Clan Tremere

Before there was a Clan, there was House Tremere, a respected House within the Order of Hermes.

"Tremere was the youngest and weakest magus among the Founders. He had studied under the magus Guorna the Fetid, who had been Tytalus' master as well, and some magi today say that the family resemblance between the two Houses is strong. This connection to the famous Guorna gave him the prestige he needed to be included in the Order despite his youth and lack of experience.

"Within the Order, Tremere had a problem. Studying under Guorna had given him a taste for fighting, but spell battles would likely endanger him because the other magi were more powerful than he. Somehow he needed a way to best the other magi and to do so he would need to invent some kind of contest at which he would be expert. He consulted Bonisagus and worked with him, and they invented a way to duel magically: certamen. Bonisagus and his filia Trianoma were happy with the new skill because it allowed magi to fight each other without deadly spells, and Tremere was happy with it because no other magus had more experience with the skill than he did. Tremere quickly became a master of the new art and he passed his secrets to his apprentices.

"Tremere was the last founder to remain alive and during his lifetime he built his followers into a highly organized political and military unit. Briefly in the ninth century, House Tremere was on the verge of dominating the Order. The other Houses were still relatively new at certamen and they had not applied themselves to learning the new art as the followers of Tremere had. He and his House were taking control of politics, land, resources, and were even influencing the ever evolving Peripheral Code. They even managed to have it decreed that those who refused to submit to a challenge of certamen would be declared rogue and thrown from the Order. He probably would have solidified his hold on the Order further if a group of unidentified magi had not penetrated the defenses around his covenant and struck his key lieutenants. These trusted aides were affected with spells which drove them to mad and violent behavior yet kept them in enough control of their faculties so that Tremere could not remove them from their posts. Unable to control his lieutenants, Tremere could not unite his House to maintain his control of the Order and he eventually appealed to House Mercere to arrange for a negotiation with the attackers. In a secret and still unknown meeting place, Tremere met with representatives of the magi who had moved against him and with the Prima of House Mercere and the Primus of House Quaesitor. Apparently, they came to some kind of agreement for all hostilities ceased, House Tremere ended its control of the Order, and the magi were restored to their sanity...."

From The Order of Hermes, published by Lion Rampant, 1990.

Around the year 1010 AD, the Order became aware that vis was lessening--sources were becoming fewer and further between, and taking longer to recover after each harvest, thereby decreasing the yield of the sources with each passing year. By the middle of the 12th century, vis sources were precious items, jealously guarded and hoarded by each covenant and House.

In the year 1130, approximately 200 years after the death of Tremere, the current Primus of the House, Goratrix, predicted the loss of all vis sources. Without vis, the magi of the Order would be unable to concoct the longevity potions which sustained their lives beyond mortal years. Goratrix, filius of Tremere, was already approaching the end of his effective life and was well aware that even longevity potions wouldn't be able to sustain him much longer. He began research into other methods of prolonging life, often using substances of questionable morality.

In 1133, Goratrix, during his long wandering for spell components, stumbled on the sleeping form of the Antidiluvian, Saulot, founder of the mystical Salubri clan. Goratrix felt he had, at long last, found the missing piece. He devised a ritual which required the combined efforts of seven magi (seven being a mystical number for immortality, symbolizing the union of God [3--for the Trinity] with man [4--for the four elements of the world below]). He recruited five others who also possessed an interest in prolonging their lives: Etrius, also filius of Tremere; Merlinda, filia of Goratrix; Xavier de Cincao; Elaine de Calinot; and Abetorius. All were respected members of the House and advanced in years, who held between them considerable power.

But they were still short one magus. Etrius suggested his apprentice, Loriel. Loriel, although extremely young and not yet 10 years past her Gauntlet, was nonetheless, extremely Gifted and supremely talented and had been predicted to contribute greatly to the House. Some even claimed she carried a piece of the spirit of Tremere himself; certainly those who had known the House's founder said she was very like him. But Loriel had one major flaw: she suffered from severe arthritis and any use of magic caused an extremely painful backlash, causing her to become bedridden for several days afterwards. Etrius hated to see the talent of his young student wasted. He believed that Goratrix's experiment might cure Loriel's disability and so convinced the Primus to allow her to fill the remaining spot.

The ritual took place in Saulot's cavern, where he slept alone. About midway through the ritual, it went horribly wrong and Saulot woke seconds before his destruction. He put up no resistance as his blood was drained, passing into Final Death with a look of peace on his face. But the seven participants found the ritual did not go as planned. They achieved the immortality they were looking for, but at the cost of their mortal souls: they had become vampires.

The seven conspirators returned to their former lives, now made more difficult by their new limitations. The ritual had been performed in secret and remained known only to those involved. But trouble continued to befall the magi and Etrius foresaw the death of the Order itself. The elder magi of the House met and agreed that even though the Order should be destroyed, House Tremere should survive by any means necessary.

