The Begining [Back Story. Invited Only]

The early moon and stars dimly shone down onto a small lake, making it glisten and shimmer. Around the lake was a vast amount of vegetation, from lush grass to towering trees which where just begin to shyly show some buds. There was little noise being made through out the woods; hooting owls, creaking trees and a trickling of the stream that lead to the lake.

A twig snapped as a fine young stag emerged from the forest and walked towards the bank of the lake. Lifting his head, he sniffed the air - creating a slight mist effect as he exhaled harshly. Twitching his ears he bent down to drink, lapping up the cool water, creating a rippling effect.

The stag flew his head back and let out a terrible scream as it was flung and held down to the ground by a humanoid form which had its canines buried deep into a vein in his neck. The stag kicked and wriggled, trying to free itself from the grasp, before gasping one last time as his head hit the ground with a thud.

The humanoid form that accomplished this fleet continued to drink greedily from the once magnificent animal before pushing its self away from it, studying the puncture marks the had blood oozing out of it. Quickly it scrambled towards the lake and splashed itself with water to remove the blood that covered its lower face.

As the humanoid finished cleaning its face it studied its form in the moonlight lit water. Staring back at him was a young man with a straight nose, baby blue eyes and slightly pouty lips. Framing these features were curled golden hair that felled to his shoulders. The form frowned at him.

"Stupid." He hissed before hitting the water with his hand. He pushed himself away from the bank and curled into himself, stroking the scars on his wrist.

Giacinto trudged through the forest with a dark frown on her face. she was ready to kill something. The mud splattered up the dark breeches she wore and peppered the off-white poets shirt adorning her frame. The crossbow and quiver of arrows strapped to her back clinked together with every step she took.

Hunt down a whole coven of vampires, Giacinto. It won't be too hard, Giacinto, she mocked with a cat-like hiss, baring sharp fangs. And to make it worse, we got split up!

She had made sure that Lyssum would stay with either Ingicio or herself at all times. There was no telling what powers the vampires in the coven had. Lyssum would definitely be needed if things went haywire.

The Succubus' nose wrinkled when she caught the scent of deer blood. She hadn't fed in a few days so the blood smelled a little more appetising than it should have.

"Of all the-! First we get send on this bloody stupid hunt. Then I get split up from the rest of them and now I'm hungry. As if tonight could get any worse," she growled with a thick Italian accent, stalking towards the scent of blood. She'd have a quick snack before she went back to hunting. Then she'd find a nice strong male to feed from after she had finished hunting the coven.

She broke through the forest, arriving at the edge of a vast beautiful lake. Her carmine eyes focussed on the corpse of a deer, blood oozing from its neck. Now, that isn't from an animal. That's from a vam-

A sharp splash of water cut of her thought. Her eyes snapped up to a form crouched at the water's edge. A boy. Long curly blonde hair; dirtied brown trousers and a poets shirt not too dissimilar to her own.

At his hissed insult, she cocked a brow. "If you were the one that drained that deer so willingly, I would have to agree." She stuck her tongue out in disgust, eyeing the corpse. "I don't know how some of us can drink from animals. It's disgusting."

The boy twisted his body sharply and glared at the one who spoke. A vampire woman; tanned, relaxed and had an accent that seemed to be from the Kingdom of Naples or somewhere around that area. Not only that, but something in his gut told him that she was not a force to be reckon with.

"Whether you think it is disgusting or not, does it really matter? You are not the one eating it at the end of the day." He snarled.

The boy then slowly rises, revealing his 5"7 stature, and took a couple of cautious steps back, keeping eye contact at all times yet kept his hearing focused on behind him, just in case. He then bent down to retrieve a light brown shoulder bag that was discarded from when he killed the stag, still keeping eye contact.

"What do you want anyway? Other then criticising what I am eating."

Giacinto chuckled, her mood lightening, as the younger vampire snapped at her. "It's just shocking to see my people degrade themselves to such a standard. Even those few that are compassionate are loath to drink from animals. Not enough nutrition to keep us going. You'll become weak quite quickly if you carry on with that diet."

She cocked a brow at his retreat. "Unless you're from that pesky coven we're hunting, you've got nothing to worry about." She pursed her lips and looked off into the distance, touching her index finger to her chin. "Unless, of course, you decide to annoy me. Then I'll tear your throat you, understand~?" She smiled brightly - the act looking maniacal coupled with her previous statement.

