From Know Your Kindred
Know Your Kindred – Lazarus James
Name: Lazarus James (aka Father Iago)
Clan: Malkavian
Generation: 6th
Embrace: 1077
Iago was the personal priest to the demanding and brutal Countess Matilde of Tuscany. Iago was also a devout follower of Pope Gregory VII, even though he rarely agreed with the Pope’s decisions on matters of state. This all came to a head when the Pope excommunicated Henry IV, the Holy Roman Emperor.
Iago found that the Pope had Henry thrown out of his castle, standing barefoot in the freezing snow. Iago believed what the Pope and the Countess were doing was very wrong. He pleaded that Henry be allowed back in, but now he was beginning to see what kind of a man the Pope really was.
At sun set, a very pale man, who was an advisor to the Pope arrived and suggested Henry remain outside until he died from pneumonia. This idea shook Iago to his core and he stood up to denounce this advisor’s idea, making a well reasoned and moving speech about Christian charity that convinced the Pope to rescind the excommunication.
After Henry was allowed inside and back into his chambers, Iago stopped by his room to kiss his ring and wish him luck. Then as Iago left the room, he saw a swirl of cloth in the corner of his eye and everything went black.
Iago awoke with the Countess standing over him, screaming and telling him what a disgrace he was to the church. Iago didn’t feel right, there was a terrible hunger in his belly and a gnawing ache in his mouth. Before he knew it, he lunged at the Countess and sang his newly sharpened teeth into her neck. Somehow Iago got a grip on himself, dropping the Countess in horror and fleeing the castle to the far reaches of the Earth.
Iago tried to remain the man he had always been, but the suffering grew extreme. With each feeding his sanity, as well as his faith, diminished a little more. Somewhere along the way he changed his name from Iago to Lazarus after his madness overwhelmed him.
Lazarus never stopped traveling, preaching a blasphemous sermon of pure Christian heresy, shocking many in the religious community. It is said he even had a run-in with Jerry Falwell.
Usually Lazarus shows up in New Orleans for Mardi Gras, where the socially dysfunctional of Kindred and Kine wait for his arrival, anticipating each year’s spectacle. One year he preached from a float, covered in black roses, scantly clad women and three crosses with what appeared to have real people nailed to them.
The Prince of New Orleans tries to keep Lazarus from attracting too big a crowd or violating the Masquerade.
With his powers in Presence, Lazarus is able to convince people of things they would not normally believe – their friends are their enemies, their children hate them, etc. But he rarely does it, not wanting to bring too much attention to himself.
Lazarus is a tall, angular man with shaggy blond hair and blue eyes. He is skinny and pale, dressing predominately in black with lots of silver jewelry. He makes his haven in monasteries around the world.
– Source: New Orleans By Night, pg. 58-59
Know Your Kindred – Ankh-sen-Sutekh
Name: Ankh-sen-Sutekh
Clan: Followers of Set
Generation; 8th
Embrace: 1315
Ankh-sen-Sutekh (literally meaning “She-Lives-For-Sutekh”) is a highly skilled sorceress for hire.
Having devoted her existence to exposing the flaws of civilization and bringing about the return of Set, Ankh-sen-Sutekh operates out of Alexandria, selling her magical talents to the highest bidder. She used the money, boons and contacts from her mercenary work to help create a network of spies and assassins, spanning the entire Mediterranean.
In life, she was originally a slave working in one of the great temples of Set. Ankh-sen-Sutekh was destined to be just another blood doll until her sire recognized her potential and Embraced her.
She spent the first part of her unlife studying Setite teachings: that civilization was a tool of Osiris against Set. That all Setites must strive towards destroying civilization and awakening their dark god. In addition, Ankh-sen-Sutekh was tutored in the Akhu style of religious magic practiced by her clan.
Ankh-sen-Sutekh is a small woman with black hair and intense eyes. She dresses more conservatively, unless she is involved in her magic, in which case she dresses like an Egyptian priestess of old. Despite her small size, she radiates an almost palpable aura of power.
