There's a lover in the story
But the story's still the same
There's a lullaby for suffering
And a paradox to blame
But it's written in the scriptures
And it's not some idle claim
You want it darker?
We kill the flame

-Leonard Cohen, "You Want It Darker"

Overview

The Lasombra are faced with a seemingly impossible task: Convince the Camarilla of their honest intentions of joining and strengthening the sect.

The first action they took, unknown to Kevin Jackson or Sheriff Damien, was the purge of all historic Lasombra in or around the domain, whether or not they identified as Camarilla, Anarch, or Sabbat. Talley wanted to leave no room for insurrection or sabotage. His murderous campaign fell short of destroying the recently Embraced Araceli Rivera and the Rabbi Michalis Basaras. The former he knows nothing about; the latter he believes is under separate instructions from the Friends of the Night.

Secondly, under the Amici Noctis’ direction, Talley instructed his childer Sierra Van Burrace and Aleksandr Malenkov to impress upon the Prince they would do anything within their power to prove the clan’s intentions are true.  When the Camarilla demanded concrete proof of the Lasombra's sincerity, Malenkov - once a terrifying Sabbat warlord and quite possibly still loyal to the Sword of Caine in his shadowy heart - was staked by his sire and remanded to the Justiciary.  His ultimate fate remains unknown.

Now, the clan must make every effort at diplomacy without displaying weakness. They must show respect without groveling. They must impress without appearing monstrous.

Bane - A Shadow of What You Used to Be: Reflections and recorded images of the Lasombra don't... work right.  It's not that they don't show up, it's that they're... wrong.  They blur, or flicker in and out, or warp.  It's like the world isn't sure whether the Magister is there or not.  Most people will attribute this to irregularities in a reflective surface or a glitch or recording error, but those familiar with de la Sombra know what to look for.  Using any technology that involves a camera image of the Lasombra, microphone or touch-pad or screen (so any telephone or tablet and the control consoles of many modern automobiles) requires a Technology test at Difficulty 2 + Bane Severity for the Magister to be able to use it.  Lasombra can still use a computer just fine, as long as it's got a manual keyboard and mouse.  This makes Lasombra especially vulnerable to the detection tools used by hunter groups like FIRSTLIGHT - avoiding these systems is penalized equal to the Lasombra's Bane Severity.  A Personal Assistant is considered a must-have tool by most Magisters for just this reason.

Compulsion - Deal in their Mother to get into Paradise: Lasombra are ruthless people.  They hate being embarassed and they hate losing, and anyone who crosses one up will find that the Magister will just keep raising the stakes until they either win or something else gives.  Whether it be an argument or a chess match or a sword fight, they just cannot drop it until they think they've won.  Whatever that means.  When this Compulsion triggers, the next time the Lasombra fails any action they receive a two-dice penalty to any and all rolls until a future attempt at the same action succeeds, or the scene ends.  This penalty applies to future attempts at the triggering action.

--

The Sabbat lies in ruins, and the Magisters have turned their back on the sect they created.  Even those who hated and feared the Sabbat most call the Clan of Night "traitors" and "turncoats".   The Ventrue merely smirk and quietly muse that in the end the best the Lasombra could do wasn't good enough, even for them.

In the Camarilla, the Lasombra are feared and hated.  They aren't respected - yet.  But as Machiavelli said, it is better to be feared than loved, if one cannot be both.  And the Camarilla needs the Lasombra.  It needs their ability to pull strings while hidden.  It needs their physical and occult might to stand off the Anarchs and crush the remnants of the Sabbat before they can re-organize.  And being needed?  That's all the Lasombra really need in order to make themselves at home in the Ivory Tower.

Every Lasombra is a refugee, their admittance to the Camarilla bought at a high price as they walk a fine line of pleasing Princes who would love to throw egg on the face of the famously arrogant Magisters.  But Lasombra don't grovel and they don't cower - they bear abuses with dignity as they rack up boons and favors and build connections.   Vengeance will wait for another night, when their position in the Camarilla is secure and their alliances are strong.  And on that night, they will make some fools famous.  But sequence and order, timing and stress, as they say.

