Brujah

Passionate warriors and scholars driven by ideology
The Brujah are at the very forefront of the Anarch Revolt
They have a long-standing enmity with the Ventrue, which makes their elders’ cooperation with the Camarilla even more offensive to the neonates and ancillae of the Clan

During the Long Night and the War of the Princes, the Brujah were widely considered one of the High Clans, warrior-scholars fiercely devoted to one radical philosophy or another. They held fast to the Aristotelian ideal of entelechy (total mental and physical discipline) and sought to build the ideal society: one where Cainites and humans could live together in harmony, ruled by justice. Indeed, many Brujah elders would claim it has been achieved at least once, in Carthage, before the hated Ventrue of Rome destroyed it.

But the fire of passion burns hot in the chest of every Brujah, and ideological differences all too often spill over from debate into violence. Disenfranchised neonates formed movements like the Furores to stand against the oppressive elders and the Laws of Caine; they flocked to new religious movements like the katharoi to free themselves of the Blood Bond and other materialistic concerns; they built the Prometheans to topple the status quo and bring down the stale power structure of Europe.

None of it worked, of course – until a neonate Furore sank her fangs into the neck of the Ventrue elder Hardestadt in his own castle and drank his soul. As a protest against the elders throwing their childer to the Inquisition’s fires it succeeded beyond her wildest dreams – Patricia Tyler, slayer of the Tyrant of the Black Cross, returned to Aragon with her coterie and turned the rage of her fellow neonates and ancillae into a bloody slaughter not seen before or since.

Without the Brujah – without Patricia Tyler – there would be no Anarch Revolt. But equally, Brujah elders across Europe support the Camarilla; at their forefront is Founder and Justicar Adana di Sforza. The conflict in the heart of every Brujah mirrors that splitting the Cainites of the continent.

Sobriquet

Zealots

History

In the First City, the Brujah founder sought to explore and understand the Cainite condition from as many angles as possible. However, his passion for his existence caused difficulties with his more sombre brethren. After the Flood, he sired Troile to counter that passion; where Brujah was prone to fits of rage that set his Beast to roar, Troile was logical, methodical, and calculating.

However, Troile and Brujah disagreed frequently due to their conflicting natures. Finally, Brujah flew into frenzy and attacked Troile. Troile sank her fangs into her sire to drain the fury from his blood, but it only enraged Brujah further. Worse still, Troile continued to drink even after her sire’s veins were dry, consuming Brujah’s soul.

When called to answer for what she had done, Troile listed a litany of reasons based soundly in logic. Troile’s reasoning convinced other Antediluvians that murder was the best course of action to preserve the peace between the descendants of Caine and the children of Seth. Some say this was the first rebellion that sparked the Second City’s fall. However, when Caine returned, he was not convinced. He cursed Troile and her line with the fiery passions of their progenitor, multiplied threefold.

Longing for the days of the harmony between mortals and Cainites in the First and Second Cities, Troile and her Clan lived as philosopher-kings among humanity. The first place that became an experiment of the Brujah was Greece, specifically Athens. Learning from and discussing their ideals with the Athenian orators and philosophers, the Brujah found countless ways to improve society. The Brujah allowed other Cainites to enter their city and to share Athens’ glory. Conflict with Spartan Ventrue led to discord and the first Brujah War. After that, many of the praedicandi, the rulers of the Clan, left Greece, convinced that the experiment had failed and that they should start again elsewhere. Many of the praedicandi seized the moment and followed Troile’s example, diablerising their sires to leave no witnesses or patrons of what they regarded as a failure.

The clan’s next major moment was also its greatest. The Brujah co-opted a Phoenician colony, Carthage, for another grand experiment. The Brujah say that Carthage was a utopia — a city where Cainite and mortal lived in harmony, and where justice reigned. The Ventrue tell the story somewhat differently: the Carthaginians were cowed by their gods, offering their blood and kin to the flames of the Baali Methuselah Moloch, masquerading as a divinity while the Brujah were able to convince themselves that they ruled a paradise. As over 1,600 years have passed, and the memory of Methuselahs is clouded by torpor, wishful thinking, and dogma, none can honestly say they know the truth.

Carthage fell during the Third Punic War in 146 BCE, when Scipio Aemilianus, aided by the Malkavians and Ventrue of Rome, crushed the shell of a city hollowed out by two previous wars. The earth was salted to prevent those Cainites who had melded with the earth from rising, the land was ploughed, and the Brujah experiment ended. This cemented the enmity between the Brujah and the Ventrue for centuries to come. None have seen Troile since, and many assume she met her Final Death during the fall of Carthage.As the centuries progressed, the Clan came to view themselves as practitioners of a Greek philosophy of total mental and physical discipline, called entelechy, often training their childer in combat and the classics with equal enthusiasm. As a High Clan, the Brujah were intensely involved in politics in Greece and Constantinople, opposing the Roman Ventrue at every opportunity. They are also swept up in powerful ideologies, and it is no surprise that they are at the forefront of the conflict between European Cainites.

