allow her to hold court, always looking to her for approval before voicing any real opinion.
After the dinner concluded most of the guests departed, but Misina remained behind in the sitting room to take a glass of brandy with us. After she had taken the chair furthest from the fire, and the servants had poured us each a generous measure of my best plum brandy, my wife and I sat across from Misina as she began to talk. At first I began to laugh at what she spoke of, tales of ghosts and death-worshipping vampires as if I were a child, but then I noticed my wife looking at me and a sudden shock hit me. She already knew. My Serafina would have been the first to laugh at absurdities like these if they were truly jokes, but she was simply staring expectantly at me. I put down the brandy and fiddling with my family ring for comfort listened to what Misina had to say. She talked for a long time, revealing the true history of our family from its origins as the Jovians in Roman times to our worship of Dis Pater and control over the dead through our art of Nigrimancy and all the advantages that had given us, to our recent (267 years ago recent) induction into clan Cappadocian and what that meant for us as a family. When she revealed that my wife had been one of her ghouls for many years, since before I had met her in fact, it all made sense at last. Misina was over a hundred years old, which in a time when the average life-expectancy was 40 was truly amazing to consider, seeming an eternity. She concluded her explanation with an offer to take me on as well, to grant me the Proxy Kiss and welcome me into the true family. And should I prove myself, she said, I might even earn the embrace.
I was stunned speechless. This was all a bit too much to take in at once. On the other hand it was actually quite simple. My family had never let me down and I had sworn never to let them down in turn. Over the years of work for them I had seen some highly dishonourable business practices, but they seemed quite willing to try other ways where these methods were shown to be ineffective. Even if the rumours of our dealing with the dead were now proven to be true, I still had the confidence in my family to believe that there must be valid reasons for these arts and that we could practice them in honourable ways. I was not concerned with the blasphemy of it all; after all, God and the Church had abandoned me and proven themselves false and profane in my eyes 16 years ago. In the end the choice was simple. The family had never abandoned or betrayed me. The family wanted this future for me. I trusted my family. I accepted and drank of Misina’s blood that very night.
The next 40 years were something of a blur. I was inducted into the true nature of the family. When time came, Niccolo Giovanni and his wife Serafina were allowed to publically die and we retreated into the shadows of the great family mausoleum. Our son grew into an admirable merchant sailor following in the footsteps of Marco Polo, forging connections to the East. As time passed, I lost touch with him, and to this night have no idea as to his eventual fate, though a lack of formal death records imply to me that he was inducted as well. I threw myself into my new studies with a fervour I had not believed possible in myself before. The blood pumping through my system focused my mind to a needle’s point, removing all distractions as long as I had it, and Misina ensured I never wanted for supply. I became an accomplished Nigrimancer, both in the mortal arts we had practiced previously and in the new vampiric arts of Mortis as practiced by our Cappadocian patrons. I wrote several important treatises on how some of our more esoteric arts might be converted to the new paradigm and vice versa for the enrichment of all. While the specific mechanics of the magic were never my greatest specialty, I had a gift for organization and looking at problems in different ways that the great scholars found immensely useful, often extrapolating some random ideas of mine into great workable theorems.
The power of the blood also allowed me to engage in physical pursuits I had left behind with the loss of my arm. I trained with several prominent Cappadocian knights as well as the warriors of my own family. It felt good to wield a sword once again, though I was still at a disadvantage due to the loss of my arm. And with the gifts of the blood, I was more than a match for any ordinary swordsman even so. My wife was my eternal companion through these nights, continuing as we had begun, our love for each other only strengthened as time went on. She was my rock, always reliable and there to support me through any problem.
And such was my life until the summer of 1312. One night in July I was summoned before Misina and told that I had proven myself so admirably that I had drawn the attention of one of the great among our parent clan. Lady Constancia herself had read some of my work and personally requested that I be granted the embrace and sent to work alongside her once my basic training in vampiric ways was completed. I had certainly heard of Lady Constancia, and was deeply honoured. That night I left the world of the living forever and became what I am. Due to family tradition, I could not be trained by Misina, and thus after my embrace had to leave for a time, training under the tutelage of other family scholars. This meant leaving my wife for a time which was difficult, but I promised that I would return for her when I was able and would see her earn her place to join me in the endless nights ahead. My training took a further 5 years, and in 1317 I traveled to the great temple at Mount Erciyes to begin my new life under the great Lady Constancia.
