Absit Omen RPG

He had his doubts - to be without doubt is a sorry state indeed - but Tristan was ultimately fond of his lodger. Cass could barely turn into a bat, much less skulk around London biting innocents; she had too much to lose, even if the thought of draining bodies was appealing to her. It was appealing to all of them, was it not?

            “United?" Cass mused. "United! Yes, yes.”

The older vampire laughed, recognising her relish for new ideas and the way in which they were framing the disrespect of her being. He came to rest against the wall, once more across from the counter.

"Oui. You are invited," he answered and bowed slightly. "I think you will like it, my friend. I enjoyed my time as part of a coven, when I was un enfant."

Tristan had jumped into the vampiric world rather recklessly, with every intention of devouring. Nowadays he preferred the nuance of what the Ministry called consensual feedings; there was some strange pleasure in bonding with your prey.

Cass would have plenty of practice with that if she fell in line at Hookers. "We may go at your leisure, oui? Terry will want your answer in person."

He eyed Cass's fangs, how unconsciously and instinctively they presented themselves. No, she was still a long way from maturity. Not that Tristan blamed her; it was difficult, it took him decades. She was a better new vampire than he had ever been, which was one of the reasons he trusted her not to have been the true attacker. Well, he mostly trusted her.

            "You all used to suck live bloodbags when you could, didn’t you?”

A dangerous line of thought but most of their thoughts were dangerous. He smiled softly and leaned back against the wall, facing his perched lodger on the kitchen counter as he crossed his arms.

"It was a different time in Europe, mon ami. Who was going to miss a few poor bodies in the middle of a war, non?" Tristan couldn't help but sigh nostalgically, thinking of those days and his recklessness. "No doubt our brethren in the likes of Baghdad and Cairo are now taking advantage of their own mortal conflicts."

Skimming papers and headlines - muggle and magical - was a hobby leftover from when he had travelled America; it helped to know about violent scuffles and congregations of people where a dead body or two would appear unremarkable.

He blinked slowly, pushing away those memories to remain rooted in now.

"Terry did not like the Aurors taking you away from work like that." Tristan's smile turned grim. "It was rude. We cannot allow them to be so rude to us, can we?" he pushed off the wall, circling the kitchen, examining his nails. "It will be better if they see us as united, if they come to question you again."

Oh, yes, he was used to hearing the odd vampire slur or seeing the repulsion in the eyes of Ministry colleagues. But he knew that these things were rooted in fear.

Aurors, however, dragging vampires around... that was not a show of fear. And this made Tristan angry, even if he did not show it.

Tristan turned away from the ice box in their rarely-used kitchen, placing a clear glass bottle on the counter between himself and Cass. It looked like a rather large potion bottle, stoppered by a cork and filled with a beautiful deep red substance. The new moon was still some time away, and so he had felt no impulse to down the blood himself; no, he was long past simple temptations.

            “Not like he gives a whatsits about someone out of the crew - coven.”

 Tristan smiled. "Terry did not offer this gift to you lightly, mon ami. He has also asked me to invite you to visit the coven, at your leisure."

The Hookers did not like the idea of Ministry people yanking vampires from their day night jobs without warning. It might signal more of that behaviour down the line. And what if they apprehended one of Terry's crew, peacefully drinking from a willing vessel? There was so much about this situation that displeased Tristan.

""Drink," he slid the bottle across the marble top. "Or save it for the darkest night, if you like. You are still my lodger and friend, Cass. But I may not be enough protection."

The older vampire sighed slightly, pushing back a lock of dark hair from his face. "The Ministry must continue to believe that I am..." he laughed once, harsh. "Their man, as the English say."
 

He had been waiting for Cass, ever since he heard from Cepheus[1] about her arrest.

Tristan was not... motherly. All the same he had grown fond of Cass and of watching her come to terms with her life as a vampire; it filled him with nostalgia, amusement and concern. His own start in the world of the undead had been different. Violent. If the Ministry knew his bodycount it might not be so content to have him in its employ.

            “TRIIIISTAAAAAN!”