– Source: The Red Sign, pg 24, 102
Know Your Kindred – Hazimel
Name: Hazimel
Clan: Ravnos
Generation: 4th
Embraced: ?
Legend says Hazimel was a stone mason, who ruled much of pre-historic India. He extended his domain by bestowing his Eye upon a succession of rulers in exchange for their loyalty. Today Hazimel’s existence is more myth than reality, but his Eye – the evil eye of Gypsy folklore – resurfaced in the midst of the Sabbat assault on Atlanta in 1999.
According to the Ravnos Khalil, Hazimel had sent his own eye out from his tomb. While he slept, he was still connected to his Eye, being able to see all that it saw. Eventually, the Eye was hidden in a statue, that wound up on display in the home of the Toreador Victoria Ash in Atlanta.
When the Sabbat assaulted Atlanta, the Eye was discovered and obtained by a vampire named Leopold, who lost his sanity to the Eye’s influence. Leopold replaced one of his own eyes with Hazimel’s and a terrible power flowed through his body.
With the Eye, Leopold began to create a horrific masterwork of flesh and stone in the Adirondack Mountains. A Gangrel war band was sent after him, but Leopold destroyed nearly all of them. Only the Gangrel Justicar, Xaviar, survived. He called Leopold a sign of Gehenna, the vampiric End Times, and pulled his clan out of the Camarilla when the war council in Baltimore refused to support his assertion.
Eventually, Leopold was killed and the Eye came into the possession of the Setite scholar, Hesha Ruhadze, who through an enchanted gemstone could telepathically connect to the Eye in the hopes to better understand the artifact’s true nature.
But before Hesha could delve too deeply into studying the Eye, a Sabbat war party lead by the Tzimisce methuselah, Lambach, stole the Eye. Lambach used the power of the Eye to create an army of vampire shock troops. The Eye horribly changed Lambach’s physical form, becoming unrecognizable.
Lambach and his forces were destroyed in Los Angeles after Ambrogino Giovanni and his clan’s most powerful necromancers performed a ritual that pulled the souls of Lambach and his troops out of their bodies.
What happened to Hazimel’s Eye after that is anyone’s guess…
– Sources: The Clan Novel Saga, The Eye of Hazimel Storyline 2002, Lambach’s Legion Storyline 2003.
Know Your Kindred – Cristos Mantigo
Name: Cristos Mantigo
Clan: Toreador antitribu
Generation: 10th
Embraced: 1924
Cristos was a photographer, who could not get over the battlefield horrors he had witnessed during World War I. No longer happy with his life in Spain, Cristos moved to the United States with his wife and infant son.
But America was not the land of opportunity Cristos had hoped. His wife and son died of pneumonia shortly after their arrival and Cristos found himself working 14 hours a day in a sweatshop, earning next to nothing. The Sabbat’s visit was a godsend.
Surviving his first War Party against a Ventrue elder, Cristos proved to be a good recruit, escaping with most of the elder’s valuables in hand. Ever since then Cristos has been collecting wealth, as well as publishing several successful photography books under different surnames.
The Last Light is a nightclub Cristos opened. He uses it as his haven, an income generator and a place where he can select his next meal.
Cristos likes to carry two Glock 17 pistols and a camera. But under his gruff exterior is the soul of a man who loves people and likes to surround himself with mortals. They still have more life in them than any vampire he’s ever met.
Cristos still has guilt over his family’s death and has secretly taken up charity work, helping new immigrants.
– Source: Guide to the Sabbat (1st Ed.), pg 94-95.
Know Your Kindred – Harry Reese
Name: Harry Reese
Clan: Gangrel antitribu
Generation: 8th
Embraced: Late 20th Century
Harry Reese was a husband and father whose life was forever changed while on vacation. His family was attacked in their car by a Sabbat pack called The Dead Gypsies. The Gypsies needed more recruits for a fight they were about to have with a rival pack and Harry, his wife and their 17 year old son were Embraced and given the Creation Rite, but it would only be Harry who emerged from the ground.
