Caine and the First Nights
____According
to Kindred myth, the first of their kind was Caine, the first murderer.
For his crime, Caine was cursed by God and thereby transformed into a vampire.
Exiled from his people, Caine was forced to stalk the fringes of civilization,
fearful of the sun and ravenous for blood.
____In his loneliness,
Caine came upon a mighty witch named Lilith, who had been Adam's first wife.
Lilith taught Caine how to use his blood for mighty magic (indeed, a few
heretics claim that Lilith, not Caine, was the First Vampire). Lilith taught
Caine many things, including how to use his blood to evoke mystic powers
- and how to create others of his kind.
The Second Generation and the First City
____At first
Caine refused to beget, believing it wrong to curse the world with others
of his kind. But eventually he grew lonely and brought three others into
the vampiric fold. These three in turn begat 13 more, and these voracious
monsters went among the early peoples of the world, carelessly feeding and
using mortals as puppets in their sibling feuds. Caine, outraged by this
behavior, forbade the creation of any more progeny. Gathering his childer
and grandchilder to him, Caine built a great city - the First City in the
world - and here vampires and mortals coexisted in peace.
The Antediluvians and the Clans
____It could
not last. Caine's childer squabbled for their sire's affections, and once
again the mortals were used as pawns in the feud. Finally the city was thrown
down - some say a natural disaster was the cause; others, that a spurned
childe's vengeful sorcery precipitated the cataclysm. Caine vanished into
the wastes, never to be heard from again. The three vampires of the Second
Generation likewise disappeared into the mists of legend. But Caine's 13
grandchilder, free from restraint, began breeding new vampires with abandon.
The 13 vampires became known as Antediluvians, and their childer, created
in their images, inherited the Antediluvians' magical gifts and curses.
Thus were the clans formed.
The Dark Ages
____The clans
spread across the world, sowing discord and misery. Though each successive
generation of vampires proved weaker than the last, they made up for it
with greater numbers. In the ziggurats of Babylon, in the palaces of Crete,
in the tribunals of Rome, vampires ruled as shadowy tyrants, forever using
mortals as food and unwitting soldiers. Vampire warred with vampire, clan
with clan, and thus - from the ancient rivalries of the First City - was
born the great Jyhad, which is still fought today.
____The Kindred
reached their worst excesses during the early Middle Ages. During this period,
many vampires ruled openly, smothering peasant and lord alike beneath their
nocturnal grip. The vampiric population reached unhealthy numbers, and it
seemed that the Earth would belong to the Kindred forever.
The Anarch Revolt
____Again,
it could not last. The Children of Caine, in their hubris, began to flaunt
their power flagrantly. Terrified peasants whispered of the monsters in
their midst - and the Church began to listen. The reports of a few horrified
priests spawned a frenzied Inquisition, and vengeful mortals rose up in
a tide of fire and blood. Though individually much more powerful than mortals,
even the mightiest vampires could not stand against the humans' sheer numbers;
vampire after vampire was dragged from its lair and hurled into fire or
sunlight.
____In the throes
of the Inquisition, a current of revolt gripped the Children of Caine. Younger
vampires, who were being deployed as sacrificial lambs by terrified elders,
began to rise up against their sires and masters. In Eastern Europe, a group
of vampires learned how to sever the mystic bonds through which sires controlled
their childer. Soon all of Europe seethed beneath a nocturnal revolt, as
rebellious childer threw off the yoke of their masters. Between the Inquisition
and the revolt of the vampire "anarchs," it seemed as though the
Kindred would not survive.
____And so, in
the 15th century, a council was called. Seven of the 13 clans united in
an organization called the Camarilla. With its advantage of numbers, the
Camarilla suppressed the anarchs and agreed to exist behind a great Masquerade.
____Never more shall
vampires rule openly, the lords of the Camarilla decreed. We shall hide
among the mortals, and conceal our natures from our prey, and in a few decades
the mortals will know vampires only as myths.
Thus, the Masquerade was born, and the Inquisition gradually forgot its
original target. Those anarchs who would not join the Camarilla were driven
into the wastes, from which they would later emerge as the dread Sabbat
cult. With the discovery of the New World and the dawn of science, humanity
gradually forgot about the Kindred, relegating them to the status of childhood
legends.
____But, though
hidden, vampires were still quite real. The wars of the Jyhad raged on,
though the nights of open battle were replaced by sudden ambushes and maneuvering
of human pawns. Weaving their webs throughout the ever-expanding cities,
the Kindred eschewed their previous games for more methodical but no less
deadly ones.
The Modern Nights and Gehenna
____And the
wars continued down the centuries, and continue still. The Jyhad rages as
it always has - though skyscrapers take the place of castles, machine-guns
and missiles replace swords and torches, and stock portfolios substitute
for vaults of gold, the game remains the same. Kindred battles Kindred,
clan battles clan, Camarilla battles Sabbat, as they have for eons. Vampiric
feuds begun during the nights of Charlemagne play themselves out on the
streets of New York City; an insult whispered in the court of the Sun King
may find itself answered by a corporate takeover in Sao Paolo. The ever-swelling
cities provide countless opportunities for feeding, powermongering - and
war.
____Increasingly,
vampires speak of Gehenna - the long-prophesied night of apocalypse when
the most ancient vampires, the mythical Antediluvians, will rise from their
hidden lairs to devour all the younger vampires. This Gehenna, so the Kindred
say, will presage the end of the world, as vampires and mortals alike are
consumed in an inexorable tide of blood. Some vampires strive to prevent
Gehenna, some fatalistically await it, and still others consider it a myth.
Those who believe in Gehenna, however, say that the end time comes very
soon - perhaps in a matter of years.