Kemintiri is an ancient Follower of Set and a childe of the Antediluvian Set himself. She is the most sought-after criminal in the Kindred world and has occupied the number one spot on the Red List ever since the list's creation. In fact, the list was originally created specifically for her.
Due to magic used on her by Horus when she was still human, Kemintiri is immune to being Blood Bound or Dominated. She is thought to be the only childe of Set who is not in torpor. Her ultimate goal is the reconstruction of the Spell of Life and creation of her own army of mummies.
Biography[]
“ | I revel in my top spot on the Red List. Do I really need to prove why I have been declared the Camarilla's enemy number one? | ” |
— Kemintiri |
Kemintiri was born during the 19th dynasty, in the reign of Seti I. The Pharaoh marked his reign by calling himself the Son of Set, exalting the Red God. The Pharaoh promised Set to build a great temple in his honor if the god ensured the long reign of Pharaoh's own son, Ramesses. The temple was built, and the most beautiful women in the land served as priestesses to honor Set. Among these was the young Kemintiri. Kemintiri rose quickly in the ranks of the priestesses, for she was not only beautiful, but intuitively skilled in the politics of the temple. Set himself grew fond of her, as she also gained the attention of the Cult of Isis.
At the time, Set did not have complete control over the cults of Egypt. Opposing him was the Cult of Isis, keepers of the Spell of Life. Isis herself was dead, but her son, Horus, had risen from the dead as a mummy by the power of the Spell of Life. Set coveted knowledge of the spell, and so he decided to place a loyal retainer within the Cult of Isis to steal the secret of the magic. For this task, he chose Kemintiri. She agreed.
Within the Cult of Isis, Kemintiri learned much of the magic taught by the wizards. After a decade of patient study she finally learned the secret of the Spell of Life. She would have taken the knowledge to Set, but Horus awoke from his death cycle and Kemintiri, fascinated by this creature, was captivated by the stories it had to tell. Kemintiri became a true believer in the cause of Horus, and thus betrayed Set.
Set was livid once he learned of her treachery, and ordered his followers to capture Kemintiri, which they did. She was brought before Set, incapacitated by lack of blood. When she awoke, she disavowed her former master and swore she would never reveal knowledge of the Spell of Life to him. He attempted to Dominate her, but her aura was suffused with a white light, rendering her impervious to the power. Thus he commenced to torture as a means of gaining the knowledge he sought, which she grimly endured. As a last resort, Set defiled her body with the curse of Caine, forever crushing her hopes of becoming a mummy.
Laughing, Set sent Kemintiri back to the Cult of Isis, who would now surely destroy her. She was now forever Set's own creature; however, he didn't know the same magic that made her impervious to vampiric domination, had also made her immune to the Blood Oath. Set could still not command her to release the secret of the Spell of Life as she held onto it out of spite, challenging her new sire to destroy her. Set abused her for many nights, until finally she managed to use the magic she had learned in the temple to escape.
Kemintiri wandered for centuries, letting her humanity slip as she prowled the caravan trails and oases until Wassail, the ultimate defeat, claimed her. Khetamon, the last surviving son of Osiris, found her. The Cult of Osiris had compassion for someone who had been rendered a beast, and so they captured Kemintiri, starved her to torpor, and spirited her away to India where they set about the long task of bringing her back from Wassail. The rudimentary magic that Khetamon used for this task would later become known as the discipline Bardo. Very slowly her cognisance returned, until she understood who she was. Her mind, and the secret of the Spell of Life, was now however shrouded in a cloud of amnesia. Kemintiri stayed with the Children of Osiris for a time, her humanity at a precarious state, until a remnant of her wassail made her frenzy and kill a number of the priests of Osiris, after which she fled into the night.
Once she returned to Egypt, many years later, she found that the battle was over. The Cult of Isis had been slaughtered down to the last magus. She spent the next millennia searching for any survivors. Set, on the other hand had only managed to obtain a corrupted version of the Spell of Life from the last priest, and so he ordered his followers to hunt down Kemintiri for she is the only remaining repository of the Spell aside from the mummies.
