Vampire Characters

Juliano Costello

These are my friends
See how they glisten
See how this one shines.
How he smiles in the light
My friend, My faithful friend.
…
You’ve been locked out of sight,
All these years
Like me, my friend
…
Well, I’ve come home to find you waiting
You shall drip rubies.
— Steven Sondheim “My Friend” (Sweeny Todd)

Name: Juliano Costello

Clan: Toreador

Nature: Bön-Vivant

Demeanor: Avante-Garde

Generation: 13

Concept: Casual Killer

Quote:“Granting a True Death, or an Embrace, requires true artistry. Nothing detracts from either than sloppiness, haste, and lack of taste.”

Concept: A Toreador whose favorite art form is violence and death and whose favorite method of artistic expression is killing hand-to-hand.

Description: Juliano stands about 6′ 1″ tall and weighs 190 lbs. He is very quick but smooth in his movements. He is always fashionably dressed in dark evening clothes or a tuxedo, as if on his way to the theater or opera.

Juliano’s eyes and long hair are black; both glisten in the light. He wears a constant bored expression, looking disdainfully at his surroundings from under half-lidded eyes while stroking his pale, thin lips with his sensitive fingers. His skin is slightly dark, but paling since he was Embraced. He wears three plain gold rings, two on his right hand (first and ring finger) and one on the left (pinky) and a gold and diamond stickpin in the form of a lotus.

Prelude: Juliano Costello is, or, rather, was a high-ranking member of the Chicago Gamboni crime family. As such, he had to maintain a straight image while constantly wanting to submerge himself in the pursuit all forms of pleasure. His only outwardly acceptable pursuit was the opera, where he met the Kindred woman who eventually Embraced him (to the music of Mozart’s Faustus.) Being made a Toreador has allowed him to explore those passions and interests with abandon.

Juliano is an expert at the French martial art of Savate and an artist with a knife. When not practicing the martial arts or on the target range, he writes haiku and practices opera singing. He has a fairly good voice, but he does better when he imitates a famous opera singer than when he uses his own voice. Despite that, he is definitely a poseur, not an artíste. However Juliano is totally convinced of his natural excellent taste and breeding: as such, he feels compelled to criticize and depreciate any work of art that does not meet his exacting (and unpredictable) standards.

Backgrounds: Before his Embrace, Juliano was in charge of several front operations, laundering money for the Mob. Soon after his Embrace he was able to withdraw most of the money invested in those fronts for himself, using it to set himself up in a comfortable lifestyle as befits someone from his Clan as the source for his Resources. He has managed to maintain a number of contacts with very influential individuals in local politics, under the cover that his death was “staged” to divert attention from him: this accounts for his level of political Influence in the city.

Merits / Flaws: Juliano only Feeds from individuals involved in violent professions: the police, violent criminals, prize fighters, etc. His aversion to garlic is purely psychological, based on old tales from his childhood.

Possessions: Black silk evening suit and top coat; top hat; white silk scarf; ebony cigarette holder; ornate gold cigarette lighter; package of French cigarettes; silvered-plated pistol with ivory handgrips; concealed switchblade; embossed and tooled leather notebook and gold fountain pens.

Roleplaying Tips: Beauty and grace in all things, even killing. Being Kin has revealed to him that Life and Death are two sides of the same coin, so he carries the same desires of beauty and grace towards both. Talk with wide, expansive gestures and phrases. Violence enthralls him more than anything else, and nothing disappoints him more than an ugly or poorly executed killing (high explosives, for instance: too messy and indirect.) Compose poetry to your knife and read it out loud.