In the Litany of Sebek Khem, Verse 14 in Book 1 of The Testament of Shadows, it states:

“The corpse of the mortal self is the egg of the blood swan that is the word of the dragon. We are blood and flesh of the darkest of nature, the raven, the wolf, and the serpent. To these do we shift as man does take in his air, for we are one spirit!”

We must understand that in the ancient tongues the ideas of the dragon and serpent were one so that the raven and wolf express the halves of the dragon. This same symbology can be seen in the persona of Drakulya, usually misspelled as Dracula, in the form of the bat and the wolf. In both the verse and the archetype the animal forms given reflect one particular soul and serve as examples for any other soul and are not absolute forms. The earth bound predator shows the carnal aspects of the individual, the density of the spirit interacting with the mundane, while the winged animal shows the non-carnal aspects of the individual, the radiance of the individual that is not bound to space or time in the mundane. Whether called serpent, great serpent or dragon, Zmeu or Zulo the term is used to denote a nature that is not accepted as being “earthly” because it is not of humanity and has much in common with the reptilian aspect in nature. The earthly animals that express the octaves of that nature cannot be uniform because no two individuals are alike in nature.

In a book on witchcraft, magick and the Poison Path called Veneficium, we find mention of the word Upyre spelt as Uphir, defined as being Hell’s Physician, being adapted from the Turkish term for a sorcerer on page 16 of Veneficium denoting a type of sorcerer that has the secrets of medicine and dead bodies, expressing the idea of life from death. Poison and medicine are linked to the symbolism of the serpent or dragon which is also linked to immortality via alchemy under the symbolism of the Oroborus. This idea syncs with the legend that the undead carry the true secrets of alchemy which is also evocative of the serpent or draconic symbolism that is a near constant in vampyric lore and legend. This also explains the fear that a humanoid serpent race has all knowledge and power over the Earth, i.e., a fear of those with the knowledge of life and death under the dual symbolism of the serpent. The distinction between an Upyre-Uphir type of witch or sorcerer and an Ubor or living sorcerer or witch is that the Upyre is aligned with the Underworld and the serpent or dragon evoking an era before the idea of the law and the imposing of shame.

The Upyreshi are a people, often shown in mundane terms as having but not limited to RH- blood, that carry in them the atavism of the dragon or serpent which is expressed in how they interact with the world. Each Upyre is a dragon that walks as a humanoid in the skin or under the pretense of humanity but willfully choosing to be other, if not more, than human. The Upyreshi willfully align with the “darkest of nature” so in some regions some animal representations of the inner dragon will be more common than others depending on location, culture and heritage of the Upyre. In many cases in modern times the reptilian atavism of the “vampire” is reduced to being manifest in the eyes and fangs while the shifting nature of the reptile is ignored and the focus is on a death-like appearance instead. A dragon in legend can walk on two legs or four and mate with a human and can take many forms as well as knowing magick and alchemy. Is this thread of lore on the dragon not that of the vampire but without the focus on death and being dead? Are not these links between the dragon and the vampire very much the same as the descendants of the union of Belial, Lilith and the Blind Dragon as set down in the Zohar? The scales, fangs and talons of the dragon can take any form because form is a manifestation of the spirit worked through the will of the individual. Here is the truth of the blood and venom of the serpent; it is the legacy of an era before the law and the ascent of civilization.