The Vampires Vicar

My life was normal. Boring even. A mom, a dad, a family farm. We went to church on Sunday, a normal part of life, most expected in the 18th century European village of my birth. I was betrothed, ready to marry the mystical beauty who owned my heart and soul. I never knew that marrying the love of my life would leave me literally without my heart and soul. It was best day of my mortal life. It was also the last day of my mortal life. For by morning after my sweet Rebecca and were cursed. I, Chauncey Nathaniel Hawkins the third, the firstborn of the Earl of Chapman, was cursed to live forever. My bride had previously been engaged. He was a cruel man, and she had escaped a fate worse than death when she discovered his dealings with the devil. As was the custom, he was burned at the stake for his evil ways. The use of magick was not prohibited, but was strongly discouraged, and using magick for evil was punishable by death. Dear Rebecca had walked in unknowingly while he was conjuring the devils magick to perform the curses upon his rivals, seeking his rise to power through the fall of the current king and all of his family. Leaving no heirs, his rise to power would be rapid, ascending he and his future bride into power and wealth. She immediately ran, seeking asylum within the vicarage nearby. Her betrothed was none other than the cousin of the king. Because of his traitorous attempts on the health and welfare of the king, he was immediately arrested and executed. Not before he could complete one last curse. Poor Rebecca was exonerated of any guilt, she had only been an innocent in the wrong place and at the wrong time. But Knowing his fate, he abandoned his attack on the kings family and instead cursed sweet Rebecca, and any man she should marry. It was believed the curse would end with his death, and so, having loved her since childhood, appealed to her father that when the proper amount of time had passed, I could formally announce my intent to court his beloved daughter. It was the year of our lord, 1762. In the time I was to wait until my beloved was again presented into society for suitors of marriage, I had built a beautiful chateau in the French countryside in anticipation of the day that my beloved would accept my proposal of marriage and would later move in as my wedded bride. I dreamed of the children we would raise, filling the rooms. I thought of the champion livestock we would raise to earn our living. I knew not that three dreams could never become reality. For on the day of our marriage, upon the vows we recited before God, his humble servant, the Vicar, and our family and community, a union that had been blessed by the king himself, the curse became our future. A curse that could only be broken by the direct descendant of the vicar, a holy man in an unholy time. With true loves kiss, the curse was complete. By morning, news of our deaths had spread, and the chateau built for my bride lay in ruins. But our curse was much more painful than death. We were destined to live forever, unable to bear children, and unrecognized by humans as ourselves. A fire burned within our unbeating hearts, a fire that could only be cooled with the blood of the living. Desperate to not live this cursed existence, we tried to end it all. Neither the fiery furnace nor the beasts of the forest could kill us. In time, we accepted our cruel fate. However, not wishing to do evil, we only quenched the fire with the blood of those who were near death, those with only moments to live, those suffering on the battlefields awaiting certain death, the elderly who were ailing and waiting for the angels to guide them to heaven. We lingered in the shadows awaiting the moment wen death was inevitable, only taking the lifeblood from them as their souls were already departing their mortal bodies. Murder was never Our intent. Through our years we followed the lineage of the vicar, we hoped that his son would be able I to break the curse, but none of the vicars children followed the road to the priesthood, nor did their children’s children for many years. As time continued, we stood frozen in time, unaltered, but not recognized by our families.