..House of V..

[Varian]

*** OOC Information on the plot to follow: ***

The following posts will comprehensively encompass any and all of the "change of life" events that take place in the existence of my character, Varian duMonde. Each and every piece of information offered here will be a page in how his life unfolds in the realm of Trae Kelsa. At first, it will be a very brief look into his past, the origins of his mortal life and what occurrences molded him into the creature that he has become. This will be, by far, the largest, continual endeavor to explain a character I have ever taken on.

This is a plotline and I encourage participation by any player that might be interested. Not only do I encourage it, but I look forward to it. Although, it may be slow-going at first, I intend to ground each of my posts here in actual roleplay that takes place in our main channel, with the exception of those events that have already taken place (i.e. the brief look into Varian's life before his embrace).

That said, here we go. Enjoy a long read and I hope it is worth your time.

Thanks,

Eric

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[Varian]

Varian apBlanc duMonde, the youngest of two sons born to a simple family. A husband, a father whose soul intention was to carve out a worthy life for his wife and children. A mother and a wife that doted upon her sons with love and affection. They survived in contentment.

It was when the wars came that the serenity was fractured. The father was taken from his family by the cause he so desperately believed in. Battles raged on for many years, leaving the boys only their mother as they grew from children to men. After so long, even the most devoted of families lose faith. Their father had vanished from their lives and their mother was aging, growing ill and frail. With her passing, two brothers were left with only one another. Once proud and adoring siblings rivalrous and hateful.

A mutual disgust drove them apart. Each took paths that would lead them into darkness. One brother a war-mongering murderer and the other, a soldier in the footsteps of his father.

Though the cause was not his own, Varian struggled through battle after battle. The sting of pain and the clash of steel kept his thoughts from his brother and focused on an eagerness to die as a warrior. To die for a purpose.

Eventually, the wars ended and the fighting was no longer their to offer him sanctity. As if there had been no span of time between the day they parted ways, his concerns returned to Tristen, his elder brother. Things that turned them to enemies now seemed petty and trivial.

The boy-turned-soldier set out to recover that frivolously cast away. Little did he know that the road his brother had chosen to follow was one far more insidious.

While their mother's death had lead Varian to seek out the abyss, Tristen grew terrified of the idea that one day, his life may come to an end. He emersed himself in the occult and desperately sought to make himself impervious to the icy touch of cessation. It was here where Tristen's mortality came to an end.

When Varian and Tristen were reunited, the oldest brother had already given himself to evil. Though their rivalry had been long since forgotten, Tristen did not divulge details to his sibling as to the reason for it.

Tristen had changed. No longer human, he had been marked by the beast. He was now Kindred. Vampire.

[Varian]

Although Tristen was no longer mortal, like his brother, their rivalry had subsided. The two were as they had been in their younger years, allied and inseperable. As brothers, their allegiance was unquestioned and as warriors, their skill was unmatched.

Leading a series of campaigns with a group of mercenaries Tristen dubbed "The Knights", the older brother convinced Varian of his cause and enlisted him in his gruesome scheme. Though Varian was loyal to his brother, it was not long after this that he knew it was best to leave Tristen's side and forge ahead on his own. Varian was aging, older then than his brother was when he gave up his mortality. So, with reluctance, Varian slipped away without a word of farewell.

After the time he had spent with his brother and those within his command, Varian had come to terms with what supernatural things existed in the world. He had embraced these things as real and was bewildered by them no longer. Instead, he sought them out no matter where his travels took him. It was this indulgance that lead him to his fate.

One evening, while travelling alone through a forest path, Varian was attacked. Outnumbered, Varian did his best to defend himself, but was overcome. Beaten and broken, the thieves took all but the his clothing. In the forest, he lay for days until he conjured the strength to climb to his feet and make his way to a nearby town.

It was night when he reached the outskirts of the place, but it seems eerily empty. In an alleyway he collapsed. Barely conscious, he was unaware he had been watched, followed during his entire ordeal. When a man approached him, Varian threw tired fists. His weakened attacks were brushed away and the man took Varian in his arms. What he offered was life, strength and the promise that the young man would never feel the pain he was suffering again.

