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“Call them.”

The tone was easy, but forceful, a command in all but tone. It didn’t have to be, the concept of refusal had been left behind long ago, years before Lubbock had pulled the damaged rat out of his hole in Seattle, a will broken by years of torment, only to find new suffering in freedom.

The labyrinthian streets of Los Angeles stretched out below them, a teeming hive of humanity lit by a billion motes of light, drenching the forested hills in darkness by contrast. Two figures inhabited the clearing, Lubbock stood, pacing around the area, while the other knelt. Surrounding the latter figure, runic symbols which hurt to look at, drawn in blood over the grass, stretched out. At seemingly random points, candles burned, faintly, in the night air. Human fat did not burn terribly well, but, it always paid to follow the recipe with these sorts of things.

“Call them.” The words were more insistent this time, betraying the impatience of a born killer, beneath the veneer of sophistication the toreador expressed. The kneeling figure made no noise. It had been some nights since Lubbock had removed their tongue, mostly in a fit of boredom. They’d lost their eyes long ago, plucked out for the crime of sharing the secrets of Clan Tremere, then cast into the bowls of the Seattle Madhouse. They were the true reason Lubbock had deigned to unseat the ruling parties of the Ivory Tower to the North. A city burned so that he might have one piece to his puzzle. The figure did not refuse, their lips moving to silently express the syllables of a spell, the drying blood stirring around them as the first spell was cast.

“Good.” It was a simple word, but it brought elation from the kneeling figure, a happy smile breaching the grimace of their ruined features. For the first time, Lubbock exuded approval, and to the being utterly caught in the power of his presence, it tasted finer than any taste of blood could have. The toreador approached the kneeling figure, slinking behind them, not breaking any of the symbols. He embraced the Tremere from behind, wrapping long, slender arms around them.

“Is your first wish still the same?” He asked her, the mute female kindred nodding slowly, but insistently, leaning back into the embrace. She rasped something that was almost a yes.

“Then I will burn them all for you. Rest well.” Lubbock spoke to her in a tone that was almost kind, before one finger pressed onto her chest. As easily as tearing paper, her ribcage gave in, Lubbock plucking her heart from her as simply as removing an apple from a crate. The Tremere gasped in final relief, before crumbling into ash. Lubbock was alone for only a few moments, before the pervasive dark of the night was interrupted by four stark motes of red. Stepping forth from these brief sparks, the Tremere of Los Angeles. Well, four of them.

There was a moment of confusion as they regarded the stooped figure of Lubbock, resting, as he appeared to be, at the centre of a large piece of Tremere spellwork. As he made to stand, he allowed some of his aura to bleed through into what would be visible to the trained eyes of more experience kindred. A tiny shred of his vast identity.
“You are not the traitor.” One finally spoke, the tallest. They were all clad in the red and black robes of their particular strain of Tremere, the surprisingly conservative chantry that Strauss lead on the Sunset Coast. Lubbock was disappointed he had not come himself, but then, perhaps he had some inkling of what had awaited his subordinates.

“Not the one you are looking for, no. You are a moment too late for that.” Lubbock rolled his shoulders as he spoke. In the low light, it finally became obvious that the finely dressed figure was covered in the ash of final death.

“You are interfering in Chantry business.” One of the others spoke, a female voice from within the obscuring hood and folds of her robes. Lubbock didn’t turn his attention as he spoke, his eyes dancing between all four Tremere, seemingly randomly.

“That is an unusual way of thanking me for doing your work for you.” He replied, seemingly adjusting his suit, heedless of the coat of ash preventing him from appearing as sophisticated as he had begun the night. The Tremere had begun to spread out, circling the spiraling patterns, their attention divided between watching the Toreador at the centre, and seeking to decipher the purposes of the spell. Naturally, they did not believe this could be spellwork of his design, instead of something their traitor had attempted, and been interrupted.

“Our arts are none of your concern, Toreador, her life was not yours to take.” The tall one spoke again, a long pale limb drawing forth from his robe, the taloned hand raising with a palm up. Already Lubbock could feel the draw of the Tremere’s blood magic. The air crackled with power and he inhaled steadily, through lungs that no longer needed to breathe. The moment the first syllables left their lips, he was in motion. The power of his own, stolen, blood thrummed and the world came to a halt. The air crackled with the force and speed of his form, the sleek, ash-covered Toreador moving beyond even the supernatural senses of his fellow Kindred. Before the first spell could be completed, one taloned hand had rent through the first kindred sorcerer, their precious vitae tumbling into the air, the power in their form sagging.

It was a dance of death, and few had practiced the steps for as long, with such enthusiasm, as Lubbock. He weaved through the crackling power of their air, the might of Thaumatergy sizzling the spaces he had occupied moments before. He was a being of power beyond these modern nights, but even he was weary of the touch of their magic, but they would never halt him. In the time it would take a mortal to even focus on the scene, the fight was over, the Tremere humbled, but not slain, kept on the brink of their unnatural lives.

“The Camarilla have taught you that you are the predators of the night, that human are sheep to be preyed upon, to be corralled and hunted.” Lubbock spoke as he returned to the centre of the runes, as the leaking blood of the Tremere flowed into the patterns already marked into the ground. His own fangs were slicked with their blood, granting him a temporary taste of the secrets they fought hard to keep. “That is a lie. You are the flock, the kine are grass. Bait to keep you in your little herds. Now comes the age of the true hunters.” His pace brought him to the centre, and he turned West, out towards the horizon, the great ocean that cast back the Light of Los Angeles and the Heavens above. As fluid as the water, his tongue switched from the bastardised modern tongue of the kine, to the old language. The intonations of Caine that his mother had taught him, before the Deluge had swept it all away.

“Arise, Ravnos, Arikel calls you, Rise, The Night Calls you once more.” As Lubbock spoke, he felt the pressure of his Sire’s mind within him even greater than before, felt the weight of eons, the voices of all the Kindred who he had consumed, or perhaps consumed him, rise to a crescendo in his mind. Then they were drowned in singular, unflinching, rage. The runes around him grew bright in the darkness, before Lubbock, and everything around him, was consumed in flame.


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Henry’s eyes snapped from his view of the city, leaning as he was at the edge of the Sunset’s pool-balcony, his mind on the young kindred whom he had agreed to shelter, as a bright light scorched through the night behind him. He had missed the initial flash, but he knew with one heart beat that it had not been natural. He who had taught the first men the might of magic would know it anywhere, even bastardised by the Kindred and their ways.

The light that he saw, however, was far more mundane. The orange light of a new dawn poured down the Hollywood hills. A moment later and the surge of heated air and ash struck him, the wave passing over him. The clothing on his form singed, and only his supernatural physiology kept his skin from doing the same, kept the rush of air from blasting him from the ledge. Some of his guests weren’t so lucky, sent sprawling down the hillside below, or falling in pain as their skin blistered. This was on the prelude, the heatwave of a detonation, as he watched the hills of Hollywood come alive in flame, he knew the forest fire was not far behind, rushing down towards the city proper.

His phone was already ringing, and he was on the way to answer when enough sensation rocked him. Not a physical one, a pang in his soul, a wrenching dread as one of the many scattered pieces of his essence called out to him.

It was the beginning of the end.