This lore dive is a helpful resource for understanding the Fae & Alchemy series! This lore guide includes spoilers, so please read AFTER you’ve finished Quicksilver.
Includes info from Quicksilver, so this guide is spoiler in nature.
This guide does NOT include information from Brimstone.
If you would like to listen to this lore dive, check out the Rusarius’s Library section here.
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What is the Blood Curse?
In simplest terms, the blood curse turned fae into vampires. It elongated their teeth, so they could bite their victims and drain them, and they needed to drink blood to maintain their immortality. This is why there aren’t humans around Yvelia anymore – the Fae drained the millions of humans in this realm, drinking them dry due to uncontrollable bloodlust.
Thousands of years ago, the fae were inflected with this blood curse. Rumor is that the witches were the source of the blood curse, though at least the Balquhidder clan denies any involvement and feel they proved their innocence when they helped find the cure.
It is known that the curse has caused many to distrust all witches and as Lorreth puts it:
“Dragon lovers. They’re the reason we’re in this mess in the first place. If it weren’t for them, there wouldn’t even be any vampires.”
Malcolm was the VERY first to be affected by the curse thousands of years ago. When the cure was discovered, many of the Yvelian fae took it because they were horrified by the monsters they’d become. But there were those, like Malcolm who preferred being the monsters, and chose to not take the cure and thus stay immortal with dark power. Over the centuries, Malcolm killed off others who kept the curse too, until he was the only original vampire.
It’s believed that Malcolm ingested their power somehow. The rumor spread because he is millennia old, undying, never aging. Every year he has survived, he grows in strength and capability. His venom is potent beyond imagination.
When one of Malcolm’s lords bites a victim, they can drink and sate their thirst without killing. If they bite the same human a number of times, eventually they become enthralled. This means the victim becomes bound to the vampire who bit them. They are mindlessly devoted to their needs.
Inevitably, when their masters grow bored, they drain them, and then their victim dies. Three days later, they rise and become the feeders.
Malcolm himself only needs to bite someone once to create a thrall. Malcolm’s venom is so lethal, only one drop is needed. Once his venom is inside someone, there are only 2 choices:
- They drink from Malcolm and become something like one of his lords (enthralled to him).
- They refuse to drink from him or he refuses to let them and they die and return as a feeder.
King Rurik Daianthus, the Witches, & the Cure
It was the last true king of Yvelia, Rurik Daianthus (Carrion’s father) who charged five witch families with the task of finding the cure to the curse. Of these five, the Balqquhidder clan was instrumental in breaking the curse. How they figured out how to break the curse, is still unknown.
FUN FACT: This is the same clan that Iseabail is heir to!
Rurik’s blood was used to create the blood curse that allowed Malcolm to become the first vampire. A vampire can’t drink from the living members of the bloodline that created them, nor can they enthrall them.
While Rurik’s blood was used to create the blood curse, he was also the one who sought to find the cure.
Even with the curse lifted, all Fae still have traces of their vampire fangs that are still functional, but because Fae don’t need blood to maintain immortality anymore, the use of those fangs has moved behind closed doors. (Psst, it’s a sex thing!)
It is also known that Finran, Fisher’s father, studied the blood curse for decades, though why and what he learned is still unknown.
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