I found her a demanding mistress, but at the same time the experience was invigorating. She pushed me to new heights of understanding and inducted me into mysteries the like of which I could scarcely have imagined. Over the next 125 years I traveled back and forth between Venice and Erciyes, acting as an informal liaison between our Nigrimancers and the greatest Mortis practitioners of the Cappadocian clan. Even the great Japeth, prodigal childe of Cappadocius himself visited us regularly, as did Ambrogino Giovanni, perhaps the single greatest Nigrimancer of my family. If I thought I had worked hard before, it was nothing compared to what I did now. There was room for nothing else in the world of service to Lady Constancia. I rose quickly in her esteem, bringing fresh ideas and organization to her research operation and, according to her, cutting her research time for most projects in half.
It was during this time that I was first exposed to the fears and resentment for my family within the main branch of the clan. I was honestly shocked. I could not understand what these great men and women believed they had to fear from us. My family wanted nothing more than a mutually beneficial partnership with the Cappadocians, a greater understanding of our arts for all concerned through mutual research and sharing of resources. When I heard Lady Constancia or the others speak of the treacherous nature of the Giovanni and how we could not truly be trusted, it was all I could do to restrain my Beast. With the exception of a few minor incidents where I had to be restrained though, I learned to restrain myself enough to restrict my objections to vehement verbal protests and convincing arguments for my family’s trustworthiness.
During this time I regularly requested that my wife be permitted to join me in the Great Temple of Erciyes, but each time it was denied. She had earned the embrace herself soon after I did and was on other important assignment elsewhere. We saw each other when we could, but it was not often enough for either of us, and secrecy forbid either of us from sharing too deeply with the other what we were doing.
And so my life continued until the fateful night of April 5, 1444. On that night I awoke to see the Lady Constancia holding a silver blade to my throat, the edges dancing with the blue flames of Corpsefire. She bore a look of such rage and instability on her immaculate face that I could barely describe, let alone understand. She proceeded to tell me in a mix of raging screams and cold and calm vitriol of what had occurred the previous night at the Monastery of St. Timothy’s. I lay there in broken silence as she told me of the great betrayal of my family and the war they had declared on our parent clan. At first I wanted to object. I simply couldn’t countenance such a gross act of betrayal with the family I had grown to know and love, the family that had always stood by me even when everything else had proven false. It took a great deal of time for Lady Constancia to convince me of the truth. After she had thoroughly probed my mind, ensuring I had genuinely known nothing of this treason, she threw me into a warded cell in the dungeons of her palace.
It took me several more nights to come to terms with what I had been told. I had refused to serve those who would countenance betrayal before, and knew the right path once again. But once again I had to choose to cast aside everything that I was, my family who were all I had left. It took me 7 nights to come to terms with my choice, to cast aside everything I had to preserve my tattered honour. Once I was resolved I begged my jailor for an audience with Lady Constancia to plead my case. Out of respect for 125 years of loyal service she granted this request, though she made it clear she had not yet decided whether or not to have me destroyed.
I abased myself before her feet and said words that could never be retracted. I forswore my family and cast aside my name. I disavowed all allegiances and loyalties to them in any way. I cast aside my name and sought to take a new one. I swore an oath of eternal vengeance upon those who would take my name and blacken it with such betrayal. I vowed that I would see every Giovanni who was even remotely involved in this conspiracy or in the later purge that was happening as ashes at my feet, including the Great Augustus himself. I vowed that until such time as it has been cleansed I would be a Giovanni no longer. Niccolo Giovanni was dead. I stood before her with a new name. It had taken me some time to consider my new identity but there was only one name that truly spoke to me of the nature of betrayal and of my new existence at once. There was a man who had written of my life without ever realizing it, not even knowing my name. A man who told of the damnation of traitors beyond all others, condemning them to the central mouth of the three-headed dog in the 9th Circle of the Inferno, including the traitor who had cut off my hand all those years ago. A man who had traveled to the depths of the Underworld and returned as I had. I stood before my Lady Constancia reborn under that name. From that night to this one, I am Dante.
