Shadow vampires

Shadow vampires are a species of vamp that feed on the shadows of sapient beings. Ariadne is currently the only shadow vamp student at wizard university.

Shadow transference and feeding

A person’s shadow represents their influence; the space they take up in the world; the light they block. Someone whose shadow is diminished may have trouble being noticed or helping things go their own way. Strong shadows are attached to people with a significant impact on the world, for good or ill.

Shadow vamps have a core shadow, representing their base essence and the bare minimum of selfhood they require to exist, and augment it by feeding on the shadows of others. An ethical shadow vamp has a difficult line to walk; building your own essence out of the people you admire means tearing them down, but you certainly don’t want to build yourself out of people you dislike, either.

It’s beyond any shadow vamp’s authority to decide whether someone cold afford having a bad week or two, whether they wouldn’t miss being called on in class anyway, whether they need to be cut down to size. As such, the standard practice is to skim trace amounts of shadow off large numbers of people, never going too deep into any one individual’s shadow.

A starving shadow vamp has bright red eyes; the eyes of an overfed vamp are jet black. Both colors are a sign of instability and danger. Most shadow vamps graze consistently, never empty and never full, and display eye colors in various shades of maroon. Other than the eyes, their bodies are fully monochromatic. Shadow vamps have scorpionlike tails tipped with a hard, sharp cap, protecting a sensory organ used to identify and gather shadow substance.

Feeding deeply on a single shadow has a pleasurable effect on the target, and a shadow vamp interested in feeding emits a pheromone-like allure. These peculiarities of evolution often put shadow vamps in situations wherein they could take advantage of, manipulate, or harm someone vulnerable. In order to keep those risks in check, shadow vamp culture puts intense emphasis on ethics and boundaries; see below.

Society and values

Because overfeeding has dangerous consequences, shadow vamps live by a rigorous code of consent and self-control.

Like other vamps, they are sensitive to invitations. Their language has both verbal and nonverbal components; speaking to non-shadow vamps requires extra attention to metaphorical language and figures of speech; otherwise, expressions like “pick my brain” or “cut me to the quick” might be mistaken for invitations to do violence.

The cultural practice of feeding only on large populations requires them to integrate into populous areas rather than live as a separate society. Shadow vampire cultural centers (SVCCs) can be found in any city or region where they’ve settled. SVCCs offer language and culture classes for young shadow vamps, plus cultural programming open to the public. They’re an artistically inclined species in general; their traditional art form is, of course, shadow puppetry, which they incorporate into films and all sorts of live performing arts. Shadow vamps value SVCCs so much that arts administration is perhaps their only culturally necessary profession.

Otherwise, shadow vamps’ metrics of judging success aren’t restricted to certain professions or paths in life. The goal for any shadow vamp is to maximize their shadow—their impact on the world—by identifying and living according to your core truths and values. In short: Just be yourself, but you’d better be good at it.