He had missed the sound of his lodger returning. Tristan was in the living room, supine on a chaise lounge and reading one of his old diaries. He closed it with a decisive clap. “TRIIISTAN!”

"You need only call once!" he called back, coming out into the foyer to greet the blonde vampire. "My poor Cass." Tristan smiled affably enough as he approached to exchange kisses on the cheek, a hand on her shoulder. "Tell me everything. But come, kitchen, I have brought un cadeau from our friend Hooker."

He had gone to vent at Terry's, and been sent home with a little glass bottle of what the coven leader called an especially innocent[2] vintage.

1.	Jan 4th - Thou Camest to Bite the World
2.	Nemo's blood from It's the Freakiest Show!

Although she stepped aside, it was with a sense of reluctance. He returned her nod with a repeat of his greeting - a polite bow. It wasn't in Tristan's interest to question her. If she turned out to be a wild card he wanted to be able to claim he knew little of the creature, and that he acted right by advising her to register.

After all, he was not an enforcer of the Ministry's laws. What Sade did with the information he gave was not his concern.

"My regards to the Hookers, mademoiselle." Tristan walked past her with a vague smile. "I advise courtesy in their presence."

Terry was not like him. It served Terry better to bicker and dramatise and throw threats about. That was what coven leaders did, to amuse themselves and their kin. He wondered what the girl would make of the Hookers - but he did not have to wonder about what the Hookers themselves would think. Whatever came through their doors was no doubt fair game for amusement.

               "What do they register. And who has the information?"

"Your name, address, details of your turning..." he trailed off, shrugging. "There is no way to ascertain honesty but I would be as honest as you can without risking criminality. The Ministry retains the record."

Tristan had a laidback attitude towards past sins. If a vampire he knew were to get into trouble now, as Cass did, that was very bad. But he could not help who people were before he met them. They were granted that amnesty because he himself had left behind a multitude of bodies in Paris, New York, New Orleans. A trail of blood.

He checked his watch - there were places for him to be, towards which his walk had been aimed. "Go to Camden Town." Tristan lowered his hand and met her in the eye, giving directions. "You are looking for the Camden Town Hookers. Tell them I sent you. They are a coven - you need not join, in fact you may not be accepted, but they will put you up until you are able to find your own boarding."

Terry would curse him for it later, probably, but he wouldn't turn away a young thing with no footing. And this girl had no footing.

"Bien? If there is nothing else..." he gestured for her to move aside so that he could get on his way.

She was wary and did not seem to understand him well. Tristan could tell the other vampire was fresh but he was wondering now precisely how fresh - the younger of his kind were not always the most coherent. Everything was new to them; many did not have the advantages Tristan did, when he was bitten and welcomed straight into one a dominant coven of Paris.

"I am Tristan," he replied and held a hand to his chest, bowing slightly. "Vampire consultant at the Ministry of Magic."

Tristan slipped out a little card - he did it so quickly it looked like a sleight of hand - which he then handed over to Sade. The card had his name printed upon it, as well as his working address on level four. It carried the Ministry logo with a subtle, magical shimmer. He had requested the cards, officious things, because they were less official than flashing his Ministry badge but official enough to lend him an air of legitimacy where vampires might not be welcomed.

"You must register," Tristan continued in French and in a direct way, because prevarication was lost on souls like this. "It will grant you monthly access to blood, and recourse to resources. You need shelter tonight?"

Food and work, that much he could help arrange. Board was a different matter.

             "Comme au magasin?"

Ah. A countrywoman. He smiled, this time with the full effect of his teeth and its gleaming fangs. "Non," the older vampire clicked his tongue and shook his head at her. "You are a vampire, mademoiselle, and I ask in the spirit of camaraderie."

Because he owed that much to their own kind. An Irish writer once wrote - children of the night. But ah, weren't they also prisoners of the night? And amongst prisoners there must be some sympathy. Although, also amongst prisoners, a kind of wariness. He noticed the shift in her position, her nervous vigilance.

"You are registered at the Ministry?" he asked blandly. Perhaps she had a reason to be vigilant.

