I am Morgan D’Arcy, Earl of St. Averil, concert pianist and vampire. I was born in 1634, was a young man during the English Civil war and fought with Charles II at the ill-fated Battle of Worcester. By the time he was restored to the throne in 1660, I was a creature of the night.
If I dissect myself into the separate facets I list above, I shall begin with the title. I became the Earl of St. Averil in 1645 when my father perished fighting with the Royalist army at the Battle of Naseby. My ancestral home, Royal Oak, commands a view of the sea from a hill overlooking a hamlet of a village on the coast of Devon. Most of my time, however, is spent at my London residence in Eaton Place Mews, Belgravia.
On to the concert pianist, I learned my art on the harpsichord from an Austrian genius named Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. Later, I studied with Liszt, Ravel and Debussy. In this twenty-first century, I am a celebrated performer in concerts worldwide. Yet I have played Mr Piano Man in a smoky piano bar in Charleston, South Carolina to an audience too drunk or sad to listen. That’s another story…
I was a fighter pilot in World War II, flying night missions over Nazi Germany. Today, I fly a Lear jet to and from Royal Oak and London, sometimes ferrying members of my brethren to the Europe for continental fare.
The vampire was born in 1659 on a winter night in Paris. Rather than pay time its due and sacrifice youth and beauty, I gave my mortal life to Dominique du Montcleare. The name Dominique to this day reminds me of the word dominant. My transformation was my reward for winning a cruel wager that ultimately ended eternity for Dominique.
The Vampyre are not walking dead. In a ritual blood exchange, a fragile virus is introduced into the host. The blood borne pathogen is a mutagen. The transformation from mortal to immortal is a mutation of DNA by the Vamprye virus. I embraced my vampire nature, reveling in the hedonism and amorality. I love women to a fault. Over the centuries, I have admired and offered my affection to many women. But in three hundred fifty years, I have never loved.
As you can see, I have everything…except what I most desire–the woman I love.
Sinners’ Opera is the tale of our Folie à deux.
My birth to the Vampyre and wanderings with my king will be told in Sinners’ Waltz and in The Golden Cavalier I will introduce the young mortal man that I once was. Sinners’ Obsession is the sequel and is currently in rewrites. As the title suggests, it is a story of obsession but have no doubt, it is a love story.
