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====Unholy Marriage====
 
====Unholy Marriage====
   
Little to nothing is known about Vlad before he appeared at Drakenhof Castle during a stormy night in 1797. During that fatefull night, the old Count of Sylvania was on the verge of dying, slew down by a mysterious illness. In 30 days, he had aged as many years. He lost control on his mussels, struggling even to speak. During the Count's last hours, 4 people were gathered around his dying bed: the village chirugeon and the local senior priest of [[Sigmar]], [[Victor Guttman]], who were trying to soothe the passing of the old Drak, his daughter, Isabella van Drak, and his brother, Leopold van Drak, who was " thoroughly bored." The Count refused to die, clinging to life with all the hatred he could muster, because he knew that should he pass, his brother would take his place, a thought he disliked even more then dying.
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Little to nothing is known about Vlad before he appeared at Drakenhof Castle during a stormy night in 1797. During that fateful night, Otto von Drak, the old Count of Sylvania was on the verge of dying, brought down by a mysterious illness. In thirty days, von Drak had aged as many years. He lost control on his muscles, struggling even to speak. During the Count's last hours, four people were gathered around his dying bed: the village chirurgeon, the local senior priest of [[Sigmar]], [[Victor Guttman]], his daughter, Isabella van Drak, and his brother, Leopold van Drak, who was "thoroughly bored." The Count refused to die, clinging to life with all the hatred he could muster, because he knew that should he pass, his brother would take his place, a thought he disliked even more then dying.
   
Suddenly, the priest of Sigmar, Guttman, was overcome by terror and fell, hitting the bedpost of the Count and losing consciousness. In the following silence, somebody knocked on the door. A trembling manservant introduced an unknown noble by the words: "The noble Vlad von Carstein, my l-lord". Leopold, trying to guess where the stranger had come from, could only mumble: "out of the storm". Vlad then addressed the Count Otto van Drak and his daughter, utterly ignoring Leopold, only answering to his inquiries of his origins by stating he was the eldest of the von Carstein family, a family he didn't expect Leopold to know, but that he could trace back before the creation of the Empire. He then silenced Leopold, stating he had come to offer his services to the ''current'' Count van Drak, only being in the vicinity while travelling to a wedding. Otto's face lites up, and he proposes the vampire to become the husband of his daughter, thus effectivly obliterating Leopolds claim to the title of Count. Vlad the turns to Isabella, claiming that at some point of the ceremony, it was usual for the bride to accept. Isabella, wanting the power she senses in Vlad, accepts, but asks him in a whisper a token of his love. Vlad then faces Lopold and tears his heart out of his chest with his bare hands before tossing him out of a window. He then presents Isabella the hart of her now dead uncle, upon which she coldly states she has no use of it, seeing it no longer beats. Shortly afterwards, the wedding is concluded.
+
Suddenly, the priest of Sigmar, Guttman, was overcome by terror and fell, hitting the bedpost of the Count and losing consciousness. In the following silence, somebody knocked on the door. A trembling manservant introduced an unknown noble by the words: "The noble Vlad von Carstein, my l-lord". Leopold, trying to guess where the stranger had come from, could only mumble: "out of the storm". Vlad then addressed the dying Count Otto van Drak and his daughter, utterly ignoring Leopold, only answering to his inquiries of his origins by stating he was the eldest of the von Carstein family, a family he didn't expect Leopold to know, but that he could trace back before the creation of the Empire. He then silenced Leopold, stating he had come to offer his services to the ''current'' Count van Drak, only being in the vicinity while travelling to a wedding. Otto's face lit up, and he proposes the vampire to become the husband of his daughter, thus effectivly obliterating Leopolds claim to the title of Count. Vlad then turns to Isabella, claiming that at some point of the ceremony, it was usual for the bride to accept. Isabella, wanting the power she sensed in Vlad, accepts, but asks him in a whisper for a token of his love. Vlad then faces Leopold and tears his heart out of his chest with his bare hands before tossing him out of a window. He then presents Isabella the heart of her now dead uncle, upon which she coldly states she has no use of it, seeing it no longer beats. Shortly afterwards, the wedding is concluded.
   
 
====Unrest====
 
====Unrest====

Revision as of 13:47, 9 September 2013

Vlad von Carstein was the first of the Vampire Counts, and is seen by many as the one who made Sylvania the cesspool of Undead activity it still is today.

