Name: Fiadh
Age: 200+
Pronouns: She/her
Species: Fae
Faction: Dusk
Occupation: Owner at Harvest Gold
Hometown: A village abandoned during the Great Hunger of Ireland
Sexuality: Pansexual
Relationship Status: Single
Fiadh had never understood the fascination people had with the past until she reached the 1970's. Until that decade she had never bother to dwell in any of her past lives. She moved from city to city, country to country, continent to continent for almost a hundred years after leaving her home when the famine came before she slowed. Her parents had no real interest in raising a child and as soon as she came of age they were encouraging her to take off on her own so when the humans began to suffer around them Fiadh followed them off the isle.
She settled in Eden Ros in the 1960's without any intent to stay. This was as close to that village as she had been since she left and she wasn't sure about sticking around but when the 70's arrived, so did the party and everyone actively chasing the same high she had been. A utopia of fun, alcohol, drugs, deals, dancing. So when the chance to purchase Harvest Gold was present, Fiadh jumped. If she was going to put down roots and spend the hordes of gold she had accrued through her travels this was worth it to her. This was going to be her home. This was the first time she wanted to remember, she wanted to know the people around her.
Over the years she's loved seeing those who come through her doors and meeting new species throughout the years but has continually struggled to find a way to build lasting relationships. She found it hard to relate to others when they built themselves off of their past experiences when she would rather leave who she'd been exactly where she dropped them in the cities she no longer dwelled in but creating a consistent self has proved harder than she had expected.
(adria arjona/136/ciswoman+she/her) VIOLA DEL MAR has been in Eden Ros for FIVE YEARS, and is from THE CARIBBEAN SEA. They are “34” (136) and work at THE SIREN’S WAIL as a LOUNGE SINGER. Rumor has it, they’re a MER associated with BEUR. They are EARNEST and CHARMING, but also ERRATIC and ENTITLED.
Name: Viola Del Mar
Occupation: Lounge singer and part owner of Siren's Wail Casino
Age: 136 (physically 34)
Sexuality: Bisexual
Species: Mermaid
Faction: Beur, exiled from Pelagi
Hometown: Caribbean Sea
Relationship Status: Got business partner-zoned by the fiancee she was attempting to honey trap </3 it be like that sometimes
BIO (coming soon, i hope).
Headcanons:
The Siren’s Wail owes part of its success to Viola’s lounge act, La Sirena de Galloway. Billed as a Latin jazz night, the act traditionally opens with multiple covers of Puerto Rican songs sung by Viola, alongside a band of four others. A large porthole tank looks directly into the lounge, as “mermaids” (humans, much to her chagrin—she couldn't get any real mers to agree to do the show) glide by the windows and dance along to the music. At a quarter to midnight, the mood shifts; the lights dim, all but the pianist and Viola clear the stage, and the audience holds their breath in anticipation. Lit in a soft, hazy blue, she begins to sing a haunting rendition of The Mermaid of Galloway, crooning into the microphone as something altogether strange takes over her captive audience. By song’s end they have to be ushered out the room, decidedly dazed, as pamphlets for the casino floor are shoved into their hands and the mermaids blow them kisses goodbye through the windows. They always take to the slots immediately after, spending far more than is reasonable, and they always come back for more.
Viola is a polyglot. She speaks Spanish, English, French, Haitian Creole, Dutch, and, most recently, Scottish Gaelic.
She sees little issue with misrepresenting facts and stretching truths if it makes reality sound nicer. She’s always had lofty ideas of what life ought to look like, particularly where it concerns her place in it, and that often translates into her rearranging everything around her to fit that narrative. Some people will call it delusional. She prefers romantic.
(Gugu Mbatha-Raw/2655/Female+She/Her) ALDORA LADON has been in Eden Ros for ONE YEAR, and is from LESBOS, GREECE. They are 2655 YEARS OLD and work at THE DRAGON'S HOARD as its OWNER. Rumor has it, they’re a VAMPIRE associated with ALBEDO. They are CHARISMATIC and COMPASSIONATE, but also STUBBORN and OVERLY SENTIMENTAL. (doodle/30/PST/SA, Eye gore, pregnancy trauma, suicide)
Introduction:
Name: Aldora Ladon
Age: 2655
Pronouns: She/Her
Species: Vampire
Faction: Albedo
Occupation: Owner of The Dragon's Hoard
Hometown: Lesbos Greece
Sexuality: Sapphic
Relationship Status: Single
TW: Death, grief, terminal illness, murder, war and historical persecution (WWII/Nazi Germany), cult-like behavior, trauma, survivor's guilt
dividers by @uzmacchiato
It’s been so long now that you don’t remember much of the time before the change. You remember the smell of the olive groves. You remember the way the waters were so much clearer then. Most of all, you remember her. The way she wove violets into your hair. The way the muses themselves seemed to have blessed her poems and songs. You could never forget her, even if you wanted to. History wouldn’t allow it. Even though her poems exist only in fragments now. The once-nameless love you shared with her now bears her name—empowering women similar to you everywhere. Violets are still your favorite. You always have them somewhere in your home.
It’s hard to remember, but you know the first century was the hardest. You missed the feeling of the sun on your skin. You struggled at first to keep yourself properly fed. But you adjusted. You learned. The hardest part, though, was the goodbyes. The clearest memory is of the woman who was your sister in all but blood. She was smart. She was curious. She loved you unconditionally. It was strange seeing your dearest friend wrinkle and grey without you. The only one who stayed after the change. You had offered her eternity together a few times. She declined each time. Instead, she simply asked you to remember her and to care for her descendants. You agreed without hesitation. You were the one to place the coins on her eyes for the ferryman. In your mind, she is as eternal as you are, for you carry her memory. You carry one of her perónē with you as a memento.
