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It was unusual for Violetta to dream.

The death-like slumber of kindred was not some peaceful retreat into the embrace of blissful torpidity, but a sudden and discordant leap into the blackest depths of nothingness.

In the clutches of yawning oblivion, there was no light, nor sound, nor thought. There was only a ravenous abyss, that stretched on for an eternity, eating away at time, and space, and creation itself. 

But on that night, against all reason, Violetta Kyborowski had a nightmare. 

Amidst the never-ending void, she saw a man with a long, flowing beard, sitting upon a pale mountain of wailing skulls. His eyes blazed with the mystical fire of untold souls, and he wore a satisfied smirk upon his face. 

“Hubris is the bane of all great men,” the bearded king chuckled, “and death makes beggars of us all.”

High up in the lifeless vacuum, where the sky would be, Vi saw the silhouette of three masks, wrought from the flowing energies of oblivion, that gazed out at the ceaseless sprawl of nothingness, watching over the end of all things, with amusement in their many eyes. 

Vi awoke with a jolt. 

Her dead heart pounded in her chest, beating in a way that she had not felt since her embrace, and her whole body trembled with palpable unease. 

She could feel enraged whispers burrowing deep into the stone walls that surrounded her, and unknown energies crackling in the air, like discharged electricity. 

A choir of the damned and forsaken sung in agonizing harmony, crying out for justice, and bloody retribution.

“Bruno is waiting for you, Miss Kyborowski.” 

The ventrue spotted a curvaceous, bronze-skinned woman standing in the doorway, watching her with a blank expression.

“I’ll be right there.” Vi grumbled in response, slowly rising out of bed. 

She had been supplied with a small but comfortable room, with few furnishings to speak of, save for the comfy single bed, and a stocky bedside table. 

Violetta assumed that this little chamber had been reserved for those few visitors that were not an actual part of the Giovanni family, or one of its wriggling branches.

The kindred pulled on her jacket, slipped into her shoes, and was soon trailing behind her guide, as they moved through an expansive corridor, fashioned from polished white marble. 

Once again, Vi could feel restless energies boiling in the air.

As the pair made their way through the Giovanni mansion, the ventrue found herself surprised by how lifeless the house felt. 

Serpentine hallways were empty, and muted rooms were devoid of the murmur of conversation, or scattered family members.

“I thought there would be more of you,” Violetta thought aloud, “this place feels like a graveyard.” 

“In more ways than one.” the woman replied. 

Vi would have guessed that her guide was 5’2, excluding the raised heels that she wore. She was dolled up in an extravagant black dress, and flashy makeup, that felt entirely at odds with the silent manor house. 

Before long, they arrived in a vast dinette, where the head of the household was stood waiting for Violetta.

“Thank you, Isabel,” the gaunt-faced patriarch gave her a faint nod, “you may leave us.” 

The soft clattering of heeled shoes announced Isabel Giovanni’s departure. 


Bruno’s dining room was lavish, and well-tended to, without a hint of dust or grime in sight.

 A long table, hewn from burgundy wood, stretched across the heart of the room, and a baroque chandelier swooped down from the ceiling, with spider-like limbs that nursed tall candles inside their golden cups. 

Each candle cracked with a warm, ghostly flame that spat quivering shadows out against the boldly decorated walls.

“This house has been the Giovanni’s stronghold on the West Coast since colonial merchants from Italy first settled the land,” Bruno explained, in a voice brimming with nostalgic pride, “my sire embraced me within these very walls, not long before Woodrow Wilson was sworn in as president.” 

“You’ve been here a while.” Violetta drearily observed, running both hands over the smooth mahogany table. 

“And there is a reason we’ve survived this long.” the Giovanni replied, adopting the callous inflection of a steely gangster, who was able to inspire dread through a smattering of thinly-veiled threats and sinister glares.

“But things have been failing lately.” Vi countered. 

A look of bitter irritation painted itself in hard strokes across Bruno’s gaunt face. 

“You should choose your words more carefully, [i]signora[/i].” the mobster snarled. 

Undeterred, the ventrue pressed on in her characteristically cold voice. 

“You’re a notoriously close family, but these halls are empty, and even someone as ignorant in the art of death as I am can feel that the spirits here are far from friendly,” she reasoned, “something is [i]very[/i] wrong.” 

For a moment Violetta was sure that Bruno was going to strike her, but then his grim expression sagged, and turned into one of hopelessness. 

He reached one hand into his jacket pocket, and pulled out a slick silver case, filled with a neat row of cigarettes.They both took one, lit up, and puffed away in offhand unison. 

“It started a few years ago,” Bruno explained, blowing twin pikes of greyish smoke out of his nostrils, “my childe, [i]Mira[/i], got called away on some family business. Said it was nothin’ I needed to worry about. I ain’t heard back from her, or the rest of the family, since.”
 