Early Life

"You cannot do this to me! I won't allow this to happen! This is my birthright! Sylvania,this castle...it is all mine."

"On the contrary, good sir. The Count can do anything -anything- that he so wishes. If he bade me reach into your chest and rip out your heart with my bare hands and feed it to the dogs, well...It might prove difficult, but if the count willed it, believe me, it would be done." --Vlad von Carstein and Leopold van Drak, about the marriage of Isabella van Drak to Vlad.

Unholy Marriage

Little to nothing is known about Vlad before he appeared at Drakenhof Castle during a stormy night in 1797. During that fateful night, Otto von Drak, the old Count of Sylvania was on the verge of dying, brought down by a mysterious illness. In thirty days, von Drak had aged as many years. He lost control on his muscles, struggling even to speak. During the Count's last hours, four people were gathered around his dying bed: the village chirurgeon, the local senior priest of Sigmar, Victor Guttman, his daughter, Isabella van Drak, and his brother, Leopold van Drak, who was "thoroughly bored." The Count refused to die, clinging to life with all the hatred he could muster, because he knew that should he pass, his brother would take his place, a thought he disliked even more then dying.

Suddenly, the priest of Sigmar, Guttman, was overcome by terror and fell, hitting the bedpost of the Count and losing consciousness. In the following silence, somebody knocked on the door. A trembling manservant introduced an unknown noble by the words: "The noble Vlad von Carstein, my l-lord". Leopold, trying to guess where the stranger had come from, could only mumble: "out of the storm". Vlad then addressed the dying Count Otto van Drak and his daughter, utterly ignoring Leopold, only answering to his inquiries of his origins by stating he was the eldest of the von Carstein family, a family he didn't expect Leopold to know, but that he could trace back before the creation of the Empire. He then silenced Leopold, stating he had come to offer his services to the current Count van Drak, only being in the vicinity while travelling to a wedding. Otto's face lit up, and he proposes the vampire to become the husband of his daughter, thus effectivly obliterating Leopolds claim to the title of Count. Vlad then turns to Isabella, claiming that at some point of the ceremony, it was usual for the bride to accept. Isabella, wanting the power she sensed in Vlad, accepts, but asks him in a whisper for a token of his love. Vlad then faces Leopold and tears his heart out of his chest with his bare hands before tossing him out of a window. He then presents Isabella the heart of her now dead uncle, upon which she coldly states she has no use of it, seeing it no longer beats. Shortly afterwards, the wedding is concluded.

Unrest

Between that first night in 1797, and the dreadful winter of 2010, it is known that Vlad ruled Sylvania under different identity's to cover up the fact he was a vampire. During this period, the Count schemed on various ways to unbalance the province and to let his power grow. Assassination of political enemies, spreading of anti-Sigmarite feelings, famine.... Also, in the year 1808, he turned Isabella van Drak into a vampire, after the former had caught a plague probably released by Vlad to further destabilize Sylvania. Giving in to her pleas, he shares the blood kiss with her. However, the first blood Isabella drinks is that of a wolf she catches during a hunt. While being able to sustain an older vampire, animal blood contains a sort of madness dangerous for new vampires. It is unknown if Isabella's madness came from this incident, or if she was unbalanced from nature.

By the end of the millennium, Sylvania was known through the Empire as the poorest and most miserable of all provinces. When in the dreaded year 2000, a huge clump of wyrdstone fell out of the sky and flattened and corrupted the city of Mordheim, Vlad, like many others, seizes the occasion to gain power through the tainted wyrdstone and sends bands of young vampires and necromancers into the madness of the city of the damned.[²] The wyrdstone the found gave Vlad the power to release the power of a spell from the liche-lord Nagash, which would change the world forever.

