Clan: Ventrue
Sire: Frederick Allen III
Born: 1925
Embrace: 2000
Apparent Age: Late 20's
Played By: Ross S.
Status: 5
Acknowledged - Anne Bowesley, Queen of London
Indomitable - Prince of Seattle Calebros
Well-Spoken - Prince of Seattle Calebros
Genteel - Alixanrda Lamareux
Honorable - Elizabetha Daniels
Capsule History
Born to blue collar parents in Brunswick, Georgia, Kenneth Ashland grew up under modest circumstances. Doing well in school, he maintained associates throughout his childhood both in the upper and lower crust of society. In his early 20's he gained employment in a local law firm as a clerk, and began the process of earning his law degree.
By means of influential individuals he met within and through the law firm, Kenneth was able to dodge being drafted into World War II, instead completing his education and moving to Savannah, Georgia, where he opened a small legal practice. Over the next few years he married, and took part in several high-profile cases.
Shortly after the birth of his first child, Kenneth took the case of one Robert Massart, an accused child-killer. After a long and sensationalized trial, Kenneth managed to get his client acquitted, though mostly through legal technicalities. Unbeknownst to Kenneth, Massart was the descendant of one of Savannah's powerful Kindred, the Toreador Regina Davenport. She, in turn, was a rival of Frederick Allen III, an Elder Ventrue who had engineered Massart's arrest in hopes of embarrassing Davenport.
Frustrated by the outcome, but impressed with the legal ability and staying of conscience it took to get a child-killer free, Allen III swiftly claimed Kenneth as his Ghoul.
When he was not managing his practice, or his young family, Kenneth was bound into managing his Sire's peculiar feeding habit on young children; and, in several instances, disposing of those upon whom his Sire had fed too deeply. Such tasks hardened Kenneth's soul.
One night, while attending his Sire at a Kindred gathering, news of large fire engulfing a nearby residential area reached his ears: it was Kenneth's neighborhood, where his wife and baby were. Kenneth pleaded with his Sire to let him go home and check on his family; Frederick Allen III refused, insisting Kenneth stay at his side. The Blood Bond won-out over Kenneth's fears. Kenneth's family died in the fire.
The ensuing decades became a blur of depression, tempered by enslaved devotion. The Blood Bond suppressed Kenneth's despair for his family, and his hate of his Master. He continued serving Frederick Allen III loyally.
In 1999, Kenneth was once more at his Sire's side while Allen III made a journey to Atlanta, Georgia, purportedly on business. As the dawn was about to break on their last day in Atlanta, something attacked the rented home in which Kenneth and his Master stayed. Somehow, Kenneth was able to fight-off and kill the creature before it could reach his already slumbering Master, but not before the creature somehow mangled Kenneth's right leg, fusing the knee joint together. To this day, Kenneth Ashland is forced to hobble with the use of a cane.
In recognition for his likely saving his Master's life, as well as for decades of service, Frederick Allen III gifted Kenneth with the Embrace. With his death, the Blood Bond broke, and years of silent torment came rushing back to Ashland. But Kenneth knew that to make any move against his Sire was, literally, suicide. So he pushed-down his rage, and accepted the training into the Ventrue Clan with full enthusiasm.
After five years of tutelage, combined with the peripheral but not inconsiderate training of decades past, Kenneth was released and sent to Seattle to prove his worth in "the wilderness."
Within three months, the Neonate Ventrue was shockingly made Harpy of the Emerald Domain; a move meant to embarrass the previous Harpy, the Toreador Jelly Roll Morton. Seeing the new role as a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, Ashland dove into his duties headfirst.
For the next two years, the young Ashland used his legal experience, combined with his southern-aristocratic facade, to ride the tumultuous waves of Seattle social and political society. On at least four occasions attempts were made on his life; in each instance, the would-be assassins were foiled, usually by others on Ashland's behalf. Notably, he created the game of the 'Social Circle,' wherein a single individual is surrounded by an attending group, and the group is given the chance to pass judgment over some action or another undertaken by the target. This 'game' has survived to be employed by several of Seattle's Harpies since.
In the Fall of 2005, Ashland was given the opportunity to accompany the Venture Elder Davrian Rockefeller to London, England to undertake further study of Kindred Law and Ventrue society. Trading all the Boons he possessed as tribute to Rockefeller for the opportunity, Ashland departed Seattle having been, at the time, the longest-serving Harpy of the Emerald Domain.
From then onward, Ashland has been a resident of London, learning Kindred Law and custom from such luminaries as the Ventrue Cyril Masters, and the finer points of social warfare from London's Harpies, The Volker Sisters.
