Helene

World of Darkness -- Medieval -DAV- Toreador -DAV- Peregrinus et Sanguis in Cinere -DAV- Athens -- medieval -DAV- Helena

Sobriquet: Helena

Appearance: Gorgeous, perfectly formed and beautiful. Dark hair and eyes, with perfect honey skin.

Behavior:

History: Even before her Embrace Helena was regarded as the most beautiful woman who had ever lived. When it was time for Helen to marry, many kings and princes from around the world came to seek her hand, bringing rich gifts with them, or sent emissaries to do so on their behalf. During the contest, Castor and Pollux had a prominent role in dealing with the suitors, although the final decision was in the hands of Tyndareus. Menelaus, her future husband, did not attend but sent his brother, Agamemnon, to represent him.

The Oath of Tyndareus

Tyndareus was afraid to select a husband for his daughter, or send any of the suitors away, for fear of offending them and giving grounds for a quarrel. Odysseus was one of the suitors, but had brought no gifts because he believed he had little chance to win the contest. He thus promised to solve the problem, if Tyndareus in turn would support him in his courting of Penelope, the daughter of Icarius. Tyndareus readily agreed, and Odysseus proposed that, before the decision was made, all the suitors should swear a most solemn oath to defend the chosen husband against whoever should quarrel with him. After the suitors had sworn not to retaliate, Menelaus was chosen to be Helen's husband. As a sign of the importance of the pact, Tyndareus sacrificed a horse. Helen and Menelaus became rulers of Sparta, after Tyndareus and Leda abdicated. Menelaus and Helen rule in Sparta for at least ten years; they have a daughter, Hermione, and (according to some myths) three sons: Aethiolas, Maraphius, and Pleisthenes.

The marriage of Helen and Menelaus marks the beginning of the end of the age of heroes. Concluding the catalog of Helen's suitors, Hesiod reports Zeus' plan to obliterate the race of men and the heroes in particular. The Trojan War, caused by Helen's elopement with Paris, is going to be his means to this end.

Seduction by Paris

Paris, a Trojan prince, came to Sparta to claim Helen, in the guise of a supposed diplomatic mission. Before this journey, Paris had been appointed by Zeus to judge the most beautiful goddess; Hera, Athena, or Aphrodite. In order to earn his favour, Aphrodite promised Paris the most beautiful woman in the world. Swayed by Aphrodite's offer, Paris chose her as the most beautiful of the goddesses, earning the wrath of Athena and Hera.

Paris meets Helen and begins to woo her. A beautiful man, with a perfect body blessed by the Gods, Paris has no problem getting her to bed him. He lavishes praise and gifts on her, and in the end Helen willingly left behind Menelaus and their nine-year-old daughter, Hermione, to be with Paris.

When he discovered that his wife was missing, Menelaus called upon all the other suitors to fulfill their oaths, thus beginning the Trojan War.

The Greek fleet gathered in Aulis, but the ships could not sail, because there was no wind. Artemis was enraged by a sacrilegious act of the Greeks, and only the sacrifice of Agamemnon's daughter, Iphigenia, could appease her. In Euripides Iphigenia in Aulis, Clytemnestra, Iphigenia's mother and Helen's sister, begs her husband to reconsider his decision, calling Helen a "wicked woman". Clytemnestra (unsuccessfully) warns Agamemnon that sacrificing Iphigenia for Helen's sake is, "buying what we most detest with what we hold most dear".

Return to Argos

Helena survived the fall of Troy, and when Meneleus was about to slay her with his sword for all the pain she had caused, she fell to his feet weeping and begging his forgiveness. Bloody and tired, the warrior king decided to spare her and bring her home to her children to rule beside him once more.

She returned with him to Sparta and for a time seemed to reconcile with her husband and once more be a good wife. In time the two fought, and it became clear they couldn't co-exist peacefully with each other. Meneleus could never forget she left him for another man, she could never forget that he had wanted to kill her. In the dark of the moon, Helena gathered her things and returned to Argos.

Helens father was exhausted with his daughters behavior. He allowed her to live for a time at the palace, but when her father died, her brother took the throne. Her brother had come under the influence of the vampire Minos. Minos the Toreador could not stand to watch Helena's beauty fade, and forced the king to give her to him. Unable to resist the vampire, the king agreed. Helena became Minos's ghoul, and his devoted servant. While deeply beautiful himself, Minos was as dark and twisted a soul as there was.

Prias

Helena knew something was wrong, but couldn't figure it out. She went to the magician Tendus of Persia, who made for her a magical draught. He told her that when she drank it she would be free of the influence of her husband. It reversed 20 years of living, effectively driving the blood of the vampire from the womans system. Helena paid the magician her weight in rubies and fled, taking only a handmaiden with her.

