Nicolai Antonescu

Nicolai Antonescu is the Tremere member of the Chicago primogen. Although he has the appearance of a ten-year-old boy, he is actually an elder who has accumulated a great amount of power, both temporal and Thaumaturgical, over his seven centuries of existence. He has participated in Chicago's primogen council since shortly after his arrival in the city in the 19th century.

As a mortal in the 14th century, Nicolai's mystic potential was remarkable as early as the age of five, when the Tremere magus Stromberg first visited him in the village where he lived with his parents. Stromberg briefly appraised him, then promised to return later, when the boy was older. True to his word, Stromberg returned three years later and spirited Nicolai away without a word from his family. Stromberg brought Nicolai to Kundera Covenant, where they were master and apprentice for several years. One night, Stromberg's feline familiar struck out against its master, drawing blood and provoking a frenzy in the Tremere magus. When Nicolai tried to assist his mentor, Stromberg viciously attacked him. When the magus came to his senses, he was forced to Embrace Nicolai to save the boy's life.

Nicolai served his master and his clan for centuries. In 1869 he was rewarded in the form of an order to gain control of the city of Chicago for his clan. Nicolai thus became the founding regent of the city's first chantry. Two years later, during the Great Chicago Fire of 1871, Nicolai supported Lodin in his coup against the residing Prince, Maxwell. Nicolai Dominated many of Maxwell's loyalists, preventing them from interfering in the coup until it was too late to act. Thanks to the gratitude of the city's new prince, Nicolai was able to become the city's first Tremere primogen.

In the primogen, Nicolai forged a mutually respectful alliance with the Brujah Tyler and the Toreador Annabelle Triabell; these three remained loyal to Lodin even when his rule was challenged by the upstart Maldavis. With Lodin's support, Nicolai sired two childer, Abraham DuSable and Erichtho &mdash; although the latter immediately abandoned her sire and his clan, instead aligning herself with the Anarchs. DuSable received his Embrace because of Nicolai's respect for the man's incredible skill as a lawyer &mdash; skill that was overlooked in a time where a talented black man like himself was stymied at every corner. Erichtho received her Embrace not only because of her mystical tutelage but also (or perhaps primarily) because Nicolai was wholly smitten with her. However, she went into the Embrace believing it to be a mystical enlightenment, and fled both from her clan and from Chicago when she learned, to her horror, just what she had become.

Nicolai endured the War of Chicago that destroyed nearly half of the city's vampires, thanks in part to the arrival of the Gargoyle guardian Ublo-Satha. However, many of his allies were not so lucky: notably, Prince Lodin was destroyed, as was Nicolai's grandchilde, Garwood Marshall. In the power vacuum that followed, Nicolai supported DuSable's bid for the princedom. However, Nicolai did not realize that he himself was being manipulated by the unearthly beauty of the neonate Portia, who was actually a false identity of the Toreador Methuselah Helena &mdash; and who had been subtly manipulating Nicolai and his allies in the primogen for decades. In the years that followed Lodin's death, Nicolai used Ublo-Satha as a pawn to "earn" the trust of Pariah, an Abomination who had emerged from the shadows during the War of Chicago, and may have since subjected that cursed Lupine to a total blood bond. If Nicolai's duplicity in this alliance is ever exposed, Pariah may violently turn on the Tremere, blood bond or no.