400 BCE[]
Kemintiri spent a decade as the lover of the Ventrue methuselah Mithras. The Lhiannan tell stories of her time with Mithras and the mystical Crone that the bloodline identifies as its founder. This time, however, was not to last and she soon returned to Egypt, where she clashed with another childe of Set, the Methuselah Taweret. During the struggle, Kemintiri was knocked into the Red Sea, where she entered a torpor that lasted several hundred years.
Fourteenth Century[]
“ | The Camarilla endures to protect its members from themselves; that is the only worthy purpose it serves. But, it must one day fail, when its ancients arrive to feed at the Gehenna's table. One chair will be reserved for me. | ” |
— Kemintiri |
Kemintiri reawakened in the 1300s. Drawing herself up to a merchant ship, she assumed the captain's identity and traveled to Mesopotamia, hoping to find allies among the Ventrue to destroy the Followers of Set. To avoid being pursued, Kemintiri assumed the identity of a wealthy Ventrue, Rimmon, whose resources she utilized to sack several Founding Temples of the Setites and reassemble the Children of Osiris, hoping to use them as weapons against those who opposed her. The ruse, however, was discovered by Ventrue elders, who slowly spread the word of her existence to the other Clans. Fearing that Kemintiri would wipe out the Ventrue and assume their money and domains, these same elders would later use their considerable influence to put her at the head of the Red List in the twentieth century.
Victorian Age[]
“ | We are not gods, no matter what we tell ourselves. It is a lesson we can only learn in pain. There is no Godhead. The heart of the universe is empty. Will you walk through it with me? | ” |
— Kemintiri to Mithras |
In Victorian England, Kemintiri masqueraded as Lady Ophelia Merritt, a prominent Kindred in London society. She held court at her estate and was the keeper of Elysium. This allowed her to use her mastery of Dominate and Serpentis to manipulate the London Kindred into obsessive, hedonistic pursuits. This left her to do as she pleased, until she was discovered by both the Tremere and her former lover, Mithras. Lady Regina Blake defeated her. Mithras was so upset, he banished the Followers of Set from London.
Modern nights[]
“ | In time, Camarilla will understand how wise it was to put me at the very top of the List. I'll continue to use Alastors as my scratching posts... Atrocities committed by any one of us strengthens the fear that we all use as weapons. | ” |
— Kemintiri |
Kemintiri has spent her unlife ever since in dedication of recreating the Spell of Life. In her mind, the philosophies of the Children of Osiris have warped into an idea that all vampires must be saved from their state. For the time being this means murdering them. Some she will gift with eternal life when she finally manages to remember the Spell of Life. Of mortals she cares very little. Everything that is not undead is an affront to her. She also hates her own Clan with passion, seeking to destroy them as contrition to Horus.
In hopes of finding information on the spell of life, she started organizing archaeological digs in Egypt. To fund this she infiltrated the Ventrue, abducted and killed the Ventrue Justicar Michaelis in 1932 and impersonated him for a period of 10 years, until she was finally discovered by the Tremere. She fled, but not before obtaining vast amounts of wealth from the Ventrue. For this outrageous act, the Camarilla made the Red List public and placed her on it as its first entry, and she has been on the top spot of the List since this time. The Ventrue will never rest until she is found. The Children of Osiris seek her as well, the abuse of their hospitality is nothing compared to the secrets of the sect she has learned. The Followers of Set have made her capture one of their top priorities, stirring up rumours of her in Camarilla cities, intending to give her no rest in her travels. Even the Sabbat have heard of this direct progeny of Set, and are keeping an eye out for her.
Her long existence as an infiltrator and pawn between Set and Horus, as well as the pangs of Wassail, has begun to take its toll upon Kemintiri's sanity. Over the millennia, she usurped hundreds of identities, killing each victim so they couldn't expose her. As each identity inevitably broke, a new set of fractured memories joined the chaos in her mind. She assumes these identities without rhyme or reason, making her dangerous for everyone in vicinity.