The clan organization of the Lasombra now tends to fall under traditional sire-childe or elder-younger relationships, with many Lasombra specifically operating in a domain at the behest of a senior member of the clan.  The Lasombra toe the line because they know that the Amici Noctis sit above them in shadow, watching the Magisters from the dark.

Occasionally the Lasombra are called upon to deal with the intractable Tzimisce, either because they are believed to know the capabilities of the Dracul better than others, or because their past associations might give a Lasombra leverage to sway the legendarily stubborn creatures.  In truth, the alliance between the Lasombra and Tzimisce has completely collapsed.  The Lasombra view the Tzimisce as unwilling or unable to see both the necessity and the opportunity that led the Magisters to the Camarilla - though they do note with some satisfaction that shedding the Sabbat has allowed the Draculs to regain a portion of their traditional hoary grandeur.  If the Sabbat was dragging both clans down, that lends weight to the Magisters making the right decision.  Associations between Draculs and Magisters tend to the personal in the Modern Nights, such as former packmates who might be lovers, vicious rivals, or both.

Lasombra SPCs of note:

• Sierra van Burrace, speaker for la Sombra to the Court of Chicago

• Rabbi Michalis Basaras, eminent Abyss Mystic

• Talley, traveling emissary of the Amici Noctis

• Braden White, hungry social-climbing shark

• Araceli "Celia" Rivera, elusive Shadow

The Anarchs:

Some Magisters, especially the very young, or those who simply find the idea of cozying up to Ventrue and Toreador too abhorrent, have instead joined the Anarchs.  Here they still deal with endemic mistrust, for their presence brings whispers of the Sabbat that spread like, well, a shadow.  But the Anarchs need Kindred with the affinities and powers the Lasombra bring to bear, and so there is a place for the Magisters in the Movement - though such Lasombra exist in existential terror of the Amici Noctis deciding they need to be culled - or worse, that their services are required.

The Camarilla:

The Lasombra seek to capture the vacant chair in the Inner Circle once held by the Brujah.  The price has been high - the Magisters have been forced to destroy elders of their clan, forced to hand others over to the Justicars to answer for the Sabbat's crimes, forced to hunt and stake other Sabbat elders, all for the price of safety and admission to the Camarilla.  The Lasombra pay the price without flinching.   The Amici Noctis have weighed the costs and determined that joining the Camarilla is to be the clan's course of action, and so it will be.  Once they've joined the Camarilla, the Lasombra go out of their way to be dignified, helpful members of a city's court, placing themselves above scurrilous gossip and petty politics - or appearing to place themselves above such things, in any event. 

The Sabbat:

A significant number of Lasombra vampires remained part of the Sabbat - those most fervent in their debased faith or divorced from the traditional hierarchy of the clan.  These Lasombra antitribu are now called "Los Vacios" - the Empty Ones - by their clanmates.  They are hungry shadows without substance, majesty or dignity, flickering and dancing in the firelight - dangerous thanks to their Lasombra blood, but pathetic and contemptible as vampires.  The Eldest's childer did not drag him off his dark throne and devour him so his descendants could aspire to nothing but undignified, violent clowning.  Los Vacios retain the old hatred for their renunciate clanmates, especially those who join the Camarilla.

The Amici Noctis: 

The Friends of the Night, a semi-secret society within the Lasombra that governs the clan, determining its course and overseeing the Courts of Blood - thus giving it control of how the Lasombra settle internal disputes.  While membership in the Amici Noctis is never stated outright, most Lasombra assume that the most famous and influential members of the clan are Friends of the Night- a safe bet to make.   The Amici Noctis's power had waned a bit when the Lasombra were fully invested in the Sabbat, but they have returned to their old prominence now that the Sabbat has collapsed.  

