History: 1977 - Present
Primogen
(1977 – 1994)
In some sense of the word, Nikolas had come
full-circle. He was a nobleman
again, and he earned it through warfare – just as his father had taught him.
He held the same position his Sire had held prior to her Final Death.
He was titled and landed after so many years of wandering.
He made a decent Primogen. Nothing
spectacular. He would always be a
strategist and a warrior before he was a ruler, and while he excelled at the
former, he was average at best at the latter.
Despite that, his reputation carried him through nearly two decades of
Primogeniture – two decades that he could only be said, at best, to have
endured.
It
was not for him. Coming full circle
was not for him, remaining still was not for him, and resting on his laurels was
not for him. Perhaps he chased
success; perhaps he chased only the thrill, the exhilaration of war and
survival. No matter what, it
displeased him to think he had ended up where he began.
Life is not a circle, and for him to have looped about was, as far as he
was concerned, something of a failure.
In late 1995, he received a missive from Liandrée Mallandaine d’Icibas inviting him to Chicago. Without so much as a goodbye, he packed and left for the windy city that very same night.
Liandrée
(1995 – 1996)
In retrospect, Nikolas could have called it love.
To be sure, he was bloodbound to her, but he believed it went beyond
that. She was, after all, the first
woman to have caught his eye after his wife’s death so long ago.
She was his first brush with a world he did not understand. She was his lover and his mentor both, in many ways, and she
missed being his Sire by perhaps only a hair of possibility.
Which is why it hurt all the more when it became
evident she had betrayed him.
It unfolded over the course of a year, from the
winter of 1995 to the winter of 1996. He
would never know exactly what went on behind the scenes.
There was a wavering Prince, and there was Liandrée, hungry to be at the
heart of the politics after so many centuries at the heart of society.
There was a bullet, a stake, and a fatal knife, and
the old Prince was no more. There
were three months of near anarchy as the investigation ensued and turned up
empty. There was an ascension, a
new Prince named and accepted. Nikolas
called on her that very night to congratulate her on her victory. He found the Ventrue Primogen already in her study, and armed
guards waiting to capture him for the murder of the Prince.
When the smoke had cleared, the guards were dead, the
Ventrue Primogen so much ash on the floor, and his gun was at Liandrée’s
temple.
Who else thinks I killed the Prince, he asked.
No one, she said.
He cocked the hammer.
Stop, she said.
Stop. The Tremere Primogen.
Call him, he said. Admit you did
it.
Nikolas, she said, don’t do this.
Remember the Rhine. Remember
the night we –
The phone, he said. Make the call.
She called.
I remember, he said after she had hung up.
I remember everything.
He pulled the trigger. She didn’t make a sound.
He shot her three more times, each unerring to the head, before his
fingers could do no more and the gun dropped to the ground. He
fell to his knees and wept like a child
Afterwards, he left her out for the sun.
Mercenary (1996 – Present)
Since then, Nikolas has existed only at the fringes of Camarilla society. He has no trust left in the Sect, and remains only nominally a member. Indeed, he has barely any trust left in anyone, period. He lives hard and fast because if enough things were happening at once, he wouldn’t have time to feel the pain. Cold, edgy, caustic and callous, he looks out for himself first and only. Caring for another is inviting disaster.
Nonetheless, he does still serve his Sect in a way. His combat prowess is undeniable, and though he no longer lends his mind to the Camarilla, he does his gun. He is a mercenary: his services go to the highest bidder, and the prices are more likely than not too high for all but the elders and the desperate to afford. For a price, he burns, bombs, maims, destroys and kills. Though his profession is not widely known, it is not a complete secret. Perhaps the only reason he has not yet brought the full weight of the Camarilla’s wrath down upon himself is because the ones who would punish him are also the ones who hire him – and because no matter what, he has not yet given his services to the enemy Sect.
But every night, Nikolas grows a little more distant from the Camarilla, a little less fond of the games they play. Every night, he grows a little closer to something else, and whether that will be Anarch, Autark, or the dread Sabbat remains, still, to be seen.