The Cliffs of Insanity

Over the course of about a day now, I've had one character get resurrected in my current narrative and another new character get added to the same narrative. As it stands in my brainmeats right now, after Cadmus kills Baptiste Chenier, a solitary Vampire whose Hive alliance is still a mystery to me, resurrects him. This would make him the only Vampire to ever be decapitated, but still be saved. The only thing I know about the female Vampire is that her name is Pandora, and she renames the film maker Cadmus just killed Lazarus. The feeling I'm getting from this new and unexpected turn of events indicates to me that they are going to be of special importance to the new story. So, to celebrate, I made a crap Photoshop manipulation whilst waiting for my words to return.

Like the whispering promise of infection, Cadmus arrived in Los Angeles. Slicing through the insistent fog, the airplane finally came to rest in a cradle of the garish light upon which humanity seemed so dependent in their fruitless effort to stave away the dark. They denied the stars. They denied the velvet night. They feared that which could not be seen, because the artificial light blinded them to any possibility beyond that which was illuminated. Let them take comfort in their obliviousness. It often served Cadmus Pariah well.

He brought with him one small bag, just large enough to hold a change of clothes and his computer. Cadmus did not plan on being in America for very long. He still had connections to the entertainment empire, mainly on Wilshire Blvd. It should not take much effort to locate the offending filmmaker and dispatch him with haste.

Like quicksilver, Cadmus moved through swelling throng of travellers, his disdain for them growing with every nimble step he took. The stench of their skin was only made worse by their pathetic attempts to mask their natural odours. The only thing remotely pleasant about humanity was the dizzying effect of their blood. Despite their general unpleasantness, human blood was still a sublime intoxicant.

Cadmus was hungry.

No one saw anything, and his dinner never knew what hit her. Cadmus stepped out of time and whisked her with him, draining her of most of her blood as people marched by, burdened with concerns or basking in the illusion of hope. She had a child, who was left standing beside her mother, crying in the belief that the woman had instantly abandoned her little girl. She could not see the female crumple to her knees, still locked in Cadmus’ trans-dimensional embrace. Only when he let the body completely drop to the floor of LAX, did she once again become visible to mortal eyes.

The child’s cries turned to a great keen, and Cadmus peered at the little human, feeling nothing but, perhaps, a vague scorn. Let the airport authorities sort it out, he thought. Let the child become emotionally locked to this moment in time, wracked with a trauma that will only serve to grow as she grows. The sooner anyone has the epiphany that life is but a treasury of agonies, the better off they shall be. What horrors will this little one collect over the course of time?

It was still early evening on the Pacific coast. Cadmus knew, though, that the business that controlled all forms of entertainment never truly slept. He had no doubt people would still be diligently working to perfect their propaganda for public consumption. As he turned away from the inconsolable child and the growing herd of curious and distressed humans, Cadmus attended to his cell, and found the phone number of Neil Beiser, one of the executives who oversaw the dissemination of movie score recordings under the Sony umbrella.

Neil picked up in the middle of the second ring.

“Sony Pictures, this is Neil.”

“Hello, Neil.”

“Christian? Is that really you? Where the hell have you been, man? What’s up with Magnificat? You still doing that gig?”

“Ahhhh, no. After Mary passed, it just seemed a bit pointless,” Cadmus said, perfectly imitating a person who was dealing with grief.

“Yeah, man, I’m sorry to hear about that. So, what are you doing these days?”

“Writing primarily. Lying low, you know. Keeping to myself. Right now, though, I am in town and was hoping you could help me with something.”

“Name it, Christian.”

Neil still knew Cadmus as Christian, because that was the name he had originally gone by with the forming Magnificat. Even though he knew Cadmus’ real name, he preferred that particular cognomen. It didn’t faze Cadmus. Names were nothing but transitory identities to be used and dismissed in accordance to one’s needs in that moment.

“Word has it that a young director is engaged in a project about various Vampire sects. I’d heard he might be interested in using some of Magnificat’s music for his film. Do you know anything about this, perhaps?”

