The Chronicles of Legion volume 2: The Spawn of Dracula


By Fabien Nury, Mario Alberti, Zhang Xiaoyu & Tirso translated by Virgine Selavy (Titan Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-78276-094-8

The epic war between immortal blood-drenched brothers continues in the second translated volume of Fabien (Once Upon a Time in France, I Am Legion) Nury’s inspired reinvigoration of the Dracula legend, with illustrators Mario Alberti, Zhang Xiaoyu and Tirso Cons each allocated a separate epoch of the centuries-spanning and intertwined vendetta.

The dread duel began in 2011 as Les Chroniques de Legion: a generational saga which put a new spin on the monster-myth, and The Spawn of Dracula further unravels a triptych of mysteries…

What You Need to Know: Vlad Tepes Dracula and his brother Radu possess the power to extend their lives beyond apparent death. Their consciousnesses are carried in their blood and by transferring the potent ichor to other living beings they can possess and dominate any number of victims infinitely.

Both have lived for centuries and for all that time they have hated each other…

Here the story expands in three theatres of war with their unceasing attempts to destroy each other centred in three separate eras, but rather than disparate clashes over time and space these duels are all part of an extended and never-ending campaign of terror with mere mortals their callously disposable tools, weapons and cannon fodder…

The opening act occurs in 1885 as gambling addict and thorough swine Victor Douglas Thorpe enters the palatial home of reclusive immensely wealthy aristocratic Lord Byron Cavendish. Should the upcoming interview go well the impoverished cad will soon be heir to the largest fortune in the Empire…

The conference goes exactly as the unseen benefactor intends. When the successful applicant returns to London, he bears a strange red mark and is no longer Victor Douglas Thorpe…

Centuries earlier in 1521, Gabriella, Doña Del La Fuente bore the same scarlet sigil as she was escorted through the green hell of the New World to a meeting with powerfully placed future husband Hernan Torres.

Guided by the conquistador’s enticingly masculine mulatto bastard Martin, the Doña’s party – rough soldier, cloying Spanish priests, avaricious self-important dignitaries and her loyal bodyguard Carlos – slowly make their way through the jungles until an uncanny sense warns of danger ahead.

Seconds later they are attacked by a horde of natives who seem immune to pain and mortal harm, fighting on even after holed by musket fire or even beheaded.

Moments before her body’s imminent demise Gabriella recognises her brother’s bloodmark on an attacker’s neck and, even as faithful, steadfast Carlos comes to her rescue, Vlad realises Radu has beaten her to this new continent and made himself at home.

Miles away, seeing through the dying eyes of his puppets, the other undying scion of Transylvania screams in fear and fury…

With daylight the much-diminished party struggles on towards Torres’ citadel and half-constructed cathedral with the bride-to-be increasingly succumbing to lust as she cares for her wounded and septic future son-in-law.

Once inside the Mission she is forced back into the role of diffident contract-bride, but Hernan Torres is no easy man to love. His thoughts are solely of preserving a legacy and creating a legitimate dynasty, and her bringing more grasping priests and fanatical Inquisitors to plague him has not endeared her to the Great Man.

Reduced to the status of closeted brood-mare, Gabriella has Carlos capture a huge eagle and, by allowing it to bite her, gains a mighty avian frame from which to view the world and survey her own inexorable rise to power…

As he slowly recovers Martin too falls under her spell, but this bewitching has nothing to do with her blood…

In late 19th century England an aristocrat’s estate burns in a vast and deliberate conflagration but the new Lord has no regrets and looks only forward, never back.

In 1812 a band of deserters from Napoleon’s army have reached Targovishte. Armand Malachie has led his faithful subordinates Kholya, Stern, Hartmann and Feraud to the Wallachian Mountains in search of the Lost Treasure of Vlad Dracula Tepes but the long-suffering peasants there quickly recognise who the dashing French Hussar is carrying inside him…

When an innkeeper passes on a message from Radu, arrogant Vlad disregards it but later engages in a pointless clash with a band of Cossacks which leads to the death of his mortal host…

As his men abandon his corpse to the snows, the embarrassed immortal summons his fading strength to reanimate the cadaver and follow in search of a new meat-home…

And in 1887 Victor Douglas Thorpe attends the funeral of his so-suddenly and suspiciously deceased benefactor and is accosted by the woman who carries his unborn child. Her entreaties go unacknowledged and, as he is driven away in his livered carriage, she bitterly damns him…

To Be Continued…

Unfolding in a luxurious oversized (211 x 282mm) full-colour hardback, superbly illustrated and beguiling told, this intoxicatingly absorbing jigsaw of terror and tragedy is a stunning and ambitious treat for all fans of fang and fear…
The Chronicles of Legion and all contents © Éditions Glénat 2011. Translated edition © Titan Comics, 2015