Part 3
A frost spread through the basement as the grey-robed woman set her bare feet on the ground. Some of the candles threatened to flicker out, before changing to a bright blue flame. Marv looked up as she approached the table and his eyes betrayed the calm exterior he managed to keep.
"Who are you?" Marv asked, a subtle shakiness to his voice. "The boss don't want visitors."
"Marv, don't." Hamlin replied. "You feel it, don't you? The chill of the grave. The smell of death. Look around us."
"Everything has... stopped?" he replied, confused. "That guy over there, he's frozen like a statue!" Marv jumped to his feet, terrified. "Who the hell are you!" he yelled.
Rebecca finally looked up from the table, and her eyes widened in shock. "Eigengrau." she whispered.
"The one and only. Rebecca Astrid Ashe. The phantom thief. Born 619 in Lichfield. Died for the first time in 652 at the hands of ‘The Baron'. Reborn under the Divine Curse as one of my children. You are most intriguing. Very few vampires manage to live so long without any protection from their fellow kindred." Eigengrau spoke with a soft sing-song voice, almost musical. "And you," she spoke, turning to look at Hamlin. "Father Hamlin DeFountain, the Avatar of Dead God Agbus. His first and last High Priest. Born countless ages ago, before even Dwarven civilization began. I see he is almost ready to return, then?"
"Marv, Jack, Heather, Jessie, get out of here for now. Forget everything you just heard if you know what's good for you." Rebecca said to the rest of her party. They nodded and practically ran up the stairs. "You called me your child, what the fuck is that supposed to mean?" Rebecca asked Eigengrau, finding her temper in the face of a God.
"You do not know? The origin of vampirism?" Eigengrau asked, slightly puzzled. "No, this will not. You know. You must know. No, you will have known. Ah, I understand now. Yes. Hamlin, this will have going to be important to your book. Record all I will have said."
"Lady Eigengrau," Hamlin began, bowing slightly "I beg of you to ground yourself to a single time frame of reference." Eigengrau replied with a nod and snapped her fingers.
"I... think I am... in a single... time frame now? This sensation... it is wrong. I am cut off. But yes I am... only now." Eigengrau spoke slowly and unsurely. "The shape is smooth."
"Thank you, my Lady." Hamlin replied as he bowed again. "So, the origin of vampirism? I must admit I am curious."
"It was a curse. By all of us." Eigengrau flatly stated. Seeing the confusion on Rebecca and Hamlin's faces, she continued. "Vordea, Agbus, Vaust, Zalas, the Raven King, myself, and Sargon. It is the greatest curse ever devised, wrought by 7 vengeful Gods against a single Nobleman."
"A nobleman? Count Titus?" Rebecca asked, finding her voice after a few moments of shocked silence.
Eigengrau shook her head. "No. It was not him. Hamlin, what year did he say he traced it to?"
"He told me approximately 12,000, and that the trail ended with a human."
Eigengrau smiled. "He traced it very closely, then. The curse's first victim was turned in 11778. Not the Nobleman. I am glad that wicked man has been so thoroughly erased from history. No, the Nobleman was a dwarf. Perhaps the most corrupt and evil dwarf in history. He was born in Ironhand 3876 in the south of Tel Hazan. I will not tell you his blasphemy. It must never be repeated. We took great pains to erase it."
"What exactly is the curse, then?" Rebecca was the first to speak. "The Baron, curse his name, told me a few things but then expelled me from his castle after only a week."
"You have experienced first hand my part of the curse. You can no longer die naturally. Looking as young as you do at the age of 145 is Lady Vordea's part of the curse. You will no longer age. You are the antithesis of change."
"So each of you provided a portion of the curse." Hamlin stated. "Of course. No single God could make one this powerful and long lasting."
"Correct again, Hamlin. Not even the primordial Gods could have done something so fierce on their own. The portion Lord Zalas provided seems simple but it is insidious. The inability to love. To be unable to truly love is a wicked thing. It is why you are always so angry with everything and everyone, Rebecca."
"At least I can blame it on someone now," Rebecca sighed, leaning back in her chair. "So, that's 3 curses. What about the other 4?"
"The Raven King's punishment is why you nor any other vampire can have children. A dead puppet cannot beget new life, he said. Vaust is why you do not reflect, it is the mark of unluckiness upon your very soul."
"Dead I may be, but my actions prove more than any heartbeat that I'm alive." Rebecca said, leaning back even further, the chair balancing on 2 legs. "So that leaves Agbus and Sargon. I think I know where this is heading but I don't like it. What do you think, Hammy?"