Veneficis Tenebris: 

Singular Veneficius Tenebris, or in English the Abyss Mystics, the Veneficis Tenebris are Lasombra who delve beyond the clan's utilitarian use of the powers of Oblivion, delving deep into the philosophical and ritualistic aspects of the discipline to become powerful sorcerers.  Unlike the Hecata, the Abyss Mystics don't concern themselves overly much with "death" as a philosophical concept or even a natural process - their focus is on a pure study of and communion with the Abyss.  Veneficis Tenebris tend to organize in Master-Apprentice relationships, or more rarely in small cabals, though in truth nothing stops any Lasombra who wants to delve deeper into the secrets of Oblivion from doing so and joining the ranks of the Veneficis Tenebris.

Most Lasombra don't bother learning a single Oblivion ceremony, or only pick up knowledge of one or two especially useful ones.  Astute observers muse that the Lasombra almost seem afraid of the powers they wield, but never when they know a Magister is within earshot.

The Cult of Shalim:

These nihilists don't have a significant enough presence to establish a full-fledged cult of their own in Chicago yet, but they do have one significant practitioner, the Venificis Tenebris and Priest of Shalim, Rabbi Michalis Basaras.  Basaras, being a true nihilist, doesn't see the point in constructing a cult to venerate Shalim, especially since it might draw unwanted attention from the Amici Noctis, but that doesn't mean other Shalimites won't float along and connect to him like flotsam, and he doesn't turn away those who wish to wash away their hopes in the flowing darkness of the Abyss; there would be no point to that, either.  Of course, Basalis's rabbinic teachings are all based in Shalimite doctrine, as he seeks to subtly teach his flock that existence is pointless and must be destroyed.  A Shalimite cult may well accrete around him based on simple spiritual inertia.  Wouldn't that be fine?

Lexicon:

Abyss Mystic: A Lasombra who delves into the deeper ceremonies of Oblivion, often with connotations of studying and communing with the Abyss itself.  The proper title for such a Lasombra is Veneficus Tenebris.

al-Zilaal: "The Shadow."  The Arabic name for the Lasombra. 

Amici Noctis: The Friends of the Night.  The internal cabal that governs the clan and oversees the Courts of Blood.

de la Sombra or las Sombras: The clan's proper name in Spanish.  "the Shadows" or "of the Shadows."  Corrupted to "Lasombra" in English.  See Umbrae and al Zilaal.

Courts of Blood: Internal tribunals convened to settle disputes between Lasombra based on the law of fortissimum sit superstes - "let the strongest survive."

Keeper: A nickname for the clan that arose after the Anarch Revolt.  A sly poke at the Lasombra's religious posturing and murderous tendencies derived from Genesis 4:9 - "Am I my brother's keeper?"  Still in use, often in a derogatory way.

The King of Shadows: The most common term for the Lasombra Antediluvian.  Diablerized by his childe Gratiano de Veronese.

Lasombra: An English corruption of the clan's Spanish name.  Has entered into common use, though more traditional Magisters find it pidgin and see it as a disrespectful diminutive encouraged by the Ventrue (and they're right).

Los Vacios: "The Empty Ones." A term the Lasombra use for their antitribu in the Sabbat.  

Magister:  An old-form nickname for a Lasombra derived from their tendency to assume legalist, advisory positions in courts outside their clan heartlands.  Fell out of vogue after the Anarch Revolt, but recently came back into vogue as the Lasombra join the Camarilla.

Night Clan, the: A nickname for the Lasombra as a whole, derived from Noddist scripture.

Obtenebration: "To darken" - a term the Lasombra use for the practice of the discipline of Oblivion.

Ramanga: Madgasacaran.  A name used by the Lasombra Abyss Mystics of Africa.

Shadow: A more modern nickname for the Lasombra, usually derogatory, indicating a dark mien and lack of substance.

Shalim: A Canaanite god of Dusk.  Used by some Lasombra cultists as the name for the embodied Abyss.

Titlacauan: A Lasombra (probably) Drowned lineage that uses Oblivion to manipulate reflections and reflective surfaces.

Traitor/Turncoat: Perjorative, nicknames stemming from how quick the Lasombra were to abandon the sect they built.  Used by all sides in the Jyhad.

Umbrae: The clan's name in Latin.  Translates simply to "Shadows."

