Prologue: En; Jake
Shin-lu Belvedere. Ling Juan. Mizuki Takusuka. Nicola Andreyev.
She leant back, letting her mind float over the many names she had been known under, the many races she had been thought to be.
What was that line from that poem again?
"The years to come seemed waste of breath. / A waste of breath the years behind."
At precisely 654 years, 8 months and 12 days old, she would obviously empathize with the poet's words. How nice. A vamp empathizing with a dead vermin. The Night World council would be thrilled to pieces.
En Redfern closed her eyes discreetly, letting the ongoing debate of the Elders wash over her. She had not fed for four days now; even with powers as developed as one of her age it was a strain on herself.
En could not remember much about her past. She didn't usually stop to care about it, but on meetings like these it was a much more interesting avenue to channel her thoughts to. She knew she had been born, an original purebred vampire, somewhere in Paris. She knew that her mother was from the Orient, her father a descendant of the apparently prestigious Redferns. She knew that she had been born into an affluent household. She knew that her first kill was when she was six, when she had done away with the head steward of the house. She knew that he had been a handsome young man, but she could not remember his face. She could not remember what had happened after she had exterminated him; to be concise she could not remotely remember anything after that: her memories could only continue from when she left the family to seek her own fortunes, when she was eighteen. And everything from there onwards was also hopelessly sketchy.
What much significant was there to remember anyway?
En. En, which meant grace in Mandarin. Grace, her cursed body had, but grace life had not applied onto her. Too much she had gambled, too much she had lost.
So En preferred not to think of such things. And En preferred not to be called En.
But ever since the dratted world of cursed beings like her somehow organized themselves into the Night World (about time too), En had had to let some of the respected authority know of her true identity. Not that they needed informing, but En was expected to admit it to them, like she was some kind of criminal confessing his crime. And, because of her years, because of her 'talent', because of the plain fact that En had become too detached and emotionless and couldn't-care-less, they had jumped at her to be a member of the Night World council. En didn't remember agreeing to join; she just had.
To En, the Council was awash with hotheaded poseurs anyway. The whole of Night World, in fact, was awash with so-called predators who were lost to the art of hunting. How ironic. En's lip curled unconsciously. It was intensely amusing, how the young ones were so very naïve.
The babble of voices had melted down around her. En opened her eyes again, and stood up, gathering her things (a slim laptop which she had been expected to type minutes on, but never did; a thin silver pen which she never used but always twirled) as the Council was dismissed. She did not bother to stay around to speak to the others, making her way to her black Porsche at the back of the compound.
As she slid into the driver's seat, deceivingly delicate frame clothed in a signature black suit, long black hair neatly tucked into a casual bun, she ignored easily the presence of a young male vampire watching her not too far away.
~
Jake Farraday knew full well who the beautiful girl who had driven away was. Even a 'just-made' new kid around the block knew who she was. She was En Redfern, of course, notoriously efficient as an assassin, a brilliant strategist, and all-round anti-social. Jake had high expectations of himself as a vampire. He was fresh, only a year since departing from vermin status (his good friend of rather questionable sexuality, Owen, had provided him the privilege when Jake had died last summer from a freak accident involving a lot of questionable underage delinquents with questionable licences and questionable ownerships of a couple of banged-up cars) so he did not qualify to party with the best of the vampires in the most glamorous clubs yet; anyway, some of them were still rather uppity around him because of him not being an original. But Jake had anticipated that: Owen had warned him earlier, so after a few times Jake seldom got riled-up.
But that girl. En had caught his eye from a distance when she had appeared at a mass gathering for Night World members, and she had got him, all right. Jake wasn't sure why - besides the fact that she was undeniably cool and (almost) undeniably unattainable, she was, as said, beautiful, but so was every other vampire you would meet. Jake couldn't explain, even to himself, why En's aloof, sharp-angled and exquisitely crafted face attracted him so; couldn't explain why her sloping, Oriental dark grey eyes appeared so appealing, so sadly gorgeous; couldn't explain why her red lips seemed so pleasurable. All Jake knew was that he wanted her. Badly.
Jake himself was lanky, with pale silver eyes, his white skin framed by soft, white-blond hair; his features decisive and well pronounced. He was only ordinary by vampiric standards, but of course amongst vermin he was decidedly desirable. But En Redfern was... Jake couldn't quite express it. She was enigmatic; her attractiveness extended, in its eloquence, beyond physical. There was a quality of dire hopelessness resonating from her that drew Jake unreasonably to her.
And of course, if Jake ever got to know her, his status in the Night World society would definitely be given a boost.
Jake trailed the gravel of the sidewalk, identical to many along glitzy Los Angeles. En's Porsche was albeit like a small black dot in the far-off distance, quickly getting obscured by other cars and other towering buildings with their flashy lights and grimy windows.
Jake sighed.
And as the overused cliché of 'so near yet so far' came to his head, all he could do was walk off to search for fresh prey.
