You want to know why I killed him? Well, I’ll tell you. I was there when we defeated the vampire lord. How many good men did we lose that day? We couldn’t dig a pit big enough for the bodies so we ended up burning them. So many of my friends were gone. Emile, would that I could hear your laugh again. Anton, why did you leave your wife and children behind? Toma, that arrow was meant for me. Not you. By some cruel fate or chance we won. We were victorious. But I had no heart to cheer. The horrors that poured from that pit haunt me. They still haunt me. I couldn’t believe it. After so many years of living under his cruel rule, the monster Dragomir was finally gone. The nightmare was over or so I thought. I was with Lord Ivan Lucien, my brother, when we marched into the castle to claim victory. Never mind the fact that he sat safely in his tent well while the rest of us fought in that meat grinder. All those songs about him. Don’t believe them. I’ll tell you the truth. We were not the heroes. We were the distraction. It took an army to distract him. There was a small team of elite hunters who fought their way through the maze in the dungeon. They are the ones who battled the vampire king face-to-face. Twelve went in. Two walked out. If they had failed, we surely would have been overrun. But the moment the vampire lord died, his creatures fled in all directions. His hold over them broken. Lord Lucien and the other eight lords looted the castle vaults. I advised them against it. Anything that evil vampire touched would be corrupted, I told him. He didn’t listen. The next time I saw my brother he was wearing a silver collar that he said was spoil from the crypts. He was always wearing that collar. It changed him, I think. He became more confident. He could dance even though he always had two left feet. He could sing when the man used to be tone deaf. He seemed stronger. I should have seen the signs. A few months ago the killings began. They were mostly beggars and the poor so no one noticed. No one but me, the Captain of the Guard. The victims were drained of blood. I knew what that meant. We must have missed one of the vampire spawn. I took this personally. I hunted the streets and then last night I finally caught him. I found the vile creature just as it was draining the life out this poor young servant girl. I was too late to save the girl but I struck with my blade and cut off the creature’s head before it could cry out. Imagine my shock when I saw that I had taken the head of my brother. You want to know why I killed Lord Ivan Lucien? It was because he was a vampire and that is my defense.

~ Confession of Andreis Lucien for the murder of his brother Lord Ivan Lucien