Veneficus Tenebris: Literally "Dark Wizard." Plural Veneficis Tenebris.  The old-form (and correct) title for a Lasombra Abyss Mystic.

Xi Dundu: Vili (Central African), "The Shadow."  A name used by the Lasombra of the Laibon courts of Africa.  Usually denotes those more sociopolitically motivated Lasombra of central and Western Africa.  See also Ramanga.

Short Fiction: "Alpha and Omega"

His name was Kevin.  Kevin.  His hair was dark gold at the root but perpetually ashy at the tips - he'd frosted it before his embrace.  The accents were long-gone but the bleaching, that was forever.  Kevin was a Ventrue, brought over because he had "good blood" and when his father had died he'd inherited a stake in a lucrative business venture his Sire had wanted before it all went up Kevin's nose.

Kevin hadn't gone hungry a day in his life, Pablo thought.  Or after. 

"Look out,"  Kevin said, elbowing the Kindred standing nearest to him - a Toreador?  Pablo wasn't sure.  He liked the eye makeup and the lipstick but her taste in men, that was dubious.  "He's ex-Sabbat.  A stone-cold killer.  Except now, he's leashed and muzzled.  I heard he had to turn in his entire pack to gain admittance to the Camarilla - fucking traitor."  The Blue-Blood laughed.  And then a fraction of a beat later, so did his entourage.

Jesus.  Pablo thought.  This is what passes for friends in the Camarilla?  He remembered leaping over the fire - Throws-Stones, the Nosferatu bagman who always made sure they had a safe place to sleep, he'd once lept right through the fire, and when they hurriedly put him out the charred monster had just laughed and said "It can't make me any uglier!"  Pins, the Tzimisce tattoo artist who could ink a novel-length story on someone's body.  Needles, the Serpent of the Light who-

"You can say whatever you want to them now, and they just have to take it."  Kevin's mockery snapped Pablo out of his reverie.

The sleeve on Kevin's wrist slid up, showing a Kanji character on his wrist.  Underneath Pablo's crisp navy suit (it got a few raised eyebrows, but it suited his complexion better than black, and this was a new night), old tattoos itched up and down his arms.  Some of the itches were just memory - Pins had coaxed that ink out of his skin, the day they chose to Walk Out - the night Pablo's Pack had chosen him over the Sabbat - but the ones he'd had as a mortal, the ones he'd gotten on the streets of Ciudad Juarez, those stayed.  He'd earned them after all, and each one was a testimony to what earned him the big step up - being a vicious enough, clever enough hijo de puta to become la Sombra.

The Beast rose up like it was going to push itself out of Pablo's mouth, and he pushed it back down just as quickly.  Kevin wanted to make him frenzy, out here, in a parking lot, this close to Elysium.  It would fuck so many things up, and van Burrace would sink his staked ass in Lake Michigan and leave him down there where the light couldn't go until Talley got back - and then he'd wish she left him there.

"Yeah."  Pablo said.  "I do, I just have to take it."  Pablo's fingernails were digging into his palms so hard the vitae had started to well up.  The Toreador had noticed but hadn't said anything - Kevin was ignorant to it.

"Cuck."  Kevin laughed.  "Your whole clan!  At least in the Sabbat you would've been alpha losers."

Pablo bit his tongue, again hard enough to draw blood.  By now his car, a Porsche Panamera that was basic black, had pulled around.  He climbed into the back, and curled his lip at the laughter of Kevin and his hangers-on as the car pulled out.  "God damn it, what took you so long to bring the fucking car around?"  He didn't mean to be so hard on his ghoul - Felipe had had his back since before his embrace - but it had to go somewhere.

"Chicago traffic."  The ghoul Felipe said, shrugging it off.  "I see the Blue-Blood's still on you."

Pablo tried to catch his reflection in the window, but it eluded him.  "He keeps trying to get me to snap because he knows it'll embarrass Sierra.  I know he's on Son's tit.  I also know Prince Jackson doesn't like it.  Or him - he's called the Prince a 'Jig' once too often and his friends leak like a sieve."

