Deadline for joining is November 10, 2018 by 11:59PM CST (well, we’re not THAT hardcore about it, latecomers are always added, c’est la vie)
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Deadline for joining is November 10, 2018 by 11:59PM CST (well, we’re not THAT hardcore about it, latecomers are always added, c’est la vie)
Official form under the cut. Go to Submit and then copy and paste this form and respond to the criteria in the box. If you would like to participate anonymously, please include that in your submission. If you submit this form, please make sure your own Submit box or Ask is turned on so that we can send you your assignment 😉
Deadline for joining is November 10, 2018 by 11:59PM CST (well, we’re not THAT hardcore about it, latecomers are always added, c’est la vie)
Official form under the cut. Go to Submit and then copy and paste this form and respond to the criteria in the box. If you would like to participate anonymously, please include that in your submission. If you submit this form, please make sure your own Submit box or Ask is turned on so that we can send you your assignment 😉
One day I’ll probably make an art tumblr, but in the meantime, I’m participating in Inktober this year & following the official prompts through my theme choice of Interview with the Vampire. Follow me on instagram for updates x
Hey! Thanks for reaching out to me, I like to think I know something about this series… but I have big areas of inexpertise, in which I call forth those who who would be able to answer better, and you’ve hit one such case.
…which is bizarre, to have this kind of gray area, that I had ALWAYS considered completely resolved, that Marius was Pandora’s maker, and didn’t question it in the least, and then here YOU are, questioning it! I’m more amused that anything else, but still!
Imma take a little stab at it, anyway, and post publicly so as to open this up to anyone to reblog/comment to correct me, offer their own ideas on it.
So! Since there are newer fans these days: Spoilers ahead for Pandora.
Why is Marius and not Akasha called Pandora’s maker?
TL;DR: After rereading the scene, I think Marius is in fact Pandora’s maker, and Akasha’s infusion was post-turning (minutes later) as evidenced by Pandora’s “renewed vigor” and the fact that she’s already perceiving more before she drinks from Akasha.
Longer answer: From what I gather, yes, Akbar drained Pandora. Which in itself does not need to be done by the maker during the Dark Gift procedure. It typically IS done by the maker, but Louis, for example, was already pretty drained by the time he was going to be turned (mortals had bled him more than once to try to cure his madness, um, wasteful!). IIRC, Jesse had suffered a lot of blood loss from her injuries. So the removal of blood is not as crucial as the blood being given. Although, a vampire’s strength may partly lie in how the procedure is done. It’s not an exact science (this post goes into more about that).
HOWEVER, it made it necessary to save her life. Marius has Akbar bring her to the shrine, at which point Akbar sets her down to go beg at Akasha’s feet, as well he should. At this point! Pandora describes drinking blood, and Marius is with her, so it’s his. Then she goes into a lot of description about passing through a veil, changed perception of things, etc. So I think that there is where she was turned officially.
And then:
“The crown, she would have her crown,” I said. With astonishing vigor I walked forward towards her.
^Pandora seems pretty well revived from being on the verge of death.
Now, within the same few minutes, she does drink from Akasha, but I think this infusion is already too late to be the definitive blood to turn her. It is a powerful infusion, though. As Akasha is drawing her near, the narration says:
I felt myself, a human, held together by the intricate threads of blood which Marius had given me. I felt the design of its support. It had no weight, my body.
^So I can see where one might be confused bc Pandora is calling herself human here, but she’s also held together by Marius’ blood, and combined with the other points above, I see her as a fresh fledgling already here.
Is it possible that they both are [Pandora’s makers]?
Sure, it’s possible! It’s fiction, so you can headcanon it however you want, you can justify it in any number of ways 🙂
@roselioncourt would be a very good resource for you in terms of a multi-Maker Dark Gift exchange, bc Rose got this treatment in Prince Lestat.She would have a better answer for you about the mind-sharing situation in that case.
The act of the Dark Gift, IMO, is the vampire maker sharing their vampiric parasite with the mortal they seek to turn. Since that parasite is the same one, just spread out among all the vampires, there’s no reason why 2 or more makers couldn’t give it over in whatever quantity and produce a single fledgling together.
In Pandora’s case, I feel like the change was already taking root by the time she got the infusion from Akasha, but if you read it as being more nebulous, then sure! Marius and Akasha can both be considered Pandora’s makers!
If someone is turned by drinking from multiple vampires, would they not be able to share thoughts with any of them?
Yes, I think that’s right.
We’ve seen in canon that typically, a maker chooses their fledgling as someone they want as a companion into eternity. But sometimes fledglings are chosen just to fill up a coven, though, so the maker is not expected to have that intimate of a relationship with just another congregant in the group.
The point to having a mental block with someone who may be your companion into eternity, to my mind, is that if you could also share that aspect of the other person, you might get bored of them pretty fast, or it could be the cause of arguments, or any number of bad outcomes. Putting up this barrier creates some mystery about the other person, and makes it so you have to keep pursuing them, over the course of hundreds of years.
