Page 108 of Eternal Ruin

Varos, as the First Vampire, holds the ability to compel all vampires.

He marks his victims with a single command using his fangs or claws. It manifests on the body as three deep red lines and only fades once the compulsion has been enacted. Often, the vampire is restricted from sharing their knowledge of Varos’s existence. That he is not a myth lost to time but very real till this day.

A vampire with a claw mark is untrustworthy, tongue-tied and must be killed quickly. They are acting against their will. Most dranaics will cover such marks. If you come across such a vampire, kill them immediately.

*Not found in Ye Abyssi Tarik or any other known text. Every soul that has been compelled dies before they lift a pen to write such a thing about Varos the Night Lion.

38.

KIDAN

Kidan waited for the Dirt Diggers in a bar outside of Uxlay, the smell of beer and mint refresher thick in the air. Rita’s Bar felt quite abandoned and old, the dim lights and stools similar to those in the ’90s bar the Dirt Diggers first used.

She focused on the plan, the opposing sides of Uxlay:

The Dirt Diggers—Piran, Temo, Rojit—change Dranacti.

Their outside aid: the Panther Order.

The 13th—Makary, Ajtaf, Delarus, Qaros, and who knows who else—open deanship to all Border Houses and alternate claiming the middle position. Remove Adane House.

Their outside aid: the Eagle Order and Oryx Order.

She still wasn’t sure how Goro, Luroz, and Umil House would vote, but one issue at a time. She hoped Yusef could sway his family to her side. But wasn’t entirely sure.

Temo House would stand before the Mot Zebeya Courts tomorrow and declare their vote, which meant Kidan couldn’t fail today. There would be no point in learning how to sever her mother’s culture if in a couple of weeks Adane House was demoted to Border House, only allowed to set the “No Soul Can Enter Uxlay” law.Now, more than ever, Kidan clung close to her three laws: Make June pay, make GK human, make Susenyos tell her the truth about the artifacts.

She had nothing else but these laws, and God help her, she would set them.

The doorbell chimed, and three people in long coats entered together. They marched toward the designated spot, just like in the picture they took in the 1990s beside her mother and father.

Next to Adjoa was a Black woman with one sharp eye and a brown-skinned muscular man in a thick scarf.

Osa Rojit’s eye patch was dark green with a fern plant decorating the edges. The Rojit House sigil. Kidan had heard many things about how Osa lost her eye. Some said it was in the riots after Kidan’s parents were murdered. But Slen had mentioned something more sinister about Rojit House. How they loved to play God with medicine. Stitching vampire limbs to humans, experimenting to the point of death.

Mikhail Temo, on the other hand, occupied the most space in the booth, thick arm extended on the back of the seat. Looking at his size, it was hard to believe he was once the fastest athlete at Uxlay. Crazy enough to race with dranaics instead of humans.

The Dirt Diggers.

These had been her mother’s closest friends.

“Thank you for coming.” Kidan squared her shoulders, injecting strength into her voice. “I’m here to tell you why you should vote to keep Adane House in the middle.”

They were silent, their faces hardened with years of education and politics.

Kidan had thought very carefully on how to sway them.

“You all believe my mother failed in locating the artifact, but she didn’t.” She inhaled deeply for what she planned to say and lifted her forged letter, holding it like a prize. “I’ll get the mask artifact the day I turn twenty-one. My mother entrusted it to someone outside of Uxlay.”

Kidan left the letter on the table. No one reached out to read it.

Sudden erratic drums beat in her ears.

She’d chosen the age because the number twenty-one was scrawled all over her mother’s books, haunting her.

And she’d been careful not to tell them it was inside Adane House because she didn’t trust them not to murder her here and take it for themselves.

Kidan almost believed her story.