War against the Empire (2010 - 2051 IC)

"Raise a glass to the restless dead, my friends! To the ghosts, the shades, the ghouls, the wraiths, the wights, the banshees, the liches, the mummies, the nightmares, the weres, the shadows, the zombies, the spectres, the phantasms, and of course,... the vampires. --Vlad von Carstein, during the Totentanz

The Totentanz

By 2010 IC, Vlad von Carstein thought the time ripe for the next step in his plan. A mysterious sickness, not unlike the one that had killed Otto van Drak, had filled the graveyard's and had pushed the people to turn their back on the gods who couldn't help them, into the arms of the cult of the Wiederauferstanden, the Risen Dead. Sylvania was gauged with misery. It was then, at the start of the winter, that the count called forth all the nobles of the province to pledge loyalty to him during a festivity called the Totentanz, the dance of the dead. The dance was to be held at Drakenhof, on the eve of Geheimnisnacht. The Totentanz was actually a huge coy, invented by the vampire count to assemble the remaining living aristocracy in one place. At the height of the ball, he gave an order to his minions, which closed off all the issues to the throne room and started to kill all living beings inside. Only two people left the throne room alive: Alten Ganz, loyal servant of Vlad which had suspected the true nature of his master for a while already, and Stefan Fischer, a witch hunter who had been chasing one of von Carstein's vampires for the murder of his wife together with Jon Skellan, his brother in law. Skellan was killed and turned into a vampire, but Fischer managed to hide below a pile of dead corpses. It was then that von Carstein, standing on the highest tower of Drakenhof and surrounded by Isabella, Ganz and his right hand, Herman Prosner, released the power of a spell contained in one of the nine books of Nagash. All throughout the province, the dead began to stir. Slowly, every single cadaver in Sylvania began to move to answer the call of the Vampire Count. While the dead nobles started to emerge from the throne room, Herman Fisher acted as a zombie and escaped Drakenhof with only one single taught in mind: they are coming.

The Tide of War

Fischer finally escaped the deadly trap Sylvania had become, only to fall into the hand of a small band of vampires travelling through the Empire. Accepting his fate, even felling joy for being soon reunited with his wife, Fischer was saved by a small detachment of the Otilla's army, send to investigate the reports of undead activity along the Sylvanian border. Fischer thus related the truth behind the Vampire Count's true nature. Feeling all sense had fled his life, he stayed with the Otilla's army which would try to fend of the undead army at Essen Ford, which would be the first battle of the vampire wars.

The battle at Essen Ford would be a disaster. Knee deep in the mud and overwhelmed by impossible odds, the human army was swept away. At the end of the battle, Fisher came across an old friend: Jon Skellan, now a vampire. When the prisoners were lined up before the Vampire count, Vlad showed them the extent of his power. While discussing with the leader of the army detachment, he invited first Ganz, then 3 vampires, including Skellan to choose and kill a prisoner. Skellan choose Fischer, and bled him dry, thus reuniting him with his dead wife. Vlad reanimated the dead each time. Then he asked the commander to choose one of his men. The later refused, not wanting to decide about the life or the death of his men. The Vampire Count thus choose the youngest of the prisoners and announced him that he alone would live, to spread the fear of the vampires through the Empire He then freed the prisoner, who ran for his life. In this moment of distraction, the commander took Vlad's sword and beheaded the count with a swift stroke. Prosner severed his wrists, but it was too late, the vampire count was no more. But, when Prosner had finished giving orders regarding the torture of the man who had slayed the vampire count, he suddenly remarked that the body of the count had disappeared. Dismissing it as trivial, Prosner started a brutal rise to power, slaying everyone opposing him. It had been Ganz who, mourning for the dead count, had taken the body away, incapable of realizing the dead of the count, who had been the center of his life. At the end of the night, Prosner had obtained control of the undead army, and was going to get the last thing which would truly cement his power: Isabella. The latter, totally hysteric, was smiling when Prosner entered her tent. She claimed that her beloved wasn't dead and that he would come back to get her. Gently, Prosner led her out the tent and claimed her before the whole army as his bride, by right of strength. "Any who would dare to challenge that right, speak now, or forever hold your silence." Then the most unpredictable of things happened: from the back of the crowd, somebody called: "I challenge you". The undead all stepped away from the one who had spoken, and there stood Vlad von Carstein. He had been saved by a family heritage, an old signet ring, which granted the wielder true immortality. In the following duel, Vlad defeated Prosner, but tended the blade so she could finish him. Seeing his final hour had struck, Prosner hurled his sword away, killing Ganz. The count then prepared to strike him down, but was stopped by Isabella, who claimed that right for herself. The count gave his sword to her, and she killed Herman Prosner. The war continued after the events of Essen Ford. For more than 40 years, the dark shade of the count put an aura of terror above the Empire. Countless times, he was killed in battle, and each time he rose again to kill those who had defeated him. When in the spring of 2050, Middenheim fell and the grand master of the order of the knights of the Wite Wolf, Jerek Kruger, was turned into a vampire because he had dared to kill the count in a previous battle, all hope seemed lost. The undead army now marched towards the last thing between them and victory: Altdorf.