The decades begin to blur. As do the centuries. You have an eternity, after all, so you take your time. You explore. You travel. You watch as empires rise and fall. Sometimes you’re in the thick of it among the countrymen. Sometimes you are deep in the remote and untouched places of the world, and when you return, civilization is vastly different than when you left it. The very air had shifted at one point in a way you couldn’t quite place. You think nothing of it, though. Everything is a cycle. There is never a shortage of things to learn. You carry many small mementos of each human lifespan you've lived.
You keep your promise to the best of your ability. Sometimes time slips away from you. But you always find your way back to them, even as they have traveled far from your homeland. They kept records of you. They gave their children middle names that honored their origins for you. They spoke of you like a revered guardian spirit. But the line is close to ending. You linger this time, protecting them more directly. What would later become known as the Renaissance has begun. The newest descendant is named Orpheus, for you. He is smart. He is curious. You love him unconditionally. You see so much of your friend in him—the one you made the promise to. He has such a bright future, one you intend to see him through.
Orpheus falls ill. His life is going to end before it even has the chance to truly begin. You can help him. You can save him. You can’t bear to lose him. You can’t bear to lose the last connection to your friend. You offer him eternity. He accepts. The tears you shed are both to mourn the life he should have had and of relief. You give him your blood and hold his hand when the sickness takes him. You make sure you are the first thing he sees when he reawakens. You promise him that he will never truly be alone.
Centuries pass again. There were growing pains at first, but you and Orpheus have fallen into a rhythm. You re-enter the world together time and time again as siblings. It's natural at this point, like there was never a time that Orpheus was not your precious younger brother. He loses track of time more easily than you do. His curiosity leads him away at times. Sometimes for a few years. Sometimes for a decade. But he always writes. He always comes back. And the two of you exchange the most wonderful stories of your experiences while you were apart.
One spring, during one of Orpheus's longer wanderings, you meet a young woman who reminds you of him. She is clever. Ambitious. Bright in a way that draws people toward her like moths to a flame. By the time the sickness takes hold of her, you already love her like a daughter. When she accepts your offer of eternity, you find yourself holding her hand through death just as you once held Orpheus's.
For a time, you are happy. You laugh together. You build lives together. Then the cracks begin to show. She embraces immortality with a hunger that unsettles you. She turns mortals freely. Surrounds herself with devoted followers. Encourages them to do the same. What begins as a family becomes a congregation. What becomes a congregation slowly becomes something else. You try to reason with her. You try to remind her of compassion. Of restraint. Of responsibility. You tell yourself there is still time. There is always time. Until one night you are forced to accept a truth more painful than any stake or sunlight: you love her, and she has become a monster.
You cannot bring yourself to do what must be done. So you ask Orpheus for help. Together, you remove your heart. You leave it in his keeping and swear you will reclaim it when the task is finished. Heartless, you hunt your fledgling across countries and decades. You end her. Then you keep going. Her fledglings. Their fledglings. Every branch of the tree you planted. Every trace of the cycle you started. You tell yourself you are preventing future suffering. You tell yourself you are being thorough. In truth, there is simply nothing left inside you to tell you when to stop. Orpheus is forced to stop you himself. Forced to return your heart despite your protests. When your emotions come rushing back, the horror nearly drowns you. There are survivors. There will always be survivors. Some undoubtedly hate you. Some may still hunt you. You do not blame them. You never remove your heart again. Some cycles must be broken, you learn. Even the ones you began yourself.
You notice the world seems to be changing faster and faster now. What once took fifty years to change now shifts in ten or less. Industrialization is starting to sweep through civilization at an almost alarming rate. After a longer-than-usual withdrawal, you come back to find out that almost the entire world had been at war—and was about to be again. You witness the early signs. You witness the first book burning in 1933. You will not be a passive observer this time. You ache that so much of your own original culture had been lost to time. You aren’t going to stand by and let others be forcibly erased.
You aren’t on the front lines, but you work in the shadows. You end up aiding the MFAA, or Monuments Men, as they would later be called, at every opportunity you can. It's while you're on your way to what you suspect is a hidden cache that you meet Emory. You have never met a woman so thoroughly exasperating. You almost consider using compulsion on her to get her to sit still long enough to let you apply first aid—almost. A stern grip on her chin and a stubborn look work well enough that you don't have to. The air is thick with a different kind of tension—but it is not the time or place for such things. You let her go, fairly sure you won’t see her again, even as she stubbornly lingers in your memory.
The war eventually ends. The war has changed you in ways you didn’t expect. You find yourself not only keeping mementos and memories of your own experiences, but now drawn to objects that seem to hold stories and memories in general. Even broken or misshapen things. Sometimes especially the broken or misshapen things. Your collection is growing. Rapidly.
Orpheus is not handling the aftermath of war well. He tells you he needs to be alone for a little while to heal. You of course let him go. You’ve been around long enough to recognize the ghosts lingering in his mind—shell shock, as they’re calling it now. He promises to write to check in once in a while. You believe him. You will miss him, as always. But you love him too much to not let him go.
Six years pass. You don’t hear very much from Orpheus, but that isn’t too out of the ordinary. He has wandered off for this long before. And he asked for space, so you don’t think much of it for now. Time feels strange these days, anyhow. It’s getting close to time for you to leave and re-enter the world somewhere else, but one night before you do, you decide on a whim to attend a gathering of other veterans from the war. When you sit at the bar that night, an impossibly familiar voice appears by your side. It’s Emory. She has not aged a day. She notices you also haven’t aged. A hushed confrontation in the alley behind the bar confirms it. Emory is a mer.