Tristan was out walking in the evening - as he usually enjoyed, after having spent so many hours of the working week in the Ministry of Magic. He believed his work was important but he preferred the outside air, even the air of a city thus polluted as London. Being underground made him think too much of the tombs and crypts in Paris, where his first coven had welcomed him in the 19th century. Different times, a different vampire.

He realised he was being followed when he was partway down the alley. The wind had changed and he had caught the scent of another vampire; and his neck tingled with the familiar sensation of being watched. Whoever it was, they were doing it from the rooftops. Someone young, maybe, not to know how to follow.

Tristan was not one for making a show of things. That was Hooker's modus operandi. The Frenchman preferred discretion. More could be exchanged in privacy than in public. And Knockturn was as close to private as he could get just now.

            "Bonjour."

An imp of a vampire faced him, when he turned around at the end of a little nook within the alley. She smelled young, looked young. And spoke French, which meant she either knew him or was a countrywoman of his.

"Bonjour," he replied, continuing in his old Parisian accent, hands behind his back. "I have your interest I see. Is there something you require of me?" Sometimes, he knew, the young ones were referred to him.

They wanted to be registered, maybe, without fuss or danger. They wanted safe passage to the continent, with its different laws. They wanted to know which covens were accepting. Tristan didn't mind the approaches but he kept his distance. After Cass's arrest, he was especially cautious of befriending new kin.

"Oui," the consultant vampire finally turned back around to face the other two, watching their expressions carefully. "A young witch, fresh out of Hogwarts. A naughty mademoiselle... flavoured, I think, with notes of gillyweed and drug use."

Some of their kin did not enjoy the taste or were sensitive to elements that could 'taint' a pure palette; Hooker himself, he knew, didn't like it when his bloodbags drank too much. Tristan did not mind if a good vintage was consumed, prior. "Her mothers were besides themselves, demanding names and establishments. Such sensible hens, normally."

Witches who were good at their jobs were not immune to the irrational effects of having children. He glanced at Lazarus, dryly.

"Of course I refused them. Can you imagine, mon amie?" he smiled a laughing smile, all teeth. "You might have had to receive the most insufferable company."

            "Hmm, well, he is very pretty. That has to count for something."

"Better to count for, than to count against me." Tristan agreed, bowing his head slightly as Lazarus joined him to stand before the ever-relaxed leader of the coven. "My tale is more of a gossipy nature, to be frank, but I think you will find it most entertaining."

What passed for entertainment amongst the Camden Town Hookers might make a regular wix sick. Even Tristan had to remind himself to not slip up at the Ministry - to refrain from teasing or condescending, to stop short of using a careless word such as Terry's favoured bloodbag. Blackburn's sense of humour was more of a mystery to him; still, he was one of them.

"Earlier this very evening, I received two witches in my office..." the old vampire stepped away, walking to the fireplace now to feel its unusual heat. "Mothers. Les mères, they come to me with frazzled nerves and flaring tempers, oui? They come to ask me about," a mock pretentious gesture, "consensual feedings."

A good word for the Ministry, not for this corner of town.

Night of the 5th, long past midnight.


Humming to himself, a romantic but melancholy chorus of von Weber's De Freischutz, Tristan stepped lightly into the late night quiet of a Sunday evening. Hooker's was peopled by only three or four patrons and then a half dozen of his own kind partaking in blood or chatter. He raised his hand in an effete little wave as he walked past Anaïs on his way to the backrooms.

The door shut close behind him and left the vampire in relative darkness. Here, where there were fewer lamps and therefore fewer lights to languish against the polished dark wood, the air was charged. He could smell an open wound - and gillyweed. A long corridor led straight to a lounge at the very end but there were many doors lining it.

These were Terry's infamous backrooms, where coven members led their especially delicious delights into private corners to sin and blaspheme to their heart's desires. Tristan walked quietly, glancing into one of the open rooms; barely lit, decorated with the same 1950s abandon of antique furniture. Jin-ho was crouched over a young wizard sprawled on a velvet divan. The vampire lifted his eyes, unhinged jaw still clasped around a pale neck. He winked.

