Leon Namwroth

History

Leon did not dream.. He remembered, and as he slept his mind recounted the fated day the Phoenican soldiers came for him in the year 508 BC, in his tent five miles north west outside of Carthage to accuse him of murdering Hasdrubal, son in law of Hamilcar the great. It was known that Hasdrubal was an even abler statesman than Hamilcar himself, who left behind also a son, the boy who would become the mighty Hannibal. Leon had been mortal yet, 20 years old and an Egyptian priest who was widely known as a soothsayer. Namwroth was at a table playing mancala with Girardus of Caistor, using gold in place of stones, and Gabriel was winning his share at the table. Between them they drank drams of strong port, and were quite heady with drink when they heard the horses thundering towards the tent. Leon had been an advisor to Hasdrubal, in matters of state and not war, and it had become known that Leon, known as Harhoteph Namwroth then, kept company with the Roman Legionair Girardus- now better known as Gabriel. It had been by Leon's diplomacy a treaty between Rome and Carthage had been attained, which on that fated night would end and lead to hundreds of years of carnage between Rome and Carthage. The Phoenican warriors surrounded the tent, and six entered to present arms and charge Namwroth with the murder of Hasdrubal, who Leon was fond of as a brother, and when Girardus laughed, knowing better of Namwroth where his brotherhood was given, whether to a mortal or not, he stood and asked at what time this murder took place. The leader of the corp announced that the assassination was fresh and had occured within two shadows of the dial (two hours) at what time Gabriel assured them Leon had been with him gambling and drinking for four hours, and that he was innocent, which was the truth. The soldier announced that his testimony would be 'considered' in trial and moved to take Leon, at what time, Garbriel's gleaming sword hissed from its scabbard, and he brought the tent down around them all, and he and Leon both scrambled out from beneath the carpets and Leon drawing his own scimitar, jerked a soldier off a horse and mounted it, Gabriel also seizing a horse by slaying its rider. The two broke free of the rabble, masacring those who charged them, and rode hard north into the desert away from the sea, another corp joining the eighty-two still living in pursuit of them. Leon feared for his friend whose courage sometimes bordered madness and led him through a canyon and into a little known cave, there to hide until the soldiers were well out of range, the two seeming to have vanished and somehow slipped away to evade the many soldiers. The treaty ended that night, and a hunt was called on Leon who Gabriel parted from an hour before dusk, saying the caves were a bad place to be during the night, and welcomed Leon to ride back to his army's camp with him. Leon wished no more trouble on his friend's back and told him he would ride back into his homeland of Egypt and make his home in the desert tombs of his kin, which descended deep beneath the sands. Gabriel wished him well and rode back to his camp, minus only his better horse and the gold both had left on the mancala stone. Leon had been played as a scapegoat, blamed for the murder of a king's successor and would be hunted a thousand years.

Gabriel met Leon again when he had journeyed to Bagdad five years later in the year 503 BC, He will have found that Leon had been Sired three years past in the year 506 BC, two years after the night he had been accused of the murder of Hasdrubal, and by many he was blamed for wars all the years after brung on Carthage out of Rome, despite the fact nothing could have saved Carthage from war with the Romans forever. Leon's Sire Eziekial had known Harhoteph as a mortal, although his un-life was a well kept secret. He was opposed to mortals knowing freely of their kind and thus was he pit against the city of Carthage whose leaders sought to unite mortals and blood kindred to strengthen their forces against the Romans. Eziekial had sought Girardus out who it was said was in Harhoteph's company the night his seizure was attempted, and went to the notorious Legionaire's camp to meet with him only months after their escape from the Phoenican soldiers. Eziekial inquired after Namwroth's guilt or innocence and knowing Girardus's word was gold under pledge of truth, believed his account of what had happened. The elder then sought Leon out, and found him in an old palacial tomb, already living a night stalker's hours in hiding. He sired him a month after finding him on the new year of 506 BC. All the while Leon was hunted, Ezeikial mentored him in the powers of his blood, and offered him his protection, Gabriel alone knowing where Leon resided in hiding. Leon lost his Sire in the year 501 BC, killed by an antideluvian named Proximo who had fled Carthage when the seperation between the mortals and kindred blood had began. It had been discovered by the high Elder that Eziekial had Sired Namwroth, who was blamed also for the seperation of the Utopian clan. Leon Sired his first Progeny Malakor in the year 23 BC.