Helena ran far, and drove herself to get as much space as she could between her husband and herself. When she had collapsed from exhaustion, she was found by a prince of Asia Minor, Prias, who matched her beauty and the two immediately fell in love. Prias escorted Helena to his city where the couple lived happily for several years.

Ten years lasted their happiness, until Minos found her and revealed himself to be not quite human as he raged through Prias's palace. Minos effortlessly defeated Prias and took Helena with him back to Argos. There he fed from her in a slow and agonizing way to punish her. When Minos finally gave her the Embrace, her first meal was to be her own father. At first, she seemed resigned to her fate (fueled by both the Blood Bond and Minos's powerful Domination), but secretly plotted to destroy her hated sire and usurp his heart's blood. Her chance came when, 13 years later, Prias returned with an army to lay siege to Argos. With the help of his soldiers, Prias managed to pierce Minos's heart with his spear. Eager for her revenge, Helena jumped forward and diablerized her sire.

At first Helena offered Prias the same eternal youth that she had received from Minos, but Prias refused, terrified at what she had become and the thought of consuming the blood of the living. Then Helena told him how mortals could achieve immortality also by drinking vampiric blood, without being turned vampire themselves. This offer Prias accepted. Helena gave him her blood, making him into her Ghoul and the two continued to live happily together, eventually venturing off to the splendid new city of Carthage in the south.

When the Punic Wars began, Helena and Prias fought for Carthage at first, but soon Helena realized that the struggle was futile. The romans, who were supported by Ventrue methuselahs, could not be defeated. So Helena traded her and Prias safety for important details about Carthages defenses and the two left the city before the fatal final siege that laid waste to the city. For her help, the Ventrue rewarded Helena with the fiefdom of Pompeii. Unfortunately a survivor, the philosopher warrior Menele, found out about her treachery and swore vengeance for his slaughtered friends and the shattered dream of unity between Kindred and Kine.

Menele traveled to Pompeii and used his knowledge of blood magic to conjure a great spirit of fire to destroy the city. Unfortunately he lost control over the spirit and had to flee. Prias and Helena managed to escape as well, traveling to Egypt. Helena realized Menele would continue to pursue her so her only option would be to destroy him first. Thus started the war between the two methuselahs that would last several millennia.

Recent Events:

If the Timeline remains Constant: The war raged on for centuries as neither of them could gain the upper hand, until Helena seemingly managed to deal Menele a fatal blow in Spain. After that all traces of the Brujah vanished. Helena was faced with a new problem however, as the Thirst of Ages had begun to take its toll on her, denying her sustenance from mortal blood and forcing her to devour her own kind.

Helena noticed with her considerable Auspex power that traces of Menele's aura were found on the other side of the ocean. Fascinated, she helped fund the expedition of Hernan Cortez and followed him over the Atlantic. Helena was accompanied by Prias and a number of her own female progeny intended to provide her sustenance. Helena supported Cortez in his conquest of the Mesoamerican cultures as her search for her nemesis continued. The Aztecs and the Spanish, like so many other cultures before them, had no idea that they were merely pawns in a gigantic game played by the methuselahs.

Menele continued to avoid facing her directly, until the two met in a terrible showdown at Fort Dearborn. Helena was supported by Prias while Menele had found an ally in the Indian chief Black Hawk. After the fight, both methuselahs were grievously wounded and in Torpor. Both were saved by their helpers. But even in Torpor, the two battled on, using their incredible powers of Auspex, Dominate and Presence to stir up people and cities against each other. After the American Civil War and the founding of Chicago, Helena focused on gaining footholds in the upper echelons of Kindred society.

Helena rose from torpor in 1990 underneath the Succubus club. This club, which was an iconic location known to all of Chicago's kindred, was in fact intentionally built on top of Helena's resting place. Prias had secretly organised its construction to give her a haven where she could safely feed and learn about the modern world. Maria, one of Helena's childer and at that time one of Chicago's most prominent Toreadors, gave up her unlife for her ravenous sire as she rose from torpor.

Helena then assumed the persona of "Portia," a Toreador neonate, as she spent the next 3 years learning about this new world. She didn't venture much outside the club during that time, as she awoke to a completely foreign world, wary of things such as automobiles, shocks by television and bewildered by the mortals of modern nights, she stayed in the Succubus Club and learned about the new world mainly through Blood Dolls, punks and Gangstas, believing the world has become a more enlightened and sophisticated place, but also a scarier place, staying in her haven as stories of things like nuclear weapons unsettled her slightly.

The succubus club was destroyed and her beloved ghoul Prias killed during the War of chicago in 1993. Helena suspects the attack of Lupines was organised by Menele.

Now Helena walks freely under the night sky as Portia, once again seeking revenge against Menele. Apart from her childer and ghouls, the Kindred of America are not aware that this beautiful but aloof neonate is in fact an immensely powerful and ancient Methuselah controlling the lives and unlives of everyone within the city of Chicago and its immediate environs.

• -- Helene's Statistics