When Varian could not answer, the man closed his eyes and brought his lips to his throat. Varian struggled, but could do nothing. The vampire's fangs pierced his dirt-and-blood covered flesh and Varian cried out.

The creature drank his fill, then cut his own wrist and pressed it to Varian's lips. Hungrily, vengefully, Varian drank at the warm blood as it gushed from the wrist of his attacker. The vampire wrenched himself free and as simply as he had appeared, left Varian to the ravages that would follow.

Cursed, the hallucinations that came to him during the agonizing change his body made, questioned reality more so than the event itself. Angels and demons alike came for Varian's penance. They offered salvation, in the form of light and fire. Varian refused them all and suffered their wrath.

Like his brother, Varian opened his heart to the darkness and it welcomed him eagerly.

[Varian]

Varian awoke to pain. Agonizing and brutal, he lay restrained across a stone slab. A sacrificial altar. Around him, figures cloaked in darkness moved wordlessly. They held daggers and other, savage weapons, wielding them like surgical tools. They cut into Varian's flesh, deep into his body.

When these creatures spoke, they did so like vipers. It was a language Varian had never before heard and understood nothing of. Incantations and curses, it was all he could fathom. Unaffected by his will to fight and his cries of pain, the continued in their diabolical work.

Blood poured from Varian's body, each new wound felt like fire to him. How could he still be alive? What execration had these demons brought upon him that he might suffer so well? He watched in horror as they opened his chest and severed the tissue that held his heart fast. Expertly, they removed the organ, wrapped it thickly in cloth and placed it within a small coffer.

Finally, his will gave way and darkness came over him once more.

[Varian]

Awakened again, Varian found himself confined with what he could only imagine to be a casket. As he struggled against its walls, he found it impossible to free himself.

Miraculously, the pain he felt before was now imperceivable. Had it all just been another vision? Another nightmare? He had given up his efforts to escape his prison and found himself wondering, instead, of what would become of him eventually.

A strange new sensation crept into his veins. A heat like he had never known before; a dark hunger. It was all he could do to quell the fiendish desire. He screamed for answers, calling from within this coffin as he again fought against it. He refused to let this remain his Hell.

Soon, the door of the casket gave. Sand flooded inward instantly, in paralyzing quantity. Varian struggled and climbed through it, pulled himself upward blindly until his fingers breached the surface and he felt the warm wind. He dragged himself above ground and collapsed against the desert floor. He was nowhere.

As far as he could see in either direction, there was nothing. He forced himself to his feet and began to walk, though he had no direction or perception as to where it was he would go.

When day came, it was torture. The sun bit at his flesh, burning him horribly again and again. Soon, he found that he could bury himself in the sand when dawn drew near and at night, he traveled more.

Days and weeks passed before he found himself at the borders of a city. He hid from its people, dining on rats and other vermin of the streets. Like them, he scurried from the light and the eyes of those who might send him away.

[Varian]

It was night again. By avoiding the light of day and consuming a wretched diet of rats and refuse, Varian had managed to regain the strength he had lost.

Now, he walked the dark streets as a man and not as a beast.

It was by chance that two men had pulled another from the street, into the alley where Varian had come to hide away. They pulled knives and threatened the other man, taking from him whatever he might hold that was valuable. Virtuous, Varian felt obliged to come to the man's aid. He emerged from the shadows and attacked them.

A vicious roar erupted from his throat, as he took one man by his throat and threw him into a nearby wall. Enraged, he leaped toward the second and pinned him beneath his weight. His mouth agape, like blades two teeth protruded from the rest. He lunged downward and buried his incisors in the man's throat.

Their would-be victim, horrified, ran from the scene. Like a lion, Varian tore at the man beneath him. As the blood flowed into his mouth and down his throat, he felt it run throughout his veins. It restored him, renewed his strength in a fashion he never knew from the disgusting creatures he fed from previously.

As much as the feeding had brought him strength, it also brought with it coherence. As he hovered over the corpse he had torn asunder, covered in the dead man's blood, realization struck him like lightning. He had murdered; not only murdered, but fed on this man.

The blood dripped from his face and hands and he watched it.

The noise from the street brought him from his reverie. He turned from the alley and ran through the streets.

What had he become?

What dark things would come?

..Why had he enjoyed it?