It was a year before Harry was finally accepted as a True Sabbat. But Harry proved himself to be a skilled warrior, planner and diplomat. He almost saw his Final Death during the Sabbat Civil War and was glad to see the war end. But the Gypsies’ leader still wanted to continue the fighting, despite the peace. Harry challenged him to a duel under Monomacy and won – making him the new pack leader. Now he seeks to bolster the sect’s power and influence and has even joined the Black Hand to help in any way he can.
Harry looks to be about 45 years old. He carries a sawed-off shotgun with silver bullets, a bulletproof vest and drives a 1949 Indian Chief in mint condition.
– Source: Guide to the Sabbat (1st Ed.), pg 95-96.
Know Your Kindred – Petaniqua
Name: Petaniqua
Clan: Malkavian
Generation: 5th
Embrace: 323 AD
Petaniqua was originally known as Olympias – the mother of Alexander the Great. Born into the royal family of the Macedonian Empire, she lived a spoiled and carefree life. She delighted in the discovery of secret knowledge, which lead her to service in the cult of Cybele – a demonic Malkavian Methuselah. The religion of Cybele had a hold over Petaniqua and she eventually became Cybele’s lover and began tasting her blood.
Using the powers she gained from Cybele, Olympias raised her son Alexander to be a proud, ruthless military leader. For her success, Olympias was finally Embraced by Cybele. After Alexander assumed the throne and conquered the Persian Empire, he was wounded and later died of fever. Olympias wanted to be with her son, but Cybele refused to let Olympias go and make her son immortal.
With Alexander dead, the noble families of Greece pushed Olymias and Cybele out of the empire. They fled to Delphia where they took resident among 13 members of the True Brujah clan.
These Brujah were masters of manipulating time and at predicting the future. They claimed to have time itself imprisoned somewhere under their compound. Olymias was fascinated with their powers and soon she studied their manipulations and became a priestess, gaining a remarkable ability to see the future.
In return for their hospitality, the True Brujah asked Olympias to help them break a curse that prevented them from crossing the borders of Asia. She agreed to aid them and upon returning from her mission she found Cybele destroyed, burned to crisp by the sun and the group of True Brujah had mysteriously vanished. Olympias spent the next few centuries puzzled by this event. She wondered if the True Brujah were actually Malkavians who tricked her, but why did they kill her sire and not her? And why could she not have foreseen their plot? Olympias was afraid she was being hunted by the clan.
Olympias finally came out of the woods and joined the Sabbat. The Sabbat accepted her because of her power, chief among them, her ability to command corrupted Garou, like the Black Spiral Dancers which she used as retainers. They renamed her Petaniqua, the Black Eyes of the Wyrm.
As the Sabbat gained power and the Camarilla learned of Petaniqua and her involvement with the Lupines, the Malkavians decided to destroy her for the good of the clan. They found Petaniqua and nearly destroyed her, but a group of Black Spiral Dancers came to her aid and chased away the Malkavian intruders. Although she survived the attack, Petaniqua was so wounded she fell headlong into torpor.
It wasn’t until the mid-1960s that the Black Spiral Dancers were able to awaken her again. Petaniqua quickly reestablished herself in the new modern world as a Malkavian antitribu, eventually becoming an Inquisitor in the Sabbat. While the Path of Evil Revelations enticed her, Petaniqua found her Garou beliefs to be the real answers to her twisted spirituality. She started worshipping the Wyrm in secret ceremonies while her pack traveled through Mexico City. She is now enslaved by the Wyrm and has transferred her loyalty from Cybele to this unholy manifestation.
Petaniqua wanted to find a way to gain entry into the Camarilla and redeem herself with her own clan. She discovered that there was a member of the Red List in her own Sabbat pack. She quickly stacked him and brought him to the Camarilla to claim the Trophy. But the Malkavians remembered Petaniqua and urged the other clans to destroy her. Petaniqua managed to escaped into the wilderness with now both the Camarilla and the Sabbat chasing after her.
Now Petaniqua has forsaken vampire society and spends most of her time among the corrupted Lupines. She hopes to one day prepare them as an army to march against the Camarilla. But this is difficult as her followers are not entirely rational beings. If they were more sane her plan might well come to fruition. In the future, she hopes to assault the Masquerade. Petaniqua unequivocally believes that Gehanna is a myth to give the Camarilla control and the Sabbat a cause.
