ChilRev: Siring in "Interesting Times"

A little more of the work in progress, this time from the introduction that looks at clan culture as it relates to Embraces in times of revolution.

Assamites

The Assamites play both sides of Revolution to the hilt. Some of their most lucrative contracts for assassination come in domains in the midst of rebellion, power struggles, or other dangerous detentes among powerful but vicious Kindred. At the same time, in domains where Assamites hold sway, the Path of Blood and the codes of Haqim make for an orderly society, at least to outsiders’ view. Internally, the Clan of Assassins is as rife with schism as any other, but the clan practices a philosophy that places common external enemies before enemies within the Assamite order itself.

The result is that most Assamites are drawn more from revolutions in the mortal world than they are in the midst of turbulent Kindred events. The Assamite Embrace is rarely one given in haste or without consideration, and many Assassin sires watch their potential childer for years if not decades before performing the act. Even when great events shake the foundation of Kindred society, the response of the Assamites is more often to vanish into the shadows and formulate a plan than to throw cannon fodder in front of the problem. This pragmatism surprises few who know the ways of the Assassins.

One notable exception colors the history of Assamite stoicism in the face of upheaval. After the Convention of Thorns, when the Assamites deliberately placed themselves outside the Camarilla, a period of open war between the Assassins’ Clan and the Ivory Tower began, and lasted for almost a decade. During this period, the Assamites performed the Embrace with uncharacteristic profligacy. To hear them tell it, they had no choice: The combined might of seven clans had been turned against them, and the only thing saving them from extinction was the ability to induct new members into Haqim’s brood. Comparatively few of the Assamites Embraced between 1493 and the early 16th century still exist, having succumbed to torpor or meeting Final Death during this wartime, but those who do survive have been tempered in the flames of the single most defining conflict in the clan’s history — which, when discussing the Assassins, speaks greatly to these vampires’ acumen, guile, and tenacity.

Lasombra

As is ever the way, those who wield power are loath to share it, and this adage is certainly true when the Lasombra are involved. The Keepers have a long and aristocratic history, and very few mortal movements culminate in the restoration of aristocracies to power, especially in these preposterously democratic modern nights. Thus, when a Lasombra aligns himself with a rebellious movement, he does so with much to gain. When a Lasombra Embraces a childe during a time of tumult, she does so in order to fortify her own position. Case in point: The Sabbat. Who would have guessed that the Keepers would be one of two nominal leaders of such a movement? But when the fire in the Kindred blood rose, the Lasombra saw their opportunity and, striking down their own leader, placed themselves at the forefront of revolutionary thought and action…

…Into which they promptly installed themselves as an aristocracy.

The Lasombra character is one of individuality and sufficiency, however, and the revolutions that call to them are much less of the bomb-tossing and beheading ilk, and much more of the kind that subtly but significantly change behavior. During the Age of Exploration, much Lasombra money, influence, and childer poured into the New World. (Even tonight, the “privateer spirit” still holds sway among certain Keepers.) When the Sabbat was on the ropes in the New World, Lasombra interests found a home for it in Mexico. Lasombra clergymen leveraged the weight of their prayers in numerous wars and schisms during the Dark Ages, and among certain Kindred historians, no small activity during the Burning Times did so as a result of Lasombra “suggestion.” Although the Keepers have no great facility with Eastern culture or philosophy, the Chinese principle of weiji has its adherents among many Lasombra seeking to sire: that crisis or instability often carries opportunity in its wake. In a clan that reveres lineage and accomplishment as much as the Lasombra do, a Cainite’s legacy may be greatly augmented by an equally meritorious childe.

And if that childe must spill blood to realize her potential, well, the Lasombra see no reason to apologize for being vampires.