Matthew Davion

Name: Matthew Elias Davion
Born: October 31, 1991 - Boston, Mass.

I grew up in Ipswich, a small town on the Atlantic Coast and the site of one of the first British colonies in the Americas. I had a pretty uneventful early childhood ... from my perspective, at least. Other kids think and talk about magic, believe in it even though they never see it; I grew up around it. My father had to retire to our old family home when I was four, and I barely remember what he was like before that. My mother used magic rarely and (so she thought) secretly, but I was always a good sneak, and I managed to see her perform her spells more often than not. Eventually she gave up on the secrecy, and let me watch. She never did anything bad or harmful, or anything that could be traced back to her. I never applied the word 'witch' to her ... I'd seen the Wizard of Oz, and believed that 'witches' had pointy hats, flying monkeys, and tried to kill little girls from Kansas. Around the time I was nine, I discovered that my four best friends ... Elise Danvers, Lucas Williams, James Grey, and Gabriel Blackwood ... all had parents who could do the same kinds of things. Elise is the conscience of the group. Lucas was hotheaded (and still very much is), and has always been a little jealous of my loyalty to James. James is my best best friend, the two of us seeing eye-to-eye on almost everything. Gabriel was the quiet one, kind-hearted but secretive. The five of us had always been drawn to each other, and had been friends since we could remember. So it was nothing to keep this secret between us; we had questions, but our parents were very evasive about answering them, telling us only that one day we'd understand. And we did.

I was the oldest, and turned thirteen first. On my birthday, we were having a party at my house and Miller Westhaven was picking on Elise. I knew he was probably just flirting with her, the way boys our age did, by being annoying pests. Then he dumped a whole bucket of water on her while she happened to be standing near a table holding a picture of my mother and father taken shortly before I was born. I moved to stop him, but when I saw that the picture had been soaked, I lost it. I blacked out and woke up about an hour later, my four best friends surrounding me. Apparently Miller had nearly drowned ... even though he was nowhere near water ... until my mother had come in at the commotion and 'stopped' it. The whole incident was brushed under the rug ... our five families owned almost all of the land in this town, and the townsfolk knew better than to ask too many questions given that no one had been seriously injured.

The next day, my mother drove me to the old house where my father now resided, and we went down into the basement. She told me many things about our family history and what we really were: 'witches'. Then she showed me the Book, and that changed everything. You see, most witches draw their power from nature, or from other not-necessarily-malevolent sources. We ... me, my friends, our families ... were, or were becoming "Nephandic witches". Our power apparently comes straight from The Pit, or Hell, or whatever you want to call it. Our ancestors had made the deal that was sealed in the book, the deal that gave them and their descendants power. The upside was that our ancestors had been devilishly clever even as normal people, and had secured a pact that was the envy of Nephandic witches worldwide ... our souls were not automatically forfeit when we gained or used our powers, we didn't tend toward evil automatically, nothing like that. According to the Book, the demon who had made the pact had been demoted from the higher echelons of the Pit to the very lowest when his superiors realized how much he'd practically given away. The Book vaguely hints that the demon had been no fool, that he had known exactly what he was doing and considered his inevitable punishment worth it, but to this day I haven't been able to figure out what those hints mean, or what his plan was. But, the Book also teases around something that I've always wondered myself ... do demons really exist, or are they just spiritual entities with a flair for the dramatic? I haven't been able to find an answer yet, but I'm still young.

My mother told me that as the oldest of this generation, I was the 'leader' of the coven, and that guiding them, teaching them, and even keeping them in line (I immediately thought of Lucas) would be my responsibility. And that's what I did, as over the next year my friends joined me in turning thirteen. I showed them the Book, told them the truth as my mother had, and worked with them to help them (as well as myself) learn the extent and limitations of our power.

My life changed just a few short months ago when I awoke to find a beautiful woman in my bed on top of me, growling and hissing, her eyes pitch black and her touch ice cold. I'd heard stories, but this was my first true encounter with a vampire ... and I was about to be her midnight snack. I reacted instinctively, using my power to push her off of and away from me. We fought briefly, my magic barely keeping her snapping teeth away from my arms and my neck. My mind was racing, trying to remember something I'd read in the Book ... something called the "Whitefire Chant" ... and I tried it, or what I remembered of it, just as she lunged for the kill. My words blew her out the window, and she fell to the ground apparently unharmed. I looked out to see her racing away at an unbelievable speed; I'd apparently gotten the spell wrong, or lacked the power to use it, because it should have burned her badly at the very least.

I woke up the next morning, a nasty bruise on my forehead where I'd passed out and hit the windowsill. I was in my bed, and Elise was sitting beside me. Lucas, James, and Gabriel were all out hunting the vampire, but they returned later in the evening to report that she'd left the area. I had tried to join them ... I didn't want them getting into trouble, I was the leader and most powerful of our coven, and I'd just barely survived ... but sneaky Elise gave me some 'tea' that kept me groggy for the day. She had more faith in Lucas (the 'second') than I did; he wasn't quite as strong as me, but in a fight, he had killer instincts ... and she knew that James wouldn't let the group separate.

That night, I went to the Book, and read up on vampires. The Book writes itself, entire chapters appearing where none had been before, writes about the past and the present, but never the future ... although it does give vague and frustrating hints. I also read some on werewolves, who were apparently the natural enemies of vampires. Just as I was about to leave, the book flipped itself back to one of those chapters that hadn't been there before, one that actually detailed history before the book itself was created (as far as I knew). I read with growing interest, and even more growing dread. I left, knowing what I had to do, knowing that the others wouldn't like it, and understanding how the vampire had been able to walk effortlessly through the layers of wards that protected my home; fortunately for me, the power wards that made me stronger in my own house had held, or no doubt I'd be dead now, or worse.

The next day, I told the others I was leaving. I couldn't tell them where I was going, only that I'd keep in touch. Elise cried a little after trying to convince me not to leave. Gabriel was talkative for once, lecturing me that I had an obligation to stay with the others. James barely said a word, and to my surprise, Lucas was the most vocal about objecting to my departure. With me gone, he'd be the temporary leader, and I'd have thought that that's what he'd wanted ... finally, they relented. Over the next few days, I worked on preparing for the journey. Gabriel and Elise helped me modify and strengthen the wardspells that we used to protect our homes to affect vampires in general, and this vampire in particular. Even though I now knew, I didn't tell them why my wards had failed that night, and I'd commanded the Book not to show them either. The Book was devious and would try to find a way around that, but it couldn't directly disobey my order. James researched werewolves for me, as I knew there were a group of them near Silver Lake, and gave me as much as he could on how to deal with them ... diplomatically, if possible. He wasn't happy with me, especially since I wouldn't tell him where I was going, but he was too good a friend not to do whatever he could to help me surivive. Lucas spent his time poring over the Book, learning and then teaching me every attack spell that he could find that might work on vampires. It was a strange role reversal, but again, Lucas had always had a knack for using our power as a weapon. And I trusted Lucas with one last request: if any vampires came near Ipswich again (this girl had been the first in over 200 years to even pass through our town), he had to kill them if he could, or take the others and hide if he couldn't ... the vampires couldn't be allowed to bite any of the coven, no matter the cost.

Three days later I drove off, heading west. My destination was Silver Lake, Minnesota.