Known Past Lives: Alfred, Lord Burlington, Earl of Devonshire (Newport), William Bradford (Plymouth), Paolo Ghiberti (Florence)
Bondmate: None
Assigned Human Conduit: None
List of Human Familiars: Unknown
Physical Characteristics:
Hair: Black
Eyes: Black
Height: 5’9”
Very little is known of the Ward family since they chose to live off-Coven at the beginning of the twentieth century. The only member that has come to the Committee’s attention is Dylan, for his role in unmasking the Silver Blood conspiracy.
Dylan enrolled at the Duchesne School his sophomore year, and the intern reports state that rumors began circulating from the very beginning that he had been kicked out of every prep school on the Northeastern Seaboard, fueled perhaps by his attitude (sullen, aloof, a perpetual scowl) and his purposefully grungy attire (beat-up leather jacket, dirty jeans). However, the truth is much more mundane. Dylan attended Greenwich elementary and middle schools, where he was an average student.
He found friendship with fellow misfits Schuyler Van Alen and Oliver Hazard-Perry, and a budding romance with Bliss Llewellyn, who was overheard saying, “Dylan’s the kind of boy who broke the rules and let anything happen, and I like that about him.”
The prime suspect of the murder of Aggie Carondolet, Dylan was being held by the Committee for questioning when he escaped and was believed to have attacked again, this time targeting Cordelia Van Alen. However, we now believe that far from being the perpetrator and suffering from Corruption, he was in fact yet another Silver Blood victim, whose memory had been egregiously tampered with, causing disorientation and incoherence. The Venators now believe that Bliss Llewellyn, under the influence of Lucifer, was the real perpetrator.
When Dylan reappeared in New York, he sought out Bliss, who turned him over to her cycle father. Forsyth Llewellyn immediately checked him into Transitions, the vampire rehabilitation center. He was checked out after only a few weeks, and his dead body was later found on Corcovado Mountain, next to the corpse of Lawrence Van Alen.
As a vampire with no bondmate, Xathaneal was free to choose a cycle mate among the Coven, and was continually drawn to Azazel (Bliss) over history. In 1870, as the eldest son of the Duke and Duchess of Devonshire, he was engaged to marry Maggie Stanford at the time of her disappearance. It is the Repository’s belief that in other incarnations he was drawn to her as well. May Brewster became Goody Bradford, and Giulia de Medici was pledged to Paolo Ghiberti.
Current Status: Finished. Slain by Lawrence Van Alen in Rio.
(See Revelations: Repository Record #303 for more information on his death.)
Author’s Note: This story takes place after the events in Blue Bloods and before Masquerade. The story is not told from Dylan’s point of view, but does shed a little more light on what happened to him.
SHELTER ISLAND
Dylan’s Story
It was the light that started it. Hannah woke up at three o’clock in the morning one cold February day and noticed that one of the old copper sconces along the wall was turned on, emitting a dim, barely perceptible halo. It flickered at first, then died, then abruptly came back to life again. At first she chalked it up to a faulty wire, or carelessness on her part—had she turned off the lights before bed? But when it happened again the next evening, and again two days later, she began to pay attention.
The fourth time, she was already awake when it happened. She felt around the nightstand for her glasses, put them on, then stared at the glowing bulb and frowned. She definitely remembered turning off the switch before going to bed. She watched as it slowly burned out, leaving the room dark once more. Then she went back to sleep.
Another girl would have been scared, but this was Hannah’s third winter on Shelter Island and she was used to its “house noises” and assorted eccentricities. In the summer, the back screen door never stayed closed; it would bang over and over with the wind, or when someone walked in and out of the house—her mother’s boyfriend, a neighbor, Hannah’s friends whose parents had houses on the island and spent their summers there. No one ever locked their doors on Shelter Island. There was no crime (unless bike-stealing was considered a crime, and if your bike was gone, most likely someone just borrowed it to pedal down to the local market, and you would find it on your front doorstep the next day), and the last murder had been recorded sometime in the 1700s.
Hannah was fifteen years old, and her mother, Kate, was a bartender at The Good Shop, a crunchy, all-organic restaurant and bar that was only open three months out of the year, during the high season, when the island was infested (her mother’s word) with city folk on vacation. The summer people (also her mother’s words) and their money made living on the island possible for year-rounders like them. During the off-season, in the winter, there were so few people on the island it was akin to living in a ghost town.
But Hannah liked the winters, liked watching the ferry cross the icy river, how the quiet snow covered everything like a fairy blanket. She would walk alone on the windswept beach, where the slushy sound of her boots scuffing the damp sand was the only sound for miles. People always threatened to quit the island during the winter. They’d had enough of the brutal snowstorms that raged in the night, the wind howling like a crazed banshee against the windows. They complained of the loneliness, the isolation. Some people didn’t like the sound of quiet, but Hannah reveled in it. Only then could she hear herself think.
Hannah and her mother had started out as summer people. Once upon a time, when her parents were still together, the family would vacation in one of the big Colonial mansions by the beach, near where the yachts docked by the Sunset Beach hotel. But things were different after the divorce. Hannah understood that their lives had been lessened by the split, that she and her mother were lesser people now, in some way. Objects of pity ever since her dad ran off with his art dealer.
Not that Hannah cared very much what other people thought. She liked the house they lived in, a comfortable, ramshackle Cape Cod with a wraparound porch and six bedrooms tucked away in its corners—one up in the attic, three on the ground floor, and two in the basement. There were antique nautical prints of the island and its surrounding waters, framed in the wood-paneled living room. The house belonged to a family who never
used it, and the caretaker didn’t mind renting it to a single mother.
At first, she and her mother had moved around the vast space like two marbles lost on a pinball table. But over time they adjusted and the house felt cozy and warm. Hannah never felt lonely or scared. She always felt safe.
Still, the next night, at three o’clock in the morning, when the lights blinked on and the door whooshed open with a bang, it startled Hannah and she sat up immediately, looking around. Where had the wind come from? The windows were all storm-proofed and she hadn’t felt a draft. With a start, she noticed a shadow lingering by the doorway.
“Who’s there?” she called out in a firm, no-nonsense voice. It was the kind of voice she used when she worked as a cashier at the marked-up grocery store during the summers and the city folk complained about the price of arugula.