Organisation

The Zealots are now loosely split into two camps, the Anarchs and the Camarilla. But there are three philosophical currents that are also crucial to understanding the Clan – the Furores, the Prometheans, and the Pure. These “sects” transcend whatever local organisation might exist between Brujah, though of course many Brujah reject all three.

The Furores are a radical sect of disenfranchised European Cainites founded in the 9th century. As the elders struggled to deal with the slow, centuries-long collapse of Roman civilisation through war and plague, many neonates were driven to the outskirts of society. Fear and insecurity turned these elders into petty tyrants, and the neonates into outlaws and bandits. Led by charismatic Brujah, they soon became known as Furores, taking a heavy-handed and uncompromising stance against the elders’ authority and even the Traditions of Caine. Disinterested in high-minded talk of liberty or old Carthage, they accept anyone interested in freedom from the elders’ clutches (except the Tremere) as comrades-in-arms. It was one of their number who struck the first blow of the Anarch Revolt, and almost all Furores (most of whom are Brujah at this point) have joined the movement. Many Furores are strong advocates of the Path of the Devil, which they created with their Gangrel allies.

The Prometheans on the other hand are also enemies of the old status quo of the War of Princes, being highly committed to the Dream of Carthage and harmony between Cainite and human. They despised the feudal system and the Church’s corruption as much as the Traditions of Caine and the division into High and Low Clans. Around a century ago, they stirred up unrest within mortal power structures but failed to topple Cainite power structures; the elders had most of the influential Prometheans killed, and those who remain are now committed to the Camarilla as the best vehicle for aligning the interests of both mortal and “Kindred”.

The Pure grew out of the sack of Constantinople and the death of Michael the Patriarch and his Dream. Led from her base in Rome by a Byzantine elder Brujah named Thrax, the Pure preach a new religion based on liberty, equality, and self-denial. They seek freedom from Blood Bonds and seek to reject the material world in pursuit of spiritual redemption; they have little tolerance for orthodoxy or corruption. This puts them at odds with both Cainite tyrants and the mortal Christian Church, a conflict these katharoi welcome as part of their mandates of the Path of the Pure.

Usually From

Georgia: Brujah supporting the mortal Bagrationi family were instrumental in the creation of the Kingdom of Imereti as part of resisting Ventrue control of the Kingdom of Georgia. They are currently resisting both the Inquisition and the Ottoman Empire in the mortal world, and the incursions of the Ashirra sect of Muslim Cainites.
Iberian Peninsula: Heart of the Anarch Revolt, and crucible of the Road of the Devil. Very few Brujah remain in Aragon and Castille that are not wholehearted members of the Revolt.
Northern England: Many of the brood of “Mithras’ lapdog”, Baron Nathaniel of Carlisle, were instrumental in the creation of the Road of the Devil as part of their resistance to the Ventrue Methuselah
Ottoman Empire: The Lexor family of Brujah were accepted into Constantinople as “scions” over a thousand years ago, and have been fierce defenders of Michael the Patriarch’s Dream ever since. For the last three hundred years, they have shared responsibility with local Gangrel and Nosferatu for preserving that Dream after the Patriarch’s death.
Scandinavia: Outnumbered only by the Gangrel, Brujah are very well-established in Scandinavia, especially in and around trade centres, where they try to preserve the old ways of valuing the individual, admiring the brave, and honouring the family in the face of well-entrenched Christianisation.
Ulster: The Dominion of Uilidh, under the elder Brujah Eileen, stands as a bulwark against Mithras’ total domination of Ireland, though many criticise her for paying tribute to London to keep the Ventrue at bay.

Preferred Roads

Havens

The Zealots seek out the highest concentrations of people they can, such as cities and major trading villages. Rare is the Brujah who ties themself solely to a small fiefdom. During a fledgling’s tutelage, they often haven with their sire, undergoing physical and mental training. In recent centuries, likeminded Zealots have established communal havens where they argue philosophy and train together. These “packs” provide a unique challenge in self-control.

The Embrace

Zealots collect their prospective childer from nobility or the clergy to ensure a strong, educated baseline. They especially favor those kine who champion a cause to improve the lot of the people around them, whether through strength of arms or wit and cunning. A few rare exceptions come from the peasant class, namely those with remarkable speed and strength in life.

Clan Disciplines

Celerity, Potence, Presence

Weakness

Brujah are highly passionate, and have great trouble controlling the wrath of their Beasts. Their difficulty to resist frenzy is increased by 2.