You keep running into each other. Accidentally at first. Emory is just as exasperating as you remember. You swear she has a sixth sense for exactly which buttons to push. The tension boils over one night into a shared bed. And then it happens again. Before you realize it, you start seeking her out on purpose. The exasperation is still there, but fond now. You have a home together in Casablanca. She teases you about your collection being a dragon's hoard, even as she brings you things to add to it. You weave violets into her hair. You love her.
Everything is a cycle, you had learned. A constant flow of beginnings and endings. You have nine wonderful, peaceful years with Emory. But all things must end. Emory’s family needs her—something about her sister. You have a very long, difficult conversation. It is getting close to time for you to leave and re-enter the world again. It breaks your heart to do so, but the two of you decide to amicably part ways. On your last night together, you stand by the ocean. You wrap your himation around her shoulders—one of the few items you still have from Lesbos. You had paid a witch to enchant it so that it would neither be damaged nor slow Emory down in the water. You use it to pull her in for one final kiss goodbye before you watch her disappear into the waves, holding the memento she gave you to your heart. You love her too much to not let her go.
Emory’s departure brings a startling realization. You have not heard from Orpheus since 1945. Seventeen years. Something isn’t right. Request for space or not, he has never in the centuries you have spent side by side gone this long without so much as a letter. You need to search for him. You need to know what happened. For sixty-three years, you tirelessly search for him. You even end up joining the Albedo faction for additional resources.
Eventually, there is a lead. An associate in your new faction informs you that someone fitting Orpheus’s description had been seen a few years after you last saw him in the city of Eden Ros, Scotland. You're close. You don't know how you know, but you do. You move there immediately, surprised to find it quite the hotbed of supernatural activity. Something about this place charms you. You decide that once Orpheus is found, perhaps you’ll spend a century or two here.
A year has passed since you came to Eden Ros. You have hit a wall in your search for Orpheus. You know he is here somewhere. You can feel it in your bones. But you don’t know the area well enough yet—too much has changed since your last brief visit centuries ago. So you decide to settle in. You open a little curiosity shop—The Dragon's Hoard—and offer good payment on any interesting items brought to you, especially broken or misshapen things. Happy customers bring good information. You learn as much as you can.
Everything is a cycle, and some must be broken. Orpheus's is the one you refuse to let end.
(Dev Patel/36/nb+he/they) Kanta Rana has been in Eden Ros for 3 years. He is 36 and works at Ahab's Ferry as a Captain/Owner. Rumor has it, he’s a Hunter associated with the Order. He is Chivalrous and Adaptable, but also Short-Tempered and Erratic.
Introduction
Name: Kanta 'Shiv' Rana
Age: 36
Pronouns: He/They
Species: Human (Hunter)
Faction: The Order
Occupation: Owner/Captain of Ahab's Ferry, Order Archivist
001: Your name is Kanta. You were born in London, 1990, and you have always been more hunter than man. Your first kill was in the womb, snuffing out your twin and absorbing him into yourself. It became a running bit in your family shortly after you were born. But, looking back in retrospect with what you know now, you don't find it as funny as you did then.
002: You are the youngest Rana son, the most recent addition to a long line of ruthless hunters. It is rumored that the Ranas had a hand in establishing Order sects across India long before the British Raj's rule but all the proof you have are tall tales and bedtime stories. Regardless of whether or not this is true, your family has drastically dwindled in numbers but still maintains a strong presence in the modern Order.
Your father, Asim Rana, is a diligent Archivist to the London sect. What Asim lacked in social skills or brute strength he easily made up for with sheer intellect and cunning. Your older sibling is his spitting image, both in appearance and capability. They were the ideal prodigy under Asim's tutelage.
You, however, were more attached to your mother: Kalpana Rana. Kalpana was a highly skilled and persistent hunter but she was more interested in the physical process and mental ritual of hunting than enforcing human supremacy or codes of honor. She had no interest in climbing the Order's social order. Kalpana instead focused her efforts outside hunting on the well-being of her children, Kanta especially. While Asim took their eldest with him to work in the Order archives, Kalpana took you on field excursions outside of London. Your most cherished early memories are the summer days and nights spent as your mother's dutiful squire.
003: Those excursions came to a gradual halt as your mother's condition worsened over time. Kalpana had been troubled with bouts of narcolepsy since childhood. That narcolepsy evolved into noctambulism by the time you and your sibling hit double digits. Some nights Kalpana suddenly fell asleep in one area of the house and mysteriously woke up in another. Other mornings she’d find herself standing at their doorstep or looking at the family home from across the street at the crack of dawn. She tried prayer and medicine. She tried locking all the doors and handcuffing herself to the bedpost. Nothing stuck. As Kalpana's physical condition faltered, her mental state spiraled soon after. Minutes, hours, entire days were lost to sudden pitch black. Kalpana lost track of time, then space, and then eventually she lost her sense of self.
One day you wake up and your mother is simply gone. No dramatic breakdown. No tearful goodbye. Just an empty space in Asim's bed and a broken kitchen window.
The community puts up missing person posters and spends nights searching for Kalpana. No dice. Kalpana is gone with the wind. The case goes cold. The Order stops looking. Your family is left to grieve.
