From SuspireWiki

Philadelphia is a city at war, literally. While the mortals of the city go about their night to night business in the city that founded a revolution the Kindred of the city fight their own, over and over again. No one remembers exactly when it started, it seems. Or if they do remember, they don't agree on it. Depending on who you ask, the Carthian Movement held Praxis and the Invictus high-handedly murdered their people and stole it from them. Or maybe it was the Invictus who had it while the Carthian Movement strategically routed out and murdered their retainers. Whoever tells the story though agrees on at least one thing: that murder was involved and that Praxis has changed hands at least three times between the two covenants. Right now Patrick Marselles holds a flimsy throne for the Invictus covenant but it's a night-to-night struggle. The Carthians are well entrenched and working on taking out Invictus support. The Invictus covenant manages to hang on through sheer age, stubbornness and many, many boons over the others in the city who hail from different covenants. Every night is a coin flip between guerrilla warfare in the streets or political assassinations of character in Elysium. The war goes on beneath the glitz of the Invictus' attempts to make every thing seem normal. After all, it's a long held Invictus motto that you really can fake it until you make it.