"My coven are hunting down a pesky coven of idiot blood vampires that are close to revealing us to the humans," she answered. She cocked her head to the side and began a slow stroll towards the blond vampire. "Don't suppose you know anything about them? But, if you're a part of that coven, you know, I have no choice but to kill you. We've been ordered with the extermination of all members of this coven."

Though Giacinto would kill this boy if he were a part of the coven, she wouldn't enjoy doing so. This boy - for some reason unknown to her - interested her.

The boy glanced down at the water for a split second before retuning to look into the other vampires eyes. He tugged his lips and debated his options. The coven she described could be the one he was just at, considering that they were not to careful with disposing the bodies, and it will get them completely of his trail - yet she might be suspicious and kill him at the mere chance that he was part of them, but this could be avoided if he just played dumb.

What does he have to live for now though?

"There is a mansion in that direction that houses an widower Lord, underneath his mansion there are a small coven of vampires that are not disposing the bodies of humans; instead leaving them out in the open for all those to see. Just simply follow the river to get to it." He said, jerking his thumb over his shoulder.

She pondered over the given information for a minute, glancing up at the moon. "There are still a few hours till dawn. I'll have to wait it out and regroup with the rest of them at daybreak. We'll storm the building about noon."

She sighed. "Their activity suggest they're bound to the night so that should make our job easier."

The Succubus strode forwards until she was stood directly in front of the boy. She rested a hand on his shoulder and smiled. "Thank you, Young One. Your help is much appreciated. My coven and I are indebted to you."

She cocked her head to the side with furrowed brows. "Y'know what? We never introduced ourselves." She took a few steps back and bowed with a flourish. "I am Giacinto: Hunter extraordinaire and Elder of the coven Cacciatori di Sangue."

Indebted? That may be useful in the future.

So, this vampire woman, Giacinto, deferentially seemed to be quite powerful now, unless she was just giving herself that title of Elder just to seem that way. Then again, titles may not be as meaningful in the vampire world. Were they? he mentally noted to study those with titles to see if other vampires treated them differently or not.

"It is a honer to meet you, Giacinto." He said politely before standing tall again, looking back into her eyes. "My name is Richard of Shrewsbury, 1st Duke of York." He frowned. "Or at least I was." He spat.

"A human of power then, were you? You're better off forgetting your human life, you know?" she said softly. "We may look like it and have similar mannerisms at times but the fact of the matter is that we're not human."

She cupped the boys cheek with one hand, marvelling over the difference in skin tone for a few seconds. She hadn't been in England for long and she couldn't believe that the English preferred to keep their skin so pale. "You're so young." This boy - and he really was only a boy - shouldn't have had this live.

"Did you give permission to the one that turned you?" she asked, her voice cold and hard. Yes, she had created vampires before but she had conditions for when she did. She would not turn anyone under the age of twenty and she would only turn someone if they had given their explicit permission to do so.

She knew that there were vampires with less than decent morals that wouldn't care about the humans opinion on being turned. And she hated it.

She became a hunter to stop injustices like that happening.

"I don't want to forget that I was human, it is what made me the person I am today and I do not want to forget those that are precious." Richard murmured, not leaning in nor out of the hand that cupped his cheek.

"And I did not give her permission." He snarled. "Yet she was bound around the thought that I wanted to become what I am now. That I wanted to be with her forever and be more powerful then I was, as if it ran through the family." He hissed then perused his lips and frowned, trying not to move the muscles on his face and clenched his fists.

"I never said that. Having once been a human will rule your life as a vampire. Created vampires and Dhampir aren't treated as great as pure vampires. We'll always be subjected to that prejudice, I'm afraid." Her hand strayed from his cheek, pushing his hair back out of his face.

Her free hand clenched into a fist. So it had been as she had speculated.

"Is she still alive?" the Succubus asked, voice low and husky with smothered emotion. It would do no good yelling at the boy. He wasn't the one at fault. "If she is, I vow to kill her for you."

One thing Giacinto never did was go back on her promises. When she promised something, she would go to the ends of the Earth to make sure she followed through. No matter what the promise was. She was a woman of her word.

Richard took in a few shaky breaths before replying; "Yes."

He lowered his eyes and twisted a bit of lose thread at the hem of his shirt, musing over what happened tonight over such a short period of time. He raised his eyes to look back at Giacinto, the woman he was extremal cautious about not too long ago, that seemed to of simply flew out of the window after a little conversation... well not completely, he wont trust her watching his back nor reveal any extreme weak points.

Something in the back of his mind kicked in as he was reminded of what she said a moment ago. "We will?"