004: Kalpana's disappearance hits you the hardest. You struggle to accept that she's gone. You cling to denial, even as your sibling insists on gifting you her magical dagger. You reject the daggers and push your sibling away but they keep coming back over and over again. You know you should be grateful but their insistent comfort is suffocating. You push and shove but they keep coming back. Over and over and over- Your irritation mutates into frustration, then furious resentment.
It reaches a tipping point on the first anniversary of your mother's disappearance. You and your sibling get into a screaming match Asim has to break off. You can't remember what the argument was about but you go to bed angry. You close your eyes, tears running down your cheeks as you curl into a ball and hug your knees. Sleep finds you. The world goes dark, quiet. Then you jolt awake. You're not in your bed. You're in your sibling's room. You don't remember how you got there but your sibling is wounded and their blood is on your hands. They scream. Asim pulls you away and you stumble away as he treats their injury. He asks you what happened, what did you do but you struggle to answer him because you genuinely don't know.
Nonetheless, one fact remains true: you committed a grievous crime. You harmed one of your own without honorable reason.
Order tradition would have you punished with equal harm. However, Asim refuses to see his children claw at each other once again. Asim facilitates another punishment in its place: banishment.
005: Your mother's dagger isn't the only thing you carry on the boat to the rehabilitation camp in Norway. The grief and anger still festers deep inside you, restless and unyielding. Your first few weeks are rough. You get tossed around by older camp kids like hounds to fresh meat. You pick fights you're bound to lose, spending nights in the isolation ward only to come back running with a sharp stick immediately after being released. Eventually the camp councilors realize that the promise of punishment was getting you nowhere. So, they shifted course.
Instead of being told to bury your anger, you're encouraged to embrace it. Redirect your wrath. Let the festering sorrow inside you fuel the fight against the dark. You finally understand your mother's passion for the hunt once you find that same clarity in practice runs. Capture the flag. Spectated sparring matches. Target practice with a bound and gagged supernatural. You perform with focus and excel with flying colors. You get tattoos to prove your worth.
The pain in your heart dulls as you lose yourself in the hunt. Shikar.
006: At eighteen, you're branded as properly rehabilitated and released into the world. Yet, You don't go home. You run to the nearest Order headquarters and report for duty. It's better this way. Your family is better off without you. Coming home now would just reopen old wounds. You tell yourself that as you spend the next few years jumping from sect to sect, hunt to hunt with no pause.
Most hunts are conducted alone. You still struggle to play nice with other hunters. The unfortunate hunting parties that do get assigned to you rack up a long list of complaints. Too brash. Too inconsiderate. Too unsettling, feral even. Your superiors repeatedly scold you after every report but it falls on deaf ears.
007: Eventually, you fuck up a hunting party so badly that you have no choice but to listen. Switzerland, 2012. It was supposed to be an easy extraction mission: confiscate the grimoire before the witches do. That was until the witch he fought against distracted him. Lost in yet another hunt, you don't realize how far you've separated from your hunting party until it's too late. You advance on the target. You summon your dagger and just as you are about to sink the blade into her vile heart- BAM! You're suddenly caught in a trap, magically bound and silenced. Your frustrated scream is muffled by sealed lips as you writhe against the restraints and helplessly watch the wicked witch make off with the grimoire.
You are brought back to your superiors as a disgrace. The rest of the hunting pack is off the hook but you are left with two options: go back home to report your failures to father as a field runner or be demoted and go back to the rehabilitation camp as a counselor. You choose the latter in a heartbeat.
008: Before you know it, you're back in Norway. Not much has changed since you were discharged. The kids are different but the underlying structure is still the same. At first, you try to keep your head low, redirecting your anger and frustration toward the cleaning jobs no one else wants. But, at some point, you run out of toilets to unclog, floors to mop and violently scrub to perfection. You're left with no choice but to actually do your job and council trouble children.
To your surprise, it's not as hard as you thought it'd be. You recognize the pain these kids go through, the weight of shame and expectation on their shoulders. In some kids you see yourself and give them the same advice you had. Other kids are the exact opposite and you adjust accordingly. Some need comfort and distraction. Others need time and space. It's all trial and error until something eventually sticks. You find yourself adjusting to community work shockingly well.
009: Saoirse is nothing like the other kids you mentor. For starters, she's much older than the other children. Having just turned 18, Saoirse was already pushing the camp's age limit when you arrived. She's been testing that limit ever since. Saoirse is notorious for giving camp staff a hard time, especially Head Councilor Titus Hagen. You've tried to connect with Saorise on several occasions but each instance has been fruitless. It quickly dawns on you that Saorise is in denial regarding the severity of her situation. Whatever political backing Saorise receives from her family will mean nothing if she continuously refuses to cooperate.
So, on one hot summer day, you set aside time to talk to Saoirse privately. You say it as it is: If Saorise doesn't get her act together soon, Head Councilor Hagen WILL put her down. Whether that be through a bullet between the eyes, a slit throat or cyanide in her dessert– It's just protocol. None of the children sent for rehabilitation were supposed to know this but Saoirse is no longer a child. She is an adult trapped in a children's bootcamp; she was fully capable of handling that kind of information. Or, rather, that's what you thought at the time.
You are proven wrong several nights after. You're the first to discover Titus Hagen crucified. Saoirsee and the murder weapon are nowhere to be found, disappearing into the night like a specter of vengeance.
010: The other counselors are left scrambling in the wake of sudden tragedy. Somehow, in the midst of all this chaos, you end up having to be a voice of reason. As more of the staff lean on you for support, you become the one to call the shots.