“Oh, you’re probably talking about Baptiste Chenier. He really gets into his work. I’ve heard he’s only filming at night, to maintain that particular undead vibe.” Neil barked out a cynical laugh, setting Cadmus’ teeth on edge. “He started out directing music videos, mostly for alternative bands, nothing like what you guys did. But yeah, I can see where he might be keen on getting the rights to use some of your songs.”

“Do you know how I might connect with him about this?” Cadmus asked politely.

This is the first revision, with the idea of The Harming Tree being more of a novel than a collection of short stories. There will be more changes here until I no longer find all this revolting.

After the song of the Augury of was sung, the Great Hive was terribly decimated by the mortation and purging of the Vampires. Gone were the last Tarmi of the Hive of Purity, finally rejoining their brethren on the holy isle of Meybhelahn. With them went the only human to grace that hidden home since the Night of the Blood Moon. Eve had fulfilled her destiny and was given her reward of sanctity, despite being Cadmus Pariah’s sacred garden of Blood. The Hive of Redemption collectively mortated back into the human population along with a number of Darklings of the Darkblood Hive. Most of the Tribe of the Tomb perished, finally being released from their crippling burdens. Those who were left also mortated and led short lives in human form. The only Vampires left were most of the Darklings and those of the Hive of the Beast. Less than five thousand Vampires walked the blessed dark, feeding upon the blood of the living.

Few of the Vampire Blood Royalty survived. Orphaeus Cygnus remained the High Prince of the Beasts, happy in his position and undesiring of any greater responsibility. Rebekah and Mephistopheles had never sought power within the Great Hive and had no desire to rise to power now that the King was dead and the Queen had passed into the Tarmian realm. Thaddeus Brannon had retaken his name of Dmitri and had disappeared into the Blue Ridge Mountains to mourn his departed lover. The only one left was the true heir to the Throne of Blood...Cadmus Pariah. The newly-born Vampire, aged to a certain regal beauty, had achieved all that he had dreamt, save for the death of his mother, Kelat. He had outlived his former master, the Apostate, and risen to power within what was now called the New Hive. Humanity was his for the taking, as were the spirits in the New Hive, a resplendent and neverending feast.

But he was not King. After Thiyennen, there could be no other king and, as long as Queen Kelat lived, the leader of the New Hive was considered a regent of the night. It rankled Cadmus, but he was barely concerned with this technicality because he knew Kelat would never return to the world of humans and Upyr. He was truly the ruler of the New Hive, but his title had to reflect his position on the throne. A coterie of Darklings and Beasts convened with Cadmus, despite their fear and hatred of him, and they decided upon the title of Plenipotentiary, the Ruler of All. Cadmus accepted this cognomen and rose to power over all the New Hive, his dark eyes watching the Upyr with dread magicks.

Still, he fed upon the Blood of the New Hive, reminding them of the Sanguinem Mittat and who was their eternal master. But he mostly took humans for food now, and basked in the ability to eat and drink the vast banquet of human food. He was more of a sybarite than ever before, and his West Country home was the center of the pleasure palace he called the world.

But all of it came with a price. Cadmus was fraught with all the trappings of emotion and he found himself countering the agonies of certain feelings with ghastly behaviour. Dogging him almost to the point of madness crept a Darkling who had always been masked to Cadmus’ boundless vision. He sought retribution for those who had been murdered to soften the blows emotion so often incur on those who feel, and he wandered on the peripheries of Cadmus’ world, waiting on a chance, any chance, to end the rule of the Plenipotentiary, by way of destruction or desire...or a strange combination of both.  Driven by vengeance, yet inspired by a kind of fascination, this Darkling was unlike any other in Cadmus' long night.

Herein lie the tales of Cadmus in the early days of his role of Plenipotentiary of the New Hive, the newfound enemy he was incapable of simply destroying or ignoring, and the object he found most sacred as he navigated his way as a Darkling walking a path of desire and revulsion: the Harming Tree.