The Dragon's Bane

I

Évrard D'Aboville - the creature

First thing you should know dear reader is that a human being is not a juice box. And sucking blood through two small fang holes is neither convenient nor a fulfilling experience when attempting to drain a two-hundred-and-fifty-pound construction worker of all his delicious contents.

Right about now you may be asking yourself, how do I eat? And to that I say, heartily. I never neglect the five food groups: organs, fat, blood, skin, and meat. Notice, I did not add bone.

I have the same number of teeth as an adult should. However, upon this, whatever you would call it-curse maybe, they've become serrated, sharp and when necessary, can chew through just about anything. But I don't like bone any more than you do in your chicken wings.

Meals have to be at the very least, bi-weekly and absolutely necessary to keep from blood sickness. That is a sort of feral autopilot built into my kind. If I try to save a life or two by skipping meals, I may just wake up on a pile of sixty or so bodies and a city razed to the ground behind me. Cyprus, September 1570. Look it up and shed a tear or sixty if you're feeling generous.

I have two fangs that I affectionately dubbed my sabers for their size. Contrary to lore, these cannot be retracted. And if I am to remain anonymous as our laws dictate, they can make speaking difficult. I am well practiced but I still cut my tongue on elongated S' and 'pha' sounds.

Despite the manner of our meeting reader, you should know I am a selective talker. I choose my words and my audience with equal measure. You may think me shy if we were ever to meet but pray for your sake that we never do.

Choosing a meal is always a thing of grand and careful importance for me. Slaughter days which account for 92% of my feedings are simple enough venture. I choose the first person that makes eye contact. Be it a precocious youth, a soccer mom, a cripple, a convict, or a courteous attendant. It matters not. Eye contact is selection.

I am a man of some honor. I do not eat children. I confess I've been tempted but they can't really choose eye contact, can they? And even I have my limits. The absolute barrier line? Fourteen years of age. A day older than that and it's fair game.

If the weight of my gluttony and shame forces me to move outside my natural diet, I can only do so with maddeningly specific restrictions. But the select group of warm-blooded things I discovered I can eat is much shorter than the list of what I absolutely can't. So, I am sorry to report humanity will always be the main course.

Regarding the other 8% of my feedings. I am a hunter by nature and trade. I must find my sport somewhere. So, every few months I will deviate, stalk, and do a live feed. Sundays and priests mostly. I'll spend two weeks spreading out their suffering and satisfying my cravings. Priests are at the very top of my delights. I have a particular dislike of them. I feel I should detail the exact why and when of it but I don't want to just yet.

And unlucky for the pretty and perfectly plump, dark-skinned waitress eyeing me through the large glass window, today is a slaughter day. I could hardly help the smile the cracked across my face. Nor the bit of salivary anticipation dripping down my fangs.

Izmir Lefeuvre-The Witch

A chill zipped down my spine and I stood bone straight. Fear rippled over my skin raising all the gooseflesh in its path. I got the eerie feeling that someone was watching me.

I lifted my head only to make eye contact with a figure staring through the glass windowpane. A man or what looked like one stood across the bustling restaurant in a dark corner of the French Quarter.

Even standing on a brightly lit street, darkness molded around him. I could only make out the nape length pitch black hair and ashen white skin covering his face and hands I saw poking from the ends of his long-sleeved shirt.

It had to be at least 90 degrees with nearly a hundred percent humidity out there. Just the look of this stranger chilled me to the bone. I could hardly make him out but everything about him screamed danger.

I've seen a lot of strange things since moving to New Orleans several years ago. The appearance of this ghostly figure was not the first but was unlikely to be the last. It smiled revealing a row of pearl white fangs. I gasped, stumbling backwards, knocking the tray of a passing server to the floor.

"Oh, I'm sorry Gary," I turned to help the boy collect the fallen dishes and cups.

"It's ok Izzy. You look like you saw a ghost." He chuckled wiping up the spill.

My eyes darted out the window again. The man was gone. "Maybe I did." 

Authors Note

Main Character credit to Adamconfession of tictok. Évrard is almost entirely modeled on his character. Thank you for such inspiration!