From that point on I cast my lot completely in with the Cappadocians and their Lamia warriors as we fought the Giovanni’s treacherous purge. Over my time at Erciyes, I maintained myself in the peak of a warrior’s perfection, and put to use the secrets I had learned from my tutors for the noblest act of all, the destruction of traitors. I felt no remorse for each Giovanni traitor that fell beneath my blade or was overwhelmed by my Athanatoi. However the greatest test of my loyalty was still to come.
The years after 1444 were something of a blur of violence and slaughter, but at some point we received intelligence of a list of those who were involved in planning the great betrayal. I saw two names on it that made my dead heart leap in my chest.
Misina Giovanni
Serafina Giovanni
Seeing those names made a lot of things suddenly clear in my mind. I flashed back to Misina’s vague letters about important family business preventing me and my wife from being together, and Serafina telling me that she couldn’t tell me the project she had been embraced to work on for the family, but all the while trying to persuade me to leave my work in Erciyes and return to Venice with her. She was trying to bring me back home, to involve me in this treason. Yet I also remembered the resigned look on her face as she spoke to me the last time we had seen each other. She knew me well enough to know I could never be involved in something like this. This explained the blood tears in her eyes as we parted for the last time. She knew she was saying goodbye for the last time.
However I felt though, it made no difference to my purpose. These women had lied to me and betrayed me. They would fall as many other traitors had fallen before me. Knowing these two better than perhaps anyone else could, I organized our intelligence and discovered the route they would be taking. I arranged an attack force to ambush them on the road from Venice north into France. It was a small attack force, comprised of only myself and two other Cappadocians as well as a small cohort of Athanatoi and several wraiths. Our intelligence suggested they would be travelling alone, with only a small retinue and much of our forces were needed elsewhere.
As we hid in the Shadowlands, waiting for the coach to come into view, I had no doubt that I could do what was necessary. She was not my wife. I was not Niccolo Giovanni any longer. I was Dante, an instrument of vengeance, merciless force of destruction.
As the coach rounded the final bend, we moved into position, ready for the attack. It was as we had suspected; they had a minimal retinue both on the material plane and in the Shadowlands. The signal was given and we struck at once in a vicious pincer movement, destroying or banishing their wraiths in a few desperate seconds of vicious before surrounding the coach, our Athanatoi making short work of their mortal retainers. Returning to the Skinlands I took quick stock of our remaining forces. Our wraiths were gone as was one of our own number. We had 3 of the original 7 Athanatoi remaining. However every one of their mortal and ghostly slaves were either dispersed or lay dead at our feet now. It was time for long-awaited vengeance.
As I ripped the coach door bearing the hated Giovanni crest open to reveal the two women, however, something changed. There they sat, prim and proper high class ladies in their dark dresses preparing to fight as best they could, but one look in their eyes said they expected to die. And yet, looking in their eyes, I knew something was wrong. Serafina had never given a look like that in her life. I tried to cry out that it was a trap, but my companion charged into the coach, heedless. As soon as he crossed the threshold, the entire coach exploded in crackling otherworldly energy. I was thrown back, stunned. I forced myself back into focus and looked up to see two women approaching from out of the trees, black dresses scarcely brushing the ground. There was no doubt this time; I would know these women anywhere. This was indeed my sire Misina and my wife Serafina.
Scrambling to my feet I looked around and saw the devastation the trap had wrought. I was alone. My companions, the wraiths and all the remaining Athanatoi were gone, yet with a quick expenditure of blood, my wounds closed and I stood to face the women proud and tall. My wife I knew had joined me in physical pursuits and was quite skilled with the sword. Misina on the other hand had always been far more feminine, preferring to work through others save with her sorcery. Indeed as they approached, I saw the fine blade in Serafina’s hand and noticed her skirts were divided for better mobility. She was more than a companion and co-conspirator on this mission. She was a last line of defence for Misina, a hidden bodyguard whom no one would expect.
As the women closed the distance, Misina started to give some speech about how the old must give way for the young and how our time had passed. But as she got close enough to see my face she stopped, mid-sentence, a look of rage crossing her face while one of horror flowed across Serafina’s. I reached up and realized my masked helm was gone, knocked off in the blast of the false coach.
“So it is true,” Misina said, her voice the deadly cold of the razor’s kiss. “I had heard rumours, yet until this moment I had chosen to believe that you had died. Now you take even that comfort from us, forcing us to acknowledge your treason to your family Niccolo. Well, it ends here. I could not bear the shame were this to become known, so you must die here and now.”
