Bogdan Zhdanov
- Paris -Z- The Gypsies in the City of Light -Z- The Seven: A List of known Vampiric Temporal Doppelgängers -Z- Darane Svatura -Z- Cirque de Ianua -Z- The Ravnos Revelations
"Ladies and gentlemen please"
"Would you bring your attention to me?"
"For a feast for your eyes to see"
"An explosion of catastrophe"
"Like nothing you've ever seen before"
"Watch closely as I open this door"
"Your jaws will be on the floor"
"After this you'll be begging for more"
-- Saliva - "Ladies and Gentlemen" (2006)
Sobriquet: Darko, one of the diminutives of Bogdan.
Appearance: At the time of his Embrace, Bogdan stood 6ft-2inches (1.88m) tall and weighed 265 pounds (about 120 kilos). He appears to be in his late twenties, but with a chunky build and round face, he could have been as much as forty when he died the mortal death. Darko is bulky with more than just a touch of pudginess, enough to occasionally mitigate the aura of furious angst that so often surrounds him.
Bogdan could best be described as hefty, with both muscle and fat. His face is a nearly perfect oval accented by a bushy Van Dyke. Darko's hair and eyes are seal brown. He was Embraced with a typical mullet which has grown down past his lower back in a ponytail. And he has his share of body and chest hair of the same seal brown as his eyes.
Like all vampires, when Bogdan heals completely, he returns to this form, each and every time.
Since his arrival in Paris, Darko -- often used as his stage name, dresses flamboyantly in combinations of red, gold and black. Although primarily a stage magician, his resonant baritone, ability to play to a crowd and modicum of showmanship have marked him out as a potential ringmaster. As such, he often carries a twirling baton which seems to come alive in his pudgy, but surprisingly nimble fingers. And while his twirling baton act holds a hypnotic appeal, the crowd really goes wild when he ignites his baton for a show stopping pyrotechnic performance.
Behavior: Bogdan behavior is brooding and stoic, until he has an audience, then and only then does he truly come alive. He lives for the spotlight. The rapt attention of the audience and the thunder of applause that follows a successful performance are his spiritual meat and drink. Like all vampires, he thirsts eternally for that next taste of mortal blood, unfortunately, where most vampires have learned a degree of restraint when feeding, he tends to get lost in the blood, which is why his preferred prey are animals. When he is not distracted by the thirst or in the midst of a performance, the camaraderie of the carnival takes the place of family and in rare moments he is capable of a surprising degree of compassion and concern for his fellow performers. While he craves the attention and praise of mortals, he forces himself to avoid the limelight of Paris' night-society, for he knows of the animosity of the Parisian Toreador for any Ravnos. Upon the advice of the Western European Ravnos, he has assumed the position of Caitiff or Batard in Paris, a lie that eats at his pride, but a lie he must continue to tell if he wishes to continue his unnatural existence.
History: Unlike the other doppelgängers, Bogdan's temporal rebirth took place in a necromantic womb, an irony not lost on the Ravnos magician. He awoke in 2015, within Varvara Kale, a medieval fortress in Gabrovo Grad, Bulgaria. His awakening coincided with the temporal return of his fellow Manus Nigrum allies and the attempted burglary of the castle's necromantic library by a Ravnos known as Vladislav Taltos. Taltos had badly misjudged the necromantic defenses of the fortress and lay close to death when Bogdan rose from a sarcophagus filled with human amniotic fluid. The dying Ravnos was only able to escape Varvara Kale with the aid of Bogdan who seemed not only immune to the cursed castle's defenses, but able to command its undead minions.
In return for his unlife, Vladislav Taltos granted the Gadje revenant the curse of immortality and tutored him in the ways of the Ravnos. Less than a year after the Embrace, sire and childe parted company. For Vladislav had fulfilled the expectations of his Romanii honor and considering his debt to the Gadje paid in full. For Bogdan, it was the start of a very long and dangerous road leading ultimately to Paris, France. In the final nights of Vladislav's tutelage, his sire took him to meet a Romanii vadoma, a gypsy seer, who turned the cards of fate for neonate Deceiver to pay a debt owed his sire. The revelations inherent in that reading of the Tarot and Bogdan's own imperfect memory led to a epiphany concerning Bogdan's improbable condition and a glimpse into his likely fate. It was the sorceress' final prophecy that put him on the road to Western Europe and the fabled City of Lights.
Bogdan Zhdanov isn't the luckiest of the Deceivers to walk Paris' streets, but trusting to his instincts and the thread of destiny seems to have worked thus far. During his journey to Paris he encountered a number of fellow clan members who were willing to trade what they knew of the City of Lights for word of Vladislav Taltos' recent activities and presumed whereabouts. Bogdan felt no sense of kinship to the Romanii fanatic Vladislav, sire or not, they had parted as neither friends nor enemies. Selling the information was a simple necessity and in their parting, Taltos had suggested that were they to ever cross paths, he would show Bogdan no favor. The information purchased from his fellow Deceivers saved his life when he entered Paris as a Caififf instead of professing his actual clan. While he received the grudging acceptance of the city's Toreador prince, he knows he is a third class citizen whose survival depends upon maintaining his mongrel status.
As a Batard (French for Caitiff), he cannot count upon his fellow mongrels despite their shared status as Parisian pariahs, but he has made a few friends from among the city's Low Clans and a wide circle of acquaintances of the other Kindred clans excepting the Toreador. It is among the living residents of Paris that Bogdan has found real connection, he has made friends and lovers of more than a few mortals over the last thirty years. While he centers his attention upon the Le Cirque Phénix (Carnival of the Phoenix) in the Bois de Vincennes (the forest of Vincennes is the largest park in Paris) of the 12th arrondissement and its carnival members, he maintains lukewarm relations with the city's growing Bulgarian Romanii population. He is also a reasonably well known figure among the city's underworld; while he supplements his income as a performer with pickpocketing, he does so far from the carnival and largely from among the city's foreign visitors and tourists. Bogdan's primary reason for residing in Paris lies in the gypsy woman's prophesy that he would find illumination in Paris, and come to know himself in his entirety.
Recent Events: The last thirty years has been a test of Bogdan's patience as he has watched the world change around him while the his own mysteries have remained murky. However, recently that has changed...
