Russia, mid-1400s. Mihailov Residence.
He woke up to hear his mother’s muffled sobs. Shivering, the fire had died out sometime in the night, he stayed motionless. She always cried this time of morning, when she thought he was asleep and had the house to herself. He didn’t know why she cried. She never showed any signs of tears when she called him for breakfast. Her tears always made him uncomfortable though. There had to be a reason for them. He never cried. Why would his mama? Finally, unable to take her tears anymore, he stirred.
“Доброе утро, Ангел мой. Good morning, my angel.”
Her voice was still watery. The chair creaked as she got up to start the fire. He squeezed his eyes closed as she bent down and brushed a kiss to his forehead before running a hand through his hair. He waited a moment before tossing his arms around her neck and squeezing tightly. She held him just as close.
“Good morning, mama!”
“Brush your teeth and then sit at the table for breakfast.”
Dragging his feet he walked over to where a small pile of mint leaves were laid out. Rubbing a leaf quickly over his teeth he rushed toward the table as his stomach growled.
He stared down into the bowl with a small frown. Porridge…again. Probably left over from the day before…and the day before that. There was a smiley face staring back up at him. Suddenly, he wasn’t that hungry anymore.
“Eat, eat. You are a growing boy. You need your cereal to grow big and strong yes?”
Picking up his wooden spoon he tapped it against the edge of the bowl. “I want sausage,” he grumbled.
“When you can afford to go to the butcher and get sausage remember your poor mama.”
“I will not ever forget you mama.”
“That is what you say now Rhostislav. When you are older and married your poor mama will be out in the cold.” She winked across the table at him.
“Mama?”
“Yes?”
“When is papa coming home?”
Her hands fluttered in her lap before she cleared her throat. “Tomorrow.”
“You say that every day.”
“Then it is true, no? Some tomorrow your papa will be home.”
Dragging a finger over the gouges in the table he kicked his foot. “Mama?”
“Yes?”
“Why am I so different? Why do the other children laugh at me? What did I do wrong?”
“Ah, nothing. You did nothing! You were born this way. You see things. It scares the other children and their ignorant parents. In time they will come to know you as I do. Come, come. Go outside to play. It is not as cold today.”
The dog was waiting for him in its usual spot when he rounded the house. Grinning, he dug around in his pouch until he found the berries that he had plucked from his porridge. Pulling them out he feed them to the dog before lifting his head to the sky as snow began to fall. His mama was right. It was not as cold as it usually was. Running a hand through the dog’s thick fur the two wandered off into a small cluster of trees a short distance away from the house.
He hungered. He shuddered as his stomach heaved a protest at its emptiness. The villagers were starting to take notice of the missing people. It was time for him to move on…but he needed to feed. Hearing a woman’s voice softly singing he glided over to the house. Peering between the boards in the windows he saw a woman washing dishes in a pan. And she was alone. Smiling, he took a step back and then kicked in the door. He didn’t have to. He just wanted to startle her. She whirled around, her heart racing, her blood thrumming in her veins and his smile widened. Her eyes widened at the sight of his fangs.
“Yes, fight. It invigorates the blood.”
“No, please. I-”
“Silence woman! Your pleas will do you no good. I hunger. I need. I will take.”
“Wait, my son-”
“The blood of a child? That is something that I have been deprived of. I will remedy it soon enough.”
“No! You-”
He clamped a hand around her jaw and forcibly turned her neck. “Shh,” he whispered as he bent down. “It’ll only hurt for a moment and then you will feel nothing…”
Rho shoved open the sticking door but stopped when he saw the vase laying on the floor. Rubbing his hands together he blew into them as he frowned down at the vase. His mama loved that vase. Why was it…
His thoughts trailed off when his gaze fell on a bare foot. His body began to trembled as he stepped over the vase he walked into the house. “Mama? Mama, are you alright?”
He knew she was not alright. Her eyes were open and she was not moving. The wind howled through the slats in the window and the door slammed behind him causing him to jump. His mouth began to tremble.
“Mama?” he whispered. “Mama, wake up.”
He didn’t hear anyone come up behind him but suddenly he was whirled around. He stared up into the gleaming green eyes of a man who had something red and glistening smeared across his mouth.
“I am not as hungry as I thought I was. I believe I will keep you. Through your mother’s memories I believe you will be useful to me. Yes, I will make you my apprentice.”
He tried to yank his arms away from the man but his grip only tightened. “What did you do to my mama?”
“Do you really want to know? I can show you. Yes, I believe I shall.”
