Excerpt: Our Murder

Sirak Caella, Lord of Clan Caella, High Ruler of the Vampiric Race, Destroyer of Hunters, etc., etc., sat uneasily upon his throne. The sendings had been getting worse—the witches, insufferable as they may be, had once again been shown to be correct. The time for the One approached, would likely arrive in the next half-millennium or so. And still the race was unprepared. Of course no one knew exactly what the One Who Was Foretold would do, nor what clan he would claim, nor even if he would be true vampire at all. All that was known had been spoken ten thousand years before, and had been translated from the tongue of the ancient witches into a single brief stanza, and a bad one at that:

In time of strife, in time of pain
One Who Is Foretold will rise again
With powers unknown and days unnumbered
Change all, he will, with will unencumbered

Unfortunately for Sirak's attempts to unravel the mysteries, no one—not even the witches themselves—still spoke the original language, and so any efforts to glean a deeper meaning from the few short lines handed down for as long as the race had recorded such things. Yet now that the time was so very near, the High Ruler found himself returning again and again to the prophecy from ancient days.
In time of strife....