"I vow on the life of myself and my coven that I shall exterminate that bitch." She dropped her hand and gave him a hard stare. The soft smile that had graced her face before was gone. Her face was schooled into a hard determined expression. "But I won't be able to do it without your help. You'll have to give me a physical description or a location or name." She could work with any of those. She had been around for long enough to be able to track someone on very little information.

She chuckled at the boys belated reaction. "Yes. Dhampir more so than created vampire. We really have a tough time in the vampire community." She smiled awkwardly, hand raising to scratch the back of her head with a sheepish smile. "It makes it difficult to get our due respect. We've really got to fight hard if we want to be respected. Even I, as an Elder, have a hard time getting people to respect me at times."

Looking for a distraction from the terribly depressing matter of vampire purity, she raised her eyes to the sky again. "Beautiful night out tonight, yeah?" She almost winced at how obvious the topic change was. She really needed to work on her subtlety.

He looked at her and smiled tightly, muttering a grateful thank you before listening about her being a Dhampir (it took him until the end of her little speech about being a Dhampir before remembering what one was) and then her rather sudden change of topic.

He looked at the sky thoughtfully then nodded in agreement, the moon was large and bright and the stars glimmered around it. Stunning. He smiled softly as memories where brought back of those times he and his brother, whenever they wear together, used to gaze up at it and point out the different consolations they could see, sometimes other family members would join them.

His thoughts soon trickled back to reality and he sighed, continuing on with the conversation; "The woman that created me looks to be about in her 30's, dark hair and she comes up to my shoulder. She also goes by the name of Elizabeth, but she is known to of changed he name when it suits her."

Ignicio, Lyssum, you two better not do anything stupid while we're split up. Her mind just couldn't help but stray to her mate and other coven member. She got so worried about them when she wasn't there. She had quite a few powerful enemies that wouldn't hesitate to attack her coven to get at her.

She hummed low in her throat as she listened to his description. "I see..." Her tongue flicked over her lower lip. "She's a pure vampire. You're quite a strong vampire for only being created, so she has to be. The weaker the vampire, the weaker the vampires that they sire, after all. Thirties... Ah, she's short? That helps a lot. Pure vampire woman are usually fairly tall. And to only come up to your shoulders... haha, she really is short." Giacinto herself was only an inch or so taller than the boy.

She pursed her lips. "Changes her name, eh? That'll be a little difficult to get around. I'll probably have Ignicio scout around. Or have Lyssum possess a corpse and use them to get information if we need it."

"Don't suppose you have a location?" It'd be much easier if she knew where the vampire was.

Richard licked his pink lips nervously before jerking his hand over his shoulder, scratching the back of his neck with his other. "Follow the steam to a mansion where an widower Lord is. She is part of that coven."

He looked down to the ground and placed his hands by his sides, waiting for her response. she wont kill him, since he was not part of the coven, then again is she the type to get kill those she thought who were even slightly an enemy? He hoped not.

"But isn't that where the- oh," she muttered quietly in realisation. She took a few steps back and stared at him blankly with her arms crossed over her chest. With a heaving sigh, she rubbed the heel of her hand over her forehead.

"You've really put me up shit creek with this one, Richard."

she threw her arms out in exasperation and threw her head back to stare skywards. "My coven was ordered with the extermination of every member of that coven. It's not as simple as 'oh, I like that person so I won't kill him.' I have to kill you by Vampire law."

Her eyes brightened dramatically and a grin spread across her face. "Unless you're already part of another coven. But, there are only two covens in the area and both of them won't be here much longer. Which means you've got a decision on your hands, boy."

She didn't want to give him an ultimatum. She really, really didn't. But it was the only way she could come up with to keep him alive.

Her lips parted with a minute sigh before they began to form words she really didn't want to say. "Stay with your own coven and die right here-" She reached for the crossbow strapped to her back. She grasped hold of it but didn't remove it. "Or join my coven and help us with the extermination of your previous coven."

Her carmine eyes were dark with the turmoil she felt. They slid closed, waiting for the boys answer.

"Sorry" Richard mutterd as Giacinto went of on a little one sideed conversation about either killing him or killing him and telling him that it was part of vampire law... At least she did not kill him on sight.

He watched in curiosity as her eyes brighten slightly, she then talkled of the alternative. According to it, it was ether join there coven and kill the on coven that created him or be killeed. Simple enough to choose an answer and even if there was a third option of simple be let free, he would of still gone to his chosen choice. He had nowhere to go and he had limited information about vampires, there social structure and there laws to get by with out the chance of getting killed.