You start simple. The camp re-establishes order within its borders, securing the physical safety of its inhabitants as well as your own authority. A year passes. Your role as impromptu Head Councilor becomes official. Then you get bold and instill reform. No more shame tactics that turn juvenile hunters against one another. No more importing bound supernaturals that eat away at their resources. The games they play shift away from individual competitions and instead focus on teamwork. The young hunters begin to rehabilitate themselves through the bonds they make with one another.
Loyalty born from comradery eventually bleeds into Order ideology. And, most importantly, everyone is having this way. The rehabilitation camp becomes a happier place. You become a happier person. Content. Calm. Pleasant to be around. You like this version of yourself. However, happiness is fleeting. The Order took notice of your revolutionary leadership and saw potential. In the eyes of these superiors, your efforts were wasted on their unwanted children. You are needed on the front lines; you are selected to replace Eden Ros’ Senior Archivist. Effective immediately.
011: Under strict confidentiality, you leave the haven you helped nurture and board a ship to Eden Ros. Senior Archivist, Callum Rutherford, welcomes you coldly. Callum was a bitter old man with no family or family but a well-stocked liquor cabinet to keep him company. You spend just as much time learning how to tiptoe around his fragile temperament as you did actually learning how to be a proper Archivist.
You come to memorize this sect's many secrets as well as Callum's many regrets. He regrets not making a name for himself in his youth. He regrets not having any more sons after the first blew his head off. He regrets agreeing to be stuck with you. Callum read through your files before you were selected. He had become acquainted with the written version of you, the wild and ruthless hunter you were before reform. He was sorely disappointed, infuriated to meet who you actually are. In his words, nothing but a "weak and sniveling, pussy-footing worm”. As useful as dirt. As worthless as shit on his boot.
Callum was sure to let his disappointment be known. You had no trouble tolerating his verbal berating at first, tuning Callum out and keeping your head buried in file after file. But he just keeps running his mouth. Behind closed doors, he digs into your name, your family, your grief and shame-- your personhood in it entirety.
Days become weeks, weeks become months. Two years spent enduring constant verbal harassment for the sake of respecting your elders, for upholding the Order's honor. Your patience wanes. The deep-seeded anger of your youth re-emerges. You maintain your composure but the itch to sink your fury into some unfortunate bastard gnaws into you. You crave clarity. You yearn for bloodshed.
012: Callum's age catches up to him. His health takes a turn for the worse, falling in and out of sickness. He is left with no choice but to hand his position to you. A local ritual must be conducted to cement your place as Eden Ros’ Archivist. Callum keeps you in the dark regarding most of the details of this ritual but you do get the general summary: You are to drive Ahab's Ferry into the Isles and engage in a hunt alone. What exactly you are hunting is for you to discover, learn and adapt accordingly.
The ritual, the hunt, is held on a fog ridden day. In a field of endless green and gray, you venture into the wild with a clear head. Your focus sharpens once you find the trail of footprints and crushed flora. You attempt to be gentle in your pursuit. That is until one false step triggers a bear trap. You manage to pull away before your foot is crushed. You are unharmed but the initial panic is enlightening. You remember that you're no longer working with children. You don't have to hold back anymore.
You fully plunge into the hunt. Old habits kick back into full gear. Everything else outside of yourself, your target and the obstacles in your way fade to the background. No pain. No distraction. No hesitation. Just hunt. Shikar.
The traps fail to hinder you. You hide in the trees. It's only a matter of time before you find your target maneuvers within your range. You pounce. Mother's dagger digs deep between the shoulder blades. The full brunt of weight and gravity brings him down. You recognize his voice, Callum Rutherford's pained scream.
He squirms, reaches around and plants a hand on your face to push you away. No use. When his fingers slip into your mouth you bite down. Tear skin. Shatter bone. Swallow flesh and blood. Callum declares his defeat and begs for mercy but it's too late. The hunt must be honored. The hunt must be carried out to completion. The hunt must take a monster's life. In the heat of the hunt, you forget your dagger entirely. Your hands find purchase in his hair. Your eyes latch onto a large rock inches away. His face is smashed into mush, his cranium into wine.
You're left alone in the afterglow. Pupils dilated. Knees buried in dirt. Fresh air heaved in and out of your lungs. Blood running down your chin, viscera dripping from your hands. Your heart hammers in your chest but your mind is clear at last.
You close your eyes and smile.
You're finally at peace. You're finally at home.
013: Looting the corpse, you find a small diary in its coat pocket. According to his writings, this is fortunately all according to plan. It was supposed to end this way. New blood replacing the old in a trial by combat. All of the Order's previous dealings die with the old man, leaving the champion as the sole keeper of secrets. But there is one more secret buried in his notes, one you are only supposed to uncover after his death.
You absorb the information. Process it.
On the edge of the isles, you cremate the old man on a pile of logs and burn the diary with him.
014: Life changes after you return to the mainland. You inherit Ahab's Ferry and take your place as Archivist with little to no fanfare. You rent out a new apartment by the docks. Get friendly with the locals. Start a new gardening hobby. All is well and good.
Name: Rafferty Locke
Age: 500 / Physically 36
Pronouns: He/Him
Species: Vampire
Faction: Albedo/The Underground
Occupation: Head of Artifact and Archival Restoration at the Foular Museum
Hometown: Oxford, England
Sexuality: Bisexual
Relationship Status: Single, allegedly
You were born the last child of a couple on their last winter of fertility — Your mother was forty four and your father sixty, your eldest sister a woman married with two children already. You were the only son, the fourth child — One who barely survived his first winter. Despite being named your father's heir, you were sickly and quiet — Often sleeping in your mother's bed for she feared you would stop breathing in the night. Despite her worries, she was a distant woman — You did not blame her. Nor your sisters. Your father was a difficult man, and times were not easy.
