A Dozen Black Roses Read Online Free PDF Page A

the school's records.
    It was there that he met the poet.
    They became acquainted over the gaming tables. Esher found the younger student intriguing, as they both shared a morbid turn of mind. Although Esher found his friend's inability to hold his liquor alternately amusing and disgusting, they remained on familiar terms after the poet's gambling debts forced him to quit his studies.
    Of the two, Esher was clearly the stronger personality from the very beginning. The sensitive young poet seemed both fascinated and appalled by his comrade's sang froid. Esher believed that the world and the wonders in it belonged to whoever was strong enough to take them. There was no room for the incompetent, the weak, and all those unwilling, or unable, to make the most of their situation.
    Although the poet argued heatedly with Esher over these points time and again, he could never quite bring himself to break their friendship. It was as if the strength of Esher's charisma compelled the poet to seek his company. But there were other, more prosaic reasons behind their relationship: it was clear that the poet envied Esher his money, position, and charm; and as they grew older, the interests they shared in death and dying continued to bind them. But where the poet's obsession took the form of fanciful stories and poems, Esher trod the path of the occultist. As the years passed, they saw less and less of one another.
    The poet drifted in and out of various editorial jobs up and down the Eastern Seaboard, publishing the occasional slim volume of gothic poetry. Esher, on the other hand, was expelled from the University of Virginia, and then from Harvard's medical schools. In each case he was accused of harvesting organs from

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    After his expulsion from Harvard, Esher decided to take the Grand Tour and "broaden his horizons." It was in an isolated portion of Romania known as Transylvania that he first learned of the blood-cult called the Tremere. Rumor had it they were a group of immortal wizards who practiced a very obscure, but exceptionally powerful brand of magic known as Thaumaturgy. This occult discipline was said to involve the drinking and manipulation of blood during its rituals.
    Intrigued, Esher was compelled to find out more about these secretive "vampire wizards." At first his inquiries as to the Tremere's whereabouts were met with evasion, if not outright hostility. The peasants who tended the fields and the thick-witted boyars that ruled over them were clearly unwilling to help anyone asking questions about the Tremere. In some villages the mere mention of their name was enough to cause every door to be slammed in his face. Still, Esher was not the type to be dissuaded by superstitious villagers.
    When he heard stories of an elderly Eastern Orthodox priest named Father Magnus who claimed to be an expert on Romania's darker secrets, he decided to search him out. Father Magnus was old and blind in one eye and given to drinking at a local inn, but Esher found the ancient cleric to be extremely knowledgeable about the dark arts. Despite his physical infirmities, he possessed a mind that was a virtual encyclopedia of the occult.
    At first the old priest hedged concerning his knowledge of the Tremere, but after a few sherries he became increasingly voluble. Father Magnus claimed that the Tremere were not mere wizards, but true creatures of the night—vryoloda. Vampires. According to the legend, a thousand years ago a group of ambitious magi had sought immortality by any means possible. One experiment after another had failed them until, in desperation, the coven captured an ancient vampire from a clan that had long dominated the region. Concocting a potion from its blood, the magi had attained an undead state similar to that of their victim. They then returned to their monastery and transformed their fellow