"I will join you and kill them, of course. I have no loyalty towards them to die for them."

She waved off the boys apology. She wasn't all that annoyed. "No worries, lad. You know the situation now."

She grinned, sharp fangs glinting in the moonlight as her unpainted lips parted over extraordinarily white teeth. "Y'know, if you're that disloyal to my coven, I'll kill you on site, right? I don't tolerate disloyal coven members." It wasn't a threat. It was a promise. She would kill him if he was disloyal no questions asked.

She dropped her hand form her crossbow and relaxed her stance. "We'll have to regroup with the rest of the coven soon and storm the place at dawn. You do have a lapis lazuli stone, right?"

Richard respectfully nodded to Giacinto. "My loyalty is to you is to you and your coven and to you then."

Richard also felt his body relax as Giacinto did so as well, leaning on his right hips and his muscles less tenses, which amused him slightly on spot. What were the chances of escaping of defeating this Vampire? A very slim chance, if any.

His frowned at the next question. "No I do not, may I ask what one is?"

"Excellent. Welcome to Cacciatori di Sangue, Richard." Her nose wrinkled and she repeated the name a few times, changing her pronunciation each time. "Richard. Richard. Richard. Rich... Rick...." She stuck her tongue out with a frown. "I don't like it... From now on I'll just call you Dick."

She raised her head sharply at his question. "You've got to be kidding me, right? You don't know about lapis lazuli? You were created by a fairly strong vampire - didn't she ever mention it?"

She pinched her bridge and sighed in mock sadness. "Probably the most important thing to us vampire apart from blood... And he doesn't know it." She chuckled humourlessly.

She clicked her fingers. "Y'know what? I'm going to torture your creator a little before I kill her just because she left you so uneducated. Every vampire and his mother should know about lapis lazuli."

Rickard blink in surprised and was taken aback a bit by the nickname, never before in his life did he had one, it was always a more formal address people used for him. Even his own brother and sisters used his full name of 'Richard'.

he flushed a little as she went on about how he did not know about this lapis lazuli. Now that he thought about it, his creator may of mentioned it once or twice - but not enough so that it would stick in his mind, let alone figure out what it was.

"As satisfying as it may be to torture her, I would very much like to know what one is first, if it is that important."

"You're serious? You really don't know what the lapis lazuli stone does for vampires?" Her carmine eyes bugged. How could someone not know? It was so important to vampire life.

"The lapis lazuli stone - after being set in silver - is priceless to vampires. No matter how little the amount of the stone or silver there is, if a vampire has it in their possession they can walk out into the sun without being destroyed."

The secret of lapis lazuli and silver was the single most important thing her father had told her about vampires.

She pulled a silver chain from under her shirt and held the pendant out in front of her. A large circular stone set in an intricate silver base of ivy leaves dangled from the thin silver frame. "They don't have to be pendants like this one, but this is what mine looks like. Ignicio has a ring and Lyssum has a... collar." She chuckled to herself. Lyssum was the kind of person she and Ignicio had to keep on a short leash at all times.

Richard looked at the unique pendent held in front of his, it looked exquisite with the high detail of the leaves that framed the stone - like something that his mother or older sister would wear. His mind quickly flashed back to the objects in his seemingly plain shoulder bag before returning to the conversation at hand.

"Thank you for explaining it to me." He muttered, still painted a light pink from his lack of knowledge. "It sounds rather useful"

Giacinto was shocked that the boy didn't comment on the names she had spouted off. She was sure he had assumed they were part of her coven but she had thought he would ask about them. He'd want to know his other coven-mates, wouldn't he?

She waved her hand dismissively. "It's better if you know. I would have just assumed you already had one. And with things like the upcoming attack, you wouldn't be around for much longer, would you?"

The Succubus sucked her teeth thoughtfully. "We better meet up with the others pretty soon. Now we have a secret weapon we can plan instead of storming the building come dawn." She turned on her heel and stalked into the tree line. "Follow me."

It was getting close to dawn. Ignicio and Lyssum should be in the room they had gotten in the local inn.

With a quick jog he caught up with Giacinto and precoded to walk a few steps quietly behind her, leaving the corpse of the deer behind them in the moonlight.

"So, who are the other two you mentioned?" Asked Richard, side stepping a moss coved rock that jutted out of the ground "I guess they are part of this coven?" At the thought of this nerves grasped him for the first time (that is if you don't count the fact he thought Giacinto was going to kill him).