You were supposed to take a liking to fighting and riding, but — Well, it was your father's fault, was it not? You were ten, coming off a flu, certainly not fit for outings. But he took you to the Queen's beheading — Anne Boleyn. A sight you were too young to see, one that broke your heart. But, after, you were fascinated with reading all about the whys, and hows. Not the career your father wished for you, but had bigger reasons to be disappointed in you.
A year after the beheading, you fell ill. Meningitis. It painfully took your hearing — And that, to your father, was worse than being a daughter. He could not public disown you, his only son, but he refused to look at you until his death years later. Adapting was difficult, but your older sister took your well-being into her own hands; her husband had passed, years ago with their children, and she saw in you something you could not see in yourself.
The silence didn't bother you, once you knew you were safe — You focused on your studies, making it to Oxford University despite the doubtful looks surrounding you. Your mother wishes you to study theology, hoped a life of a Bishop awaited you. But you were taken with medicine and anatomy, with history and mythology.
Back then you were seen as a man man, you suppose. Knowledge was limited, and people didn't dare dream. But you were a brilliant doctor — Eccentric, but brilliant. It wasn't enough to save you.
You were walking home after a night with friends when it happened — An empty alley, a shadowed figure, a knife to your stomach. You were stabbed five times and left bleeding in the dirt. It was meant to be your end, finally, after years spent in between sickness and barely-health. But you were luck, they say. You had caught her attention. You didn't know she had been fascinated with you, following your every step. Not until her blood was in your lips and her teeth in your neck — Welcoming you into eternity with a dark smile.
She taught you all you needed to know about vampirism, even allowing you to turn your sister when she fell in. You could not love her the way she wanted, and her obsession grew stifling, so after a century together, you ran away. She didn't give chase.
She knew you wanted to spend your centuries with your head in books, devouring all information you could. That's what you did — You studied archeology, languages, maps, photography. You even began going on expeditions with a fellow vampire you met in Romania — A woman who shared your passion and desire to return artifacts to their place of origin.
For the past two centuries, the two of you have done just that, and more. Your names are well respected in the communities for your studies and books. You and your partner smuggle artifacts and supernatural beings who were being hunted for years, eventually joining the Underground together.
You did not wish to settle down somewhere, but five years ago, you heard rumors of a woman in Eden Ros who sounded awfully like the sister you left behind. You found a job in the museum, a perfect cover for you and your partner, settled in a loft above a bookstore, and waited. Waited and hoped to see your sister again.
HEADCANONS:
Rafferty is an archeologist, linguist, cartographer, curator, and an archivist. He has taken the most of his immortality and studied in many universities across Europe - Though his very first was Oxford.
Strange as it may be, Rafferty’s love for history showed its head when he watched Anne Boleyn lose hers. He was ten years of age, attending the beheading with his father - A loud supporter of Henry VIII.
Rafferty is extremely energetic. He talks with his hands, his whole body, and is constantly moving.
Rafferty knows British Sign Language and American Sign Language, and is adept at lip reading. Sometimes, however, he signs too fast for humans to understand.
His hearing aids was gifted to him by a witch, made to work for his vampirism. It is enchanted so he will never lose it and it won't run out of battery. Same as his glasses, as he has lost too many glasses and hearing aids to count.
He is autistic and has ADHD. Proceed with caution.
WANTED CONNECTIONS:
Friends: He loves people! Loves talking, and getting to know people. He is a man full of whism, so be prepared for that if you befriend him - Lots of frog pictures and dinosaurs pictures sent to you.
His Sister: Raff left his sister when he ran away from his maker, and they haven't seen each other in nearly 300 years. He is in Eden Ros because of her, but if she has been here for a long time or just arrivied, is upt to the mun!
Underground buddies
His partner: If it's romantic or platonic, I'm down for anything. This woman is the dark to his sunshine, and they have a pretty good relationship. Must be POC
Name: Domitille de Villiers
Age: 262 / Physically 25
Pronouns: She/Her
Species: Primal Witch, Blood and Bones based
Faction: None
Occupation: Owener of the Peséphone's Den, a shop located in France (For now)
Hometown: Marseille, France
Sexuality: Lesbian
Relationship Status: Single
TWs: torture, murder, beheading, blood, cruelty, body horror, gore, The French
You were not meant for Paris — Maman used to joke the city belong to charlatans and revolutionaries only, of which you were neither. (Laughable, really, how your history had been written in between-the-lines from the beginning — If you could find it in yourself to laugh.) You could not imagine Maman strolling the streets of Paris, your hand gripping hers tightly. You belonged to the woods, the two of you — Where grass and dirt touched the bare sole of your feet, the trees whispered songs of old gently in your ears, and the sun warmed your pink cheeks while gathering herbs for Maman’s next concoction.
(But, you've come to learn, life makes a mockery of us all, does it not?)
Maman was careful — undeniably so. The little cabin in the woods you called home was under powerful protection wards you can not replicate to this day — Its magic so heavy you could taste it on your tongue. But the cruelty of humans reach even the farthest of paradises. They came in the morn — When fog still covered the floor and sleep clouded your eyes. You were dragged, kicking and screaming, outside with Maman — Where you watched and felt how evil men can be. Her head was cut off after hours of torment, falling by you as the hunters laughed and laughed and laughed.
They had cut your arm off a little below the elbow, but it was the sight of your head mother which made indescribable rage fill every nook and crevice of your being. You made their blood boil with the same ease as breathing. (You never could, before — Channel your magic in multiple targets, so strongly as you did then. You had not found in you the cruelty to do so until that moment.)