"I can merely channel his powers. Agbus hasn't spoken to any mortal, well, ever. In a sense I speak for him. But Eigengrau is about to tell us something interesting about my patron, aren't you?"
Eigengrau, for the first time in many millennia, did something unexpected. She laughed, with a genuine smile on her face. "Oh my yes, yes of course." she said after composing herself. "Agbus is much more interesting than he lets on, at least to you mortals. You have both met him many times over your lives. He is the life of the world, and to uphold it all he walks among the many souls of the world."
"So the old Draconic creation myth has some truth to it after all?" Hamlin asked, surprised. "I thought it was just a story."
"All stories start with a grain of truth, no matter how small. Agbus did die, but he also did not. He is... hmm." Eigengrau paused, and frowned. "It is difficult to express in a frame of reference for ones such as yourself. You experience time linearly, I cannot explain it in any way that will make sense."
"I don't think it really matters, let's get back to vampirism." Rebecca replied, feet up on the table. "What did our man Agbus do?"
"What happens when you are hit by sunlight? That is what he did. He took your ability to enjoy a warm summer day. He made natural sunlight, but only sunlight, deadly to the Nobleman, forcing him to hide away in misery during the day, only to sulk out at night after the sun has set."
"But why?"
"Think of who this curse was originally designed for, child. A nobleman. To not be able to be seen in public is as good as death to someone with wealth and power. A tailor made punishment, if you will. Agbus always did enjoy karmic punishment."
"A fitting punishment, then" Hamlin chuckled. "Makes sense that Agbus has a sense of humour, in retrospect."
"Now, the last one is the so-called punishment of the Judge himself. I still detest what he did, but I had the last laugh." Eigengrau's expression changed and she adopted a much more serious tone. "It is his fault, you know. He got far too full of himself, so I inserted a small change to my part of the curse. I wonder if he regrets what he did."
"No." Rebecca whispered. "It was Sargon who..."
"Yes. He is why you must feed on the blood of mortals. He cursed him ‘to never gain nourishment from food and drink again, and to be forced to feed on the blood of those he abandoned forevermore'. That was Sargon's ‘blessing'." Eigengrau looked positively disgusted at the final words. "The Judge annoyed me greatly with his portion of the curse."
The three of them sat in silence for several minutes as Hamlin and Rebecca pondered the meaning of Eigengrau's words, that Judge Sargon was responsible for the worst part of vampirism. It was Hamlin who eventually spoke.
"Lady Eigengrau, will I publish the fact that it was Sargon?" he asked, framing his question carefully.
"You did, yes." she smiled, nodding. "It is for the best. The world must know that justice is not always just."
"What did you change?" Rebecca asked, leaning her chair dangerously backward. You said you changed your portion."
At this question, Eigengrau smiled wickedly, and the frost on the floor seemingly grew thicker. "I made it a disease. Communicable. Spreadable. I made it vampirism. The rest of the Gods cast their curses against a single dwarf destined to walk the lands until the end of time. I made it a divine disease. If Sargon is the father of vampirism, then I am the mother. You are the Children of Death."
Rebecca fell out of her chair. Hamlin dropped his quill. The stillness of the great reveal hung in the air.
"T-Then, you can cure me, right?" Rebecca desperately asked, grabbing Eigengrau's robes. "You're the mother of vampirism, so you can do that, right? I can age normally? I can be human again? Please please please please please..."
Eigengrau closed her eyes and shook her head slowly. "I am sorry, Rebecca. I cannot do that. The only thing I can do is protect all vampires from destruction at the hands of the other Gods. They did not take kindly to my mischief, when they found out. Maybe I still have a bit of Sirene in me." Rebecca began to speak, but Eigengrau raised her hand. "I know your pain is my fault. That is why I came, at the behest of a certain someone who cares for you. High Priest Hamlin, I have something to share with you as well. Since the two of you will travel together for many years, Rebecca will hear it too."
"We're going to what?" Rebecca demanded, looking at Hamlin. He just shrugged his shoulders, as if saying ‘you get used to it'.
"Lady Eigengrau, what are you sharing?" Hamlin asked, leaning forward in his chair.
"The Dead God will no longer be dead. Agbus will speak to you. You will receive his only orders he will ever give."
"When?"
"Eventually. You will know it is him when the time comes. My time here is done. Take care of Rebecca, Hamlin." Eigengrau rose from her chair, and her feet left the ground. The frost around them receded, and the blue candle flames changed back to the soft orange glow. Around them, time resumed, as if nothing untoward had happened at all. "Until next time, Hamlin." Eigengrau said, before slowly floated back up the staircase.
"That... was unhelpful." Rebecca eventually said.
"Advice from Eigengrau rarely is, Rebecca." Hamlin answered.