If there’s a multi-maker situation, I would think you’d get the barrier between them and the fledgling only, which would piss off that fledgling immensely. Can you imagine:
Vampires A, B, and C turn Vampire Y. So (assuming none of them are makers of each other) A, B, and C can all share thoughts with each other and Y is constantly left out and bitter about it. Bc they may all be sitting around some nights, and A and B will start laughing randomly and C will chastise them lightly, “Can you guys not? Y can’t hear you.” Poor Y!
I can’t remember which VC it was that AR tried to do some triangulated mind-reading, but it was complicated. Two vampires who were locked from each other could access each other through a conduit vampire who was not locked from them. Might have been Blood Canticle.
I was digging around in my archive bc I was SURE I had ONE fanart of Louis and Claudia fighting with the European zombpire, but I can’t find it :[ Maybe someone else knows of it?
Have this, anyway, at least this creature doesn’t have to waste money on lipstick, no lips!: [X]
[I’m re-reading the original trilogy (IWTV, TVL, QoTD), and I was wondering if any of the later books ever talk about the revenant Louis meets in Transylvania with Claudia? Is it ever explained? What do you think caused it?]
I don’t think those European zombpires
are ever explicitly explained in the first 3 books or mentioned in later canon (except in a vague way in TVL by Armand and Marius, quotes further down this post). I might be wrong. If they are mentioned in canon again, I don’t think it was explained what they are :-
TL;DR: The Dark Gift is not an exact science. Your theory could be right! Personally, I don’t think the zombpires share the same origin story as the conscious vampires in VC. Some fans think AR included the
zombpires
as a way to sort of low-key slam the older vampire mythos, since her vampires are SOOO much better… with no issues with crucifixes, having reflections, etc.!
I don’t think we know enough about the zombpires to say definitively how they’re made, so it’s kind of up for grabs in that sense. However each reader sees it! Your theory about the mortals closing their minds during the Dark Trick could be the answer!
If a mortal was deliberately closing their mind to a vampire intent on turning them, thus locking the vampiric parasite out of their head/memories… that could be a reason for the mortal MIND not accepting the vampiric parasite, resulting in THE BODY turning, but NOT the mind, the mortal LOSING their mind to madness, having lost control of their body, thus, zombpire. Quite possible! Would random mortals know how to do this? Could be an unconscious defense mechanism? Maybe!
Hit the jump for more on this, cut for length and/or spoilers.
[My personal theory is that when a vampire makes someone with their mind closed (the way we know some can do), it results in a revenant, as all the making-scenes in the series describe sharing memories and emotions; it seems pretty vital!]
That’s possible, in VC context, closing one’s mind is smtg you do to protect your mind from being read by others, and it takes practice and skill. Talamasca members seem trained to do it.
Refusing the Dark Gift or accepting it, a strong will to live does seem to be a necessary element. Even the vampires who were turned against their will (Lestat, Marius, etc.) actively refused it right up until their last breaths, but that shows a strong will to live, not a closed-off mind. Just in IWTV:
Lestat tells Louis to be still and listen for their blood flow, keep his consciousness during the process: “It is your consciousness, your will, which must keep you alive.‘”
Learning from this, Louis tells Madeleine to keep her will to live, “" `Hold fast to me when I take you,’ I said to her, seeing her eyes grow wide, her mouth open. `And when the swoon is strongest, listen all the harder for the beating of my heart. Hold and say over and over,“ I will live. ” ‘”
And other Dark Gift scenes have some variations on that, I think.
In IWTV, Claudia is fascinated by the European zombpires, tries to puzzle them out, she’s considering how much blood needs to be exchanged and how strong the heart of the mortal is:
“But Claudia’s waking thoughts were of a far more practical nature. Over and over, she had me recount that night in the hotel in New Orleans when she’d become a vampire, and over and over she searched the process for some clue to why these things we met in the country graveyards had no mind.
… ” `After all, what does it take to make those creatures?’ she went on. `Those vagabond monsters? How many drops of your blood intermingled with a man’s blood … and what kind of heart to survive that first attack?’
But how would his blood get into them? He’d have to have an open wound, idk, it seems kind of awkward to imagine Louis accidentally turning any of his victims, and it makes him super uncomfortable to talk about it with her.
Later in canon we see vampires giving drops of their blood to mortals to heal them or as a sensual gesture, and those mortals aren’t given enough to turn them, so that little isn’t enough to make a zombpire.
Claudia seems to think it’s really about the strength of the heart of the victim:
“ `That pale-faced Emily, that miserable Englishman …’ she said, oblivious to the flicker of pain in my face. `Their hearts were nothing, and it was the fear of death as much as the drawing of blood that killed them. The idea killed them. But what of the hearts that survive? Are you sure you haven’t fathered a league of monsters who, from time to time, struggled vainly and instinctively to follow in your footsteps? What was their life span; these orphans you left behind you-a day there, a week here, before the sun burnt them to ashes or some mortal victim cut them down?’
^This seems to fit in line with the needing a strong will to live.