"So what're you going to do?"  Felipe asked.  He habitually looked up into the rear-view, though he knew catching Pablo's image in it was dodgy. 

"Me?"  Pablo sprawled across the back seat, arms out.  "I'm not going to do a fucking thing.  By the way, have you fed Mauricio tonight?"

Felipe shook his head. "No."

"Good."  Pablo said, "...Damn cat fucks around less between here and there when he's hungry."

Three months later:

Kevin Herlihy wasn't bothering to pack.  There was no time to pack, not with a Blood Hunt called down on his head.  He'd tried to reach his sire to defend himself, but her majordomo had hung up on him, and then the phone was busy.  A fucking busy signal.  He tore through his belongings, desperately stuffing what he thought he'd need in a bag.  A roll of hundred-dollar bills.  A ziploc baggie full of cocaine, the blood just didn't taste good unless his prey had taken a rail bump.  A loaded pistol.  "Come on."  He held his phone up to his ear.  "Pick up!"

This number has been blocked.

He tried another.  Someone would help him get out of this.

This person is not taking voicemails.  

"So much for fucking friends!"  Kevin stuffed an extra clip into the bag - then the lights went out.  No.  The apartment went black.  The blinds were always shut, but there wasn't even a sliver of light from them.

"Fuck!"  Kevin turned to grope in the direction of the door, and then tripped over a foot stool - "Fuck!  Ow!"  Wait.  That hadn't been there before.

Then Kevin felt the knife at his neck, and the stake at his sternum.  A knee pressed into his belly.  "You know something, Pendejo,"  Pablo said, "...You were mostly right.  I was Sabbat.  I am a killer, and I killed my first man long before I became a vampire.  I think I was thirteen. "  There was a crunch and a wet gurgle as Pablo put his weight into the stake and pushed it up through Kevin Herlihy's heart.  "There've been so many, it's hard to remember. ...But in the Sabbat, I was a member of a group called the Order of St. Blaise.  A King of Shadows.  I'm sure you don't know what that means, so I'll educate you.  The Order of St. Blaise were the Sabbat cleanup crew.  We kept the Masquerade for entire packs that had no idea how to keep it for themselves.  I cleaned up masquerade breaches, bad ones, every fucking night.  And I never even got thanked for it.  But it did make me really good at fabricating stories.  You know, useful fictions."

Pablo stood up.  "...There is one other thing you got wrong.  I never sold out my Pack.  I couldn't bring them into the Camarilla with me, and I won't fuck up them finding a place with the Anarchs, but - family is family, and it's forever."  In the dark-beyond-darkness, Pablo shook out a bodybag and unzipped it.  "Prince Jackson or Damien could figure out that the evidence of you conspiring with the Anarchs was forged - even the recording - if they really cared to.  Of course, it was all forged from the Anarch side.  If they followed the chain back, they'd trace it to my old packmates, and then to me.  Even the best lie is never perfect.  But-"  Pablo bent down and began pulling the bodybag over Kevin's torpid form.  "They obviously don't care enough to bother.  Probably because you called His Majesty a monkey the night you got wasted at that party and said he can only drink banana-flavored blood that night you got wasted at the 'Cocaine Apartment.'  God, are you an imbecile."

Pablo zipped up the bag, and then he paused.  "I'm aware this could count as something of a confession.  ...But who's Prince Jackson going to choose to believe?  You, a racist burst of trust-fund jizz that should've gone into a napkin, or me - an obedient Kindred whose resume is pre-loaded with fire-tested skills in keeping the Masquerade?"

Pablo stomped the bag, until the sound of crunching bone had satisfied him.  "Huh!?  WHO will he believe, Pendejo!?  WHO!  WILL!  HE!  BELIEVE!?"

Then Pablo slung the bag over his shoulder.  "...Oh.  Also, your Toreador girl?  She does do anal.  But not for you.  Cuck."  He shifted the weight of the bag, jostling Kevin and disturbing his shattered bones.

The door shut and the darkness slowly receded, leaving only an empty room.