After your mother was buried and the cabin burned, you limped your way to Marseille. You had never been around people before, but their rightful anger and discontent welcomed you in with open arms. You cared not for kings nor queens, but the rage of the revolution kept you grounded — It was the perfect cover to train and honor your magic.
You were not meant for Paris — Yet, you sat squashed in between warm bodies stuffed inside an old wagon, making way to the damp city with little complaints. The revolution was not yours — you cared little for politics — but you were starved for a proper fight, and you thought blending in a big city would be easier. Life is not kind to a covenless witch — Easy targets, watched by hunters hiding in enemy lines. You were not surprised they were in the palaces, slithering like snakes around the throats of were-influential people.
What surprised you was how they followed you back to Marseille. It shouldn't have, you now know, for men will do anything to dispose of those they deem dangerous — But back then, you did not see the prosecutor. You were weak, captured, and thrown in Château d'If — For you were no woman, but a demon in disguise. You screamed and punched the walls until your hand was broken and bleeding, spending days in the darkness of a cell meant to be your end.
When you thought of giving up, Andreas crawled in your cell through a hole he carved in the walls.
Old, frail, but refusing to break, Andreas were your light in the darkness. He taught you everything he knew; languages, etiquette, mathematics, alchemy, poetry — He believed knowledge could save your soul. He told you of a treasure from the Crusades, hidden in an island only he knew the location of. You, however, were too caught up in your anger to care about riches. You wanted revenge. You made a deal with the old fae — Entered a Gaes. The details of it are a secret the both of you will take to the grave, but it gave you enough life and power to get revenge.
Andreas, however, died before the two of you could escape — Ten years after you met him. You took your opportunity, changed places with his body when the guards put him in a sack. The ocean against your skin was the first touch of freedom you felt in a long time. You snuck your way to Paris, in time to watch Marie Antoinette's trial and beheading — But you couldn't join your old friends in commemoration; they were dead. Killed, like you should have been.
Alone once more, you found your way to Andreas's treasure, now yours, and found your revenge. However, once it was done, you had no desire to keep your end of the deal. You became mad with power, greed. The Gaes did not like that. You became sick — Your life slowly being stolen by magic you could not understand. You became killing witches, hoping to buy time, but you know you are only rescheduling the inevitable. It is why you found your way to Eden Ros — To find a way out. You will do anything to save yourself.
HEADCANONS:
Domitille’s antiques and magical artifacts’ shop is a front for what she truly desires; information on how to free herself of her curse. She dabbles in the black market often, finding rich investors (or older women) whose fortunes she can steal.
Domitille has a very short temper, shorter than a cut nail, but she never raises her voice. Her tone turns colder than a glacier, but it never grows.
Having fought in the revolution, Domitille has became quite adapt at climbing - what the kids call parkour - and she is skilled into breaking in.
She has a prosthetic arm made of her own skeleton, that she creates at will. It takes a lot of her magic, however, to grow it, so she has found a way to attach and reattach it with the help of a witch she murdered after.
Has written too many dark grimoires.
Is getting worse by the day, but tries to hide it.
Name: Thalorien Starfell
Age: 336
Pronouns: He/Him
Species: Day Fae
Faction: Dawn Court
Occupation: Captain of the Queen's Guard
Hometown: Eden Ros and the Fae Realm
Sexuality: Bisexual
Relationship Status: Single
Dietary requirements: Pescatarian
Thalorien was one of five children, the middle child who didn't mind the consequences of his birth order. He had two older brothers who would carry on the family legacy, marry the correct day fae to further the family's prospects. His only duty was to make sure he didn't cause a scandal and marry modestly. When in their fae form, members of the family resemble what the human kind call eagles, Thalorien particularly, with the same plumage of a white-tailed eagle and with the same diet of fish. It was more of a personal choice, but one he’s not wavered from since his childhood. His siblings always used to tease him that if he showed the same dedication he had for his diet to politics, he would be a force to be reckoned with.
Thalorien found politics infuriating, study tedious, even as a young boy, he was of the mind that life was for living and not for learning about someone else's actions. He was rambunctious, wild even, charging headlong into the unknown. But he wasn’t alone; he had a partner in adventure, Eryndra. They had grown up together, spent every waking day of their childhood together. The only thing gentle about the duo was when one heroically ate dirt, then healed the other depending on who had fallen. Childish notions soon turned into serious ones. Where the pair wanted to be warriors, protecting their kind against the hunters. With the bravado of youth, they tried to take the fight to the hunters; they had no training, no idea of what they were up against, only the threat they had imagined.
They had found a small fortune, but the hunters they had tried to engage with were unscrupulous and instead of killing them, the pair was captured, and the hunters intended to sell off their body parts to the highest bidder. Their childish behaviour was shattered; there was a notion that escape could be possible, but the iron bar that kept them captive, with the addition of watching another prisoner be executed for an attempt, halted that idea. Their captives would take them out one by one, harvest organs and dump them back in their community cells with just enough medical treatment to keep them alive. However, once the hunters realised that Thalorien and Eryndra were easing the pain of others in the cell, the aid they gave was lessened. The hunters only thought it was a shame that the pair's healing capacity couldn’t regenerate organs completely.