Shin-lu Belvedere. Ling Juan. Mizuki Takusuka. Nicola Andreyev.
She leant back, letting her mind float over the many names she had been known under, the many races she had been thought to be.
What was that line from that poem again?
"The years to come seemed waste of breath. / A waste of breath the years behind."
At precisely 654 years, 8 months and 12 days old, she would obviously empathize with the poet's words. How nice. A vamp empathizing with a dead vermin. The Night World council would be thrilled to pieces.
En Redfern closed her eyes discreetly, letting the ongoing debate of the Elders wash over her. She had not fed for four days now; even with powers as developed as one of her age it was a strain on herself.
En could not remember much about her past. She didn't usually stop to care about it, but on meetings like these it was a much more interesting avenue to channel her thoughts to. She knew she had been born, an original purebred vampire, somewhere in Paris. She knew that her mother was from the Orient, her father a descendant of the apparently prestigious Redferns. She knew that she had been born into an affluent household. She knew that her first kill was when she was six, when she had done away with the head steward of the house. She knew that he had been a handsome young man, but she could not remember his face. She could not remember what had happened after she had exterminated him; to be concise she could not remotely remember anything after that: her memories could only continue from when she left the family to seek her own fortunes, when she was eighteen. And everything from there onwards was also hopelessly sketchy.
What much significant was there to remember anyway?
En. En, which meant grace in Mandarin. Grace, her cursed body had, but grace life had not applied onto her. Too much she had gambled, too much she had lost.
So En preferred not to think of such things. And En preferred not to be called En.
But ever since the dratted world of cursed beings like her somehow organized themselves into the Night World (about time too), En had had to let some of the respected authority know of her true identity. Not that they needed informing, but En was expected to admit it to them, like she was some kind of criminal confessing his crime. And, because of her years, because of her 'talent', because of the plain fact that En had become too detached and emotionless and couldn't-care-less, they had jumped at her to be a member of the Night World council. En didn't remember agreeing to join; she just had.
To En, the Council was awash with hotheaded poseurs anyway. The whole of Night World, in fact, was awash with so-called predators who were lost to the art of hunting. How ironic. En's lip curled unconsciously. It was intensely amusing, how the young ones were so very naïve.
The babble of voices had melted down around her. En opened her eyes again, and stood up, gathering her things (a slim laptop which she had been expected to type minutes on, but never did; a thin silver pen which she never used but always twirled) as the Council was dismissed. She did not bother to stay around to speak to the others, making her way to her black Porsche at the back of the compound.
As she slid into the driver's seat, deceivingly delicate frame clothed in a signature black suit, long black hair neatly tucked into a casual bun, she ignored easily the presence of a young male vampire watching her not too far away.
~
Jake Farraday knew full well who the beautiful girl who had driven away was. Even a 'just-made' new kid around the block knew who she was. She was En Redfern, of course, notoriously efficient as an assassin, a brilliant strategist, and all-round anti-social. Jake had high expectations of himself as a vampire. He was fresh, only a year since departing from vermin status (his good friend of rather questionable sexuality, Owen, had provided him the privilege when Jake had died last summer from a freak accident involving a lot of questionable underage delinquents with questionable licences and questionable ownerships of a couple of banged-up cars) so he did not qualify to party with the best of the vampires in the most glamorous clubs yet; anyway, some of them were still rather uppity around him because of him not being an original. But Jake had anticipated that: Owen had warned him earlier, so after a few times Jake seldom got riled-up.
But that girl. En had caught his eye from a distance when she had appeared at a mass gathering for Night World members, and she had got him, all right. Jake wasn't sure why - besides the fact that she was undeniably cool and (almost) undeniably unattainable, she was, as said, beautiful, but so was every other vampire you would meet. Jake couldn't explain, even to himself, why En's aloof, sharp-angled and exquisitely crafted face attracted him so; couldn't explain why her sloping, Oriental dark grey eyes appeared so appealing, so sadly gorgeous; couldn't explain why her red lips seemed so pleasurable. All Jake knew was that he wanted her. Badly.
Jake himself was lanky, with pale silver eyes, his white skin framed by soft, white-blond hair; his features decisive and well pronounced. He was only ordinary by vampiric standards, but of course amongst vermin he was decidedly desirable. But En Redfern was... Jake couldn't quite express it. She was enigmatic; her attractiveness extended, in its eloquence, beyond physical. There was a quality of dire hopelessness resonating from her that drew Jake unreasonably to her.
And of course, if Jake ever got to know her, his status in the Night World society would definitely be given a boost.
Jake trailed the gravel of the sidewalk, identical to many along glitzy Los Angeles. En's Porsche was albeit like a small black dot in the far-off distance, quickly getting obscured by other cars and other towering buildings with their flashy lights and grimy windows.
Jake sighed.
And as the overused cliché of 'so near yet so far' came to his head, all he could do was walk off to search for fresh prey.