WIP INTRODUCTION - Vampire Lesbians In The Roaring 20's
Nan Marshall abandons her provincial life in Louisiana —along with the husband chosen for her— in search of something she cannot yet name. Harlem promises freedom, but the city’s rhythm is relentless, its nights colder than she imagined and her place within it uncertain.
Then she meets June Blanchard. Draped in bright colors and exuding a mysterious allure, June embodies everything Nan’s parents warned her against, but with every chance encounter, she finds herself drawn closer.
June eventually leads her to The Gorgon, a clandestine speakeasy at the borough’s heart where the beautiful and damned gather under the rule of vampire matriarch Lucille, indulging in pleasures both intoxicating and forbidden: women, power, and blood.
Although seduced by the promise of eternal life and a sense of belonging, Nan begins to realize that her flight from Louisiana may have brought her into a different kind of captivity.
By night’s end, the choice will be hers to make.
✦ Themes: Escape, belonging, desire, repression, decay, mortality, power and vulnerability.
✦ Status: Drafting
✦ Vibes: velvet curtains, crimsom lipstick stains on crystal glasses, gold dust clinging to skin under dim light, jazz echoing through underground walls, cigarette smoke, bare shoulders catching the glow of a chandelier, whispering in powder rooms, pearls against dark skin, the sticky warmth of a crowded cabaret, the ache of shoes too tight for dancing all night long, the flicker of neon lights, blood spilled over fur coats and feather capes.
A small-town girl from Louisiana, running from an arranged marriage that promised her nothing but a lifetime of polite obedience. She arrives to New York City not knowing what she's looking for, but in desperate need of finding it.
The girl who left first. Once the miracle beauty of her hometown, she was still a teenager when she swore, “make me marry that old man and I’ll vanish to chase modeling.” And she did. Now she helps Nan find her footing in the city, offering her a bed in her cramped room and a taste of glamour she wears like armor.
The first face Nan meets in New York, and the one who opens the door to The Gorgon. Enigmatic, magnetic, a little fragile beneath the polish —she’s Shug Avery with stage fright. A century of undeath hasn’t made her immune to sunlight, garlic or pretty lady.
Owner and architect of The Gorgon. To her, vampirism was never a curse but a covenant bestowed upon her by a beloved partner as the highest act of trust. Where others fed in alleys and fled from torches, she imagined something bolder: a sanctuary. The Gorgon is her cathedral, her rules its scripture. Nothing is taken without being freely given, and those who cross that line answer to her. Regal, uncompromising, almost priestess-like, Lucille turns survival into ritual.
Lucille’s main partner and right hand, though never her reflection. Where Lucille sees sacrament, Archer remembers conquest. She lived through the days when vampires bowed to no laws, and she carries that feral pride like a badge. Blunt and unyielding, The Gorgon’s delicate rules mean nothing to her but a gilded cage. She stays at Lucille’s side not out of devotion, but in the hope of one day shaking her out of it. Sharp suits, sharper teeth and almost no patience left. The butch your sire told you not to worry about.
The youngest at The Gorgon. Once a rich man’s spoiled daughter, now restless, hungry and ungrateful for rules. Lucille’s worshiped donors are nothing but blood bags, if you ask her. Blood bags getting far too comfortable with their natural predators’ devotion. To Sylvia, vampirism isn’t sacred; it’s power, and she’s starving for more.
