History/Background
Antonio was born in 1467 to a very ecstatic mother and father. It was very rare, even in those times, for two vampires to find one another, let alone fall in love and be lucky enough to have a child. His father was an architect of great renown whose strictly nocturnal meetings were scrutinized, but tolerated in light of his designing genius. Antonio began apprenticing under him at the age of 13. He learned the intricacies of arithmetic, geometry, and the like. He fell in love with his father’s trade.
One cold, October night in 1492, his father left for a business meeting and never returned. His mother, fretting for her husband’s life combed the city for him, but was forced to return because the dawn was fast approaching. The mob came just after dawn. His mother told him to hide, he complied. They burst into their home and dragged her out, out into the sun. Out into death. He watched from a shaded window as she died, convulsing, screaming, being beaten with clubs until she stopped moving.
He still can’t accurately recall how he fled the house, avoiding the sun, though he can recall the nights thereafter, sleeping in caves to avoid the killing rays, subsisting on animals. He fled east. He avoided towns for the most part, but when he reached the City of Venice, his life was changed forever. He met a man named Leonardo, a gifted anatomist, mathematician, sculptor, and painter. He befriended the lost and lonely Antonio almost immediately, fascinated with his very nature. He learned many invaluable lessons from Leonardo: how to hide one’s actions in plain sight, how angles can be convinced to work with rather than against gravity to create structures that seem to defy gravity. Leonardo’s most important lesson, though, was that, regardless of the evils that plague all of society, there existed, still, genuinely good people, and good friends. Leonardo reawakened Antonio’s faith, both in God and in humanity.
After the death of Leonardo da Vinci, Antonio spent the next 490 years staying below the radar. He hired actors, using funds from the fortune his father’s supposed death had caused him, to play himself during daylight hours, allowing him to work as an architect, and gain quite a bit of renown, under various pseudonyms, throughout the centuries. He has spent time in China, France, India, England, Scotland, and Japan, and is nearly fluent in all the languages spoken in those parts. After the American Revolution, he relocated to the newly created United States, drawn by the land of promise just like so many immigrants. A new country needed buildings, he reasoned, and he wasn’t mistaken. Since, he has lived in New Amsterdam, which has sense been renamed New York, getting lost in the constant stream of newcomers.
One cold, October night in 1492, his father left for a business meeting and never returned. His mother, fretting for her husband’s life combed the city for him, but was forced to return because the dawn was fast approaching. The mob came just after dawn. His mother told him to hide, he complied. They burst into their home and dragged her out, out into the sun. Out into death. He watched from a shaded window as she died, convulsing, screaming, being beaten with clubs until she stopped moving.
He still can’t accurately recall how he fled the house, avoiding the sun, though he can recall the nights thereafter, sleeping in caves to avoid the killing rays, subsisting on animals. He fled east. He avoided towns for the most part, but when he reached the City of Venice, his life was changed forever. He met a man named Leonardo, a gifted anatomist, mathematician, sculptor, and painter. He befriended the lost and lonely Antonio almost immediately, fascinated with his very nature. He learned many invaluable lessons from Leonardo: how to hide one’s actions in plain sight, how angles can be convinced to work with rather than against gravity to create structures that seem to defy gravity. Leonardo’s most important lesson, though, was that, regardless of the evils that plague all of society, there existed, still, genuinely good people, and good friends. Leonardo reawakened Antonio’s faith, both in God and in humanity.
After the death of Leonardo da Vinci, Antonio spent the next 490 years staying below the radar. He hired actors, using funds from the fortune his father’s supposed death had caused him, to play himself during daylight hours, allowing him to work as an architect, and gain quite a bit of renown, under various pseudonyms, throughout the centuries. He has spent time in China, France, India, England, Scotland, and Japan, and is nearly fluent in all the languages spoken in those parts. After the American Revolution, he relocated to the newly created United States, drawn by the land of promise just like so many immigrants. A new country needed buildings, he reasoned, and he wasn’t mistaken. Since, he has lived in New Amsterdam, which has sense been renamed New York, getting lost in the constant stream of newcomers.