Trueblood

(W.I.P.) Trueblood is the central villain in the Ravenloft Dominion novel Heaven's Bones. Known as Tibor Vadoma previous to his casting out, Trueblood is both a darkling and a Dukkar. Though he did not build them, Trueblood is responsible for the creation of Robarts' Angels, to which he hoped to use to invade realms beyond the Land of Mists. Trueblood believed himself to be a master of the Mists, though he found out after his ultimate failure that he is their pawn as much as anybody.

History

Trueblood was part of the Vadoma tribe, a clan of Vistani with the unusual practice of letting males with the Sight live. He was the twin brother of Jaelle Vadoma and the biological son Mirela and Pietre Volmi, though Tibor was raised by his uncle. As a youth, Tibor's Sight enabled him to see worlds beyond the Mists, and he learned forbidden arcane knowledge. Tibor ultimately sought the ability to breach the Mists and conquer the worlds beyond with Jaelle as his queen. He used his powers of mind control to set up an elaborate sacrifice he needed to enable him to breach worlds, one which spelled disaster for his clan by inciting the wrath of Harkon Lukas.

As he attempted to take Jaelle with him out of the Mists, she stabbed him in the stomach after she Saw the tragedy he would cause in the realms beyond. Vibor returned the favor with a stab to the chest. For his act of treachery, the entire clan cast him out cursed him to have no name. The Mists engulfed Jaelle and Vibor. Tibor was stripped of his name and mortal body and became nothing more than a disembodied spirit. The Mists deposited Jaelle near St. Agnes, England, where she was found by Jory Penhallow and nursed back to health. They eventually fell in love. Jaelle lived out the rest of her life in peace and sired a Jaelle's Breed|family line that produced many descendants, a family line that would come to be known as the Children of Jaelle or Jaelle's Breed.

A hundred years or more passed before Jaelle's brother could works his way onto Earth. In London, her disembodied brother spoke to the grieving Dr. Sebastian Robarts and persuaded him kidnap women and give them forms beyond the limitations of weak and delicate flesh. These constructions of metal and flesh Robarts called Angels, though intended them for use as weapons of war to invade and conquer. Jaelle's brother was eventually united in body and soul after Dr. Alistair Weldon, the darklord of Riverbend, stumbled upon him and healed him. Whole again, the man once known as Tibor assumed the name of Trueblood. He quickly joined Robarts' side as his servant and assistant, though in truth Trueblood gave Robarts the orders as the doctor fell further and further into madness. Robarts worked in a copy of Bryani House in the Mists, a place where time did not flow as it did back on Earth.

Construction on the Angels continued for fifteen Earth years, during which time Trueblood received from Robarts a preoccupation with the heavens, a preoccupation that led Trueblood to wish to conquer them. For Robarts' mad creations to reach heaven, they needed wings. The ability to create functional metal wings was beyond Robarts, so Trueblood recruited and then kidnapped the engineer Henry Thorpe. Robarts became obsessed with enlisting the aid of Dr. Sophie Huxley, Thorpe's cousin, in placing the finishing touches on his Angels. By the time of her kidnapping, Huxley found her cousin Thorpe's mind addled. In the temporal distortion of Bryani-House-of-the-Mists, he had already constructed wings for the Angels.