The New World Mysteries

Chapter 1.

1. The mysterious savior

The cold wind blew briskly sending shivers through Elise’s spine, she drew her coat closer to her slim body and fastened her pace.

The streets were deserted at that time of the night, it was middle of November and the upcoming winter could be felt in the gelid atmosphere that hovered in the thick haze. The lights were dim and every house was tightly closed, giving no signs of life. Even the smell was hard to breathe, it was a dreadful stink of solitude and fear wrapped around nasty smoke, poverty and cheap alcohol.

Elise shrugged the emptiness of those streets; it was depressing seeing a city and its people private of their own liberty and choices, private of having a life out of the small minded concepts and fear that were injected on them, everyday.

The world changed a lot since she was born, the smooth yet terrific sounds of the night led Elise to an introspection during her path. She was now eighteen, legally responsible for herself but she had been so since she was a little girl and her parents got killed.

She still dreamt of the night she saw her mother being ripped away from her embrace and tore open in front of her shaky eyes. The image craved itself in her soul and there was no way it was going to cicatrize.

After the dreadful incident she was sent to a training school, which was like an orphanage for kids whose parents had passed-away or had simply abandoned them. There were separated schools for the different genders and they never blended.

Girls were taught how to be a proper maid, craftswoman, needlewoman or servant; they learned how to sew, how to properly clean and maintain a household, how to cook meals in massive quantities, how to be pleasant and not impolite or inappropriate but mostly they learned how to obey fealty to their future masters – if they were lucky to find one.

The boys were taught almost the same except they were trained to serve physically as well for the most extenuating and demanding jobs or to be prepared to serve in any war or conflict, if needed.

When both reached the adulthood they were sent away with their few belongings to jobs previously fixed for them, those jobs were just a passage through whatever they would really do. If they were lucky enough they would be bought by some Master and serve him, if not they would just blend in the torpid mass that the humans were.

That year there was a celebration in town and Elise was one of the lucky few who got picked up to help in the preparation of the royal household. It was the King’s birthday, apparently he was celebrating his millennium but she couldn’t be sure, because no one knew, in reality, his true age.

About a century ago vampires became known to man, they perfected their own skills in order to rule the world and apply their power over the others races. They managed to succeed in their quest though the way they’ve done it was a blurry page on the history’s books. There were different versions of how they accomplished that and it depended mainly on who was telling the story.

Ever since then, humans had only one purpose: to serve.

They had no rights whatsoever but their importance and conditions depended on the class they belonged. The richest ones were closer to the vampires – though they were not friends, they sometimes frequented the same places, such as the royal gatherings; they lived on the upper part of the cities in more accommodating homes.

While the poorest ones were labeled as the vermin class. They lived at the oldest part of the cities, the part where only existed the basic living conditions and nothing more, the darker and melancholic part of each realm.