Vaulderie

Progeny is the term vampires use to describe new vampires they have Embraced and who are permanently linked to them by blood, descent, and possibly social or political factors. A single one of a vampire's progeny is referred to as a childe, while an entire group of childer from a single vampire can also be referred to as a brood. A vampire who has created one or more childer is referred to as their sire.

Supernatural Connections

All vampires are supernaturally connected to their sires, and to their childer as well if they choose to create any. The strength of this connection depends on various factors, but is present even for vampires who never even see or speak to their sires; now that they share their sire's literal vitae, they are linked to them in spite of their best efforts. Many sires supplement this connection with a blood bond as soon as possible, especially if they are not particularly powerful and doubt their influence over their chidler.

For most vampires, this only means that they feel occasional twinges in emergencies; depending on how powerful and ancient their sire is, they may be able to send out distress signals to their brood when endangered, or else they may have no conscious control, meaning that their childer only become vaguely aware of this when they are near death. Distance also affects ths bond, making it more and more difficult for vampires to sense their sires the farther they stray from them, but this is often considered a benefit, and many young vampires move substantially far away from their sires as soon they can.

Because childer have weaker blood than their sires by default, sires seldom have any psychic awareness of them, even when they are in danger or destroyed, without using additional powers. Similarly, members of the same brood may share the same sire, but generally have to keep tabs on one another the usual way if they wish to do so. Depending on the clan or bloodline, some vampires are extremely careful about sharing blood or powers outside of their broods, believing that it might diminish their uniqueness or otherwise damage their family relationship.

When a sire is killed, if they were sufficiently ancient (an elder at the youngest), their childer may sometimes experience a psychic backlash that causes intense emotional distress and disorientation; folktales exist of elders so powerful that their deaths echoed all the way down the generations of their descendants or even killed their childer with the sudden trauma of severing the link. These stories are considered apocryphal, especially among neonates who are unlikely to even encounter the phenomenon, or else to be mistaken tales of the effects of a broken bloodbond.

Social Connections

There is significant variation between different clans, bloodlines, and sects, but most vampires consider broods to be a sort of rudimentary family unit. They are often treated informally as though the sire were the head of the family and their childer adult children under their care, which often leads to fractious discord among the brood itself but also allows them to protect one another in the event of danger and to expect that other vampires will recognize and respect their instinct to do so. Different members of a brood may treat one anothers as cousins or siblings due to this shared "relation", although of course the relationship is not analogous to most human ones.

Of course, vampires tend to dislike one another due to territorialism, mismatched morals, or simple lonerism, so broods are not necessarily recognizable as happy families, especially since new members are meeting everyone as adults rather than having the luxury of growing up together. Some vampires avoid or repudiate their broods, especially if their sire or a broodmate is notorious for something that can likewise make them look bad; the behavior of a brood is often considered a reflection on their sire, and similarly a sire's behavior leads other vampires to guess that their childer will be similar. Depending on the sect and local politics, some vampires may succeed in formally renouncing their broods in order to escape negative connotations, but for most, the brood is a constant that, for good or ill, they will carry for eternity (or at least until they're the only one left).

Political Connections

Since broods are so fundamental to vampire society, various sects and coteries have a dizzying array of laws regarding them, ranging from draconian to surprisingly compassionate. In particular, the Camarilla, Cradle of Civilization, Quiet Nations, and Shining Kingdoms maintain laws related to the protection of progeny, usually in the sense of allowing a sire enough latitude to protect their childer from danger without courting death or at the least considering it a mitigating factor. Progeny are often considered directly attached to their sires in these sects, and an attack on any them is often considered tantamount to an attack on their sire.

On the other hand, the behavior of a childe also reflects politically back on their sire; in particular, a sire may be considered fully responsible for a childe who breaks laws or commits crimes, a convention upheld in the hopes that it will encourage sires to be careful not to Embrace hotheaded or over-flamboyant childer. If more than one member of a sire's brood causes problems, it is not uncommon for local rulers to ban that sire from Embracing any further until they correct the issue or otherwise demonstrate a reasonable level of responsibility.

Broods are also an important family unit in most other sects with the exception of the Sabbat, which considers the idea to be a relic of human society that vampires have no need to reproduce after death. Sabbat vampires sometimes know who their sire is, but are unlikely to have more of a relationship with them than anyone else outside of a few rare cases of genuine fondness, and often not only never see them but don't even know for sure who they are, let alone any possible broodmates that may exist.

Camarilla Houses

In the Camarilla, the idea of progeny has been refined into the complex system of the Houses, which are in essence broods that have grown large enough to be considered political entities in their own right. Few sires are old, powerful, and politically savvy enough to amass enough childer (who then have their own childer) to become considered a House, but once they have done so they become a formidable political force. Houses are always headed by an elder or older vampire and function much like lines of nobility in human society, allowing their members the social and political cachet that comes from associating with such a well-established and powerful family. Once formed, they are extremely difficult to dissolve without managing to successfully kill all their members.

A House is basically just one enormous brood, usually considered headed by their oldest member (almost always the original elder that started Embracing with the goal of founding the House). Within a House, grandchilder and great-grandchilder may also be colloquially referred to as part of the brood of the elder who spawned the generations that led to them.

Shovelheads

Sabbat shovelheads, vampires who were mass-Embraced by multiple people and left to fend for themselves, obviously have no idea who their sires are and therefore very little chance of connecting to the rest of their brood. For the lucky few footsoldiers who survive the offensives they were Embraced for, some consider fellow shovelheads Embraced in the same event to be their "brood", although this is more of a comrades-in-arms personal designation than one that carries any political weight with their peers.

On the positive side, however, no one vampire's blood is typically strong enough in a shovelhead to connect them to their sires, so they tend not to suffer from emergency warnings or even notice if someone involved in their Embrace drops dead somewhere.

See Also

Embrace
House