For a thousand years Leon was hunted, and fought beside Gabriel off and on in the wars against Carthage after his Sire was killed, his rage immense, until on the 500th year of strife he came across what he had been LEAD to believe was his Sire's slayer, and diablerized her, taking her power into himself. Leon then laid himself in a cold sleep having no more will to live, and slept in torpor the second five hundred years he was hunted, his grief finally overwhelming him. He stirred in the dark ages to awaken again on the eve of AD 499, still safe in that desert tomb where his first progeny Malakor with Gabriel had sealed him at his request. With the ancient voice of his blood he called to his progeny, who did not answer his call, for he had been smote by his enemies Proximo and his methuselah consort, Amanhar, two years after Leon had been placed in rest, for being the blood of Namwroth. It had been Gabriel who answered to his call, after a month of calling out to his blood son, and to Gabriel when Malakor did not answer his call. He had laid down in grief and awoken in grief to hear of his progeny's death. ### He would not Sire again until the year 1802, when he killed his own blood son Kassal to bring him into his vampiric birth.
It had been in the year 700 AD Leon last had the honor of Gabriel's good company, on another fated night when Gabriel had come to him, and warned him that the vampire who sought Leon's allegiance was not to be trusted. Gabriel's last words to Namwroth had been, "I shall slay the villain if I get the chance." Leon had thanked him for his warning, and vowed he would stay away from the Vulcan vampire, for Leon did not trust him either, and had wanted nothing to do with what he had offered. Gabriel had not departed two hours when Valaeros had seized Namwroth by force, and so began Leon's second greatest ordeal on earth.

Valaeros had been unable to break Leon of his unwillingness to serve him on his own terms. The desert blood, three generations removed from the Vulcan anteduluvian, simply did not agree with his methods not was he of a mind to be a part of his clan and concepts. Valaeros imprisoned him, and held Leon two years in torture, privation and the worst indignations imaginable, including commanding the rape of the vampire's long suffered sexual abstinence, a virginity the vampire priest had clung to for 1231 years until Valaeros Vulcan had taken it from him with a cold hearted command to five of his retainers. Leon escaped and fled back to Egypt, Arabia, and began to deal in stolen art and artifacts he collected from grave robbers and stole from private collectors, to preserve them in his secret Haven beneath the dunes in the Valley of the Dead. His love of the trade grew, as did his collection with his studies of the archane and history. 998 years later, in 1700 AD, Valaeros caught up to Leon again to discover he had a Haven Leon had established in the mountains North of Lyons France. By this time Valaeros was threatened with the palacial mutiny of his own progeny Raif Marcus, who had grown to abhore his Sire's desire to possess all who came under his reign, and his heinous treatment of the slaves he took.

Leon was watched by the clever and patient Vulcan vampire, and it was known by him when Leon fell in love and married a mortal female in the year 1776 named Aeshah met in France but who was of Arabic kin. In 1778, two years later, she gave birth to a child which divorced Leon's faith in her in heart break. The child was his but he could not believe it where blood kindred could not bear children, he unaware of the blessing of Tawret which his blood possessed. He came and went regardless, providing for the child his mother named Kassal, and when the child turned three, Valaeros came on a new moon to capture Leon using powerful necromantic commands. Five years of torture and emotional torment finally broke down the Elder's will to what point Valaeros' powers of domination could enslave his will. Leon's will ceased to be his by bond of blood and chains of dark necromancy. The cruelty stopped, and through 8 years of loyal service, regardless of whether it was forced, Leon earned rank, title, the clan osirian ankh, and respect under Valaeros, who reigned over the Vulcan mountains large Territory in Romania. He grew close in that interum to Valaeros' progeny Beornagh Lionguard, Vassel Vulcan and Raif Marcus and in the year 1794 Leon was sent to France to reclaim his child Kassal, with a command to kill his beloved wife Aeshah. He could not refuse where his will was so utterly dominated, but wept a river of crimson tears even as he slew her and as he buried her. Kassal was by then 16, and Leon slew Aeshah as Kassal slept, and he buried her outside their chateau in a grave marked by a stone Leon carved with 'Aeshah. Love binds us always, even in death.' on her stone and whispered with breath bated by sobs.."Forgive me.. I did not know.. forgive me." She had never lied to him, Kassal was his son.

