Meet the Elder

The hulking vampire led the Melniks into a pre-Fall theater. While the outside looked as rundown as the surrounding buildings, the inside was decorated in rich tapestries and intricate woodwork. The marble floor was polished to such a shine that they could see their reflections as they crossed the hall. But nothing could prepare them for the beauty of the actual theater itself. Rich velvet curtains hung half-closed across a hardwood stage. Everything before them was a testament to craftsmanship that perhaps only royalty had ever enjoyed. The decadence of it all was breathtaking.

Scottie sniffed at the air and the lingering smell of death broke the spell for him. He cast a glance at Sky and as she looked around in wonder he noticed her hand had drifted to her sword. She could sense it even if she wasn’t consciously aware of it. They were in a predator’s den. A vampire’s nest. And not just any vampire, but that of the Elder.

The vampire led them to the front row and turned around, holding out a hand to each of them, “Your weapons.” Sky’s hand had wrapped around the handle of her sword and she shook her head quickly. The vampire growled and Scottie stepped between the two, unfastening his sword and pushing it toward the vampire’s chest, “You can have mine, as show of good faith, but she’ll keep hers, thank you.”

The vampire took Scottie’s sword but was not satisfied, “You seem to know the rules, and yet you would let think I would allow your woman to be armed when meeting our Elder?”

“And you’re telling me that your great and powerful Elder is scared of a simple human armed with a sword?” Scottie could feel Sky’s eyes boring into his back at his reference to her as a “simple human”, but he didn’t see that he had much choice in the matter. Three quick thumps, as though from the stomping of a boot, came from behind the stage curtain and the vampire grimaced.

“Go on then,” he grumbled and motioned to the front seats, “The Elder will be with you shortly.” Sky untied her sword and held onto it tightly while they couple sank into the plush seats. She leaned over to Scottie and asked, “What just happened?”

Scottie studied the stage for a moment and noticed the curtain ruffled, then billowed out a bit around the middle. A mist began to seep out from under the curtain, tendrils flicking out toward them as it crept across the stage. Scottie grinned and bit his lip, leaning over and whispering very quietly into Sky’s ear, “I would guess the Elder wished to make a grand entrance and Roadblock over there was holding up the show.”

The mist seemed to rear back and there was an audible “harrumph!” from within it. The mist pulled back under the curtain and it suddenly flew open. A stout little man in a neatly pressed suit and more lace than Sky owned altogether stormed out toward the front of the stage. The couple pressed back in their seats and Sky was drawing her sword from her sheath.

“You children today have no respect for drama,” said the Elder in high clipped tones as he reached the edge of the stage and dropped, his rear planted to the edge and his feet dangling over. “I weep for your generation,” he lamented, counting on his fingers, “as I did for the generation before you. And the one before that. And the one before that…”

Sky, who had had her sword half withdrawn from its sheath, seemed unsure of whether to finish pulling it free or to start laughing in relief. She held it out like that while the Elder had counted out to the eighth generation before his foppish manner turned icy.

“Philip,” he motioned to the large vampire holding Scottie’s sword, “can be a wee bit overzealous, but would you be a dear and put that sword away before I send your pretty little red head back to the Church in a box?”