Death and Aftermath

"Deserve, deserve, deserve. You speak a lot of deserving, soldier. Now listen to me. The beast has a name. It's Jon...Skellan. And believe me, I have no intention of dying, not for a very, very long time." --Jon Skellan, after being tortured by Captain Grimm in the bowels of the Cathedral of Altdorf

The Siege of Altdorf

When the Undead army arrived before the walls of Altdorf, the found the city was well prepared: the Reik had been diverted to surround the city, harvests had been entered and the walls had been manned. However, the powers of Vlad proved enormous. In a shocking display of cabalistic power, he covered the sky in clouds and awoke every dead beneath the plains surrounding Altdorf. Huge siege engines formed of zombies where thrown against the city walls. There was no hope of victory for mankind. In search of divine aid, the Grand Theogonist retreated in the catacombs of the cathedral of Altdorf to pray. It is probably that he received there the visit of Manfred von Carstein, the eldest thrall of Vlad. Manfred wanted the power of the vampire counts, but he knew that he wasn't strong enough to take Vlad down. So he informed Wilhelm III about the secret of the immortality of the Count. The priest then set out an elaborated trap to catch the best thief of the city: Felix Man. When they finally caught him robbing the Imperial counting house, they gave him a simple choice: to rob Von Carstein's signet ring, or to be hung for his crimes. In reward of the theft, he would be paid enough to start a living elsewhere. Mann accepted the theft and, with a little aid of Manfred, robbed the count of his most precious belonging. When the count awakened, his anger was uncontrollable. In one frenetic attack, Vlad threw everything he had against Altdorf. There on the battlements, he confronted Wilhelm III and eventually, overcame him. However, with his last breath, the Great Theogonist threw himself against the undead count, and both fell of the walls. While the fall wouldn't have killed a vampire as powerful as Vlad, they both fell on a wooden stake, the vampire trapped beneath the corpse of the holy man. With the death of Vlad, his army dissolved and the Altdorfers could rejoice, because the war had ended.

The End of the Old, the Start of the New

The war had ended, and von Carstein's kingdom of the dead was no more. His actions would survive him much longer however. The horrors perpetuated by him would still stalk mankind's worst nightmares for the centuries to come. The Vampire threat hadn't been routed either. Oh surely, the vampires had fled into the woods and were returning to Sylvania, but still 2 of Vlad's lieutenants where alive, and enough direct descendants to assure the continuation of the line. Kruger being a warrior with experience about commanding managed to shepherd the surviving vampires back to Sylvania. He would, however, never try to obtain the position of Count. Skellan had been captured by the Altdorfers and was imprisoned in a crypt under the cathedral of Altdorf, where they kept him prisoner for many years.

Felix Mann, wanting to claim his reward, discovered that with no physical proof of the deal he had with the Grand Theogonist, nobody would believe he had committed a theft on behalf of a holy man. Wronged and angered, Felix stole one of Vlad's Books of Nagash. However, while fleeing for the Sigmarites, he became conscious he was being stalked by a stranger who seemed able to walk inside the shadows. When was finally culled by the stranger in a back alley, he tried to buy him off with the dead count's signet ring. The stranger, who was in fact Manfred von Carstein, severed the two wrists of the thief, took the ring and the book and left Felix to die. Thus, Vlad's artefacts passed on to a Vampire and Necromancer of almost equal potential power.

Isabella von Carstein would be taken captive the next night, while she tried to find her husband's body, which had been buried beneath the Theogonist's grave. She was completely hysterical and had lost all touch with reality. She would commit suicide eventually, when the Lector of Sigmar, in an attempt at pity, told her Vlad was really dead and wouldn't come back.

Sources

  • Inheritance (Novel) by Steven Savile
  • Vampire Wars (Omnibus Novel) by Steven Savile
  • Warhammer: Mordheim Rulebook