The distress in Bruno’s voice reminded Vi of a wounded animal. She knew that the Giovanni valued family above all else, so being separated from his kin must have crippled the mobster in a way so deep-seated that Violetta could scarcely comprehend it. 

[i]Like when David betrayed you.[/i] 

With a stab of heart-wrenching sadness, she pushed that thought back into the nethermost recesses of her mind. 

“Even the rest of the US Giovanni have gone silent,” the gangster murmured, taking a covetous draw from his cigarette, “until [i]Franziska[/i] arrived, a few months back, I hadn’t heard from the clan outside of these walls for what feels like an eternity.” 

Despite her frosty demeanor, Violetta was not entirely made of stone, and the obvious grief in Bruno’s voice stirred a faint pang of sympathy inside of her. 

“Family means a lot to you.” she muttered, in between pulls of her cigarette. 

“Family means [i]everything[/i] to me,” he replied, “they were my [i]salvation[/i], and my nights without them have become [i]damnation[/i].” 

A faint crimson haze welled over Bruno Giovanni’s shark-like eyes.

“I’m alone now.” he whispered to himself. 

Ever the enterprising go-getter, Violetta grabbed hold of the opportunity that had presented itself. 

"Vannevar Thomas needs allies,” she explained, “the Giovanni and the Camarilla have worked together in the past, and we can do so again. You don’t have to be alone.” 

Vi imagined that her sire, [i]Queen Anne[/i], would be rather proud of her childe’s business savvy. 

Bruno took a moment to ponder what the ventrue had said. 

“Once, I would have spat at the idea,” he grunted, “but these are dark nights, and there are twisted fuckin’ monsters out there.” 

The Giovanni vampire let out a conquered sigh. 

“Talk me through your proposition.”  

[hr]

The scent of petrichor was heavy on the air, as rain poured forth from the night sky, like the uninterrupted tears of a jilted lover. 

Franziska Giovanni shielded herself from the downpour with a large black umbrella, striding cooly over sodden ground, in a pair of slick, onyx boots. 

A splintering, box-like shell of cracked stone rose up out of the sloppy mud, with tall, domed towers sticking out of what was left of its squat torso. What had once been a rigorously cared for chapel was now a deserted ruin, marred by the explosion that had torn through its labyrinthine passages, during the battle for the Ankaran Sarcophagus. 

“Ain’t you a pretty picture?” a harsh, rasping voice echoed out of the night. 

In an eyeblink, the hunched figure of a leering zombie snapped into being, who looked as necrotic and rotten as the ruins behind him. 

“Henri.” Franziska greeted the Samedi creature with a cold stare. 

She was a tall woman, even without her heeled-boots, and stood a fair few inches above the walking cadaver. 

“How do you like ma’ new crib, [i]chérie[/i]?” Henri grinned, flashing a mouth full of yellow teeth, “I think it has an [i]austere charm[/i] to it.” 

The Samedi vampire’s flesh was a mishmash of sickly greens and rancid blacks, clinging to his tawny bones, like strands of torn toilet paper. Even before the embrace, Franziska had possessed a fervent love of thanatology, so the fetid being infront of her inspired more curiosity than repulsion. 

“My time is precious,” Franziska replied sternly, “and I’m not here to talk about your hideout.” 

A sick, guttural cackle bounced out of Henri’s putrid maw. 

“Straight to the point then, [i]mon trésor[/i],” the Samedi laughed, “what does Bruno think happened at the [i]Family Reunion[/i]?”

“Bruno must have royally pissed someone off, because he hasn’t heard from the inner-circle since before [i]Venice[/i],” Franziska explained, “I think I’m the first contact he has had with other Giovanni in a [i]looooong[/i] time.” 

The young necromancer had no idea how Bruno had missed so many critical shifts in the Giovanni’s situation, but it looked as though the LA branch of the family had degraded into little more than up-jumped mobsters. 

Franziska knew that Bruno had fallen out of the good graces of the Italian Giovanni even before he bungled the Ankaran Sarcophagus job, so her current working theory was that Bruno and his meager circle of childer were so securely on some petty elder’s shit list that they had been deliberately kept in the dark by the wider family, prior to Augustus’ disappearance. 

“Ain’t that a stroke ‘a luck?” Henri leered, his thin lips twisting into a decayed grin. 

“He doesn’t know anything about the reunion,” the necromancer assured the Samedi, “I don’t even think he knows that the spectres have been hunting him because Augustus isn’t around to hold them in check anymore.” 

Henri let out another blood-chilling rip of cackling. 

“The poor bastard has no idea!” the hunched zombie laughed, “he left da’ gate wide open, and now the [i]Hecata[/i] have come ta’ take everythin’ away from him.”