Bound by Blood

Places:
Centuries after a bloody war, vampires have replaced humankind as the dominant species on the planet. Werewolves, having sided with the humans, were driven to extinction. Werepires are the only real evidence that werewolves ever existed. After centuries of breeding, werepires have become a status symbol among vampires and fill the roles of companions, guard dogs, and sometimes entertainment in the form of werepire fights held by the more unscrupulous vampires.

The vampires had mostly done away with the archaic form of government that consisted of a council of lords using their knights to maintain their hidden existence. Now there is a one-world government with an elected council of vampires from different regions of the world. Each council-member has representatives from their region, appointed by the council-member and approved by the council, who serves as a two-way ambassador between the council member and the common vampires.

Human Towns
Humans now inhabit small walled towns, typically near the largest vampire cities such as capitols. These human towns are often crowded, but inside them humans are free to form families and grow food for themselves as well as the humans who live with vampires.

Human-Vampire Relationship
There are two options for the human-vampire relationship:

1.      Contracted Humans : In this option humans are free to leave their towns as they wish, though if they do then they are fair game for any vampire who comes upon them. They also can’t take jobs outside of their towns. However, if they form a contract with a vampire then they gain more freedom as well as protection in exchange for freely giving their blood for their vampire. They can take jobs such as doctors (only for other humans) and craftsman with access to materials that would otherwise be too expensive of just inaccessible to someone in a human town. Important jobs such as government jobs and law enforcement are illegal for humans, deemed too dangerous for fragile creatures. They are free to roam as they wish, just as long as they stay within the same city as their vampire.

2.      Enslaved Humans : In this option humans are slaves with next to no freedom, or only as much freedom as their master allows. The human towns are more like prison camps or centers for maintaining the human population, though the inhabitants often still grow food for the human population. When they get over-crowded, humans are pulled at will and shipped to markets in other cities. Once a human leaves a human town, they can’t go back as measure to prevent escape and revolts. Instead if a human no longer has a vampire they are sent back to the market grounds, which can be compared to dog pounds with humans in cages and fed barely enough to survive. Most are there until they die, either from natural causes or by being drained by the managers of markets. Werepires are often used as guard dogs in these situations, both to prevent human escape and to prevent vampire thieves.

In both instances it is considered in a human’s best interest to be “kept” by a vampire, though humans probably wouldn’t view it that way.

The Vampire’s Bite
When a human is bitten by a vampire it creates a bond between the vampire and human. For the vampire, they can easily locate their human and for the human, there is a gradual craving that builds. Human get so addicted to being bitten that they suffer withdrawal symptoms if they haven’t been bitten for a certain period of time and the severity depends on how long the human has been fed from. In short, a mutual attraction tends to form and add to the human-vampire relationship.