Vanstrom Klause has been given total control over the Myreque hunt, and things are starting to look worse and worse. Abductions have been happening close to Burgh de Rott itself, and supply lines between Meiyerditch and the outside world have been cut. Also, some shadowy figure has been seen rifling around a cave south of the town. Veliaf wants you to investigate.
Inside the cave, you find two things of interest- a strange medallion with the Drakan symbol, and a letter to Safalaan from someone who signs themselves as 'V'. V claims to have known Safalaan as a child and to know the secrets of his past. Naturally, everyone thinks that it's a trap and 'V' stands for 'Vanstrom', but Safalaan is desperate. He's Really 700 Years Old, but has no memory prior to maturity. He also has that power you saw demonstrated on a pair of Vyrewatch last quest, and he's recently been having disturbing, barely-remembered visions. So he wants to meet with V. Of course, he's not stupid enough to just let himself get lured into a trap when he's clearly the target, so he wants you to go instead.
When you go to meet V, you find that you've misunderstood the situation. V didn't stand for Vanstrom, it stood for Vanescula, sister of the big cheese Lord Lowerniel Drakan (who's a bit miffed about the mistaken identity). And she's surprisingly on the level- she, too, wishes to kick Lord Drakan out of power, if for her own reasons. Drakan's been shut up in his castle for centuries instead of actually ruling, and Vanescula is not happy with it. She would also be a better ruler, by human standards, because she's willing to exploit something that Lord Drakan isn't. You remember that Haelchemy lab from "Darkness of Hallowvale", which the vampyres abandoned because of something they found there that they wanted hidden at all costs? Turns out, what they found was a method to remove vampyres' dependence on blood. This would absolutely shatter Morytania's status quo, so Lord Drakan ordered it covered up. Vanescula, on the other hand, wants to make use of it.
Vanescula also reveals one of the vampyres' biggest weaknesses- blisterwood. Blisterwood harms vampyres on contact, and because it's alive and moves of its own will, it No Sells vampyric telepathic cheating. There is only one Blisterwood tree left in Morytania, although there once were more. And if you're wondering why the vyres haven't destroyed it yet, the answer is that they've tried. It didn't work, and all they could do was shut the tree up in the Arboretum, restrain it, keep it sick, and guard it. If you can revive the tree and cut some logs from it, you could turn them into weapons even stronger than the Ivandis Flail.
The Arboretum where the tree is kept is in the upper terraces of Darkmeyer, the vampyre part of the Sanguinesti region. Vanescula will help you disguise yourself as a vampyre, at which point you can start integrating yourself with vyre society until they trust you enough to let you in. Once you're safely alone in the Arboretum you can heal the tree and get some wood from it. Rainis Drakan, Lord Drakan's other sibling, suspects you and corners you in the Arboretum, but he didn't suspect that Vanescula would be on your side, and she kills him.
Now there's only one more immediate problem left- Vanstrom. He won't stop chasing the Myreque until either he or they are dead, and Vanescula has informed you that he knows of the Myreque's Meiyerditch base (this time not your fault). The Myreque are tired of running, and thanks to you they have shiny new anti-vampyre weaponry. So they send you to solve the problem by killing Vanstrom off. You have a fight and Vanstrom dies... but beforehand, he reveals that he's interested in Safalaan because he's part Icyene (Saradominist-alinged angel-like beings who ruled Morytania back when it was still Hallowvale. Safalaan's mother was the Queen of Hallowvale, Efaritay). Safalaan himself has gone missing, last seen talking to Vanescula on the Vyrewall. Veliaf is worried because the deaths of Rainis and Vanstrom mean that the vampyres can no longer dismiss the Myreque as unimportant- after all, one of their members broke into Darkmeyer itself and killed two powerful and influential vyre nobles, one of them a Drakan, without being caught.
On the bright side, you have killed off a major threat to the Myreque, and one of Drakan's siblings is dead and the other is (tentatively) on your side, so congratulations, quest complete!
The Tropes of Darkmeyer
- Cain and Abel: A bit of a reverse to the norm, since the sibling plotting fratricide (Vanescula) is the better sibling and the victims (Lowerniel and Rainis) are more evil than she is.
- Decadent Court: Darkmeyer in a nutshell. It's heavily class-segregated between the upper, middle, and lower terraces, and you can't get to the upper terrace before you've gained a good deal of reputation.
- Evil Cannot Comprehend Good: The vyres will think of you as very strange whenever you do a good deed without ulterior motive (well, aside from gaining reputation). You'll still get a reputation increase, they'll just comment on it.
- Fantastic Racism: Vampyres don't think too highly of humans. One vyrelord will have you humiliate a human blood tithe collector just for the fun of it. They're also racist against werewolves; the two Canifis Settlers are confined to the lowest part of Darkmeyer, and the werewolf trader is stuck in the middle level.
- Half-Human Hybrid: Safalaan, it turns out. His mother was the Icyene Efaritay and his father was human.
- He Knows Too Much: Vanescula does this to Rainis when he guesses that you're human.
- Kryptonite Factor: Blisterwood, to Vampyres.
- Orcus on His Throne: Lord Drakan stays shut up in his castle all the time and delegates carrying out his orders to his siblings. Notably, his subjects don't think much of him because he does so little, and his sister Vanescula is plotting against him because he won't stop obsessing over some stupid rock (implied to be the Stone of Jas) and start actually ruling.
- Pragmatic Villainy: One of the reasons Vanescula doesn't like Lowerniel is because he won't make use of the new haelchemy research, which could improve the lives of everyone in Morytania, both vampyre and otherwise, just because he doesn't want social disturbance.
- Rewarded as a Traitor Deserves: The Blood Tither in the upper terrace allied with the vampyres to collect blood from his fellow humans (although, as with Gadderanks earlier, there might have been extenuating circumstances). He's still treated like dirt and tortured for sport, and you can have him killed for something that was actually your fault.
- The Starscream: Vanescula. She helps you infiltrate Darkmeyer and kills her brother Rainis when he puzzles out your true species, all because she thinks her other brother absolutely sucks as a ruler and needs to be replaced.
- Taking the Heat: Inverted. Vanescula kills Ranis and blames it on the Myreque, but she insists it had to be done, for he would've exposed you otherwise while you were busy chopping for blisterwood.
- Taking You with Me: As you take down Vanstrom, he explodes as a last-ditch attack, which knocks you back and nearly kills you while he also spawns eight bloodveld guardians.
- Video Game Caring Potential: You have the opportunity to free Maria Gadderanks, the wife of Gadderanks the blood tither you killed back in "In Aid of the Myreque", from prison. You can also protect a blood tither from being subjected to You Have Failed Me for an accident that you caused, and refuse to kill Meiyerditch citizens abducted because they couldn't pay the blood tithe. Doing the latter two will give you less reputation, but you can still gain enough through other methods to enter the Arboretum.
- Video Game Cruelty Potential: You can also terrorize Maria until she loses the will to live, lie and have the tithe collector murdered for something you did, and kill the helpless Meiyerditch citizens. The vampyres like it best when you pick the cruel options.
- We Hardly Knew Ye: Rainis Drakan. The other Drakan sibling, equal in status to Vanescula... but he is only seen before in one short cutscene in "Darkness of Hallowvale", and his main role in the quest is to have Vanescula turn on him and kill him when he tries to stop you from getting wood from the Blisterwood tree.
- You Have Failed Me: Vampyres are big on this. One middle-class vyre worries that Vanstrom will kill him for losing the bloodveld younglings in his care (you re-collect them for him), and this will happen to the Blood Tither unless you advise that he be kept alive.