With that she spoke a brief invocation and reached out her hand, and I felt a tugging at my very essence as she attempted to rip the soul from my body. Knowing there was no true defence against this attack, I could only steel myself to resist it as best I could. In what could well have been my last few moments on this earth, I looked at Serafina, and saw the blood tear roll down her cheek. She did not attempt to stop Misina’s attack, but she did mourn for me. Cold comfort is better than none.
A few moments later the attack ceased and to my surprise I found I was still in my body. I had resisted her pull, my will bolstered by what I knew I was doing and the knowledge that there was at least enough left of the Serafina I knew that she would mourn me. I looked up at Misina and grinned darkly.
“Bad luck,” I said. “First lesson I was taught all those centuries ago in the Florentine army: never neglect your defence in favour of an all-out attack.” With that I charged, burning all of the energy from my blood I could toward my preternatural speed. Before she could even react to attempt to dodge my assault I had brought my blade down into her neck, blue Corpsefire flickering along the edges as my sire met the end she very richly deserved, beautiful alabaster face turning to ash before my eyes.
Looking up I saw Serafina standing before me, sword held outstretched and ready, ruby tears glistening in her eyes as I felt them well up equally in mine. As both of us began to circle, looking for an opening to begin the duel we knew was now inevitable, Serafina cried out, damning me for forcing her into this position, cursing my disloyalty. Each word tore pieces out of my heart, her condemnation a far more effective weapon than her blade. Then we clashed together, blades dancing in a blur of steel and blue fire. The two of us were equally matched, I had seen to that over the years, always wanting her to stand as my equal.
As we dueled a realization hit me, more surprising than anything I had yet experienced. I could not do it. I couldn’t kill my love. Even after everything she had done, even while she was actively attempting to kill me, I couldn’t strike her down, deprive the world of her beauty and vitality. Unfortunately the same time I had that realization, a light came to her eyes and I knew she had realized my weakness. She began to leave herself undefended more and more, opening herself to killing blows she knew I would not take in favour of stronger and faster strikes. Slowly but surely she was wearing me down, and both of us knew it. The Corpsefire still flickered around my blade, preventing me even from attempting to strike for torpor, and trained as I was without a left arm, I had long since ceased carrying swordbreakers or secondary weapons. I knew if we continued much longer Serafina would strike me down, so I decided to risk everything on one final gambit.
Leaping back I threw down my blade and stretched my arms out wide. “Serafina, my love. I think you have realized by now that I can’t kill you. However much I am disgusted by the treason you were part of, however much you might deserve a traitor’s death, and however much I believed I had hardened my heart against you in preparation for this mission.” Serafina hesitated, sword falling back down into a passive stance as she approached. Seeing my one and only chance I pressed on. “Serafina, this isn’t you. I can make them understand that as I do. Come with me back to Erciyes. I have allies among the highest ranks of the clan. I can vouch for you. Whatever evil you have wrought does not have to be the end. You can redeem yourself. You know I will not let anyone harm you, anymore than I can harm you myself.” I was pleading now, desperation obvious in my voice. “Fina, I love you more than anything else in either world. Please, I beg you, take this chance with me.”
I stretched out my hand to her, waiting desperately for her reply as she slowly took one step toward me, then another. She reached out her hand, almost as if to take mine, then dejectedly let it fall back by her side. “I cannot do that. I am my family. I would not know who I am without them, Niccolo. The family is greater than either of us or what we may want ourselves. I cannot come with you.” Then a new fire lit her eyes as she offered out her own arm to me. “But you can return with me. Come back to Venice. I have my own influence with the elders, even with Grandfather himself. If I vouch for your contrition, they will welcome you back Niccolo, I know they will. Together we will finish this purge of the old and corrupt Cappadocians and with you by my side we can sit near the top of the brand new Giovanni Clan. Just think of that Niccolo. The Giovanni Clan, standing tall and proud, equal of any of the other 12 despite their age.” I heard a desperation in her voice now that almost matched my own a few moments ago. “Take my hand and return to Venice with me, and we can be together again, never again parted. We will tell the elders that you never truly betrayed us, that you were my agent all along, feeding me intelligence from within Erciyes itself. With Misina dead there is no one left to contradict this tale. We’ll simply say she died in the first assault from your forces.”