The Children of Darkness chose their fledglings with care, and even then it’s unpredictable. Armand in TVL:
But let Armand understand here also that the effect of the Dark Trick is unpredictable, even when passed on by the very young vampire and with all due care. For reasons no one knows, some mortals when Born to Darkness become as powerful as Titans, others may be no more than corpses that move. That is why mortals must be chosen with skill. Those with great passion and indomitable will should be avoided as well as those who have none.
Marius confirms this, still in TVL:
But no matter, only so many children can be made by one in a century. And new offspring will be weak. However, this is not necessarily a bad thing. The rule of the old covens had wisdom in it that strength should come with time. And then again, there is the old truth: you might make titans or imbeciles, no one knows why or how.
Nicolas might have become such a zombpire, the way he was barely functional as a fledgling at first.
By midnight it was clear that [Nicolas] would not speak or answer to any voice, or move of his own volition. He remained still and expressionless in the places to which he was taken. If the death pained him he gave no sign. If the new vision delighted him, he kept it to himself. Not even the thirst moved him. And it was Gabrielle who, after studying him quietly for hours, took him in hand, cleaning him and putting new clothes on him. – TVL
^But he does move when prodded and Lestat thinks Gabrielle can telepathically communicate with him, which makes him more functional than the European zombpires. Lestat is finally able to rouse him with the violin, so was Nicolas just refusing to talk, etc, or was he really unable? We don’t know.
Why couldn’t Claudia access the full extent of her vampire powers? Are they really that biologically discriminate?
^They don’t all automatically get all the vampiric powers, and some powers are only “earned” over time (like the cloud gift, which is flight). Some vampires automatically do get certain gifts upon being turned, like Lestat and the mind gift, but Louis didn’t get that one (debatable somewhat, as
Armand notes in TVA that Louis can spellbind others inadvertently but that might also be bc Louis is just too adorable and dreamy for anyone to handle).
We don’t know just how strong/gifted Claudia was, I don’t think there are any scenes that explicitly talk about her abilities. She was most likely stronger than her mortal self, even if she was weak compared to other vampires. Even if she had the mind gift, she would not have been able to read Lestat’s mind, and he wouldn’t be able to read hers, due to the barrier between fledglings and makers. But she might have been able to read Louis’ mind, since she’s his sibling. We don’t know.
Not sure where you’re at now, but in TVL there’s some discussion about fledglings and strength when Armand tells Lestat what he knows about the Dark Trick, and later, Marius that tells Lestat what he knows about it. Claudia is not specifically mentioned at the time, bc she doesn’t exist yet in the story.
The Dark Gift is not an exact science, and even makers with gifts cannot purposely give/withhold them to/from their fledglings :- Armand mentions in TVL:
But let Armand understand here also that the effect of the Dark Trick is unpredictable, even when passed on by the very young vampire and with all due care. For reasons no one knows, some mortals when Born to Darkness become as powerful as Titans, others may be no more than corpses that move. That is why mortals must be chosen with skill. Those with great passion and indomitable will should be avoided as well as those who have none.
The Dark Gift in unpredictable, despite all good/bad intentions; it’s the vampiric form of pregnancy. But there are things about the procedure that can affect the strength of the fledgling:
Whether the blood is transferred
between maker and fledgling
once (for Louis and Claudia) or multiple times (for Marius) – IIRC, Marius doesn’t tell Lestat this in TVL, but multiple times seems to make for a stronger fledgling. Why didn’t Lestat do it multiple times for Claudia? I think Claudia was already in such bad physical shape that Lestat didn’t want to risk it. Plus, he had already turned 3 fledglings using the single transfer procedure, he probably felt like that was good enough.
Age and/or power of the maker – Lestat was only ~15 yo vampire himself when he turns Claudia. That’s still almost a fledgling himself, even tho he had been turned with powerful blood from a 300+ yo vampire.
Timing of making previous fledglings of the maker – Marius tells Lestat that the gift is weaker from the Maker to fledglings if given close in time period. Lestat had already made 3 vampires in his 15 year time, each one was weaker in strength than the last. It seems like whatever the Maker’s power, it’s outweighed by this timing issue.
The fledgling’s diet after turning – Louis was feeding on animals for the first 4-ish years of vampiring, which is like bad junk food, and probably not drinking the volume of blood he needed, either. Claudia seemed to have a voracious appetite, but she did have the body of a child, so it’s possible that she was physically unable to consume the amount of blood needed for the vampiric parasite to really transform her body properly. Possibly another reason why vampires generally don’t approve of turning children.
Don’t you know tho? The Dark Gift comes with a free perm….
… there’s also the humidity to consider, NOLA is a pretty humid place, other VC locations might also be humid.
I just skimmed TVL, and yes, it looks like there’s a lot of curly-hair references, but having read the entire series, what sticks out more for me are the “round little arms” on the women and children, like, WHAT OTHER SHAPE would they be? “square little arms” “trapezoid little arms”…?
I-want-my-IWTV 