The seven new vampires met in secret. They believed they carried within them the means for House Tremere to survive, if it could be passed on. They had no idea if they could create others like them, though occult knowledge implied that vampiric nature could be passed on in the blood. An experiment was created and a suitable "guinea pig" found -- Marcello, another student of Goratrix and also a Quaesitor for House Tremere. It had been convincingly argued that it would be good for the Seven to have a sympathetic ear among the Quaesitori. They decided to use a mixture of their blood, as the rest of the Seven did not want any single one of them to have sway over a Quaesitor. The experiment was a success and Marcello joined the ranks of the vampiric Tremere. The giving of the "gift" of vampirism by using the mingled blood of the Seven has remained the standard practice ever since.

All agreed that their new "gift" was the only way to save the House, but they argued about the method to disperse it. Goratrix felt all members of the House should be transformed or die. Etrius argued that each individual member should be given a choice. After all, he said, the Order was doomed and all who declined to join them would pass from this world, regardless. The remaining Seven were divided, two siding with Goratrix, two with Etrius. Loriel broke the tie, stating the survival of the House as a whole took precedence over the preferences of its individual members. All but Etrius were swayed by Goratrix, Loriel and their supporters and it was agreed that members of the House would be "innoculated" or eliminated, for the good of House Tremere.

As the number of vampiric Tremere increased, their existence within the Order became harder to disguise and their behavior harder to control. By 1205, the year Pope Innocent III declared the Fourth Crusade, the Order was becoming aware of the existence of the undead within their ranks. Even some among the mortal population (a few scholars both inside the Church and out of it) were beginning to notice.

The Crusade expanded beyond its original targets, the Cathars, to include others suspected of heresy, turning from a Crusade into the Inquisition. Many magi of the Order were executed as heretics during this time and the Order itself came to be seen as a heretical organization (though it was never officially declared such by the Pope).

Increasing abuses of vampiric power brought the attention of Church and State on the Kindred in general and drew attention to the Tremere specifically. It was believed that Goratrix himself, heady with power, instigated many of these abuses. An emergency meeting of the Seven was called in Transylvania to consider the situation. Goratrix was ruled to have overstepped his bounds and to have jeopardized the Code of Hermes, risking the security of the Clan. He was ordered by the rest of the Seven to relinquish his position. Goratrix claimed it was no doing of his, but the rest did not listen. Believing the rest of the Seven intended to destroy him, he fled into the wilderness of the Eastern mountains. Grimgroth, formerly of Mistridge covenant, was named to replace him as one of the Seven and Etrius was named Primus of the House, which by now was essentially vampiric.

The Tremere like to take credit for the founding of the Camarilla and, indeed, they did greatly influence its formation. At a meeting of clan elders in 1394, the Tremere revealed their existance to the vampire population at large. They proposed an organization loosely based on the Order of Hermes. The plan wasn't adopted by the gathering, but their ideas did influence the Ventrue leader, Hardestadt, who proposed a league similar to the modern Camarilla. Despite their role in creating the Camarilla -- or perhaps because of it -- the Tremere have remained the most mistrusted Camarilla clan.

Meanwhile, while the Camarilla was on the rise, the Order of Hermes was on the decline. Some members blamed this on the growth of Reason, others on the dwindling sources of vis, others on House Tremere. By the 15th century, the Order had become aware of House Tremere's "conversion," and the House was stricken from the Order's ranks (though rumors persist that mortal mage Tremere still exist, in secret, within the Order of Hermes, masquerading as members of other Houses). This created an animosity between the Tremere and the Order, which has, at times, flared into actual warfare.

Around the mid-18th century, several of the younger members of House and Clan (as the Tremere have come to refer to themselves) inexplicably went missing. At first, this was attributed to the predations of more aggressive members of the Order of Hermes (most notably among them, members of Houses Flambeau and Tytalus who have lead the skirmishes against House and Clan). Only through diligent efforts was it discovered that Goratrix, hidden deep in the mountains of Eastern Europe, had joined the Sabbat and that many of the missing neonates were believed to have joined him. Upon this discovery, the Seven, in a powerful ritual, branded Goratrix and his followers with a sigil on their foreheads. This mark is readily visible to any Tremere magus.

Because of the unique way Clan Tremere came into existence, the blood of its members differs from other Kindred blood. Having been created from Salubri blood heavily saturated with vis, Tremere blood used in magick has sometimes startling side-effects. The Tremere rituals do not suffer from this, but they do make a distinction between Tremere blood and other Kindred blood, preferring one or the other, depending on the nature of the working they are attempting.

Tremere also suffer somewhat less from the side-effects of drinking mage blood (though even they should not be exempt from them) and, indeed, some seem to have a preference for it. A good number of Tremere "recruits" come from the ranks of the Traditions.

Other Kindred diablerizing a Tremere may suffer some interesting side-effects (Storyteller's discretion) from drinking the Tremere's strange vitae. Otherwise, Tremere vitae should have all the same properties as normal Kindred blood. These differences, though, cause House and Clan to view themselves as superior to other Kindred and is one of the "proofs" given to justify the other Clans' mistrust of the Tremere.

Tremere, World of Darkness, Camarilla, Kindred, and probably other terms, are property of White Wolf Publishing. House Tremere, Order of Hermes, and Ars Magica are property of Atlas Games. The information on this page is for personal entertainment only and is not intended as a challenge to any copyrights owned by any game company.

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