Zal

Mortal Days

As a young girl, Christal hated her name. Seeing holiday cards with the religious-neutral “Xmas” written on them would send Christal’s parents into apoplexies of “war on Christmas!” As a joke and as revenge, Christal made an affectation of signing her name “Xal,” but no one ever got the joke. People just pronounced it “Zal” and that seemed good enough.

Zal coasted her way through a reasonably privileged life. She was just smart enough to get through school without much effort. Her parents were just wealthy enough that financial worries were never a motivator. Her music teacher said she possessed talent, if only she would apply herself.

After college, Zal moved into a downtown apartment with her parents’ help. Still she coasted and drifted. She wasn’t depressed, merely content to just get by. Her music was the closest thing she had to devotion, and even that she failed to practice as much as she ought to.

One night, a fellow musician and a friend asked Zal for a favor. He was sick and could not attend a music gig. Reluctantly, Zal left her cozy apartment to play on her friend’s behalf. The gig was for some rich dude. “Dress to the nines!” the text message from her friend read. The mansion was opulent, the party decadent, and the guests few and eccentric. At the end of the night, she followed her patron upstairs to get paid. That is when he bit her, and God how it hurt.

Kindred Nights

Zal does not know why her sire Embraced her. He said his name was Giovanni, but she doesn’t know the significance of that. She only saw him the one night. He, and it would seem his entire family, vanished from Chicago.

The city’s Kindred quickly pointed out to Zal that she was Caitiff, that her blood never imprinted a clan. They were even quicker to treat her horribly for this fact. Zal might not have made it through her first nights as a vampire if not for the House of Mamuwalde. The Bahari vampires took her in and showed her the ropes. Though profusely thankful, she never actually joined their cult.

Odd compulsions echo in Zal’s blood. Most nights, she goes out and impulse buys anything related to death. Macabre decor, clothing, plastic goth memorabilia, rictus-grinning calaveras, Baron Samedi symbols, and discount Halloween junk. She purchases whatever she finds. Zal has even tried getting skull and graveyard-themed tattoos, but the ink always bleeds out of her undead skin while she sleeps during the day. She has recently heard interesting rumors about this place called The Painted Lady, and she’s determined to visit it when she’s saved up enough cash.

Zal does not know why she does these things. She never had such interests while alive, never even owned much black clothing. The compulsions don’t end there. She devours books, learning dead languages at an alarming pace. She took up taxidermy and then forensic pathology. There are times when cutting into a corpse is the only thing that sets her mind at ease. She has momentary flashes of alien insight — signs and portents in the most unlikely things. She wanders cemeteries, checking each stone as though the right date or name would explain it all to her.

What’s more, Zal is finally dedicated to her music — obsessively so. When not collecting macabre symbols, Zal feverishly scribbles out music on paper. She loses time, later to find sheet after sheet scratched with musical scrawl. Some of it isn’t exactly music. It’s a little like an esoteric equation. Where does it come from?

The nights go on. Zal learns. She writes music. She collects skulls. It is all building to something. It all means something. She plays her music and feels the invisible locks between worlds groan and turn.

Zal made a ghoul of a forensic pathologist so she could get into the city morgue and accelerate her autopsy studies. It was an impulse to fill an immediate need, but now Zal considers the possibility of taking more active control of the Cook County Medical Examiner’s Office. She might be good at it, and it would lead to influence, at least in the way these ambitious Kindred define it. This line of thought is more proactive than Zal is used to. In passing, Zal has heard Kindred mention things like Noddist lore, Enochian, and the like. Every time, her cold guts quiver and say, “Yeah, we need more of that!”. Zal does not know what the Giovanni are, other than the family of her sire. She does not yet know about the Clan of Death, but would be thankful to anyone who can fill those gaps in her knowledge.

Zal takes her electric upright bass, bow, and battery-powered amp, and wanders the streets. Her preternatural instincts lead her to places of specific spiritual resonance. In these places, she plays her esoteric music. She plays until otherworldly phenomenon manifests. She does not know if she is hindering or helping something from crossing over. She knows only that she must play. Word has it that Zal is looking for someone who can teach her Noddist lore. There is a rumor that Zal is not what she claims to be. She is the reason the Giovanni are now missing. She masquerades as a confused neonate. Zal is a Hecata whose memory was wiped clean to protect her from whatever befell Chicago’s other Necromancers. Only the proper phrase or circumstance will reactivate her to her clan’s purpose.