'Qui: The Fall of Ottawa' Chapter 2

Ever since writing 'Vampire: the Masquerade - Parliament of Knives,' I've had trouble getting Sheriff Qui out of my head and I'm sure there's a few of you out there who feel the same. Thus began The Fall of Ottawa project, following Qui's story from his first steps into the great white north of Canada.  Interested in vampire spycraft, king-making, and a little good old fashioned vampire violence? Read on!

I'll be collecting all chapters together once per month and posting a unified version. Chapter 1 was posted 10/9/24.

[Please note that these chapters are not an official World of Darkness licensed product and should not be construed as such. All chapters within this setting will be available free of charge and will never be behind a paywall.]

Chapter 2:

Eleanor Cranston's haven was an expansive basement beneath a four-star hotel currently used as a stopover for Ottawa's visiting Kindred. In Qui's estimation, it was a step above the sewer hovels the average Nosferatu used to conduct their business, but not by any significant measure. Cranston intended to move up in the world—quite literally—into the heart of Kindred politics, and she meant to do so through the fine art of assassination. Qui was a tool to that end, and he was under no illusions otherwise. Sometimes he preferred it that way, actually; it made the whole business less personal and more like a transaction. Sometimes Kindred overstepped their bounds and pissed off the wrong person, other times they were simply in the wrong place at the wrong time. 

Qui wouldn't take just any job, of course. He preferred to target those vampires who in some way deserved to meet final death. Hapless innocents didn't fit his standards, though like all vampires, he had a sliding scale of morality most often landing somewhere in the gray spaces between saint and sinner. If he could justify the job to himself, he did so. Otherwise he moved on.

This particular job had fascinated Qui since he first received the invitation. It seemed Cranston had come into possession of a particularly fine blade—a falchion many believed to possess supernatural properties. A scholar of clan Tremere whom he worked with over a decade ago had been searching for the blade for most of his unlife. If the rumors were true, his obsession with the thing led to his final death by the vicious Sabbat hordes of Montreal. If this artifact of Cranston's was the same blade, it was worth a hundred assassinations to lay claim to. How could it be real? The Sabbat vampires were merciless creatures—Qui knew that reality quite well through personal experience—and Montreal was one of their strongest domains these nights.

"Where did you find it?" Qui asked. He leaned in to admire the sword through the glass that Cranston was using to protect the falchion for display. Both the blade and its gaudy case felt out of place in the comparatively dingy basement lair. "It's…beautiful."

Cranston smiled; the expression was particularly ghastly on her pock-marked face. It seemed she liked it when visitors admired her war trophies. "I captured it from a Sabbat Priest during the October Crisis, seven years ago," she said. "The animal was using it in one of their disgusting rituals to collect Blood from his own pack."

"October Crisis?" Qui asked, bewildered.

"Ah, yes," Cranston said with a theatrical sigh. "At times I forget that you Americans don't find much interest in Canadian politics unless they directly affect you."

Great. He was being lectured on culture by a Canadian Nosferatu whose haven was in a hotel basement. But if humility would get that sword in his hands… "I suppose we'll need to remedy my lack of historical knowledge, then," he said. 

She gave him a look. Had he come on too strong? "I'll give you the basics so you know what's at stake," she said. "The mortal version of the story is that a group of Québécois separatists calling themselves 'Front de libération du Québec,' kidnapped and murdered the Labour Minister after years of bombing campaigns. You've heard of the FLQ at least?"

Qui shook his head.

"Americans." Cranston snorted. "Slightly longer version, then. Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau cracked down on the separatists and invoked the War Measures Act. It's damn near what you US folks would call martial law. What the mortal news won't tell you is that our glorious Prince Jonah manipulated these events and puppetted the Prime Minister in an excuse to militarize the police and burn the Sabbat out of Montreal."

Realization dawned on Qui. He had heard about this, though the US news networks downplayed the attempted revolution and didn't give it nearly as much coverage as it deserved. "That sounds like a smart move," Qui said. "I thought you said Prince Jonah was a failure?"

"I'm not finished," Cranston snapped, waving a hand in the air. Her fingers had been blackened and left crooked by the clan's curse. "Unfortunately for Jonah, the FLQ was almost entirely made up of mortals—whipped up by the Sabbat, yes—but mortal, nonetheless. So while Jonah's ghouls rounded up the separatists thinking they were supernaturals, they left themselves wide open to counterattack by the forces led by the Sabbat Archbishop, Véronique La Cruelle. She slaughtered them."

"And you were there?" Qui asked.

Cranston nodded. "I was, but not with the Prince's footsoldiers. My methods were different. Unlike Jonah and yourself, I'm forced to work from the shadows. I made contacts with traitorous Sabbat within the Montreal packs and learned the truth about the FLQ. My reports to the Prince were ignored and discarded. For his hubris, dozens of ghouls and several Kindred met final death. We've been seen as weak ever since, and the Sabbat have made a sport of raiding Ottawa. Jonah's mishandling of the Crisis turned our city and its Primogen into laughingstocks for the last six years and he's shown no sign of turning it around. That is why he no longer deserves to rule." 

"Because he made you look like fools?"

"Weak fools."

Qui nodded. "Perception is currency in Kindred circles. I understand. And the sword?" He gestured to the display case. 

"While Jonah's forces floundered in the chaff their enemies threw at them, I led a surgical strike and destroyed one of their Priests. The sword is a trophy I brought back with me. Unfortunately for Ottawa, Montreal hosts a great many Sabbat Priests. I was able to hurt them, but in the end it matters little to their kind. They spawn like rodents with no care for who they Embrace into undeath."

The falchion glimmered in the dim light and Qui could swear he heard it whispering to him. He didn't realize he'd been staring at it until Cranston cleared her throat for a second time.

"It speaks to you, too?" she asked.

"Not in words," Qui admitted. "Nothing I can understand."

She walked over to the display and took a small, golden key from her front pocket. "You are the first Kindred other than myself to hear the call of the blade," she said as she unlocked the case. As the glass door opened, Qui could swear that the whispers got louder, if not easier to interpret. What language was it speaking?

"How many of our kind have seen the sword since it came into your possession?" Qui asked. 

"Nine," Cranston replied. She reached down, wrapping one scarred hand around the hilt while the other supported the flat of the blade as she drew it from its resting place. She held it reverently before Qui as one would pass on a holy artifact.

Qui hesitated. "May I hold it?"

"Please do."

He took the sword from her hands and its voice cut off when he touched it. "What happened?" he asked. "Why—"

"Wait for a moment," Cranston said with a crooked smile.

Then the vision came. Prince Jonah begging on his knees, seconds away from suffering final death. The hand gripping the blade in the vision was unmistakably his own as he swung in a controlled arc, his spirit joined as one with the Executioner's blade. He could feel its Hunger burning through him as Jonah's head was severed in one clean stroke and rolled to the ground. Within seconds, the Prince's body fell to dust and brittle bone.