I have seen my successor in my dreams. Not the whole, but bits and pieces - fragments of a man who will someday come together in my sight, as the pieces of a puzzle. When that instant comes, I shall know him as I know all those who follow me, and many that came before me. For now, he is a stranger.
Although he is my friend, my partner within our fellowship, John has never asked if he is to be my successor. He never will. The thought is completely foreign to him - after all, I am to live forever. There is no reason in his mind for there to be a successor, and he will follow me as long as he lives.
No matter how weary I am of my tasks, despite the pain they bring me - his loyalty nearly makes me wish there was never to be a successor. But there must.
If it were a choice given to me to make, and were such an arrangement even possible, I would still not choose him. It is not that he is too weak, or too inexperienced - if the Dark was to wait for experience, I never would have come into this power. Rather, it is a burden I would not offer a friend.
Besides, I have heard the whispers in his heart at night as he lies beside me, or beneath me, his hands clutching my shoulders or clenching in my hair. I fear that they are true: in my absence, he would find his life not worth living.