The History Of The Cainites

In the beginning there was only Caine.

Caine who sacrificed his brother out of love.

Caine who was cast out.

Caine who was cursed forever with immortality.

Caine who was cursed with the lust for blood.

It is Caine from whom we all come,

Our sire's sire.

For the passing of an age he lived in the land of Nod,

In loneliness and suffering.

For an eon he remained alone.

But the passing of memory drowned his sorrow.

And so he returned to the world of mortals,

To the world of mortals,

To the world his brother and his brother's children had created.

The Second And Third Generation

Though he became ruler of a mighty nation, he was still alone,

For none was as he. His sorrow grew once again.

Then he committed another great sin, for he begat progeny,

[Of whom there were only three.]

But from them came more progeny, Caine's grandchilder,

And then Caine said, "An end to this crime. There shall be no more."

And as Caine's word was the law, his brood obeyed him.

The city stood for many ages,

And became the center of a mighty empire.

The Great Flood

But then came the Deluge, a Great Flood that washed over the world.

The city was destroyed,

And its people along with it.

Again Caine fell into a great sorrow and went into solitude,

Becoming as a dog amidst the wastes,

And leaving his progeny to their own ends.

They came to him and begged him to return,

To help them rebuild the city.

But he would not come with them,

Saying the Flood had been sent as punishment

For his having returned to the world of life

And subverting the true law.

The First Fall

So they returned alone to what mortals were left

And announced that they were the new rulers.

Each created a brood,

In order to claim the glory of Caine,

Yet they did not have his wisdom or restraint.

A great war was waged, the elders against their children,

And the children slew their parents.

The Second City

The rebels then built a new city

And brought to it [13] tribes.

It was a beautiful city and its people worshipped them as gods.

They created new progeny of their own,

The Fourth Generation of Cainites.

But they feared the Jyhad,

And it was forbidden for those childer

To create others of their kind.

This power the elders kept for themselves.

When a childe was created, it was hunted down and killed,

And its sire with it.

The Second Fall

Although this city was as great as Caine's, eventually it grew old.

As do all living things, it slowly began to die.

The gods at first did not see the truth,

And when they last looked about them it was too late.

Their city was destroyed and their power extinguished,

And they were forced to flee, their progeny along with them.

But many were killed in the flight, for they had grown weak.

With their authority gone, all were free to create their own broods,

And soon there were many new Cainites,

Who ruled across the face of the Earth.

But this could not last.

The Jyhad

Over time, there came to be too many of the Cainites,

And then there was war once again.

The elders were already deep in hiding,

For they had learned caution.

But their childer had founded their own cities and broods,

And it is they who were killed in the great wave of war.

There was war so total, that there are none of that generation

To speak of themselves any longer.

Waves of mortal flesh were sent across continents

In order to crush and burn the cities of the Cainites.

Mortals thought they were fighting their own wars,

But it is for us they spilt their blood.

Once this war was over,

All of the Cainites hid from one another

And from the humans who surrounded them.

In hiding we remain tonight,

For the Jyhad continues still.

The Signs Of Gehenna

Quiet! Hear the raven's cry! The stillness of the wind rising hot on the street. The towers hide the darkness of the day.

When Lasombra's dreams come true on the day when the moon runs as blood and the sun rises black in the sky. That is the day of the Damned when Caine's children will rise again.

And the world will turn cold and unclean things will boil up from the ground and great storms will roll, lightening will light fires, animals will fester and their bodies, twisted, will fall.

So, too, our grandsires will rise from the ground. They will break their fast on the first part of us. They will consume us whole.

On the second day, Caine will return and call his children to the meeting place on the site of the First City. He will beckon them, sitting on his basalt throne.

And Caine will call aloud the names of those to be destroyed for their crimes are too great and all those who have consumed the heart's blood of their sire will be brought before the Black Throne and made to drink Caine's blood and Caine's blood will eat their blood.

And the Dark Mother herself will be brought forth and there, in the valley of Enoch, will there be a battle. A duel of Dark Father and Dark Mother. The demon queen will bite deep. The damned king will bite deeper. We will not know the thing which will happen, but the sky will tear apart, and the earth below. And the forces of Hell will pour up out of the ground

On the third day, there will be silence. The crows will feed on the carrion. Plague will dance amongst the ruins. The last of the Wild Ones will leave this place. The last of the Moon-Beasts will fight and fall and the Antediluvians will make for themselves an empire of blood.

