Candelabro

“Vampires are very good at keeping secrets. Dee asked me to find a way around that.”
— Tavin

Candelabro is not officially called an interrogation spell.

Within the House's oldest ledgers, it is classified as an extraction rite.

Among hunters who have actually witnessed it, however, it has another name:

the living candelabra.

The spell was devised by Tavin the Hunter at Dee's personal request, after conventional methods of questioning proved nearly useless against elder vampires. Vampires could ignore pain, heal wounds faster than hunters could inflict them, survive mutilation, and—perhaps worst of all—remain smug throughout the process.

Dee's request to Tavin was supposedly simple:

“Give me something regeneration cannot make comfortable.”

Tavin did.

The Spell

Choose one vampire or vampiric creature you can see within range.

The creature must make a Constitution saving throw.

On a successful save, the spell fails and the creature immediately knows that something attempted to seize control of its body.

On a failed save, its arms violently straighten outward from its body.

Its elbows lock.

Its fingers spread.

Its jaw closes.

Then the rendering begins.

The vampire's flesh does not immediately burn.

Instead, Candelabro draws the natural fats, oils, waxes, and other combustible substances from throughout the creature's skin and underlying tissues. These substances seep slowly through the pores as a thick, translucent film before soaking into the target's clothing.

The victim can feel every drop leaving.

Within seconds, their skin becomes unnaturally dry.

Their lips split.

Their eyelids tighten.

The flesh around their knuckles begins to crack.

Their clothing darkens as it becomes saturated.

And then—

the candles are lit.

Flames blossom from both hands.

A third flame ignites across the scalp and crown of the head.

The fire does not spread normally.

It remains concentrated around the victim's hands and head, causing the vampire to resemble a grotesque three-branched candelabrum.

This is where the spell received its name.

The Silence

Candelabro deliberately prevents the victim from screaming.

Not because they feel no pain.

Quite the opposite.

The target's throat works.

Its lungs contract.

Its tongue moves.

Its mouth may even open.

But no sound comes out.

Not a scream.

Not a grunt.

Not a prayer.

Not the sound of breathing.

Nothing.

The only sounds in the room are the crackling of the flames, the faint sizzling of rendered oil, and whatever questions the hunters choose to ask.

Tavin considered this part essential.

“Screaming wastes everyone's time.”
— Tavin

Interrogation

While affected by Candelabro, the creature is restrained.

It cannot willingly move its arms from their outstretched position, cannot cast spells with verbal components, and cannot produce sound except when the caster permits it to answer a question.

At the beginning of each of your turns, you may ask the victim one question that can be answered verbally.

For the next 10 seconds, Candelabro allows the creature to speak.

During this time the flames remain.

The pain remains.

The creature knows that its voice will disappear again when those ten seconds end.

When asked a question, the creature makes a Charisma saving throw.

On a Failed Save

The creature must answer.

It cannot knowingly speak a direct lie.

It may attempt to avoid the question, omit information, use careful wording, or answer incompletely, but it cannot intentionally state something it knows to be false.

If the caster believes the creature is deliberately withholding important information, they may say:

“Burn brighter.”

The target immediately takes 4d8 radiant damage, and must repeat its Charisma saving throw against the original question.

This additional damage can occur only once per question.

On a Successful Save

The creature may answer however it wishes.

However, successfully resisting Candelabro causes the flames to intensify.

The creature immediately takes 3d8 radiant damage.

The Burning

When Candelabro is first successfully cast, the target takes:

5d8 radiant damage.

At the beginning of each of the caster's turns while concentration is maintained, the target takes an additional:

2d8 radiant damage.

Damage caused by Candelabro cannot be reduced through a vampire's regeneration feature, and hit points lost to this spell cannot be restored until 1 minute after Candelabro ends.

If the creature has a vulnerability to sunlight or suffers penalties while in sunlight, the flames of Candelabro count as sunlight for those features.

The spell itself does not automatically kill a creature reduced to 0 hit points. Instead, if the target would be destroyed by its normal vampiric weaknesses, those rules apply normally.

Ending the Spell

A creature affected by Candelabro may repeat the initial Constitution saving throw at the end of each of its turns.

However, it makes this saving throw with disadvantage if it knowingly refused to answer the caster's most recent question.

On a success, the spell ends.

When Candelabro ends, the flames extinguish instantly.

They do not shrink.

They simply cease.

For several moments afterward the victim's clothing remains heavy with rendered oil, and its skin appears grey, cracked, and parchment-dry.

Survivors often retain thin black burn marks around their fingertips and hairline even after their supernatural healing returns.

Among vampires who recognize these scars, they have become something of an unspoken warning.

This one has been questioned by the House.

A House Spell

Candelabro is not taught to Fledglings.

It does not appear in standard House spellbooks and is deliberately excluded from most instructional material.

A hunter must be specifically taught the rite by someone who already knows it.

Possession of the spell is generally restricted to hunters whose work involves:

• Elder vampires
• Vampire courts
• Blood cults
• Missing hunters
• Compromised Gardens
• Vampire infiltrators
• Information concerning active nests

The House does not consider Candelabro a punishment.

Punishment implies that suffering is the objective.

Candelabro has an objective.

Information.

The suffering is merely the mechanism.

That distinction has caused more than one argument inside the House.

Why Tavin Created It

Dee supposedly approached Tavin after the capture of a vampire who had allowed itself to be tortured for nearly two days without revealing the location of several missing hunters.

Every broken bone healed.

Every cut closed.

Every threat was laughed at.

Dee became tired of listening to it laugh.

Tavin studied the problem and concluded that ordinary torture failed against vampires because hunters were treating vampire bodies like mortal bodies.

A mortal fears destruction.

A vampire becomes accustomed to it.

So Tavin designed something different.

Candelabro does not simply injure the flesh.

It turns the vampire's own flesh into the instrument being used against it.

Its body provides the oil.

Its clothing becomes the wick.

Its hands become the candles.

Its head becomes the lantern.

And its supernatural resilience ensures that, unless the hunters lose control of the ritual, it remains conscious long enough to understand exactly what is happening.

When Tavin first demonstrated the completed spell, Dee allegedly watched the vampire burn silently for several seconds before asking a single question.

The vampire answered immediately.

Dee looked toward Tavin.

Tavin looked at the burning creature.

Then said:

“I think that'll do.”

The Name

Tavin deliberately called the spell Candelabro rather than Candelabra.

Some hunters insist the name came from an older regional word for a candle-holder.

Others claim Tavin simply mispronounced candelabra while writing the first version of the spell and refused to change it afterward.

Dee reportedly preferred the incorrect version due to its connection to slang used by younger fledglings.

According to one House ledger:

“A candelabrum holds candles.
A Candelabro makes them.”

Today, when a vampire interrogation has gone nowhere, there is a phrase occasionally spoken among older hunters:

“Bring out the Candelabro.”

Experienced vampires who have heard those words before rarely require the spell to actually be cast.