Finding Blood (City Underdark #1)

The Temptress

He soon came to regret having given his money to the witch. He found out more useful information during the following nights than he had when going to her house.

Among them were the rounds of the night's watch and the coming and going of a few people he suspected to be supernatural. It was hard to determine what creatures they were exactly, but their coming and going were telling enough for someone that knew where to look. Barmond might be quite young for a vampire, but he had been trained for this.

For example, there was a shop in the centre of the town, a few steps away from the cathedral, that was run by an elf. A wood elf, Barmond estimated, because there was something cat-like about his face. By day, he sold vegetables and fruits that were so colourful that it was hard to believe that no magic had been used to enhance them. But at night, shadows moved around his shop and strange people were admitted in. (Barmond suspected the shop to be an entrance to Ranphoros' lair but it was all conjectures.)

And then there were the shadows that went around the streets freely. Barmond didn't mean the shadows in which he hid as a vampire, but shadows that moved on their own, forms that crawled up and down the walls, darker than the deepest pit itself. Barmond had heard of such things, he knew that they were called clawers because of their preferred mode of attack. Although he had kept his eyes peeled for them and had avoided them the best he could, so far it didn't seem that they were on the lookout for him. They were not the smartest - Barmond could compare their level of intelligence with the one of talking dogs. As long as he didn't run into a stalker, also known as the smarter, stronger, and faster version of a clawer - and the ones that generally lead gangs of clawers - he was fine just making sure he didn't step on one during his nightly escapades.

Going around collecting rumours also proved to be quite fruitful. Humans, while generally aware that creatures beyond their understanding existed, never realised that said creatures oftentimes lived right under their nose. And while that might be true for unicorns and fey, werewolves, vampires, incubus, and even demons had no reason to live elsewhere than very close by. Even so, more, often than not, humans still saw the signs that such creatures left after their passage, even if they didn't recognize them.

That is how Barmond learned of the existence of a group of "mercenaries" that regularly stopped in town, men and women that liked celebrating their victories together by drinking in a tavern. They never boasted about what they were fighting or never mentioned their employers, and among them was a tall, bearded man that seemed to be their leader.

There was no doubt in Barmond's mind that those were the werewolves he knew worked for Ranphoros. Luckily for the vampire, it didn't seem like they had ever laid a foot in the Fishy Monster. He gave the places they favoured a wide berth. Vampires didn't smell like much, meaning that oftentimes they were not noticed by creatures with a finer nose. Werewolves were among the rare creatures that were both smart and sensitive to recognize that faint smell of stale blood they carried, effectively singling them out among humans. (Of course, a vampire was rarely so unnoticeable that they needed to be identified by scent alone, even if Barmond seemed to be an exception to the rule.)

All of that, he wrote it down in as much detail as he could and sent it out every week in letters to his sire. For this purpose, he had a contact with a human merchant that also happened to be a blood servant to one of the vampires of his clan. And, while all the letters were delivered straight to his sire's hand, he never received a reply.

Not that he wanted to receive one. If he ever had any letter from his sire, it would probably be choke-full of unnecessary remarks, all of which would be written in that condescending tone he excelled at.