Leon had lived those six years in the chateau with his son, grooming him, confessing what he was to him, letting him adapt to the fact his father was a vampire, and on the eve of Kassal's 24th birthday, Leon Namwroth sired his son to damn him for all eternity. A week after Kassal was Sired, Leon was called on by Valaeros, who met his twice born son and was pleased by his mannerisms. Valaeros presented himself to Kassal as a fatherly figure, and brought Kassal back to Romania with Leon and named Kassal Terrence Reid, and took his memory of his real name and his childhood as a mortal from him. Terrence was brought into a clan torn by inner conflict and discontent, a power struggle between Raif Marcus and his Sire Valaeros. Leon mentored to his son Terrence regardless of the troubles, and no matter where Leon went, Egypt embraced his soul closely, and he traveled there often with his second only progeny ever. Terrence was never told his father murdered his mother. A viel of secrets hung around the Vulcan legacy. Terrence never knew his Sire was under the power of Valaeros' domination and not there by his choice. Leon and Terrence served Valaeros faithfully, Leon's loyalty forced, Terrence's loyalty genuine, for 200 years together, and yet apart, for Valaeros kept Leon very busy, and when Leon was not seeing to his duties he was mentoring Terrence in the command of his powers.

Through ordeal, diligent research, very secretive practice and with the blood of two antedeluvians imbuing him, Leon had mastered the powers of his mind, blood and soul, and reveled in that freedom bestowed to him, however brief and deceitful it may have been. His power could not save him though, and his freedom was as false as his love for Valaeros. Madness reaped havock in Palace Vulcan in the year 1994 when Raif Vulcan made his first move to take over the clan, and overpowered Leon's will to liberate him temporarily of Valaeros' dominating control over him. Raif Marcus was ever so much more than a vampire alone, his true name Azriel, an angel of death and Ascension. Free of Valaeros' possession of his soul, Leon felt all the rage caged in him all those years, and took it upon Valaeros to diablerieize him and lay his stony form to rest in a cavern deep within the carpathian mountains wilderness. He had not realize that what he had done was release the true powers within that ancient necromancer, who was so heavily imbued with necromantic magics that he was part of the dead magics himself, and in a year he made his return as an undead necromancer some called a Lich. It was with poised cunning the vampire lich made his return, his own progeny Louis DeLeon raising him from his tomb. Valaeros immediately began plotting by first making peace with Raif and repossessed Leon in secret and two years later he sent Leon to slay Raif, and Leon very nearly succeeded only for the clever death angelican vampire to narrowly escape him only to fall into Torpor with blood loss. The plotting and scheming continued between Raif and Valaeros, Valaeros always plotting in secret behind Raif's back, making promises of peace while using those he dominated against Raif. Leon claimed he had acted on his own under Valaeros' command. It all came to a head one faithful night when Raif offered Valaeros throne to him in exchange for Leon. On a dark and stormy summer night, in the year 1999, Leon was captured and given unto a devil clan of vampires in Raif's stead, who they had marked to claim. Leon spent two of three years in a cramped cell, starved, barely surviving on rats, mice and even occasional bats, and then another year in abject slavery of a most humiliating kind. That emotionless race studying vampiric emotion through Leon's suffering. Then on the night before his release, he was branded with a mark of soul possession, and released of all other powers of familiar enslavement, and returned to New Orleans on New Years Eve 2003. He was quite insane when the Prince of New Orleans himself found him wandering the streets lost and dazed. Under his care had Leon revived, and re-established himself in a short four months, two spent in recovery in Denoir's own Haven.

Now here he was faced with yet another ordeal. Doom's Day and the greatest task of his life.. Helping the father of the Cannanites come into power while becoming the leader he was destined to be. Who knew better how to survive ordeals? How to fight the inner demons of tribulation. Leon would pick him up and brush him off when he fell, but who would pick Leon up? His son Kassal.. Oh let his son who he had been reunited with, have the strength to keep Leon from failing. Let not all Harhoteph Namwroth's struggles have been for nothing. Let him give Caine the strength and knowledge to be great, and not to lose hope and his heart blacken against his own children. This was his prayer to Anubus, to Lucifer, to Thoth, to all the forces of chaos which ruled over the earths and the skies and living creatures and undead creatures.. to God. Don't let Harhoteph Namwroth fail his calling. Let us rule the earth better than the race which we sprung from. Help us Gabriel and be not against us.

The great war of kindred, where man pit himself against his superior counterparts with his modern weapons of war, with his neutron bombs, came and went, the Neutron and vampire,Old enemies began to stir in the darkness and stalk the whispers of rumor. New enemies arose out envy and covetry. Caine ruled the world now and those infidels of his blood who did not redeem themselves to bow to his soverreign, were marked by his eyes.