The Malkavians want her more than any other clan, dead or alive. The Gangrel fear her because of the hold she has over werewolves. The Lupines are just now beginning to learn about her, although most do not consider her a great danger.
But Petaniqua is a convenient scapegoat for the crimes committed by Camarilla elders, when they need to shift blame to someone else. Some quietly suggest the Justicars have been ordered to pull back from pursuing her in order to maintain this “safety net” of blame. A few say there is an even more sinister purpose for slowing the pursuit.
Rumors persist that she is either a Black Spiral Dancer or a Follwer of Set. Because of the taint she carries, Garou can detect her over great distances, but because she has only been awake for the last 30 years, the Garou don’t yet realize the threat she poses.
Her skills in Auspex allow her to peer into the spirit plane of the Umbra. And she can use her Dementation to give targets derangements and turn them into cold blooded killers.
Petaniqua moves like a queen, as if she owns everything. She cannot rest unless she controls her environment. Not being able to do so causes her to go into a rage. Lately, she has been having dreams of a world in flames – and saw herself fanning these flames. She also saw ancient vampires rising from the graves she dug up. Petaniqua has no idea what these visions mean, but she knows better than to dismiss them.
Petaniqua has black hair and lovely purple-hued eyes. She dresses like a shaman, with rattlesnake skulls, rattles and bird bones attached to her clothing like ornaments.
– Source: Kindred Most Wanted, pg 80-85.
Know Your Kindred – Mary the Black
Name: Mary the Black
Clan: Baali
Generation: 6th (Previously 7th)
Embraced: ~1700 B.C.
Mary was originally known as Ma-ri, a beautiful girl who was the daughter of a local ward boss in the city of Ebla. Ma-ri became a loyal disciple to a Toreador named Mi-ka-il (aka Michael). In return for her service, Mi-ka-il gave Ma-ri his blood to drink, keeping her forever young as a ghoul for many years.
Eventually Ebla was assaulted by the Akkadians and Mi-ka-il fled the city, leaving Ma-ri alone. As the city was under attack, Ma-ri spent her last days writing her life story on clay tablets, inscribing her history, knowledge and newfound hatred for her master. As the invaders entered, Ma-ri gutted herself with her sword, spilling her blood on the tablets.
The fires from the burning city baked the tablets, preserving them. They were lost during the invasion, but were rediscovered in Ma-ri’s unearthed home three centuries later. The tablets were scattered across the lands. Finally, a Baali servant discovered some of them and took them to his master, Anaduk.
Anaduk discovered the tablets held more than just words, but also Ma-ri’s memories. Using his Auspex, Anaduk sank deep into Ma-ri’s passion and hate. He fell madly in love with her and wanted desperately to find a way to bring her back to life. He made a deal with his demon master, Anoster, who in return for Anaduk’s remaining soul sent Anaduk a succubus who could consume the tablets and become the product of whatever was contained in them.
The tablets were incomplete and Ma-ri was only partially recreated, full of disjointed and partial memories and corrupted by hate. She slew Anaduk upon awaking and gorged on his blood, becoming a Baali in the process. She fled into the night, searching for the other missing tablets.
Down the centuries Ma-ri had remarkable success locating all the lost tablets along with the sword she used to commit suicide with. In 1204 A.D. Mary the Black, as she was now known, discovered the whereabouts of Mi-ka-il and diabolized him.
Mary turned her attention to overthrowing her demoic keeper, Anoster. Anoster was a member of the Decani, a group of 36 disease-ridden demons who are typically the masters of individual Baali. By the 18th century, Mary amassed enough power and demon allies to usurp Anoster and become a full-fledge member of the Decani.
Mary is a young woman of 15, her eyes are rimmed with red flames, her skin is pitch black and though she appears burnt, her visage betrays no blemish or damage. She conceals her sinister appearance under a dark hood.
