Lasher

Lasher is a novel by Anne Rice, published in 1993 and the second in her series Lives of the Mayfair Witches. It continues the story of the Mayfair family, whose history is watched over by the Talamasca, an order that documents paranormal activity and keeps records of what it cannot explain.

The order is looking for Lasher, a being born into a body through Rowan Mayfair. Mayfair women are dying of haemorrhages, an unusual genetic anomaly has been found in Rowan and Michael, and Lasher is another species altogether, which makes him an incalculable threat to the family rather than just to the individuals he chooses.

Rowan and Lasher travel together to Houston, where she becomes pregnant with another creature of his kind, a Taltos, and he sets about trying to reproduce his race through other women, who cannot withstand it. Rowan escapes and is left comatose as her fully grown Taltos daughter is born, and the Mayfairs declare all-out war on Lasher while trying to bring her back to health.