Canned Goods: History of Lighthouse

Since even after the lion’s share of my first day back at work I still have a veritable mountain of e-mails to which I must respond lest a client become incensed or the universe explodes or something else monumentally dire occurs, here’s something related to the novel upon which I’d be working if I had the time. Here there be spoilers… kinda. I guess. I’m still tired from the weekend, shut up.

– Tenebrous Fellows founded when Simon the Sorcerer and his apprentices first meet Kabbalist rabbis and their acolytes. Agree to guide humanity indirectly rather than seeking direct control and risking revolt.
– Fearing persecution, the Simonist mages raise corpses as guardians (zombies).
– Fellows spread across Europe, Asia and Africa.
– Corresponding mages in Islamic Spain & Transylvania exchange ideas on more capable servants.
– Their experiments lead to the creation of the first vampires.
– Procedures spread to other Fellows, though most Kabbalists caution against making them too powerful.
– With the rise of the Holy Roman & Ottoman Empires, Fellows seek to exert more control over the politics & taxation of the citizenry; to prevent backlash they create more vampires to rule by fear from shadows. Spanish Inquisition drives both groups into hiding, and seperates some vampires from their creators. They are the first vampire lords, though they will not be referred to as such for several hundred years.
– Vampire lords begin to correspond with one another, learning new abilities such as flight & TK.
– Prussian Crusades. Vampires express a desire to fight with provincial forces in their defense to protect their food source rather than protecting the mages. Mages refuse. Protests are met with execution.
– First vampiric conversion of a human: Vlad III Dracul, 1474. News causes outrage among Fellows, who have Vlad killed at the earliest opportunity (Bucharest, 1476).
– More vampires convert humans. Population rises exponentially.
– 1507, beginning with Maximilian’s Italian campaign, vampire rebels begin manipulating humans against the pawns of the Tenebrous Fellows. Magical Cold War begins.
– 1669, Ottomans with vampiric backing seize the island of Crete. Vampires begin using Crete as a safe haven from observation or interference from the fellows. The first Sanguine Court is convened, noble houses are established based on lineage to original created servants, and the Sanguinous Articles of Conduct are agreed upon.
– Fellows become increasingly concerned with the lack of new members. Expansion of the world and advances in science are slowly reducing number of people able to accept the greater truths required for using true magic. Some even flee to Americas, seeking nascent minds to open rather than assisting with the Magical Cold War.
– Conflicts culminated in the Austro-Ottoman War, 1716-1718. After over 200 years of cold war and skirmishes fought by proxy, shapeshifters appear to both sides: the werewolf to the vampires, the werecat to the Fellows. Both sides meet in The Hague to discuss terms. Finally, in 1719, it is agreed that neither vampires nor Fellows will directly influence the greater course of mortal nations, and the Fellows will allow the vampires to exist as free beings while the vampires agreed to be monitored by the Fellows lest some of their number become feral and ignore the Sanguinous Articles of Conduct.
– One Fellow, one vampire and one shapeshifter act as Monitors, overseeing the activities of all groups.
– Fellows in America report good relationship with members of the Masons there. They agree to meet biweekly at a small lighthouse off the coast of Virginia. Fellows convene and discuss the merits of having mortals carry out some of their investigative work.
– Lighthouse is officially established as a secret investigative body after Fellow Abraham Talmud has a long discussion in France with Benjamin Franklin. Fellows membership slowly continues to dwindle, but Lighthouse recruits canny & capable investigators that operate in secret until the modern age…