Tristan smiled back and hesitated, tempted. But he pushed on towards Terry's lounge and knocked once before entering. In here, Terrence Hooker sat at the far end in an armchair by a window overlooking the back alley. He did not look up from the book he was reading. There was a fire on, though nobody enjoyed its heat on the pillows and rug laid before the hearth.

"That had better not be Bram Stoker," Tristan quipped in greeting as he circled the room, treading wooden floorboards and looking at the various portrait sketches on the walls as he always did. Each coven member had their own self-portrait in pencil or charcoal or the odd pastel.

           "Not looking for tales tonight mate," Hooker shut the book and waved it to show him the cover of John Berger's Art of Seeing.

"Are you certain, mon frèrei?" asked the Frenchman, coming to a halt before the coven leader. "Because I have a story for you tonight, if you are amenable."

Behind him, another knock before the door swung open. Terry glanced past Tristan with a soft snort. "Laz. Tristan 'ere has a story for us. What do you think? Should we suffer him?"

            “It would be professionally irresponsible of you to withhold information on illegal vampiric practices,” stated the more hot-tempered of the two women, and Tristan took a last drag from his cigarette before stubbing it out in a thin brass ashtray. He licked his lips, then ran his tongue along those sharp incisors that so alarmed these mothers on behalf of their child.

"Such information would be conveyed to the correct authorities on level two, in the case of an investigation..." the vampire shrugged, unperturbed by Iona's accusation. "Indeed, madame, even if the odious Auror Pratt were to come down here and rudely demand information, I would happily give it. But you are private individuals."

They had brought no paperwork. He would be surprised if there was any, if maternal agency overtook work obligations; a bright red stain on their daughter's record in history.

Tristan reclaimed his tumbler of blood and gestured carelessly with it. "Is there any other way I can help? Maybe you have questions, non, about the nature of these feedings? Precautions to best take?"

            "Please. Tell us something. Where would she have gone to do this?"

His gaze flicked from the rejected pamphlet to the face that made this earnest, frowning plea. Tristan paused to study the auror because she reminded him of something distant and faint; a mother's concern, as if seen in the troubled reflection of a murky pond. He was once a child. He had a father and a mother and brothers and sisters. A life, lungs full of air and limbs warm with blood. So long ago, too long ago.

"And what will you do if I provide a list of names, of places?" Tristan stared at her with a gentle, searching look - softened by the memory of a mother long dead. "Will you find the vampire who accepted your daughter's blood? Will you threaten them? And then will you threaten the next vampire your daughter finds?"

He spoke quickly, one word disappearing into the next. His graceful voice was dictated by harsh logic. "It would be professionally irresponsible of me to oblige you."

The one mother was certainly more vehement on this subject than the other. Tristan blinked slowly as Ballentyne interjected with as much delicacy on the subject as your average wix; he knew her type, people for whom feedings were without a doubt revolting. If only she knew how revolting her blood smelled to his kind - how, if the Ministry were truly set on sniffing out unregistered werewolves, all you had to do was let loose a vampire with a sensitive nose.

            "You understand," interjected Roh, and he turned his passive expression to her instead. "We're worried. We can't have it happen again."

"Then you had better speak to your daughter more thoroughly, non?" Tristan replied with a shrug. "She is of age? An adult? You must go to the source of the act, unless you believe it was truly nonconsensual." In which case, they all knew, the witches would have to report it.

But they weren't going to report it. No, they would not be here if that were the case. The vampire crossed one leg over the other and nursed his cigarette as she glanced back at Iona.

"There are places and individuals who participate in consensual feedings, madame, but I cannot furnish you with such information," he spoke in a quiet, distinct voice. "However, I can ease your concerns..." Tristan reached behind his desk to open a drawer and procure a St.Mungo's pamphlet. "If your daughter has not yet been examined, you may advise it."

He handed Roh the pamphlet, So, You've Just Been Bitten by a Vampire: There's a Bright Side[1], smiling mildly. "Scars can be removed. Temptation cannot."

1.	Niobe's, from And For My Next Act