Time Of Judgement[]
In the scenario "Apophis Ascends" in the Time of Judgement book, Kemintiri is drawn to the deep deserts of Egypt where a wraith called Eurydice had taken control of the Amkhat, a cult of mortal cannibalistic sorcerers in the service of Apophis. Kemintiri is portrayed as insane at this point, and Eurydice eventually stakes her and uses her blood, along with stolen fragments of knowledge from sorcerers of Osiris and Amenti, to reconstruct a mockery of the spell of life.
Eurydice is resurrected for seven heartbeats and Apophis promised her life once she reclaimed all seven shards of Apophis's soul from the seven Apepnu.
Recent Nights[]
Kemintiri is rumored to have been sighted in London, in the company of the Assamite antitribu Montgomery Coven. Kemintiri has seen the soul of her former lover within the Assamites body and together the two conspire to send new pawns into action, fulfilling plans designed centuries ago.
The Anarch Rudi discovered Kemintiri was disguising as a young fledgling in Copenhagen after she left his community.
Her motivations and end goals tend to appear opaque, as if she was striving towards a purpose that somehow required lies and destruction. Most of the modern stories involving the blood gods suggest that they've been awakened recently in response to the Gehenna War. Kemintiri is something of an exception as she has enjoyed a role as a mythical enemy in many European Camarilla domains since they first joined the sect, being personally responsible for why such domains established Red Lists of their worst enemies in the first place. In recent nights, there have been increasing voices in different Camarilla domains calling for the removal of methuselahs from the various Red Lists kept by different Princes or even abolishing the institution altogether. The argument is that placing a blood god onto a list of official enemies is presumptuous, arrogant and may be catastrophic if the methuselah in question takes notice. Because Kemintiri is famous for taking on different masks and identities, pretending to be different Kindred and even mortals through the centuries, she also has plenty of imitators. Ambitious Kindred may decide to "reveal" that they're actually her for the infamy such a claim brings. This means that of the vast panoply of Kemintiri stories, most are probably untrue.
Description[]
Descriptions of Kemintiri vary tremendously, although there's some consensus that in her true form, she's an Egyptian woman of indeterminate age, long, straight black hair and eyes with vertical pupils like a snake. Stories about Kemintiri tend to highlight the idea that she can be anyone, anywhere. The Prince can be her, as can be that Nosferatu who always wears a mask. Stories about her tend to engender paranoia among the easily influenced.
In her "true" form Kemintiri is 4'6" in tall with dusky skin, long, straight black hair and eyes that appear very serpent-like. Even without her powers Kemintiri may possibly be the most beautiful woman in the world, as many men and women have dropped to their knees with instant love and devotion to serve her. She is the ultimate pretender. With her mastery in Obfuscate, Auspex, Serpentis, and other disciplines, she is able to assume the role of any Kindred and perform it to perfection. She has done this innumerable times over the ages, with aliases too many to count.
Rumors[]
- The local Camarilla's leaders are in the thrall of Kemintiri and must be destroyed: Accusing your enemies of associating with Kemintiri is a classic, oft-used tactic in the war of narratives among the Kindred.
- Kemintiri is misunderstood: The Camarilla's elders hate Kemintiri because she reveals them for the power-hungry monsters they are. She is a true hero of the people, the mythical original rebel!
- Kemintiri takes your soul but also lets you experience wondrous delights: There's a reason why she's able to get everyone to do her bidding. She has mystical abilities which grant access to an unknown world of sensuous pleasure and wisdom.
Trivia[]
Contrary to the description, women of Ancient Egypt shaved their heads and wore wigs.
Character Sheet[]
Revised Edition[]
V20 Edition[]
Gallery[]
References[]
- ↑ VTM: Clanbook: Followers of Set Revised, p. 96-97
- VTM: Dread Names, Red List, p. 77-81
- VTM: The Kindred Most Wanted, p. 87-91
- WW: White Wolf Magazine 45, p. 36-38 : The Extinction Game
- VTM: Fall of London
- VTM: Gehenna War (book)