At this point, however, Serafina realized she had said the wrong thing and her impassioned speech about our new future together trailed off into nothing. She looked into my eyes and saw the truth. She saw my disgust at this plan. “I am sorry my love,” I said. The next words to leave my lips were the hardest I’ve ever spoken. “I cannot come with you. I could not live like that anymore than you could live without the family. You would make my existence a lie, devoid of truth and honour. I would rather you took my head here and now. So strike fast and true my love. I will not fight you anymore. We have nothing further to say to each other.”
There were no tears with this final speech. We were both long past the point of tears. Serafina approached, lifting her sword as if to strike. My eyes never left hers. She leaned in and kissed me one last time, and as she pulled away whispered in my ear, “Our paths have reached an insurmountable impasse. I see that. I must go my way, and you must go yours. And yet I will retain some glimmer of hope, for even the most circuitous and wandering traveler can find his way back to the road again in time. I hope we meet again in time, my love, but not too soon. For the hope I have for our future, I give you your life tonight. Don’t seek me out again though. If we are meant to be together again in time, we will be. Know though that I do not share your weakness Niccolo. However hard I can and will strike you down if you come after me again. I strongly advise you go to ground, for your allies will soon be finished and you’ve cast aside your family. Farewell my love.”
With that she quickly slashed her wrist and drew her blood circle, stepping through the newly made door into the Shadowlands and vanishing from my sight. It was nearly a full hour more before I moved again, stepping over to pick up my discarded sword and returned it with difficulty to my sheath. Slowly I began to make my way back across the country to Erciyes. I could have summoned one of my wraiths to deliver a message quickly and gained help, but I needed the time alone that the travel gave me. There would be a purpose of this long journey. I had confronted myself and found him wanting. Niccolo Giovanni could not strike down his wife Serafina. Very well. Then my path was clear. Over the 2 months of my return journey to Erciyes, I cast aside every bit I could of Niccolo Giovanni, doing everything within my power to become Dante in truth as well as name. I knew this might be a futile gesture, unable to predict how I might act should I meet her again, but it steeled me for the next step.
Upon my return to Erciyes I delivered the report that it was an ambush, that Misina was killed and that Serafina escaped. To this night I still do not know if the Lady Constancia knows the truth of what happened, but she has never mentioned it to me. She simply nodded and accepted the report. I was not worried about Serafina speaking in detail of what had happened to the Giovanni either. It would be as damaging to her name and prospects as it was to mine. No Serafina would do the same as I had, deliver a bare report of the facts and move on with the war. She was always solid and practical like that.
The war progressed badly after that, our conflict shadowed by the greater war raging of the Anarch revolt. Curiously the Giovanni never allied themselves with the other Anarchs rising against their elders. If they had I’m certain we would have fallen far sooner. Nevertheless, the war was not going our way. All those who we might have called on as allies were consumed with their own struggles, and our own forces were scattered and disorganized. The Cappadocians had never numbered a great many warriors outside the small number of Lamia left fighting. It became clearer and clearer that we were going to lose.
In the final nights of the war, Lady Constancia gathered her council to her to discuss a desperate, zero hour strategy. She said that she had discovered a way to take a small number of us and hide us away in the deepest depths of the Labyrinth within the Underworld. No Giovanni would venture that deep and there we would wait. We would preserve ourselves long enough for the Giovanni to believe they had won and grow complacent as we had done. And when they had grown fat and decadent, we would return and purge their treason from the face of the earth. It was truly a desperate gambit, and not an easy strategy to countenance as it meant sending our best warriors and scholars away, effectively leaving the rest of the clan to die, for Lady Constancia revealed that she could take no more than 50 of us in this great working. After it was decided that she would go ahead with this scheme, I was most surprised to find my own name on her list of those who would go with her.
For 500 years we lingered in our Underworld prison, allowing the energies of the Shadowlands to permeate us fully. It drove more than a few of us mad in the end. Lady Constancia completely changed, becoming the terrible Unre that she is today. I however remembered. I remembered our purpose and what we had to do. I will always remember. Now that we have returned, we will have our vengeance. This new world was confusing at first but a few things were clear. The Giovanni are still here. The Giovanni are allied with this new order, this Camarilla by treaty and by deed. It is clear then our place. Our place is with the enemies of this Camarilla. This Sabbat will do nicely to aid in the destruction of the Betrayers of my name.