VAIERR, Lake

A large freshwater lake in eastern Alastari. Khalani is situated upon its northern shore.

VAMPIRE

Ghean vampires were created several hundred years ago in the Karnhorn Empire when a priestess of Kjarran defied the god and refused to sacrifice a slave to him; legend has it that she had fallen in love with the captive and was carrying his child, but this may be mere rumor. Since she had refused to shed blood in his name, Kjarran cursed her to live by blood. Since she had defied him for the sake of an unborn child, he cured her to barrenness. The woman fled the Empire, eventually settling in Aruak City, where she felt that she was safe from Kjarran's wrath since that city was under the protection of Kjarran's nemesis, the cat-god Demnat. Eventually Vampiress, as she called herself, discovered that she could make others into vampires by allowing them to drink of her blood.

Over the centuries Vampiress created several "children" and they created more. With each generation Kjarran's influence grew more tenuous; very young vampires often have no idea where their race originated. The oldest vampires, Vampiress and the first generation of her "children" are often affected by holy symbols of Demnat, or may be unable to enter a temple of Demnat, due to the antipathy between Demnat and the god who created them. Younger vampires may feel only slightly uneasy in such a situation. Vampiress is only three or four hundred years old, so all other vampires are younger than this.

Alastarian vampires are very strong and fast, with incredible reflexes; they can easily jump from rooftop to rooftop and seem to "disappear." They have excellent night sight, hearing and sense of smell. They are not immortal but age very slowly and can live for hundreds of years. They heal very quickly and can survive wounds which would kill a normal human, but they can be killed in several ways--decapitation and burning are the simplest. They have the ability to hypnotize their victims (strong-willed people can resist this). They must drink several pints of blood a day to live, which they can get from any warm-blooded organism. They can drink other liquids, but get little nourishment from them, and solid food makes them sick. They are very sensitive to sunlight and burn badly if forced to go out in the daytime. There is an anesthetic/healing quality in their saliva that both numbs their bites and can heal the holes they make swiftly (some vampires will deliberately lick a wound until it's closed, to leave no sign of their passing). They do not have to kill their victims or drain them dry, and are not "evil" by nature, just another type of predator. However, since many vampires are ignorant of the facts of their condition, some may believe themselves to be cursed, evil creatures and act accordingly.

There's no law against being a vampire, but many people fear and hate them, and most vampires keep their nature secret. If they've been going around killing people for food they'd be arrested and tried for murder if they were caught, and people tend to automatically suspect known vampires if bodies start turning up mysteriously.

When anyone is made into a vampire, their exterior physical form is unchanged, but their insides are dramatically altered. The heart and the stomach become essentially one large organ, blood is transferred directly through the stomach muscles into the heart and then into the body. They function normally--their bodies pass wastes and they can have sex--but they do not produce eggs or sperm and so cannot produce young in the conventional manner. A "vampire child" is someone who has been made into a vampire--the maker is always referred to as the parent.

VORLAN TORME TWO-FAMILIES

A high-placed member of the Andorian Assassins' Guild, head of the Raltuman branch of the King's Eyes. An ordinary-looking man, he is about 35, very married (two wives), and appears to all as a merchant with a couple of ships and trading interests in many places. He is reasonably honest and is loyal to the League and the Guild; he is based in Choragi, a non-arena city on the Raltuman Peninsula.

VRI'IN ZAN

High-placed member of the Andorian Assassins' Guild, head of the King's Eyes. He is an Aruaki, typical of that race in appearance. He is suave, debonair, very much a lady's man type who looks as though he'd never done a day's work or fought for his life, but he is actually a very tough customer indeed and will fight with skill and cunning and every dirty trick in the book. He is about 35, considered by some to be too young for his position; those who have actually said so tend to meet with accidents, not always fatal. He is unmarried and his name has not been firmly linked with any one woman, though he has dallied and flirted with many. His considerable intelligence and ambition is all focused on his job. He sees himself as the next head of the Guild but is meeting with resistance from the heads of the other departments.

VYAHR

The most valuable coin in the Karnhorn Empire, roughly equivalent to the Andorian Eagle or Delarquan Astrum; a gold coin, rectangular, with crossed sword and flail over a triangular hole.