The next night:

Pablo had been hunting, when van Burrace's limo had pulled up and the back door opened.  It was dark as 3 AM inside, but the message was obvious.  He climbed in.

Sierra was half in darkness, sitting with a glass of something that wasn't wine in her hand and when she turned to look at Pablo, her eyes looked like pits.  "If that had gone wrong, if you'd lashed out at someone a little less hated, if your old packmates weren't trained members of the Order... that could've gone so fucking wrong for us, Pablo."

Pablo sat silently.  He knew better than to speak.

"...You took a huge risk and you took it without consulting me.  And that pisses me off.  But I would've told you 'no'.  And you decided it would be better to ask forgiveness than permission."  Sierra picked up a bottle and poured more of the stuff that wasn't wine into a glass.  "Which ought to piss me off even more."

Van Burrace sat in thought, for a moment.  "On the other hand, you took a Kindred who publicly insulted us off the board, you're about to be awarded domain in Chicago for it, the price is that Prince Jackson gets to remind the other Blue-Bloods who's in charge, and he has a very front-facing reason to behead a Kindred he hates.  After the banana-flavored blood crack, I don't think Jackson would care if he'd watched you fabricate the whole story firsthand."  van Burrace passed Pablo the glass.  "Well done.  Instead of punishing you for failure, I get to reward you for success, and that makes me a very, very happy bitch."  She sipped her own drink.  "You did make sure the case against him looks air-tight, right?"

Pablo held his drink but didn't taste it, instead letting it roll from side to side in his glass.  "Herlihy tied his own noose.  I just kicked the stool.  I couldn't resist monologuing a little - I confessed the whole thing to him after I staked him in his haven.  But before I handed him over to Damien I wiped his memory of my confession, except for the nagging feeling there was something he could've said that would've saved his ass, if only he could remember what it was."  Then he drained it all in one go.

"And rightly so."  van Burrace poured him another.  "You are de la Sombra.  Your vengeance should always be as cruel as it is impeccable.  Oh, and be sure to tell Mauricio to give Throws-Stones my love when he goes to get his Fancy Feast.  I still have a crush on that crazy bastard."

New Oblivion Ceremonies:

Talon of the Abyss (Prerequisite: )

This ritual conjures forth a minor Abyssal Elemental; an un-being of semi-solid, animate shadow that exists to do the bidding of its conjurer.  The Abyssal elemental is an unwholesome creature with a composition somewhere between slime and flesh; it flows through forms vaguely reminiscent of deformed animals and humanesque shapes roughly the size of a toddler; these shapes have odd numbers of limbs and never in the right places.  

Performing this ceremony requires a Attribute + Occult roll and the snuffing of a candle flame in the palm of the vampire's hand - this causes a level of Aggravated damage that the vampire cannot mitigate using Fortitude in order for the ritual to work.  

The Abyssal being summoned by this ritual is a 1-dot SPC.  It has  no fighting ability and can only communicate with its conjurer.  Exposure to sunlight or a single level of damage from fire instantly destroys the elemental.  However, the creature makes a fine spy; it's naturally stealthy, can slink through gaps as narrow as a half-inch, and climbs walls at normal speed.  It can communicate telepathically with other beings by stepping into their shadows, but non-Lasombra or Hecata find this communication extremely unpleasant.

Abyssal Blade (Prerequisite: Arms of the Abyss)

By sacrificing a living being, a user of Oblivion can imbue a weapon with the necrotic power of the Abyss.  To perform this ritual, the user must use the weapon to kill a living being.  An animal such as a chicken or a dove imbues the weapon for one night; a goat, pig or cow for three nights, and sacrificing a human being imbues the weapon for a week.  Once the weapon is so imbued, it has a +2 damage modifier, ignores armor (but not supernatural powers that reduce damage such as Protean), and inflicts aggravated health damage to humans.  Superficial damage inflicted by the weapon is not halved.  

While the weapon is imbued with abyssal power, the weapon appears dulled with no sheen, as if it's drinking in all light that touches it.  At the end of the imbuing period, the weapon decays beyond hope of repair; wood and leather rot, metal corrodes and rusts.