– Sources: Constantinople by Night, pg 87-88, Clanbook: Baali, pg 67-68
Know Your Kindred – Paolo Sardenzo
Name: Paolo Sardenzo
Clan: Giovanni
Generation: 8th
Embraced: 1867
Paolo Sardenzo is a Giovanni on his mother’s side. Ghouled in 1821, Paolo proved to be a very good diplomat for the family, using his skills to negotiate power between the Sabbat and Camarilla for influence over the Italian peninsula. Paolo’s reward for his extraordinary service was the Embrace in 1867.
Between 1866 and 1914, Paolo brokered many fruitful deals with other Kindred clans. He showed his aptitude for Necromancy was as great as his aptitude for politics.
During the first World War, Paolo was fascinated by modern warfare and was aggressively harvesting new shades from the dead in the battlefields. His success gained him many followers until a shell landed too close to his haven and his crypt was exposed to sun light. Paolo survived by burrowing into the ground, but his left arm and left side of his face were forever scarred.
A group of war-dead wraiths, calling themselves the Bloody Legion, rose up and rebelled against Paolo and the Giovanni. Eventually the Bloody Legion was put to an end, but not before they dealt Paolo a series of defeats – humiliating him infront of the family.
Out of favor with the Giovanni, Paolo was now a family outcast and unable to find anyone willing to partner with him, so he skulked across Europe for many years.
Finally when World War II started, Paolo hoped to use this opportunity to regain his place in the family. He traveled to eastern Germany, hoping to harvest the souls of the dead during the Russian campaign, but things ended poorly for Paolo and he was staked and dragged back to Italy.
Paolo remained staked until 1985, when he was finally given a second chance. He was blood bond to Diego Giovanni. By 2000, Paolo had caught up with modern life and computers, urging his master to invest more in technology. Although the blood bond is very strong, Diego finds it harder and harder to resist relying on Paolo’s advice.
Paolo started out as a tall, dark, handsome man, but the left side of his face is now hideously scarred. He removed his left eye and replaced it with a corpse’s eye, which has festered in its socket. Observers say his left hand festers too.
Paolo has created a new combination Discipline, using Thaumaturgy and Protean, so that when he is laying in soil soaked in blood, he can absorb the blood into himself, even in torpor. Of course, blood-soaked ground isn’t terribly common, except in wartime or at the sites of atrocities.
– Source: Clanbook: Giovanni (Revised), pg 97-98
Know Your Kindred – Janey Pickman
Name: Janey Pickman
Clan: Gangrel
Generation: 8th
Embrace: Late 19th Century
Janey sought out vampires ever since she heard stories about them from her grandmother. She looked long and hard for one. When she finally found a Gangrel, she pleaded with him to let her come along on his travels. He decided to give her a chance if she could survive the battles soon to come.
Janey proved she was tough as nails in battle and was Embraced soon afterwards. She has been devoted to her bestial undead lifestyle ever since. When her sire died in combat, Janey moved on, joining the Boot Hill gang. She has never regretted the decision.
Janey is anything but soft. Her red hair and freckles might mislead you to think she’s delicate, but years of hard labor on the farm gave her corded muscles and a lean frame. Despite being undead, she still has her sun tan left over from her mortal days. She usually wears women’s clothing, but has altered her dresses to allow her easy access to her six shooters.
– Source: Tales of the Trail: Mexico, pg. 88-89
Know Your Kindred – Ezmerelda
Name: Ezmerelda
Clan: Ravnos
Generation: 4th
Embrace: Unknown
It is unknown if Ezmerelda truly exists or not, but her name has appeared throughout centuries among the Gypsies. Whether she is one woman or several borrowing the same name is unknown, but the Ravnos elders are unwilling to discount it as a mere coincidence. Some speculate she may be a childe of Ravnos himself.
She is regarded as the quintessential Gypsy heroine. And whether she is a single individual or a series of powerful Ravnos seers, her influence has nonetheless been profound.
Ezmerelda is a beautiful Gypsy woman with sparkling eyes, lustrous hair and a crescent-moon birthmark on her face. Her ways are mysterious, her history unknown, her visions powerful and her mind and wit are sharp.
– Source: Clanbook: Ravnos (1st ed), pg 68.