The man dropped his arms only to grab his head. “This is what I did to your mother…and what you will do to countless others.”
There was nothing and then his body jolted and he heard screaming, crying, bones breaking, his mama’s voice whispering his name and then nothing.
Nothing…
Nothing…but the cold.
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Rho raised his voice to be heard over the sound of Vivian vomiting.
“He fed from me, keeping me a halfling for over two hundred years. I aged but slowly and he kept me so weak I could do nothing. Thanks to him my visions grew more frequent. At one point I gauged out my own eye in a mindless haze. And yet he kept me with him. I poisoned myself and him through my blood. He drained me completely and I thought I was dying. And I was happy. But I awake and I was what I am now. He was clinging to life and I ended it. I placed a stake through his heart, cut off his head and left his body to burn in the sun.”
Bending down Rho helped her to her feet. Wetting a rag he carefully wiped at her mouth.
“This is what I know. And I know that there are both vampyres and lycans like my sire. Who do anything for power. Caine is not like that. Is your Alpha?”
“I-” Her brain was foggy. Rho had only given her a portion of the pain he had lived with through the his first year with the man who had murdered his mother. How could he function?
“Sleep child. You’re going to need your rest.”
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Why yes, that IS a child Rho. LOL! I made Rho in BS so I was just able to age him down and make a quick mama for him in CAS. Evil vamp is some Sim that I had made to be an orderly in the asylum with Caine but you never saw him soo…yeah! I hope this made sense. Prompt word wasn’t so much the focus on the season as on the callousness of Rho’s youth. Like always all lots linkage is in the header. 
And the Lycans have a tweetboard now! YAY! *points over to the left* Easier to keep up with all their tweets this way!
Yeah…I think that’s about it. Oh! New layout is new…again! The other layout annoyed me because of some wonky CSS. So, this is the new layout…for now.
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Needz moar lycan tales plz. D:
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PhoenixFG Reply:
February 9th, 2010 at 1:41 AM
LOL!! I’m working on it! Already have the general idea for the next prompt…if my game will cooperate with me!
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YAAAAAY LT UPDATE!!
Poor Rho, losing his mama like that
His sire was a douche. Not one merciful bone in that guy’s body. I hope he died in pain. GREAT pain.
Hopefully he got through to Vivian…
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PhoenixFG Reply:
February 9th, 2010 at 4:14 AM
Haha!! Man, I try to update more frequently but it never happens!
Ah well!
Yeah man! Rho had it rough. Two hundred years of having that guy pretty much put him through the wringer for his own sadistic pleasure.
I’m thinking he did die in A LOT of pain. But I was closing in on my word count!
I do TRY to stay within it! LOL!
Oh…we’ll be seeing more of her. Just sayin’…*whistles innocently*
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this is sooooooo addictive!
Rho was such a cute child! the lighting during the flash back was perfect! The tone and words of his mother made it feel like it really was ages ago!
ok.. now i’m motivated! off to capture chapter 2 lol
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PhoenixFG Reply:
February 9th, 2010 at 5:30 PM
Thanks!
And tell me about it. I have to jot down ideas because they’ll just come out of nowhere when I’m dealing with LT!
I was surprised how cute he was. Haha! Whew! Thanks! I worried about that but I didn’t want to add electric lights. That’s actually how Rho sounds to me. He’s so old school but LOVES technology and stuff.
DO IT!!! I can’t wait to read!
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*sigh* Mr Poetic got a whole lot deeper
He is such a cutie and that locco Vivian (GAH, MY EVIL NAMESAKE! 
) has NO idea of what he went through. And his ‘creator’ dude man person? BYOTCH! I know he has to feed but on Rho’s’ mama? 
Last note – Ulrich and Nolan have met? Because according to on the couch Ulrich asks have you met Nolan .. I think anyways. *taps nose*
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PhoenixFG Reply:
February 10th, 2010 at 2:16 PM
LOL! I love Rho. I don’t use him nearly enough! *sigh* She needs a smidgen of what happened. Just the first year but not the whole thing. She doesn’t know nearly enough…
I know right? Which is why Rho is trying to make sure vamps DON’T feed off humans.
Yeah, they met! When Alana and Nolan got into that bit of trouble with the rouge vamp. Plus Ulrich helped Nolan move into his new place.
I just didn’t write that all in. 
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I began reading along a while ago and was waiting for an update to comment.
Rho was a very… appealing looking child. Hmm… Adorable doesn’t seem to be the right word. He almost has a thoughtful maturity to him.