They will rule with iron talons. They will wrench the hearts of all still alive and the full sum of the earth's living will come and live in the Last City, called Gehenna.

And there will be a reign of one thousand years and there will be no love, or life, or pity. The mighty will be as slaves. The virtuous will be made foul. Every good gift and every perfect gift will be tainted by the Father of Darkness, whose power will come from the nether realms.

When the snows consume the earth and the sun gutters like a candle in the wind, then and only then, will there be born a woman, the last daughter of Eve, and in her there will be decided the fate of all.

And you will not know this woman, except by the mark of the moon on her. And she will face treachery, hatred, and pain. But in her is the last hope.

And you will know these last times by the time of thin blood which will mark vampires that cannot Beget. You will know them by the Clanless who will come to rule. You will know them by the Wild Ones who will hunt us even in the strongest city. You will know them by the awakening of some of the eldest. The Crone will awaken and consume all.

You will know these times, for a black hand will rise up and choke all those who oppose it. And those who eat heart's blood will flourish. And the Kindred will crowd each to his own, and vitae will be as rare as diamonds

Mark these signs, they are coming! Gehenna will be on earth.

Mark the shadow which flies. Mark the dragon which rises. Mark the darkness which moves. Mark the shadow of the moon. Mark the angel that dies. Mark the maiden who weeps. Mark the children Embraced. Mark the Clanless who run.

And there will be a time when sire will drive out childer, when sire will abandon childer to the sun's mercy and there will be no mercy for the Clanless. There will be no mercy for the Clanless, mongrel though they be. Upon their forgotten sires shall be the curse of Auriel. Upon their hateful sires shall be the curse that comes of crossing Caine. Upon their lazy sires shall be the curse of the hunters hunted.

Those among the Clanless will have no path to follow. No family to name. No generation to hold. No traditions to keep. No customs to give. No hospitality to give.

Why do you make these orphans? Why do you leave them in the street? They are the dark seed of our undoing. They will follow Brujah's childer. They will make the blood run red. They are going to kill the dead. They are going to eat our kin. They will scream and bash our doors. They will cry aloud for justice.

Clanless, all, they will know secret ways. Clanless, all, they are Lilith's foul get. Clanless, all, they are newly awake. Clanless, all! No family, no sign, no loyalty, no elder.

Recently a fragment of the Book Of Nod was found within the depths of an old cave where legends say Cappadocius trapped thousands of his descendants and cursed the entrance where no mortal may enter yet no Cainites could leave. It was recently discovered by Okulos, a Nosferatu, who is partnered with Beckett the Gangrel, searching for artifacts about Gehenna and the Book Of Nod. Beckett is trying to keep Okulos "alive" until he can find a way to free Okulos. The fragment itself has been freed of its prison and has caused quite a ruckus as word about it spread....

The Words Of Caine After The Deluge

The time has come,

My Children,

For me to bid the night goodbye.

But know that I do not leave you.

Await the time when I join you again

After you have learned the wages

Of your vanity, sin and pride.

And mark well the heralds of my return

For I do not leave the affairs of my house

To be tended by the Children of Seth.

Caine's Confession At Lilith's Bosom

And I traveled for a hundred years before I found

My father's first wife

Whose blood I drank

And yet she was Awake still.

"I must talk to the One Above," I said

And she smiled.

"Talk to Him," she said,

"But know that he has turned his back on you

For your sin."

At this I cried thirteen tears of blood

And named them as each fell

When Lilith said:

"Why do you call our children's names?

They cannot

And will not

Help you.

They are nothing but other sins

Committed to make sweet Abel's death

Less sharp in your cold heart."

And to her I said,

"Mother, lover,

I cannot feel.

We made them to buoy me

And yet they drag me into [Hell]."

The Words Of Caine Before Entering The Earth

And I grew tired,

My dead heart heavy with all that I had done.

So I pledged to sleep until my wrongs

Had righted themselves.

With Lilith's knife, I cut myself and sang:

"From these open wounds

Life shall come from death,

As the last daughter

Bearing the mark of the moon,

Sends [Lasombra's] bane to the ashes,

Sends [Gangrel's] brood to the cold stone,

Infests [Nosferatu's] den with [snakes] and strikes down his wife,

And pierces the rest of my grandchilder

With the fires of the wise."

At these words, I sank

Embraced by the cold arms of

Lilith's garden.

Please [God],

Erase my folly

And end this.