One night, when the night sky was clear, the stars were visible from the water-damaged hole in their prison. Thalorien and Eryndra observed a meteor and its tail; neither of them actually knew what it was, but it didn’t take much for them to come up with a story of their own. Eryndra stated that it was a falling star, and when asked what was behind it, she told Thalorien that stars cried too, cried for the home they left behind, for the place in the night sky they lost. The night should have been peaceful, but there was no luck to be found. All the healing Eryndra had been doing was catching up with her, and her attempts to hide the adverse effect were now failing. Blood was brought up in her rib cage rattling cough. The next morning, when the Hunters spotted the declining health, they took Eryndra to harvest from her what they could before she expired.
Thalorien didn’t need to see Eryndra's body to know what happened to her and that she wasn’t coming back. There was only one hope for him: sending a beam of light into the sky from his location. It was so obvious that the hunters had noticed, it was impossible not to notice it. They needed to punish Thalorien for his signal and, in turn, took his left eye, something that he couldn’t heal or replace; it would serve as a perpetual reminder. Due to the risk he took forced the hunters to prepare the prisoners for transport. And in this weak transition was when the Dawn courts' warriors struck. What happened to the other captive Thalorien never found out, he cared but when you're told not to ask questions and move by the people here to save you, you don’t question it.
It was here that Thalorien knew what he was to do with the rest of his existence: sever the crown that had saved him. They had been too late to save Eryndra, but Thalorien would always remember her and took Starfell as a second name, with the theory that as long as a star is falling, tears would be shed for her loss. Training to be a royal guard wasn’t for the faint of heart; it was only made harder by the fact by his missing left eye that was taken by the hunters, but much like in his youth, when Thalorien set his mind to it, only short of his own death would stop him. He officially joined the royal guard at age 186 and still serves to this day, but now as its captain, proudly being referred to as Captain Starfell, keeping the memory of Eryndra alive with him.
Name: Oneiroi
Age: 264
Pronouns: He/Him
Species: Night Fae
Faction: Dusk Court
Occupation: The Keipar of Time
Hometown: Eden Ros and the Fae Realm
Sexuality: Demisexual
Relationship Status: Single
TW: Abandonment,
Bio:
Oneiroi’s family could access the dream realm for generations, their depth in the subject surpassing his birth; his own father, Morpheus, even had a reputation in the mortal realm for his expertise with dreams. Morpheus even found love in the dream realm with Oneiroi's mother, Aisling. Aisling was another night fae, with access to walk the dream world. Their romance was a whirlwind one that was, well, a dream. But when out of the fantasies, the connection felt mundane; everything was so much more magical in the world of imagination. They conceived Oneiroi in the realm of dreams, and it is theorised that the reason that Oneiroi only has access to one of the three birthrights a night fae could be born with was due to a factor that she spent a considerable amount of time while pregnant in the fictional realm.
Growing up, Oneiroi was mainly raised by his grandfather and mother, as his father, Morpheus, had little time for raising a child with his job as Keipar of Time and making sure that the apprentices he had were up to his standards. But Morpheus had a sense of pride that his son was being taught by his own father, as the man had taught Morpheus himself, and he knew Oneiroi was in the best hands. Oneiroi's childhood was a relatively happy one when he was innocent, accompanied while walking the dreams of others. When he was in his teen years, his innocence was turned into understanding the nuances of the dreams that not everyone was happy with and a joy to be in. He had travelled into the dream of a hunter who dreamed about what they would do to all supernatural species if they got their hand on them. The experience had trapped him in the dream for the entirety of the night, the reality paralysing him into inaction.
It was a sobering experience and one that his grandfather wouldn’t let him forget or ignore. He was taught the lesson that with the privilege he had been granted, he would see the best and worst of the minds around him. And that it might be easy to give up on the world after seeing such sights, but what he saw was the sum of what the world had done to that individual and the way to change that is to interact with the world and not hide from it, to change it one needs to understand and that in these dark dreams he needs to see past the acts and see the meaning in the way the dreamer paints their dream. What position do they give themself, how do they feel, and is it recurring?
Over the next hundreds of years, Oneiroi had become his father's apprentice, and while the others amongst his ranks thought he only got the position because of nepotism, Oneiroi worked as hard as he physically could to sway their minds. He was gifted with dream craft and surpassed them all, but he could conjure illusions and hold power over the shadows. His father had been thinning his herd of apprentices, removing those he thought had reached their capacity. It was a nasty rumour from disgruntled apprentices going around that Morpheus was getting rid of those he thought would beat out his son for approval. Oneirroi hated the notion that his current standing wasn’t down to his own merit but that of blood ties. It was insulting that none of his work was being recognised… or at least that's how it felt amongst the apprentices.
Oneiroi's father had whittled the number of apprentices he had down to just two before his departure. A departure where the only communication was that he was going to retrieve an artefact for the court. It seemed normal till the other Keipar questioned the apprentice as to Morpheus's reason for not attending their meetings. Confusion was in the air till Oneiroi realised what had been happening over the past several years. Morpheus had been giving Oneiroi and the other apprentices more and more of his responsibilities, disappearing for longer periods of time each time he assigned them a new responsibility. Keipar saw no reason to afford Morpheus grace as he hadn’t afforded the Keipar any with his actions. Morpheus had left the state of the next Keipar of Time with his son Oneiroi, and the other Keipar saw no reason not to honour the tradition.
Fifty years, Oneiroi has been the Keipar of Time. Fifty years, he has fought off rumours that the other Keipar were bribed before Morpheus abandoned the night fae. Fifty years, he has cared for his mother, who only spends time in the realm of dreams searching for her husband, who didn’t want to be found. Fifty years, he's been responsible for recording the atrocities, casualties, losers and victors of the outer world and the one he sought to guide. Hope has yet to die fully within him, but its flame needs coaxing