His sire’s manner of speech seems like it should be accompanying with a cackle and twisting of his mustache. Very classically devious.
And excellent vomit image there
I can’t help but wonder if the timing of this was a little motivated by the cliff-hanger from last chapter. The suspense is killing me!
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PhoenixFG Reply:
February 10th, 2010 at 2:32 PM
Oh! Hi there! *waves* Updates are never set in stone here so sorry about the wait!
I know what you mean. When I aged him down I just thought he looked so young but still looking out at the world with old eyes. I guess he’s always been that way.
His sire probably did practice that move in the mirror when no one was looking!
LOL! Thanks! I debated on using it but then my game was acting weird so…yeah!
I had this one planned(I was going to go with Summer for the prompt but this one turned out better I think!) because I needed to move some people around and add more depth to Rho.
And I’m always leaving cliffhangers!
But back to Caine, Alana and the gang next prompt!
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Rho was such a beautiful child! I thought he was a girl at first. I’m curious to know though, why didnt his eye grow back? Are you ignoring that whole invulnerable thing vampires normally have?
And Vivian is lucky Rho is so kind. I’m positive anyone else would have let that girl drop her off the deck.
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PhoenixFG Reply:
February 11th, 2010 at 10:30 PM
He does have a feminine look to him. It’s weird since I didn’t do anything but take the eye mask off. When he’s older he doesn’t look that girlie! Hrmm..
I think them being invulnerable depends on the situation. Say his arm had been cut off it’d be weird for it to grow back. It’s the same with his eye. Tissue and nerves were completely severed. Growing that back would be implausible. At least in my story!
Rho’s had enough unkindness in his life to want to extend kindness to everyone. Which may be his one true weakness…not the sun.
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Rho has always been quite compassionate then, and he seems to have also have had a close connection to his four-legged friends too.
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PhoenixFG Reply:
February 12th, 2010 at 11:38 AM
Yep! I like that about his character! Most of my characters are loud and just say whatever but Rho thinks before he speaks!
Funny story! That dog just walked onto the lot and Rho went outside to play with him so I just went with it because of his connection. I’m glad you picked up on that!
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HOW did i miss this chapter?! I absolutely loved the flashback, it was beautifully executed!
Yay for kiddie Rho.
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PhoenixFG Reply:
February 14th, 2010 at 10:38 PM
You had/have a lot going on! Now worries!
Thank you!!! I worry about it. The clothing and the wording! Blah! LOL! I appreciate it!
Kiddie Rho was awesomely cute!
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Nicely adds depth to Rho’s character. Now we see why he is the way he is. What a horrible way to find his mama though. Poor guy.
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PhoenixFG Reply:
February 17th, 2010 at 8:10 AM
Yeah!
I feel for him! He and his mama were pretty close(as you can tell) and what child needs to see that? *sigh*
Thank you Gayl!
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Awwwww, poor Rho…my hear wept for him. No child should have to deal with something like that at such a young age. Poor baby.
Fantastic writing and picture taking…beautiful update as always.
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PhoenixFG Reply:
February 20th, 2010 at 3:17 AM
I know! I don’t know why I make my kids have such horrible childhoods. Seriously!!
Thank you!!
I had fun doing this set up pics!
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Rho looks like a very good vampire… who is the wolf he was feeding as a child? I was thinking it could be Caine’s father, but then I thought it couldn’t be… seems like that memory took place like hundreds and hundreds years ago…
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PhoenixFG Reply:
March 11th, 2010 at 4:12 PM
Yeah…I felt sorry for Rho as well.
It wasn’t his fault and that’s only a small part of what he went through!
It was just a random dog that came on the lot so I used him!
But it did happen several hundred years ago so it’s not Bernard! 
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Hmmm just what is Rho, obviously he’s a good guy but I dont really know for certain. Perhaps he isnt… and the girl, really now she wants to kill Caine. Nice insight to the Lancaster name! REALLY NICE!
Dang nice look back at Rho! how old is this Vampyre? must be hundreds if not thousands of years and wow I liked the look at how he became. 80)
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PhoenixFG Reply:
April 13th, 2010 at 2:28 AM
Rho is a vamp…but different! He’s always been strong and powerful and becoming a vamp just increased that!
Vivian’s pack leader(Odin) has always had it out for Caine!
Thank you! I try to put things in without throwing it in your face! haha!
He’s pretty old. I would say almost 6, 7 hundred years old. Thank you! I figured he needed some sort of background!
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